How Behavioral Patterns Affect the Body

Allow Me to Share a Personal Revelation

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I find myself to be an endless science project. For years I have been watching myself, behaviorally, habitually, energetically, and physically. And it never ceases to amaze me that with all the healing I’ve done, there are always more avenues to explore and lessons to learn.

Most recently, my physical body has made me aware of a very deep behavioral pattern that I’ve carried for years.

Our bodies speak our minds. I firmly believe this, and there is enough science now to back it up. Physical ailments rarely if ever, come out of nowhere. We may be able to trace them to a specific injury, but if we dig deeper, we may find the pain began with a behavioral/energetic pattern born long ago.

This is what I have discovered about myself recently. So, here’s my confession.

Over the last couple of months, I have had an injury make its way deeper and further up my body. What began as heel pain, eventually created searing hip pain and lower back pain. And I know the moment it began. I was teaching my strength class and using the bosu balance trainer, which I love, to enhance my squats and lunges.

Determined to get even stronger!

There were two things working against me immediately, which I should have noticed. Of course if I had, then I wouldn’t have realized my pattern and learned this valuable lesson.

I digress.

First, the bosu was not properly inflated, and second, I was not using sturdy enough shoes. I began feeling a little pain in my heel, and I powered through it for a time. Then I tossed the shoes out and kept going with more supportive ones. Then, I inflated my bosu and kept going. Then I stopped using the bosu, but kept going with the lunges and squats.

I didn’t give my heel time to rest; I just adjusted to what I thought would work better.

It wasn’t long before I began altering my gait on walks to compensate for the heel and ankle pain. This eventually led to discomfort in my hip and lower back. I tried to stretch it out, roll it out, and energetically move it out, but it wouldn’t budge.

A little over a week ago the pain became bad enough that I stopped doing all activity, including walking and even stretching. I laid off completely, as challenging as that is for me. And I could feel some improvement, until I was taking groceries in from the house one day.

And the pattern emerged…

Though my intuition said, “take more than one trip in with the groceries”, my habitual thinking pattern said, “just carry it all – you’ve got this!”

I carried it all, and halfway in, I felt burning and searing pain that I knew was going to set me way back.

As I was sitting with my partner eating dinner that night, I remarked about how bad my hips were hurting. And how I knew that I had exacerbated the injury.

And I said sarcastically, “I just had to bring in both grocery bags. I just couldn’t do it one at a time.” And then I told him, “my whole life I have been that way. Oh, I can lift that, I can do that, I can carry that. I’m strong! Nothing stops me!”

I laughed, as I realized that this has been my MO for as long as I can recall. Maybe my body is finally tired of carrying all the physical weight my mind insists I can. In that moment, I had a memory that would explain why I developed this as a personality trait and behavioral pattern.

When I was a little kid, everyone wanted to pick me up.

I was, and still am, very small. Currently just under 4’11” tall. Even kids who were younger than me wanted to pick me up, and did.  And it really fired me up.

Whenever anyone would do that, I would just say “I can pick you up too!” And I would proceed to do so, and try to pick them up even higher, to prove I was stronger. I may be little, but I am strong!

My poor little back.

I can see how this pattern proceeded throughout life for me. This, proving I was strong. And it has worked for me. It gave me confidence, and helped me feel powerful, which I needed. It helped me feel safer to be tough. I’m grateful for my strength.

The patterns we carry in our lives work for us, until they don’t.

This is what the current pain I am in is teaching me. I am 50 now, and though before the injury, I never felt older than 20-something, my body is feeling my age.

Yet I know it is more than that.

My body wants to embrace softening. My soul is ready for me to let go of this heavy masculine, needing to be so strong to carry everything energy, so I can fully embody my feminine healer self.

I have realized this pattern of working my body so hard and then trying to fix it so hard through an injury. And now realize what a masculine energy that is.

If I am in my feminine, and softening. I am allowing rest. I am soothing my body. I am not angry at it or forcing it.

I am nurturing it.

I realize that I cannot force my body out of this pain. There’s no pushing through it this time. And this letting go, is deeper than this current injury. This is 45 years of clenching, ready to release.

Deep breath.

I breath out my need to handle it all, figure it all out, prove my strength, and carry everything.

This is the first time I’ve had pain that screamed loud enough for me to recognize this deep long held pattern.

I thank my body, my soul, and my guides for this powerful lesson.

Thank you for showing me what I must let go of at this stage of my life.

I surrender control.

I surrender the need to carry everything.

I don’t have to be the strongest person. I have nothing to prove.

This is a decades long habit of holding on tightly. I know it will take time to unravel.

Fortunately, the divine feminine and my soul self is never in a rush, like the masculine energy and ego would be. The feminine allows time, space, comfort and support.

I will heal, and I am healing.

I release this pattern lovingly.

I hope by reading about my experiences, you may get to know yourself a little better.

Can you trace your life to see what patterns you may be holding onto that no longer serve you in the now?

Can you sense that your body may be trying to communicate with you?

Where may you be forcing, and where could you soften?

I hope you give yourself grace, time, and space to truly listen to your body.

Love and Light,

Kristina