Donna Thornton

March 1, 2016 by Donna Thornton Leave a Comment

Pain as a Teacher

“There is no consciousness without pain”

– C.G. JUNG

I’d like to make an argument for pain and darkness as a requirement for enlightenment…Wait what?

How can we shift our thoughts about pain from avoidance to gratitude? I invite you to try looking at your irritating symptom, broken heart, depression, sprained ankle, etc as a gift. Perhaps the pain is a red flag signifying an imbalance that needs to be addressed. Perhaps our pain is the wisest teacher.

Pain is a complex and subjective phenomenon; therefore an adequate definition is difficult to put to words. In this article, I’d like to address three categories in which we experience pain and describe five levels of its increasing intensity.

LEVEL 1 – PRESSURE

You can feel it’s weight, but it doesn’t hurt yet.

Examples:

1. External or Physical – Brushing up against a wall
2. Internal or Chemical – Feeling bloated
3. Mental or Emotional – Rapidly approaching deadlines

LEVEL 2 – ACHE

Ache is a dull but nagging discomfort. You feel noticeably not yourself, but you usually try to push through and keep going.

Examples:

1. External or Physical – Muscle soreness
2. Internal or Chemical – Stomach aches
3. Mental or Emotional – Being home sick

LEVEL 3 – PAIN

This is a wake up call. The signal now refuses to be ignored and you’re extremely uncomfortable. Action must be taken: address the underlying reason for the pain OR create a compensation pattern (a limp) to avoid the pain.

Examples:

1. External or Physical – A broken leg
2. Internal or Chemical – Severe Constipation
3. Mental or Emotional – Divorce

LEVEL 4 – TICKLISH

Being tickled doesn’t really feel good; your nervous system is in hysterics. Ticklish is the oscillation from “pain” and “no pain”. It’s dissociation.

Examples:

1. External or Physical – Muscle spasms
2. Internal or Chemical – Anxiety
3. Mental or Emotional – Laughing at trauma

LEVEL 5 – NUMB

Becoming numb is our highest level of pain. The trauma has become so great that the pain signal
has been completely shut off.

Examples:

1. External/Physical – The physiological shock response
2. Internal/Chemical – Over-medication
3. Mental/Emotional – Ignoring or blacking out traumatic memories

WHY SHOULD YOU CARE?

Each level is an important survival mechanism. Pain protects us. However, each level can progress to the next in severity if ignored long enough. Temporarily relieving the pain is important as well, but the situation can become more dangerous if we continue to avoid the pain. Not addressing the root cause can permanently alter healthy function.

Real world examples:

External or Physical: A limp will naturally develop after you break a leg. In this case, the limp is temporarily necessary for daily mobility. However, the new faulty motor pattern can become embedded in your brain. If the dysfunctional pattern is not retrained, it will cause further problems due to the long-term abnormal compensations- ie. Back spasms, neck pain,migraines, etc.
Internal or Chemical: A busy person self-medicates their abdominal gas and bloating for years. Over time, it can escalate into severe stomach pain and/or a very irritable bowel. If the underlying dysfunction is not addressed it will cause further problems due to the long-term abnormal compensations- ie. Weight gain, infections, autoimmune disease, etc.
Mental or Emotional: A person may not feel comfortable opening up to someone new after a recent divorce. That’s ok in the short term, but further down the road, social isolation can develop into a deep unshakable sadness. This dysfunctional pattern is like an emotional limp. If the underlying issues around self worth are not addressed, it can cause further problems due to the long-term abnormal compensations- ie. Relationship sabotage, substance abuse, depression, etc.

WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT?

If you’re having a hard time pulling yourself out of the pain and/or darkness, ask for help. WE ALL NEED EACH OTHER! We recover faster and more completely when we’re coached through the levels of pain, by someone who’s been there before us. With education and motivation from talented Teachers, Physical Therapists, Nutritionists, Personal Trainers, Doctors, Coaches, Mentors etc. we can learn how to “listen to our bodies”, restore ourselves to health and share our story of healing with others.

I hope you enjoyed this article and found the information is helpful!

-Casey Shivers
Owner of IAmWell, LLC
Functional Nutrition + Holistic Lifestyle

June 2, 2015 by Donna Thornton Leave a Comment

How can you leap straight from the problem to the answer?

Intuition is the supra-logic that cuts out all the routine processes of thought and leaps straight from the problem to the answer. – Robert Graves

Learning to trust and use your intuition in decision making can be a game changer for you. When you begin to learn to trust that small still voice, that gut feeling, that little nudge you feel from deep within, you truly can learn to leap straight from the problem to the answer.

