How a Naturopathic Doctor Heals the ‘Unhealable’ with Dr. Jen Mann

In this Episode

• [01:59]Jen Mann shares a childhood memory of feeling spirit in a church gathering, which influenced her journey towards becoming a naturopathic doctor.
• [04:21]Jen addresses the misconception that functional medicine is strict and restrictive, advocating for a more curious and enjoyable approach to health.
• [11:26]Jen shares her personal experience of getting sick after traveling to the Amazon and the process of healing through various methods, including herbs, food, and addressing emotional and spiritual health.
• [16:12]Orion shares her recent experiences of stress due to moving, a sick relative, and the war, and asks Jen for advice on stress management.
• [18:04]Jenn describes her daily practice of calling in her essence and clearing out any negative energy, which helps her maintain her own light and peace.
• [34:38]Jen suggests finding an elimination diet to identify foods that work best for the body and learning to listen to the body’s signals.
• [37:50]Jen shares a story of a client who overcame inflammatory bowel disease by learning to honor his body’s needs and making lifestyle changes.
• [41:52]Jen advises thinking of the healing process as a cocoon, where one can experiment with different foods to understand what works best for their body.
• [44:05]Orion asks Jen for her top tips for living a stellar life.

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About Today’s Show

Hi, Jen. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for being here.

Thanks for having me, Orion.

Before we begin, maybe you can share with me one beautiful memory from your childhood.

It’s a great question. Well, I grew up with my parents, both of whom are in the priesthood of the church I was raised in. I remember growing up with a day when everyone gathered in the church to pray for someone who was sick. 

I remember the energy that came into the room that day. I loved it when people would call on spirit and bring it into whatever we were working on. That’s one of my favorite feelings of being a kid, when they would call on spirit and bring spirit into the room.

Were you able to see things, or was it just a sensation?

It was really a sensation. I’m not a religious person. I never really felt religious as a kid, but I had this feeling of spirit. When the spirit would come in, whether it was when we were singing, gathering or praying for someone, I couldn’t really see it, but I could feel that feeling so much, and I loved it.

So, you think that’s what started your journey to becoming a doctor and helping people?

I think as a naturopathic doctor, there’s this belief in what’s called the ‘Vis’. There’s this idea that the body has a capacity to heal itself. All we’re doing is working with that capacity and helping it to flow. 

To me, that’s very similar to spirit. My dad’s a physicist and my mom’s a mathematician. I had a science background and exposure to spirit. I think naturopathic medicine pulls both of those together.

I think of science as a tool. It’s a way for us to get information and to understand our bodies better.

How do you combine science and the spirit, like a natural way of healing and all that?

I think of science as a tool. It’s a way for us to get information. It’s a way for us to better understand our bodies. There’s so much information we’ve gathered through science. That’s like a tool we’re using to harness this spirit, this energy, to help it flow and express itself. When combined, they can be really, really powerful.

What do you think is the biggest misconception that people have around functional medicine?

I think one of my favorite ones is that it has to be strict, restrictive, hard, difficult, and limiting. I think that’s a lot of ideas about what health has become these days: the idea that you have to limit or restrict yourself to feel healthy. It’s not good for the body, for desire, and for aliveness to feel really restricted.

How can we bring our health and get our aliveness, that freedom, and that flow, and make that possible?

How do we do that?

That’s a much more interesting process. I encourage my clients to bring an attitude of curiosity that you get to be in this amazing form, this beautiful, organic body that’s fleshy and does all these things. 

To bring an idea of curiosity and fun to it, and to look inside and play with it, versus limiting it and telling it what to do every moment of the day, and what it can eat and what it can’t eat. It’s a very different place to come from.

All those years that you’ve been doing what you’re doing, what do you think you discovered is your biggest talent and expertise?

As a clinician, the gift of sitting with someone and hearing them deeply is the biggest gift that I’ve honed in on. Every time I do that all day long, every day that I get to do that and deeply listen to what’s really at the edge for that person, what’s alive for that person, what’s growing, what’s transforming, ultimately, to me, that’s the biggest gift of what I get to do. 

