Heal: A documentary about the power of the mind

"I always thought that

living was easy

and life was the hard part.

But now my fingertips are shaking.

Does he love me?

Will I get a better job?

Should I buy that shirt?

Can I afford rent this month?

I laugh.

I laugh.

I laugh.

These questions that once

brought me to tears.

'Her weight is dropping.

Her pressure is rising.

Rapidly.'

Rapidly.

Rapidly I'm losing my chance

to ever find the answers to

these questions that once

brought me to tears."

-Melissa Bartley 2012

When I was 23 I had chronic pain, high blood pressure, and searing headaches that felt like lightening and left me dizzy and dazed. The doctors couldn't tell me what was wrong only that I was at high risk for a stroke in the next 2 years of my life. Stroke at 23....I was in disbelief. They recommended a change in diet, increase of exercise, and the removal of birth control from my daily intake. Slowly, I began to make these changes. More importantly, this turn of events turned on my awareness. I had to be conscious of what I was putting into my body and how I was (or really wasn't) using my body. This started the 6.5 year journey that has lead me to the woman I am now. It did not stop at diet and exercise, my stress levels were still high and I had to make severe life changes and shifts in my perspective before I started to feel the difference in my well being. At massage school and soon after within a regular yoga practice, different modalities began to take their place in my evolving state of wellness.

Yesterday a friend recommended I watch the Documentary "Heal" on Netflix so that is how I spent my Friday night, alone, with a pipe, my cats, and some Quorn nuggets. I bawled over and over again. This is the first time I've been able to hear and see my own experiences retold and validated by so many others...of all different walks of life with science to back it up! I so strongly believe that my relationship with my mind and body as well as my faith is what keeps me going each day. It is the times when my care is not forthcoming that dis-ease settles in. If I could share this documentary with every person I know it would be all I could dream for. The opportunity to see a lifestyle from a different perspective and an insight into the work that I do and why. Not only has this journey saved my life over and over again, it has also given me the tools to share with others how they can incorporate some really challenging new beliefs, interesting experiments, and a bit of faith into their daily lives. And even more how it ripples in to effect their health and ripples out to those around you.

Have you seen this doc? What are your thoughts? How has your relationship with your mind, body, and/or spirit effected your healing?

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A big take away for me in the past few years of my life has been faith. Something I rejected strongly and fully until recently because of my experience of religion growing up. I felt faith had been forced on me, through lies and misguiding. I felt like I didn't know what to trust or how. Time and time again spirit has come and shown me differently. This morning I felt it and saw clearly. I was thinking much of the documentary and how belief, trust, and meditation were main factors of my healing. On my drive to work I wanted desperately to hear "I Wanna Get Better" by Bleachers and prayed for it as I hit shuffle on my Spotify list, over 80 songs long. Guess which one played?

After my last yoga class at Illuminate ended up as a no show I went to leave and my car brakes broke! Driving through Marble Works & Middlebury with no brakes praying for something to save me. I pulled into Country Tire Center hopeful for assistance or maybe a lift, only to find them closed closed closed. What could I do? Passed me walk a man into the garage quietly on his Saturday morning. Jarrett. I never knew him until today. Jarrett had come at that exact moment on his day off, 2 days before his 15year anniversary at CTC, to work on his sisters truck. Jarrett took my car in off the lot and had it fixed within the hour, barely asked for anything at all and taught me well on questions I've had for many years. I believe in circumstance oh, yes and I believe in the divine. I believe in guidance and spirit. and I believe we have a choice. to act. to listen. to love. to have faith. It'll all be okay.

MM <3

Attached is a photo from a paused screen of the doc. The 9 things listed are the common threads they found in each participate they studied that had experiences a radical recovery from illness or injury.