Episode 54
Dr. Meg Haworth:Healing the Emotional Root Causes of Illness
Dr. Meg Haworth:
Healing the Emotional Root Causes of Illness
In this episode we talk about emotions and beliefs have tremendous effect on the body over time and may be the overlooked root cause of your illness. My friend, Dr. Meg Haworth is here to walk us through getting to our emotional root cause and releasing, and replacing, those emotions.
First Aired on: Sep 26, 2022
Episode 54
Dr. Meg Haworth:Healing the Emotional Root Causes of Illness
Dr. Meg Haworth:
Healing the Emotional Root Causes of Illness
In this episode we talk about emotions and beliefs have tremendous effect on the body over time and may be the overlooked root cause of your illness. My friend, Dr. Meg Haworth is here to walk us through getting to our emotional root cause and releasing, and replacing, those emotions.
First Aired on: Sep 26, 2022
Table of Contents:
Table of Contents:
In this episode:
In this episode:
In today's episode, Dr. Meg Haworth shares the importance of getting to the emotional root cause of illness and releasing those emotions to allow for true healing. We are talking about the effect of emotions and beliefs on the physical body over time.
Dr. Meg is an Holistic Health and Wellness Expert and Transpersonal Psychologist. She is also the best-selling author of Get Well Now.
Dr. Meg shares a bit of her journey with us, which begins at the beginning of her life. During childhood, she experienced all forms of abuse, including sexual, physical, and emotional, and even survived a childhood drowning incident, where she needed to be revived.
By her 20's, she was experiencing multiple illnesses and diagnoses including: IBS, ulcers, severe depression, scoliosis, fibromyalgia, Mixed Connective Tissue disease, and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
She read an article about alternative medicine and began to explore that world, starting with chiropractic care. She incorporated meditation, yoga, energy work, and nutrition, and each modality helped her slightly improve. Transpersonal Psychology, and getting connected with her body, allowed her healing to make a quantum leap! The key was getting to the emotion root cause of her illnesses.
Through her work with her clients, she has created an emotional release technique that allows clients to get in touch with, address, and replace the stuck emotions that are making them sick.
BUT...this technique does it in a way that allows her clients to feel happier, lighter, and more free at the end of the session. There is no two week recovery from reliving trauma in order to heal.
We are constantly learning, growing, and evolving.
"The fun never stops!"
Your body holds the answers and the wisdom you need in order to get to the next level of health.
Freedom comes from healing!
We tend to hold resentments and anger, and we all do it differently.
Dr. Meg considers these to be "teaching emotions" instead of negative emotions.
Using the emotional release technique and learning the tools to use moving forward leads to emotional self mastery - which is FREEDOM!
Exercises:
Close your eyes, place your hand on your belly and take a deep breath, inhaling through your nose and exhaling through your mouth.
Focus on your body.
Scan it.
What does it need in this moment?
Get up and MOVE.
Stretch...dance...Move!
Dr. Meg is an Holistic Health and Wellness Expert and Transpersonal Psychologist. She is also the best-selling author of Get Well Now.
Dr. Meg shares a bit of her journey with us, which begins at the beginning of her life. During childhood, she experienced all forms of abuse, including sexual, physical, and emotional, and even survived a childhood drowning incident, where she needed to be revived.
By her 20's, she was experiencing multiple illnesses and diagnoses including: IBS, ulcers, severe depression, scoliosis, fibromyalgia, Mixed Connective Tissue disease, and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
She read an article about alternative medicine and began to explore that world, starting with chiropractic care. She incorporated meditation, yoga, energy work, and nutrition, and each modality helped her slightly improve. Transpersonal Psychology, and getting connected with her body, allowed her healing to make a quantum leap! The key was getting to the emotion root cause of her illnesses.
Through her work with her clients, she has created an emotional release technique that allows clients to get in touch with, address, and replace the stuck emotions that are making them sick.
BUT...this technique does it in a way that allows her clients to feel happier, lighter, and more free at the end of the session. There is no two week recovery from reliving trauma in order to heal.
We are constantly learning, growing, and evolving.
"The fun never stops!"
Your body holds the answers and the wisdom you need in order to get to the next level of health.
Freedom comes from healing!
We tend to hold resentments and anger, and we all do it differently.
Dr. Meg considers these to be "teaching emotions" instead of negative emotions.
Using the emotional release technique and learning the tools to use moving forward leads to emotional self mastery - which is FREEDOM!
Exercises:
Close your eyes, place your hand on your belly and take a deep breath, inhaling through your nose and exhaling through your mouth.
Focus on your body.
Scan it.
What does it need in this moment?
Get up and MOVE.
Stretch...dance...Move!
Other Resources:
Other Resources:
Connect with Dr. Meg Haworth
Connect with Dr. Meg Haworth
Watch this interview:
Watch this interview:
Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Julie Michelson: Welcome back to the inspired living with auto immunity podcast. I'm your host, Julie Michaelson. And today we're with Dr. Meg Haworth, holistic health and wellness expert, transpersonal psychologist, and bestselling author of get well now. In our conversation today, Dr. Meg shares her incredible healing journey and how using her emotional release technique helps create true [00:01:00] wellness.
[00:01:01] We talk about root causes a lot on the show, and today it's all about the emotional root causes to illness and how we can get in touch with our bodies to allow for healing.
[00:01:12] Dr. Meg, welcome to the podcast.
[00:01:15] Dr. Meg Haworth: Thank you so much for having me here. I'm so grateful to be here.
[00:01:19] Julie Michelson: I am excited to share not only your story but your work with listeners. And I know some really incredible parts of your story. But let's introduce you to listeners by, by sharing your journey and how did you get to be doing what you're doing.
[00:01:37] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. So my story is it's really, it started at the very beginning of life for me. So I grew up in a an environment where basically there was a lot of abuse going on. So it was, I ended up with all types of abuse, sexual, physical, emotional and By the time I was in my twenties, I ended up with illnesses. So in all different [00:02:00] types of illnesses from mostly digestive issues, I had migraine headaches.
[00:02:04] I had severe depression, of course, from all the trauma, I had also drowned as a small child. And Had to be revived from that. And so that's, you know, a major trauma. So I had a lot of night terrors from that. I just had so many different symptoms. And so by the time I was in my twenties, I was just in and out of doctor's offices getting another diagnosis.
[00:02:24] Irid will bowel syndrome ulcers again, severe depression. And I also had a scoliosis in my upper back and I would get these severe debilitating muscle spasms that would put me in bed for two weeks at a time. And I'd be on painkillers and muscle relaxers. At one point, I think I was on nine different meds in my twenties.
[00:02:43] Julie Michelson: the only one I was on. Well, I was in my thirties though. I was on 10, but you're the closest
[00:02:49] Dr. Meg Haworth: The closest, oh my gosh. And they, you know, they prescribe another med for a, another diagnosis that gets piled on because of medication side effects. And that's [00:03:00] one of the things that was happening with me as well. And I just. Had this moment. Actually I was reading the Washingtonian magazine. That's where I'm from originally.
[00:03:08] And it was in the, the mid nineties and it was an alternative medicine article. And I started reading about chiropractic care and I could barely hold this magazine up. And my first thought was, oh, that'd be so great for my then boyfriend
[00:03:22] And then it clicked like, wait a minute, you can't hold. You're thinking about everyone.
[00:03:28] You can't hold of this magazine, you need to go to the chiropractor. And a friend of mine had been raving. So I called her right away and started working with a chiropractor and she opened me up to meditation and yoga energy work, nutrition, big, big piece of the puzzle for me. And so that really started me on my journey and also the journey of, of understanding.
[00:03:51] The body and the mind are connected. And I was so disconnected from my body. I was in so much pain all the time. I remember my doctor said [00:04:00] you're in the kind of pain that would bring the average person to their knees.
[00:04:04] Julie Michelson: Yep.
[00:04:04] Dr. Meg Haworth: But she would be pressing on trigger points and I'd be like, what's that feeling? , she'd say Meg, me it's pain.
[00:04:12] And so I had to really get re get connected with my body, cuz I've been so dissociate, dissociated from all of the experiences that I'd gone through. Eventually in my, my journey, I found transpersonal psychology and that's what I ended up getting my PhD in. Because I, I did all of the, you know, changing the diet significant difference, major differences traditional psychotherapy, different, big, big differences as well.
[00:04:37] Acupuncture, you know, I just tried so many different modalities and they all made a huge difference, but it wasn't until I really got into the emotional root cause. And how that affects the physical body. And also.
[00:04:53] The how that gets affected and that that's. [00:05:00] So it wasn't until I found transpersonal psychology that my healing. Basically a quantum leap because I was looking in every part of my system and that includes the energy system and that's something I really I'd been studying about and I knew some about it, but I didn't understand how incredibly important it was.
