Energy Coaching: The Physics of Your Mind
Photo by Maia Love
“If you want to know the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration.””
Often in the field of medicine, we have focused on the study of biological parts, the solid observable matter. However, physics has informed us of the energy behind the manifestation of matter. What happens when we apply our understanding of physics to our personal well being? This question is one that I have been pondering since a young child. My father was keen for us to be curious, and support my fascination with electromagnetism.
In university, I spent my second degree studying the electricity and the electromagnetism of living creatures, including humans. This is where I first became aware of the SQUID magnetometer, a device that can measure the electromagnetic field of the human brain. I also studied the biophysics of the electric eel, and the magnetic navigation ability of various creatures, including seagulls, turtles and dolphins. In my final paper, I prepared a theory for the mathematical equations behind the mechanics of magnetic navigation.
Later, in medical school and residency, I studied neuroimaging and the physics of the mind and heart. In my psychiatry training, I spent several months in Neuropsychiatry, working with Magnetic Resonance Imaging, EEG (electroencephalograph) and EKG (electrocardiograph) readings on our patients. I also spent time at the innovative Connect Health Centre, where the use of biofeedback devices to read the heart’s electromagnetic field was a part of the wellness approach to improving health. In my former psychiatric career, I spent many hours with first responders who used the MUSE headband to understand personal mind frequencies and learn to shift from beta waves - our high powered thinking waves that can be useful but when prolonged can be tiring - to alpha waves, which can restore and nourish the brain.
My studies over the years on the energy, frequency and vibration of humans, and how this may impact well being versus distress, is something I bring to energy coaching.
“Energy coaching” - what is this?
summary
In this article, understand:
briefly, my first tier of coaching to re-design your lifestyle for optimal well being
in depth, my second tier of coaching to re-design deeper layers of self for deep transformation
the four layers of well being as defined by the Canadian Medical Association
energy coaching
For clients starting out with my services, I usually start with an assessment and then an approach that applies the wellness science of optimal well being to an individual’s current lifestyle. With the client, together we sculpt a new lifestyle design that supports well being and addresses problems such as fatigue, burnout, stress, sleep difficulties, self care concerns, relationship challenges and lack of fulfillment or vibrancy, and similar well being concerns. As well as the science of particulate matter, we review options for applying the energetics of the physical form and mind to support well being. The energy approach includes a review of the electromagnetic heart, the brain rhythms and the resonant effect in the fascial layer. This lighter style of coaching includes brief weekly sessions to assess and choose which wellness tools are best suited, with an action plan that includes measurable outcomes, a personalized ‘mantra’ and guided meditations to support motivation.
As well as the lighter style of coaching that helps you sculpt a personalized lifestyle informed by wellness science, I offer a second tier of a more intensive style of coaching in the Energy Program, that I call “Energy Coaching.” In the Energy Program, I pay attention to the energy behind your words. I notice the energy signature of the non-verbal emotional tones. I observe body language to engage pattern recognition on how your words are used to impart your meaning. In this way, I am able to help you find where you are losing energy - where you are feeling drained and how this is happening from an energy perspective. Using a method based on a combination of neuroscience and meditation, I clarify the energetics of your core belief systems and help you see which core beliefs cause you pain and which uplift you. When I pay attention to the energy in this way, your obstacles to growth can be identified more quickly than in some other approaches to transformation. The energy coaching can help you on a deeper level so that you create more profound and lasting change.
Paying attention to the energy of a person is not mysterious - it is simply a culmination of years of training and skill development. Some of the energy that I read can be measured by scientific devices. However, humans with specific trainings and skills can sense the energetics and help you see these more clearly to effect change.
When you investigate the science of who you truly are, you learn that you are essentially made of energy. The energy of your body and mind can be measured in a variety of waveforms. For example, an electroencephalograph, or EEG, measures brainwaves. An electrocardiogram, or ECG, measures heart waves. The MUSE headband measures brainwaves. The emWave biofeedback device measures the waves of variable heart rate variability. The waves of energy that move through our physical body in response to beliefs and ideas in the mind, are measurable and exist. Although not visible to the naked eye, the waveforms can be sensed, read, mapped and shifted through practise.
When you want to shift how you show up in your life, you have to shift your energetics. If there is an obstacle that you can not yet overcome, you can get closer to moving past the obstacle when you understand the hidden aspects of the energy behind the obstacle. If there is struggle, suffering or pain in you related to a specific issue, and you have not yet been able to move past the issue, you can get further once you understand the energy of what you are trying to create and how the energy of the obstacle is at odds with what you are trying to create.
The energy of your being can be understood as having several different layers. As well as quite a few other organizations, both modern and ancient, the Canadian Medical Association has identified the following four layers of your well being as being significant: physical, emotional, mental and spiritual.
1/ THE PHYSICAL LAYER
One layer of your energy is your physical self. The physical layers is composed of the cells of your body, the cells of the trillions of bacteria that also make up a part of the ecology of your body, and the measurable vibrations of the different organ systems of the body. Each clearly definable physical structure is in fact made up of vibrating molecules and waveforms that are energy. The energy oscillates in different frequencies. For example, your heart can oscillate at a variety of different frequencies. Some of these frequencies will benefit your physically, while others will wear at you physically. During the Energy Program coaching sessions, I sense these heart rhythms and coach you to shift these towards more beneficial heart rhythms. As a reminder, this is not therapy. This is not treatment for disease. Instead, this is a very specific type of coaching that is physical, as well as incorporating other layers of your being. In addition to coaching your heart rhythms, if needed, you review other personally relevant science-based strategies for physical well being in the areas of sleep, exercise, nutrition, brain health, connections to others and nature and your sense of purpose.