The reality is that you actually do have all of your answers inside of you. You just have been taught not to look there for the answers. If you are like me, you were taught to look outside of yourself. Ask the “experts” or research the answer. Or write out lists of pros and cons or talk to everyone else about the problem until you are so confused you don’t know which way to turn.

I’ve spent a lot of time learning to trust my intuition, and now I spend a lot of time teaching others how to trust theirs. For many people, the first step is even allowing their intuition to have a voice. There are a lot of ways to go about accessing your intuition. Sometimes we’ve cut that voice off so much or stuffed it down so deeply that it is barely a whisper… for some people it has literally gone mute. So the first thing to learn is that everyone has an intuitive voice and it’s okay to let it speak!

Once you’ve gotten through that first step, of even acknowledging and allowing your intuitive voice to be heard, the second step is actually listening to the message.

I think this is the hardest part for a lot of people. Our intuition may kind of speak a different language than we are used to. Intuition can be a whisper, a voice in your head, or it can be a feeling or a knowing. It can present itself outwardly through signs and symbols. The important thing is to start listening and learning how your intuition communicates to you.

Once you’ve started listening, the next step is in learning to trust your intuition. This can be very difficult for some people. I teach a number of ways to go about this, from learning ways to verify the information you are getting to tracking your hunches, and the use of tools that help you to really be able to feel confident in trusting the information your intuition gives you.

I know it is difficult sometimes to really live by your intuition. I mean, if your intuition tells you to go right instead of left, and you go left and have an accident, well, you probably will say to yourself “I should have trusted my intuition!” But if you go right and nothing happens, you may never even think about it again. So your brain doesn’t register that listening to your intuition paid off! I think a simple way to start paying validating your intuition is to just simply keep a journal. Start tracking your intuitive hunches, what you did with them and what the result was (even if the result was that nothing happened!).

Whatever else you do, I really recommend you find the ways that work for you to begin to truly tap into your intuition. Once you begin to recognize when your intuition is speaking, and then when you follow your intuition, you will find life gets a lot easier for you, and much of the time you absolutely can make that leap right away from problem to solution!

If you would like to find out more about the courses we offer, here at Onederous Tribe Academy, that can help you tap into your intuition click HERE. If you haven’t done so yet, I hope you’ll take advantage of our FREE eBook, too! I just know you’ll love it!

May 5, 2015 by Donna Thornton Leave a Comment

Enlightenment is for Business, too!

Onederous Tribe and Onederous Tribe Academy were born out of a desire to give you (awakened business folks) a place to network and connect with others of like mind and to provide knowledge, wisdom and insight that will help you to achieve the abundance and prosperity that every one of us deserves.

But many people want to know why we are moved to combine business and spirituality. What does one have to do with the other? Well, from my perspective, the answer is EVERYTHING!

The truth is, we are shifting the energy on this planet. We are moving towards a higher frequency. We are now moving towards living our lives with much more compassion, love, grace and integrity than on any other time in history. And I, for one, do not think this means that everyone is going to be sitting around all day meditating, playing the guitar and watching the flowers grow. I think the key to all of this is the word “living” – as we shift the vibrations on the planet, we are still living our lives!

In fact, in a lot of ways, with the fast pace of the internet and technology, we are probably busier than ever. So, the shift has to come in a way that includes living our lives! And this includes business! We have to continue to have businesses and we have to continue to have work. The difference is, now, many people are striving to find deeper meaning in their businesses and work. Working for the sake of working just isn’t working for people anymore! And while money is a tremendously useful tool in our world today (and we should never be afraid or ashamed to make money!), it isn’t “all about the Benjamins” anymore either!

So many people now are searching for meaning. We want to do more than “work, pay taxes and die” – in fact, we KNOW we are meant for so much more than that!

People who see that there is more to life than “business as usual” are the ones we call awakened or enlightened. We are waking up to the fact that there is more… and as we move into the light, we become “enlightened” – and this is where everything begins to coalesce. Our spiritual lives and our business lives can no longer be two separate things!

And we know that. That is why we are here. Because we want to help YOU as you move your business more and more into the light. We want to be here for you to help you to see how you can combine your spiritual life with your business life, to make your entire life more satisfying and more in alignment with who you truly are at the core.

