CLEVELAND — The holidays are wrapping up and you may be feeling all of the stress that comes along with the season.
Amanda Thompson is a reiki practitioner at Cecilia Holistic and Wellness Center in Northeast Ohio. She says she’s tapping into her guiding energy this holiday season to help others heal from the holidays.
“Reiki is an energy-based healing practice that can lessen the impact of stress by supporting the body’s natural abilities to heal itself,” Thompson said as she began her practice.
Thompson says healing the mind is just as important as healing the body — especially when a person wants to relax.
“Even just one reiki session can help your nervous system by taking it from fight or flight from the stress from the holidays into rest and digest,” Thompson said.
She says reiki, a Japanese wellness practice, clears internal imbalances and blockages and could help reduce anxiety from the holidays.
“I think that we can be mindful, in the fact, that, usually, all year round, we don’t take care of ourselves very well, even during the holidays, since there’s so much going on, we don’t have enough self-love going on,” Thompson added.
Her coworker Andrew Kuhlman instructs yoga at the studio. He says setting aside time for deep breathing is a simple way that people can show love for themselves.
“Practicing deep breathing and rest after the holidays can help balance our bodies by giving us time to connect with our physical bodies, our environments,” Kuhlman said doing a seated yoga pose.
Kuhlman says pairing deep breathing with simple movement can help people refocus the connection between their mind and body.
“All the breath, the mind, body are connected and through these postures, we’re exercising the effort, the focus of the mind,” Kuhlman said.
Kuhlman says he recommends that people shouldn’t abandon healthy habits, like meditation and exercise, if they want to remain stress-free. However, he says strict routines shouldn’t take people away from being present with their loved ones.
“We can get in our way from actually living and being in the world which is where our work is. So, it’s important for us to spend time actually in diverse ways,” Kuhlman said.