As a clinician, the gift of sitting with someone and hearing them deeply is the biggest gift that I’ve honed in on.

How do you work with someone in that space? What arises in that space? What wants to grow out of that space? I don’t know. That’s a skill you can only get by sitting with people for a lot of hours and honing it through a lot of practice.

You can’t teach it, you can’t learn it, you just have to be with the people. When we say chronic illnesses, what do people come to you for? Do they come to you after they’ve been to a regular doctor, where they can’t do anything, and then they come to you? How does it work?

In terms of physical conditions, the most common ones I work with are chronic fatigue, digestive disorders, thyroid conditions, and autoimmune conditions. These are typically things people have been dealing with for a long time. Most people we see have been to multiple doctors, at least their primary care doctor, and they feel dismissed, they feel frustrated. 

These days, we have access to so much information. People have researched on their own now on ChatGPT, Google, blogs, or podcasts like yours. They’re trying to implement and work with a lot of people who are very smart, very capable, people who are used to being able to figure things out. 

So, between getting frustrated with conventional medicine and not getting answers, and trying things on their own without success, people typically look for a guide or someone who can provide more support and help them figure out what’s going on and how to work through it.

Beyond the listening, what’s the difference in protocol working with somebody like you and working with a regular doctor?

Well, in conventional medicine, that system is set up to look at what insurance covers. Insurance covers certain labs and certain imaging. If you fall within a certain threshold of illness, cancer, or major illnesses, very obvious things on your labs, then those are going to pop up, and they’ll offer you a medication or some sort of therapy for them.

The key difference is that we can identify where your body is out of balance. Where is it really not showing up the way you want it to? What’s more nuanced than that’s off? It doesn’t have to reach the level of obvious illness for you not to feel good. 

So, that’s the level of nuance and detail we can explore, not just from labs, but also from what you’re experiencing in your body and your history. All these pieces, you were able to put together and sort through over time, really understanding what your body’s saying, what it needs, and what it wants.

Can you give me an example of a specific nuance that, for example, a halopatic doctor will never find? Because they are limited in what they can do with insurance.

We work with a lot of gut issues. In conventional medicine, pretty much all they’re going to do for that is a colonoscopy or endoscopy. They’re going to set a scope down and look at the intestines. If they don’t find any masses or major inflammation, they’re going to call it IBS, irritable bowel syndrome, which is what the name is. Like people already know, going in there, the bowels are irritated. That’s obvious, right? 

What we’re able to do is specialty testing that looks at the gut microbiome. For example, the function of the gut: Are you producing digestive enzymes? Do you have any overgrowth in the microbiome? Do you have a lack of growth in the microbiome? 

And get to that more nuance in conventional medicine. They don’t have any testing for that. They don’t even consider that what’s going on is a major issue for most people.

Do you feel like most people have problems with their microbiome?

We want to keep growing our microbiome with good flora, like probiotics, and eating healthy food. You wanna avoid the things that bring down the microbiome—antibiotics, pharmaceuticals, processed foods, and stress.

I would say it’s pretty much universal.

What can any of us do to protect our microbiome and gut health?

It’s one of the most powerful systems in the body. You can link pretty much any aspect of illness to the gut microbiome. It’s a huge one to be looking at, taking care of. It’s one that’s built up. If you look at how babies grow their microbiome, it’s a flora when you come out of your mother, either from their skin or vaginal flora. It’s the breast milk, and then it’s the food that you’re eating. 

We want to keep doing that throughout our lives, growing our microbiome with good flora, like probiotics, and eating healthy food. You wanna avoid the things that bring down the microbiome—antibiotics, pharmaceuticals, processed foods, and stress. 

So, it’s really how I think about it – it’s more like a garden that you want to nourish. You want to get the weeds out once in a while, too. That’s why it’s good to work with someone. We’ve always done that as humans. We collect things in our gut. We collect little microbes, and we need to clean them out once in a while, too. Working with someone who can look at your microbiome once in a while and help you keep it well-balanced is helpful.

