In this episode we discuss how to discover the transformative power of the present moment to heal your relationship with yourself and how being present can help heal your nervous system.
Whether you struggle with being present, feel overwhelmed by life's demands, or seek escape through distractions, this episode is tailored to guide you towards profound self-healing and acceptance.
What You'll Learn:
The Importance of Presence: Understand why embracing the present is crucial for healing and how avoiding it can hinder your progress.
Why we avoid being present: Why it is important for us to understand how not being present is serving us.
The Benefits of Being Present: Three Ways Being Present Helps Heal Our Nervous System
Acceptance Techniques: Explore methods to foster self-love and accept your true self, by being present.
Mindfulness Practices: Simple, actionable strategies to enhance mindfulness and maintain presence in everyday life.
I know how transformational the practice of being present has been for me. I hope you find the same benefit in practicing being present as a part of your healing journey.
0:00 - Introduction to the Healing Power of Presence 1:31 - The Impact of Being Present on Self-Healing 5:17 - Why We Avoid Being Present and Its Consequences 6:01 - The Three Primary Reasons We Avoid Ourselves 6:40 - The Negative Effects of Avoiding Presence 7:29 - What Does Being Present Mean? 8:28 - The Present Moment as the Only True Moment 9:29 - The Immediate Benefits of Practicing Presence 10:16 - Techniques for Becoming Present in Daily Life 11:32 - How Being Present Transforms Our Emotional Health 12:09 - The Role of Observation in Healing 12:35 - Breaking the Cycle of Negative Self-Talk 13:39 - Calming the Nervous System Through Presence 14:05 - Overcoming the Initial Challenges of Being Present 15:07 - The Question That Can Bring You to the Present 15:54 - Recognizing Safety in the Present Moment 16:38 - The Healing Break Provided by Presence 17:41 - Disconnecting from Past and Future to Embrace Now 18:44 - Teaching the Nervous System to Recognize Current Safety 19:40 - Gaining Perspective and Making Rational Choices Through Presence 21:04 - How Presence Clarifies Feelings and Decisions 22:15 - Investigating the Root Causes of Our Reactions 23:05 - Connecting with the Authentic Self Through Presence 24:08 - Discovering the Authentic Self and Its Needs 25:28 - Embracing True Self-Acceptance 26:29 - Challenges and Benefits of Pra
In this episode we discuss how to discover the transformative power of the present moment to heal your relationship with yourself and how being present can help heal your nervous system.
Whether you struggle with being present, feel overwhelmed by life's demands, or seek escape through distractions, this episode is tailored to guide you towards profound self-healing and acceptance.
What You'll Learn:
The Importance of Presence: Understand why embracing the present is crucial for healing and how avoiding it can hinder your progress.
Why we avoid being present: Why it is important for us to understand how not being present is serving us.
The Benefits of Being Present: Three Ways Being Present Helps Heal Our Nervous System
Acceptance Techniques: Explore methods to foster self-love and accept your true self, by being present.
Mindfulness Practices: Simple, actionable strategies to enhance mindfulness and maintain presence in everyday life.
I know how transformational the practice of being present has been for me. I hope you find the same benefit in practicing being present as a part of your healing journey.
