This episode is Part 3 of the series on the new BTR.ORG Meditation Workshop.
Part 1: Brand New Meditations for Victims of Betrayal & Abuse
Part 2: Find Peace & Calm With Our New BTR.ORG Meditations
Part 3: New Meditations: Are You Ready to Start Healing? (this episode)

BTR.ORG Meditations: A Healing Modality for All

Sammy, like many members of the BTR.ORG community, is a woman of faith. She shares:

“I have typically shied away from meditation because I’m coming from a Christian base and I was afraid of new age-type meditations that I had only briefly heard about. So I kept scripture reading, prayer, and just my own meditation in communing with God, so to speak.”

Sammy, Member of the BTR.ORG Community

All Belief Paradigms Are Welcome & Respected at BTR.ORG

Sammy decided to try The BTR.ORG Meditation Workshop despite her reservations – and found immense healing and peace.

Regardless of your ideology, please know that BTR.ORG resources, included the new Meditation Workshop, are designed with all belief paradigms in mind.

BTR.ORG Is Here For You

Listen to Sammy’s experiences with the new BTR.ORG Meditation Workshop for more, and consider enrolling today.

Full Transcript:

Anne (00:01):
Welcome to BTR.ORG. This is Anne.

The last two episodes have been members of our community who are sharing their experience with The BTR.ORG Meditation Workshop.I wrote, recorded, and edited it specifically for women in this situation. It includes 13 meditations and they are all really amazing. They cover different topics, even though the beginning of all of the meditations is similar, it uses different words and has a different topic, and then it has a topic specific visualization about halfway through, and women are finding it to be really, really helpful. So I’ve invited Sammy, another member of our community to share her experience with the meditations today.

Before you even listened to it one time, what were your expectations before and then the first time you listened to it, what was your experience?

Being open to new healing modalities

Sammy (02:21):
My experience with meditation, I have typically shied away from it because I’m coming from a Christian base and I was afraid of, I don’t know, new age for lack of a better definition type meditations that I had only briefly heard about, so I kept scripture reading, prayer, and just my own meditation in communing with God, so to speak. But I thought, well, no, I’m really open to this. I’ll see what I think.

Anne (02:52):
Just out of curiosity, what made you open to it in the first place? Just that you trusted BTR or –

Sammy (02:58):
Oh, yes, yes. It was going to be safe and fine, and I always know that, say I started it and it was too triggering, for lack of a better word for me, I can just stop it, knowing that it was coming from a safe source.

Using the Workbook with the Meditations

Anne (03:14):
Before you tried it, did you print out the workbook?

Sammy (03:17):
Yes, the whole deal.

Anne (03:19):
How did you feel about like, wait, this is a meditation. I didn’t know it was a workbook. Or did it just seem like normal to you?

Sammy (03:26):
A little of both. I hadn’t imagined meditations where you would stop and kind of journal at the same time. I thought I’m going to go with what they say to do and see where it leads.

Anne (03:37):
So you were just like, I’m all in. I’m just going to go for it. Alright, so this is an experiment for you. Talk about that first time you went through it. What did you think?

“I wanted to get started right away.”

Sammy (03:46):
It was in the middle of a day, which is unlike me. I normally would save this for either first thing in the morning or in a little less likely, but evening or bedtime. But I wanted to get started right away and I knew I had a limited amount of time, so I think it the BTR Group Sessions.

It’s been a lifesaver, and I went into a room where I kind of have a home altar kind of prayer area, and I just decided to follow exactly what it said to do. One area where I carry, and I’ve known this even before the meditation, a lot of my physical stress, it’s in my jaw area and my neck and my shoulders.

I started that meditation aware that everything felt really, really tight. By the end of the meditation, I had noticeable, significant relaxing in those muscle areas. That was so encouraging in and of itself, so the actual exercise, the first thing that came to mind actually kind of surprised me.

“I just went with it.”

(05:05):
It took me back in my childhood and I really didn’t think I’d go there, so I just went with it. I mean, it really makes sense. That’s where some of my fears and lack of healthy coping mechanisms began. I relived it, but it felt safe at the same time. I had plenty to write about where it would say, stop and write. The first part about obstructions to knowing you deserve safety, and then especially under the part where it talks about if the obstruction could speak, what would they say?

I loved some of your prompts that helped get me going, but I had no problem expanding both times. Oddly enough, on the first time, it asked me one through five how resolute I was to knowing I deserve safety. I just felt like a five, even though when I was back in that moment experiencing that early in life situation, I know I didn’t quite feel that then, but in this moment, reliving it. I’m absolutely resolute that I should have had safety and I certainly deserve it now in my current life.

