highly sensitive power » Health

Successfully Sensitive | Stella

Grace Kerina — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 22:34:41 +0000

Energy Healer

Have you ever met someone and instantly felt like you’ve know them a long, long time? That’s how it was with me and Stella, my husband’s sister. She practically glows with connectivity.

In spite of the geographical distance between us (she lives in Berlin and I live in Vancouver) and the language barrier (I finally know enough German to have conversations with her, but barely), for years we’ve had long, long conversations that soothe and connect us both. She understands me perfectly, even when we struggle with our words.

The energy work she does, which I’ve experienced firsthand, doesn’t take place in person (unless you live in Berlin) or over the phone. An appointment is made, and at the appointed time the client gets comfortable and Stella gets to work, focusing healing energy on the client, no matter where in the world they are and even if they have no language in common. After the session, she has lots of information about the client’s energy blocks and suggestions for continuing to clear and heal.

Many in our society poo-poo this kind of work, but there’s more and more information coming to light via the scientific community that actually backs it up. Uniquely talented, sensitive people like Stella are finding more and more acceptance.

In what way are you most successfully sensitive?

My sensitivity enriches me most in my energy work. I am so sensitive that I can perceive different cosmic energies, deliberately summon them, and take them in. I can perceive and feel the different energies of precious stones and the way they work in different areas of the body. And I’ve been able to turn my calling into my profession. I now support others, heal them, and bring them into their power through my distance treatments. And that fills me with deep gratitude and great joy.

What or who has inspired you to embrace your sensitivity?

Inspiration has come through my first experiences with the ethereal world and through my dear sister-in-law, Grace, and her Highly Sensitive Power website, which is so interesting that ever since I started reading it I’ve devoted myself to this topic and can now definitely say, “Thank you for my high sensitivity!”

What are your eternal fascinations?

Finding out who we really are behind our masks, walls, and façades, and discovering that, behind it all, we are amazingly beautiful, great, and luminous beings. And everything else having to do with the topic of ethereal energies: their effects, their gifts to us, their healing powers, and their unbelievable, unlimited possibilities.

What quest currently captivates you?

I am more and more intrigued to find out how working with ethereal energies can radically and quickly change our daily routines, our health, our whole life and personality in a positive way; how these energies can give us incredibly much joy and power, and increase our quality of life; how working with these energies can, step by step, lead us to greater knowledge of the incredibly beautiful, great, and luminous beings we actually, intrinsically are.

What is your favourite kind of help to give?

My energy work and talking with people, whom I can often help because – as a result of my sensitivity – I have great empathy and compassion. I can tell them much about what has helped me in my own life and encourage them in theirs.

Translated from the original German version

Photo from Stella’s website

Successfully Sensitive | Dr. Judith Orloff

Grace Kerina — Thu, 28 May 2009 07:15:11 +0000

Author of Emotional Freedom

Judith Orloff, MD – a psychiatrist, intuitive empath, and highly sensitive person – is the author of the bestselling new book Emotional Freedom: Liberate Yourself from Negative Emotions and Transform Your Life (Harmony Books, 2009). Her other bestsellers are Positive Energy, Intuitive Healing, and Second Sight.

Dr. Orloff synthesizes the pearls of traditional medicine with cutting edge knowledge of intuition, energy, and spirituality to help sensitive people come into their power. Her insights create a new convergence of healing paths for our stressed-out world.

For additional information and inspiration, visit Dr. Orloff’s website at www.drjudithorloff.com.

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In what way are you most successfully sensitive?

I am a psychiatrist and an intuitive empath. In my new book, Emotional Freedom: Liberate Yourself From Negative Emotions and Transform Your Life, I write about how I combine these aspects for health and healing. My sensitivity allows me to sense and know things deeply, to pick up intuitive information, to read patients, and to read energy. In Emotional Freedom I write about how to maintain your sensitivity but not absorb the negative emotions and energy of the world – essential skills for all sensitives to learn.

What or who has inspired you to embrace your sensitivity?

