by Dr Rachel Hall, Holistic Dentist, Brisbane
No matter what I was doing, be it working, reading, walking, swimming, resting, chatting with friends or trying to get to sleep, my body always felt agitated or shaky and my mind would be in a whirl, spinning with constant chatter.
I never felt at rest, there was always a tension and a sense of having to get on with the next thing. That there was more to do, better things to achieve, one more hurdle, goal or milestone to hit and then I could rest, be at ease and achieve a sense of completion. But when I reached that goal there was another and another and another to strive for. My restlessness built and built until my body felt wired and my mind could hold several conversations simultaneously without my being even really involved in them.
I needed coffee to get me going in the morning and then several more to make it through the day. And then to help me sleep a couple of beers or a glass of wine or two or three… but usually the whole bottle. When this wasn’t enough I’d work harder and longer than my colleagues, cycle to work, run or swim at lunch time and go to the gym on my way home. I just could not stop – I was in perpetual motion, spinning out of control. I felt like a Newtonian flywheel; the faster I went the more momentum I gathered so I could just keep going. I was the woman who could defy Newton’s first law of motion: an object at rest stays at rest and an object in motion stays in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted on by an unbalanced force. How ironic, as looking back I was that unbalanced force driving myself faster and harder.
I viewed this way of life as my being ambitious, driven, productive and a bit of a ‘go getter’. At first it was a good thing; it got me through high school and University, from one job to a better one and even to opening my own dental practice. It spurred me to travel, meet new people, try different things and emigrate to start a new life. But I never felt at peace, rested or able to take a break. Nothing helped stem the feeling of being restless and going at a million miles an hour on the inside. I tried long soaks in a hot bath, walks on the beach, yoga, meditation, massage, visualisation techniques, Chi Qong, New Age Music, self-help books, the works… but nothing helped. In fact most of these things made me more uptight, on edge and wound up.
A friend of mine gave me a flyer about a Universal Medicine heart chakra workshop – a whole group was going and would I like to come. Now this wasn’t really my thing, I was cynical about hippy trippy new agey stuff – none of that crap worked in my opinion – but when my friend explained it might help me relax I relented and said I’d give it a go.
I listened to this guy Serge Benhayon talk about some stuff, most of which went over my head and decided when the tea break came I was out of there. I didn’t feel relaxed at all, I needed to bolt, the chatter in my head was full steam ahead and I couldn’t sit still.
I became very aware of how completely unsettled I was and realised that this was how I felt every moment of every day, but here in this room with 50-60 other people I had no way of avoiding what was going on in my body.
Serge explained we were going to do a simple meditation. I closed my eyes and breathed gently through my nose. As I did so, something in me changed, the chatter in my head faded away to a quiet whisper and for the first time since I was a little girl I felt settled.
Settled: “to discontinue moving and come to rest in one place”.
That place of rest, the place where I felt settled was inside me; it had been there all the time, I had simply lost my way.
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
When we allow our selves to be run into the ground by the way we live we have tended to look outside ourselves for the answers and as you have shared Rachel life begins from the Livingness from the recognition of what is within ❤️ and this starts True healing.
That constant chatter used to be there from the time I woke up to the time I used to go to bed. I can understand that agitation and restlessness now and while it is far from perfect, boy is it better than before.
Many of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine’s presentations bring forth from within, an eternal settlement. This settlement is within all, it is THE thing that is calling us home, hence the unsettlement because we have strayed so far from it.
Such a simple thing as breathing gently from your nose, and feeling it entering your nose, is actually honouring of what is entering your body. It is pure, clear and unpolluted. The simplicity of bringing you back home is right there in front of you.
I love how you have shared so honestly that you were that very same unbalanced force that was driving yourself faster and faster, harder and harder….We can feel like the biggest fool when we realise what we do to ourselves, but the greatest blessing in this realisation is that we get to know we hold the power to make true change by our everyday choices.
Our mind can certainly be a major chatter box – a constant talk and criticism and distraction from our body. I call this ‘Head noise’ – not a very scientific explanation but I know this comes from the overstimulation of the Nervous System as a result of a disconnection from our body and breath. Hence why it can be so powerful to breath gently and feel the body again.
The mind is useful in its right place. Whilst the body is the real boss, it’s the thing that knows exactly what to do, lovingly and honouring of it. The mind can be critical and can make you do extreme things at the expense of the body. Without the body, we are useless, without the mind, we could also be useless. With the two, we can bring harmony, with the body being the leading boss.
Rachel, this is so beautiful to read and is a deeply heartfelt sharing – and in so many ways I too can relate to what you have shared and experienced with the constant motion and chatter in the head, and then to finally (after eons of trying so many different things), to find the gentle breath and the beginnings of settlement within.
A great reminder to read this today. I know when I get anxious, racy or lost if I settle within it helps ground me once again.
Rachel, I can very much relate to the unsettlement you speak of at the beginning of your blog. For me it has been more a constant mental chatter that at times I fool myself is ‘normal’, and or a general feeling of needing to be more, sometimes unconsciously, but nevertheless it is there.
The opposite of this is when I feel completely settled in myself, it comes as a wash over me but from the inside out. Sometimes this may be from something I hear or read or see with my eyes that instigates this settlement, and other times it comes from an awareness or realisation within. Either way it is one of the most beautiful feelings and you feel untouchable by anything outside. I am learning to hold this settlement more consistently as I can also feel the impact it has on others, just as was your experience attending your first workshop.
