A Crisis Toolkit for Your Mind, Body, and Spirit.
For years and years, I’ve carried around a crisis toolkit to use whenever a friend, family member, client, coworker, or complete stranger entered my life in a crisis situation. Do you have a healing tool kit?
I’m betting you do. After all, we’re all healers. We all carry one around, even if we don’t call it that. So my question is this: What’s in it?
My toolkit has things to help with fear as well as death and with the dreaded coronavirus. But it also has to help with all the other diseases and aches and pains we encounter in addition: colds, fever, rashes, asthma attacks, arthritis, heart attacks, cancer…
Maybe you feel your toolkit is not ready for today’s situation. It’s probably filled with all sorts of things you can use.
Here are some things I’m sharing with you. Maybe you have things in your toolkit you can share with me.
When it comes to supporting your mind, body, and spirit during these challenging times, I TURN FIRST TO YOGA. I recommend restorative yoga.
When you are stressed, a weekly session is important. I don’t know how it is in your area, but I’m in Upstate New York which is a new hot spot for Coronavirus. I take a restorative yoga class via Zoom every week with Carolyn Abedor.
Carolyn is a physical therapist/yoga instructor. I come away from her class restored, renewed, and recharged for the coming week. I would take her class twice a week but I work on the other day she teaches it.
Do you have a yoga teacher? If not, make finding one a priority. Today’s challenges call for restorative yoga. But, if you find a different yoga that you prefer…go for it. Use what works for you.
REIKI CANNOT BE OVERESTIMATED. Do you practice Reiki therapy? If so, don’t forget to use this tool every chance you get.
Use your Reiki when you walk into a building. Use it when you walk down the street. Use Reiki when you encounter other people. Everyone is stressed out. We can all use Reiki’s healing, calming energy.
If not, now is the best time I know of to learn Reiki. Reiki is essential in stressful times. And, frankly, no time can be more stressful than now.
If you don’t practice Reiki and you can’t find a teacher, book some sessions with a practitioner. Begin with 5 sessions.
Whether or not you practice Reiki, or visit a Reiki practitioner regularly, now is a good time to organize a Reiki circle or Reiki share. Gather several friends together and let the Reiki practitioners offer healing to everyone in the room. Reiki is not one bit intimidated by the requirements of social distancing.
DON’T FORGET REFLEXOLOGY. Reflexology sessions are extremely grounding. If you are stressed out or if you have health issues, Reflexology sessions can help. Gloves and face masks will not negatively impose on Reflexology.
HEALING MUSIC HAS BEEN AN IMPORTANT PART IN MY TOOL BOX FOR YEARS. I use it during healing sessions, classes, or whenever I feel the need.
Through the years, I’ve learned that healing music can be all sorts of sounds. Beauty is in the ears of the beholder. I tend to favor Deuter, Halpern, Ken Davis, Anugama. Your favorites may be totally different. Because of my experiences, I prefer the older musicians. But, there are many kinds of healing music available today. Explore them until you know what works best for you.
GUIDED MEDITATIONS are essential. I began reading those written by others and now create my own. I suggest that you go with someone else’s until the time is right for you. The goal of a guided meditation is to awaken, transform, or heal. For years, I relied on the meditations compiled in books by Larry Moen.
BEDSIDE TABLE BOOKS are essential. They are the books I read when my tanks need refilling. These books vary with the need. Sometimes escape is the only route. Other times, I need to know what other people have to say about the situation I’m dealing with.
I’m often hungry for the wisdom others offer. To prevent empty tanks, I try to read about an hour a day.
When I fed hungry and homeless people in a food pantry, I found solace in the statistics of hunger. At any given moment I could tell you what percentage of children in our country went to bed hungry. I knew the difference between resource poor and generational poor and struggling poor. I knew all about dumpster diving.
Now, I’m attracted to memoirs. It’s not the problems that attract me. It’s how the writer tackled the problem that counts.
Fear, and forgiveness are big on my list.
Finally, when I need to veg out, I go for whatever catalogue is in my mailbox.
The important thing is to know when to fill your own tanks. Your toolbox won’t be worth much if you’re stretched too thin.
Your toolkit may be totally different. It probably is different. After all, we are scattered all over the planet. I hope to hear about some things in your toolkit. Please email me.
Meanwhile, please forward this article to your preferred social media network.
In honor of this most stressful time, I’m offering you a free copy of a book I wrote entitled “Miracles”. Email your mailing address to thurmangreco@gmail.com before April 12th, and I’ll send it along – absolutely free with no strings attached.
Thank you for being here.
