The Healing Ick

I’ve taken a step back recently from my single session offerings in the energetic space- focusing more of my energy on my bodywork practice, Threshold mentorship, and creative pursuits. I’ve written emails, a blog entry, and social media posts about my backpacking trip to Canyonlands already- so I’m not going to dive into all of that again. However, when I was out there in the middle of soundless nowhere, a lot of realizations settled in my belly. Primarily how so much of the “healing/spiritual” industry keeps people stuck in massive loops- always chasing the next session, activation, on another shadow work or underworld mission, clearing and clearing and clearing in an effort to be as healed as possible. I’ve spoken to this before- specifically in my podcast series on the Demiurge- but it landed in a different way this time, and my body had a visceral response. I didn’t want to be a part of any of it anymore. I didn’t want to send anymore emails, make anymore posts, record anymore podcast episodes, offer any new sessions… nothing. I just wanted to walk and be where my feet were and experience true, visceral life- not decoding all of the energetic hits I was getting, diving into the mysteries, or using my backpacking trip as a tool to have some profound energetic realignment event (though that is, in essence, what happened). Then the “oh fuck” moment hit- the realization that my entire business is anchored in this energetic work. My work outside of the energetic space is too- though more grounded via bodywork. I realized I moved into this work for a reason and I didn’t actually want to just burn it all down and start off on some new venture- because this is what my soul is calling me to do, and once you see what your soul is calling you to, you can’t really unsee it. So I took some time to think, to understand and organize all the realizations that landed in my belly during that trip. Here is what I’ve got so far:

So much of what we see in the healing/spiritual space is a beige-d out version of life. People with enough privilege to check out, drop in, and play out a fantasy of being healed, being a priestess, honoring the goddess, the earth, etc- but never actually becoming a better person. Never actually doing the work to help the world become a better place for everyone (not just the people that look like them, or can drop 10k on a ‘sacred medicine retreat’, or those that have the time to meet in their monthly womb circle). It’s activation after activation, with a small plunge into the shadow where tears can be shed and it feels big and life-altering, though in reality, after the sound bowls are put away and the incense sticks have burned out, nothing has actually changed other than the ego being a bit more inflated. It’s a vicious cycle of needing just one more retreat, one more big cry in the circle, one more kundalini activation and finally they’ll be the goddess or priestess an Akashic reader told them they’d been lifetimes ago in a ‘Discover your Life’s Purpose’ reading over Zoom. It is disconnection from reality: from the terrors many face that have a different skin color, a different income, a family of 5 to feed and no time to log on to the next 60 minute ‘Priestess Codes Live Activation for only $333’. Anything outside of the sacred circle or container is considered low vibe, unascended, not awake. It’s also a division of the psyche. A sovereign shadow worker with immunity against all darkness bitching out someone over Instagram DM because they called out some hard truths- immediately dropping in to lead a week-long ‘sacred retreat’ in South America after hitting ‘send’. A divine feminine healer screaming at her partner and having no recollection of it two days later- hopping on a plane for their next facilitator training retreat, though, because she’s a priestess now and needs to level up. A renowned Akashic reader and galactic channel starting an unhinged argument with their partner, and in the next breath pulling up Zoom, welcoming their next client with love and light- let’s get these shadow systems out of you. It is fake, it is fractured, and it is, frankly, dangerous. Performative and pretend- a cozy blanket to wrap yourself in when you want to feel good without doing the hard work of looking at all of your own nastiness. Or, worse yet, blaming your nastiness on the shadow systems you claim to eradicate from your clients for a breezy $555/hr.