[00:05:19] And that The emotional mental, physical, the entire holistic system is all one thing. And when you treat all the parts of it, it really helps to accelerate your healing in, in such a profound way. So getting to the emotional root cause of the traumas that occurred how my body was holding those and how my energy system was also storing that energy and I was being drained.
[00:05:44] My whole body was. Drained from all of the emotions I was experiencing all the time, the anxiety, the fear, the depression the, the sadness, all of those things were so in me all the time. And it was great to have [00:06:00] healed to the point that I did with all of the food. Work and the nutrition, just all of the interventions that I use it used were just incredible.
[00:06:09] But this whole whole level is what led me to become a transpersonal psychologist. I didn't mention also eventually I also got diagnosed with fibromyalgia with chronic fatigue syndrome. And then I had two positive tests for mixed connective tissue disease. . But by the time I got to the rheumatologist, which took, which took like three months to even get the appointment.
[00:06:30] Right. Cuz they're so backed.
[00:06:31] Julie Michelson: Right.
[00:06:32] Dr. Meg Haworth: I had gone to an herbal Oriental medical doctor and done all of my other interventions to help me and my symptoms were almost completely cleared up. And so the rheumatologist said, I I've never seen anybody, this healthy walk through my doors. And you already, you have a test positive for mixed connective tissue, just like he was puzzled.
[00:06:51] And they said, well, I guess it was just a false positive let's test you again.
[00:06:55] Julie Michelson: say? It must have been, yeah, it must have been misdiagnosed.
[00:06:58] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Yeah. [00:07:00] Let's test you again. And they tested me again, the exact same results came through, but I didn't have this symptomology anymore. And everything in their criteria is about the symptoms.
[00:07:11] Julie Michelson: Did they ask you how, what you were doing?
[00:07:14] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Well actually he did say, you know, whatever you've been doing, keep doing that, you know, he was very open minded.
[00:07:21] Julie Michelson: until we get to the point though, where they say, tell me so that I can help other people do the same. You
[00:07:26] Dr. Meg Haworth: I know, I know.
[00:07:28] Julie Michelson: just, one day we're, we're getting there.
[00:07:31] Dr. Meg Haworth: It would be wonderful. Yes. To have them be so excited about the healing that, that happened in my body. That they'd be like, well, I've gotta know how you did that. And I need to implement that into my practice too, because you know, it was a profound difference, you know, to have 19 different symptoms that had almost completely cleared up in three, four months of doing the herbal medicine.
[00:07:53] And the, the other emotional. Interventions that I was doing.
[00:07:58] Julie Michelson: amazing.[00:08:00]
[00:08:00] Dr. Meg Haworth: yes.
[00:08:00] Julie Michelson: And because I'm familiar with some of your story, I know it doesn't end there either.
[00:08:06] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yes. Yes. Seven, almost eight years ago. Wow. We're coming up on the 27th of July will be eight years since I was struck by lightning on Venice beach. So here I am with already this compromised nervous system with fibromyalgia and. All these things that I, I honestly think of myself as being healed and cleared of those things.
[00:08:27] I do have flareups from time to time that are in inflammation. They're inflammatory flareups that we all get. And I tend to be able to trace like, oh, oh, I ate that thing. Or
[00:08:38] Julie Michelson: Yeah,
[00:08:39] Dr. Meg Haworth: I went, I, I was exposed to those chemicals or, you know, And then I am able to balance it out pretty quickly, or I need something emotional that I've gone going through something emotional it's deeply affecting me right now.
[00:08:51] And I need to clear that up. So, so yeah, so I was struck by lightning eight years ago and it's had a, it was a profound turning point for me, [00:09:00] for
[00:09:00] Julie Michelson: Unbelievable. And for those of you that are listening on audio, she is the picture of health and beauty
[00:09:08] Dr. Meg Haworth: Aw, thank you. thank you.
[00:09:11] Julie Michelson: nobody would look at you and pick out any one of those things. And I love that you shared that with listeners. I say that all the time, I too I don't identify with any of the labels that I used to.
[00:09:24] And I. I don't usually use the word remission. I don't feel like I'm in remission from something I'm not waiting for something to come back. But
[00:09:32] Dr. Meg Haworth: a great way to put
[00:09:33] Julie Michelson: you know, you talked about. Integrating and, and getting in touch with your body and that's the key for everyone. But especially those of us that have overcome these chronic illnesses, autoimmunity, whatever it is that you're like, Hey, when you feel the inflammation.
[00:09:54] Poke its head up. You're like, okay, did I eat something? Am I stuffing an emotion? Is that, you know, [00:10:00] what am I not handling? Cuz my body's telling me something. And that's, that will be, I know for me, the rest of my life, you know, is,
[00:10:09] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:10:10] Julie Michelson: to listen and not wait.
[00:10:13] Dr. Meg Haworth: yes, yes. I say it all the time. As long as you're in a body, the fun never stops.
[00:10:19] Julie Michelson: Oh, I love that. love
[00:10:21] Dr. Meg Haworth: you're, there's always something to learn, grow, and evolve through. And your experience and your body, I think, especially teaches you so much. It is so
[00:10:32] Julie Michelson: oh yeah.
[00:10:33] Dr. Meg Haworth: and it carries the answers that you need to get to the next level of healing in your life.
[00:10:40] Julie Michelson: love that. Say that again.
[00:10:43] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Yeah. Your body carries. It has all of the answers has all of the wisdom that you need in order to get to the next level of healing in your life. And I love the word healing because it means its definition is the process of getting well, it's a process. It's not [00:11:00] something that, you know, here's your pill.
[00:11:02] I better , you know?
[00:11:04] Julie Michelson: right. Yeah. And it is a process. Health is a process I was sharing, you know, before we hit record listeners know, you know, I'm here I am at 53. I didn't expect to live, to see 50, much less be doing all of the new. Things and physical things that I'm doing now that, you know, I couldn't do before, or had never even thought to do, you
[00:11:29] Dr. Meg Haworth: it's amazing. You have a horse farm, like that's a lot of work.
[00:11:33] Julie Michelson: I learned
[00:11:34] Dr. Meg Haworth: four dogs.
[00:11:35] Julie Michelson: dive, and that's a brand new hobby is scuba diving. Just because, and I'm guessing you've experienced similar, you know, when life gets smaller, smaller, smaller, and we're healing. And when it gets bigger, bigger, bigger, now I'm like, why not? You know, scuba diving was never on my bucket list, but the opportunity come up and I was like, why not?
[00:11:56] Like I, and honestly, I, I [00:12:00] love it more than I really thought I would. And so now it's, you know, it's, it's up there. It's
[00:12:07] Dr. Meg Haworth: That's fantastic. You know, cuz what you're really talking about is the freedom, the freedom that comes from healing from getting to the root cause on all levels of why is this, why is this happening in my body and what can I do about it? And I know anybody listening is probably in that That mystery.
[00:12:24] Cause it really is a mystery and it's your own and every everyone, you know, it's, it's, you, it's unique to you. It's your own unique story and pathway.
[00:12:34] Julie Michelson: Absolutely. And that's the, and that's, more gold. It is where there is no standardizing, these things like we all, you know, look at your life and I love how you're like, oh, well, my story starts at the beginning. All of our stories start at the beginning, whether we realize it or not. Right. It's it's all.
[00:12:54] And, and so of course it's unique, you know, there's no one diet, there's no [00:13:00] one healing modality there, you know? And, and so I love that you highlighted that as well. That's
[00:13:07] Dr. Meg Haworth: yeah.
[00:13:08] Julie Michelson: So, In your practice. I know you've created an, an emotional release process and I was gonna ask you before I, I, I have similar path in that I, there were root causes that I didn't even know about yet. Finding the right nutrition and diet changes, finding a meditation practice, you know, handling some of these other things. I was able to move my needle. What I see and I'm sure you don't, you, you see as well with, with your clients. That's not always the case. Sometimes people can be making. Proper changes to support the body, but they're not feeling better and they're not moving their needle enough.
[00:13:56] And so I'm guessing [00:14:00] the emotional piece. The results are, like you said, you're you had a quantum change, right? You, you were just quantum improvement from handling that. I'm guessing you're, you're doing this earlier on with people. Hopefully, and, and not like it, it's not optional, right? It's not like, oh, well, if diet and lifestyle aren't enough, then maybe I should look at the emotional piece.
[00:14:26] Dr. Meg Haworth: Exactly. You know, I, I always, I think there's always an emotional component. Even if you have the common cold, you know, what, what precipitated it, you know, what happened right before that? Did you get in a, a major fight with your spouse or, you know, did somebody pass away? Some here's something that's interesting.
