When is enough enough?
How much pain do we endure before something in us finally says?
I can keep living this way.
Some people seem to be able to recognize fairly quickly when something isn't working and make a change.
I wasn't one of those people.
I could endure,
I could adapt,
I could push through.
I could find ways to function inside circumstances that were causing me enormous pain.
And for a long time,
I thought that was strength.
And in some ways it was,
It helped me survive.
But I've come to understand that sometimes our greatest survival strengths can also become the very things that allow us to remain in suffering.
Hi,
I'm John.
I'm an energy healing practitioner.
And suffering has played an enormous role in my own healing journey.
And not because I believe suffering is necessary for healing.
And certainly not because I believe there's anything noble about suffering.
But because in my own life,
I often didn't make significant changes until my suffering became impossible for me to ignore.
And the truth is,
I knew I was suffering long before that.
I can see it all the way back into my 20s.
Relationships were one of the first places where my deeper wounds became visible.
A relationship would end and suddenly so much would become to the surface.
Abandonment,
Fear,
Grief,
Rejection.
The feeling that something was wrong with me.
And when that happened,
I would go looking for answers.
I would read.
I would explore different kinds of healing or therapy.
I would try to understand myself.
And some of it helped.
I don't look back now and think none of it mattered because simply deeper healing came later.
I was doing what I knew how to do.
I was also listening in the ways I knew how to listen.
And eventually I would feel better.
Life would reorganize and I would keep going.
But some of the deeper patterns remained.
And later in my life,
Intimate relationships were no longer the primary place where those wounds were being activated.
For me,
It became work.
Different circumstances,
Different relationships.
But underneath them were some very familiar feelings.
Authority.
Recognition.
Belonging.
Abandonment.
Safety.
And once again,
I endured.
I thought,
I analyzed,
I tried to change the circumstances.
I try to get people to understand.
Try to make things work.
Until eventually,
In my early 50s,
I reached a point where I couldn't do it anymore.
I was brought to my knees.
And something became very clear to me.
I have to heal this.
No more excuses.
I didn't know what healing was going to look like.
I didn't know where it was going to lead me.
I just knew that I was no longer willing to keep living the way I had been living.
And there's a saying that I've always liked.
Nothing changes if nothing changes.
Eventually,
I had to confront that in myself.
I could keep searching for answers.
I could keep trying to understand why I was suffering.
I could keep wishing the circumstances would change.
I could keep waiting for other people to change.
But at some point I had to participate in my own healing.
Nobody could do that for me.
Other people could support me.
Teachers could guide me.
Practitioners could work with me.
I could be given tools and practices.
But eventually,
I had to take the first step.
And then another.
And another.
And for me,
One of those steps eventually led me to energy healing.
And that began a very different relationship with my body.
My emotional life,
And the wounds I had been carrying for decades.
I began learning how to stay with myself.
How to feel what was happening in my body.
How to listen instead of immediately trying to fix what I was feeling.
And eventually how to turn towards some of the very things I had spent much of my life trying not to feel.
And I wish I could tell you I did all of that because suddenly I became incredibly courageous.
I didn't.
I think I finally did it because the way I was living had become more painful than the uncertainty of changing it.
And looking back now,
I find myself wondering.
Did it have to get that bad?
Did I have to wait until I was brought to my knees?
I don't believe I did.
And I certainly don't believe anyone needs to hit bottom before they're allowed to change.
But I do know that eventually my suffering became louder than my ability to keep managing it.
And maybe you recognize some version of this in your own life.
Because so often suffering becomes impossible to ignore when something in our lives changes.
A relationship ends.
Someone we love dies.
We lose a job or the job becomes unbearable.
Our health changes.
Something we depended upon disappears.
And suddenly something becomes visible.
Sometimes the pain we're feeling belongs to exactly what is happening right now.
Lost Herbs.
Grief hurts.
Rejection hurts.
Being treated badly hurts.
We don't need to turn every painful experience into a childhood wound.
But sometimes what is happening now can also be touching something much older.
And we may not immediately know that.
I certainly didn't always know.
Sometimes I just knew this hurt.
But now I think there's another question we can ask.
What is this suffering asking me to stop ignoring?
Because sometimes the circumstances change,
But the pattern doesn't.
The relationship ends,
But something familiar appears in the next relationship.
We leave one situation,
But eventually find ourselves experiencing something very familiar somewhere else.
We promise ourselves we'll never do something again.
And somehow we end up back in that familiar place.
That doesn't mean we caused what happened,
And it doesn't mean every difficult experience is secretly a wound we need to heal.
But repetition can be information.
Our reactions can be information.
The things we continually endure can be information.
And maybe we don't always have to wait until they become unbearable before we listen.
Maybe we can begin listening much earlier.
This keeps hurting.
This keeps repeating.
Been here before.
I keep having the same reaction.
I keep abandoning myself in the same way.
I keep telling myself that this is simply something I have to live with.
And maybe that's enough information.
There was a time in my own life I had identified what I believed was one of my deepest wounds.
I knew it was there.
Try to heal it.
And eventually,
I essentially decided,
I'm just going to have to learn to live with this.
And I did for years.
Until eventually I reach that moment,
No more excuses,
I have to heal this.
And after completing several significant emotional responses connected to wounds from my childhood,
Something I once believed I simply had to live with,
Changed.
So now I wonder whether we can recognize enough before we reach the point where we can't take anymore.
Maybe you already know something isn't working.
Maybe you've known for a long time.
Maybe someone has offered you help.
Maybe you already have a practice you know supports you,
But you keep putting it on.
Maybe there's a phone call you know you need to make.
A boundary you need to set.
An appointment you need to schedule.
A conversation you need to have.
And maybe the first step is even smaller than that.
Five minutes of grounding in the morning.
Sitting quietly with yourself.
Writing down what you're actually feeling.
Asking for support.
Letting yourself acknowledge,
I'm not okay with this continuing this way.
Doing something different doesn't necessarily mean turning your entire life upside down tomorrow.
And healing doesn't mean we have to do everything alone.
I don't believe that at all.
We need one another.
We need support.
And sometimes we need professional help.
Sometimes we need community.
Sometimes we need someone beside us while we do something we don't yet know how to do alone.
But nobody else can participate in our own healing for us.
At some point,
There is a step that belongs to us.
And we have to be willing to take it.
Not perfectly,
Not fearlessly.
Not because we suddenly have everything figured out.
Because nothing changes if nothing changes.
So maybe the question isn't.
How much more can I take?
Maybe it's.
.
.
Why am I waiting until I can't take anymore?
And I want to say that gently.
Because sometimes we genuinely aren't ready yet.
Sometimes we don't have the resources.
We don't have enough support.
We don't feel safe enough.
We may not even understand what's happening.
I look back at the younger versions of myself with that understanding.
I don't think that man in his 20s was refusing to heal.
He was trying.
He just didn't yet have everything he would eventually need.
But I also know there came a point when that next step was mine.
And I had to take it.
So if you recognize yourself somewhere in this,
Maybe you don't need to figure out your entire life today.
Maybe just ask yourself.
What keeps hurting?
What have I been continually enduring?
What have I convinced myself I simply have to live with?
And is there one small step I already know I could take?
Because I used to think enough was the moment when I couldn't take anymore.
And I don't believe that now.
Maybe enough is the moment when I recognize this keeps hurting.
This keeps repeating.
And I don't want to keep abandoning myself just because I know how to survive it.
You don't have to wait until you're brought to your knees.
Maybe you can begin with one question.
What have I been enduring?
That I'm finally willing to listen to.
Thank you for joining me.
I'm John.
Take good care of yourself,
And I'll see you next time.