How do we clean it?

When I got sick, that’s how I got into this work, too. I went to the Amazon when I was in college, and I did a study abroad program there. Like many people, we love traveling the world and doing all these different things. I went to the Amazon, and did a college program there, and got exposed to all these bugs and water that my body was not used to being exposed to at all.

I got very sick, and my health deteriorated from there. So, you know, there’s herbs and things that we’ve always been connected to because humans, just like all animals, we pick up these microbes that love living in other beings. 

There are herbs, foods, and various pharmaceuticals that can help eliminate these microbes that get in there. It can be life-changing because when they’re overgrown, they start to take over our immune system, giving us brain fog, acne, eczema, and autoimmune conditions. 

When you clean them out, your immune system can become healthy again. The gut lining can heal up again. We can absorb our nutrients. So, using food, herbs, pharmaceuticals, whatever it takes to really clean that out.

What was your process of healing back then when you got really sick?

I was someone who had to really go through all of it. I had to go through a lot of discovery as to what was deeply going on. That was huge for me to know, like, I had stuff growing in my gut that shouldn’t have been there and had parasites. I had something called SIBO, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth. I had an autoimmune thyroid condition. I had endometriosis. 

So for me, there was a huge discovery process of like, what’s actually going on in my body that’s making me feel so terrible? It was like this whole piece of how do you heal these otherwise untreatable conditions in conventional medicine? 

For me, it was a process of everything. I was looking at the food I was eating, my nutrients, and my gut health, as well as my hormone health, and examining my emotional patterns and spiritual well-being. I had to really look at all the layers to go through and reverse these types of conditions.

I was listening to Dr. Dispenza on my way to take my son somewhere, and I was really into the mind-body connection. He’s also known for his retreats, where people spontaneously heal, which is pretty amazing. Blind people can see, people walk out of wheelchairs and all those things. 

What do you think about this? Do you combine—I’m sure you do—this type of aspect of the spiritual in your work?

I love his work too. I do his meditations a lot, and I’m going to one of his retreats in October. We’re excited.

Oh my goodness, you’re so lucky. We were supposed to go to Marco Island during COVID, but then our babysitter got COVID, and we couldn’t go. It was terrible. Well, I guess it’s meant to be. We had the in-laws coming down to Florida to help us, but we had to cancel everything at the last minute.

What I love about his work and what I hold for healing is that everyone has that potential to heal, that our body wants to be healthy. I agree with him that illness exists in certain states of being but not in others. 

How do we find the place where our body is healed? Some of that might be through physical means, such as changing our diet or taking supplements. Some of that involves working on and getting rid of old thought patterns and systems that no longer serve us. And a lot of people become entangled in these things. 

Maybe you’re not holding boundaries—let’s keep a more simple one—with work. That’s an emotional pattern you’re overgiving. That’s going into your sleep. So you’re not sleeping as much because you’re overworking. We can give you sleep mats. We can give you a sleep routine. But if you’re not dealing with the pattern of overgiving or not holding your boundaries, that pattern can be deeper than it can be. 

‘I’m not holding boundaries with this illness. I’m not holding the boundary in my gut. So I’m getting leaky gut. I’m not holding boundaries with my immune system. So I have an autoimmune disease.’ 

This theme of boundaries is leaking into everything. That’s going to be your state. It’s going to show up physically, mentally, emotionally, in your relationships, and spiritually. Maybe you’re not holding your essence enough in your body. 

The more you can work these themes throughout your life, the more you can break out of them into something different, when you’re at that different frequency, when you’re at that different state of being, that pattern of illness is much less likely to exist.

In the last year, I think I had more stress than in many, many years altogether. We moved, and I had a sick relative, and we experienced the war with Iran, having our building shaken.

Crazy stuff that normal people don’t experience, but we chose to come here. I’m glad we did, and in the midst of chaos, in the midst of having fear for your life literally, how do you keep yourself at the eye of the storm? How do you reduce stress?