[00:14:45] You know, something I see in cancer patients, cuz I work with a lot of people with chronic illnesses is that there was usually some event or series of events that precipitated it. So like their husband cheated on them. Somebody close to them passed away. It, it [00:15:00] just, there's so many different events that can occur.
[00:15:02] You know, they, they lost their job that they've been in for 25 years. And something very emotional occurred and that emotional component I often will see. There's a lot of held resentments anger, fear And of course what's fascinating about it is it's different for everybody, everybody stores their information, their energy, their beliefs, their negative core beliefs.
[00:15:24] As a result of these, these difficult experiences, no matter how far back they went or how recent they are, everybody does it differently. And so that's why uniquely getting in and getting to that emotional root cause and how your body is holding. It makes all of the difference in the world. Because nobody's doing it.
[00:15:43] Like you're doing it. , that's all of healing is like this, you know?
[00:15:48] Julie Michelson: That's it's so true. So true. So tell us more about your approach. How, how are you helping people get to their emotional root cause and, and release it?[00:16:00]
[00:16:00] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. So a lot of people that find my work, they find it through podcasts like these through online summits and or you know, referrals, you know, cause they're just, cuz it's an unusual form of working on On illness and how, you know, how our bodies have been affected by traumatic experiences.
[00:16:18] And a lot of us don't even recognize. It's so fascinating to me. People will come to me and they, they watch their father beat up strangers in public, you know? And they're like, well, that's a trauma. Yeah. That's a trauma. That's really intense that you jumped in as a little kid to try to get your father away.
[00:16:35] You know, like it is just it's. Because it was normal for. You had, it was a normalized experience that is affecting you dramatically because we're not really meant to hold all of that fear and anger and sadness, but we put it somewhere and we're not encouraged to, to express it. [00:17:00] We're often told, you know, stop crying.
[00:17:03] Don't don't, don't go there. So we distract ourselves, we numb ourselves. But when we start to listen to these emotions, to the negativity, to the, what people call negative emotions, and I don't call it that anymore, I call them teaching emotions.
[00:17:17] Julie Michelson: I love that.
[00:17:19] Dr. Meg Haworth: Thanks. Cuz I think they're here to teach us something about who we really are and they're here to lead us out of the darkness, not to keep us in it.
[00:17:29] And as long as we're numbing and distracting and just not listening it, it will, we'll stay in that darkness. So when somebody comes to me I meet them where they are and we look at what's happening in their lives right now. The emotions that are coming up for them, the, the one that's I call it the, the overlighting emotion.
[00:17:52] Or the go-to emotion, the one that you cycle in over and over again. And we start with that emotion and if it's anxiety and I see this a lot, of [00:18:00] course, a lot of people are suffering from high anxiety for a lot of reasons. Cuz we look at the food piece too. Cuz I'm also you know, a holistic nutritional chef on top of this.
[00:18:08] So so we look. Those different layers of what's happening in the person. But when we do the emotional release work, a lot of emotional release techniques can be very jarring and they can be very difficult for people. They can take them weeks to recover from it. And what. I tend to see happen is in my sessions, people tend to leave them feeling happier, higher, lighter, freer, freer, like, oh my gosh, I've let go of something.
[00:18:37] It's, it's much more of a gentle technique because we're looking at the emotion itself. What does it believe? What does it think feel? How, what does it look like and feel like and we're having a whole conversation with that part of the, of the self. I'm fine. I found that these emotions, these negative emotions, these teaching emotions want the same thing you want.[00:19:00]
[00:19:00] They wanna be seen. They wanna be heard. They wanna be understood and ultimately they wanna be loved. And that's what the process that I use does for these. Parts of the self and those beliefs when they start to see, wow, that's in my heart and no wonder I have heart disease, like, and I have these chest pains and, oh my gosh.
[00:19:20] And so they see all of the connections simultaneously, then they're ready to say, okay, you know what? I just don't want this in my body anymore. And so we do a release process.
[00:19:28] Julie Michelson: That's
[00:19:28] Dr. Meg Haworth: and a replacement process. Cause I think that's one of the key pieces because we know emotions can make us sick. We know this just by things that we say, you know, that person makes me sick to my stomach or , you know, I, I, I'm worried sick about, you know, those kinds of things, but emotions can also make us well.
[00:19:49] And this is one of my greatest joys is to watch emotional wellness occur in people's lives and in their bodies. Cuz
[00:19:57] Julie Michelson: I love that it it's, [00:20:00] it's the same. Well, it's even, I actually wanna go on a limb and say, it's all, it's more important than the food you're eating. Of course. Anybody that knows me is gonna say, I can't believe she said that. It, it is. It, it really is. Cuz it's underneath all it. It's the why we got to where we got to to begin.
[00:20:17] But it's the same. I love that you do the emotional replacement because it's the same thing with food. People say, well, tell me what not to eat. And I'm like, but wait, wait, wait, let's start with like, what are you eating?
[00:20:29] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yes. Exactly.
[00:20:30] Julie Michelson: we, we, it's not all about what we're taking away. We need to nourish the potty, which you clearly know.
[00:20:37] We could do a whole separate, I have so many questions about your time as a chef and,
[00:20:42] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah.
[00:20:43] Julie Michelson: Your culinary expertise is, is exciting to me. I grew up in my, in the restaurant business. And so and, and now obviously I'm all about clean cooking and clean eating, so that, that would be a whole fun episode as well.
[00:20:56] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah,
[00:20:56] Julie Michelson: but so I'm really glad that you [00:21:00] shared with us. The, the fact when people hear. Trauma work or emotional release or emotional root. Cause we often we think, oh my gosh, that means I have to relive the trauma. And I just spent all these decades avoiding feeling that I, you know, I don't wanna spend two weeks recovering from an hour with Dr.
[00:21:24] Meg. Like , that's not ideal. So I love that it's a, you've found a way to deal work with the emotion. As it as its own thing. Okay. Let's just talk to the emotions and find out, you know, what, how are they just like everything else, just like your signs of inflammation that you feel in your body are serving you.
[00:21:50] Those emotions serve you. They're trying to give you information.
[00:21:54] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Yeah, they really are great teachers and they do hold the wisdom that [00:22:00] helps us unlock that key. Why is, why is this happening? You brought up something I think is really important too. As I found, I've worked with a lot of emotional eaters over the years. And many of them there was, there was abuse in their history.
[00:22:16] Julie Michelson: mm-hmm
[00:22:16] Dr. Meg Haworth: Oftentimes there's sexual abuse in their history. And when they get to that emotional root cause, and we start to work with releasing those emotions from the body and them understanding all of those connections then they're able to eat the advice that everyone else has given them.
[00:22:34] Julie Michelson: Right,
[00:22:34] Dr. Meg Haworth: eat healthily.
[00:22:35] Julie Michelson: nourish their body
[00:22:36] Dr. Meg Haworth: Eat healthily because, you know, and, and I know they hear this a lot in emotional eating programs and. You know, dear friends with some, some amazing top level emotional experts that are doing incredible work in the world. And they all say the same thing, you know, you've gotta get to the emotions because those are really running the program for you.
[00:22:55] And that when you clear that up, then you're able to.
[00:22:59] Julie Michelson: Then you get [00:23:00] to be in charge.
[00:23:01] Dr. Meg Haworth: Exactly. Exactly. That's you're exactly right. Cuz the emotions are in charge until, until you have a talk with them.
[00:23:12] Julie Michelson: I love, I love that. I, I tell clients when we're first working to identify patterns and the mean voices and you know, those things that are the programs that are running, that they're not aware of. And I'm like talk back like, you know, and they look at me like you want me to? I'm like, yeah, I, I joke. I'm like, you can be nice.
[00:23:32] You can say, thank you that doesn't serve me anymore. Or. You could be not nice and tell it to go pound, you know,
[00:23:38] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah,
[00:23:39] Julie Michelson: outta here.
[00:23:40] Dr. Meg Haworth: get outta here.
[00:23:43] Julie Michelson: cuz you know, I have some clients that are really polite. I'm not, I'm not that polite. not anymore. I was that's that's part of what, you know, led to my illness. So
[00:23:55] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah, that's interesting. You know, cause that makes me think about, you know, how pushing down [00:24:00] anger, particularly as a woman, you know, cuz we're encouraged, you know, to be sweet and nice. And it's just like, wait a minute. What does that mean? We just can't express ourselves. So we often will push our anger in and that will create the illness.
[00:24:14] Julie Michelson: Yep, absolutely.
[00:24:16] Dr. Meg Haworth: for sure.
[00:24:17] Julie Michelson: And mine as well. And I'm one of those people listeners have heard me share before. You know, it it's this, you mentioned cancer specifically, but it it's all, all of it. And so common with autoimmunity that there is some stressor trigger, even if it is a lifetime of stress or trauma. And for me it was divorce and the divorce itself, you know, it, it, I was fine through the divorce.
