Messages from the unconscious mind

The unconscious mind is sending you messages.

Are you listening?

Have you heard this saying before?

God will only give you what you can handle, and won’t give you what you can’t handle.

I am not very religious, but after working as a therapist for many years, I see the truth in this saying.

However, I would like you to substitute God for "the unconscious".

This is a story of a client of mine that was shown powerful messages by her unconsciousness, freaked out about them, and decided to seek help to understand and resolve the problem that she was experiencing.

First, some facts about the unconsciousness

• Unconscious is a place that ALWAYS takes care of you. IT IS ITS MAIN JOB.

• The unconscious is something you are not aware of or you can not control.

• 96% of what we are and do is unconscious: feelings, thoughts, beliefs, memories, and bodily functions.

Have you tried controlling any of this? Tried controlling your heartbeat, a feeling, a thought?

If I ask you to start feeling afraid right now, can you do it?

Or if I ask you to stop your anxiety, can you do it?

Can you slow down your heart rate, or lower your blood pressure?

Go ahead, try.

Can you do any of it?

• Another curious fact about the unconsciousness is it is a place of NO limits, yet it can limit you in the worst way in order to protect you.

• It’s a place of creativity and choice and yet, it can take your choices away because this is better for protecting you at the time.

Let's go back to my client, whom I call Tiff. (not the real name for privacy consideration)

Out of the blue, Tiff developed an intense phobia of stairs.

She had a successful, high-flying job that she really enjoyed, a happy family, and a great relationship with her husband; all in all her life seemed very normal and comfortably settled.

Suddenly, she started having a recurring dream of stairs, falling off stairs and dying. The dream felt very realistic. She would wake up in cold sweat. In the mornings, she couldn't shake off the nightmarish feeling from the dream. The dream had such a powerful impact on Tiff, that she began to worry about stairs in real life. She lived in a three-story house and her work office was located on the second floor in a building without an elevator. She started dreading stairs and having suffocating sensations and panic attacks at home and at work.

When she came to see me, she was really puzzled over and fearful of this sudden onset of phobia. She couldn’t make sense of why this was happening. Her life was settled, her work was going great, her family life was good, and her kids were growing up.

"Why now? she asked. Am I having a premonition about something terrible about to happen to me?"

This thought caused more fear and panic.

One thing about premonition is this. If it comes with a strong feeling of fear, anxiety,or worry- it is not a premonition. If you were to experience a genuine premonition, it would come with a clear sense of detachment, void of any strong feelings. You just know. Premonition is knowing, like knowing a fact.

So when I saw her, I told her this about premonitions.

Another thing I told her was this.

"Your unconsciousness might be showing you something it believes you are ready to process, and to deal with. It is ready to help you resolve something, which will help you to move further in life. It might want you to learn something. You might be at the stage when you are ready to receive this help, healing, and learning. "

This gave her some comfort and she experienced a sense of gratitude and curiosity toward knowing more about this phobia.

The unconscious knows how it’s been protecting you and it knows that you are ready to unload some fears or negative feelings to get even better at life, to get better things and better experiences.

Something interesting happened in Tiff's session. She realized that she was holding too much control over too many things in her life. As a result, she was running out of batteries and energy to keep doing things this way. The old way stopped working and she needed to find better ways.

She was stuck in this loop.

"I want to have it all, I worked hard to build it all: my career, my family life. To grow further, I have to work harder. The harder I work, the more I stress, the less rest I have, and my body, mind, and soul get tired. Burnout is how it has to be. "

In a way, she sacrificed her own well-being for this idea that she can have it all. She saw no other way but to control everything through stress and martyrdom. The only choice she felt she had was to sacrifice herself in order to have it all.

In the session, however, she came up with new creative ideas on how to live her life, and the solutions that came were simple and elegant, like little or big aha moments. She started seeing choices.

Since the session, Tiff has stopped seeing the dream, and all symptoms associated with stairs disappeared. She adjusted a lot of things in her life in a clever and creative way, to make sure that she still has it all, has a life-work balance, and takes good care of herself while building the life she wants.

She listened to her unconsciousness, she asked for help and she received it. She allowed the solution to come up for her, exactly the way she needed it.

Today, pay attention to and listen to the messages from your unconsciousness.

Believe in its benevolent power to protect, heal, and teach you.

These messages from unconsciousness come in the forms of feelings, emotions, sensations, bodily reactions, and dreams, like in Tiff's case.

I want to hear from you. Leave me a message below.

What messages from the unconscious have you been receiving? (feelings, sensations, dreams, bodily reactions)