0:00 - Introduction to the Healing Power of Presence 1:31 - The Impact of Being Present on Self-Healing 5:17 - Why We Avoid Being Present and Its Consequences 6:01 - The Three Primary Reasons We Avoid Ourselves 6:40 - The Negative Effects of Avoiding Presence 7:29 - What Does Being Present Mean? 8:28 - The Present Moment as the Only True Moment 9:29 - The Immediate Benefits of Practicing Presence 10:16 - Techniques for Becoming Present in Daily Life 11:32 - How Being Present Transforms Our Emotional Health 12:09 - The Role of Observation in Healing 12:35 - Breaking the Cycle of Negative Self-Talk 13:39 - Calming the Nervous System Through Presence 14:05 - Overcoming the Initial Challenges of Being Present 15:07 - The Question That Can Bring You to the Present 15:54 - Recognizing Safety in the Present Moment 16:38 - The Healing Break Provided by Presence 17:41 - Disconnecting from Past and Future to Embrace Now 18:44 - Teaching the Nervous System to Recognize Current Safety 19:40 - Gaining Perspective and Making Rational Choices Through Presence 21:04 - How Presence Clarifies Feelings and Decisions 22:15 - Investigating the Root Causes of Our Reactions 23:05 - Connecting with the Authentic Self Through Presence 24:08 - Discovering the Authentic Self and Its Needs 25:28 - Embracing True Self-Acceptance 26:29 - Challenges and Benefits of Pra
you will begin to find some of the deepest sources of healing, some of the deepest aha moments that will come from within you an unconditional love towards you, no self-judgment, no beating yourself up, just a place of presence with yourself. And what it will actually show you more than anything is that you've always been okay, you've always been light, You've always been love, you've never been broken, there's never been anything wrong with you, and that you can truly accept yourself. Hello everybody, and welcome to today's episode of the Permission to Love podcast. I'm your host, jerry Henderson, and I'm grateful that you're here, as always. You know, this podcast is dedicated to helping you have a healthier relationship with yourself, and that relationship with ourselves often gets broken through things like trauma or other painful life experiences. And when that relationship is broken, we begin to experience things like self-sabotaging behavior, imposter syndrome. We sabotage relationships, we choose toxic relationships, we limit ourselves in our careers and in our life in general. We wind up living out our core beliefs, and that core belief is often the belief that there's something wrong with us. And if we believe that there's something wrong with us, we will continue to try to align our lives with that belief. So if you've experienced that and you want to learn how to improve your relationship with yourself. This podcast is for you. So I'm glad you're here and I hope you enjoy today's episode.
Speaker 1:
Today, we're going to be talking about how the present moment can actually heal you can heal your relationship with yourself and it can begin to heal your nervous system. So let me ask you a few questions. Are you a person who constantly avoids being present? Are you always busy in your mind? Do you feel like you're missing out on your entire life? Do you feel guilty when you're not active or doing something? Are you constantly distracting yourself? Are you constantly doom scrolling or binge watching? Or are you seeking escapes through things like alcohol or other substances because you can't stand being present? Is it painful to be able to be with yourself? Does being present feel scary in your system? Does the idea of being present scare you? Well, if that's true for you, I wanna challenge you on something today. I wanna challenge you that the very thing that you're avoiding being present is actually the very thing that's going to bring deep levels of healing to you, because, in order to heal your relationship with yourself, you're going to have to be with yourself. You're going to have to learn how to be with yourself, accept yourself, love yourself and discover that your own presence is a deep sense of healing. You know, it's often the things that we avoid that are often our biggest sources of breakthrough, and we almost subconsciously know that. Right, that's why we keep pushing it off. So is it possible that the reason you're avoiding yourself is that you're afraid of what's on the other side of being with yourself, that your subconscious knows that you are a deep source of healing for yourself and that if you're present with yourself and you listen to yourself and you're allowing yourself to accept yourself, that that is going to be your source of a breakthrough? So, instead of doing that, you're avoiding it because your system is afraid of who the healed version of you is. You know we talked about that in some of our last episodes that our systems always want to reinforce our core beliefs, and so if your system knows that being with you is going to be a source of healing, it's going to get you to avoid that. It's going to get you to avoid being with you because it doesn't want to confront the truth that there's not something wrong with you, that you are lovable, that you are acceptable.
Speaker 1:
I want to take a quick moment and talk about my book Returning. It's a collection of meditations and reflections on self-love and healing. I designed this book to help you on your journey of moving from shame to self-love. It's divided in three sections. The first section is about seeing seeing that you're not alone. The second section is about understanding that healing is possible. And the third section is designed to remind you and to show you that loving yourself is the path back to yourself. I've heard from a lot of people that they're using it as a daily reflection guide, where each day they're selecting a passage, reading it, meditating on it, journaling on it, and it's really helping them in their healing journey and helping them understand that they are worthy of love, that they can heal, that they're not alone, and I know it can do the same for you. So if you haven't picked up a copy yet, please take a moment to do that, and if you have picked up a copy already, it would mean a lot to me if you'd take a moment and review the book, because the more positive reviews the book gets, the more likely people are going to become aware of it and benefit from the work. So thank you, thank you for picking it up, thank you for reviewing it and thank you for passing it along. Maybe, when you're done with it, you can pass it along to somebody else or pick up a copy for somebody else that you know could benefit from the work. You can get it on Amazon or you can simply see the show notes in this episode to get your copy.
