A Deep Dive Into What Blocks You From Having What You Long For

You might wish for intimate connections, self-love, inner strength and goodness that life offers… yet it can feel foreign. The roots can reach all the way back to the womb or early infancy—before conscious memory—yet still held deeply in the body’s viscera, felt instinctively, and leaving a lasting impact.

What I’m sharing is through the lens of my trainings and my experiences with clients—it doesn’t mean everyone is impacted in the same way. What's hopeful is that much repair and healing of these early attachment ruptures is possible.

Some are able to manifest or “call in” the life they want through intention, visualization, and gratitude practices as taught by experts like Dr. Joe Dispenza and Dr. Tara Swart. Combining neuroscience with heart-centered gratitude can be incredibly powerful.

But for some of us, there’s a much deeper layer that also needs attention—a layer that can’t be reached through mindset alone.

Why Mindset Alone Isn’t Enough

When people talk about developmental trauma, they often refer to experiences like neglect, abuse, or not being seen or heard as a child. As we begin to heal the young parts that had to adapt to survive and reconnect with our authentic self, life can start to feel more alive and open to possibilities.

If it still feels hard to shift out of old survival patterns, it can help to look even earlier—before a sense of self had fully formed—toward the stresses of our womb and preverbal experiences.

Was your mother under chronic stress while pregnant with you? Were you wanted and welcomed? Was she emotionally available enough when you were a baby? Perhaps she was exhausted from having to work and care for too many children and/or in an unhappy or even abusive marriage. Maybe she couldn't attune because she never received that kind of care herself. Was she sick and you were separated from her?

There is an inherent wisdom within all of us—a life force that carries a blueprint for connection, growth, and thriving. How does an embryo become a fetus? How does the baby know when to be born? But the flow of our life force can get constricted. Even as a fetus, we can contract—pulling away into the womb wall in an instinctive attempt to escape stress or toxicity. This early fear response can remain imprinted in the nervous system, shaping how safe it feels to be here, to open to receive, and to connect with life itself.

Additionally, in infancy or childhood, we couldn’t fight or flee, so our only option was to freeze. That early bracing becomes a deep, unconscious pattern—a kind of cellular-level “no” to some aspects of life.

I help clients with their nervous system to move out of old patterns of freeze. It can show up as high anxiety that goes into collapse. There could be depression, feeling helpless, unable to stand up for oneself or even numbing of desires such as for intimacy For others, it can look like being constantly “on,” busy, or caught in chaos—anything to avoid feeling that collapse.

We use specific, gentle exercises for developmentally related structures in the body to open and begin to yield into support (see next section). Sometimes we dialogue with the body. For example, if there’s a chronic grip in the gut, I might ask, “Is there any reason why it’s not safe right now to let go into the support of the chair?” Once that recognition is there, the body lets go a little.

The body cannot sustain a total opening to receive quickly. We build tolerance bit by bit. I reassure clients they never lose the skill of gripping to protect—it’s still available whenever safety requires it.

When Early Imprints Shape Our Capacity to Receive

The first imprint of trust, safety, and nourishment begins with feeding. Could the infant relax into comfort—or did it tense up from a stressed, unattuned mother, learning that it wasn’t safe to yield to care? It might grow up to be the giver hoping to get but it doesn't happen, or may not even know it has needs. When early impulses like reaching or grasping for the mother aren’t met adequately, these earliest imprints echo through life, shaping how we open to nourishment, love, and connection.

The good news is: we’re not broken—just disconnected from our blueprints. As my NARM teacher, Dr. Laurence Heller reminds us: We are born as Love and we are born with trust—with the expectation that nature intends for us to have what we need. The work, then, is to reconnect with that original blueprint—to awaken our innate capacity to trust and receive.

Building Capacity for Goodness

Some of my clients have a deep longing for love and connection. That longing is a sign of aliveness. Yet they don't allow themselves to feel the longing because it brings up the heartache of what wasn’t met. Also, because of missing experiences of connection early in life, there may be no internal platform for love and connection to land.

In our work together, we create safety to feel the longing bit by bit—without overwhelm. We also create experiences of having/taking in care and connection. Sometimes there's a repulsion to the care or they might reach for it, but they can't take it into their hearts. We awaken the impulses inherent in the blueprint for connection, and then we "wire" in the satisfaction of receiving so that when the connection comes in their life, it has a place to land. This is a beautiful and intricate process.

From Spiritual Work to Somatic Healing

I spent 28 years immersed in spiritual work before turning to trauma healing. I was told to “just be present” with emotional pain—but I didn’t know how to somatically be with what overwhelmed me. As my Integral Somatic Psychology® teacher, Dr. Rajam Selvam, says: The brain’s job is to keep us alive. When sensations from the body feel overwhelming, the brain shuts us down for protection.

My NeuroAffective Touch® teacher, Dr. Aline LaPierre, teaches ways for the body to yield into support—because we can’t take in care if we’re braced. One thing I do with clients is I guide them to open the cranial base so mind, heart, and body can function together, to find safety in the now and not be stuck in the mind that's figuring out how to be safe.

Early trauma often breaks our young hearts, and we learn to shut them down to avoid being hurt again. I teach clients to gently massage the clavicles to soften the bracing around the heart, then place their hands there in protection of their vulnerability, and to let the back of the heart soften into support. These small somatic gestures help access the love that has always been inside the heart.

Coming Home, Reconnecting to Aliveness

As clients unbrace, reconnect with their aliveness, they are more aware of their needs and longings. They don't want to settle for "crumbs" in relationships and are more willing to go towards what they want in life. As they continue to expand their capacity to love, receive, and thrive, they feel more wholeness, vitality, strength, joy, and other innate qualities that were never lost, only buried beneath layers of survival.

This is a delicate process of expanding the " window of tolerance for goodness," and coming out of freeze. We’re not fixing ourselves—we’re coming home to who we truly are. With deep gratitude to all our mothers—for the gift of life, and for the very challenges that inspire our healing and growth.

Brianna Lia Ho, MBA, BBA-PSYC, is a NARM Master, Neuro-Affective Touch, and Somatic Experiencing Practitioner. She's trained in other somatic modalities as well as in spiritual counseling with One-Spirit Interfaith in NYC. She works with clients internationally via Zoom. www.Essence-Alive.com

Disclaimer: Please note that I am not a psychotherapist or mental health counselor. The info above is not a substitute for licensed medical, psychological or psychiatric help.