My word of the year is REGULATION.

I sat in my car with a blank gaze. I must have looked like a nut, sitting there motionless with messy hair and wrinkle lines across most of my face. But you know what I’m talking about – the post massage buzz.

I just had a wonderful 90 minute treatment that squeezed away the back pain, the results of breaking up the sidewalk ice last week. Because I was having trouble forming a thought, I knew I wasn’t present enough to drive the car. So I grabbed for my planner (yes, I still use a written one) to pull myself back to earth. As I read through my very aspirational to-do list for the week, I could feel my chest get heavy and panic resettle into my jaw. I’m happy to say that my back remained loose but as I chased away the mental fog of the treatment, I also chased away the false inner peace of my massage.

You see, massage is wonderful at squeezing tight muscles into submission, which can allow you the space to catch your breath. However, your mental and emotional discomfort hasn’t changed. How you feel about life circumstances remains the same. How you view, or can’t see, your next best step hasn’t changed.

This is why my word of the year is regulation. Relaxation is nice but regulation opens the door for lasting change. While the two concepts are indeed related, they are not the same. Basically, regulation is being able to relax your mind-body (nervous) system while functioning, carrying on in life. There is co-regulation and self-regulation. Co-regulation is why people love practicing meditation in groups. It is also what your children need from you in order to learn and master their own self-regulation. And of course, self-regulation is where you need to be in order to offer co-regulation to friends, family, co-workers and everyone around you.

Here’s the thing…

You must first master relaxation to be equipped for any kind of regulation. Most meditations out there can help you build your relaxation skills, just like a good massage. In our Craniosacral self-care program, we call this level of meditation - settling. At the beginning of every class we settle before moving into revealing, healing and regulating. More on those other three another time, but if you are ready to give the first step a try - click here for this month’s free mini-reset. This three-minute guided awareness exercise features our Space Decompression Settling.

For and with you in healthy and happiness,

Aimee

PS – Next week you’ll have limited time access to one of my regulating resets. So be sure to practice this settling reset a few times this week. It will prime your nervous system to get the most out of the next one.