The importance of rest and letting go of old wounds
Hello beautiful people,
IT’S CHRISTMAS EVE! 🎄 I am FEELING PUMPED! How about you?
I don’t know where all this energy and vibrancy has sprung from but I am feeling irritatingly chirpy, focused and (dare I say) powerful. No delusions of grandeur, just a legit experience of feeling good in myself.
At first, I was questioning it…. wait, why do I feel so good?! I am clearly forgetting something important I should be worrying about… Obviously the mind can go hunting and find a million things to fret about. But I decided not to ruin my own good mood and just bask in it, like a sleepy cat bathing in winter sunshine next to a toasty radiator 🐱
This month also marks the 1 YEAR of my weekly online breathwork sessions. Thank you SO much for all your lovely messages of congratulations with that milestone. To celebrate, I held a giveaway, and I’ve had a flurry of 1:1 coaching and breathwork sessions with people wanting to shift old patterns and stories.
It’s never too late to tell a new story about your life! More on that below.
I hope I can spread some of my warmth your way with this week’s Friday Feels, inspired by coaching, meditation and breathwork.
1. Song of the week
O Holy Night by A. Adam, arr. J. Rutter (Listen on Spotify or watch on YouTube; it’s quite captivating to see it sung by the choir!)
As a child of the 80s, Home Alone and thus this song featured a lot for me growing up. I felt like singing it the other day when swimming in a lake (mainly to distract myself from the cold). I realised I didn’t know the lyrics and so I started to make them up!
“O Holy Night, the stars are brightly shining!
The ducks are swimming by me with mirth,
The water is freezing it is freezing my butt off,
I feel the cold despite my belly’s girth…”
You get the idea 😉 What’s your favourite Christmas carol? I’d love to know!
2. Quote of the week
“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.” ― T.E. Lawrence
I first heard this quote when watching Lawrence of Arabia. I remember seeing it in a packed London cinema screening *just* before the first lockdown in 2020. Such an epic film! I’d strongly recommend watching it – maybe it’s one to watch over Xmas?!
With feeling so vibrant and excited about the future, I have felt an authentic drive and desire, which has been further fuelled by my coaching clients and their epic wins. May you dream with your eyes open, Day Dreamer!
3. Practice of the week
REST!
I used to *always* get sick at this time of year. I’d either get white spots on my throat or end up with the flu knocking me out for 2 weeks 🤒
After some rather brutal lessons with unmanaged stress and anxiety over the years, I am much more in tune with my body. I recognise the signs and signals of being off balance and know the red flags that mean I am beginning to get poorly. It’s then that I slow down, do less, sleep more, eat well, drink plenty of fluids, do breathwork and cold water swimming to support my immune system. I’m grateful for good health and being able to rest. Rest. Rest. Rest. I wish you all rest and good health too.
4. Article of the week
Samadhi Movie, 2021- Part 3 – “The Pathless Path” ☯️
If you fancy a big dollop of spiritual awakening this Christmas, I’d find a quiet 90 minutes to watch this excellent movie. If you haven’t seen Part 1 or 2 yet, start there first.
Like a lotus flower emerging from the mud, perhaps we are evolving towards the light. The old societal structures are decaying and providing the rich soil for something new to be born…🌸
5. Client win of the week
“I liked the way you described my experiences as a story that we don’t need to carry forwards.”
During a 1:1 coaching and breathwork session with a client this week, she opened up about past trauma that was dominating her mind and causing her to doubt her intuition. We all carry wounds from the past and the stories we tell ourselves – the memories and our interpretations of those events – often continue to shape our thinking and how we see the world. I refer to these memories and thoughts as stories, because they can change depending on how you look at them: “when we change the way we look at things, the things we look at change”. What if you didn’t need to stay stuck in your old story?
Neurons fire and wire together as you ruminate on the past. This shapes the thought energy in the brain. As long as we continue to devote awareness and headspace to the past, it will continue to echo into the present moment. But we can’t ignore the past either. The only way out is through: to explore the stories and feel the feelings connected to them. What new stories do you want to welcome in? And what stories do you want to let go of? As we head to the end of the year, now is a perfect time to let go of old stories.
If you’re feeling triggered around this time of year, here’s a reminder of the journalling prompts I emailed previously, to help you work through those triggers. I’ve also got a blog post for you: How to deal with Christmas triggers. These featured at a virtual retreat I ran with my friend Briana Pharos. Bri is totally awesome – I learn so much from her! I’d recommend you check out my interview with her here from earlier in December.
Whatever you are up to this week, I am sending you love, peace and warmth ✨
Big Christmassy love 🎄
Briony x
P.S. Here are some upcoming awesome events I’m hosting that may interest you:
Wednesday 29th Dec 2021 at 8pm GMT: Join my warm snuggly 60-minute online breathwork session. Register for free here.
Sunday 2nd Jan 2022: Release and Renew Breathwork Workshop – a 3-hour in-person workshop (ticketed), with coaching exercises and reviewing lessons learned in 2021 and identifying goals/desires for 2022. Buy your ticket here.
P.P.S. What is this Friday Feels email about? In case you’re reading this for the first time (hello!), I share a weekly email with snippets from my world of coaching, meditation and breathwork. My intention is to share useful, joyful or interesting tidbits, which may serve you in some way 🙏