[00:24:43] Dr. Meg Haworth: right.
[00:24:44] Julie Michelson: Then my body fell apart. And, and so, and it's, I will say for the handful of men that are listening you know, y'all are taught to, to stuff, your sadness and stuff, you know, so it it's, we all have, and this isn't just [00:25:00] a female thing. It's it's all of us.
[00:25:03] Dr. Meg Haworth: yeah, absolutely. You know, and you keep saying, using the word stuff. You know, you're stuffed with emotions to the point of bursting and allowing those emotions to be released from the body is one of the most powerful things that you can do intentionally for your health.
[00:25:20] Julie Michelson: Love that. Is there a, kind of, I know you alluded to you, you do it for, for yourself. Say somebody comes and they, they work with you and you know, they're healing, right. They're in that place.
[00:25:34] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah,
[00:25:36] Julie Michelson: It it, do you recommend, this is totally out of the blue so you, you can be like, why did you throw me under the bus that way? just, it literally just came up. Well, I just got this. I never thought about it this way before. You know, we talk about when we were talking about stuffing, we talk about, you know, toxins and we use the bathtub analogy, right. And we overflow. And so what do we [00:26:00] do? We support those pathways is one of the steps, right?
[00:26:03] To work better to obviously we wanna reduce exposure and we wanna be able to excrete them. And it is the same with emotion, emotional stuff. So do, do you recommend, I, I don't know, periodic kind of self checking, like once we're feeling well, cuz we're, as you mentioned, it's we're not done. We're never done.
[00:26:28] Dr. Meg Haworth: Right.
[00:26:29] Julie Michelson: I, is there some kind of a maintenance emotional maintenance you recommend for people,
[00:26:36] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. You know, that's, that's a great question. And the more, you know, yourself and, you know, your triggers and you understand your emotional inner workings that I say to deal with it when it comes up,
[00:26:49] Julie Michelson: right.
[00:26:49] Dr. Meg Haworth: It, it's easy to kind of go back into the, the way you've always. Because it's the way you've always done it.
[00:26:55] So it's easier to go back into the pattern, but unhinging and [00:27:00] releasing the pattern. It also takes work, as you mentioned earlier. And so if you found that there's certain things along the way of, of working with your emotions, releasing your emotions, that work for you then, you know, like journaling, for instance, if it really helps you to sit down and write out, like, gosh, I'm so upset right now.
[00:27:19] The. That person spoke to me was just horrible. And I, and I feel, you know, insignificant and small at the moment, you know? And so you just start going into that. And you know, something I do with my clients is I teach them different techniques that can help them so that they're doing this on their own.
[00:27:36] They don't have to rely upon me.
[00:27:39] Julie Michelson: they have the tools moving forward.
[00:27:42] Dr. Meg Haworth: They have tools moving forward, and it's finding those tools that work for you and continuing to implement those tools throughout your life. Because it becomes easier and you get through it faster and faster. The more you do it, it's just it's exercise. Right.
[00:27:55] You know, it's like when you go to the gym and the first time you go in, you're just like, oh [00:28:00] my God, I'm in so much pain. But as you continue doing it, you feel yourself getting stronger, you feel yourself getting faster, you feel yourself having more energy. The same thing happens with your emotional life.
[00:28:10] And working with that emotional muscle and strengthening your emotional maturity.
[00:28:15] Julie Michelson: I love that.
[00:28:16] Dr. Meg Haworth: yeah, so it's, it's, you keep working with it as it happens. And you make it to that point where, you know, you're in the middle of the moment and somebody triggers you and you're just like, oh my gosh. Okay.
[00:28:28] Julie Michelson: I can breathe.
[00:28:29] Dr. Meg Haworth: You.
[00:28:29] Yeah. You know, there's simple, energetic exercises. I teach people that they can use in those moments. And so you can start to shift in the moment and that's hard. That's a really hard thing to master, but it's emotional self mastery. And when you get to that place, it's just like, wow, this is, this is true freedom.
[00:28:49] Julie Michelson: That is true freedom like that, that's it right there. Like when you can do that, you win
[00:28:55] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah.
[00:28:56] Julie Michelson: really. But I would imagine like every other [00:29:00] technique you and I use people need to be using it. And I always say like, you, you, the tool has to be in your toolbox for you to grab it at a time of stress like that.
[00:29:09] I dunno.
[00:29:10] Dr. Meg Haworth: And I do teach, teach people in my online course how to do use whole person integration technique on themselves and they can get certified to do it on other people for practitioners. Because it's, it's it's proven to be such a valuable tool to help people get to that emotion quickly. In a simplistic way, you know, it's not, it's not too complex. But I think a lot of the things in life that are the best or the simplest
[00:29:36] Julie Michelson: Of course simple foods, simple flavors. I knew it
[00:29:44] Dr. Meg Haworth: is a
[00:29:46] Julie Michelson: It is unbelievable.
[00:29:48] Dr. Meg Haworth: yes.
[00:29:50] Julie Michelson: it's it's so funny. I had this total aside, but I have, I was just on vacation and I came home and I, I planted. [00:30:00] Side of my garden. In addition to inside my garden this year, we had just some areas around some rock beds, and I was like, let's throw, you know, some butternut squash over there and some zucchini over here.
[00:30:11] And, oh my gosh, I came home and I have given away at least three or four zucchini a day. In addition to eating zucchini in some form every day, like we are living on, but it, it may, it's so simple, you know, it's so joyful. And somebody said to me, I don't even know how to cook it. I'm like, well, we had it last night, just grilled.
[00:30:32] like, it doesn't have to be, you know, in, in a. Fancy dish. So yeah. Keep your food simple. Keep your li I mean, and that's what happens as we unravel, you know, life should be simple. Like it doesn't have to be that complicated. I, to me, at least the, the more simple, the more joyful and fun.
[00:30:54] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah, I agree. simplify
[00:30:57] Julie Michelson: I, I, I love that.[00:31:00]
[00:31:00] So you let us write to my next question, which is what are some things that listeners can do. And I'll warn you and you'll have to highlight one because I always ask at the end of the podcast or the end of the interview for one step. So as I'm asking for some things, it can be one thing or it can be.
[00:31:20] whatever you've got for us. And then tell us what that one thing we really need to start with.
[00:31:26] Dr. Meg Haworth: okay. Yeah, so I think resonating with, if any of this is resonating with you rather Getting really in touch with the body, I think is one of the most important things that you can do and really understanding what's happening within it. We're so often so busy, we're moving so fast during the day that we don't even listen to signals.
[00:31:45] Like, oh, you have to go to the bathroom until suddenly you have this urgency, you know?
[00:31:50] Julie Michelson: Or you pull in your garage?
[00:31:52] Dr. Meg Haworth: yeah, right. I'm like, oh, wait a minute. I didn't go all day. You know, so so even if you're sitting at [00:32:00] your desk at work it just to close your eyes for just a moment I often say put your hands on your stomach and just take in a deep breath and through the nose and out through the mouth.
[00:32:12] And then just focus on your body for a moment. Just scan it and just ask yourself, what do I need? Oh my gosh, I'm thirsty. Oh, my stomach hurts. oh, my knee hurts. like, what's going on? So your body's giving you these signals in different parts of it. It's, it's asking for certain needs and just honoring those needs, so, okay.
[00:32:34] I need to drink some water. So get up and go get some water, or you've got water right there by your desk. and you haven't had any sips of it for the last few hours, so stop and do that. So movement also is very important. So get up, get up, stretch put on some music and dance for a minute. Like it doesn't even have to be that, that elaborate, you know, it just.
[00:32:57] Dance for a minute and you will feel much better. You'll [00:33:00] just be like, oh my gosh, I moved. And I'm you moved in a way that was just natural to you. And it didn't really matter, you know, cuz you weren't
[00:33:08] Julie Michelson: Yeah, dance. Like, no one's looking exactly. I love that.
[00:33:13] Dr. Meg Haworth: so just, those are just some simple things to start doing to, to get in touch with your body and start feeling yourself, you know, and what's something that's interesting that I know somatic therapist, friend of mine that I've worked with before says most of us are disconnected from our legs.
[00:33:30] Julie Michelson: Ah,
[00:33:30] Dr. Meg Haworth: Which is very fascinating because our legs are really our forward movement. If you think of the body as a metaphor for your experience and your, your feet are like your understanding, right. you know, so getting in touch with your legs, how do your legs feel right now? How do your feet feel? Oh, oh my goodness.