Speaker 1:
So how can the present moment become a source of healing for us? How can it become a refuge for us? How can our own presence become a place that we seek refuge in, instead of a place that tortures us, instead of a place that we constantly want to avoid? Well, let's first start talking about why we do avoid ourselves. We avoid ourselves because there's a lot of pain. That's there, right. We avoid ourselves because of the story that starts to kick up in our heads about why we're such a loser. We start to beat the hell out of ourselves. And who wants to be in that environment? Right? If you were with somebody who was treating you the way that you treat yourself, you would avoid that person. You would get away from them. You would immediately seek to get out of their presence. That's what's happening with us. In our relationship with ourselves.
Speaker 1:
We are avoiding ourselves for three primary reasons. One, because of the way that we talk to ourselves, the way that we treat ourselves. Two, the memories that begin to come up about the past or the fears of the future. Okay, and then number three, because subconsciously we know that if we are with ourselves long enough and we break through all of that turmoil that's on the top of the surface, just like in the ocean. You know you have all of that turmoil that's on the top of the surface, just like in the ocean. You know you have all of that turmoil that can be on the top of the sea. But as you go deeper, you find a place of stillness and calm. That is the thing that our subconscious is avoiding when we're avoiding ourselves. So those are the three primary reasons why we avoid ourselves.
Speaker 1:
So what happens when we do avoid ourselves? Well, we miss out on our entire lives. We are never present. We're constantly distracted. People are always telling us you're here, but you're not here. I know you, but I don't know you. We have a guard up and that guard keeps us isolated. And so not only are we missing out on our entire lives because we're not present to really get into the moment and soak it up and feel it and enjoy it. But we also are winding up isolating ourselves and so we never experience intimacy. You can't have intimacy when you're never present with somebody. You can't have intimacy if you never allow somebody to get close to you. And for a person to get close to you, you have to be able to be present with them. They have to be able to connect with the authentic you. And for a person to get close to you, you have to be able to be present with them. They have to be able to connect with the authentic you.
Speaker 1:
And the third thing that happens that I've already discussed that we become disconnected from the source of healing. Our own presence is so healing. The present moment itself is a place of deep healing. So we are missing out on the most primary source of our healing, which is being in the present moment. So let's talk quickly about what being present is before we move into how it can heal us. Being present is simply that ability to be aware of the now. So if you've listened to spiritual teachers such as Eckhart Tolle, ram Dass, others, alan Watts, you'll hear them talk about the practice of being present, and even in scripture with Jesus. Jesus would talk about not worrying about tomorrow. That today has enough troubles of its own, and I believe that Jesus was one of the most present beings that has ever been on this planet.
Speaker 1:
And so, as we look at the power of being present, it really is the practice of getting our minds out of the past, getting our minds out of the future and becoming aware of what's happening right now, in this moment, because the reality is, this is the only moment that exists. The past is gone. It's a memory. The future is a fantasy that we build in our heads. The present moment is all that exists, and it is only in the present moment that you'll find healing. Why? Because the past is gone, the future doesn't exist, and when you get to a place in the future, or whatever you have in your mind of what the future is going to be like, when you get there, guess when? It's going to be the present. There is never any other time than the present. When you experience something painful in the past, when was it? It was the present moment at that time when you were experiencing that. So the only place that you can access healing is right now. It's the only place that it exists.
Speaker 1:
And see, one of the things that keeps us trapped is this future projecting that someday I'll get healthy, someday I'll heal, someday I'll do the practices that allow me to become the healthy version of myself, or when I'm healthy, then I'll love myself, then I'll begin to accept myself. It doesn't work that way, because the only time that you can love yourself is now. The only time that you can accept yourself is now. The only time that you can practice self-forgiveness is now. I think you're getting the point right, because this is all that exists. There is never a moment that is the future. It is simply a fantasy in our heads that we're projecting about what we want to be and where we want to be. But the way that we get to whatever there is is by practicing things right now.
