𝐔𝐍𝐑𝐀𝐕𝐄𝐋𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐀𝐃𝐃𝐈𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍, 𝐁𝐄𝐆𝐈𝐍𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐑𝐄𝐂𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐉𝐎𝐔𝐑𝐍𝐄𝐘 – 𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓’𝐒 𝐈𝐍𝐕𝐎𝐋𝐕𝐄𝐃

Addiction (of any sort) is a way of managing pain where the individual just simply doesn’t have the resources to know what else to do.

It is not personal weakness, it is not a character flaw, it is not a moral failing.

Nor is it a gene that is passed on in families. That’s just part of the collective BS around addiction that justifies why we can’t heal or why we are pre-disposed to behaving addictively. Yes, of course addiction is created in families, behaviors and coping methods are learned and trauma is created (and as we heal we can certainly have empathy for our whanau who have also suffered ahead of us), but it’s not what we’ve been led to believe.

What does get passed through families is inter-generational trauma and genes for sensitivity (rather than addiction – there is no actual gene for addiction). If we have the gene for sensitivity and grow up chaos, we are doubly disadvantaged. Usually when this is our situation, we weren’t attuned to, supported emotionally or guided in our lives either. It is therefore no wonder in our trauma based, separate from each other, toxic Western society, that addiction occurs. Research is now also proving if the mother was stressed while pregnant that baby is far more likely to be addicted later in life.

Many people with addiction feel a deep sense of toxic shame. Not just about their addiction, but on every level of their being. They feel bad for just being here and like every part of them is to blame or is wrong for something. I see clients who have been abused from the moment they got here until now. For them it is obvious why they are addicted, but they still feel shame. What is often even more difficult to identify reconcile is those clients who were neglected emotionally, but weren’t beated, abused or molested. For them working out why they feel so wrong, like they don’t fit and they have the emotional patterns they do, just doesn’t make sense.

People think if they didn’t have big T trauma, they don’t deserve to be dysfunctional and often have a much deeper sense of being personally flawed, because they think it’s a deficit within themselves that is to blame. On top of that, their families may have appeared functional within society or to the outside world, so they are doubly living in a secret world of pain and shame, which is totally confusing to them.

Usually my addicted clients have sought help, sometimes many times over, but they either weren’t fully ready and/or the help they received was wrong. These clients often do really well with me because unconsciously at least, they know what they need as they’ve already discovered what doesn’t work and they are truly ready.

I offer:

• Trauma informed therapy and somatic work for releasing trauma from the body, neural pathways and energy field. This is psychotherapeutic and relates your early childhood experience directly to how perceptions operating now, are tripping you up.
• Body work that operates on the neural pathways, energy field and being. (For those who live near me or in another part of New Zealand and who wish to take a ‘healing holiday’ for several days to my area and do several sessions of intensive work together).
• Powerful facilitation which is energetic, spiritual and psychological.
• Neuro linguistics. I teach you how your language creates and how to change your story to create success.
• Positive psychology coaching – I show you what’s right about you, your past and your experiences that you’ve been missing. It’s pretty hard to see this for ourselves when we’ve been caught in suffering.
• Bio-energetics, I teach about energy and how this relates to emotion and about how to manage frequency as a completely different system of self management.
• I show you how to use your intuition and awareness to create an amazing life. Addictive clients are highly perceptive and intuitive.
• Laws of the Universe and pragmatic modern tools for putting this wisdom into practice. how this relates to their life experience, and I always find, this is natural to them.
• I treat all my clients with dignity and respect and show them how much insight and awareness their suffering has taught them.
• Your unique brilliance. We look at their capacities which have been hiding beneath all their pain and trauma and bring those forth. Related to this and to your experience is your soul purpose, connecting with this can be a process or you may already know it.
• I teach empowering tools/skills and perspectives for processing life, so you feel alive, safe and like you have a shot at decent future without the legacy of the past.

I love working with many of my addicted clients, because they have never been attuned to, held in safety, honored, seen for who they are or told there is anything valuable about them. Once this is provided, they can begin the journey of healing themselves, unpacking their purpose and letting go of the past in ways that allow them to finally start believing in themselves and moving forwards. There is a lot of joy for them in experiencing this and a lot of sadness, grief and loss in their process too, because this is the legacy they have endured. Having real support makes such a difference here.

In my experience what is often invaluable is someone impartial who knows what it’s like to think addictively, who’s been through there too and unravelled it for themselves and who knows the pathway to healing and recovery and can guide you on yours. Given that addiction is a response to deep emotional pain and trauma, once healing is well underway, the need to use will subside on it’s own. Of course old urges and pain will arise from time to time, that is natural, but it’s all part of the process. Addiction doesn’t have to be a life sentence any more and I strongly disagree with the 12 step mantra that “I have a cunning, baffling, powerful disease” that is more potent than me and that I am helpless in the face of.

Take charge of your life through doing the work of recovery and your issue won’t be avoiding addiction, it will be how to live the best life possible and become who you have always wanted to be. You might even become obsessed with personal growth, healing and living your soul purpose. You are not helpless, nor powerless, you are a powerful, infinite being having a human experience and once you are properly empowered with knowledge and information you have been lacking, you can succeed enormously if that’s what you want, possibly beyond your wildest dreams. I often find with these clients they are more resourceful, wise and resilient than others because of what they have endured, so success is not as unobtainable as what they expect.

Where life-coaching differs from other ways of dealing with things, is that it focuses on what’s right about you, you’ve been missing. We focus on dealing with your deep emotional pain, acknowledging, releasing and learning from it, re-aligning and supporting your body to recover. Bringing meaning to your experience, connecting you to your special qualities and capacities and helping you develop these and supporting you with learning to reframe things, become non reactive, create amazing health and wellness, develop your self awareness and intuition and let go of toxic shame and heal from it. Whilst our broken self will often tell us long and loud we are the one person for whom this stuff won’t work, that’s never true. If you want it, there’s a reason why you want it. If recovery is tapping you on the shoulder and you are dreaming of the life you always wanted, what do you have to lose?

I have a few mentorship places available for one on one work in 2022, before my study commitments begin and am looking to work with a few select clients committed to creating their future and uncovering their greatness. I look forward to receiving your message and meeting you soon. If you are in New Zealand you may wish to come to Nelson and book in depth sessions over a week, followed by working together online once you are back home.