2/ THE EMOTIONAL LAYER
A second layer is your emotional self. You may have heard this referred to in modern literature as the “emotional body.” Bessel van der Kolk speaks to how this emotional body “keeps the score,” as the emotional body stores memory of past negative and positive experiences. The emotional body, similar to the physical body, holds a record of your history. The emotional body can become activated in various ways, sometimes creating a feeling of distress even when there is no actual threat. Emotions have been studied to show how they vibrate your form at different frequencies. Dr. Joe Dispenza has identified how survival emotions such as pain, victimization, guilt, shame and fear vibrate at lower and more “heavy “ frequencies that can drain us of vitality; whereas, emotions of gratitude, joy, appreciation, love and freedom oscillate at faster and “lighter” frequencies that build energy. During energy coaching, I note specific emotional patterns that either drain your energy, or uplift and support your vitality. I coach you to understand how to practise positive emotional patterns that lead to feeling uplifted and energized, and how to cope with negative emotional patterns that lead to suffering. Again, this is not treatment of emotional of physical illness or disease or disorder. Instead, this is a specific kind of coaching that teaches you how to recognize these emotional patterns, and then how to shift them for greater harmony, clarity, balance and energy. You also learn how to shift your emotional energy patterns for more connected relationships.
3/ THE MENTAL LAYER
A third layer is your mental layer of self, or the mind. In the mental layer, energy travels down branching pathways as electrical circuits that create specific networks of thought, and specific kinds of thought, that can sometimes be read as brainwave patterns. Your mind travels specific neural pathways, choosing different physical pathways that lead to different destinations of impressions and experiences. Different pathways activate different kinds of brain cells. Some pathways are travelled more frequently. Others are travelled less frequently or have not yet been brought into existence. You might think of the neural pathways as a series of roads that enable you to navigate the vast inner landscape of your consciousness - your consciousness being the realm of your experiences, ranging from past experiences to daydreams, which register in a similar brain architecture as do memories of actual events. Your experiences can be positive, negative, neutral. or somewhere in between. Your experiences can be painful, blissful, nondescript, or somewhere in between. Your experience can include a burst of creative insight, a dulling of the ability to see clearly, or can be a kind of lulling consistent wave of thought that might sooth or calm the mind. These examples of different experiences are like different ecological territories within. Sometimes a mental road might take you to a swamp and you experience being sorry for yourself and discouraged by the state of the world. Sometimes, a mental road might take you to the top of a mountain and you might look with glee and clarity over the experiences of your life with greater perspective, knowledge and inspiration. During coaching with me, you learn your keys to greater adaptive intelligence in understanding these inner territories so that you can navigate through life with more ease, starting with an understanding of what is happening within, mentally. In the energy coaching sessions, we have the space and time to observe these mental road maps and decide how to re-route, which roads to make bigger, which roads to allow to become smaller and less used, and where you might wish to build new roads.
4/ THE SPIRITUAL LAYER
A fourth layer is the spiritual layer. The word ‘spiritual’ can have a lot of different meanings for different people. So, in this layer, I focus on the aspect of the spiritual that includes the well-studied layer of your subconscious. You might think of this layer as a part of your psyche where who you are and how you feel about things is partially hidden. In this layer, hidden aspects of your inner programming can come to light through the coaching sessions. Here, the hidden emotional basis for what you have decided is your “rational decision making” can be observed in more detail. It is this hidden emotional basis that can have a dramatic and significant effect on how you live your life, and can create personal limitations that you may wish to overcome. The hidden emotional basis on this layer shows up in metaphor, stories of past experiences, stories of your future and non-verbal impressions that you access through a specific form of guided deep meditation. You begin to become aware of potentially erroneous or energy draining beliefs that lead to “rational decision-making'“ that drains you and limits you instead of uplifting and energizing you. You begin to challenge internal assumptions that actually do not contribute to your life and well being. During a transformative process called a Deep Dive, you encounter a limiting belief and, as you learn to allow this belief to dissolve, you then make space to discover, from the infinite source of your innate wisdom, an expansive belief. Again, this is not therapy and is not a telling of you what to do. Instead this style of approach creates the space for you to listen to your inner wisdom that is revealed through expert guidance. You explore the truth of who you truly are with a guide to take you to places where you can really, truly and deeply sense your own inner truth. This inner truth then becomes your guiding light, your true North, and your inner centre of gravity that, through practicing awareness of this truth, guides you in challenging times and difficult situations to choose words and actions that lead to greater success. In the Energy Program Coaching, the approach is designed to give you a greater understanding, identify a desired goal or outcome for the very specific kind of success you wish to experience in your life, and then work towards this outcome in your daily home practice.
There are other layers, but some of these will remain unique to what you bring to your sessions, and how you show up, and I will leave these always a bit mysterious, as within these other layers exist the kind of dynamic mystery that allows for a true magic of transformation.