“Whatever comes up, comes up”

Anne (06:23):
Knowing you were a five the first time after that, did you think, okay, I’m just going to go through it again because Anne asked me to, or were you like, Hey, I want to do that again? What were your thoughts at that point?

Sammy (06:34):
It was both. I thought, I’m going to redo this as many times and feel I want to need to or would benefit from. I’m an older BTR woman and I have a lot of different things to process in my brain and my soul and my heart. I don’t try to force it. Just whatever comes up, comes up. I’m trying to look at it as a version of EMDR for myself, even though it’s not technically EMDR. Because I have done that a little bit in the past, I do believe that it can still help me. I want to be healed.

I know my savior wants me to be healed and he can work through many different things, and this to me feels like a wonderful, inexpensive, not even all that time consuming avenue that I can do it almost any time that I choose.

“Every single time I listen to it, I hear something i didn’t hear the last time.”

Sammy, Member of the BTR.ORG Community

Anne (07:39):
Knowing that you’re redoing the same one, what surprised you about doing it a second time?

Sammy (07:46):
Okay. I only took notes on three times. I’ve probably done it five more times without notes, and as recent as this morning, every single time I listen to it, I hear something I didn’t hear the last time, and it’s usually something you’re saying because it’s so filled with such good nurturing words and information and message.

I just hear something different every time that makes it deeper and more profound, more meaningful. Like I said, even if I re-experience the same thing, in my mind, it’s still a little bit different each time. One thing that has not changed every single time I’ve done it is that place that I go to in my mind where I do have total safety, all the sensations around me and everything makes me have that feeling that has stayed the same.

Understanding “Obstructions”

Anne (08:51):
Did you find yourself becoming more and more deeper, deeper into things that you didn’t realize were obstructing you from safety as you continued to do the same meditation over and over?

Sammy (09:04):
Just going deeper and deeper in trying to get at the true core and root of that? Yes.

Anne (09:12):
Do you feel like it has changed just your everyday waking life, waking up for the meditation? You’re saying you feel more relaxed, you feel better, your body’s responding well in terms of when you’re not even thinking about the meditation, when you’re just going about your daily life, have you noticed anything different that surprised you that you think is related to the meditation?

Processing Trauma Through The BTR.ORG Meditation Workshop

Sammy (10:50):
I am way more aware of trying to relax those tense muscles in my jaw because if they start tightening, then the whole neck follows. I do think it’s helped me be more mindful of just trying to concentrate on relaxing as much as I can. The other thing is each time there’s about maybe three to five different parts of trauma that I’ve processed while doing this. Each time now that they come up in a thought moment, they’re not as powerful. The power of their grip on me is lessening and lessening.

Anne (11:35):
I found that as I use meditation too, it’s like before maybe in his presence or the fear was just the charge was just, and then the more I meditated, the more it reduced. Now it’s not as triggery,

Powerful Visualizations

Sammy (11:53):
And even if it is a little, it’s less so than it was the time before. It’s given me such a strong visual of that light that you talk about. I’ve experienced that in my mind’s eye. One time in particular, many years ago in my wasn’t quite sure where I stood and I prayed for a sign that God had revealed to me that he really is real and it came in that form in a half awake, real, calm, relaxed state, and it was the most beautiful, brilliant, warm, but not too hot, light and warmth. I’ve never experienced anything like that.

One time recently, a real blip of it. I didn’t ask for it. It just came. Every time you talk about that, I go to that place and it just feels so real. Feel everything I need. I love imagining about the vortex of him just taking this pain and this trauma and just obliterating it.

“BTR is changing my life.”

(13:09):
That helps me so much, and the more I do it, the more I keep remembering in real moments to try to do that and then that force field that you talk about, I imagine this circle around my whole body. It’s an invisible one to everybody else, but it’s like my buffer in my shield and that’s Jesus surrounding me and specifically how you brought in angels. That’s always been something so important to me. I could go on forever about how BTR is changing my life. I just can’t even thank you enough because I know it all began with you.

Anne (13:54):
Thank you, because without you, I wouldn’t still be doing this. If people hadn’t listened and been supportive in that way, there’s no way I would still be doing this. It’s my life’s mission and goal and I love creating meditation and The BTR.ORG Living Free Workshop. I just think it’s so fun as I solve my own problems, sharing what I’ve learned in this way has been so healing for me.

If I didn’t have the support of people listening or people being supportive in the way that you are supportive, there’s no way I could have done it. So thank you and thank all of you listeners. I appreciate you so much.