I’m a coach and a hypnotherapist, having studied with many people and interviewed all of whom I find brilliant. I did a lot of work. But still, when things like this happen, it’s very hard to regulate the nervous system, especially because as an empath, I feel my environment, I feel my family, I  just feel the frequency and the density.

Here in Israel, it’s way more dense and way more intense. What would you recommend doing to either supplement or focus on regulating the nervous system?

Thank you for sharing that. You’re talking about some of the most difficult situations in the human condition that you’re up against—war, life-threatening situations, and things with family.

Yeah, and also the perception of what I see around the world in anti-Semitism, which I’m like, “Whoa, this is crazy.” It’s a lot. There is climate change and everything else. I also think that as an Israeli, I have this extra layer of stress. What do you think?

Acknowledging the level of stress that you’re experiencing, I think that’s just being with what is, and sometimes the human condition is really difficult. Anytime we can bring compassion to a situation, I’ve had to do that a lot at a much lesser level, not dealing with war and the things you’re talking about, but my own healing journey when things felt so difficult; acknowledging this is difficult. It’s huge, just that step. 

And then for me too, in a lot of these situations, I work with so many people who are sensitive and empaths, and luckily, there are a lot of us big-hearted, feeling sensitive people on this planet right now. We need all of us in these times. How do we be with ourselves, and how do we keep these boundaries? How we maintain our own light in these situations is a growing habit and practice. 

I have a practice every day. I’m very empathic, too. I remember going to a doctor when I was first dealing with all these things, and she’s like, “Jen, you take everything into your body.” 

I had all this stuff growing in me. I had endometriosis, and I had SIBO. I had all these autoimmune issues, which caused a lot of confusion about what was mine and what wasn’t. It was a big part of my healing—claiming what’s my essence and getting the stuff that’s not me out and getting a right relationship with it.

What is a daily practice of where I want to separate myself from the collective, from the environment, from news, from the outside noises into my own bubble of light and peace and happiness and joy?

Every morning when I wake up, I start this way, and I feel what I call my “essence,” and I call it in. I’ll close my eyes, focus on my essence, say my name to myself, and focus on that vibration I feel when I say my name. Then I ground into the ground and clear anything that’s not mine. 

I’m very visual, and I’ll see what’s not mine. I’ll see black spots or things, and I’ll use a little vacuum cleaner to clean them up. Then, I will feel my bubble around me, making that space pristine for me. That’s my area, where I get to live. I get to shine my essence in, and I get to clear out everything that’s not mine in it and keep that space beautiful.

All I have is my essence, and my essence connects to spirit.

That’s a practice I do many, many times a day. It’s not just me. I set up my morning like that. But a lot of times, I’ll just sit there and call in my essence, clearing out my space after every client, especially after any weird stuff.

Because you like people come to you in the worst conditions, where they’re like desperate, angry, frustrated, sick, and sad, and you seem to be very empathic. If you sit and listen to your patients like no other doctor and you really receive them, you probably also open your field to them.

Yes, very sensitive.

And the fields are merging, and then you need to do something to disconnect with that energy that is not yours, because as the doctor, you’re not able to help anyone if you’re just kind of going down with their sadness, not good for anybody. That’s amazing practice.

I was doing it all wrong when I started practicing. I was taking it all in. I was kind of digesting it through my body. Yes, it’s not good. So, I’ve learned to hold my energy. I meet them where they’re at. I can’t do it for my clients. They have to do it for themselves. They get to do it for themselves. 

With all the things going on in the world, we get to choose how we want to interface with that, how we want to support, how we want to help, but we have to hold our own energy or else we’re gonna get sick, and we won’t be able to help other people either. It’s tough. There’s a lot going on in the world right now.

That’s why I told you, this morning I went with my girlfriends to the beach at 5 AM, and I was so surprised to see that they were like, “Oh, we’re going to the beach. It’s going to be so quiet. No one’s going to be there.” Then there was a huge group of runners and a family that came really early. It was really nice. We found a more quiet space and we were with the waves. I kind of just spontaneously took them.

