BLOG 175: HOW TO NAVIGATE BEING HURT, HEALING AND HEALED WITH THESE 3 SIMPLE TIPS

I’m a huge fan of using visualisation and manifestation techniques, both in my business planning and in my life. So, I was thrilled to welcome back Emma Mumford as a guest on the Face Yoga Expert Podcast recently. 

 Long-term listeners may remember Emma from a previous episode she did with me on understanding what you want in life and then manifesting it (which you can find here). She’s an award-winning life coach and a leading expert in the Law of Attraction. She also hosts a very popular podcast, Spiritual Queen’s Badass Podcast, which I enjoyed being a guest on. 

This time, Emma joined me to talk about the three stages of hurt, healing, and healed, and how they relate to our ability to manifest the easeful and abundant life of our dreams. We discussed how to recognise when we’re in each of these three stages, and Emma also gave some practical advice on how to navigate each stage so that we can come home to our true selves. 

If you’d like to dive deeper, Emma’s new book, Hurt, Healing, Healed, is coming out in October. It’s published by Watkins Publishing, who also publish my two books, Danielle Collins’ Face Yoga and the Face Yoga Journal. 

In the meantime, I hope this blog post will give you food for thought, help you identify where in the journey you are right now, and give you some practical ideas of how to move forward. 

STAGE 1 – HURT 

All of us have found ourselves in this place at one time or another. Emma describes the hurt stage as a feeling of being stagnant, blocked, and stuck. We feel like our whole lives have come to a standstill and we can’t move forwards. 

We might try to use visualisation techniques to manifest our desires, only to hear a niggling little voice in the back of our heads telling us, “You’re not worthy to do this” or “Who are you to try that?” 

This voice is a sign that we’re battling limiting beliefs and fears. They crop up in our day-to-day lives, as well as when we’re trying to manifest. They keep us from moving forwards. 

In this hurt stage, we might also feel frustrated or agitated for no obvious reason. Feeling lost or numb are also common signs. And we might find we avoid turning our attention inwards and feel reluctant to face and work on the issues that are limiting us. 

Another common theme of this first stage is loss. That could be the loss of a loved one or loss caused by a big, life-changing event. But these aren’t the only forms of loss – we all experience it in our lives and everyone’s losses are valid. They can feel huge, even if they seem small to other people. 

You might experience the loss of a relationship, loss of a dream, loss of a sense of identity, or loss of your sense of safety. It is all loss, and it all leaves us with a sense of living grief that we need to process and work through. 

Loss is the catalyst for a lot of the hurt we feel in our lives. It’s when we’re aware of it and ready to face it that we can start to move into the healing stage. 

I feel that this is the most difficult stage to move away from because we need to stop, listen, and go within. I know from my own experience that it’s not exactly comfortable work. It can feel so hard, and brings up a lot, mentally but often physically as well. 

However, I promise you that it is so worth the effort. 

NAVIGATING THE HURT STAGE 

Recognising that you are in this hurt stage is the first step in the journey. Once you’re aware of what is happening for you, Emma says that it’s time to identify those limiting thoughts and fears that are keeping you stuck. You need to recognise what’s coming up for you and what lies beneath it before you can start to work on it. 

Emma has more tips for how to do this in her book, but one thing she focuses on in the hurt stage is slowing down. This is so necessary to allow the space for the hurt to come up so that we can acknowledge it and have the time to sit with it. 

Most of us live busy lives with packed schedules. All this busyness can stop us from being aware of our fears and our blocks. But when we move into the healing stage, we’re going to need energy, time, and space to work through these things. We can’t do any of that when our schedules are full. 

This doesn’t necessarily mean you have to drop everything and take weeks off (although if you can, it would probably be beneficial!). It just means that you need to make spending quality time with yourself a priority. Allowing yourself time to sit with your feelings and make space for healing sounds simple but is absolutely pivotal during the hurt phase. 

STAGE 2 – HEALING 

The healing stage is all about connecting back to love and the source/universe. It’s an ever-changing process that requires us to honour the ebb and flow of our cyclical natures. 

This stage is all about transition and flux. Emma likens it to being a caterpillar, thrust into the darkness of the chrysalis. The caterpillar doesn’t know that it will emerge as a beautiful butterfly, but it takes a leap of faith. That’s what the healing stage demands from us – faith that this transitionary phase will lead us towards transformation. 