Speaker 1:
So being present is about being in this moment, deeply being aware of what we see, what we feel, what we hear, and allowing the past and the future to fall away. And when we do that, we start to access a layer of life that is beautiful, that has peace, that has love, that has joy and that has the healing that you want. And one of the most beautiful ways to get present is through things like meditation or mindfulness, but a simple practice that you can do is to ask yourself the question am I present right now? That question alone, if you'll ask yourself the question, am I present right now? Will cause you to be present. Why? Because it immediately takes you out of whatever you're worrying about in the future or whatever you're thinking about in the past, and asks you to begin to observe in this moment. If I'm present, and when you start to observe, if you're present, guess what? You're present, you're beginning to observe, and then that can lead you into a state of really beginning to connect with the present moment, to feel, to become aware and to begin to access the source of healing that exists right now.
Speaker 1:
So what does it do for us when we're present? How does it become healing? Well, the first thing that it does is it allows us to become aware. We become aware of what we're feeling, we become aware of what we're thinking, we become aware of what's going on around us and we become aware of all of those things. It begins to give us clues about the things that need to heal. For instance, we get into a really mindless kind of almost subconscious pattern of the way that we talk to ourselves. And when we begin to get present, we start to become aware of the way that we talk to ourselves, the chatter that's coming up.
Speaker 1:
See, being present is about observing. It's about observing what's happening right now, in the here and now. And when you begin to observe your thoughts, you start to become aware of how you're talking to yourself. Because, once again, we can mindlessly beat ourselves up. We can mindlessly talk about what a piece of crap we are and how unlovable we are, how stupid we are, that we did this thing or that thing. You know, we go into these subconscious mindless patterns of you know.
Speaker 1:
All of a sudden we find ourselves in the past and beating ourselves up about something that's going on in the past. Or all of a sudden we're in the future, catastrophizing our future, and it's almost like we go to sleep or we become unconscious in that moment and we've lost ourself, like we totally lost ourselves into that. And what's happening when we do that, when we're kind of lost in that type of thinking, is our nervous system is going haywire. We're wreaking havoc on our nervous system. We're layering on anxiety, worries, regrets, self-loathing, shame, all of those feelings. We're kicking all of that in, and then we're kicking in all of the chemicals that go with that, all the emotions that go with that, and the cortisol and all the other chemicals that are happening, the stress hormones that are getting released into us because we're not being present. So the first thing that's going to happen is you're going to become aware, you're going to start observing what's going on with you, which is then going to take you to the next thing that's going to start happening is you're going to begin to relax your nervous system.
Speaker 1:
Okay, so how is that going to happen? Well, let me encourage you. At first, it might feel like it's making your nervous system go haywire. Okay, when you first start practicing being present and all that stuff starts to come up, you're going to feel like a boat that's in the middle of a storm. You're going to feel like you're in the ocean and you're looking at 30-foot waves and they're all around you and all of this stuff is going on. You're going to want to get up, you're going to want to run away. All this stuff's going to come up.
Speaker 1:
But here's the key the only way to be with yourself, the only way to learn to be with yourself, is to be with yourself. There's just no other way to do it. You're not going to, someday, all of a sudden, get teleported to a place where you're comfortable being with yourself. You have to begin to practice it, and the work of practicing it requires us to be with it, even in the middle of the storm, and wait for the storm to calm. And as the storm calms, for the storm to calm and as the storm calms, I promise you there is a layer of peace that will begin to come. There is a layer of healing and joy and life that begins to come, and what that does is that begins to relax your nervous system. And so how does it begin to relax your nervous system once you get past that phase? Okay, I want to encourage you. There is going to be a phase, and that's okay. But once you get past that, what's going? I want to encourage you there is going to be a phase, and that's okay. But once you get past that, what's going to happen is you're going to pull yourself out of the future and you're going to pull yourself out of the past.
Speaker 1:
You know, I often like to ask a question of people when I'm coaching them. It's this question are you okay right now, and the first thing that starts to come up is like no, because I have this I need to deal with. I've got a relational problem, I've got this that's going on. I don't love myself. I mean all these things start to cycle up, right when I ask the question again and I give it some context and I say no, right now, in this moment, on the phone with me, where we're at in this present moment are you okay, are you safe? I may get a little bit pushback again, I may get a little bit of pushback again, but we eventually get to the point where they realize that you know what. Yeah, like right now I'm on the phone with you, I'm not in danger, I'm okay.
