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An Excerpt from Reclaiming Wellness by Jovanka Ciares

Wellness is for everyone: young and old, sick and healthy, rich and poor, and all races and ethnicities. Wellness also includes everything, or all aspects of our lives, and the ultimate goal is to achieve positive, sustainable, long-lasting changes. Wellness is not a single thing we do, it doesn’t happen all at once, and our wellness practices should increase happiness, not feel like a chore.

Ideally, wellness is how we unlock and access the full potential lying within. This isn’t about following lifestyle rules to a T, but rather understanding our choices and owning them. We will certainly encounter roadblocks during this process, and that’s to be expected! Pursuing wellness with an “all-or-nothing” attitude is a nonstop ticket to frustration and failure. Instead, if we accept ourselves, and trust the natural process, things will slowly fall into place. Wellness is about creating balance and strengthening the connection between our physical, mental, and spiritual selves. As a result, what we do to achieve wellness will vary depending on what needs more attention at any particular time. For instance, if our spiritual life is strong but our physical activity isn’t, then we might find balance by focusing more on our physical self, while continuing to strengthen all the other parts that make us who we are.

In the big picture, wellness is about being at peace in and with the world. We are each an integral part of the whole that we call the universe. The energy that emanates from each of us, as well as from plants and animals, is interconnected. Our daily choices touch millions of lives, whether we realize it or not. Being aware of this interconnectedness fosters a holistic awareness of our place in the world and helps us make positive, conscious choices every day in our lives.

Health in the United States Today
The United States is the wealthiest nation in the world, and it knows how to spend! Americans spend more on healthcare per person than any other country, yet the nation consistently ranks lowest in comparative healthcare outcomes. I’ve often wondered why we worry so much about terrorism and natural disasters when the standard American diet is what we should fear the most:

In the United States, approximately 33 percent of adults are overweight, another 38 percent are obese, and 8 percent are extremely obese.
Heart disease, stroke, and cancer — diseases affected by diet and lifestyle — account for over 
50 percent of all deaths in the United States each year.
Nearly half (47 percent) of American adults have high blood pressure, a precursor of heart disease.
About 38 percent of Americans have high cholesterol, a major cause of heart attack and stroke.
About 80 percent of heart disease–related deaths can be prevented with diet and lifestyle choices.
In America, 50 million people have at least one autoimmune disorder that reduces their quality of life.
The United States has one of the lowest life expectancies in the industrialized world.

Reclaiming Wellness: Own Your History, Own Your Health
Some of today’s most popular wellness practices can trace their history to parts of the world and cultures historically populated by people of color. Every society has pursued wellness, and as a woman of color living in the United States, one of my goals is to share this multicultural history and to encourage all people, but especially people of color, to embrace the knowledge and wisdom of their particular ancestry and heritage. To me, owning your history is a part of owning your health and creating your own
personal wellness journey. Yoga, for example, is now a very popular and widespread wellness practice, yet it’s one of the world’s oldest physical disciplines, having been developed in northern India over five thousand years ago.

Meanwhile, the use of plants as medicine — that is, herbalism and the use of modern supplements — has been part of every culture and every ethnic group since the beginning of time. In South America, shamans have been helping people heal using medicinal plants since precolonial times. Similarly, most ancient cultures developed their own plant-based diets to foster good health, diets that emphasized mostly local plants, grains, nuts, and seeds, while consuming expensive animal flesh only in small amounts and on special occasions.

Today, the wellness community invites people to incorporate ingredients from all cultures into their daily diets, sometimes touting them as “superfoods.” Yet I believe that learning the history of these foods and their health benefits can excite you to embrace them. In in-person workshops, I include popular herbal blends and ingredients with medicinal properties, making sure to explain the places these amazing ingredients come from, honoring the land and the people who carried their knowledge from generation to generation. If the workshop is about stress management, for example, I often incorporate adaptogenic botanicals indigenous to every corner of the world to emphasize how almost every culture has had amazing products and practices that we can still use today: maca from the Andes Mountains in South America, ashwagandha from the dry regions of India and Africa, and aloe vera from the Arabian Peninsula. This inclusivity is a powerful educational tool. It reminds us that these foods are part of our shared human legacy, our DNA, whatever our personal background or culture.

I want every single person to know that their culture has played a role in the wellness practices that have become popular in the West. These practices are truly amazing at helping us restore and maintain health, and using them is part of how we honor the legacy of those who came before us.

Jovanka Ciares is the author of Reclaiming Wellness and several other titles. A certified wellness expert, integrative herbalist, nutrition educator, and coach, she offers lectures and workshops in Spanish and English. Visit her online at jovankaciares.com.

Printed with permission from New World Library.

I have several entities constantly around me at home, work and everywhere. I feel possessed. They manifest through touches on my body, music, and clicks in my ear to listen to music for a message. How can I get them to leave or cross over? They are obviously using me for energy. They are even attached to my body. I get vibrations all over, burning sensations, and can feel someone trying to whisper in my ear. I am almost sure of one's identity, but not the others. I have prayed and constantly rebuke them in the name of Jesus; this seems to help. They are strong-willed and refuse to leave. This has been going on for a year. I have no health issues that would cause this. It's like one is in love with me and the others take turns with me. I do feel relief when I meditate in prayer and do the white light thing, but it's temporary. I have told them to leave or cross over many times. I am now going to try a priest and exorcism. I feel bad because I think I know one of them who was a good person in life. This isn't a game as they try to make it out to be; for me it's serious as it is starting to affect my health. Can you give any suggestions? I can't afford to move and they follow me everywhere anyway. Thank you.