I did a guided meditation for everyone while we were inside the ocean. I love working with the subconscious mind. They had this tape, and they put tape on the water. The lifeguard is not there. The tape says, “The water is rough. Please don’t go in.” 

I was like, “Okay, we are going to go in a little bit, but not a lot. But wait, I want to do something with you.” I took them on a guided meditation where that tape was representing everything, every obstacle, everything that seems stuck and unachievable. 

My deepest sense of safety comes from knowing I can create some safety in the world, even though the world itself isn’t safe.

I guided them, and I said, “Okay, the moment we’re going to go through that tape, you’re going to release all those obstacles. It represents all of those obstacles, and you’re just going to keep your eyes closed. Then when you open, you’re going to look into the horizon and the endlessness, knowing that this is who you are—ever-expanding, endless possibilities, invisible.” 

I don’t know what I said there, but it was so great just to be connected to nature and not see buildings, not see anything, just the horizon, just nature. And also imagining that the waves are taking away anything that doesn’t serve us and releasing and cleansing it. It was just really magical. 

Things like that are really helpful. I’m still doing them. If there is a siren, for example, my conscious mind says, ‘I’m good. Everything’s under control. This is what we’re going to do.’ But then I feel like my heart is racing, really fast, and I’ve noticed it a few times. 

How do we get coherence between the brain and the heart in this type of situation, where it’s almost like a Pavlovian reaction for stress and anxiety?

Thank you for sharing that; it’s a beautiful practice to do in the ocean, where you can remember who you are and your connection to everything. I think the more we can do that, the more resilient we become. I think we have to become so masterful in the moment with the siren to be able to do something like that.

But I’m not that masterful, apparently. I have to practice more.

I think that’s the thing. We’re all human, and we’re all learning. The more we can build these practices outside of those extreme moments, the more resiliency we build. That’s why I think a daily practice or regular practice is so good.

Many people here have pets—multiple dogs, cats, and other animals—because they’re animal lovers. They freak out when they hear sirens. I saw a woman with three huskies; she had just started playing the siren on a very low sound. Then they all went to the safe room together, and she gave them treats. 

The fear turned into something familiar, so they’re not. They’re used to it. They practiced it in real time, and they don’t freak out. They’re just super calm. Perhaps there is something that can be done on a subconscious level for humans.

For me, it’s knowing in the end, all I have is my essence and my essence as it connects to spirit. There are things I can do in the moment to calm myself, such as self-soothing activities, which, as you mentioned, can help create a plan for how to handle those moments. 

In the end, it’s knowing my connection to spirit is where we started today, too. It’s interesting that it came through, but my deepest safety is in knowing I can create some sort of safety in the world, even though the world itself isn’t safe.

I know what you’re saying. Because we’re trying to control the outcome, but we don’t know what will happen tomorrow, the next day, or the next moment. We never know. I’m already so worried about the future these days with AI and everything. But you never know what’s going to happen. Sometimes, most of the time, your biggest fears never come true.

I think what you’re talking about, connecting to your essence, is about losing control and trusting the divine to guide us, that no matter what happened, we’re going to be okay. Because at the end, we’re all coming back to the source and light.

To look for the deep sense of safety in other people, or to look for the deep sense of safety in our politics, government, social media, blogs, or all these things, it’s not a good place to look for that deep sense of safety from. It’s so volatile. Things are changing so much every day. So, if that’s where we’re deriving a sense of security or safety from, it’s going to make us very stressed. 

Building a sense of safety in life is about connecting with my essence on a deeper level, with the life source energy that flows through me and everything around me.

For me, building a sense of safety in life is about connecting with my essence on a deeper level, with the life source energy that flows through me and everything around me. That’s my current practice. 