Speaker 1:
I do feel like I've got red alarms going off in me still, but as we begin to examine those red alarms, they quickly begin to see that those are things that have been wired in their nervous system. The red alarm, or the red alert, got stuck in the on position and it's a false red alert that's going off in many senses. Right, it's a nervous system that is just totally redlined all the time. And as we begin to examine that and we pull a person into the present moment, that red alert, those alarm bells, can begin to quiet. They can begin to calm down. Because when we realize that in the present moment, we're okay, we're okay right now. You listening to this podcast, you're okay right now. You listening to this podcast, you're okay right now.
Speaker 1:
And so, becoming present, one of the most healing things that can do for us is give us a break. It can give us a break from beating ourselves up from everything that we regret in the past and all of the fears of the future, and allows us just to be here. It allows us to be that boat on that calm water, that still water. It allows us to access the depths of the still water of the present moment. You will find the stillest and the most beautiful peaceful waters. When you surrender to the present moment, when you choose to let go of the past and you choose to stop projecting into the future and you come here now, your nervous system will begin to relax and it will start to become a refuge. It'll become a place. When, all of a sudden, you find yourself cycling into anxiety or fears or depression or whatever, you'll begin to access this place of the now and the place of the now begins to teach your nervous system that you're okay now.
Speaker 1:
You see, we're still living things.
Speaker 1:
You know the great book about the body keeps the score. See, we're still living things from 30 years ago. We're still living things from 10 years ago, five years ago, two weeks ago, that we're still beating ourselves up about that, we're still regretting and our nervous system is thinking that all that stuff is still going on right. All the research will show you that when your mind and your emotions and all that begins to kick up and you start living in the past or the future, your body begins to think that it's actually happening right now, because it begins to get into that fight, flight, freeze or fawn mode because it's trying to keep you safe. And so when you're visualizing all that feeling, the emotions that go with that, it's as if it's happening, so pulling us out of all of that, helping us understand that that's not going on anymore and that we can begin to be present. And when we are present and to see that in this moment we're safe and even though you might be in a toxic relationship, still you might be in a financial jam or whatever's going on with you right now in this moment you're okay, you're safe.
Speaker 1:
So I want to encourage you that this practice of being present can teach your nervous system to get out of the past, to get out of the future and to see and to understand that you're safe right now and that you can begin to feel that and you can begin to allow that to happen. When you get deeply present, your nervous system will learn to start to relax. As I shared before, it might take a few storms to get through in order for you to get to that place, but as you continue to do it, to let the emotions come, to let them pass, to realize that you're okay, nothing terrible is going to happen. I know feelings like anxiety, depression and other things. As they begin to rise, it feels like, oh my gosh, the entire world's going to fall apart. You're okay, you are okay, and if you come back to this moment, you'll begin to see that you're okay Now.
Speaker 1:
Another thing that being present can do that heals us is it gives us perspective. It allows us to begin to make more rational or more logical choices. We begin to look at things differently. It changes our perspective, because when you're all worked up and your nervous systems are going haywire and you're living in the future and the past, you don't have a true perspective about what's actually going on with you, and if you're distracting yourself from this present moment, you're not listening to yourself, you're not understanding what needs to happen inside of you, and so you can't make clear decisions, you can't get clear about the next steps to take, because as soon as you try to make a decision, all of a sudden you're projecting into oh well, this will mean that, and then this will happen, and you start to build a story in your head, right, or you start to make a decision and then you start to think about all of the reasons why that didn't work in the past and why you're such a loser, and why you're such a loser and why you're such a failure and why this is going to fail. And you can't do that because this happened to you. So all of that stuff starts to happen, and that chatter begins to happen because we're not being present. So if we can be present in this moment and understand what's truly going on not what is the story that's in our head about what's going on, but what's really going on and then we can begin to make clearer decisions what's really going on and then we can begin to make clearer decisions, and those clearer decisions can lead us on a path for better outcomes.