Absoulutely😇 Anna, when we settle from within we do start to understand🦉 how others are feeling through the connection we have with everyone equally and thus can read what is happening around us.
A lovely read of what supported you to settle Rachel, I imagine that settlement is at a whole new level now.
What an amazing journey Rachel, and it is so amazing you have found your way back to that inner feeling and how simple it is to re-kindle the fiery energy that has always been within.
“That place of rest, the place where I felt settled was inside me; it had been there all the time, I had simply lost my way.” We have disconnected from something so beautiful within ourselves and structured a whole way of human life to cope with the disconnection. Achievements, entertainment, goals, fitness, family, pretty much any part of human life can be approached to attain something because we feel so empty within and have lost our connection to our inner true selves.
We drive ourselves into exhaustion, with constant humming of nervous energy in the back ground – this is deliberate, we do not even want to imagine the fact that there really is much much more, that we are not our hurt, not our issues, not our profession, not our role, that we are actually pretty magnificent.
Yes, we push ourselves to do more and more, never feeling we have done enough, no surprise exhaustion is so rampant.
…’that we are not our hurt, not our issues, not our profession, not our role, that we are actually pretty magnificent’.
So wise and beautiful Fumiyo. We are magnificent and only need to connect to that inside ourselves.
The gentle breath meditation offered by Serge Benhayon allows the body to reconnect back to itself and to remember that we don’t have to live in our minds we can drop back down into our bodies which is where we feel the settlement.
It is a great trick of the world to keep us thinking that we need to live outside ourselves – always striving to be/get more, but in truth it all resides within us and the ‘trick’ is to connect to that and live it….and as you show it here Rachel, it is only a breath away.
So true Sarah, a breath that then opens up the ability to walk talk and move while staying connected.
I have found that even in the awareness that everything is within, we can still choose to remain on the outer. The key is that we have to want the settlement from every part of our being. We have to want to be in our magnificence. If we have an issue with magnificence, we will keep choosing the unsettlement of being thrown around by the outer demands and pressures of life.
We often favour the highs and lows of life until we realise how temporary they are, and how they always leave us feeling lacking and wanting more. Feeling settled within ourselves offers us a depth of contentment that is self sustaining and relies on nothing from the outside.
‘Feeling settled within ourselves offers us a depth of contentment that is self sustaining and relies on nothing from the outside’….
Beautiful Bryony.
We have a world epidemic the vast majority of us are avoiding our bodies, hence the need for coffee, sugar, alcohol, drugs, extreme sports, gaming etc. These are all designed to stop us from feeling what’s truly going on in our bodies. Our bodies only way of letting us know that there is something wrong is through illness and disease so to me it make complete sense that Illness and disease is also on epidemic levels in our society. What is it going to take for the vast majority of us to wake up and start to take notice?
This is so relatable Rachel as for so long nothing I tried would bring ease to the unsettlement that simmered constantly underneath the surface regardless of how much I achieved in life or tried to numb the feeling. The only thing that has stood the test of time and has offer true settlement has been my ongoing development with and deepening in my connection to my essence which began with my first ever introduction to Serge Benhayon & Universal Medicine presentations and the Gentle Breath Meditation. I have not looked back and this way of life and being is one that was instantly and strangely familiar but is now simply very natural and empowering.
I agree Carola I have lived with nervous tension always on the go and even when sitting I would rip something up like a tissue or a piece of paper into teeny tiny pieces it was a way of venting the tension I felt in my body but didn’t know what to do with. Since meeting Serge Benhayon a lot has changed and I feel far more settled in my self and this has supported me to sleep more deeply at night which means when I wake up in the morning I don’t feel tired. I used to wake up more tired than when I went to bed weird but true.
The feeling of being settled or contented is huge and supports the body enormously when it is achieved.
Once you feel settled, and can live with this settlement, then your body can finally surrender and rest.
So simple, wise and to the point Elizabeth.
We are able to stop, but don’t want to stop for we don’t want to feel the consequences of our choices and take responsibility for them. The actual No we are saying is to our soul and this addiction to motion fosters the control that our spirit wants so it can stay individual and in charge.
Our soul is true settlement, the moment we are in constant motion we are saying No to us. The greatest pain we choose to have: being disconnect to our universal connection that knows no time and drive but moments and settlements through expansion.
The way you described your way of living applies to so many people nowadays. Today at our supervision coach group we shared what we observe with our clients and we mentioned exactly this: the not being able to stop and constant being in motion without any settlement in the body. How important are tools like the Gentle Breath or Esoteric Yoga for us to find our way back to ourselves and the stillness that is inside of us.
The moment we stop we feel our choices, which we avoid at all costs, as they expose how much we have chosen to go against of who we truly are, which is the ultimate and grandest pain of all of us.
A connection to our breath is all that is needed.
Yes being settled is being totally with that place within. Who would think you do not have to go anywhere to settle .. breath gently feeling the cool breeze at the tip of the nose and feel that stillness within.
It is our choice to settle or not to settle.
We often think we have to do something outside of ourselves when we feel unsettled but that is actually contra to what we simply need to do and that is re-connect with ourselves. The Gentle Breath Meditation is a great way to do this as are gentle exercises and Esoteric Yoga.
We have tools that support us being able to settle. It feels lovely to be settled, why would we not choose to live this way?