[00:33:48] My feet are a little bit sore. Maybe do a little self massage and just help to ease that soreness that's going on. And just feel what's going on in your legs, in your, in your forward movement. [00:34:00] So those kinds of things, there's
[00:34:01] Julie Michelson: Those are amazing tips. And, and for listeners, like really do these things, , you would be amazed at just taking the steps to do that. You know, we do, we live in our heads, it's time to get in your body. I always think that that. You know, the people being so disconnected from their legs is just, cuz it's just, they're so far from your head and you're up in your head all the time.
[00:34:26] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yes, you're in your head, big, big time and a, a, a big piece of what I teach people as well is, is their intuitive guidance and really listening to their inner, your inner guidance system. And that one way to do that is. When you're in the middle of that, that breathing process, scanning process, what am I feeling?
[00:34:47] You know, what, what feels right for me, what's my best next move and simple questions like that. And just letting that, that information just come to you.
[00:34:58] Julie Michelson: I love it. [00:35:00] Amazing, amazing stuff. So before we wrap up for people that are listening on the go, which is how I usually take in my podcasts and don't want to check out the show notes to find all the links. What's the best place to find you. People that are leaning in that are like, wow, you know, I need.
[00:35:20] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah.
[00:35:21] Julie Michelson: should they look for you?
[00:35:22] Dr. Meg Haworth: You can find me Meg hayworth.com. It's M E G H a w O R T h.com. At Dr. Meg Hayworth on all of the social media platforms like Instagram, we have little, little clips that help people, and I also have YouTube channel. So yeah. Also at Dr. MCK Heworth yeah.
[00:35:43] Julie Michelson: Dr. Meg, thank you so much. You have shared amazing gold with us today. Really life changing stuff in that simple way that you were talking about like basil, you are, you are like basil but really it is so understandable. [00:36:00] And so I love that. My hope is that that even the listener who in the beginning was thinking, you know, I don't have trauma.
[00:36:08] I don't have feelings. I don't have realizes now, like, huh, this is something that needs to be explored. I think it's something that everybody should explore autoimmunity or not illness or not to, to have our very best healthiest fullest lives. So I really appreciate you sharing with us.
[00:36:27] Dr. Meg Haworth: Oh gosh. You're most welcome. Thank you for having me.
[00:36:30] Julie Michelson: My pleasure. And for everyone listening, remember that you can get the show notes and transcripts by visiting inspired living.show. I hope you had a great time and enjoyed this episode as much as I did. I'll see you next week.
[00:01:01] We talk about root causes a lot on the show, and today it's all about the emotional root causes to illness and how we can get in touch with our bodies to allow for healing.
[00:01:12] Dr. Meg, welcome to the podcast.
[00:01:15] Dr. Meg Haworth: Thank you so much for having me here. I'm so grateful to be here.
[00:01:19] Julie Michelson: I am excited to share not only your story but your work with listeners. And I know some really incredible parts of your story. But let's introduce you to listeners by, by sharing your journey and how did you get to be doing what you're doing.
[00:01:37] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. So my story is it's really, it started at the very beginning of life for me. So I grew up in a an environment where basically there was a lot of abuse going on. So it was, I ended up with all types of abuse, sexual, physical, emotional and By the time I was in my twenties, I ended up with illnesses. So in all different [00:02:00] types of illnesses from mostly digestive issues, I had migraine headaches.
[00:02:04] I had severe depression, of course, from all the trauma, I had also drowned as a small child. And Had to be revived from that. And so that's, you know, a major trauma. So I had a lot of night terrors from that. I just had so many different symptoms. And so by the time I was in my twenties, I was just in and out of doctor's offices getting another diagnosis.
[00:02:24] Irid will bowel syndrome ulcers again, severe depression. And I also had a scoliosis in my upper back and I would get these severe debilitating muscle spasms that would put me in bed for two weeks at a time. And I'd be on painkillers and muscle relaxers. At one point, I think I was on nine different meds in my twenties.
[00:02:43] Julie Michelson: the only one I was on. Well, I was in my thirties though. I was on 10, but you're the closest
[00:02:49] Dr. Meg Haworth: The closest, oh my gosh. And they, you know, they prescribe another med for a, another diagnosis that gets piled on because of medication side effects. And that's [00:03:00] one of the things that was happening with me as well. And I just. Had this moment. Actually I was reading the Washingtonian magazine. That's where I'm from originally.
[00:03:08] And it was in the, the mid nineties and it was an alternative medicine article. And I started reading about chiropractic care and I could barely hold this magazine up. And my first thought was, oh, that'd be so great for my then boyfriend
[00:03:22] And then it clicked like, wait a minute, you can't hold. You're thinking about everyone.
[00:03:28] You can't hold of this magazine, you need to go to the chiropractor. And a friend of mine had been raving. So I called her right away and started working with a chiropractor and she opened me up to meditation and yoga energy work, nutrition, big, big piece of the puzzle for me. And so that really started me on my journey and also the journey of, of understanding.
[00:03:51] The body and the mind are connected. And I was so disconnected from my body. I was in so much pain all the time. I remember my doctor said [00:04:00] you're in the kind of pain that would bring the average person to their knees.
[00:04:04] Julie Michelson: Yep.
[00:04:04] Dr. Meg Haworth: But she would be pressing on trigger points and I'd be like, what's that feeling? , she'd say Meg, me it's pain.
[00:04:12] And so I had to really get re get connected with my body, cuz I've been so dissociate, dissociated from all of the experiences that I'd gone through. Eventually in my, my journey, I found transpersonal psychology and that's what I ended up getting my PhD in. Because I, I did all of the, you know, changing the diet significant difference, major differences traditional psychotherapy, different, big, big differences as well.
[00:04:37] Acupuncture, you know, I just tried so many different modalities and they all made a huge difference, but it wasn't until I really got into the emotional root cause. And how that affects the physical body. And also.
[00:04:53] The how that gets affected and that that's. [00:05:00] So it wasn't until I found transpersonal psychology that my healing. Basically a quantum leap because I was looking in every part of my system and that includes the energy system and that's something I really I'd been studying about and I knew some about it, but I didn't understand how incredibly important it was.
[00:05:19] And that The emotional mental, physical, the entire holistic system is all one thing. And when you treat all the parts of it, it really helps to accelerate your healing in, in such a profound way. So getting to the emotional root cause of the traumas that occurred how my body was holding those and how my energy system was also storing that energy and I was being drained.
[00:05:44] My whole body was. Drained from all of the emotions I was experiencing all the time, the anxiety, the fear, the depression the, the sadness, all of those things were so in me all the time. And it was great to have [00:06:00] healed to the point that I did with all of the food. Work and the nutrition, just all of the interventions that I use it used were just incredible.
[00:06:09] But this whole whole level is what led me to become a transpersonal psychologist. I didn't mention also eventually I also got diagnosed with fibromyalgia with chronic fatigue syndrome. And then I had two positive tests for mixed connective tissue disease. . But by the time I got to the rheumatologist, which took, which took like three months to even get the appointment.
[00:06:30] Right. Cuz they're so backed.
[00:06:31] Julie Michelson: Right.
[00:06:32] Dr. Meg Haworth: I had gone to an herbal Oriental medical doctor and done all of my other interventions to help me and my symptoms were almost completely cleared up. And so the rheumatologist said, I I've never seen anybody, this healthy walk through my doors. And you already, you have a test positive for mixed connective tissue, just like he was puzzled.
[00:06:51] And they said, well, I guess it was just a false positive let's test you again.
[00:06:55] Julie Michelson: say? It must have been, yeah, it must have been misdiagnosed.
[00:06:58] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Yeah. [00:07:00] Let's test you again. And they tested me again, the exact same results came through, but I didn't have this symptomology anymore. And everything in their criteria is about the symptoms.
[00:07:11] Julie Michelson: Did they ask you how, what you were doing?
[00:07:14] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Well actually he did say, you know, whatever you've been doing, keep doing that, you know, he was very open minded.
[00:07:21] Julie Michelson: until we get to the point though, where they say, tell me so that I can help other people do the same. You
[00:07:26] Dr. Meg Haworth: I know, I know.
[00:07:28] Julie Michelson: just, one day we're, we're getting there.
[00:07:31] Dr. Meg Haworth: It would be wonderful. Yes. To have them be so excited about the healing that, that happened in my body. That they'd be like, well, I've gotta know how you did that. And I need to implement that into my practice too, because you know, it was a profound difference, you know, to have 19 different symptoms that had almost completely cleared up in three, four months of doing the herbal medicine.
[00:07:53] And the, the other emotional. Interventions that I was doing.
[00:07:58] Julie Michelson: amazing.[00:08:00]
[00:08:00] Dr. Meg Haworth: yes.
[00:08:00] Julie Michelson: And because I'm familiar with some of your story, I know it doesn't end there either.
[00:08:06] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yes. Yes. Seven, almost eight years ago. Wow. We're coming up on the 27th of July will be eight years since I was struck by lightning on Venice beach. So here I am with already this compromised nervous system with fibromyalgia and. All these things that I, I honestly think of myself as being healed and cleared of those things.