Secondly, so much of the spiritual space is giving ‘medieval Christianity’ in the sense of purification. ‘Look at your past lives, look at your karmic implications, look at your shadow, look at your contracts, look at the trickery, the distortion, the curses, the hexes, the black magic and the imitation. Do you have a real connection to true God, Source, Spirit? Have you actually suffered through the underworld and learned how to discern each and every thing and see the distortion in all of it and can see each and every person for who and what they really are? Because if not… well, then, you’re simply distorted. You’re simply failing. You shouldn’t be a healer, you shouldn’t be trying to help anyone, you certainly aren’t going to ascend, and you will definitely be stuck in a cycle of suffering in this life and the next because you haven’t done enough shadow work. Unless you come see me, of course. Pay me thousands to make you feel saved, light, honest, and free.’ That is what I’m also seeing a lot of. Fear mongering. “Healers” acting no better than pardoners selling indulgences, or Southern Baptist preachers spitting their hell fire in the hopes they’ll scare people into getting baptized and offering their weekly tithe so they can remain doing ‘the Lord’s work’. If you can’t reel them in through the highs, then scare them in through the lows. Purify, purify, purify. Hours of meditation. Hours spent in plant medicine ceremonies, scouring your insides, every level of your physical and energetic being, seeking any “bad” and banishing it. Never trusting anyone, never trusting yourself, always on the lookout for the devil in disguise. Never able to enjoy the small, normal, little pieces of life that we are here to enjoy. Never being silly. Never having one too many Aperol Spritzes, or eating mushrooms to simply roll around in the grass and giggle, or going to a concert because the artist is ‘low vibe’ even though they still bring joy. (Not that I’m pushing for substance use, but you know what I mean. Not taking every moment of life so seriously.) Forgetting that you are, in fact, human- clinging only to the idea of becoming a sovereign being that is holier than thou, above the rest, impenetrable by life’s lows… and thus missing out on life’s highs. Missing out on true, honest connection. Wrapping yourself so fully in your spiritual bubble wrap that you find yourself so incredibly alone, afraid, and unable to fully live. (Or, doing all the ‘human’ things in secret while publicly bashing others for doing it in full, honest view).

Both of these scenarios keep people trapped in loops and cycles: One being a loop of total disengagement from the real world, from the real pain that is held by many, and playing pretend while the goddess-tinted veneer hides the rot on the inside. The other a loop of, when it comes down to it, self hatred and fear. I, personally, sat in a spiral of self hatred for long time. Absolutely believing I was bad, dark, and never good enough to see through all of the distortion that this world blares in our faces, the distortion I held in my body, etc. I spent years working through it. Years untangling all of the shit. Years trying to be good trying to be light, finally realizing that I was just fragmenting myself and making myself so very small. Upon finally coming up for air, I saw that life was actually so beautiful. That it wasn’t something that constantly needed to be decoded, cleared, and psychically muscled through but rather something to so fully enjoy, laugh at and with, and danced through. I saw that I was simply a person that experienced so much. So much good, so much bad, and it shaped me into who I am today- a person that I so deeply love despite my missteps, my mistakes, my cruelties and my bad decisions.

So here’s the thing with all of this: the spiritual healing space can be and is, in a lot of ways, beautiful. Returning to one’s soul and truth and inner knowing is something I hope every single person on this planet is able to experience, because it is a return to freedom. What is not a return to freedom, however, is the endless onslaught of rabbit holes to go down, new healing modalities to try, session after session, plant medicine ceremony after plant medicine ceremony, on and on and on. While all of these can be beautiful, powerful tools of transformation, they can also turn into a carefully constructed cage- keeping you from being present, keeping you from actually being in your body and listening to yourself / your soul, and noticing how you actually feel and what you actually want. The spiritual influencers that bop from one festival to the next, Tulum to Egypt to Glastonbury, taking months off at a time and preaching about how ‘when you align with your soul, you can’t not be abundant’, paint a pretty picture. They set a lovely trap: ‘By paying $x,xxx angel number to join my program, you won’t only be healed by the end, but you’ll also be signaling to the universe that you’re ready to receive more abundance.’ ‘Bad things keep happening because you haven’t cleared your karma, you haven’t met your shadow, you aren’t at a high enough vibration.’ ‘You still have blocks, that’s why you aren’t aligning with your soul entirely,’ on and on and on. While some of this is true, and so many of these containers, sessions, and retreats do offer a beautiful level of healing, they can still be a cage. The amount of stories I’ve heard from people that have signed up for the courses, elected for the payment plan because who has a casual 5-10k lying around in this economy, gone to the retreat, sat in all the circles… to only come out the other side a bit more aware of themselves, still deeply wounded, and broke. Spirituality and ‘healing’ has become a personality trait- who you are rather than what you do or what you’re working on. Someone has a random insight into life on a Thursday afternoon and by Friday night it’s been turned into a program and now they’re a healer, a thought leader, a priestess carrying ancient codes. Worse yet, the stories of those that have dropped in with ‘healers’ that are in the game for the clout, the money, the vibes and have no idea how the human psyche actually works, and end up in some form of psychosis or another.

