The social isolation, uncertainty, and economic strain put on us by the coronavirus pandemic has left many people more anxious and stressed, and depression is on the rise. The coping mechanisms many people typically use, such as going to the gym or meeting with friends, are often unavailable. While reaching out to healthcare professionals is helpful, our own daily habits and self-care are also important.
I often like to remind people that any kind of imbalance or illness we experience, whether mental, physical, or emotional, corresponds to imbalances in our body’s energy flow. Making sure all of our energy points are open and that energy flows freely throughout our body is as important as making sure our blood is flowing well.
Emotions are energy and also need to flow. If we get stuck in our emotions, especially negative emotions, our energy also becomes stuck. Then the systems of our body responsible for rest and repair don’t work as well. We may have trouble sleeping or eating, or experience stomach or intestinal issues. The idea that “things will get better” or “everything will be OK” may seem like wishful thinking, and hope may seem far away.
Emotions cannot be changed with emotions. It’s also difficult to change them by changing our thinking alone. Even when you understand that an emotion is irrational or does not match the current situation, and especially if it does match, that emotion can be too strong to respond to rational thought. Physiological phenomena, as well as our subconscious processes, also make up our emotions and need to be addressed.
All of these can change if we change our energy. Being filled with bright, warm, flowing energy brings us a body full of vitality, a heart full of love and hope, and a mind full of optimism. Since our minds alone are not always strong enough to overcome our emotions, we need to use our solid physical body. Just as running releases mood-enhancing endorphins and dancing and smiling can make us feel happier, we can use moving meditations to beat the blues.
While taking a walk in nature could do wonders to improve our mood, we may not always have the means to get outdoors or make it a daily habit. And, if we’re feeling lethargic, discouraged, and sad, we may not always have the energy or motivation to fight against it. Techniques such as Belly Button Healing, however, can be done on your own in the comfort and security of your own bed whenever you want.
What Is Belly Button Healing?
Belly Button Healing involves rhythmically stimulating your navel through your clothing while focusing on the physical sensations this creates in your abdomen. You can use your fingers or a sturdy tool to do this. It can be done standing, sitting, or lying down, but doing it in a relaxed way is best. The pressing itself helps to relax your body, your mind, and your breath.
But Belly Button Healing is not just a relaxing massage for your abdomen. The belly button is a powerful energy point on the body that lies over an important energy center. Stimulating the navel opens many energy channels at once and allows more energy to go into the energy center. The center of energy in our lower abdomen is associated with our physical vitality and keeping it full of strong, clear energy helps to ground and center us along with making us feel more energized. Making this energy center strong and full also helps stuck energy flow out of the energy centers in the chest and head and keeps them open as well.
The belly button also lies over our digestive tract and its associated enteric nervous system, with the vagus nerve bringing messages to and from it and the brain. Some psychiatric or other brain disorders, such as depression, have related digestive symptoms, such as irritable bowel syndrome. The gut makes ninety percent of the serotonin in your body and about fifty percent of the dopamine. Serotonin in particular is out of balance in depression and some anti-depressant medicines correct this. The mix of microbes in the gut are also thought to affect our mood. Belly Button Healing may help improve gut health by relaxing and warming the intestines, pushing food and waste through them more efficiently, and circulating more of the blood there. Keeping your gut healthy is one thing we can do to improve our overall health.
How to Do Belly Button Healing
I show you one way to do Belly Button Healing in this video. You can follow along with me, but it’s important to listen to your body at the same time. If you experience too much pain or discomfort from pressing on your navel, you can do it more gently, or you can press around the navel on other parts of your abdomen at first instead. Once you get used to the sensations, you can also press in and out more rapidly, finding your own comfortable rhythm.
Doing a practice like Belly Button Healing is a way to clean out the energy that builds up every day. Clearing your energy for about five minutes in the morning to help you start your day and about five minutes before bed to remove negative energy from the day and help you sleep better are simple ways to alleviate symptoms of depression. They help you take back power over your life and your health and are easy enough to do even when you’re not feeling well. Belly Button Healing can help you remember that you are not your emotions or your depression. I hope you use it to bring yourself the health and happiness you deserve in any situation.