Thurman Greco
A Reflexology Spa Treatment to Renew Your Client Partner
Our bodies are constantly discarding and regrowing new cells. Scientists tell us we create a new body every seven years. How this happens is pretty much shrouded in mystery but the endocrine system is the hub of this process.
Glands making up the endocrine system regulate this renewal as they control the growth and development of the body. One important thing our endocrine system does is boost the body’s ability to resist disease and fight infections.
A Renewal Spa Treatment is not a luxury. It’s a necessity for the client partner who wants to be as healthy and alert as possible.
Begin this session plan by selecting the essential oil you’ll use. My preferred essential oils for a spa session encouraging renewal are:
frankincense
Idaho balsam fir
lavender
lemon
myrrh
Roman chamomile
Once you select the oil, you’ll be guided to the music, the decor.
My favorite oil is lavender. However, some people don’t like lavender so it helps to move on to something else if your client partner resists.
So, when you book the appointment you need to find out if your client dislikes lavender. If so, you have other oils to choose from. But, settle this when you book the appointment so you’ll know how to coordinate the decor…music…
After you choose the oil, it’s time to choose the music. When my client partner is open to lavender, lemon, or Roman chamomile, I choose one of two CD’s I’ve had for years:
“Shamanic Dream” by Anugama
or
“Spiritual, Spiritual” by B Tribe.
If you don’t have either of these CD’s, you probably have something in your collection which will work. Whatever you choose, select music which is powerful and healing. You’re working with your client partner’s endocrine system here…a very spiritual part of his/her being.
Decor for this Spa Treatment may not take much work. You may not have to do much beyond taking away some clutter and adding a ceremonial throw for the table or chair.
Have your selection playing when you your client partner enters your healing space.
Offer your client partner a luscious water feature to begin this Spa Treatment. I suggest either a foot bath or simply washing the feet with wet terry cloth cloths that have been warmed in the microwave for a few moments.
If you go for a foot bath, think about a generous bucket or plastic water container filled with about four inches of warm water with a few colorful stones in the bottom. Let your client partner sit with the feet soaking in this essential oil scented water for 2-3 minutes before drying the feet. Then have him/her get on your healing table or reflexology chair.
When your client partner is comfortably situated face up on the table or in your reflexology chair, wrap the feet in warmed towels.
Begin by anointing your client partner with your selected oil. Put a few drops of essential oil in your client partner’s hands. Have him/her rub the palms together and hold them over the face and take a deep breath. Then, have your client partner rub the hands over his/her face,, head, and halo.
When you offer reflexology to the feet, add a bit of carrier oil to the essential oil and use this blend throughout the reflexology session. If you are using lavender or lemon, you may be able to find a commercial lotion which you like.
Move to your client partner’s head and bring in Reiki and offer three Reiki holds to the head.
Now, move down to your client partner’s feet.
Selecting the first foot, offer five minutes of delicious warm ups. Then offer five more minutes of general reflexology to your client partner’s foot.
Now, you have your client partner’s first foot prepared and ready to receive the Renewal Session on this foot. In this part of the session, you’ll stimulate the glandular parts of the body as you work the reflex areas listed below. You’ll encourage your client partner to heal, and rebuild.
Work the following reflexes for twenty minutes on the first foot in the following order:
1. Work the solar plexus to relax the body even more.
2. Work the pituitary gland because this is the gland which regulates everything.
3. Work the thyroid and parathyroid to balance the body’s metabolic rate.
4. Work the liver to enhance the immune system and remove wastes.
5. Work the adrenal gland to offer energy to the body.
6. Work the reproductive glands (ovaries/testicles) to balance this system.
Finally, work the solar plexus again to finish the rejuvenation path.
When you have worked these glands for twenty minutes on the first foot, spend five more minutes offering general reflexology. Then, finish up the first foot with five more minutes of warm downs.
Now, move to the second foot and repeat the process. This means you’ll offer five minutes of warm ups, five minutes of general reflexology and then you’ll spend the next twenty minutes working the body’s glands in the following pattern:
solar plexus
pituitary gland
thyroid and parathyroid
liver
adrenal gland
reproductive glands
solar plexus
Finally, offer five minutes of general reflexology and then five minutes of warm downs.
When this is completed, offer your client ten minutes of Reiki therapy on the feet.
It is now time to seal the Reiki therapy part of the Spa Session.
Let your client rest for a moment while you get a bottle of water for him/her.
Spend a couple of minutes with your client while s/he drinks the water and returns to “now”.
Thank you for reading this blog/book.
Please share this article with your preferred social media network. You may also want to share this article with your fellow professional reflexologists.
It is my sincere hope that you are able to use this article in your healing practice.
Don’t forget to join the email list.
Thurman Greco
Artwork provided by Jennette Nearhood.
