Having a special environment to work on your emotional healing is something that is becoming more popular right now. One of the options was founded by Jana Wilson, our interviewee today for MysticMag.
Jana is the founder of the Emotional Healing Retreat and offers Group Events, Private Intensive, Healing the Healer and more, using several power tools like HeartMath and with Meditation as the foundation. Check out this interview to know more about Jana’s work.
How was the process of deciding to help and create change and start organizing the retreats?
I launched my first retreat in 2004, it was for women only at that time. Within six years I included men as well. I had overcome adverse childhood trauma and learned the essential emotional intelligence skills on how to heal.
I wanted to share those teachings with others. Many people think the only avenue to mental/emotional well-being support is a traditional psychotherapy. My work includes psycho/spiritual teachings reaching a deeper level of core pain.
How do your retreats work? Do you believe each person needs something specific or all your retreats can help anyone, anytime?
We offer private and group retreats. Our retreats are for a person who is managing life, but not fulfilled and not in major crisis. If someone is in crisis (stress response) they can’t learn. Their brain isn’t coherent so their cognition is altered. So no, our retreats can’t help anyone anytime, its an individual who is self-responsible and wants to grow.
Is it more challenging to organize the group retreats and deal with multiple expectations and help in each “programming and conditioning”?
No, not at all, groups are the easiest and require less of our time and energy. We aren’t up close an personal with participants because its impossible to be with 30-50 people at each event. We do have trained EHS teachers who assist us and they support the participants. Ultimately its up to the individual to listen, take notes, and surrender to process to get the most out of the teachings.
Can you explain how you integrate the HeartMath technology in your methods?
Heartmath tools are used to teach people how to create a coherent connection from their heart to the brain. There is more ascending connections from the heart to the brain than the opposite.
Ultimately each participant is dealing with how to regulate emotions so that they can manage STRESS. Heartmath teaches simple techniques to do on the fly — you can do the techniques as you are going about your day. In order to create a life you love you must master your thoughts — consistently creating a coherent field with an elevated emotions you are better able to handle stress.
The more resiliency and capacity to manage stressful situation in the moment equals to more creativity, joy and contentment. We also offer to our private clients the Heartmath biofeedback monitor so they can see real results of their practice based on their heart rate variability.
Can you explain to our audience the concept of reparenting?
Reparenting is a simple 5 step process of communicating to your feelings as if it were you as a child. You relate with the intense emotions as a wounded child needing your support like a healthy loving parent would. Practicing this process daily bonds you to yourself in a deeper more heartfelt healing way.
Most people say mean hurtful things to themselves; “we can be our own worse enemy.” This process helps you befriend yourself with compassion for your pain and even suffering. When you do this is creates true self-love and acceptance.
You include a wide array of methods and concepts in each retreat. How do you find a fit to all of them or do you use HeartMath techniques with one person, another can focus more on meditation…?
Yes we teach all the tools to everyone, we don’t pick and choose. HeartMath is just a small percentage of the tools we teach, HeartMath is not a meditation technique. Meditation is the foundation to our work. If a person won’t commit to practicing sitting in stillness and silence daily then they won’t be able to use the tools we teach.
They won’t have the foundational skill of self-awareness, which is paramount to emotional intelligence. Imagine if you aren’t aware you are creating a ’story’ in your mind that may or may not even be true and you are feeling low vibrational feelings — in this case, its you who are creating your suffering. But you won’t know it — you will be a slave to the thinking and not a master. If you want to master your life you must master your mind!
What is the first step to improve your emotional intelligence and start your transformation?
Meditation.
Do you have a special message for our audience in these challenging times?
Happiness is your birth right! But it’s not found externally. It’s an inside job, and if you can’t sit in meditation and do ’nothing’ well; how to you expect to do ‘anything’ well? Most people operate from a false belief and unexamined assumption that they should feel good all the time or that when something outside of them happens (partner, job, house, car, trips) they will then be happy.
Life is wabi-sabi, perfectly imperfect and in order to be truly content in the present moment we must accept that NO ONE has arrived. We are all bozos on the bus, even the ones that look like they have it ALL — its an illusion. Our true home is within — connect to the truth of who you are through meditating and dipping into stillness and you will transcend this 3D world.
