Personal Holistic Rituals & Resources While Attending to Mental Health Wellness

Written By Alexandra Seits

* This resource offers information and is designed for educational purposes only. You should not rely on this information as a substitute for, nor does it replace, professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your health, you should always consult with a physician or other health-care professional. Do not disregard, avoid or delay obtaining medical or health related advice from your health-care professional because of something you may have read on this resource. The use of any information provided including advice on this resource are solely at your own risk. Never use hypnosis or subconscious reprogramming recordings while operating heavy machinery.  This resource offers information and is designed for educational purposes only. I am not a medical doctor and this is just a compiled list of educational resources and always consult with your doctor first. The views and opinions expressed in these resources are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of Alexandra Seits.

 

Holistic subconscious mind work:

  • Jungian dreamwork

  • Jungian shadow work

  • Subconscious reprogramming/ hypnotherapy

  • Hypnotherapy coupled with journaling

  • Theta brain waves

Holistic somatic work:

  • Rebounding

  • Polyvagal toning

  • Sauna therapy

  • Cold therapy/ cold plunges

  • Heliotherapy

  • Red light therapy

  • Infrared therapy

  • Lymphatic drainage massage

  • Body brush

  • Tapping or EFT

  • Bilateral stimulation coupled with hypnotherapy

  • Face plunge in ice bowl bath

  • Dr. Linda Lancaster’s therapeutic baths

  • Earthing

  • Neurostimulation

  • Brain spotting

  • Ozone therapy – I use this Ozonator to ozonate my water

  • Silver pulsing for Epstein Barr and other viruses that can contribute to chronic fatigue

  • Castor oil packs

  • Facial exercises like gua sha, facial reflexology, buccal massage, Nuface, red light therapy mask to attend to and move stagnant emotions stored in somatic facial tissue
     

Cognitive/Behavioral work:

  • Bullet journal method

  • DBT skills

  • CBT journaling
     

Example DIY Personal Retreat Holistically Attending to Mental Health:

  • Wake up with the sun or as close to it as you can to set your circadian clock and do self-hypnosis, attend to Jungian dreamwork, listen to personalized hypnosis

  • Attend to oral hygiene: tongue scrape, water pic, brush, do an oral rinse etc.

  • Get morning sunlight (outside, not through window) for 10-30 minutes

  • Drink filtered water with L-theanine with trace minerals

  • Ground bare feet onto ground to discharge positive ions

  • Face plunge in ice bowl bath

  • Have a protein centric breakfast like cottage cheese or eggs with fiber like blueberries within 30 minutes of waking up between 7am and 9am

  • If you consume caffeine, have caffeine after breakfast (no added sugar)

  • Take supplements for mental health condition like depression and anxiety

  • Lymphatic body brush with ionic copper body brush to stimulate lymphatic circulation

  • Sauna and cold plunge

  • Do facial exercises like gua sha, facial reflexology, buccal massage, Nuface, red light therapy mask to attend to and move stagnant emotions stored in somatic facial tissue

  • Go for a walk and listen to binaural beats, theta waves, a personalized hypnosis session, or hypnotherapy, or walk and talk with a positive and real friend

  • Bullet journal outside or on biomat inside

  • Attend to life administration, school work, or work

  • Attend to housework to clear physical space to feel better about inner space

  • Eat lunch – vegetable and protein centric

  • Attend to oral hygiene: tongue scrape, water pic, brush, do an oral rinse etc.

  • Go to a coffee shop or the library to continue to do school work outside of room in a different environment with a friend

  • Or go to job to work to increase self-esteem and individuation

  • Go to the gym, do personalized somatic flow from therapist, do at-homework out

  • Go to yoga class, workshop, or hangout with a kind friend

  • Eat dinner which is balanced protein, carbs, fats eat with loved ones

  • Drink herbal tea or boil filter water and pour over fresh mint leaves with dessert of  72% or higher dark chocolate if necessary

  • Wind down with sundown (make sure all artificial lights used are incandescent)

  • Do fascia flossing, roll on foam roller to release somatically stored blockages from the body, or use lacrosse ball to roll out

  • Take one of Dr. Linda Lancaster’s therapeutic baths

  • Red light therapy, infrared blanket

  • Take magnesium before bed for stress, anxiety, and sleep

  • Attend to oral hygiene: tongue scrape, water pic, brush, do an oral rinse etc.

