WHAT IS THE HOLY SPIRIT?!?!

There are many spirits influencing the coaching space. It's a very spiritual space which I quite like because it represents people who are searching for what really matters.

But there is only one pure and HOLY spirit.

So - What is the Holy Spirit (ruach ha-kodesh in Hebrew) ?

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God.

It is the same spirit that breathed upon the waters in the book of Genesis and created the earth.

It is the Spirit that raised Jesus' body from the dead.

It is the same Spirit that fills up your heart when you receive salvation (when you put all your trust and faith in Jesus and His Sacrifice on the cross and you give your life to Him). When this happens, the Spirit makes your body alive.

The Holy Spirit is described by Jesus as a Comforter.

After Jesus appeared to the disciples in his Risen body, He told them He was going to up to heaven to the Father to prepare a place for them.

They were sad that He was leaving, but He explained to them that...

THE POWER OF WORSHIP IN TRAUMA HEALING

Oxford Languages Defines worship as:
The feeling or expression of reverence and adoration for a deity.
"the worship of God"

Interestingly, Dr Stephen Porges, founder of Polyvagal Theory has discussed the importance of cultivating a sense of “awe” as part of restoring the health of the nervous system.

As believers, the ultimate source of awe is God Himself. The Bible will often describe this as the “fear of the Lord”

When we worship God, there is a change in the spirit and the body.

In the presence of the Lord a natural surrender occurs in which we may weep, tremble, or move in ways that we do not normally do. Not just the spirit, but the physical body surrenders/yields to the Lord.

Worship is the expression of the awe of God.
When we worship, we are brought into the presence of the Lord.

Here we are in the presence of perfection and purity. We are in the presence of all that is good and true.

This presence is healing &...

I just keep walking away… ‍‍‍

And this one feels hard to write.

This month I was scheduled to go to my Advanced Somatic Experiencing Training (SE Advanced 2) in Halifax.

The hotel was booked.
The flight. The train.
The registration.
All set to go.

The final culmination of three years of time and investment, relationship building with beautiful colleagues.

Somatic work has been a pillar in my life for at least 7 years of a 14 year plus healing journey.

I began my SE training already having read and studied the topic intensively for years. Having worked with SE practitioners.

I believed Somatic Experiencing to be the “missing piece” in my life and in the world of personal development.

Through my sanctification process I left behind everything else. The Lord opened my eyes a few months after my salvation in the middle of the night to the spiritual dangers of what I was practicing with the I Ching, Human Design and Gene Keys, Spiritual Kinesiology. I also...

PRAYERS FOR YOUR TRAUMA HEALING JOURNEY -PART 1

One prayer I often pray is: “Father - make the crooked places straight in my heart”

I get this prayer from the metaphor often found in Scripture of “preparing the way of the Lord”

In the Old Covenant before Jesus came, Prophets would proclaim His coming and they would declare that One was coming who would make things right with humanity. Who would “level the playing field” against sin, corruption and evil.

One who would heal and restore and repair. One who would light the way both in the world and in our hearts.

I love this metaphor because it is so profoundly true in the context of trauma.

Sin & Trauma creates so much confusion, dysregulation and disruption in our hearts and minds.

As a result, we can see things from distorted lenses.

What is safe seems unsafe & what is unsafe can seem safe.
We can be reactive or easily shut-down as a result of our nervous system’s sensitivity.
...

Click here to listen to the episode on iTunes 

Description 

Everyone say it with me: Co-Regulation leads to self-regulation!

This is a key concept for understanding trauma healing at the nervous system level because it teaches us how we can access neuroplasticity with support from other people who have regulated nervous systems.

In this episode, I talk about

• What is nervous system regulation exactly? 
• How does co-regulation lead to self-regulation 
• The Role of Co-Regulation in Neurodevelopment from the womb onward 
• Bottom Up Brain Development (Dr Bruce Perry’s neurosequential development theory)
• Dysregulation, trauma and the healing impact of Co-Regulation
• The Fruit of the Spirit:How the Gospel makes us naturally more regulated and co-regulated
  
  

Scriptures mentioned in the episode: 

• Galatians 5:13-26 
• Matthew 19:13-15 
• 1 Corinthians 13
• 1 Thessalonians 2:6-8 
  
  

  Instagram: www.shylacash.com/growhealchange

  Email me: ...

