Harness the Simplicity of Plant Essences, Child’s Pose, and Brainspotting to Help with Grief & Letting Go
We've arrived! Nature makes her grand exhale from Late Summer into Autumn (though it’s still warm in Phoenix). A favorite time of year for many. The spirit of Autumn guides our emotional and physical capacity to let go of clutter, past grief, long-held emotions, and patterns that no longer serve us.
What catches my attention most this Autumn season is the intersection of grief and gratitude. In the therapy room, I see the struggle to allow grief and gratitude to co-exist in the process of change, as if one cancels out the other. I'm joining with clients by leaning in to the messy middle. It can be both: Sadness for what is no longer, or what has not yet come to pass. Gratitude for the smallest glimmers in the empty spaces carved out by change, even loss.
Allowing room for both, we can create room for acceptance. Acceptance helps us release the either-or tension, making space to breathe in the both-and. A full cycle of breath. Beginning and ending. Just like the natural world around us and in us.
Practical Application: What is Autumn asking you to release? Create room for? Where can you soften into a little more into acceptance? This season, clients were invited to write one thing they were ready to release, which they physically left behind in the box in my office (shown above). Then, they wrote down one thing they are making room for. I invite you to do the same.
To navigate transition, I've included a few of my favorite, simple go-to's for Autumn below:
Essential Oil: Cardamom
Cardamom is a warming spice supportive to the circulatory and digestive systems — each affected by grief. Crafted into a chai tea or as an essential oil, it is a staple in my home and office, facilitating stagnant emotions in the body, inviting warmth into the heart. It is especially helpful when incorporated as aromatherapy in grief work, providing a deep sense of comfort, grounding, and calm.
Flower Essence: Elm for Overwhelm
Like herbs, essential oils, and homeopathic remedies, flower essences have healing properties supportive to emotional and physical well-being. Elm is known for its calming, soothing effect on the central nervous system and psyche, helping our systems to let go and adjust to transitions and change—like Autumn’s shorter days and cooler temperatures. Consider elm for seasonal overwhelm.
Somatic Support: Child’s Pose
Child’s Pose is a gentle, resting yoga stretch assisting with letting go. It helps us turn inward to release tension along the spine. It can be very conducive to processing grief and helping us soften into life’s major transitions. It’s often referred to as a pose for surrender.
Brainspotting for Life Transitions
Transitions, whether seasonal or personal, can bring about grief, anxiety, depression, and worry about the future. A core fear I hear often in the therapy room is: “I don’t know what’s next, and that is so scary.” Brainspotting therapy is a gentle, nervous system-based approach that can help us move through change with more ease and grace, adjusting to new circumstances from a place of possibility.
Discover more about Brainspotting therapy at Calm Hearts Counseling in Mesa, Arizona here.
Here's to honoring cycles, within and without us. As natural as breathing. May your letting go be gentle and graceful. I'm right alongside you.
With Heart,
Christine
Christine Slomski, MS, LPC is a Licensed Psychotherapist in Mesa, Arizona. Her practice, Calm Hearts Counseling, serves Arizona (in-person and virtual) and Idaho (virtual only) using Brainspotting, EMDR, EFT Tapping and Somatic Therapies to heal trauma, grief, anxiety, fertility struggles, miscarriage, reproductive loss, and women’s mental health issues.
Hi, I’m Christine Slomski, a Licensed Professional Counselor, Brainspotting & EMDR Therapist, EFT Tapping Practitioner & Reproductive Trauma & Grief Specialist in Mesa, Arizona. I’d love to help you come home to Calm.
In-person & virtual counseling services for Mesa, Gilbert, Chandler, Tempe, and Arizona statewide.
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