The Outside vs. The Inside

The Outside vs. The Inside

Humans today are in a time of great challenge: stressed, stuck, and looking for real meaning. We seek answers in the external world - through social media, quick-fix techniques, the perfect guru, and myriad other ways. Most of the time, it just doesn’t get us where we want to be. Our culture, with its many advances and technology, has caused great disconnection - from nature, from each other, and worst of all, from ourselves. “Civilized” society has enabled us to reach new heights in science, technology, and social networking. It has defined for us how to be successful, productive, and to do what is expected of us. Artificial Intelligence is becoming so prevalent that we humans are needed less in many areas of today’s world. However successful we may be as the highest members of the food chain and the “most evolved” living creatures on earth, humans are suffering. Humans in today’s world are often sick, stressed, depressed, and lost. Our intense focus on technology and social media has increasingly separated us from what humans are designed to do when our nervous systems are allowed to function optimally. We have lost our connection to ourselves, to our bodies, and to our spirits. 

I was that person. In my teens, I struggled with pain and health problems and was basically told that nothing could be done. I refused to believe that there wasn’t a way to get better. It put me on a lifelong mission to learn what really works. It took me to medical school, lots of extra courses, 3 board certifications, and tons of healing work on myself. I tried a lot of things, through a deep desire to not only feel better but to feel really good. I knew there had to be a way, and I found it. 

One of the first times I saw the real power of the mind-body connection was when I was in my twenties as a medical student. I had been to an extra course and learned some new things, and when I went home and tried it, I instantly felt better.  What I had done was connect to my body by feeling my feet and legs in a positive way rather than feeling the discomfort that I was used to.  Not only did my pain improve, I felt more relaxed.  It was such a huge relief to know that I didn’t need to find someone to “fix me”. I had the power to fix myself. We all do. I kept practicing the method, and over 25 years have used the basic principles to help myself and my patients empower themselves to feel better.

My journey of learning to heal myself when no one else could have unknowingly created a scaffold of real self-care that works for anyone who wants it. Andrew Taylor Still, DO, the founder of Osteopathic Medicine, said, “To find health should be the object of the doctor. Anyone can find disease.” For many years, I knew this had to be true but didn’t know what it really meant or how to do it.  What I now know and practice every day is that when we tap into what’s inside each of us by sensing and relating to our body in a positive way, we’re already “finding the health”.  When we do this, we can directly feel and activate our inner “superpowers”. As we do the simple process of making the connections, it makes all the work we’ve done actually work, and in the simplest and most direct way possible. I call it “following the breadcrumbs” because when we start to make the connections, everything comes together and starts to work better.  

As I applied what I had learned, the “inner” work and study that I had done for over 25 years helped my patients, often more quickly and more profoundly than I expected. Because of their various problems, I’ve seen even more ways this approach can be applied and how my own healing journey has given me the simple but profound healing tools to help people with problems that no one else could solve. The beauty of this method, both for myself and for my patients, lies in uncovering the interconnectedness between our own humanity and nature’s design. Reconnecting with ourselves on the inside offers us all a simple and profound empowerment. It’s possible through embodiment: recognizing and relating to the perfect design within us, fostering a loving, healthy, and even spiritual connection to the health and wisdom within us. What I like to say is that this stuff isn’t my stuff; it's your stuff. It's all of ours, and the more we make the connection, the more we bring it into our lives.

I’m not suggesting there’s a quick fix because there isn’t. And frankly there are a lot of things out there that are misleading or that just don’t work. The perfect design of our human body has everything we could want and need, and the answers are on the inside. Human beings have lost their sense of embodiment, and making simple connections through our attention and awareness is the pathway back to less stress and anxiety, greater self-knowing, and real happiness. When we learn to do it in bits and pieces throughout the day every day, amazing things start to happen, and that’s so much better than a band-aid approach. This work is different from so much of what is out there because the answer is “in here”. It’s in me, and it's in you.  

The difference is about the mind-body connection, what we’re doing with our attention and our awareness, and relating to our body in a healthy and connected way. My first class, which I’ve made into a mini course, is called “Living In A Body” because many of us are so busy in our thoughts that sometimes we’re even outside of ourselves and we aren’t really using our body to its fullest potential. When we’re in our thoughts or paying attention to all the stuff on the outside, we're missing what’s on the inside. What I’ve found is that it stresses our nervous system, and then our nervous system makes us feel stressed.

When our nervous system remains primarily in sympathetic, or “fight or flight” mode, we stay in a constant state of stress, our body doesn’t heal as well, and our intuition and creativity are less accessible. This pattern keeps us in a vicious cycle of stress that we can’t escape. When our thoughts spiral out of control, it can induce feelings of distress, prompting us to seek salvation elsewhere. Sadly, this often results in self-medication with substances, reliance on prescriptions that fail to address the underlying issues, spending money on ineffective remedies, or opting to evade the problem altogether by escaping our own reality. Consequently, we move further away from where the real answers reside: within ourselves.

  We are at a pivotal moment in human history: As a culture, we face exceptional challenges, many of which are a result of disconnection - deteriorating mental and physical health, self-destructive thoughts, hate, and violence. These things happen when we can’t feel who we are on the inside and only look externally for our identity and validation. When we disconnect from ourselves, we cannot fully connect with others, our health, or nature. Dis-ease happens with disconnection - and when it happens in mass, there is far-reaching suffering.