I’m 33!

Yesterday (Tuesday, Sep 26, 2023) was my birthday.

I became a Christian last year - it’s my first full year as a born-again believer. 

Though I grew up in church I don’t feel that I had a saving faith as my heart did not fully grasp the truth of the gospel.

I had a general revelation of God and His Word but looking back I really don’t feel that I was saved.

The reason for that is because my true salvation last year felt so radical and life-altering that it pierced my heart and changed me forever.

Before I was saved I wandered and looked for truth in mystical traditions and spiritual systems like Chinese I Ching, Human Design, Gene Keys, Spiritual Kinesiology and basically whatever else appealed to me. I was sincere in my pursuit but sincerely deceived.

Until God led me to the truth of the Gospel.

As a result, this year has been kind of wild.

I have made serious changes in every area of my life in response to the Gospel being brought to me by the...

This week is the second instalment of the Theology of Trauma Series - We are talking about the Gospel. 

Specifically we are looking at:
What is the Gospel?
How Do we live out our trauma healing journey with the Gospel in mind?
How is the Believer's trauma healing journey is different from the secular healing journey. 
Common Grace Vs Saving Grace 
A note on religious trauma 

Links
Instagram: www.instagram.com/growhealchange

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/growhealchange/ 
 

Jumpstart Program: www.shylacash.com/jumpstart 
 

Waitlist for The Faithful Trauma Recovery Institute: www.shylacash.com/faithfulwaitlist 

‍ Learning to Trust the Lord ‍

The thing God has been dealing with me most about since I gave my life to Christ last year has been trust.

Trust is a scary dirty word for a lot of us.

Add in a childhood wrought with abuse and neglect or any kind of relational or spiritual trauma for that matter and you compound on the challenge.

In my years of personal trauma recovery, nervous system repair, and formal training - I’ve learned and experienced a lot about the body and trust.

About how the nervous system can be wired for a kind of closed off hyper-independence in which we construct a life where we protect ourselves from the need to trust others for anything.

How the nervous system can learn to be drawn to (and even cling to) what is unsafe in relationships and deeply untrustworthy.

How we can be so cut off from our God-given intuition that we can’t even FEEL the instincts let alone discern and trust them.

How we can feel terrified to trust that which is actually...

I had something to prove!

I didn’t want to be like my mom who was pure chaos walking and left nothing but destruction in her wake.

She was so uncontained and so wild and completely lacking any modicum of self-awareness.

As a kid I really just wanted to be normal.

I knew that I knew that I KNEW that I was not going to end up like my mom if I had anything to do with it.

So I constructed the image in my head of the successful put together woman I would one day become.

No longer an outsider.

No longer so different.

And I became that woman. And I’m so grateful for so many pieces of that.

And yet?

There was a part of me hidden - even from myself.

A part of me that was not fully alive.

And by part of me I mean the TRUE REAL me.

I hid behind being an expert on the nervous system - knowing the science and being so good at it. I hid behind my intellect. I wanted to be taken seriously. Seen as the consummate professional.

But yet? There was that other part of me that I had labelled...

There was a time when I didn’t have my right mind - my sanity. As a teen you could have diagnosed me with reactive attachment disorder and severe depression and ADHD among other things.

I grew up in a very dysfunctional home. My mom suffers with paranoid schizophrenia and manic depression.

Her childhood was awful - she talks about being suicidal at 11.

She didn’t make her way to healing.

And when she had me, she struggled. And as a result she severely abused and neglected me. She also decided to homeschool me until I was 11.

Growing up in that situation took its toll on my developing brain and body. On the outside I adapted well as I was very smart and quite gifted as a kid. I learned how to perform in school and in church. I kept my home life a secret.

People who knew my mom knew something wasn’t right - but I felt a pressure to protect my parents and so I put on a happy face. As I got older I continued to perform well despite the inner turmoil.

But the body is not...