Downward Spiral – How To Build Resilience Through Curiosity
- Oct 28, 2021
- 5 min read
Updated: Feb 13, 2022
Written by: Janet Caliri, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
I’m sharing my personal story with the intention to inspire you, the reader, to reflect on how your hardships and vulnerabilities can help you find your passions and calling in life. Here is a story about how pain and curiosity can lead to connection with the Universe:
Wailing and flailing on the floor of my childhood bedroom, eyes locked on the round rug, I recall – life is not linear. Through blurry eyesight, I notice the pink swirls on the white rug, spiraling around me. I avert my gaze and stare at the hardwood floors and stark white walls through puffy eyes, seeking solace in the warm fuzzy clothes on my back.
Its daylight. I feel like I’ve been wrenching for hours, bawling my eyes out. My tongue feels like a toxic stew of trash coming out of my mouth. Again, I recall – life is not linear.
How did I get here? I don’t want to think about it anymore. It’s been days, or weeks, or longer. I’m so done with it, with everything! Where is my motivation to get off this floor – to go into the next room, to do anything? I’ve known my purpose in life, igniting human potential, and I always thought that would be enough. But it appears, it is not. How can that be? If it’s true that it’s not enough, what can I do? What’s next? Here I am, a sick adult, and on the floor of my childhood bedroom. I don’t know where I am going to get the motivation to heal. And live.
Like a tube of toothpaste having its insides squeezed out, I surrender to this moment. I am humbled. Dear Life, “What?! What will motivate me to move forward, to heal, and be of service once again? Because at this juncture, I am done with life, yet I know the muted spark remains, so… what?!” I drop the question into an imaginary pink bubble on its way into the ethers. I go on with my day.
Days go by, and yet again I’m on the floor. I don’t want to be here, but this seems to be where the answers come. This is a safe place in some regards, and I have a roof over my head. In a state of curiosity and connection with the Universe, the answer whispers in my ear: CREATION. “Okay, thanks and SO WHAT?! Now what?” This abiding in the state of curiosity is working well, so I leave the question again to circle in the air around me, unanswered.
After what feels like an exorbitant amount of time, the ethers finally nudge me with a pop-up command: Take pictures of your emotions. All of them, not just the ones you like. I obeyed this command and asked myself: What does relief look like? What does compassion look like? What does anger look like? The closed bedroom door for privacy. Click. A selfie through the mirror with me curling back my lips, squinting my eyes, scrunching my forehead. Click. This stupid overactive heater vent that won’t close. Click.
Clicking away, I notice a release of the heat from my veins. How does that happen with just three clicks with a smartphone camera? This feels more like a choice rather than a “have to” be here, like a crack into freedom. I recall the answer I felt about CREATION and realized – I am creating with curiosity and a camera! With each click, I am being present with my emotions.
At that moment, I realized that my relationship with my emotions was a blockage, and that specific type of creation, through mindful photography, could help release that blockage. These energy forms that are meant to be simply observed, yet typically are met with resistance, no longer had power over me. I felt elated. I reminded myself that emotions are energy in motion and must move through us like a river: when I attempt to control them, by either pushing away, changing or attaching, I am creating blocks and scars in my energy body. Over time, these river blockages led to my conditioned fears, limiting beliefs, and a variety of illnesses.
Over time, I recognized that this photographic process is my ticket to freedom from illness and limiting beliefs which hold me back from my potential. Just a few months after publishing my first book, Me With Me, I was being tested on self-love, self-care, self-honor. Ha! I am my first client!
Over the next two years, I received two more significant messages from the Universe. The second: use a camera to track subtle evidences of my progress. The third: use a camera to capture what triggers my emotions to significantly reduce the emotional charge. I happily obeyed the instructions, which lead me to more ease, joy, clarity, and personal power.
I started finding ways to share this knowledge with others. I understood that emotional blockages and lack of emotional intelligence are most likely to occur during times of life transition and uncertainty – you may recall, life is not linear. That is why I’ve shared my Visible Transitions program with those going through life transitions, in ALL stages of life, to help them go from overwhelmed to overjoyed using curiosity and a smartphone camera, just like I did. My program helps people gain understanding, compassion, empathy, and a sense of belonging. People can experience peace of mind by minimizing unnecessary resistance to what is.
Learn more about the amazing outcomes and benefits my clients are creating with the Visible Transitions photographic process, and hear from a very satisfied, former client who used the Visible Transitions methodology to cope with losing her home in a wildfire.
Follow Janet on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, or visit her website for more information about the Visible Transitions methodology!
Janet Caliri, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Janet Caliri is a certified life coach, bestselling author, and well-regarded speaker, who brings her innovative process and playful energy to audiences and private clients alike.
Known as the “Curiosity Coach”, Janet’s mission is igniting human potential. She is the founder of Visible Transitions, a proprietary photographic technique that helps clients approach difficult and challenging life transitions with curiosity, ease, and acceptance.
Janet has combined her passions and experience in life coaching, professional photography, cardiovascular radiology, writing, and art, to develop a community of leaders with high emotional intelligence.
Her journey and her proven photographic methodology were inspired by personal health challenges which required her to utilize curiosity and a smartphone camera to accelerate her healing and feel joyous during a life transition. Ever since Janet has shared Visible Transitions with hundreds of people worldwide as a gateway to ignite their potential.
