The Six Steps to Healing the Heart

My private practice as an acupuncturist and psychotherapist is guided by heart-centered healing. I found through my many years of giving and receiving bodywork, body-centered psychotherapy, acupuncture and spiritual healing that including the heart is a very direct avenue to deep and long lasting healing. Here is a self guided tour into that realm.

Begin with bringing to mind some way you are not at peace or a way you can open to greater peace.

1. Come home to your body in the present moment.

Feel the pull of gravity and how it is a constant source of support from the earth to our bodies. Feel the movement of breath through your nostrils, down through the chest and into the belly. Listen to sounds in the room. Smell the moment and feel the life force moving through your body.

2. Be a curious observer of your experience.

Adventurously travel through the landscapes of your mind, body and emotions to see what the current weather report is. Experience the sensations, temperature and color of your reality with the fresh openness of a child instead of assuming that you already know all the answers.

3. Humbly and courageously face whatever you find.

Notice any resistance or fear to what is. Notice any thoughts of, “this isn’t fair or shouldn’t be happening.” Notice the relief that comes with authentically being with your self, like being deeply listened to by a friend.

4. Wrap the arms of your deep heart around any place that is not at peace or is in pain.

Ask the endlessly compassionate capacity of your deep heart to hold and care for this place of pain as you would an injured child. Notice any belief systems or negative conclusions you are holding about this place of pain or painful situation.

5. Open to the largest most inspiring Source of Healing and Love you can relate to.

Place any painful beliefs, memories, physical or emotional pain in the hands of your heart and humbly ask for help. Open your heart in expectation of an answer. Find a name that captures your relationship to the divine. Repeat that name silently or out loud and place it in your heart where you are holding confusion, pain, emptiness or questions. Awaken your souls subtle awareness. Listen as if there is music playing in the distance, smell the presence as if there is some fragrance of cookies baking in the next room. Feel the movement of subtle energy move through your body. Keep receiving until there is a change. Usually there is a dynamic cycle of washing followed by a stopping point of calm and stillness. You can stop here or open to another layer of washing. If and when there is an expansive opening and qualities of beauty, peace and light are filling your entire being let yourself drink with every cell and level of your mind, body, heart and soul.

6. Fill with gratitude

Savor the fullness of what you have received and express gratitude to your mind, body, heart and soul as well as the infinite source of all giving.