What I’ve discovered after many years of my own healing journey and work with my patients with complex issues is that it isn’t difficult to unlock our body’s “Intelligence.” In a world that rewards us for living in our heads, reconnection with the vital, and often forgotten, parts of ourselves that hold our ancient wisdom can lead us to rediscover profound insights and a deeper sense of fulfillment. Reconnection with ourselves, on the inside, gives us a real counterbalance to the many external forces challenging us today. It can calm our nervous system, limit the influence of outside stressors, help us to know ourselves better, heal ourselves on many levels, and integrate our mind, body, and spirit. 

            When we learn how to relate to our bodies in a normal and healthy way, we really can “rewire our nervous system” and allow it to function in a more relaxed state. This is the parasympathetic, or “rest/digest” state. This stops the flood of cortisol, decreasing stress and anxiety and making us feel much more normal. The remarkable and beautiful aspect of learning these skills is that it empowers us to profoundly help ourselves on a daily basis. This innate gift of interconnectedness within the human design is wired into us, requiring only a few steps to become aware of it. Our inherent connection can counteract external stressors that overwhelm our nervous system when left unchecked. With practice, regaining our connection becomes easier, fostering a sense of normalcy, vitality, and health. This balance enables the optimal functioning of the autonomic nervous system, promoting a real sense of well-being.

Embodiment is not a new concept. In fact, humans in ancient and native cultures were connected to their bodies, to their intuition, to nature, and to spirit. They lived in harmony with nature and knew how to trust the instincts that we are all inherently endowed with. They were able to be still and present, without the need to scroll on their phone or look or act a certain way to be ok. Their senses and perceptions were developed and intact, whereas humans today have learned to depend on devices for both information and social connection. Their concept of spirit was accessible and deeply integrated with the natural world.

Today, many of us are seeking to rediscover our humanness; what our ancestors instinctively knew about wholeness, self-connection, and oneness with nature. In our quest, many of us have experienced modalities whose limited perspective compartmentalizes us, rather than helping us to know the wholeness and interconnectedness of our being. The cure is in the connection, which starts with recognizing and relating to the wholeness of mind, body, and spirit. This idea transcends the theoretical concept of connection; it’s a tangible, felt experience that is inherent in all of us as human beings. 

My personal journey and the success stories of my patients repeatedly demonstrate the profound healing power of the interconnectedness intrinsic in all humans through embodiment. There are numerous methods that emphasize the importance of the mind-body connection and self-empowerment. But so often, thoughts and ideas get in the way of real connection, feeling and being. I often say perhaps we should call mindfulness “bodyfulness” because integration with our body allows us to relate to our wholeness and allows us to Be. This is an accessible, “feeling” oriented, and embodied whole-person approach that, when applied in our lives in real-time every day, truly empowers us to our full potential - no ashram or guru necessary. 

  True transformation happens when we bring our knowledge and ideas into real “felt” experiences. Through awareness of the wholeness of the human body, we can shift our nervous system to work in a more natural, optimal, and healthful manner. We can practice simple but profound daily exercises in an opportunity for a real reclamation of ourselves. As we learn how the mind, body, and spirit are designed to work in harmony, it becomes something we can feel and do for ourselves every day. Through connection, we can build new habits that blend knowledge and experience until they become our new normal and healthy way of life - the way ancient civilizations and Indigenous people have done for millennia. 

 This embodied knowledge reignites vital, ancient parts of us, illuminating what it means to live as healthy, fulfilled human beings in today’s world. Making these connections guides us toward healthy self-centeredness and opens a new world of perception and grace. By tapping into all that is available through embodiment, one can transcend old habits and patterns and unlock unlimited potential for growth, peace, health, and freedom. This work is for people grappling with feelings of confusion or being adrift in life, those battling uncontrolled stress and anxiety, as well as spiritual seekers of all kinds. 

Through my own healing journey and work as an Osteopathic Physician, I learned to dig deep through additional study to perceive subtle neurophysiologic and biophysiologic phenomena that bring together science, profound healing, and spiritual practice in a truly holistic way. What I’ve come to see that makes this work different and often much more effective than a lot of what’s out there is that what can make a real difference is showing people how quickly and easily they can help themselves. 

We all need help here and there in our lives, but we don’t need to find someone or something to fix us because the “fix” is on the inside, and it's something we can do and give to ourselves to feel good every day.  I’ve seen many complicated problems, struggled myself, and learned what works and what doesn’t. The real power and empowerment is through consistent connection to bring it into our daily lives. I love sharing this work in a way that makes relating to our bodies and our health interesting and easy. I've come to realize that what is missing in our world (and in medicine in particular) is the mind-body-spirit connection, and it happens largely on the inside. 

My work with so many people and patients has shown me that this fundamental disconnection to our whole selves is largely responsible for our struggles with pain, depression, lack of relationship to oneself, and lack of purpose in life.  I’ve worked successfully with patients whose conventional medicine and psychotherapy have failed again and again, and sometimes with immediate results that amazed me. Making these connections is so much easier to do than most people think.

There’s a lot of stuff out there: “vagus nerve techniques”, methods of breathing, meditation, overcoming pain, dealing with stress, and life coaching, but much of the time, it compartmentalizes us.  I’ve searched and studied and found the missing piece that brings it all together in a way that really works. The missing piece is on the inside, not the outside. I see it happen every day in my work with my patients, and I created my online courses so that anyone can learn it directly from me, but in their own time and space.  I love teaching people to feel and relate to their own inner superpowers in an accessible and practical way that makes the mystery and magic of each human being's incredible capacity to live life to the fullest available to anyone who wants it. 

If this resonates, to see more details about everything you need to learn how to make these connections yourself, click here: The Art and Science of Being Human. Use the code INTEGRATE and save 20%.