C.J.

Susyn:

The methods you are using to keep these entities at bay will only yield temporary results, which is why they keep returning. When you are feeling distracted, weak or not keeping up your spiritual shield, they will sneak back in. It is good that you are working with a priest and employing him as an exorcist. Ideally, he will be skilled enough to move these spirits into the light.

You must not feel guilty or troubled that you may know one or more of these entities. Good or bad, if they refuse to move into the light and on to the next step of their journey, they will remain stuck and keep you stuck as well. It is important for you to know that feeling concerned about them and attempting to identify them will undermine your attempts to rid yourself of them.

I recommend that you start a journal so you can record the sensations you feel, such as the vibrations, burning and whispering. Note how often they occur during the day or night and at what times. This will give you potentially valuable information. For example, you may notice that most of the activity occurs at night or early in the morning. Once you can establish this, you'll know when to be careful to keep your guard up. If the events seem random with no apparent pattern, make sure you let the priest know that, for it can help him identify how strong these presences are and what it will take to get rid of them.

Because these entities have found you to be an easy target (someone they can attach to who hears and notices them), other spirits could decide to attach to you as well. It is possible that you have a series of discarnates just waiting in line. Because of this, it is important for you to send the entities involved into the light, and also to strengthen your spiritual barriers so that you don't continue to have experiences like this in the future.

I encourage you to continue battling this possession. At some point, these entities will get the message and move on. This includes the entity you feel you may know. Once you have cleared these spirits, a calmness will come over you like you have never experienced before, and you'll be free to reclaim your life and peace of mind.

*****

Oceania:

I'm sorry for your distress, but I think it's premature to consult a priest at this point. I would be more thorough about exploring potential physical and psychological causes for your symptoms first! Think about what was going on in your life a year ago. Was there a significant event, loss or change? Stress can trigger both physical and mental illness. Did you start a new medication? If so, you may be experiencing side effects.

Ask your doctor about tinnitus, because clicking sounds are a symptom of this disease of the ear. Feeling vibrations or burning in the body are common examples of parethesias (unusual sensations), which can be traced to neurological disorders like multiple sclerosis and diabetic neuropathy. A variety of physical conditions can lead to muscle twitching, which resembles the sensation of being touched by someone unseen.

Along with your physician, I would consult with a psychiatrist, as many of the symptoms you describe can be caused by chemical imbalances in the brain. I don't know how old you are, but schizophrenia tends to manifest in early adulthood, the most common symptoms being delusions (misinterpreting your experiences) and auditory hallucinations (hearing things others don't, particularly voices and whispers). Medication can treat those symptoms. Contrary to popular belief, schizophrenia does not mean split personality. When someone's sense of self is shattered by trauma, it is called Dissociative Identity Disorder.

Physical symptoms can also be manifestations of psychological issues that need your attention. If we look at the theme of your experiences over the past year, they revolve around violations of your boundaries. The behavior of the entities may reflect experiences you are having with real people in your life. Perhaps there are some who annoy you or don't give you peace, never leave you alone, are overly attached, who bully you, play games or don't take you seriously. Does that list remind you of anyone? If so, you can address that relationship in therapy and get some support for changing the unhealthy dynamics between you!

You said you feel bad because one of the entities bothering you was a good person in life. That statement suggests that you may have unresolved anger towards the person. As you make peace with your feelings towards them, they will take up less of your time and energy.

I see no need for you to move, because no matter where you go, there you are. I believe your experiences reflect some disease or dis-ease within you. I wish you peace and healing.

Astrea:

Many times in life we hear, "You will always have what you NEED, but not necessarily what you WANT." Your spirit must have needed to experience the feeling of leaving your human body, and the suggestion in the next chapter of Sylvia Brown's book was all it took to get you there.

Even though you hadn't read it yet, your SOUL recognized the title of that chapter as something it had been seeking, and your soul, knowing that you had that reference to read after your experience, got with it and out you went!

While I don't usually recommend her books, Sylvia Brown has a wide reaching and powerful effect on lots of people. A Gemini like you would be able to relate easily to her writing and put it to good use. Synchronicity - you gotta love it!

I like your description of "getting caught." That's exactly what it feels like, isn't it? One minute you're free and hovering above the room, and the next minute, ZAP! back down into your corporeal form you go!

As a little kid, I loved that "feeling of return." With practice, most of the time we can control that event, but sometimes, when our physical ears hear a distracting noise or something else occurs to knock us back into reality, back we go. With practice you will be able to control your return better.

I find it interesting that you were visiting your mother-in-law and not someone in your own genetic family. Evidently, you and your husband got married for reasons that are even deeper than love. His family's interest in "psychic stuff" will nurture your children in such matters and help them to grow into their own abilities.

You'll never have to be concerned that when your daughter visits them, she'll be discouraged from exploring her own psychic life and power. My parents encouraged me to develop my psychic senses in a time when it wasn't nice to even discuss such things in public. Heck, it's STILL not considered a great topic at the dinner table in some families!

Your kids will get to talk about it ALL and ask questions and read and study. This is going to give them such an edge in life! Talk with your husband about how you want to present this to your kiddos, so that you are united in your approach and ready to tell them their experiences are all natural and okay.

A word or two of warning: Geminis often have difficulty staying grounded in REAL LIFE. Don't get so strung out on your ASTRAL life that you neglect what you're doing here on Earth.

You are at the beginning of a long journey to learn where your power really lies. Try to be patient with this process and take your time.