I don’t write all of this to shit on spirituality, on healing, etc- if you know me, and if you’ve worked with me, you know who I am. You know I care about the work that I do, the way I go about the work, and that it is helpful. It is what I believe in: remembering who you are on a soul level, understanding your loops and cycles and breaking free of them, no longer in a state of constant suffering. The idea, to me though, is to help people remember- to flush out all of the gnarly shit, the distraction, the conditioning, so that they can exit the ‘healing’ space and fully live. Not in a state of perpetual fixing, or fear, or needing to ‘level up’. But LIVE, as who they are, in their full soul’s expression. Whether that is going to hike the PCT, continue their job in corporate America, or completely change their lives and become the person they’ve always wanted to be- so long as they are being true to who they are, living from their heart, and in connection with all that is. I realize I’m sounding a bit like ‘I’m not like other girls’, and that isn’t necessarily what I’m trying to give off here. However, I don’t want to be another voice in the roar of capitalistic spirituality + healing. I don’t want to be yet another link in the chain holding people in this vicious cycle. I want to be a tool that helps people break free. I want to share what I know- tools, practices, etc- that got me free so that people can do it for themselves. I want to see people remember who the fuck they are, return to their heart, and help this world become a more loving place- for everyone. I’ve never had an end goal for any of what I do, other than to help people. It’s always been that way. My very first job was as a lifeguard. When I was considering college, I wanted to become a therapist- art therapy for children, specifically. In a roundabout way, I ended up in art school, and thought about becoming a forensic photographer (oof). I worked a lot of random jobs over the years- primarily in the service industry. I ended up working at a local health department to pay my way through massage school, because for some reason I knew I needed to become a massage therapist even though I don’t like being touched. I finally allowed myself to dive into my psychic awareness during that time- after spending years ignoring it, shutting it down and running from it. I studied psychology, anatomy, various forms of Eastern medicine and energetic healing techniques. All of what I offer now, energetically speaking, came bubbling up to the surface- all very personal techniques and process that I’d simply used for my own healing over the last decade. It became loud and clear that I ‘wasn’t just a massage therapist’, and that I was walking down a path of bridging the etheric and the physical. So I followed the bread crumbs. I offered what I had to share. I moved and shifted things, allowed room for change and new ideas. And then I saw, more so felt, how it didn’t fit who I am or what I want to do. I don’t want to perpetuate these cycles. I don’t want people to keep coming back to me for help when they have the tools to get through on their own (that’s not to say we need to just always go it alone- but to remember your power and your capability rather than constantly needing external validation!). I certainly don’t want people looking to me for answers and guidance as though I’m some know-all-guru when they have the answers they’re looking for inside of themselves. There are enough Instagram priestesses, oracles, channels and prophets out there. What I feel is lacking is doing the healing and spiritual work then actually going out into the world and living. You can see god during a session or ayahuasca ceremony, but do you see god in the eyes of the cashier at the gas station? You can talk about gratitude but do you actually feel grateful for the life pumping through your veins? You can sit with cacao and share your heart opening experience on social media, but are you actually living from your heart- from a space of love and compassion? Are you actually becoming a kinder, more loving person in your day to day life? Are you banishing demons in session but doing nothing about the injustices in the world, on the sidewalk outside of your home? What, actually, are you doing?