00:00:06 Saima: What if healing isn't just getting better, but becoming more honest inside your own body? What is spirituality? Isn't a concept you believe in, but a felt experience of safety, breath and aliveness? Today we're exploring the meeting point between trauma recovery and spiritual death with the nervous system and the soul. Stop arguing and start collaborating.

00:00:29 Saima: Welcome to sacred Harmony, a space for calm, healing oriented conversations that bring you back to what's steady within you. I'm Simon, and today I'm joined by Morgan J. Cummings, a somatic psychotherapist and advanced practitioner with thirty years of experience supporting people through mental health and substance use recovery with deep work around anxiety, PTSD, and consciousness development. Our topic is spirituality, core energetics and trauma recovery and what it can look like when healing isn't just inside, but embodiment. So if you have been doing the work but still feel stuck in your body, this conversation is for you. So once more, Jay, welcome to the show.

00:01:17 Morgan Jay Cummings: Thank you so much.

00:01:20 Saima: You're welcome. You're welcome. So, Morgan, before we, you know, get technical or conceptual, I'm really curious to know that what drew you to the intersection of spirituality and trauma recovery in the first place? And you know what felt true enough that you kept following it?

00:01:40 Morgan Jay Cummings: Well, I think what called me to this work was a very intense, loving, devoted connection with my mother growing up. As I grew up, I realized there were parts of me that regular talk therapy wasn't getting to. And I also watched my mother grow and learn and develop about her adult self and grow into more calm, more curious, and more compassionate states of mind and body. And yet, when the two of us would get together, there would be these old patterns that really were disconnecting, that were not calm, that were not curious and were not compassionate. And it wasn't until I, um, I got into my marriage and saw some of the similar patterns reflecting with my spouse that I realized there had to be some deeper work, deeper processes to help release. And it wasn't until I got into the body that I realized that there is a there's a memory, that there is a reflex that happens in the nervous system all the way down the spine, and not just up here in the forebrain, and what we all consider to be the root of our adult consciousness. So it was really the, the, the child like strategies that were following me into adulthood in my twenties, that called me to help other people by helping myself. And as I evolved, so did my treatment practices and so did my communities. I found the coroner genetics community first, and then I was led to a place where there's somatic processes incorporating many different practices breathwork, Gestalt psychotherapy, uh, breathwork, yoga, coroner, genetics, bioenergetics, all to all in the format of a loving community, which is in itself its own container. So, um, that's what called me. And that's where I landed.

00:04:14 Saima: And that's really powerful, Morgan. And I appreciate how personal that origin is for you. Like the connection with your mother and how that wasn't just an idea about something you felt in the body. That says a lot. I feel that it sounds like, you know, this path wasn't something you chose intellectually. It was something that leaped when you first. And there's something deeply authentic about following what your body knows before your mind can fully explain it. And that kind of embodied truth tends to create work that's grounded and real and not just conceptual. Now, you know, I want to lean into something that often comes up around the space when people hear the word spirituality in the context of trauma healing, what's a common misunderstanding, you see, like, what's the idea? That sounds comforting on the surface, but can actually slow the healing process down?

00:05:08 Morgan Jay Cummings: I think what really Slows the healing process down is a desire to have it all done. Six months of therapy and we're done to rush it, to see how powerful we can become, to feel how deep the changes. Can be when we set ourselves free and connect and belong to our own healing wisdom that lives inside us, and to trust that that can take us very far away from what our boss wants from us at work, what our parents wanted for us in their adult lives, what we were born to be and born to do. The spirit of us. The essence of spirituality. It's different from religion. Religion tells us how we should practice Spirituality and can be a guide to our soul, to our spirituality. But I think that's the that seems to be the thing that most humans have in common when I'm sitting down with them. This fear of our own power.

00:06:31 Saima: That makes sense. And that's actually such an important distinction. Like, I really like how you, you know, not dismissing the desire for transformation. You are honoring it, but also pointing out that healing isn't about bypassing or doing it all at once. It's about depth, about freedom that comes from reconnecting to our own inner healing wisdom, like you said, rather than, you know, chasing a perfect spiritual state and that feels grounded and empowering, not performative, I would say. And you are bringing spirituality back to the body, back into lived experience, instead of keeping it as, you know, something Abstract. And now that makes me curious about something delicate. When someone has been using spirituality as a way to stay above the pain, to avoid fully feeling it. So how do you gently guide them back into the body without it feeling like punishment?