How do I stay with that deeper source of energy, of vitality, of life, and let the other blips go on around me? That’s my practice. How do I support? How do I love? How do I care? How do I take care of myself in all of these things that are going on in our world right now? We’re all practicing that.

You know what, I’m looking at teenagers or kids, and most of them are, no matter what’s happening, they do experience the world, of course, but like I look at my little one, and he’s got no worries. 

We can all be stressed out, and he’s just like, “La la la la la la, everything is good.” Or teenagers who just worry about things like makeup, clothes, or celebrities. I think that when I was a teenager, it was pretty much the same way. I was aware of my reality, but I still lived above it, and I wasn’t so focused on the news. 

We always feel like, “Oh, what’s going on today? It’s so crazy.” But I think that in the 90s, 80s, 60s, and 70s, every generation had its own unique challenges to deal with, and they never stopped. Because there is always good and bad, black and white. Where do we choose to live in this matrix? That’s the question.

What do we put our attention on? What do we turn to for resourcing? If we can be resourced, how do we extend help in the world? Where do we give our services? How do we support humanity to heal and for us all to live at a higher level of frequency? For me, it’s both. 

How do I stay resourced? How can I contribute to healing the suffering in the world without giving up on myself or getting overwhelmed by things beyond my control? 

It’s not in any way to bypass anything that’s going on in the world and the horrors that are going on. But that’s the key, because you can’t control what you can’t control. It’s like, even if you try really hard, it’s never gonna happen.

So, for me to do that in these times, I can help way more people without getting burned out or sick from taking on too much. But it’s an art. It’s an art that we’re all trying to sort out right now.

You can’t control what you can’t control; even if you try really hard, it’s never going to happen.

You said that you had a thyroid condition.

‘You have a thyroid condition, great. Here’s a pill for you for the rest of your life, and deal with it. You’re us forever.’ 

Also, I heard that the levels are decreasing, meaning what was normal blood pressure 10 years ago is now abnormal. What was normal cholesterol 10 years ago is now abnormal. Every 10, 20, 30 years—I don’t know if this is true or not—they change the levels. Let’s say you’re 150, and it used to be normal, but now the normal is 140, then you’re going to be on this blood pressure medication for the rest of your life, so they have more clients.

Autoimmune diseases are considered incurable, or you have to be on pills for the rest of your life, but you see different miracles in your practice. Could you elaborate on that and share how you managed to cure your own thyroid condition?

I think what’s happening with labs because they’re controlled by insurance, and whether we have pharmaceuticals that can treat within certain levels, that’s really what a lot of lab functions are based on. So, cholesterol and testosterone ranges have changed due to the information often released by the pharmaceutical industry or the treatments available.

People are much sicker, so the norm has extended. So, it comes back to how you feel in your body. And ultimately, I think that is the best test. Do you feel good? Do you feel healthy? Do you feel resilient? Can you show up the way you want to in your life? 

If the answer is something like, “I could have more,” then that’s the truth.

So, there are labs that help guide us, but ultimately, your guide to being healthy is knowing how you feel. There are a lot of times people are like, “Something’s off,” but all the labs are coming back normal, even in functional labs. 

Ultimately, that’s the guide. Holding that again, the theme of what we’re talking about here today is knowing yourself, knowing your essence and what’s possible for you. That’s really what guided me. What I don’t believe is that any of these conditions are permanent. I like this idea that these autoimmune conditions are not reversible. 

Again, I hold that your body is meant to be healthy. Your body wants to be in balance. It’s giving you messages that it’s not. Many of these conditions didn’t exist, or people simply don’t like what they see in Joe Dispenza’s work or the discussions about this topic. They only exist under certain conditions. 

Ultimately, your guide to being healthy is knowing how you feel.

If we can start to shift those conditions, for me, it was everything. It was about getting the right food and addressing food intolerances. It was healing the gut. It involves looking at nutrient levels, such as vitamin D, and taking an inventory of all the different aspects of your health. 

My theme for my thyroid was self-expression and really being able to speak my truth. I’m healing my thyroid right now, being with you and expressing it. It’s like ongoing work. 

