I'm working with a Pilates and Personal Coaching Gal,
looks great,
does fine work with her clients
and in all sorts of pain, in her ribs and neck
on one side from an accident awhile back.
She had temporarily gotten the pain to be "under control"
when she became a Pilates instructor and developed a
great deal of strength,
strength with which she seemed to be able to hold
herself rigid enough not to feel pain
Eventually that didn't work.
She came to me,
and though the lessons need to be slow
and delicate,
huge shifts are happening.
BUT she called, worried that she is sleeping hours
after each lesson and fatigued and taking naps even on
days between lessons. Was this okay.
Four part answer:
1.
This is great. All the healing that didn't get to take place
after the accident,
that got more or less "swept under the rug"
by her strength training,
is now getting to happen.
She needs lots of sleep for this healing time.
Also, all the mobility her strength was holding in bay,
and than can now inch forward out of pain
because we are re-wiring the brain to work the whole system,
all that re-wiring needs lots of integration time.
Hence more sleep.
So, goody. Sleep and rest all you can.
BUT
2. Before you take your naps, or go to sleep for the night:
do small movements, aware movements.
Movements she has learned in the lessons.
Movements she feels good about, and does slowly and gently.
The famous touch the ground, lift to the sky movement.
Get high quality movement reawakened before sleep,
so the brain can be working on that in the sleep and rest time.
3 Put to yourself the "big picture" questions
before you go to sleep:
what dreams and changes do you have for the
next thirty years.
What can your dreams tell you about pathways and adventures
you'd like to include in your life.
Get excited about sleep in this third realm: the prepare for new
territories in your life.
And dreams to help you see things you can't quite see clearly.
So sleep:
to heal and integrate the wounds and the learning
to practice and expand the new movements while we sleep
to dive deeper into and take advantage of any wisdom from the unconscious
The first and second sound almost the same,
but in the context of my one, two, three,
the first is the healing of the ribs and the neck from long ago,
that is now being attended to,
the second is deepening learnings of new movements and patterns and the ease
and pleasure they create
and the third
is just getting interested in what the sleep and dream and intuitive world has to teach us
And a fourth suggestion?
What is my work about?
Being present.
And creating learning and awareness no matter what.
And giving ourselves the joy and freedom that a life of curiosity almost always brings.
So, she has, or anyone has a "fatigue thing."
What differentiation can we notice about our fatigue?
Is it always the same?
Is it in our neck, our ears, our toes, our breathing, our eyes.
Is it the same on the left side or the right?
Is morning fatigue different than afternoon fatigue?
What kind of words do we have in our heads when fatigue starts
to come along?
If we stand up and move slowly, gently and with awareness does the
fatigue shift?
If we take a walk while in fatigue, does is shift the walk? Does our fatigue shift?
Which is all to say:
put part of the attention on the fatigue
and part on learning about and playing with the fatigue
and part of curiosity about the fatigue
and part on getting more clear about the different subparts to the fatigue
A Sufi master of name Idries Shah, when busy putting out a whole slew of books
that brought the Tales of the Dervishes, and the Sufis and Nasrudin to the west,
would feel "tired."
He would go out and rake leaves for awhile.
If the tired went away, he'd know what he'd been feeling was mental staleness.
if the tired stayed, he'd know it was time for a nap.
Now Sufis do sensing exercises, so for all we know he did something close
to two above by sensing himself in certain ways as he feel asleep in his naps.
Who knows?
But everyone's fatigue is different.
What can we discover about it and it's parts?
Can we make it "more."
Can we make it so it's just on our left side?
Mainly in our left foot?
There are many possibilities.
Many.
These three books, by the way
are MUST READING
for anyone on any spiritual path:
Tales of the Dervishes
Exploits of the Incomparable Mulla Nasrudin
The Pleasantries of the Incredible Mulla Nasrudin
