Healing, Everything is Temporary

Contributed by Natasha Akery

My name is Natasha Akery. I am a high school English teacher, wife, and mother. I live a beautiful and blessed life with PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder), panic disorder, and generalized depression. The themes of my life revolve around healing, relationships, and spiritual faith. I have always been very proactive in seeking mental health and stability, but it is only recently that I realized healing doesn't mean "to not experience pain."

At the end of a Jivamukti yoga class some years ago, the teacher asked the students to lie down in savasana, which is basically a supine position on your mat. The teacher turned off the lights and began to talk about mula bandha, which is the Sanskrit term for the act of flexing your pelvic floor. It is more than an act; it is associated with one's foundation, identity, and roots.

Lying on the floor in a dark room triggered my post-traumatic stress and I started to panic silently. The teacher just happened to begin explaining that part of mula bandha is sitting with the pain we might be experiencing instead of trying to run from it. I was actively trying to keep flashbacks and other sensations away, but when the teacher said this I decided to surrender to those scary feelings. Yes, it was painful, but it was also temporary. Eventually, those sensations passed away and I realized that it's okay to hurt.

Teacher Natasha Akery's hand in mudra and with a temporary tattoo on her wrist that means - I willingly change and grow.

Teacher Natasha Akery's hand in mudra and with a temporary tattoo on her wrist that means - I allow life to nourish me.

Healing doesn't mean pushing the pain away; it means letting it pass over you like a cloud.

Mindfulness and intentionality help me to focus more on the present and what I am capable of controlling instead of trying to control others or my circumstances. Instead of rejecting my negative emotions or sensations, I try to sit with them and wait for them to pass. Instead of panicking about having a panic attack, I say positive affirmations to myself and wait for it to pass. Everything is temporary - not just the good things, but the bad things, too. So much of my life I focused on everything that's going wrong. Now, I just acknowledge what's going wrong and remind myself that "this too shall pass." Peace follows shortly thereafter and even if that peace is temporary, it will return in time.

ABOUT NATASHA AKERY

Teacher. Author. Wife. Mother.

At LumenKind, we believe teachers arrive in perfect time to guide us in connecting with our greatest truth. A few years before LumenKind launched, Natasha completed a healing project she also called LumenKind. As soon as we became aware of her previous work, we reached out and she quickly became one of those "teachers" and a valued support to us. We learned about our shared gratitude for moments, our choice in them, and a great respect for the temporary nature of things.

Natasha is a language arts teacher and poet from Charleston, South Carolina. She graduated from the College of Charleston with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Religious Studies, specializing in biblical literature and esoteric traditions. For three years, she was an editor and a writer for 1:1000, an online literary journal that published flash fiction paired with photographs. She now devotes her writing practice to haiku with themes of heritage, motherhood, and spirituality. Connect with Natasha

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Healing: everything is temporary