[00:08:27] I do have flareups from time to time that are in inflammation. They're inflammatory flareups that we all get. And I tend to be able to trace like, oh, oh, I ate that thing. Or
[00:08:38] Julie Michelson: Yeah,
[00:08:39] Dr. Meg Haworth: I went, I, I was exposed to those chemicals or, you know, And then I am able to balance it out pretty quickly, or I need something emotional that I've gone going through something emotional it's deeply affecting me right now.
[00:08:51] And I need to clear that up. So, so yeah, so I was struck by lightning eight years ago and it's had a, it was a profound turning point for me, [00:09:00] for
[00:09:00] Julie Michelson: Unbelievable. And for those of you that are listening on audio, she is the picture of health and beauty
[00:09:08] Dr. Meg Haworth: Aw, thank you. thank you.
[00:09:11] Julie Michelson: nobody would look at you and pick out any one of those things. And I love that you shared that with listeners. I say that all the time, I too I don't identify with any of the labels that I used to.
[00:09:24] And I. I don't usually use the word remission. I don't feel like I'm in remission from something I'm not waiting for something to come back. But
[00:09:32] Dr. Meg Haworth: a great way to put
[00:09:33] Julie Michelson: you know, you talked about. Integrating and, and getting in touch with your body and that's the key for everyone. But especially those of us that have overcome these chronic illnesses, autoimmunity, whatever it is that you're like, Hey, when you feel the inflammation.
[00:09:54] Poke its head up. You're like, okay, did I eat something? Am I stuffing an emotion? Is that, you know, [00:10:00] what am I not handling? Cuz my body's telling me something. And that's, that will be, I know for me, the rest of my life, you know, is,
[00:10:09] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:10:10] Julie Michelson: to listen and not wait.
[00:10:13] Dr. Meg Haworth: yes, yes. I say it all the time. As long as you're in a body, the fun never stops.
[00:10:19] Julie Michelson: Oh, I love that. love
[00:10:21] Dr. Meg Haworth: you're, there's always something to learn, grow, and evolve through. And your experience and your body, I think, especially teaches you so much. It is so
[00:10:32] Julie Michelson: oh yeah.
[00:10:33] Dr. Meg Haworth: and it carries the answers that you need to get to the next level of healing in your life.
[00:10:40] Julie Michelson: love that. Say that again.
[00:10:43] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Yeah. Your body carries. It has all of the answers has all of the wisdom that you need in order to get to the next level of healing in your life. And I love the word healing because it means its definition is the process of getting well, it's a process. It's not [00:11:00] something that, you know, here's your pill.
[00:11:02] I better , you know?
[00:11:04] Julie Michelson: right. Yeah. And it is a process. Health is a process I was sharing, you know, before we hit record listeners know, you know, I'm here I am at 53. I didn't expect to live, to see 50, much less be doing all of the new. Things and physical things that I'm doing now that, you know, I couldn't do before, or had never even thought to do, you
[00:11:29] Dr. Meg Haworth: it's amazing. You have a horse farm, like that's a lot of work.
[00:11:33] Julie Michelson: I learned
[00:11:34] Dr. Meg Haworth: four dogs.
[00:11:35] Julie Michelson: dive, and that's a brand new hobby is scuba diving. Just because, and I'm guessing you've experienced similar, you know, when life gets smaller, smaller, smaller, and we're healing. And when it gets bigger, bigger, bigger, now I'm like, why not? You know, scuba diving was never on my bucket list, but the opportunity come up and I was like, why not?
[00:11:56] Like I, and honestly, I, I [00:12:00] love it more than I really thought I would. And so now it's, you know, it's, it's up there. It's
[00:12:07] Dr. Meg Haworth: That's fantastic. You know, cuz what you're really talking about is the freedom, the freedom that comes from healing from getting to the root cause on all levels of why is this, why is this happening in my body and what can I do about it? And I know anybody listening is probably in that That mystery.
[00:12:24] Cause it really is a mystery and it's your own and every everyone, you know, it's, it's, you, it's unique to you. It's your own unique story and pathway.
[00:12:34] Julie Michelson: Absolutely. And that's the, and that's, more gold. It is where there is no standardizing, these things like we all, you know, look at your life and I love how you're like, oh, well, my story starts at the beginning. All of our stories start at the beginning, whether we realize it or not. Right. It's it's all.
[00:12:54] And, and so of course it's unique, you know, there's no one diet, there's no [00:13:00] one healing modality there, you know? And, and so I love that you highlighted that as well. That's
[00:13:07] Dr. Meg Haworth: yeah.
[00:13:08] Julie Michelson: So, In your practice. I know you've created an, an emotional release process and I was gonna ask you before I, I, I have similar path in that I, there were root causes that I didn't even know about yet. Finding the right nutrition and diet changes, finding a meditation practice, you know, handling some of these other things. I was able to move my needle. What I see and I'm sure you don't, you, you see as well with, with your clients. That's not always the case. Sometimes people can be making. Proper changes to support the body, but they're not feeling better and they're not moving their needle enough.
[00:13:56] And so I'm guessing [00:14:00] the emotional piece. The results are, like you said, you're you had a quantum change, right? You, you were just quantum improvement from handling that. I'm guessing you're, you're doing this earlier on with people. Hopefully, and, and not like it, it's not optional, right? It's not like, oh, well, if diet and lifestyle aren't enough, then maybe I should look at the emotional piece.
[00:14:26] Dr. Meg Haworth: Exactly. You know, I, I always, I think there's always an emotional component. Even if you have the common cold, you know, what, what precipitated it, you know, what happened right before that? Did you get in a, a major fight with your spouse or, you know, did somebody pass away? Some here's something that's interesting.
[00:14:45] You know, something I see in cancer patients, cuz I work with a lot of people with chronic illnesses is that there was usually some event or series of events that precipitated it. So like their husband cheated on them. Somebody close to them passed away. It, it [00:15:00] just, there's so many different events that can occur.
[00:15:02] You know, they, they lost their job that they've been in for 25 years. And something very emotional occurred and that emotional component I often will see. There's a lot of held resentments anger, fear And of course what's fascinating about it is it's different for everybody, everybody stores their information, their energy, their beliefs, their negative core beliefs.
[00:15:24] As a result of these, these difficult experiences, no matter how far back they went or how recent they are, everybody does it differently. And so that's why uniquely getting in and getting to that emotional root cause and how your body is holding. It makes all of the difference in the world. Because nobody's doing it.
[00:15:43] Like you're doing it. , that's all of healing is like this, you know?
[00:15:48] Julie Michelson: That's it's so true. So true. So tell us more about your approach. How, how are you helping people get to their emotional root cause and, and release it?[00:16:00]
[00:16:00] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. So a lot of people that find my work, they find it through podcasts like these through online summits and or you know, referrals, you know, cause they're just, cuz it's an unusual form of working on On illness and how, you know, how our bodies have been affected by traumatic experiences.
[00:16:18] And a lot of us don't even recognize. It's so fascinating to me. People will come to me and they, they watch their father beat up strangers in public, you know? And they're like, well, that's a trauma. Yeah. That's a trauma. That's really intense that you jumped in as a little kid to try to get your father away.
[00:16:35] You know, like it is just it's. Because it was normal for. You had, it was a normalized experience that is affecting you dramatically because we're not really meant to hold all of that fear and anger and sadness, but we put it somewhere and we're not encouraged to, to express it. [00:17:00] We're often told, you know, stop crying.
[00:17:03] Don't don't, don't go there. So we distract ourselves, we numb ourselves. But when we start to listen to these emotions, to the negativity, to the, what people call negative emotions, and I don't call it that anymore, I call them teaching emotions.
[00:17:17] Julie Michelson: I love that.
[00:17:19] Dr. Meg Haworth: Thanks. Cuz I think they're here to teach us something about who we really are and they're here to lead us out of the darkness, not to keep us in it.
[00:17:29] And as long as we're numbing and distracting and just not listening it, it will, we'll stay in that darkness. So when somebody comes to me I meet them where they are and we look at what's happening in their lives right now. The emotions that are coming up for them, the, the one that's I call it the, the overlighting emotion.
[00:17:52] Or the go-to emotion, the one that you cycle in over and over again. And we start with that emotion and if it's anxiety and I see this a lot, of [00:18:00] course, a lot of people are suffering from high anxiety for a lot of reasons. Cuz we look at the food piece too. Cuz I'm also you know, a holistic nutritional chef on top of this.
[00:18:08] So so we look. Those different layers of what's happening in the person. But when we do the emotional release work, a lot of emotional release techniques can be very jarring and they can be very difficult for people. They can take them weeks to recover from it. And what. I tend to see happen is in my sessions, people tend to leave them feeling happier, higher, lighter, freer, freer, like, oh my gosh, I've let go of something.
