Scars have profound influences on common ailments, such as digestive distress and hormonal imbalances, long-standing chronic conditions and nervous system dysregulation. Kendra’s innovative Neuro-Scar Method integrates lymphatics, somatics, biomechanics, nervous system rewiring, and hands-on fascia therapies. She guides people through her transformative healing processes, mining scars ‘gold’ (wisdom) which offer them deep access to profound healing and self-discovery.
This short edited excerpt of Kendra’s interview tracks her discovery and exploration of our scars’ deep body wisdom and potent healing potential Listen to her full interview on The Gifts of Trauma.
We’re all excavating, doing inner child work, Compassionate Inquiry, yoga, meditation and many other practices. But what I have found is that the emotional story, even if you’ve worked on it energetically, cognitively or in the nervous system… little pieces of that story stick in your physical scar tissue. And until they’re liberated, the emotional story is not fully 100% resolved. My work is to find my clients’ 100%.
The way home to yourself is to stop externalizing the process, stop adding more and more complexity into your “healing journey.” And to notice that scars are actually road maps back to yourself, to your body, to reclaiming your neglected parts that have been damaged, shamed or forgotten. Scars are gold mines which, with skillful mining, can restore the integrity to your system, so you feel the true function, support and stability that occurs when your body is working as a cohesive unit.
I believe we all have answers inside us, but we’ve often lost the ability to ask ourselves the good questions that uncover them. In both my personal journey and work with others, the good news is that what we’re seeking is not so far away. It’s much closer and simpler than we imagine. In my own journey, I sometimes laugh when I realize, “Really? That’s what it is? It’s so simple. It’s been there the whole time!” So the wisdom I share is about learning how to listen to your nervous system, to your body.
I have reservations about the term “healing journey,” as it can suggest that we have to get somewhere, or that there’s more to do; a new cool diet or supplement or plant medicine, or an exciting ‘discovery’ in the health and wellness world. I don’t jive with this because, to me, that’s overwhelming. It’s as if I have to take on all of these tasks before I get to enjoy my life. And as I’m sure many of us realize, myself included, the healing journey is life, in which we feel, “This is enjoyable. I’m getting pleasure out of this experience now. It’s not so painful.”
Yes, we absolutely go through phases of suffering, like riding a rollercoaster, up and down, ebb and flow. It’s not as if once we heal the suffering or the pain, we never have to experience them again. But at some point we hit a place in our process where we begin to enjoy ourselves and realize, this is actually life. This is what it means to be a human being, to be having a human experience, feeling emotions, processing things in real time. What I want for myself, and what I want my clients to have, are robust nervous systems that enable us to enjoy the full spectrum life has to offer.
So today I catch myself when I say “healing journey.” I still say it, but I want to come away from that perspective. I just want myself and my clients to build the desire to thrive in life, to experience life in all its fullness as human beings having human experiences.
To achieve this means we have to get off the rollercoaster of cutting out foods and movements, editing our lives, or modifying them so much that we eventually back ourselves into corners where we have no resilience, no capacity in the nervous system, and very few options. We heal one thing, then what’s next? We get this dealt with, but now this other part is really angry and calling to us, so we need to assess and attend to it. This rollercoaster ride seems endless and when we get to that point, we have no idea how to heal or get off.
For over 12 years, I’ve been exploring how physical scars impact the nervous system; our physical, emotional and energy bodies, how they weigh us down, burden, drain and deplete us in every way. When the nervous system became the new exciting thing in the health and wellness world, I was already a decade into this work. As my original interest was in movement, both the nooks and crannies of a person’s movement patterns, and how we function at a very high level, I began with nervous system rewiring. I found my work in this realm revived movement in systems impacted by trauma, incurred through accidents or surgeries or giving birth.
This led me to a very narrow niche. I am one of the only people working with scars in this way, through a neuro-scar lens. Lots of people may be touching, manipulating or massaging scars, but my work is far more profound as it gives people back their power, and their lives, after they’ve been debilitated. My nervous system work also showed me that many peoples’ symptoms can be traced back to their scars.
So I invite everyone to listen to their scars, as they offer great healing potential and wisdom. The way to listen is often simply through asking a good question. And “good” doesn’t mean complex or fancy. Just tenderly approach yourself with a curious desire to know more, as you would a really good friend, a loved one or a small child. You could ask, “What do you need right now? I’m here, I’m listening. What are you feeling? What’s going on?” You’ll be surprised at the clarity, information and insight that can come from that inquiry, and how that experience can grow your relationship with yourself.
Whether you have no relationship, very little, or a blossoming relationship with yourself, there’s so much that can come from slowing down, asking good questions, actively listening, and taking action on whatever your body asks for. Follow it, listen, and then take action. That may seem a bit amorphous or intangible, but like looking for our eyeglasses when they’re on our head, or looking for our keys when they’re in our hands, it’s so much simpler and closer than we could ever imagine. Usually the thing that we’re fighting to find is right under our nose.
The Gifts of Trauma is a weekly podcast that features personal stories of trauma, transformation, healing, and the gifts revealed on the path to authenticity. Listen to the interview, and if you like it, please subscribe, leave a rating or review, and share it with others in your community.
