Meet Natalia Rachel
Interview
The Founder of the Illuma Health clinic in Singapore, Natalia Rachel, accompanies people in their personal journey of healing and transformation and specialises in three areas: 1) Trauma recovery, 2) Transformation & self-mastery 3) Culture transformation.
Illuma comes from the word ‘illuminate’ and has always been a fond word in her vocabulary around self-development. She believes that the more we understand about ourselves, our mental health, physical health and our relationship dynamics, the more empowered we become to transform them and step towards healing, recovery and transformation.
Our interview with Natalia will give you some insights as to why her clinic is so successful, with people flying from all over the world.
1. You went from being a patient to being a therapist following your own journey of recovery from trauma, abuse and mental & physical health conditions. People suffering with such conditions can knock at many many doors for years and years and still struggle to find transformative solutions to their issues. One question people ask you often is “how did you do it’?” So, can you give us some elements of answer: how did you do it? And what steps would you advise someone to take?
The first thing that changed my approach to my recovery, was an awareness that my past experiences of trauma were effecting me in the present – mentally, physically and relationally. Before I could feel and identify my trauma, I just thought that something was inherently wrong with me; but that I had to accept it and make the best of life with all my dysfunction.
After I admitted that trauma was decontextualizing within me, my life and relationships, I decided – ‘I don’t want this life anymore’. Agency and choice are fundamental to recovery. Often when we have unresolved trauma we are frozen, immobilized and accepting of our traumatized self as finite. The moment we connect to non-acceptance, we ignite a process where we can move forward into a self-directed, creative process of healing and reclamation. It’s as if something switches on… you could call it the spirit, lifeworce or sheer will. To me, these are one and the same.
Some of the areas I have explored for myself and encourage my clients to work with include:
Repairing the nervous system
Identifying core emotions and beliefs
Reintegrating the fragmented self
Somatic exploration
Relational restructuring
While everyone’s journey is unique and non-linear, I believe that these are the essential components to an integrated transformation.
2. All of your work stems from the intention to support a shift from disempowerment and oppression to empowerment and expression. What does that shift entail and would you say anyone can make it happen?
Two of the hallmarks of trauma are 1) disempowerment and 2) oppression. The remedies to these are 1) Empowerment and 2) Expression.
Accessing empowerment:
Any time we access choice, we are empowered. It could be as small as choosing to eat something different, or say no to request for our time. Small changes beget big changes and I encourage conscious connection to choice in all our interactions. Small choices are possible, even when big ones seem impossible. The more we learn to choose, the greater our capacity for choice and risk becomes. In the case of trauma, choice has been impossible, so learning to choose changes the way we relate in the world.
Accessing Expression:
Any time we speak or show up authentically we are expressed. This may mean to cry (rather than hold in our tears), to tell someone we don’t agree with them, ask for what we need or share a desire. In the case of trauma, our expression wasn’t safe or welcome. So learning to say and express how we really feel is fundamental to reclaiming ourselves. Allowing the body to express is also really important and why a somatic approach to trauma-recovery has become welcomed by many. The body needs a chance to tell its story too. Working somatically has been deeply transformational for me and my clients.
These concepts can be worked with on micro-levels which makes them accessible to anyone. With these processes, we require patience and self-compassion. We are often working to re-pattern a lifetime of conditioning and trauma. We need to go gently.
Learning to choose
It changes the way we relate to the world
3. You are saying that relationship is at the cornerstone of change. Please can you explain this to us and how important is it?
When we are babies, it is the formative relationships that allow us to feel safe and loved, or unsafe and harmed. We need our parents to survive and learn how to relate and thrive in the world. When we don’t have this, the way our nervous system and personalities develop is effected. We adapt to try and survive because our basic human needs are not met.
Similarly, later in life the quality of our relationships has a huge impact on our mental health and wellbeing.
When we look at relationship through a trauma-informed lens, we can look to harness its beauty and power for healing and transformation.
The concept of co-regulation plays a big part in my work. When two nervous systems connect, they have the power to support an increased sense of safety. This is part of our biological truth. So, when we are in the presence of a person that we deem as safe, healing is taking place moment by moment. Taking the concept deeper from a therapeutic perspective, if as a facilitator, I understand past relationship dysfunction, I can seek to counter and repair through the unique relationship I build with my clients. For example, if I know that someone grew up having their boundaries violated, I will engage in boundary work to help them feel, express and re-instate their boundaries. If I know someone grew up being unable to express their wants and needs, I will engage with a process of self-inquiry to acknowledge what needs and wants are present and invite them into expression. The more I understand about how a harmful relationship dynamic has effected a person or people, the more deeply I can work to invite change. This is true not only when working with individuals, but groups too. We are often terrified to challenge our relational organizing principles. In the end we need someone to see where we have adapted against our authenticity and sovereignty, and invite us to reclaim them!