  • Do castor oil pack on thyroid and/or stomach

  • Hang out with loved ones and watch comedy, play chess or checkers

  • Read, watch calming videos i.e.: https://www.youtube.com/@FairylandCottage, swap out violent or overstimulating video games and play calming video games like Zelda, Sims, and Animal Crossing while wearing blue blocker glasses, listen to audiobooks while painting, journaling, write out your dream life, review goals and write out goals for every area of your life (spiritual, emotional, physical, social, financial, career, joy etc.), Spoak Interior Design, Holisticism community hub, knit while watching videos learning about your passions, do ancestry/lineage work to connect with ancestors, learn about Human Design, watch shows advised by me as a therapist like Sparking Joy with Marie Kondo and Queer Eye (uplifting, inspiring, healing), look through books with photographs like Home Therapy: Interior Design for Increasing Happiness, Boosting Confidence, and Creating Calm: An Interior Design Book

  • Use neurostimulation device like the one by Fisher Wallace Labs

  • Attend to your personal spiritual practice: pray, gratitude list, connect with nature, go on a spirit totem walk

  • Listen to personalized hypnosis session before bed and while falling asleep

Daily routine/rituals goals:

  • Get 8 hours of sleep

  • Do not go on social media until after 12pm and get off an hour before bedtime

  • Do not watch news, only read news

  • Phone on airplane mode or Do Not Disturb mode for most of the day

  • Aim for 10k steps a day

  • Daily protein goal is whatever your ideal body weight is in grams to stabilize blood sugar

  • No blue light after sun down, use Dark Mode on phone, use bluelight blocking glasses, use Iris on computer, after sundown only use: incandescent lights, beeswax candles, red lights, red light panel

  • On weekends, swap in time to explore new towns or spots, i.e. go to farmer’s markets, or take classes or workshops like Shibori, aerial arts, sourdough making, yoga, sound bowl healing, and take more time to be involved in community, be social, and volunteer

  • Continue to take prescribed medications as advised by your primary care physician, medical doctor, or psychiatrist

We are using the crowd out method to literally crowd out maladaptive previous behaviors, this means that you most likely will not get to all of these things everyday and that is perfectly understandable. We just want to have a lot of tools and rituals to crowd out previous behaviors that are no longer serving you. This is an example for an intensive retreat; however, you can pull on any of these techniques as habits to attend to your holistic mental health everyday.

Holistic Personal Practices & Devices:

Psychotherapy modalities, interventions, and alternatives to continue and consider with current or another therapist:

  • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

  • Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

  • Cognitive Challenging

  • Cognitive Refocusing

  • Cognitive Reframing

  • Communication Skills

  • Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT)

  • Evaluation & Measure-Based Care

    • Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) Questionnaire

    • Adult and Adolescent CBIT Intake Form

    • Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT): Self-Report Version

    • Substance Use Intake Form

    • GAD-7 (Generalized Anxiety Disorder)

    • PHQ-9 (Patient Health Questionnaire)

    • PHQ-2

    • PTSD Checklist for DSM-5 (PCL-5)

    • Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS-v1.1) Symptom Checklist

    • Mood Disorder Questionnaire (MDQ)

    • Dissociative Experiences Scale (DES-II)

  • Progress Notes

    • Biopsychosocial Assessment & SOAP

    • CBIT - Daily Treatment Note

    • Counseling Progress Note

    • DAP Note

    • SOAP Note

    • Suicide Risk Assessment & DAP

    • Suicide Risk Assessment & SOAP

    • Treatment Plan & Goals Note

  • Assessments

    • Initial Clinical Mental Health Assessment and Treatment Plan

    • Adult/Adolescent CBIT Initial Evaluation

    • Biopsychosocial Assessment

    • CBIT Initial Evaluation

    • Suicide Risk Assessment

    • Mental Status Note

    • Patient Safety Plan

    • Release of Information for care coordination

  • Treatment plans

    • Behavioral Health Treatment Plan

    • Initial Clinical Mental Health Assessment and Treatment Plan

  • Exploration of Coping Patterns

  • Exploration of Emotions

  • Exploration of Relationship Patterns

  • Exposure Therapy

  • Guided Imagery

  • Insight

  • Interactive Feedback

  • Interpersonal Resolutions

  • Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT)

