Originally published as “What’s your Why?” on Timothy Grossman’s website, asourceofwellness.com, on January 25, 2022.
“Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space our power to choose our response. In that response lies our growth and freedom.”
Viktor Frankl
Mr. Grossman has lived trauma since he was just 6 years old, losing his father to glioblastoma, a vicious cancer of the brain. Thereafter watching his guardian die of medical complications a few years later. He was more or less an orphan being shifted around from members of his family. Unwanted and a burden, he suffered physical and psychological abuse until he left at 15 and reunited with his mother. At 17 he emancipated himself. At 19 he joined the U.S, Army earning several commendations and deploying several times to include Iraq where he served as an Infantry squad leader in combat. During his combat deployment, he lost 20 of his fellow soldiers and leaders alongside being involved in multiple firefights and combat operations.
Suffering from the effects of PTSD, head injuries related to chronic blast exposure, and near misses from IEDs, alongside a cornucopia of physical ailments, he nonetheless thought his redemption would come in service to his wounded comrades and their families. He became a professionally accredited advocate and litigator before multiple agencies using all of his willpower to serve selflessly. His service continued for a combined 17 years within his capacity as a soldier and advocate.
Healing did not come to patients of trauma from pills or clinic visits, healing came from community, engagement, empowerment, and mental/emotional support that led to independence from the trauma of past experiences. Enlightened medical practitioners and wellness professionals entered into uncharted territory taking a chance on those who dared to sift through their own pain to live again and it worked!
Complementary Alternative Medicine (CAM) modalities have been shown, through research, to promote relaxation, reduce stress, and promote the body’s innate healing processes. while the mechanisms of action are still not well understood, the results across over 400 studies cannot be eschewed as simply a placebo effect.
Notable scholars and medical professionals such as Gabor Mate, Bessel Van Der Kolk, David Trelevan, and many more support that trauma is stored in the body. These modalities help to gradually release such trauma and therefore support a return to the nominal functioning of the individual under Maslow’s model of self-actualization.
These methods aren’t just for the service member or first responder, nor just for those that have the means upon which to attend yoga, taichi, or other practices.
No one demographic corners the market on trauma, not the service-member nor the first responder, nor the immigrant, nor the abused, oppressed, or exploited. Trauma affects us all, no matter the source, and for the mind and body to become integrated with the whole self of the spirit, trauma must be released in a carefully titrated and gradual way.
Certainly, it takes a person to own their healing process, and definitely, as these are not “done for you” methods. You have to put in the work, which is empowering in and of itself. A person’s sense of agency is an integral factor in their healing, and we seek to empower that agency one person at a time.
Because of this Mind Body Spirit REIKI offers our services from a place of compassion and unconditional regard for all-comers.
Why?
The why is quite simple.
Through grace and blessings beyond understanding, I awakened with the support of meditation, mindfulness, and reiki to the nonattachment, nonjudgement, non-dualistic nature of suffering through conscious awareness.
I found one way, but not the only way, towards healing the wounded ego, the inner child, and in return, I found a deep abiding love for myself and others. I found that the path to healing began within, and it was not the fire or the storm but the still small voice that led me even in my darkest moments of deep despondence and feelings of worthlessness.
I listened, so can you.
I have learned through meditation, self-practice, and spiritual healing (not couched in dogma), that the best-lived lives are not the ones that experience no struggle or pain, but the ones that rise above their pain in a way that creates greater or even the greatest level of compassion for themselves and others. Yet this is not a path we teach in our societies today, quite the opposite really.
Yet, by healing those wounded parts of ourselves we create the freedom that is not experienced by either money, privilege, status, or any other such thing. It’s a freedom of the soul and spirit to shine forth into our lives, the roles we play, and into all of our lived experiences.
To do this I hold space for my beloved family of humanity and the world herself so that others might become curious, to see they are both worthy and deserving no matter their background. To then walk beside them as they take agency over their mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health, not as a guru, but purely as a member of our great family.
“It is the heart and its ability to unconditionally love the self and others, not the mind and its ability to convince, justify, or cajole, that creates freedom within the self.”
Timothy J. Grossman
Are you ready?
Thanks for reading! Learn more about Tim and how to book his offerings at his Centered Team profile here. If you’re inspired to explore more Reiki in your own personal practice, go to centeredlex.org/workshops and take a look at his upcoming First and Second Degree Reiki trainings! <3
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