This is a very inwards journey that requires us to connect to the feminine energy of looking within and working with our shadow selves. It’s a stage of surrender and flow, working towards forgiveness and self-acceptance. 

You might start to feel the shifts. You’ll likely experience tears and feel the release. This is the stage where we’re tested the most. 

NAVIGATING THE HEALING STAGE 

All the way through this journey, it’s important to remember that there are three pillars to this work – mind, body, and spirit – and we need to honour all three. However, Emma has found that each stage seems more ruled by one area than the others. 

The hurt stage is very much a mind stage. But as we move into the healing stage, it becomes even more important to work with our bodies. Emma believes that this was what was missing for her in her previous healing. She loves tools like journaling, meditation, and sound baths, but she now understands much more about how emotions and trauma are stored in our bodies. 

There are plenty of different modalities out there you can try, and it’s definitely not a one-size fits all deal. Some people are drawn to one thing, others to another. The best thing is to try a few different things and see what intuitively appeals to you. 

It’s also vital to allow ourselves a sense of grace and surrender when negative thoughts come up. There’s sometimes an idea with the Law of Attraction that we need to resist all negative thoughts and be positive all the time. But we don’t live in a world of instantaneous manifestation. It’s only when we are consistently operating from a space of negativity that those blocks will start to show up in our lives. 

We’re only human and negative thoughts are going to continue to come up. Emma likes to track progress not by how often those thoughts arise but by how quickly we can come back from them. 

At the start, those negative thoughts might really shake us. They might affect our whole day. But over time, we find we’re able to sit with the triggering thought and move on from it without feeling shaken – that’s huge progress and we should celebrate it. 

STAGE 3 – HEALED 

If the hurt stage is ruled by the mind and the healing stage by the body, then the healed stage belongs to the spirit. 

This stage is all about flourishing and blossoming into a new version of ourselves. We start to discover who we really are, without all those limiting thoughts and fears holding us back. 

We have a sense of reconnecting with our true selves. We experience unconditional love towards ourselves and enjoy the expansive energy of getting to grow into this new space. We feel excited to go out there and manifest our desires. 

In the healed stage, we experience feelings of peace, abundance, and clarity. We feel trust in the universe and warmth in being at home with our true selves. 

NAVIGATING THE HEALED STAGE 

In some cases, we may have been carrying those limiting thoughts and fears for a long time, perhaps our whole lives. This can cause almost an identity crisis, as we work to discover who we are without all these blocks. 

Emma recommends making time to get to know this new version of yourself, so you can start to manifest from this new, aligned place. 

Another thing to remember is that we are cyclical beings. Even once we’ve reached the healed stage once, things will come up for us again in the future. 

I like to use that classic image of the layers of the onion. You might have worked through one layer, but there’s still more beneath it that needs to be looked at. This is ongoing work, not something you do just once. 

When we do hit those hurt feelings again, we need to remember that we haven’t gone backwards. All the progress we’ve made means we can meet the challenge from a more settled and grounded place. 

This doesn’t take away from the validity of the feelings but does mean they may feel less intense each time we work through the cycle. We can navigate the journey from a place of peace. 

We can also put in place daily practices that help us maintain this healed stage. Start with a daily gratitude practice and then add other things that feel right to you – yoga, face yoga, journaling, affirmations – whatever you intuitively feel drawn to. 

These daily practices help us create self-loving time for ourselves so that we can meet challenges and adversity from a grounded, present place. 

EMBRACE ABUNDANCE AND GROWTH WITH ME 

I hope you’ve found this blog post useful. If you’re drawn to manifestation and the idea of growing your business or career from a place of abundance and ease, come take a look at my new venture, Soul Purpose Business. 

I’m creating a community of women who love wellness and embrace their spiritual side and want to achieve business success without sacrificing their health or wellbeing. 

We talk about practical business tips like how to market on social media and how to sell your offerings. But we also work with the chakras, visualisation, and affirmations to release money blocks and let go of limiting beliefs that might be holding us back. 

I share plenty of tips and advice via social media – find Soul Purpose Business on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. 

You can also join my two courses, Be Your Own Brand and Soulful Social Media Success. And I’m offering a free Zoom session in September, which is all about using your intuition to grow your brand.