  • Mindfulness Training

  • Preventative Services

  • Problem Solving

  • Somatic therapy

  • Somatic Experiencing

  • Hypnotherapy

  • Yoga therapy

  • Body mapping

  • Eclectic

  • Family Systems, Internal Family Systems

  • Gestalt

  • Integrative

  • Interpersonal

  • Motivational Interviewing

  • Person-Centered

  • Narrative

  • Psychodynamic

  • Schema Therapy

  • Strength-Based

  • Coaching

  • Dance Movement Therapy

  • Hypnotherapy

  • Neuro-Linguistic (NLP)

  • Emotional Freedom Technique

  • Structural Family Therapy

    • Integrative approach that focuses on the biological basis of trauma and the reflexive, defensive ways the body responds to threat and fear

    • Naturalistic & neurobiological approach to healing trauma

    • Emerging EBP: Somatic Experiencing for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: A Randomized Controlled Outcome Study

      • Focus is on inner physical sensations, which are seen as the carriers of the traumatic memory

      • Therapeutic goal is to decrease the distress and symptoms caused by the posttraumatic arousal and restore healthy functioning in daily life (Brom et al., 2017)

 

Nine steps of Somatic Experiencing:

  1. Create an environment of relative safety.

  2. Support an initial exploration and comfort with bodily sensations.

  3. Pendulation.

  4. Restore active defensive responses.

  5. Titration.

  6. Uncoupling fear from immobility.

  7. Encourage the discharge of energy.

  8. Restore equilibrium and balance through self-regulation.

  9. Reorient to the here and now.

 

Alternative psychotherapy modalities:

 

Couples Therapy Interventions:

  • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

  • Adaptive Internal Relational Network (AIR)

  • Adlerian

  • Affective education

  • Assessing for safety

  • Beck

  • Behavioral activation

  • Body awareness

  • Boundary setting

  • Building feeling vocabulary

  • Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT)

  • Cognitive challenging

  • Cognitive reframing

  • Communication skills

  • Compliance issues

  • Conflict resolution

  • Coping/stress reduction

  • Crisis stabilization

  • Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)

  • Differential reinforcement

  • Emotional Focused Therapy (EFT)

  • Empathy training

  • Experiential therapy

  • Exploration of coping patterns

  • Exploration of emotions

  • Exploration of relationship patterns

  • Exposure with response prevention

  • Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)

  • Gottman Method couples therapy

  • Grounding exercises

  • Guided imagery

  • Habit reversal training

  • Interactive feedback

  • Interpersonal resolutions

  • Mindfulness training

  • Motivational Interviewing (MI)

  • Narrative therapy

  • Parent management training

  • Polyvagal therapy

  • Preventative services

  • Problem solving training

  • Psychoeducation

  • Reattribution training

  • Relaxation training techniques

  • Role-play/behavioral rehearsal

  • Self-instruction/self-talk

  • Self-monitoring/self-management training

  • Sensorimotor Psychotherapy (SPI)

  • Social modeling

  • Social skills training

  • Solution-Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT)

  • Strategic therapy

  • Structural therapy

  • Structured problem solving

  • Supportive reflection

  • Symptom management

  • Systematic desensitization

  • Time projection

If you are interested in seeing me for psychotherapy and your primary address is in Florida, you can email me at office@alljoysco.com or by calling me at my office line (609) 312-5740
 

Alternative Healing Modalities:

Holistic Mental Health & Somatic Resources:

 

Spiritual Wellbeing Resources:

 

Lifestyle Resources:

 

Hormonal Birth Control x Women’s Mental Health Wellness:

As a reminder and disclaimer,  I am not a medical doctor and this is just a compiled list of educational resources and always consult with your doctor, or family planning OBGYN first.  

Books:

 

Online Articles/Websites:

Podcasts:

Other Resources:

Resources

Andersen, T. E., Ellegaard, H., Schiattz-Christensen, B., & Manniche, C. (2018). Somatic experiencing[R] for patients with low back pain and comorbid posttraumatic stress disorder - protocol of a randomized controlled trial. BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine, 18(1), NA. Retrieved from https://link-gale-com.proxy.library.upenn.edu/apps/doc/A568042850/AONE?u=upenn_main&sid=AONE&xid=6a2d6532

A., V. der K. B. (2015). The body keeps the score: brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. NY, NY: Penguin Books.

