Frazzled? Overwhelmed? Join the club. Between the run-up to the holidays, the short winter days, and cold and flu season, I’m challenged myself. So, when I’m feeling overwhelmed and need to reset, I do a mini-cocoon session.

For me, cocooning is about creating a cozy, contained space where I can let the inner whirlwind run its course until the dust settles. It starts with choosing a place.

My place is my living room couch. What’s so special about a couch? Well, perhaps nothing for you, but for me it’s this lovely piece of furniture that I splurged on. It’s also the center of my home. It’s where I relax, write, eat, pet my cat, and talk deeply with loved ones. It’s where I feel most at home.

Your place may be different. Perhaps your bed is where you feel snug and warm…or your bathtub…or closet. Or maybe your place is a backyard bench or a roof under the stars—not everyone likes feeling contained. You know it’s your place because, when you’re there, you feel relief.

I also secure my space. I don’t want to be interrupted, so I lock my door and turn off my phone. I tell Mara, my cat, that she’s welcome to join but no bugging. She gets it.

The next step is to add sensory elements that help you relax. For me, that means sound. When I was three, I experienced my first thunderstorm from the security of a warm house. Ever since, I’ve found rainstorms soothing, so I play a recording of one.

Your sensory elements will be specific to you. You may need warmth to relax, or weight. So get blankets and a heating pad, or try a weighted blanket. Or perhaps you need scent. Lavender can be relaxing…or maybe a scent from your childhood. It might be as simple as candlelight or a plush fabric to rub between your fingers.

Once I’m on my couch, with blankets piled on and my thunderstorm playing, I let the comforting sensations wrap me up and hold me. And then I stop trying to suppress all of the feelings of stress and overwhelm. I just let them wash through. It’s safe to feel them in this place.

The overwhelm often moves through like a cloudburst, all pouring emotions, rumbling sensations, and static electricity. But eventually it peters out. And in its wake, I’m calmer. I’m more here, in my body. And the stressors, out there, seem smaller.

I’m sick of feeling this way—I want to get it all out now!

Go deeper…I can take it!

In addition to my acupuncturist, I’m seeing a chiropractor, physical therapist, orthopedist and you. What else should I be doing to heal?

When I hear clients say things like these, my heart goes out. Because I hear how strong the desire is to feel better. But I also know there can be an underlying belief driving these statements, a belief that healing has to be hard—that it has to hurt, be a struggle, or be intense. But that’s just not true, and it can make healing, well…harder.

More is not always better…

When it comes to healing treatments, sometimes less is more. If you pile on multiple types of sessions in one week—like acupuncture yesterday, craniosacral today, and chiropractic tomorrow—it can stress out your body.

Think of it like eating one rich meal after another, leaving no time for digestion. It’d make you sick, right? The same is true for healing. Your body makes changes during a healing session. Afterwards, it needs time to pause, rest, and integrate the changes.

Deeper is not always better either…

In the same vein, harder and harder deep-tissue massage is not the best way to get muscles to relax. Often, it’s quite the opposite. Hard or painful pressure can activate the body’s defenses, making muscles more tensed and guarded.

Lighter pressure can slip beneath this defensive radar, allowing muscles to let go. And the very lightest touch can often produce the deepest releases.

Faster and more intense is also not…well, you get the idea

I understand how badly many of us want to clear out old emotional pain and energies. Just get it all out now! I wish it were so simple. But “bigger” or more cathartic sessions often don’t help. And they can actually be retraumatizing.

It’s counterintuitive, I know, but strong sensations and big emotional releases don’t necessarily equal deeper healing. The most powerful shifts happen amidst stillness.

So how does the body heal?

Remember the last time you cut your finger? It took time to heal, didn’t it? And the changes were so slow and incremental, you probably didn’t notice them. But one morning you woke up and your finger was healed.

Most healing is like this. It’s slow and gentle. It arises from within, guided by a deep, inner wisdom. And it works best when conditions support it. The most we can do is create the right conditions for healing and get out of the way.

I recently had the good fortune to visit New Orleans, which is a feast for the senses. But it was a message in a book from an old shop in the French Quarter that has stayed with me most. The book was on ghosts and the afterlife, written by a journalist looking for answers. The message was channeled by a medium.

According to that medium, the spirits want us to know that suffering is needed for spiritual growth.

When I read that sentence, my whole attention narrowed to a focus, and something inside me sighed and said yes. If that was true, I could accept the pain of the past, the struggles of today. I could breathe. And ever since, the idea has kept resonating.

Now, I make no arguments for or against the afterlife…or ghosts, or mediums. And I’m aware that the message itself is controversial. Really, Virginia, all suffering is needed? I know, it’s a hornet’s nest. But that doesn’t stop me considering the possibility.

The potential of hardship to lead to growth is mirrored everywhere in life.