Speaker 1:
It's hard to make clear decisions when the present moment is tangled up with the past and the future, because you don't have a clear perspective. Getting present being present allows you to get a clear perspective as to what you're feeling, how to work on what you're feeling, how to work on what you're feeling, what's actually going on with you? Because if you keep avoiding being with yourself and you stay out of the present moment, you never know what you're really feeling. You never know what's going on, right? You might think well, I'm pissed off because X, y and Z happened, or this person made me mad, and why do they always do this to me? Well, that's reactive, right? That's that place of I'm not in the present moment and what I'm doing is I'm tied up in all of the behavior, the actions of somebody else that happened in the past or, you know, projecting about why they did that or their motives, or what's going to happen in the future and what you're going to say to them when you see them again. All of that keeps you from going down a few layers to go wait, I'm actually really upset with what they said because it triggered this in me. And this got triggered in me because of a core belief that I have or something that hit a really delicate spot or a sensitive spot inside of me.
Speaker 1:
You see, when you get present, you can begin to investigate that, you can observe what you're feeling, why you're feeling it, and then you can start to get to the core of it and then you can start to make clearer decisions about how you react, how you live your life and what you actually need to address. See, we don't always need to go address the person. What we need to do is address what's going on inside of us, and what's going on inside of us. When we heal that and then when the person continues to behave that way, it doesn't trigger us as much because we've begun to heal that place within us. Now that doesn't mean we continue to stay around the person. It can actually give us the perspective that we need to move away from the person. You see, when we don't have clear perspectives and we've got all these stories in our head, it actually keeps us tied to that person. It actually keeps us connected because all of our energy is going there and we don't get away from that toxic behavior. So being present can help us with that as well.
Speaker 1:
Now the final thing that I'll talk about, and how being present can help us heal, is how it connects us with our own presence. Your authentic presence is a deep source of healing for you. You know, we get wrapped up into thinking that we're all of this other stuff right, that we're this broken person or this. You know XYZ, my name is Jerry and I live here and I do this and this is what I am and who I am. All of those are things, right, that I do. They're attributes that are part of my life, but it's not who I am right, because when I was five, I was still me, my internal self, who I am, and that's presence that I had with me, that awareness. And so before I had whatever job or before I was whatever age and lived at whatever address, I was still that same person internally, right, that presence of who you are. And so when we're distracted and we're away from the present moment, we're not connecting with who we are, our authentic self.
Speaker 1:
And that authentic self knows what you need. That authentic self can be trusted and in order to access the true self, high self, you have to be with that part of you. You have to learn to sit with that part of you long enough to observe, to listen and to hear, because you will begin to find some of the deepest sources of healing, some of the deepest aha moments that will come from within you. But in order for you to begin to access that, that place of calm, that place of pure love, that place of pure joy and unconditional love towards you no self-judgment, no beating yourself up, just a place of presence with yourself, as you begin to access that, you'll begin to find and you'll begin to see and you'll begin to hear a pathway to healing. It'll begin to show you the things that need to be addressed. And what it will actually show you, more than anything, is that you've always been okay, you've always been light, you've always been love, you've never been broken, there's never been anything wrong with you, and that you can truly accept yourself, because self-acceptance is accepting who you actually are.
Speaker 1:
Let me say that again Self-acceptance is accepting who you actually are, the authentic, pure light and love of who you are eternally, who you've always been and who you always will be. That is the purest form of self-acceptance I know to come to a place where you identify with the authentic self and accept that as you, versus being confused with all these other things that you think about yourself, that I'm broken, that I'm flawed, that I'm fundamentally wrong or whatever it is. That isn't self-acceptance. I'm not saying that we don't accept that those things that are in our lives, that we feel that way, no, that's a part of self-acceptance that will lead us that true, authentic self. But in order to get there, you're going to have to be present. You're going to have to be with yourself and begin to feel the healing that comes from you, to begin to understand that not only have you been a source of your own suffering, you can also be the source of your healing.
Speaker 1:
So let's start talking about how to be present. How do we start to practice presence? Well, I'm not going to tell you that it's easy. It's not. I've been working on it for years and I still find myself struggling with it.