4. Would you say that anger is something that happens often as part of one’s journey to healing and recovery? And then I would like to ask you two things from two different angles: 1) for the patient suffering with anger, how can they process it effectively and find new ways of relating? 2) for the people in the patient’s life who are at the receiving end of that anger and don’t know how to deal with it, is there any advice for them?
I believe that supressed or mal-adapted anger is one of the fundamental drivers for most of the world’s problems. Finding expression and resolution for supressed anger is essential to healing. There is also a requirement to renegotiate our relationship to anger. When expressed healthily without aggression or harm, anger is a very helpful emotion. Healthy anger lets us know that a boundary has been breached or an expectation left unmet. It tells us we either need to re-instate a boundary or renegotiate a relationship contract.
1) Anger is often a very physical and animalistic emotion. In my work with TIRS (Trauma-informed Relational Somatics), clients often connect to a very primal experience where they may need to growl, hiss or scream. There is also a need to express it through the body, often by pushing through the hands or the feet (depending on where they are holding it somatically). Personally, I have also had profound experiences using physical fitness for releasing anger, specifically through boxing/muay thai and throwing sandbags! The idea is to tap into the anger in the body, master it, and send it out safely, in a way that doesn’t hurt anyone or ourselves. When we have been holding on to a lifetime of anger, it can feel too scary to start processing, so we often need to get comfortable talking about our anger first, so we can welcome the process. We also need to work, slowly in layers so it is safe and containable.
2) Working with boundaries is important. Aggressive anger is not acceptable and should have relational consequences. When someone is aggressive with us, they are breaching a personal boundary. It is our job to a) state a boundary ‘It’s not ok to engage with me like this.’ And b) provide a consequence if the boundary is not respected. (This might be to disengage from the interaction). The person violating the boundary will learn ‘If I am aggressive, there will be some kind of disconnection. And if I want to be in connection with this person, I need to work on my anger’. It’s a complicated topic, because in the end we can’t force anyone to change. If there’s someone aggressing us and they show no signs of change, we have to ask ourselves if the relationship truly serves us, and if not, weather we have the courage to leave. Sadly, in most abusive situations, the victim is not aware of their right to boundaries, does not have the tools to express themselves, nor the courage or resource to leave. I believe there needs to be much more education on this topic to empower those in abusive or harmful dynamics to find their way to freedom.
we are all human
Be kind to yourself and allow others to be fallible
5. Mental health has become a lot more mainstream as a topic for a few years now and Covid has reinforced this even further. People are speaking out more and also it is as if a lot of people are realising that it is not healthy to live in a constant state of hustle, that human connections matter and that the relationship with our ‘self’ matters too.
Do you have any tips or advice for people that could help them live more in harmony, but also to create more empathy and compassion towards themselves and others?
There are two self-inquiry questions that are a good starting point here:
1) Am I feeling safe or unsafe? And if the answer is unsafe, is my sense of threat perceived or present? Often the answer is perceived. There is something incredibly powerful about realising that we may feel overwhelmed, panic or fear, when really there’s nothing to be worried about in the present moment. At this time in the world, most of us are existing in overdrive - it’s become the new norm. Working to invite safety in the nervous system and orient to the present is a simple and powerful way to counter it.
A somatic exercise you can try is to place your feet on the floor and be aware of the connection and stability beneath it. You can look around the room or space you are in and ‘orient to the here and now’. Even when the world is in chaos and trauma, we may be able to find momentary safety in the present in a safe space.
2) Am I existing within or beyond my capacity?’
We have been taught to hustle, succeed, strive and be the best. Most of us live beyond our capacity for coping. This is what leads to stress, anxiety, physical and mental health conditions and burnout. Working to understand and respect our capacity is a game changer. For many of us, we need to take a lot off our plate to stay in balance... but when we do, there are consequences. We have to start putting ourselves first – beyond work, beyond external goals, and beyond fulfilling the needs of others (at the expense of ourselves). When we keep checking in with our capacity, we can start to make healthy decisions that will keep us happy and healthy. It’s a big shift, but this is the only way to live sustainably. To start on the journey towards living within our capacity, we need to do boundary work. We have to identify our thresholds and then set boundaries so we don’t exceed them. When we start to live within our capacity, it starts to increase. This is the beginning lesson of energy mastery!
When it comes to empathy & compassion, we need to watch out for the very judgemental parts of ourselves that tell us we are not good enough, or write off other people for not meeting our very biased standards. We are all human and doing the best we can. Be kind to yourself and allow others to be fallible. Understanding that other people’s actions and expressions have little to do with us, is very freeing. We are all just trying to survive… so let’s not make it any harder than it is. It’s through empathy and compassion that we will thrive individually and collectively.
We seek safety and connection above all. When these serve as the foundation for our existence we can start to thrive. If we lived in a world where relationship was harnessed to invite safety, it would be a very different place. So let’s create it!
