You’ve been on the path to heal and resolve your wounds and trauma for a while now. You’ve sought the help of trusted practitioners and have put in the time, energy, and emotional and financial resources required to delve into your shadow, shift your core beliefs, confront yourself, redefine boundaries, forge a connection to Spirit/God/Source/Universal Intelligence, (whatever you call it) and on and on and on…

You feel better than you have in a really long time. Like, really solid in yourself. That’s an extraordinary feeling, right? Right. It is until it isn’t.

The next phase in the healing process is the integration phase, where you feel brand new, but everything around you feels frozen in time. You begin to sense that your life doesn’t seem like it belongs to you or you to it. You walk around your home as if it’s a movie set. Designed by someone else, yet so familiar because you’ve been cast in this role for decades, if not a lifetime. The job that was good, okay, or even tolerable feels awful - worse than awful - you actually hate every minute you spend on it. The activities and hobbies you once enjoyed don’t bring the satisfaction or joy they once did. Your social circle has shrunk to maybe one or two local friends that you struggle to vibe with and your family doesn’t seem to “get” you at all, or more accurately keeps trotting out an old, phantom version of you every time you try to flex your new, healthier, emotional muscle. If you’re partnered, you may also be experiencing a chasmic distance between you and them. They may seem like a complete stranger to you and every interaction feels disingenuous and scripted. Your entire world feels completely surreal, as if you’ve jumped timelines and are now living in a parallel universe.

What I’m describing sounds bleak and more accurately, feels even worse than it sounds. You keep asking yourself, “Now what?”, as you sit in what I call, The Void.

The Void is very real and is rarely ever discussed in healing spaces, whether shamanic, psychotherapy, or any of the myriad healing modalities available today.

Now what? What do you do? How do you completely change every aspect of a life you’ve spent decades building? Should you do anything at all? The answer may not sound helpful, yet it’s part of the healing process. You must stay in The Void, for a time. You need to learn to be comfortable there. The void state is not one of doing, but of being.

From an energetic perspective, once you’ve cleared the imprints of wounding, trauma, reactivity, and old coping mechanisms, there’s a very real, subconscious desire to fill those empty spaces that have been occupied for so long.

You may have had a series of healing sessions, felt great for a time, encountered The Void, and then subconsciously invited the energetic imprints back. It’s akin to having a tooth pulled, and despite being told by the oral surgeon to not touch the empty space with your tongue to avoid an infection, you feel compelled to do just that. The result of energetically grasping at what you just cleared, is that you’ll call it all back.

The space that has been created should not be filled back up. And this can be a very uncomfortable feeling, but given a bit of time to integrate, you’ll find peace. Yes, peace lives in The Void.

As a Shaman, I have gone through numerous healing cycles and encounters with The Void. I’ve learned to be comfortable there because I know that on the other side lives more peace than I ever imagined I could access. That peace is available to you too. I have guided many clients through their own experiences in the void space after our shamanic sessions. The best news of all is that The Void is temporary! It’s simply a place of adjustment and reordering what has been disordered.

Let’s talk a little bit about how to “be” in the void. As I mentioned earlier, this is not a time to make big life decisions or changes. Here’s a short list of suggestions that you can easily do to self-regulate when you feel anxious or unsettled with the discomfort of feeling empty.

Spend time in nature. Put your bare feet on the earth and allow her negative ions to rebalance and ground you.
Listen to music. Be discerning by choosing only music that uplifts. Try to avoid the music you’ve relied on in the past because it may trigger old emotional states.
Vocalize. Use your voice. Sing, hum, as long as your vocal chords are vibrating, you are raising your own vibrational frequency.
Drumming. You can drum to journey or simply to connect your heart to the heartbeat of the drum. This is a very soothing practice.
Move your body. Gentle somatic movement like walking, yoga, and dance are excellent ways to ground and stay present in your body.
Spiritual practices, ritual, and ceremony. Continue those practices that nourish you. If you have a spiritual community, consider participating in group ceremony.
Avoid consuming alcohol or any substance having a depressive effect on the body.
Bring beauty into your environment! Buy flowers, candles, incense, whatever inspires you and brings you joy.
Create. Paint, draw, crochet, write, etc. Birthing a new creation is an excellent way to channel your new energy.

You have given yourself the gift of healing, while also healing past and future generations. Congratulations! Make sure to acknowledge your strength, resilience, and commitment to healing by showering yourself with compassion, grace, and love. You did it and you should be very proud of yourself - your ancestors and guides certainly are. See you on the other side!

In Munay,
Francine

You’ve Healed, Now What?