In 2006 I graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Physical Therapy. I chose to start my physical therapy career in Moose Jaw. I worked for several employers in Moose Jaw over the years, starting at the hospital and then moving into private practice from there. I was always searching for something more…
Just a few years into this career, I was a stress-bucket. Bosses controlled my schedule which often meant doing my dambdest to accommodate their unrealistic demands. There were interpersonal conflicts everywhere – amongst workers, between professions, with insurance companies offering sponsored programs, with patient employers, with my bosses/ owners/ managers… yet I still tried and tried with all my might to please everyone, not yet realizing it is a broken system, it’d never be enough, they’d always just take-take-take, there’d never be acknowledgement, and it’d never ever end. There was bullying. There was power-over. There was every single type of conflict you could imagine.
Right about the time I was ready to walk away, I was introduced to the Integrated Systems Model. I was worn out, exhausted, in adrenal fatigue amongst a host of other things like digestive issues, inability to sleep, anxiety etc. I literally had to give myself a “pep talk” every morning to convince myself to go to work… sometimes the pep talk had to occur first thing upon waking, again while getting ready, and again while sitting in my car after parking at work. I was plagued with migraines and several physical injuries including disc herniations where I had to constantly manage nerve pain. I was not well. And every time I just got going into a good exercise routine, I hurt something else or flared a pre-existing injury, and was derailed from my exercise routine once again.
So I immediately signed up for the training in Vancouver and started on my path to becoming an ISM-Certified Physical Therapist and opening Within Physical Therapy. And for a while, I thought I’d found that something more…
While the holistic ISM model was hands-down, for me, a far superior method to conventional physical therapy, there were some things that just didn’t change. Yes, I worked for myself and I was a much better boss. Yes, I had more flexibility to manage my schedule how I saw fit. Yes, I avoided a tremendous amount of stress by choosing not to work with insurance providers or those that offered sponsored programs. Yes, overall my entire world was much better… But, the system was/is still broken. And I still carried far too much responsibility for one person. Many clients were wonderful to work with. But many weren’t ready to take responsibility for their own well-being and were difficult to work with. I started to realize it’d never ever end. The health and wellness industry is not an easy one.
In March, 2017 I started on my journey with Training in Power (TIP). Addressing energetic patterns allowed me to let go of all the over-responsibility I was burdened with. I learned how to establish boundaries and how to avoid placing myself in lose-lose situations, or any situation where I was made to sacrifice myself in time, energy, or head-space. I learned to recognize unhealthy energetic patterns amongst clients, family members, and friends. I learned the dynamics that triggered anxiety and used my anxiety as a tool and a hint that more boundaries were needed here.
More importantly, I learned to have immense gratitude for the awesome and well-intended clients I was honored to work with – those who generally wanted to heal, do the work, learn, and improve. And I was (and still am!) so thankful that the bulk of my caseload was made up of awesome clients. And I learned, that I loved I co-learning right alongside those clients. It was a collaboration, a team effort, a partnership. I learned this is what physical therapy (and any other health service) is meant to be, but is such a rarity. I also learned that those well intended and awesome clients were also consistently and repeatedly battling the same battles and energetic patterns I was. They were always under extremely high stress whether they recognized it or not. They thought it was their duty to fix everyone and everything, please everyone, accommodate, put up with this or that, settle, and they were always the ones doing the sacrificing. They were amidst interpersonal conflicts everywhere whether it involved work, family, or a relationship. They were in some sort of bullying or power-over dynamic, again whether they recognized it or not.
It was at this point I learned that hands-on treatment, no matter how brilliant and innovative and effective, can only take you so far and for true healing, the energetic patterns must be addressed. And if we all just slow down, and stop and pause to tune to our intuition, we can start to avoid being pulled into the same energetic patterns over and over again. And we are the only ones who can change our own energetic patterns. It takes us, working on us. We can then start to walk a new path, lay down some new tracks, and create the life we think is only available to us in our dreams.
So, thank you to all the difficult clients and family/ friends for teaching me that just because I offered a service and was in a service-profession, that did not mean I had to carry you. Thank you for teaching me it was not my job to take on your unhealthy patterns. Thank you for teaching me I didn’t owe you anything – no matter the circumstance. Thank you for teaching me it was never my duty to try to win you over or convince you of a belief or system you had no regard for. Thank you for teaching me I deserved nothing but respect and appreciation for being me, and for the innovative and unique skillset I offered to the community of Moose Jaw. Thank you for showing me all the ways our system is still broken, and for showing me how far we have yet to go to not only recognize quality alternative professionals but to also value such professionals… instead of holding the mainstream way as somehow being superior, when it just isn’t.
And thank you for the greatest lesson of all – that my life’s journey, my soul purpose, was to be an intuitive and energetic healer. I just took the scenic route to get here…