When I was a teenager I got heavily involved with drugs to try to squash my sensitivity and intuition. At that time I was blessed to work with a psychiatrist who helped me see that in order to be whole I needed to embrace my sensitivity and learn to be grounded and strong. When I was a child I couldn’t go into shopping malls and crowded places because I’d go in fine and walk out exhausted or anxious or depressed. I didn’t realize I was sensing and absorbing other people’s energies. My Daoist teacher has helped me learn to meditate and center myself in the midst of turmoil – tools I teach to readers in Emotional Freedom.

What quest currently captivates you?

I am on a book tour for Emotional Freedom, traveling around the county teaching people to embrace their sensitivities but develop a strong solid core – teaching strategies for dealing with emotional vampires so they don’t sap your energy and assault your sensitivity.

What is your favourite kind of help to give?

Meditation to center yourself and setting kind but firm limits and boundaries to protect your sensitivity. I love to help others embrace their sensitivity so it is not a cause of suffering or overwhelm. I love to offer readers strategies for becoming more courageous, overcoming fear, and dealing with emotions in a way that is empowering instead of being knocked off center when the power of emotional energies hit. It is very freeing to develop these skills. I honor sensitive people and want to do everything possible to help them embrace their gift.

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Dr. Orloff is currently offering a special promotion for Emotional Freedom, which includes free gifts of further encouragement and inspiration.

Photos from Dr. Orloff.

Simple Ways to Rejuvenate

Grace Kerina — Mon, 11 May 2009 07:15:14 +0000

Need a lift? Freshen up by taking mini-holidays throughout the day.

What gives you a hit of joy? Perhaps it’s watching a three-minute digital slide show of your five-year-old. Or reading today’s post from a blogger who’s guaranteed to make you laugh. Or unscrewing the lid of a vial of lavender oil.

Consider the physical nature of rejuvenation and pander to your senses. Even if your daily work is physical, a switch to a different form of physical wonderment can revive.

Experiment and keep track of what works best to rejuvenate, reconnect, and resuscitate you. Make it easy to renew your WOWs.

Here’s a sampling from my list:

k.d. lang singing Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”
Pamela Hochschartner Viola’s photography on A Small Work A Day, Flickr, and Trunkt
Pulitzer Prize-winner Dave Barry’s funny columns
Jo Dunning’s broadcasts (certain ones), like from May 7th on The World Puja Network (sign in to access the archives), and her Abundance Project series (on her own site)

Flickr photo: burning sky, by Per Ola Wiburg (Powi)

Related reading: The Reset Button, Herbal Pharmacy

Narrative Medicine

Grace Kerina — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 22:57:30 +0000

What a blessing it is to go to a doctor who’s a skilled listener.

As the inhabitant and owner of a highly sensitive body, I’ve amassed a great volume of wisdom about my own self. Because the mainstream medical profession has shown a consistent lack of interest in the valuable database I carry around about me and my body, I tend to seek help from the kinder, gentler types of healers, like naturopaths.

In my experience, the most effective healers listen first. They know they’re starting from scratch, they want the full update, and they know I’ve got it. No one wants to feel like they’re superfluous to their own medical treatment – just another tick mark on the mighty doctor’s daily to-do list.

When Rita Charon, a medical doctor, noticed a connection between healing and storytelling, she explored, researched, and eventually coined the term “medical narrative” to describe the profoundly positive benefits to patients when they’re allowed to tell their own stories to doctors who know how to listen.

Charon took the time to study literature and creative writing, to the point of getting another Ph.D., then went on to found The Program in Narrative Medicine at Columbia University, which trains doctors to add listening to their healing skills.

The narrative medicine movement continues to spread – maybe even to a doctor near you. Ask around. There might be someone out there who wants to help you by hearing your story.

“Narrative Medicine fortifies clinical practice with the narrative competence to recognize, absorb, metabolize, interpret, and be moved by the stories of illness.”
~ From The Program in Narrative Medicine’s Mission Statement

Further Resources

I first learned about Rita Charon and narrative medicine from this lovely article: “Story Telling and Healing,” by Heinz Insu Fenkl.

Rita Charon wrote a book called Narrative Medicine: Honoring the Stories of Illness.

The Scientific American published an article about Charon and her work in May of 2005: “When Medicine Meets Literature.”

The New York University School of Medicine medical humanities website includes their Literature, Arts, and Medicine blog and database of resources.

Flickr photo: sitting, emdot.

Related reading: Self-Care Basics, Herbal Pharmacy