Cattitude, ‘familiars’ and Polyvagal Theory – CREATE A LIFE YOU DON'T NEED TO RETREAT FROM

With tomorrow being International Cat Day, you can read on to find out how you might heal more deeply by working with your nervous system and Vagus nerve…

Read on for more around cats, familiars and how Rainbow MagnifiCat – and Polyvagal Theory – inspired the Cat Coaching (Cattitude: Feline Better Every Day) element of my work.

Embodied Wellbeing (with Eve) has an animal inspired trauma recovery resource roundup for you. READ MORE HERE

Free subscribers can read more about simple self care ideas for connecting with your own wild animal self in today’s Personal Peace newsletter (SUBSCRIBE HERE) and Extra Embodied (Wellbeing with Eve) paid subscribers (less than €1.54 per week) can access your oracle card reading (from the Power Animals oracle deck again) this week…

And while there’s no Personal Peace online membership live self care coaching call this evening (today’s an Irish Bank Holiday), we’ll be returning at 8.30pm as a new time on Monday 14^th August AND today has a brand new Yoga Nidra in the Membership Hub so you can connect more deeply with that wildest part of yourself that’s got so much animal wisdom for you. (If you’re not already a member but would like to be, message me to find out about potentially joining us for weekly live calls, private email coaching with me and a host of other benefits when the doors are next open.)

What is Cattitude?

From the time the MagnifiCat came into my life, she’s enchanted me with her magnificence and recognising how she is purrfection pawsonified even when she’s in full on hoolikitten mode has helped me amp up the self compassion to all aspects of myself.

After all, calling her Rainbow MagnifiCat because black absorbs all the colours of the rainbow and I wanted to remember to honour and appreciate ALL aspects of her personality taught me the same about myself and other humans.

I’m a WAY nicer, more accepting, more loving and more whole human since she began cracking my heart open in 2013.

Pets used to be known as ‘familiars’

And Rainbow feels like a magical being a lot of the time.

When my energy is good (grounded, embodied, at ease) we both know it. When it’s off, she’ll sometimes bite me. (To be fair, she also bites if I’m stroking her and my attention temporarily wanders from her to any other thought at all.)

Am sure my connection with Rainbow is what has helped me connect with the local sheep, guiding them back to their fields when they go rogue. And my donkey friends who come for treats each day.

This alone has been a healing, transformative experience for me.

Sure, I regularly feel so bursting with love for her I also imagine how awful it’ll be if something ever happens to her but that again has helped me open my heart more to humans. Even after claiming (in a piece on pet loss in the Independent) that I’d NEVER do that again

What‘s Polyvagal Theory?

Stephen Porges’ groundbreaking work around the Vagus Nerve (which sends 80% of signals from body UP to brain) and Deb Dana’s work in making it more accessible has been life changing and informs my whole practice.

There’s little point telling us to calm down or feel more confident or anything at all when so much input is ‘bottom up’.

Instead, by working with the body, breath and nervous system, we can heal more deeply and more EASILY than a lifetime of talk therapy alone can offer.

Understanding about how we’re wired to thrive when we feel welcome, safe and loved explains so much and SIMPLIFIES life and trauma recovery (even when we’ve been conditioned to feel too comfortable with people who make us feel UNsafe, UNwelcome and who act in UNloving ways.

It’s never too late to retrain our nervous systems and with practice, rewire our brains.

Our tone of voice has an impact as well as our posture, other movements and the breath practices that can be so healing.

By developing Cat Coaching, I make this accessible and fun for clients. READ MORE HERE

Subscribe to Cattitude: Feline Better Every Day for Rainbow’s (I pretend to translate for her) advice on being more cat