[00:18:37] It's, it's much more of a gentle technique because we're looking at the emotion itself. What does it believe? What does it think feel? How, what does it look like and feel like and we're having a whole conversation with that part of the, of the self. I'm fine. I found that these emotions, these negative emotions, these teaching emotions want the same thing you want.[00:19:00]
[00:19:00] They wanna be seen. They wanna be heard. They wanna be understood and ultimately they wanna be loved. And that's what the process that I use does for these. Parts of the self and those beliefs when they start to see, wow, that's in my heart and no wonder I have heart disease, like, and I have these chest pains and, oh my gosh.
[00:19:20] And so they see all of the connections simultaneously, then they're ready to say, okay, you know what? I just don't want this in my body anymore. And so we do a release process.
[00:19:28] Julie Michelson: That's
[00:19:28] Dr. Meg Haworth: and a replacement process. Cause I think that's one of the key pieces because we know emotions can make us sick. We know this just by things that we say, you know, that person makes me sick to my stomach or , you know, I, I, I'm worried sick about, you know, those kinds of things, but emotions can also make us well.
[00:19:49] And this is one of my greatest joys is to watch emotional wellness occur in people's lives and in their bodies. Cuz
[00:19:57] Julie Michelson: I love that it it's, [00:20:00] it's the same. Well, it's even, I actually wanna go on a limb and say, it's all, it's more important than the food you're eating. Of course. Anybody that knows me is gonna say, I can't believe she said that. It, it is. It, it really is. Cuz it's underneath all it. It's the why we got to where we got to to begin.
[00:20:17] But it's the same. I love that you do the emotional replacement because it's the same thing with food. People say, well, tell me what not to eat. And I'm like, but wait, wait, wait, let's start with like, what are you eating?
[00:20:29] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yes. Exactly.
[00:20:30] Julie Michelson: we, we, it's not all about what we're taking away. We need to nourish the potty, which you clearly know.
[00:20:37] We could do a whole separate, I have so many questions about your time as a chef and,
[00:20:42] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah.
[00:20:43] Julie Michelson: Your culinary expertise is, is exciting to me. I grew up in my, in the restaurant business. And so and, and now obviously I'm all about clean cooking and clean eating, so that, that would be a whole fun episode as well.
[00:20:56] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah,
[00:20:56] Julie Michelson: but so I'm really glad that you [00:21:00] shared with us. The, the fact when people hear. Trauma work or emotional release or emotional root. Cause we often we think, oh my gosh, that means I have to relive the trauma. And I just spent all these decades avoiding feeling that I, you know, I don't wanna spend two weeks recovering from an hour with Dr.
[00:21:24] Meg. Like , that's not ideal. So I love that it's a, you've found a way to deal work with the emotion. As it as its own thing. Okay. Let's just talk to the emotions and find out, you know, what, how are they just like everything else, just like your signs of inflammation that you feel in your body are serving you.
[00:21:50] Those emotions serve you. They're trying to give you information.
[00:21:54] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. Yeah, they really are great teachers and they do hold the wisdom that [00:22:00] helps us unlock that key. Why is, why is this happening? You brought up something I think is really important too. As I found, I've worked with a lot of emotional eaters over the years. And many of them there was, there was abuse in their history.
[00:22:16] Julie Michelson: mm-hmm
[00:22:16] Dr. Meg Haworth: Oftentimes there's sexual abuse in their history. And when they get to that emotional root cause, and we start to work with releasing those emotions from the body and them understanding all of those connections then they're able to eat the advice that everyone else has given them.
[00:22:34] Julie Michelson: Right,
[00:22:34] Dr. Meg Haworth: eat healthily.
[00:22:35] Julie Michelson: nourish their body
[00:22:36] Dr. Meg Haworth: Eat healthily because, you know, and, and I know they hear this a lot in emotional eating programs and. You know, dear friends with some, some amazing top level emotional experts that are doing incredible work in the world. And they all say the same thing, you know, you've gotta get to the emotions because those are really running the program for you.
[00:22:55] And that when you clear that up, then you're able to.
[00:22:59] Julie Michelson: Then you get [00:23:00] to be in charge.
[00:23:01] Dr. Meg Haworth: Exactly. Exactly. That's you're exactly right. Cuz the emotions are in charge until, until you have a talk with them.
[00:23:12] Julie Michelson: I love, I love that. I, I tell clients when we're first working to identify patterns and the mean voices and you know, those things that are the programs that are running, that they're not aware of. And I'm like talk back like, you know, and they look at me like you want me to? I'm like, yeah, I, I joke. I'm like, you can be nice.
[00:23:32] You can say, thank you that doesn't serve me anymore. Or. You could be not nice and tell it to go pound, you know,
[00:23:38] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah,
[00:23:39] Julie Michelson: outta here.
[00:23:40] Dr. Meg Haworth: get outta here.
[00:23:43] Julie Michelson: cuz you know, I have some clients that are really polite. I'm not, I'm not that polite. not anymore. I was that's that's part of what, you know, led to my illness. So
[00:23:55] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah, that's interesting. You know, cause that makes me think about, you know, how pushing down [00:24:00] anger, particularly as a woman, you know, cuz we're encouraged, you know, to be sweet and nice. And it's just like, wait a minute. What does that mean? We just can't express ourselves. So we often will push our anger in and that will create the illness.
[00:24:14] Julie Michelson: Yep, absolutely.
[00:24:16] Dr. Meg Haworth: for sure.
[00:24:17] Julie Michelson: And mine as well. And I'm one of those people listeners have heard me share before. You know, it it's this, you mentioned cancer specifically, but it it's all, all of it. And so common with autoimmunity that there is some stressor trigger, even if it is a lifetime of stress or trauma. And for me it was divorce and the divorce itself, you know, it, it, I was fine through the divorce.
[00:24:43] Dr. Meg Haworth: right.
[00:24:44] Julie Michelson: Then my body fell apart. And, and so, and it's, I will say for the handful of men that are listening you know, y'all are taught to, to stuff, your sadness and stuff, you know, so it it's, we all have, and this isn't just [00:25:00] a female thing. It's it's all of us.
[00:25:03] Dr. Meg Haworth: yeah, absolutely. You know, and you keep saying, using the word stuff. You know, you're stuffed with emotions to the point of bursting and allowing those emotions to be released from the body is one of the most powerful things that you can do intentionally for your health.
[00:25:20] Julie Michelson: Love that. Is there a, kind of, I know you alluded to you, you do it for, for yourself. Say somebody comes and they, they work with you and you know, they're healing, right. They're in that place.
[00:25:34] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah,
[00:25:36] Julie Michelson: It it, do you recommend, this is totally out of the blue so you, you can be like, why did you throw me under the bus that way? just, it literally just came up. Well, I just got this. I never thought about it this way before. You know, we talk about when we were talking about stuffing, we talk about, you know, toxins and we use the bathtub analogy, right. And we overflow. And so what do we [00:26:00] do? We support those pathways is one of the steps, right?
[00:26:03] To work better to obviously we wanna reduce exposure and we wanna be able to excrete them. And it is the same with emotion, emotional stuff. So do, do you recommend, I, I don't know, periodic kind of self checking, like once we're feeling well, cuz we're, as you mentioned, it's we're not done. We're never done.
[00:26:28] Dr. Meg Haworth: Right.
[00:26:29] Julie Michelson: I, is there some kind of a maintenance emotional maintenance you recommend for people,
[00:26:36] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah. You know, that's, that's a great question. And the more, you know, yourself and, you know, your triggers and you understand your emotional inner workings that I say to deal with it when it comes up,
[00:26:49] Julie Michelson: right.
[00:26:49] Dr. Meg Haworth: It, it's easy to kind of go back into the, the way you've always. Because it's the way you've always done it.
[00:26:55] So it's easier to go back into the pattern, but unhinging and [00:27:00] releasing the pattern. It also takes work, as you mentioned earlier. And so if you found that there's certain things along the way of, of working with your emotions, releasing your emotions, that work for you then, you know, like journaling, for instance, if it really helps you to sit down and write out, like, gosh, I'm so upset right now.
[00:27:19] The. That person spoke to me was just horrible. And I, and I feel, you know, insignificant and small at the moment, you know? And so you just start going into that. And you know, something I do with my clients is I teach them different techniques that can help them so that they're doing this on their own.
[00:27:36] They don't have to rely upon me.
[00:27:39] Julie Michelson: they have the tools moving forward.
[00:27:42] Dr. Meg Haworth: They have tools moving forward, and it's finding those tools that work for you and continuing to implement those tools throughout your life. Because it becomes easier and you get through it faster and faster. The more you do it, it's just it's exercise. Right.
