Happy Sunday! 🫶 

I haven’t had time to film recently due to my recent move to Europe, but I just posted a video today! You can watch it here. 

I’m here studying neuroscience, specifically neuroplasticity and the biological components of anxiety. I can’t wait to share what I’m learning with you, because it’s deeply connected to the healing work we do together.

I was diagnosed with OCD and major depression at 12.

Once that label was placed on me without the tools to manage it, I found myself sinking into low after low. My compulsions became so debilitating that I began to fail in school, lost many close relationships, and couldn’t even get out of bed on the worst days.

In one of my journals at 17, just before I was hospitalized for SI, I wrote:

“I am going to be stuck like this forever. It keeps coming back.”

Do I still get negative emotions and intrusive thoughts? Absolutely. I’m human.

Do they run my life and drain my energy like they used to? No. Quite the opposite.

My relationship with them completely shifted to the point where negative thoughts and emotions pass through my body. I didn’t think the life I live now was even possible, where each “low” or negative emotion is an opportunity for more alchemy.

I create and share this work to remind others that change is possible and these cycles will end. You have no idea how powerful you and your mind are, and how you can turn your life around.

To help you on your journey, here are the 6 things I wish I knew at my lowest points: 

1. You will get to a point where you are grateful for your suffering.

It sounds crazy, I know. Especially when you’re currently in it.

Your suffering is serving a purpose you can’t fully see yet.

What do great artists, spiritual teachers, thought leaders, and activists all have in common? At one point, they suffered greatly to the point where they needed to shift their life.

I look back on my suffering and am so glad that it happened. Yes, it was excruciatingly painful, but it was what propelled me into changing my life, researching neuroscience, and sharing this work with thousands of wonderful people.

2. If you don’t know how they feel about you, that is your answer.

This is for the folks draining their life force chasing emotionally unavailable “partners” or friends that don’t treat them with respect.

Yes, I mean that… you are draining your life force doing that. Sinking your energy into the wrong people is literally like throwing all of your energy into a void that can never give back. Sinking energy into the wrong people can actually trigger depression.

I made a video on this a while back that I really recommend for those struggling with this.

We get so caught up in our thinking that we forget we only have one life, and it shouldn’t be lived chasing emotionally unavailable people or people who don’t show up for you in the way you deserve. 

Before you reach out to that person or decide to sink more energy into them, take the 3 deepest breaths you can muster. Imagine you are filling every cell in your body with air.

Then ask: What would the highest version of myself do right now?

Follow that consistently, and I promise you will start to refill your life force. Observe doubt and insecurity, and recognize it for what it is: an old pattern of energy moving through your body.

3. If a thought causes your body to constrict and be fearful, it’s not true.

Real Truth will always feel like freedom.

I’ve spoken much about this in other videos and letters, but listening to your body is one of the best skills you can develop.

Your body is so intelligent. You have hundreds of thousands of years of human evolution on your side.

When a thought makes you feel tight, anxious, and constricted, that is how you know it is not real truth. That is not the whole picture, or your thinking mind’s interpretation is off.

Real Truth will feel like exhaling. Your body will relax, and you will feel peace or even joy.

4. You have an energy body just like you have a physical one.

You care for it by holding space for your emotions, scanning where they arise in your body, and releasing old energy.

What you resist persists. I dealt with suppressed emotions for years after events, since I didn’t know that resisting emotions can just store them in your body. It will come out at some point, so might as well hold space for it right when it arises.

Holding space means observing it as it arises. If your mind starts to go crazy, just watch it. Let it do its thing. Don’t feed its reaction.

When an emotion comes up, locate where you feel it in your body. Close your eyes and breathe into it. Is it in your throat? Your chest? When you breathe, envision that you are sending energy into it. Sit with it for as long as it needs.

That is what it means to build a real relationship with yourself.

5. Tap into Consciousness.

Bear with me on this one, friend :D

There is a vast, beautiful openness behind where all of your thoughts and emotions arise. This is called Consciousness.

If your thoughts and emotions are like the planets and stars, consciousness is the empty infinity of space. You can tap into this realm by sitting in silence or observing what comes up in your experience. 

Developing a meditation practice is what started to help cure my depression. Observing your thoughts and emotions throughout your day (not even just in “formal meditation” since meditation is something you can do in any moment) allows you to detach from their grip. You can take your power back into your own hands, and out of the hands of your mind’s fears and anxieties.

6. Learn to use your intuitive, gentle nature.

Your fear and survival response once helped you. It developed as a coping mechanism that did work once upon a time.

It is no longer needed. But it doesn’t know that. So, you need to show it that it is no longer needed, and that it can relax.

You don’t do this by hating it, shushing it, and giving it more things to be afraid of. You show your fearful side that it can relax by breathing deeply, dropping your shoulders, and allowing yourself to smile.

If a wounded little puppy showed up on your doorstep, how would you treat it?

Would you abandon it, hate it, or shun it away? Or would you get down on the ground, wait for it to come to you, and make sure it was okay? (that rhymed)

That is what your fear response needs. The gentleness that exists primally within you. You deserve that.

I love you guys so, so much. 🫂 hugs.

If you need a workbook to help you with this process, click here.

To support this work, click here.

Much love and light,

Emma