Brom, D., Stokar, Y., Lawi, C., Nuriel‐Porat, V., Ziv, Y., Lerner, K. and Ross, G. (2017), Somatic Experiencing for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: A Randomized Controlled Outcome Study. JOURNAL OF TRAUMATIC STRESS, 30: 304-312. doi:10.1002/jts.22189

De Jager, A., Tewson, A., Ludlow, B., Boydell, K. (2016) Embodied Ways of Storying the Self: A Systematic

Review of Body-Mapping, FQS Vol.17(2): art.22

Duros, P., & Crowley, D. (2014). The body comes to therapy too. Clinical Social Work Journal, 42(3), 237-246. doi:http://dx.doi.org.proxy.library.upenn.edu/10.1007/s10615-014-0486-1

Elbrecht, C., & Malchiodi, C. A. (2018). Healing trauma with guided drawing: a sensorimotor art therapy approach to bilateral body mapping. Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books.

Felitti, V. J., Anda, R. F., Nordenberg, D., Williamson, D. F., Spitz, A. M., Edwards, V., Koss, M. P., & Marks, J. S. (1998). Relationship of childhood abuse and household dysfunction to many of the leading causes of death in adults: The Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 14(4), 245–258. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0749-3797(98)00017-8

Gastaldo, D., Magalhaes, L., Carrasco, C., Davy, C. (2012). Body-Map Storytelling as Research: Methodological considerations for telling the stories of undocumented workers through body mapping. Retrieved from http://www.migrationhealth.ca/undocumented-workers-ontario/body-mapping. 

Generative Somatics. About Us. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://generativesomatics.org/about-us/ 

Mischke-Reeds, M. (2018). Somatic psychotherapy toolbox: 125 worksheets and exercises to treat trauma & stress. Eau Claire, WI: PESI Publishing.

Knight, C.  (2015).  Trauma informed social worker practice: practice considerations and challenges.  clinical social work journal.  43(1), 25-37

Leitch, M. L., Vanslyke, J., & Allen, M. (2009). Somatic experiencing treatment with social service workers following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Social Work, 54(1), 9+. Retrieved from https://link-gale-com.proxy.library.upenn.edu/apps/doc/A192052039/AONE?u=upenn_main&sid=AONE&xid=6824389b

Levenson, J. (2017). Trauma-Informed Social Work Practice. Social Work. doi: 10.1093/sw/swx001

Parker, C., Doctor, R. M., & Selvam, R. (2008). Somatic Therapy Treatment Effects With Tsunami Survivors. Traumatology, 14(3), 103–109. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534765608319080

Payne, P., Levine, P. A., & Crane-Godreau, M. A. (2015). Somatic experiencing: using interoception and proprioception as core elements of trauma therapy. Frontiers in psychology, 6, 93. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00093 

Straussner, S. L. A. & Calnan, A. J. (2014). Trauma through the life cycle: A review of current literature. Clinical Social Work Journal, 42, (323- 335).

Skop, M. (2016). The art of body mapping: A methodological guide for social work researchers. Aotearoa New Zealand Social Work, 28(4), 29+. Retrieved from https://link-gale-com.proxy.library.upenn.edu/apps/doc/A561566481/AONE?u=upenn_main&sid=AONE&xid=374e067c

Tewson, A., Vaughan, P., De Jager, A., & Boydell, K. (2016). Body Mapping Anxiety.

Walker, R. (n.d.). Retrieved April 18, 2020, from https://www.rubyjowalker.com/RubyJoWalker.html

Yalom, M.-H., Seid, E., & Levine, P. A. (2010). Resolving trauma in psychotherapy: A somatic approach. Mill Valley, CA: Psychotherapy.net.

* This resource offers information and is designed for educational purposes only. You should not rely on this information as a substitute for, nor does it replace, professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your health, you should always consult with a physician or other health-care professional. Do not disregard, avoid or delay obtaining medical or health related advice from your health-care professional because of something you may have read on this resource. The use of any information provided including advice on this resource are solely at your own risk. Never use hypnosis or subconscious reprogramming recordings while operating heavy machinery.  This resource offers information and is designed for educational purposes only. I am not a medical doctor and this is just a compiled list of educational resources and always consult with your doctor first. The views and opinions expressed in these resources are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of Alexandra Seits.

Alexandra Seits
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