Without the irritants of sand, an oyster would never create a pearl. Without problems and challenges, most of us would have little impetus to grow. I think of my own struggles to build a healthy business and know each great leap came specifically because some very real hardship or problem was nipping at my heels.

So when it comes to something beyond blood and bone, something greater than ourselves, something luminous—and most of us have sensed this at some point—is it such a stretch to consider that the same natural process might spur us on to spiritual growth?

I can only speak for myself. Whenever I consider the possibility that my suffering polishes me like a diamond, my chest opens and my breathing becomes soft.

And I think of all the clients I have seen over the years, many of whom have been through immense suffering and trauma, some even believing themselves broken. But the resilience and creativity they’ve shown, the skills learned, depths mined, and wholeness which is so much greater than the wounds it contains, say otherwise. They are some of the most amazing people you could hope to meet.

If you’ve ever had severe sciatica, you’re not likely to forget it. The condition can be excruciating, with burning or stabbing pain shooting down the buttock and leg. But sciatica’s not always like that. Sometimes, people have weird symptoms in a leg or foot and don’t link it to sciatica.

The nerve path

The sciatic nerve is the longest in the body. It starts in the low back, travels through the buttocks, and goes down the back of the leg to the foot. Specifically, its path includes the:

• Two lowest vertebrae in spine
• Piriformis muscle (in butt)
• Hamstrings
• Back and side of calf (nerve splits behind knee)
• Foot and toes

So, what goes wrong?

If this nerve gets pinched, you can get pain or symptoms anywhere along its path. The two main places it gets pinched are at the low back, usually when a bulging disc presses on a nerve root, or in the buttocks, when a tight piriformis muscle squeezes the nerve.

How this shows up

I’ve seen clients with severe sciatica who could hardly get on my table without excruciating pain. But I’ve also seen people with more “mysterious” leg or foot symptoms that they don’t connect to their back or pelvis. For instance, imagine that:

• Your hamstring and upper calf keep cramping
• Your leg is numb in one area and tingly or painful in another
• Your foot hurts or won’t lift when you walk (drop foot)
• One leg feels weaker than the other

What can help?

Most sciatica will clear up on its own in a few weeks. So unless there are red flags, doctors typically advise home care like heat or cold, pain relievers, and gentle exercise.

In my experience, massage may be helpful if the pain is caused by a tight piriformis. Craniosacral therapy, however, is nearly always helpful. It can relieve pressure on the nerve by releasing restrictions, reducing inflammation, and correcting alignment issues in the vertebrae and sacrum. Often, the relief is swift.

You may also be able to relieve some pressure yourself. For a tight piriformis muscle, try these stretches. If the problem is your low back, try this flat-back resting position.

Know these red flags:

• Sudden, severe low back or leg pain (especially after injury)
• Extreme numbness or weakness in a leg or foot
• Trouble controlling your bladder or bowel

If you have any ref flags, see a doctor right away. Don’t mess around with nerve damage.

How often do we feed our hearts on stories of violence, ugliness, and heartbreak? If we follow the news, then daily. This diet makes our hearts heavy. In times like these, we need to feed ourselves better stories and experiences—not only for our personal well-being, but also to remind ourselves of better possibilities for humanity.

So, let me offer your heart something nourishing.

On a recent summer evening, I found myself at loose ends. My boyfriend and I had planned to picnic at our local concert in the park. But that day turned out to be his cat’s time to die, and he and his daughter needed time together. So, with a heightened sense of the briefness and sweetness of life, I decided to go to the concert myself.

The park was brimming with people. The music was in full swing. I waded into the midst of the crowd, through families seated around picnic baskets, older people in lawn chairs, and whirls of tumbling and laughing children.

The musicians, a swing band, played with a palpable sense of joy. They told us this was their favorite concert to play all year. I could feel it. This joy radiated, spreading from the crowd to them, and back again.

I sat on the grass, feeling my body connect to the earth, the entire park supporting my weight. A profound peace descended. I looked at the people around me—really looked—and felt suddenly overcome by their beauty.

The older woman, in a dressy hat and lipstick, staring with adoration into the face of the corgi on her lap. Unnoticed beside her, the weathered partner staring with equal adoration at the woman.

The couple who knows how to swing dance, their steps the perfect complement to the music. The huge, lumbering man who turns graceful when he hits the dance area. The slender woman, swaying with a toddler on one hip and a pinscher pup on the other.

I could go on. The delighted little girl dressed in a velvet fuchsia dress, and the mom who rolls and plays with her all evening while their huge family laughs. The barefoot grandma chasing and tumbling with the barefoot girl, both in matching sundresses.

Strangers talking. Introverts smiling. Non-dancers sitting still, their faces lit from within.

All around, the best in us, the brightest, shining out and bonding us. All to be found in a couple of hours, on a summer’s evening, in Trolley Barn Park, in my neighborhood of University Heights—and probably in yours, too. All you have to do is look.