00:07:28 Morgan Jay Cummings: Well, that's the that's the amazing part of core energetics and yoga and breathwork. The body has its own plan, its own map that matches up with the soul's intention. But the mind brings in fear. So many times it's about convincing the mind and all of its beliefs and experiences that it's safe to inhabit the body. That feelings won't kill us, we won't be destroyed. We won't cease to belong to ourselves if we allow ourselves to feel what we've been avoiding feeling since we were little children. I personally don't think any human being escapes childhood without some kind of relational trauma within themselves or to others. We have these nervous systems that come in, and we have immature beliefs that are formed from intense experiences when we're young, and some of the intensity of these record scratches or these indelible marks from experiences that no one can prevent. No parent, however great they are, can. Imagine what's happening inside that tiny little human with an immature nervous system that's telling themselves intense things about the intense, unwanted feelings that they're experiencing. So these blocks, these blocks and these fears keep us from doing the work that our adult nervous system can take, can handle. At five years old, we couldn't handle the death of someone important to us. But at twenty five years old, our nervous system will know what to do. We are fully independent, capable adults and the nervous system can process, reprocess and desensitize the pain of a loss or a breach or a violation of our personhood. Whereas we couldn't when we were much younger, usually ages eight and below is when the intensity is is really big and we come away with beliefs that disconnect us from our spirituality. We're unworthy of love unless we perform a certain way. I'm only safe if I'm invisible, so I'm not going to create. I'm not going to paint. I'm not going to sing. I'm not going to write that book, because that would embarrass my parent and and I wouldn't belong to them anymore. Well, if I write something that embarrasses my mother, then, you know, I we'll we'll get over it and come back to each other here at my age or a fully grown adult nervous system can survive the shame or the guilt or the regret that a parent disappointment that a parent might transmit, but that young nervous system that that little child. It's a it's a relational trauma. And some of those beliefs follow us into adulthood. How how many times have I thought, well, it'd just be better to be invisible. It's safer that way. Or I deserve everything that happens to me. I deserve to be punished. Right.

00:11:34 Saima: Absolutely. That's such a compassionate way of framing it, Morgan. And the way you normalize the body's intelligence that it has its own map, its own wisdom, like you said, and the reminder that feelings won't kill us, that we don't stop belonging to ourselves when intense emotions arise feels incredibly grounding, I would say. And the way you speak about immature beliefs formed in childhood not as flaws, but as adaptions to overwhelming experiences brings so much dignity to the healing process, and I feel that it shifts the narrative from I am broken to my system learn to survive. And that's such a great thing. Now let's stay with this for a moment. When we look at chronic anxiety or PTSD symptoms through a somatic and energetic lens, not as what's wrong with me, but as what happened to me. What do you often see sitting underneath those symptoms?

00:12:34 Morgan Jay Cummings: Underneath those systems are. Maladaptive or unwanted beliefs that continue to protect the system even past the systems. The whole humans need to protect themselves. Uh, there's usually a distorted, vital energy, um, uh, destructiveness and learned systems. You know, cruelty us a disconnection from spirituality and the spirituality of all around us. Cruelty is something we learn, um, and part of us believed that the world had this mean intention towards us. So we're really just reinforcing the world of cruelty towards ourselves or others to protect ourselves, to get our needs met, our needs, our needs for food, clothing, shelter, a sense of belonging with one another, a sense of belonging to ourselves and our work and our family and our friend groups. So, uh. Behind everything is just people going through the world trying to get their needs met. And when we know better about the impact we have on others wanted or unwanted, we do better. We do better. If we reach out for help and ask a friend, a family member, or a behavioral health professional for some assistance and support in a different way of living our life patterns behind the life patterns. It's all the same. We're all just going through the world, trying to get our needs met, and maybe do the least amount of harm that we can.