Speaker 1:
Right, it is a struggle to try to be present, because there's so much that's going to try to pull us in and out of the present moment and there's so much of our culture, our society and our entire system that's been built to keep you out of the present moment. And it can be especially hard for trauma survivors, because the present moment has never felt safe and I've talked about that in other episodes. But the present moment just hasn't felt safe and so we've avoided it. And because we've avoided it, we've gotten habitually used to, or addicted to, or wired to, not being present. Because if you're present, whose job is it going to be? To continue to reinforce the core beliefs that you have because of the regrets of your past? And who's going to be there in the future worrying about all the problems that might begin to come your way? So you know, the whole system that we've built for ourselves is to keep us from being present. So it's tough, it's not an easy task, but it can become easier and it can actually become a way of life, because what you'll find, that what you once avoided, will then begin to call to you, it'll begin to speak to you and you'll find yourself wanting to seek refuge in the present moment and in your own presence. Your presence will go from one that was abusive to one that is healing, from one that was shaming to one that is loving, to one that was self-judging to one that is now self-accepting.
Speaker 1:
So let's go through a quick list of how you can practice being present. Number one I've mentioned meditation. Starting a meditation practice or a mindful prayer practice, whatever language that you want to use, can be a very powerful way to help you learn how to be present, to observe, and there's a ton of meditation resources out there that you can begin to look at, study, observe, there's all kinds of meditation apps, etc. But the practice fundamentally of meditation becoming present, observing and allowing yourself to be here now and to tap into the present moment, to tap into the authentic self, to tap into the source of all life and love. And meditation doesn't just have to be 20 minutes on a cushion, it can be throughout your day. To be 20 minutes on a cushion, it can be throughout your day. It's your practicing, walking meditation, observing, being aware, connecting and just being with yourself and being with all of life that surrounds you 24-7.
Speaker 1:
The second practice is to ask yourself, as we talked about am I present? To just be mindful, to ask yourself that question. You can put that question as your screensaver on your phone or little sticky notes, wherever you need to, to just trigger yourself to ask the question am I present right now? And as soon as you realize that you're not present, you become present and then you can begin to connect with this present moment and the healing that begins to happen. Another way to become present really quickly is to observe your breath, to just do some mindful breathing, to just stop and observe your breath, feel it as it begins to expand in your abdomen or in your lungs, and just become aware of your breath. That draws you to the present moment and gets you connected with yourself once again.
Speaker 1:
Another way that helps and helped me and helps people I work with is to tie a string around your wrist that when you see that, or some kind of beads around your wrist that when you see it, you're reminded I need to be present, I need to connect. Or you can set an alarm on your phone that dings and reminds you to come back to the present moment. Whatever it is that you need, whatever tool that you need that'll help you, that will remind you to come back to here and now, because as long as we're avoiding the present moment, we're never going to heal, because the present moment is the only thing that exists. Being in the present moment is the source of life. It gets us out of the past, gets us out of the future, helps calm our nervous system, and it connects us with ourselves, and we are a deep source of healing for ourselves, if we'll allow ourselves to be that, and the way that we allow ourselves to be that is by being in the present moment.
Speaker 1:
Well, thank you for being here, for being a part of another episode of the Permission to Love podcast. If you haven't had a chance yet to subscribe or to follow this podcast, please do so, because that's going to keep you updated on when new episodes come out. And I want to ask you a favor that would mean a lot to me. If this podcast is having an impact on you and it's helping you in your journey, would you share it with somebody else? Would you share it on your social media? Post it on Instagram, let other people know about it, because the only way that this podcast grows is by you sharing it with other people. So if you know people who could benefit from having a healthier relationship with themselves, please pass it along. Please share it, get it out there, because we want to get this message out to as many people as possible that they can heal and they can have a healthy relationship with themselves by giving themselves permission to love themselves.
Speaker 1:
And just a final reminder if you need resources in your healing journey, I want to encourage you to go to my website at jerryhendersonorg. I have a lot of resources there that can help you on your journey. I have a free self-assessment that you can take that also will help you go on a 30-day journey of having a healthier relationship with yourself. You can pick up my book there. You can also sign up for my newsletter there, where you'll receive tips about how to heal your relationship with yourself, and you can also find out more information about my one-on-one coaching program. So if those resources and tools will be helpful for you, you can go to my website once again at jerryhendersonorg. And in closing, I want to remind you, as always, that you are worthy of your own love.