I had an autoimmune condition that was attacking my thyroid called Hashimoto’s. Why was I attacking myself? A lot of things were confused. I wasn’t eating the right foods. My gut membrane was permeable. I didn’t know myself, so I needed to get to know myself better and express my emotions and myself more. No medication reverses it. It’s considered irreversible, but it’s not reversible. It’s about coming into more and more and more alignment.

What do you think are the three most important life changes or supplements that everyone should take or do?

The foundation is food, and while food isn’t everything, it is really important. It’s really hard to heal if you’re not eating things that support your body. Finding someone or doing an elimination diet to figure out which foods work best for your body and eliminating the ones that really irritate it is critical.

Another important part is your nutrient levels, things like iron, vitamin D, and B12. If you lack these foundational nutrients and their levels are not high enough, even if you’re doing all the right things, your body is still running on empty. It’s really hard to head. 

Then, I would say the third piece is looking at the gut.

Supplements are supplemental, right? They’re meant to create change and stuff. There shouldn’t be one nutrient or supplement. It’s really individualized supplements. But if you don’t have those foundational pieces in place physically, like the nutrients, the food and the gut health, you can really be putting in a lot of work and not get anywhere.

I’ve noticed in the last year that I have more hair loss, and I’m sure it’s due to stress, but what else can I do to support that, for example?

Think about what your hair is made of. It’s made of protein. It’s made of minerals. You want to ensure you’re getting the basic nutritional foundations. 

For most women, getting at least 100 grams of protein a day is recommended. Getting basic labs done on your vitamin D, iron, and B12, and making sure that those are optimized, and that you’re getting—if you’re not—those supplemented.

Today, we’ve discussed stress, cortisol, and the importance of getting into the ocean, getting out, and meditating, as well as your other subconscious practices.

Wow, last week was a week we spent some time by the ocean in a hotel. It was so good. I went to the beach twice a day, and it was so reviving and amazing. There’s nothing like nature; it helps me feel connected and grounded.

Nature is a coherent field. It is in balance. Many things around us are currently out of balance. That’s a place where we can find natural coherence and remember it for ourselves.

Maybe you can share a story that gave you goosebumps or surprised you in your practice with someone who healed.

So many good stories.

You’re so angelic. The vibe that comes from you is so pure and angelic. Whatever you’re doing comes from the heart and a pure source. It’s really beautiful to see.

Thanks, Orion.

Of course, I cannot hold my tongue.

I’m remembering a client from a while ago. Still, just a really vivacious, active person who loved traveling the world, mountain climbing, and sports. He was just a photographer and had so much aliveness in him, but he had inflammatory bowel disease. 

Many things around us are currently out of balance. That’s a place where we can find natural coherence and remember it for ourselves.

Everywhere he went, he had to stop and use the bathroom. He had to opt out of trips sometimes. And now, we went through the process, like I’m talking about, of looking at the food, looking at the nutrients, looking at the gut health, and he got it. He really found out what works for me. 

These are the supplements I need to take on an ongoing basis; they’re the stuff that was growing in my gut. These are the areas where I’m not truly taking care of myself, like really learning how to honor what my body needs under circumstances where I’m with peers or where I’m traveling. 

He doesn’t have that inflammatory bowel disease anymore. He’s not on medications. It’s like a simple story in a way, but it’s this process of him learning his body, how to connect with it, and then how to honor that day after day after day, and how to move through the world, traveling, doing the things he loves, and honor what his body needs at the same time on this deeper level, and how to take care of himself. 

In a way, it sounds so basic. But if we can all do that—learn, honor, and respect ourselves—then that process is where health comes from.

How do you honor yourself? How do you listen to your body?

That’s a lot of times why we start with our clients with an elimination diet, and you just take out foods that might be like processed foods, sugar and alcohol. As you start to learn how your body works, you add those back in and conduct trials. How does my body speak to me when I eat this food? Do I get brain fog? Do I get acne? Do I get sluggish? Does my gut act up?

