Karen Pearle, longtime OPEN EXCHANGE lister, offers Body Centered Therapy in our Bodywork category.

One morning, holding an ad which I had cut from the OPEN EXCHANGE years ago, I found myself calling the Chi Nei Tsang Institute. That call began a chain of events which was the beginning of a radical change in my view of healing.

I was looking for the key to help people heal from the effects of painful experiences on the deepest level and what I found far exceeded my expectations. Contrary to our assumption that our emotional experiences are governed by our brain alone, actually emotions originate in the body's center, the belly. So when we have a "gut feeling," or can't "stomach" something, we are connecting with our bellies.

Just like with food, the body needs to digest our emotions so we can fully let go of them. The mind is unable to digest emotions. They are not rational and cannot be solved like problems. It is in our bellies that we digest our emotions, take what we need out of them and eliminate the rest. In this way we outgrow emotions. So the process of healing is a process of outgrowing and evolving.

Chi Nei Tsang (CNT), which means "working the energy of the internal organs," is a form of applied Chi Kung (energy exercises). It began as an ancient art of massage used by monks in Taoist China to help detoxify, strengthen and refine their bodies in order to maintain the high energy required to perform the highest levels of spiritual practices.

Today the abdominal area of the body is often neglected in the healing process. In most healing arts the work is from the periphery of the body towards the center. Yet the lower abdomen is the energetic center of the body and the place where breath and movement begin.

What is so different about CNT is that it goes to the very roots of physical and emotional problems. While providing the safety and support to work on very subtle and deep levels, I use the chi (energy) from my chi kung practice to work mainly on the abdomen with a gentle and precise touch.

I help people to unwind the stored emotional energy in their bodies while training their internal organs to work more efficiently. Though there may be painful feelings—grief, fear and anxiety—when we release them we are transformed. The conflict and tension at the root of the problem is fully resolved. So we feel more awake and clear and experience an inner strength right at our core.

People come for CNT sessions for many reasons: digestive, reproductive and breathing difficulties, chronic neck, back, shoulder pain - With low self-esteem, low energy, depression, chronic fatigue, relationship problems or healing from trauma. Whatever the symptoms, the CNT practitioner works with the whole person. All areas of our bodies are in deep communication with one another.

When we digest and outgrow emotions we have held (sometimes for our whole lives) we unwind and a feeling of ease and well-being is restored. We feel things, but they don't control us. Instead of a desperate search for meaning outside of ourselves, we find satisfaction and comfort from within. As we become more mature people we can safely open our hearts and speak our minds, and rediscover our inborn connection with all of nature.