Healing Essentials

Sometimes healing asks us to pause — not because we’ve failed, but because our body is trying to teach us something the mind hasn’t yet learned.

This isn’t a story I planned to tell, and it’s not easy to write. But I’ve learned that whenever we’re going through something deeply personal, we’re rarely going through it alone. Energy moves collectively. What one of us faces, many of us are quietly facing in our own way.

Lately, I’ve been navigating a wave of medical appointments — finding out that I’m okay, but that my body still needs help healing. My cervical spine surgery, which I thought was behind me, hasn’t fully fused. It’s been a year since the operation. I expected a clean bill of health, but instead, I’m being asked for another year of careful recovery.

At first, I felt the sting of disappointment. I thought, How could this be happening? I did everything right — didn’t I? But as I started asking questions, researching, and truly listening — to my doctors, my intuition, and to God — I began to see that this wasn’t a punishment. It was information.

The same intelligence that guides spiritual healing was guiding physical healing too. It was just speaking a different language — through calcium, vitamin D, rest, patience, and surrender.

When the Body Becomes the Teacher

I was born with congenital issues in my spine. For years, my spinal cord had been compressed without my knowing. When degenerative changes began to set in, the spinal canal grew too narrow for the cord and the network of nerves reaching into every part of my body. Eventually, I needed surgery to decompress the spinal cord — and when that finally happened, everything began to change.

So many symptoms that had once been debilitating began to disappear, and the ones that lingered — the balance issues, the weakness on my left side, the occasional tingling — have grown softer, quieter. They remind me of what’s still healing, but they no longer define me.

What’s left now is the fusion itself — the bones finding their way to full union. It’s not a failure. It’s a process. A slower rhythm than I expected, but the right rhythm for my body. The possibility of full healing is strong. The signs are there.

And still, I don’t know exactly what the outcome will be. That’s the truth. I live somewhere between what has healed and what may yet heal. But even here — in the in-between — there’s grace.

A Gentle Routine: Healing with Rigor

What’s helping me most right now is rhythm — a kind of gentle rigor. I’ve made it part of my spiritual practice to study my body’s needs with the same curiosity I bring to meditation. I ask questions. I gather facts. I listen.

I learned that bone healing after an ACDF (anterior cervical discectomy and fusion) can take up to two years for some people, especially when multiple levels are involved. Knowing that gave me peace. It reminded me that I’m not behind; I’m simply healing on schedule for my body.

Small things make a big difference: gentle, consistent movement; steady, weight-bearing exercise; enough calories and protein to support bone growth; balanced calcium, vitamin D, and iron levels.

I’ve adjusted medications that can interfere with bone fusion — especially NSAIDs — and focused on natural anti-inflammatory foods instead. It’s about balance: not too much, not too little. Enough movement to keep energy flowing; enough rest to let healing integrate.

This is what faith in action looks like now — steady, conscious, and kind.

Listening to the Body’s Wisdom Through Food

One of the most profound lessons I’ve learned this year is that the body doesn’t speak in numbers — it speaks in sensations.

For years, I equated nourishment with willpower — counting, tracking, restricting. But I’ve learned the body already knows what it needs. The key is to stop overriding that wisdom with fear of the scale or rules that don’t fit our reality.

When I began researching nutrition for bone health, I found the science and the soul saying the same thing: trust the body. Healing depends on consistent nourishment — not dieting, not depriving, not trying to fit into someone else’s formula.

Safety allows the body to repair.

So, I started feeding myself with more care — calcium, vitamin D, magnesium, iron, protein, and vitamin K2 — but also with gratitude. When I slow down, breathe between bites, and honor the food in front of me, digestion changes. My body relaxes. Healing accelerates.

When I stopped listening to the scale and started listening to my body, the pressure dissolved. I no longer needed to manage healing. I could partner with it.

The Contradiction of Healing

There’s a thought many of us know too well — that looping voice that says, “I’m not enough,” whatever the word might be. For me lately, it’s been, “But I’m fat.”

I know my body will feel better when I lose some of this weight. And yet — this past year, I put on pounds. How was that my body’s wisdom?

It feels like a contradiction.

Part of me wanted to jump into action — to diet, to fix, to rush. But my neurosurgeon’s message was different: go slowly. Move gently. Let healing set the pace.

And that, too, is wisdom.

I realized that my body has been protecting me. Holding me back from overexertion, asking for time. Weight gain wasn’t failure — it was feedback. My body slowed down to heal.

I used to panic at changes in my body. But I’ve learned to thank it instead. Every time I choose acceptance over judgment, something shifts. My body calms. My energy opens. My healing deepens.