[00:27:55] You know, it's like when you go to the gym and the first time you go in, you're just like, oh [00:28:00] my God, I'm in so much pain. But as you continue doing it, you feel yourself getting stronger, you feel yourself getting faster, you feel yourself having more energy. The same thing happens with your emotional life.
[00:28:10] And working with that emotional muscle and strengthening your emotional maturity.
[00:28:15] Julie Michelson: I love that.
[00:28:16] Dr. Meg Haworth: yeah, so it's, it's, you keep working with it as it happens. And you make it to that point where, you know, you're in the middle of the moment and somebody triggers you and you're just like, oh my gosh. Okay.
[00:28:28] Julie Michelson: I can breathe.
[00:28:29] Dr. Meg Haworth: You.
[00:28:29] Yeah. You know, there's simple, energetic exercises. I teach people that they can use in those moments. And so you can start to shift in the moment and that's hard. That's a really hard thing to master, but it's emotional self mastery. And when you get to that place, it's just like, wow, this is, this is true freedom.
[00:28:49] Julie Michelson: That is true freedom like that, that's it right there. Like when you can do that, you win
[00:28:55] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah.
[00:28:56] Julie Michelson: really. But I would imagine like every other [00:29:00] technique you and I use people need to be using it. And I always say like, you, you, the tool has to be in your toolbox for you to grab it at a time of stress like that.
[00:29:09] I dunno.
[00:29:10] Dr. Meg Haworth: And I do teach, teach people in my online course how to do use whole person integration technique on themselves and they can get certified to do it on other people for practitioners. Because it's, it's it's proven to be such a valuable tool to help people get to that emotion quickly. In a simplistic way, you know, it's not, it's not too complex. But I think a lot of the things in life that are the best or the simplest
[00:29:36] Julie Michelson: Of course simple foods, simple flavors. I knew it
[00:29:44] Dr. Meg Haworth: is a
[00:29:46] Julie Michelson: It is unbelievable.
[00:29:48] Dr. Meg Haworth: yes.
[00:29:50] Julie Michelson: it's it's so funny. I had this total aside, but I have, I was just on vacation and I came home and I, I planted. [00:30:00] Side of my garden. In addition to inside my garden this year, we had just some areas around some rock beds, and I was like, let's throw, you know, some butternut squash over there and some zucchini over here.
[00:30:11] And, oh my gosh, I came home and I have given away at least three or four zucchini a day. In addition to eating zucchini in some form every day, like we are living on, but it, it may, it's so simple, you know, it's so joyful. And somebody said to me, I don't even know how to cook it. I'm like, well, we had it last night, just grilled.
[00:30:32] like, it doesn't have to be, you know, in, in a. Fancy dish. So yeah. Keep your food simple. Keep your li I mean, and that's what happens as we unravel, you know, life should be simple. Like it doesn't have to be that complicated. I, to me, at least the, the more simple, the more joyful and fun.
[00:30:54] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah, I agree. simplify
[00:30:57] Julie Michelson: I, I, I love that.[00:31:00]
[00:31:00] So you let us write to my next question, which is what are some things that listeners can do. And I'll warn you and you'll have to highlight one because I always ask at the end of the podcast or the end of the interview for one step. So as I'm asking for some things, it can be one thing or it can be.
[00:31:20] whatever you've got for us. And then tell us what that one thing we really need to start with.
[00:31:26] Dr. Meg Haworth: okay. Yeah, so I think resonating with, if any of this is resonating with you rather Getting really in touch with the body, I think is one of the most important things that you can do and really understanding what's happening within it. We're so often so busy, we're moving so fast during the day that we don't even listen to signals.
[00:31:45] Like, oh, you have to go to the bathroom until suddenly you have this urgency, you know?
[00:31:50] Julie Michelson: Or you pull in your garage?
[00:31:52] Dr. Meg Haworth: yeah, right. I'm like, oh, wait a minute. I didn't go all day. You know, so so even if you're sitting at [00:32:00] your desk at work it just to close your eyes for just a moment I often say put your hands on your stomach and just take in a deep breath and through the nose and out through the mouth.
[00:32:12] And then just focus on your body for a moment. Just scan it and just ask yourself, what do I need? Oh my gosh, I'm thirsty. Oh, my stomach hurts. oh, my knee hurts. like, what's going on? So your body's giving you these signals in different parts of it. It's, it's asking for certain needs and just honoring those needs, so, okay.
[00:32:34] I need to drink some water. So get up and go get some water, or you've got water right there by your desk. and you haven't had any sips of it for the last few hours, so stop and do that. So movement also is very important. So get up, get up, stretch put on some music and dance for a minute. Like it doesn't even have to be that, that elaborate, you know, it just.
[00:32:57] Dance for a minute and you will feel much better. You'll [00:33:00] just be like, oh my gosh, I moved. And I'm you moved in a way that was just natural to you. And it didn't really matter, you know, cuz you weren't
[00:33:08] Julie Michelson: Yeah, dance. Like, no one's looking exactly. I love that.
[00:33:13] Dr. Meg Haworth: so just, those are just some simple things to start doing to, to get in touch with your body and start feeling yourself, you know, and what's something that's interesting that I know somatic therapist, friend of mine that I've worked with before says most of us are disconnected from our legs.
[00:33:30] Julie Michelson: Ah,
[00:33:30] Dr. Meg Haworth: Which is very fascinating because our legs are really our forward movement. If you think of the body as a metaphor for your experience and your, your feet are like your understanding, right. you know, so getting in touch with your legs, how do your legs feel right now? How do your feet feel? Oh, oh my goodness.
[00:33:48] My feet are a little bit sore. Maybe do a little self massage and just help to ease that soreness that's going on. And just feel what's going on in your legs, in your, in your forward movement. [00:34:00] So those kinds of things, there's
[00:34:01] Julie Michelson: Those are amazing tips. And, and for listeners, like really do these things, , you would be amazed at just taking the steps to do that. You know, we do, we live in our heads, it's time to get in your body. I always think that that. You know, the people being so disconnected from their legs is just, cuz it's just, they're so far from your head and you're up in your head all the time.
[00:34:26] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yes, you're in your head, big, big time and a, a, a big piece of what I teach people as well is, is their intuitive guidance and really listening to their inner, your inner guidance system. And that one way to do that is. When you're in the middle of that, that breathing process, scanning process, what am I feeling?
[00:34:47] You know, what, what feels right for me, what's my best next move and simple questions like that. And just letting that, that information just come to you.
[00:34:58] Julie Michelson: I love it. [00:35:00] Amazing, amazing stuff. So before we wrap up for people that are listening on the go, which is how I usually take in my podcasts and don't want to check out the show notes to find all the links. What's the best place to find you. People that are leaning in that are like, wow, you know, I need.
[00:35:20] Dr. Meg Haworth: Yeah.
[00:35:21] Julie Michelson: should they look for you?
[00:35:22] Dr. Meg Haworth: You can find me Meg hayworth.com. It's M E G H a w O R T h.com. At Dr. Meg Hayworth on all of the social media platforms like Instagram, we have little, little clips that help people, and I also have YouTube channel. So yeah. Also at Dr. MCK Heworth yeah.
[00:35:43] Julie Michelson: Dr. Meg, thank you so much. You have shared amazing gold with us today. Really life changing stuff in that simple way that you were talking about like basil, you are, you are like basil but really it is so understandable. [00:36:00] And so I love that. My hope is that that even the listener who in the beginning was thinking, you know, I don't have trauma.
[00:36:08] I don't have feelings. I don't have realizes now, like, huh, this is something that needs to be explored. I think it's something that everybody should explore autoimmunity or not illness or not to, to have our very best healthiest fullest lives. So I really appreciate you sharing with us.
[00:36:27] Dr. Meg Haworth: Oh gosh. You're most welcome. Thank you for having me.
[00:36:30] Julie Michelson: My pleasure. And for everyone listening, remember that you can get the show notes and transcripts by visiting inspired living.show. I hope you had a great time and enjoyed this episode as much as I did. I'll see you next week.
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Dr. Meg Haworth
Holistic health and wellness expert & Transpersonal Psychologist, Dr. Meg Haworth helps women survivors of difficult childhoods heal from chronic conditions using nutrition and emotional healing. Her healthy recipes were developed during 15 years as a private chef and wellness consultant to celebrities in Hollywood. Her emotional release technique helps to relieve the tension the body holds from long-standing emotional patterns. Her best-selling book Get Well Now is a holistic handbook and guide that teaches how to overcome and prevent chronic illness using food and the power of the mind. As an international speaker and 10-time author, she has been featured in the LA Times, NBC Nightly News, FOX 11 Los Angeles, and numerous other media outlets, podcasts & Summits.
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