00:14:45 Saima: That's a powerful way to name it Morgan. Like distorted, vital energy and cruelty. Like you said, it really shifts the frame from pathology to protection. Like instead of seeing anxiety or PTSD as defects, You know you are pointing to the way someone's life force got interrupted or distorted in response to something harsh or overwhelming. And that feels, you know, both sobering and hopeful because it's energy that's been distorted. And then it's also energy that can be restored. Yes. Now, you know, that brings us into the framework you work with how to understand this differently, like what does it suggest about blocked energy, held emotions, or the ways the body armors itself in response to those early wounds?

00:15:40 Morgan Jay Cummings: Well, it shows up. If I'm understanding the question correctly, it's it shows up in different kinds of pathologies. Um, and we have certain blocks. Everyone has all of these five specific blocks that Core Energetics specifically talks about. Uh, and by relaxing, activating and then relaxing these defenses that are embodied, we allow the, um we allow spirituality in the higher self wisdom, self responsibility, authenticity, and love to come through and repattern itself, uh, according to the inner wisdom. And the coroner process is just helping people guide themselves through safety, through the five different pathologies, uh, which could be a whole podcast in itself. Uh, but it seeks to not pathologize we're trained in the core Energetics Institute that, uh, you know, people are the flower of their spirituality and their soul's purpose, their life mission. They are not their pathologies. Those pathologies are just simply distortions. And it shows. Okay. You're you're you're your question was how does it show up. So it can show up as fragmentation dissociation. Okay. We're just we're not safe in our bodies. So we go out of our head or we, um, we are undercharged and we don't have our blocks to our innate abilities prevent us from trusting the other person's really going to love us. So we hold on with dear life and it looks like anxious attachment and the other one is overcharged. The opposite. I'm going to hold it all in. Maybe if I over give and overdo and and and just keep giving giving giving giving giving somebody will clue in and without me having to ask. They'll give me what I'm doing for them. Someone will be a martyr for me. Like I'm being a martyr for them. The person who doesn't know how to receive, but they want to receive, but then they can't receive. Then the next one, uh, up the line is displacement. And that is, um, an immediate pivot away in consciousness from any kind of compassion. There's something I don't like about myself. So rather than face what I don't like about myself, it's immediately pivoted towards the other person who represents that the displacement piece. They're messed up. I'm not messed up. What you were talking about before with the bypass, the, um. I'm up here in love and light, and I'm not going to look at my shadow. That's that other person who represents the shadow. I'm going to displace my. shadow onto that other person because I'm just loving life. It was the kind of the pattern you were talking about. Uh, as part of the question. Lastly, is the rigid, I'm going to hold back, I'm going to be a rock and I'm going to be quiet. And you want something from me? I'm going to make you perform for me until you're perfect, and maybe I'll give it to you. But I'm going to hold back what I perceive you're looking for. And what that does is that helps. Has the person stay in their power, but they also hold back their creativity. They hold back their erotic love with the beauty of the of the universe's creation all around us. It disconnects them from the spirituality of belonging as an organic whole part of the whole. So that's a summary of the five basic defenses.

00:20:00 Saima: That's such an important piece, Morgan. Like when you name dissociation, it really brings it into everyday life, like everyday reality. So many people don't even realize that zoning out, feeling numb, or living from the neck up can actually be a protective response. And it's not weakness. It's the body's way of surviving something that once felt unbearable. And when we understand that there's so much more compassion available in the healing process. Now, for those listening who feel, you know, drawn to this work and want to explore it further, to connect with you directly, where's the best place for them to find you?

00:20:36 Morgan Jay Cummings: I can be found through my contact information in MJ and on my website MJ therapy com. Uh m j a y t h e r a p y dot com. Uh, also, the Institute of Core Energetics has a very descriptive and lovely website where intra weekends are offered. Uh, Shalom. Mountain calm is also a retreat center which offers introductory, um, process weekends. Uh, I also have a neuromodulation neurofeedback, uh, process that I am, uh, integrating and developing with my coroner genetics processes. Um, I can also be reached at Morgan J Cummings at gmail.com Morgan j a y. C u m I n g s at gmail.com.

00:21:47 Saima: That's surely going to be beneficial for all our listeners out there. So, listeners, if something in this conversation touched you. I want to invite you to do one small thing. Take a slow breath and notice what your body feels like after being seen. You don't have to force healing. You don't have to earn it. You can work toward it one honest moment at a time. This is sacred harmony. I'm Simon. And wherever you are tonight, may you feel a little more supported in your own becoming.