Acceptance isn’t giving up — it’s alignment. And the more I accept myself as I am, the more my body naturally finds its own balance, without shame or punishment.

The deeper truth is that I’m held — by love, by friendship, by Spirit, by this loyal body that has carried me through more than I give it credit for. Beauty isn’t in the mirror; it’s in the way I move through the world when I feel safe enough to be myself.

Finding the Right Match

This journey hasn’t been easy. For years, I carried an invisible weight — the fear of what doctors thought of me. My size, my age, my pain. I worried they’d see my body as the problem instead of seeing me.

And for a long time, that’s what happened. I met my vibrational match: doctors who reflected my insecurities back to me, dismissing my pain as psychosomatic.

It was disheartening — not just because I was in pain, but because I started to doubt my own perception. When authority doesn’t believe you, it takes enormous strength to believe yourself.

Something deeper in me kept whispering: You’ll find the right support. So I kept going.

When I finally met my neurosurgeon at UCSF, he understood my symptoms almost without words. To be seen and believed after years of dismissal was profoundly healing. But the greatest shift wasn’t in being believed — it was in believing myself.

Healing doesn’t begin with approval. It begins with belief.

The Subtle Shift: From Guidance to Ownership

My neurosurgeon has taught me something beyond medicine. His confidence in my ability to listen to my own body has become a mirror of faith.

He answers when I ask — but doesn’t overexplain. It’s not detachment; it’s trust. Somewhere along the way, I realized I’d been seeking his validation. I wanted him to understand why I was struggling, why I wasn’t there yet.

But his calm presence reminded me: it’s not up to him. Healing is my responsibility.

When I asked how I’d know if I was overdoing it, his answer was simple:

“Listen to your body.”

That’s the wisdom at the center of everything.

My well-being isn’t dependent on anyone else’s permission or belief in me. It’s between me, my body, and God — who waits patiently for me to pick up the reins and act on what I already know to be true.

Evolving the Practice

For a long time, yoga was my sanctuary. I trained deeply — not to perform, but to merge movement and spirit.

But after surgery, many of the poses I once loved — the forward folds, the inversions like downward-facing dog — are no longer safe. It was hard to accept at first. I missed the surrender, the flow.

Now, yoga looks different. It’s mountain pose, tree pose, gentle cat-cow, soft pigeon. It’s slower, wiser, more in tune with my body’s rhythm.

Healing has turned my yoga inward. It’s not about striving or comparison. It’s about listening. Every posture I’m given, both in body and in life, leads me closer to truth.

Practical Wisdom: Moving with Strength and Grace

Even the stairs have become part of my practice.

Every movement is a meditation in alignment — a conversation between gravity and grace.

When I climb, I keep my spine tall, my eyes forward, and my breath steady. I use the handrail as a partner, not a crutch. I move slowly, deliberately, with awareness.

Each step becomes a declaration of faith: I’m rebuilding my strength — not by force, but by presence.

Perception of Self: Seeing Through the Illusion

There are still days I catch myself comparing — my body, my healing, my life — to some version of myself that doesn’t exist. Maybe it never did.

In a world that lives on images, it’s easy to forget: we’re not here to replicate someone else’s form. We’re here to express the soul in our own unique way.

The body we have is not a punishment. It’s an instrument for awareness.

Beauty isn’t perfection — it’s light moving honestly through form.

When I return to that knowing, I stop chasing and start inhabiting.

Reflection

Healing is never about perfection. It’s about presence — learning to meet yourself exactly where you are, without apology or resistance. Every ache, every pause, every small victory is part of the same conversation between body and soul.

When we slow down long enough to listen, the body becomes a sacred teacher, guiding us back to truth again and again: we are already whole.

And that’s why I write — to remember.

The deeper I go, the more I realize there is no separation at all — my body and spirit are one. The illusion of division dissolves the moment I remember that every cell, every breath, every heartbeat is Spirit made visible. Writing helps me remember that unity, and in remembering, I heal.

Journal Prompt

Take a few quiet moments to ground and center. Breathe into the present moment and ask yourself:

“What part of me is asking to be accepted, rather than fixed?”

Write freely. Let your body, not your mind, answer. Notice what softens, what opens, what finally feels ready to be heard.

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About Jennifer Lasell

Jennifer Lasell is a psychic medium, spiritual life coach, and energy healer dedicated to helping people connect with their intuition and inner wisdom. Through meditation, reflection, and spirit-guided practices, she offers guidance and tools to support emotional and spiritual well-being. Her work fosters a sense of community and belonging—inviting others to explore the unseen, trust their sensitivity, and remember that we awaken together.