If Healing Feels Like a Job You’re Failing At, Read This
When Healing Starts to Feel Heavy
You experienced childhood trauma.
You finally decided to get help—and you did make real progress.
You changed the coping strategies that were hurting you most. You learned what it means to regulate your emotions. You gathered tools. At some point, therapy no longer felt necessary, and for a while, things were good… or at least okay.
And then something happened.
Maybe it was big. Maybe it wasn’t. But suddenly, the idea of doing any more healing work makes you want to lie down and disappear.
You know you’re avoiding your emotions. Everything feels flat—or overwhelming.
You think about journaling, but you can’t bring yourself to do it.
You set an alarm to exercise every morning and then lie in bed wishing you could pull the covers over your head and opt out of the “real” world.
You try a breathwork class, and your body and mind respond with a hard no thank you. You feel irritated the entire time. You can’t relax.
If This Feels Familiar, You’re Not Failing
If any of this sounds familiar, your nervous system may simply be at capacity.
Deep healing work (and the significant behavior and lifestyle changes that often come with it), even when they’re healthy and chosen, can still overwhelm a nervous system that has spent years in survival mode. When you respond by pushing yourself to do more—more workshops, more books, more practices—healing quietly turns into another project. Another metric of productivity. Another place to feel like you’re getting it wrong.
Healing Isn’t Meant to Be Another Job
So let’s be very clear:
You are not behind.
You are not doing anything wrong.
You are not regressing because you can’t do “more.”
Healing is not linear, and the goal is not permanent calm. A well-supported nervous system isn’t one that’s always relaxed—it’s one that’s flexible. One that can move into activation and return to regulation without getting stuck.
The Invitation to Do Less
If healing has started to feel heavy, obligatory, or strangely unbearable—and you don’t know why—the answer is often not more effort, but less.
Slow things alllll the way down.
Those sensations of resistance, numbness, or irritation aren’t failures. They’re communication. And very often, they’re a sign that your body hasn’t had time to catch up with everything your mind has already processed and integrated.
A Body-Led Way Forward
This is where somatic work can be deeply supportive.
Somatic work centers the body and the present moment. It doesn’t require digging endlessly into the past or retelling painful stories. It’s about listening to the body, allowing emotions to move through at a pace that feels safe, and restoring trust in your internal signals.
That’s why, when I hold somatic sessions, nothing is forced. We don’t push. We don’t fix. We go at your pace. Your body leads, always.
If you’re curious about somatic work, you’re welcome to reach out—or, if you prefer to start gently on your own, you can begin with my 6-day guided somatic journey, available here: https://www.lovezenn.com/6day-practice
No graded work. No productivity metrics. Just support for the part of you that’s already done so much.
