Modern life tends to make people soft in the places we should be tough and tough in the places we should be soft.

We have endless OTC drugs to make simple illnesses like the flu more bearable. And trust me, after being fully incapacitated for 3 days with the flu, it is not pleasant in anyway shape or form.

I didn’t enjoy it.

I didn’t love it.

I’m still pretty physically miserable, to be honest.

Taking ibuprofen or any other OTC drugs that are simply meant to keep us comfortable, slow down the natural healing process. And, I believe, they create a numb divide between the communication of our bodies and our consciousness.

I did take one capsule the second night just so I could sleep, so I am not militant, but that is the first ibuprofen I have taken since tearing during childbirth, so I take it VERY rarely and only when very necessary.

I was so hesitant to take that one ibuprofen because I knew it would lower my fever and a fever is what you want when you have the flu. We are programmed to be afraid of the ways our bodies heal themselves because sometimes they are quite uncomfortable.

I am a woman who leans in to the communications of the body.

There is value in the pain. There is wisdom in the experience of something hard. There is insight to be had when we are brought to the edges of our sanity with discomfort.

Now, does this mean we should unnecessarily make things hard for ourselves? Does this mean we should be gluttons for punishment? I also know all about this, because I am someone who has had, in the past, a very strong internal punisher. The story you have got to earn it was very much part of my programming.

So I’ve sat with my hesitancy to take OTC drugs or go to a doctor and I’ve asked myself, “Are you punishing yourself here?”

And the answer is truly, for me, no.

I believe ibuprofen disconnects me from myself and my own felt sense. Call it a sort of extreme sobriety, but I feel it when I take it. It’s super subtle but it allows me to override parts of myself that I wouldn’t be able to override if I didn’t take it.

The answer is that I believe these physical health challenges are shamanic initiations of sorts. I believe they leave us better than they found us, maybe not physically initially, but mentally or spiritually. To disconnect from myself while in that experience doesn’t feel aligned for me and in integrity with who I am and what I teach and model.

(As far as going to a doctor, my observation is the closer you get to conventional medicine the sicker you become and the more interventions you get.)

As I was in the deepest dark of my recent flu journey, one of the stories that really got kicked up is how I’m going to lose what I’ve created in business, and in life. Like I have this idea that my family will fall apart, my house will fall apart, my business will fall apart, if I’m not capable of holding it all together. Because the fear is always that I will always feel this way (sick).

These stories are not logical or based in reality, they are the illogical fear stories that just play on a loop when you’re in a vulnerable, painful, uncontrollable, uncomfortable place. It’s not actually about the stories. It’s kind of like the Bogart in Harry Potter, the stories just show you what you are most afraid of. This takes A LOT to be with and not want to run to something to take it away.

There is the physical discomfort and that is painful, but it’s the stories that arise from that discomfort and the idea that it may never go away that really gets you desperate.

I am not saying that everyone should see every headache as a mini shamanic initiation. This is my practice. My path is of listening to the body and trusting the communications of the body, and that needs to come with the fun and pleasurable, as well as the pain.

This is a spot where I do feel like people have gotten a little too soft in a place where it would serve us to be a bit tougher. Not in a “tough it out” kind of way, but in the way that we see physical processes as an opportunity to learn deep truths about ourselves. If we stay deep in the cavernous blackness that opens up to us when we are in pain, sick, or grieving, there is a massive opportunity for growth and expansion.

In this particular flu, for me, there was a big healing around my younger self who was sick a lot and always felt like she needed to get better quick. That being sick wasn’t ok and it needed to end as soon as possible. I got to revisit this wound during this illness and rewrite it for that internal little one. I got to love her and let her know, no, it is ok. You can be sick. You can rest. You can be warm and cozy and do nothing.

One of the messages that came through was: This sickness doesn’t mean “you’re falling behind”, it’s actually propelling you forward in ways you can’t see right now.

What if that was true? Our minds think we need to keep all our appointments and can’t handle the inconvenience that illness brings with it, but what if the illness was actually preparing us for something? What if this pause right now is exactly what we need? What if this is the “fastest” track to our own awakening?

What if illness was always an upgrade?

I see this in childbirth. Childbirth is an initiation. It is not meant to be easy or breezy. I do not think it is meant to be “orgasmic.” I think it’s possible for it to be orgasmic, but most of the time it is f*****g intense. As it should be.

We deny our strength when we try to rescue women from this fact or offer epidurals or planned c sections to anyone and everyone. I am speaking on a collective level. I, obviously, believe each woman has complete bodily sovereignty over her choice of how to birth, but if this narrative was shared more, and we practiced being uncomfortable more via going through things like headaches without ibuprofen, maybe women would be more willing to surrender to the birth process as the intense initiation and rebirth of a mother that it is. Which is intense, painful, and, ultimately, always leaves you a better woman than you were before, when it’s integrated.

Postpartum feels so long and “unproductive” and I understand how isolating it can be for women, but postpartum is also thought of as the “golden opportunity” in Chinese medicine. It is a time in a woman’s life when she can miraculously heal old illnesses and diseases, complete cycles, change relationships, and massively blossom into who she is becoming.

It’s all about how we frame it.

What if we met these naturally occurring initiations in our lives with courage and strength and a resolve to learn what there is to learn from the communications our bodies are giving us?

What if we softened into the ways these initiations want to shape us?

(Ok. I want to be really clear here. There are a lot of things in this that could ruffle feathers and poke at some tender spots. I want to say, I am speaking on a collective level. If you decided to have a planned c section, I do not judge you. If you take nyquil to go to sleep every night, I do not judge you. If you go to the doctor all the time, I do not judge you. We all have our own stories and our own histories that shaped us into who we are and got us to where we are today. Your journey is yours, mine is mine. We all have to live our lives in this day and age. There is no judgment on how you decide to go about healing your own body).

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Episode: https://clarabelize.substack.com/p/lessons-from-the-flu

Podcast: https://clarabelize.substack.com/podcast