What are the ways that my body speaks to me? Your body doesn’t use words, right? We have to attune. Do I get achy in my shoulders? Do I get a neck cramp? Do my eyes look less clear? There are many ways your body speaks to you, and each person has their own unique language. My migraines might be cramping. 

So, you were used to wanting to get rid of these symptoms. I don’t want them anymore. But they’re your body’s language. They’re how they speak to you. They’re actually a gift, and I think that’s part of healing, too. Instead of being just mad at my body for my thyroid not working or for having this joint pain and rheumatoid arthritis, the hair falling out, you know, that’s your body’s language.

Your body is speaking to it. You’re seeing it in your hair. That’s one way it’s communicating with you. So how do you work with that? How do you not just get mad at your body for doing that? How do you listen to it and start to understand what it’s trying to tell you through that?

Love that, but it just feels like cutting sugar and cutting gluten and being so good with your diet feels so restrictive. Do I really want to do this and feel great in my body, or just have that cookie, that chocolate, and that ice cream? It’s summertime, and ice cream is amazing. 

Where do you find the balance? Where you go, “That’s it, I’m cutting everything out.” Because I’ve done that, I cut all sugar and all gluten, and I lost weight and I looked amazing, and then stress happened, “Okay, just this little candy and just this little thing,” and here I am back on a gluten-full diet and candies and all that. So, where is the balance?

Great question. When we go in with people, I’ll tell them, think of this like you’re going into a healing cocoon. You’re gonna be doing some experimentation. You’re going to learn what works for your body and what doesn’t. If you can go into this cocoon for a period of time and deeply heal, then you come out with more resiliency. 

Ultimately, it’s about knowing what works for you and what doesn’t, and finding that line where indulging in things like ice cream can be self-care. Sometimes that is about living a life of pleasure and enjoying it. 

That’s a whole point of healing: to enjoy life, to be more of you, to engage, to travel, to eat that croissant in Paris. And yes, other times it’s like “Well, my body can only do so much of that. I don’t want the acne, I don’t want the gut issues that come with that.” 

My greatest self-care and self-love is not to eat that thing. And it’s going to fluctuate. But to have agency with that and to come to it from a place of self-love versus rebellion and restriction within ourselves, that’s not very fun.

Not very fun. But you know, even when I’m grateful that even when I have my crazy period of eating everything and going a little crazy, I do listen to my body. 

Eventually, I’m like, “I don’t like this. This doesn’t feel good.” And all I’m craving is protein. I’m craving the greens. I’m craving all the things that make me feel really whole and good. 

Exactly. There’s a deeper issue that most people are finding too. It’s not just about the cookies and the brownies. It’s a deeper ‘want to feel good and feel deeply nourished’.

I just made cookies with my son today. We met up with some friends, and they made the best butter cookies I’ve ever had in my life. Seriously. It’s like it was store-bought quality, but a thousand times better. We really indulged. We still have more cookies. It was great.

And you moved them together, creating something beautiful, and then you ate it.

We made stars, mushrooms, and hearts, and it was really, really fun; the kids loved it. 

Before we say goodbye for now, I have two questions for you, Jen. One question is, where can people find you, and what are your three top tips for living a stellar life?

People can find us through the website. We’re at novawellnessmed.com. If you’re in California, you’re welcome to book a free discovery call to talk to us more. 

Three tips for living a stellar life: know and grow your essence, the theme we discussed today. 

Second thing would be to trust your knowing, trust your deepest truth. 

And I think the third would be to hone in on how to interface that with the world, finding what works for you and what doesn’t, and enjoy the discovery of that.

I love that. Jen, thank you so much for being here. It was a pleasure. Thank you for all the beautiful work you do in the world. Thank you for connecting to your essence and teaching others to do so as well, and just being the bright light that you are.

Thank you, Orion

And thank you, listeners. Remember to know and grow your essence, trust your deeper truth, find what works for you in the world and have a stellar life. This is Orion, till next time.