As we become more and more enlightened, and become more and more awake, so must our businesses. We must do business in a way that is in integrity with our spiritual selves. Does this mean we just sort of throw our hands up and leave it to Spirit to run our businesses? NO. Absolutely not! But what it does mean is that everything we do in our businesses has to be in alignment with Spirit. From our marketing practices, to our accounting practices, to the way we price our products and services and the way we attract customers and clients… ALL of these things must resonate with the way we are living our lives. Enlightenment is for business, too! This is the new business paradigm!

Unfortunately, the old paradigm of business had people convinced that the only way to do some things was to do them in a questionable manner. This was just “the way business is done” is what many of us have been led to believe. Many of us were led to believe that if we wanted to make money, we had to embrace this model!

I’m here to tell you that in the new business paradigm, that is just no longer true. How we do anything is how we do everything, and that includes the way we do business. If you want to keep moving more and more towards enlightenment in your personal life, you have to do the same in your business life!

That is what enlightenment has to do with business! And Onederous Tribe Academy is here to offer you courses to help you grow spiritually, but also with practical courses to help you do business in the “enlightened” way! In the world we are used to living in, it can seem kind of confusing to think about one place where you can go to both grow and expand in your awareness AND in your business… but in the new business paradigm, we are sure this is absolutely going to be just “the way business is done.” And we want to be here for you, to help you in all aspects, so that you can be ahead of the curve!

If you would like to bring more enlightenment to your business, Onederous Tribe Academy is here for you! We even have a great FREE course to get you started! Download it today (click HERE) and use it to expand your awareness, remove blocks and get your business into alignment with your spirit!

February 26, 2015 by Donna Thornton Leave a Comment

Expanded Awareness :: Dive All The Way In Through Meditation

Meditation is to dive all the way within, beyond thought, to the source of thought and pure consciousness. It enlarges the container, every time you transcend. When you come out, you come out refreshed, filled with energy and enthusiasm for life. ~David Lynch

What a beautiful and inspirational quote. Much of the beauty of this quote come through the truth in the statement. Meditation really is the way to dive into the source of thought and to touch pure consciousness. Meditation is a practice that can truly change you… refresh you… fill you with energy and enthusiasm for life.

The reason meditation has such an effect on us, is that in this world filled with so much noise and chaos, we lose track of that small still voice inside of us. That small still voice is the key to our intuition and the key to finding peace. That small still voice is the voice of God inside of us. Through meditation, we can quiet the chaos, silence the noise and listen. Through meditation we can expand our awareness, our intuition and transcend our existence.

Many people believe that they have the one and best way to meditate. And that actually serves as a barrier for other people. If a person cannot relate to that “one, best way” then they may abandon the idea of meditation altogether.

My personal opinion, based on my experience, is that there are many wonderful ways to meditate. The key to a good meditation is finding the way that works for you to quiet the noise of the world and shut out the chaos, even for just a little while.

While some people can sit in silence and empty their minds and sit in traditional meditation easily. They have either trained themselves to do so, or it comes naturally to them. Some people struggle with that type of meditation. Attempting to sit still in silence and trying to empty the mind can cause some people to have extreme anxiety and they end up feeling like there is something wrong with them or that they must just not be able to meditate. And they give up on the thought of ever being able to make meditation a part of their life.

That’s why I like to help people to see that there are many ways to meditate. For me, the object of meditation is to shift the conscious mind over to the side to allow the unconscious and subconscious mind a chance to emerge and be heard. This is where the small still voice resides. So, anything that helps the conscious mind to move over will assist the person to get into a real state of meditation.

There are many ways to achieve this state, but I will just give you a few examples: prayer, using a mantra, doing yoga, guided meditations and visualizations, self-hypnosis and hypnosis, listening to particular music and even driving can be a meditative activity. It all depends on how you use these things – but they can all be a form of meditation! A favorite type of meditation for an artist friend of mine is called Meditative Art Doodling. This is a repetitive and creative activity that keeps the conscious mind (and the body) busy and allows the unconscious and subconscious thoughts (that small still voice) to bubble up and be heard. Allowing that voice is allowing the divine to speak to you. And that is really all that meditation is.

If you are someone that has stayed away from meditation because you felt like you couldn’t do it, I would encourage you to try some different paths to meditation until you find something that fits for you. There is real value in mediating… it does really leave you refreshed, energetic and enthusiastic… and it puts you in touch with the source of thought and pure consciousness. Everyone is different and this really is not a “one size fits all” kind of world. So, keep trying! That small still voice has so much to tell you… all you have to do is find a way to hear it!