How I Transformed Suppressed Emotions into Nervous System Resilience
- Brainz Magazine
- Sep 17
- 8 min read
Updated: Sep 18
Written by Ada Garza, Embodied Resilience Guide
Ada Garza is the founder of Love.Alchemy.Life, guiding individuals and corporate leaders through life transitions using emotional alchemy, breathwork, and energy healing. She helps transmute emotional chaos into clarity, enabling clients to embody resilience, reconnect with their soul, and lead with presence and purpose.
Ever since I was a child, I've carried an inner knowing. Life will place us in situations meant for our growth. Some of these moments are beautiful. Others will shake us to our core. However, every single one, no matter how uncomfortable, invites us to expand and see things from a different perspective.
For much of my life, I didn't know how to meet those moments. I did what many of us do. I pushed my emotions down, soldiered on, and told myself I was "fine." But emotional suppression has a cost. Over time, it disconnects us from our bodies, dysregulates our nervous systems, and creates a chasm between who we truly are and how we show up in the world.
My turning point came when I realized that healing isn't about avoiding discomfort, but about learning to sit with it. In 2024, I experienced the most severe health crisis of my life. My digestive system completely shut down, triggering massive hair loss and dramatic weight loss. Having never experienced serious illness before, I was forced to confront what I had been avoiding emotionally, the unprocessed grief and trauma from my second divorce in 2023.
This health crisis became my greatest teacher. It marked the beginning of a profound journey of self-exploration and reclamation not just as a woman, but as a complete human being. I had to sit with every uncomfortable emotion I had buried since my divorce, the shame, the anger, the deep sense of failure, the fear of being alone. Through this painful but transformative process, I discovered a resilience I never knew existed within me and learned to alchemize fear and pain into strength and clarity.
This insight inspired me to create The Alchemical Spiral of Healing™, a three-stage journey that gently guides you from emotional suppression back to full embodiment of your soul. What I discovered through my own healing was that true transformation happens when we understand how our bodies actually process and store emotions. This is why we must first understand the nervous system, the very foundation of how we experience, hold, and can ultimately release emotional pain.
Understanding your nervous system
Your nervous system is your body’s master communication network. It sends and receives signals between your brain, spinal cord, and every cell, organ, and muscle in your body. It not only controls movement and sensation, but also regulates emotions, stress responses, and the healing process.
It has two main parts:
Central Nervous System (CNS): Made up of the brain and spinal cord, the CNS processes information, stores memories, creates emotional patterns, and sends out instructions to the body.
Peripheral Nervous System (PNS): This is everything outside the brain and spinal cord. It’s like the wiring that connects your CNS to the rest of your body. The PNS has two key branches:
Somatic nervous system: Controls voluntary movement and sensory perception, helping you consciously interact with your environment.
Autonomic Nervous System (ANS): Regulates automatic functions like heartbeat, breathing, digestion, and emotional responses.
The Autonomic Nervous System has two key modes:
Sympathetic (Fight/Flight): Activates your stress response to keep you alert and ready to act.
Parasympathetic (Rest/Repair): Calms you down, promotes healing, and restores balance after stress.
Warning signs
When life brings stressful situations, whether from work, family, or relationships, your nervous system can become overwhelmed. If you're always on alert, constantly moving from one task to another, your sympathetic nervous system stays locked in overdrive. In our society, which often glorifies busyness and productivity, your body rarely gets the chance to truly rest and restore itself.
You might recognize these signs of a dysregulated nervous system in your own life, feeling constantly 'on edge,' difficulty sleeping even when exhausted, digestive issues that seem to come from nowhere, or that disconnected feeling from your own body. Perhaps you find yourself snapping at loved ones over small things, or feeling emotionally numb when you know you should feel something. Maybe you experience unexplained headaches, chronic muscle tension, or that weird-but-tired sensation that no amount of coffee can fix.
These aren't character flaws or signs of weakness, they're your nervous system's way of signaling it needs support. When your autonomic nervous system is out of balance, it creates a cascade effect throughout your entire body. Add in poor sleep patterns, limited movement, and stress eating, and these symptoms often intensify, creating a cycle that can feel impossible to break.
But what if we could interrupt this pattern? What if we could help our body remember how to feel safe again, allowing our nervous system to shift from survival mode back into a state of healing and growth? This is where the Alchemical Spiral of Healing™ comes in.
The Alchemical Spiral of Healing™
This method is based on the idea that our emotions are not obstacles, but messengers. When we meet them without judgment, we open the door to transformation.
The Spiral works with the nervous system, energy field, and subconscious mind in three stages. The energy field, often referred to as the aura, is the subtle body that surrounds and interpenetrates the physical body, thought to affect emotional and spiritual wellness. [1]
1. Feel
This is where we gently create a safe, welcoming space to honor whatever is truly present for us. Rather than numbing, avoiding, or distracting ourselves, we invite our emotions to rise to the surface with kindness. We feel them not to be overwhelmed, but to listen with curiosity and compassion to the wisdom they bring.
This stage is about building emotional literacy, learning to recognize and name what's moving through your system without immediately jumping into fix-it mode. It's the practice of saying "hello" to your feelings rather than slamming the door on them. Through simple awareness practices, we begin to restore the connection between mind and body that emotional suppression has severed.
When we create this foundation of feeling, we're not just processing individual emotions, we're rewiring our relationship with our entire emotional landscape.
2. Transform
Here, we work with the body and the breath to release the physical tension and nervous system activation that comes from suppressed emotions. When we hold emotions in our bodies, they trigger measurable stress responses, including increased cortisol levels, muscle tension, and activation of the sympathetic nervous system. Through specialized breathwork techniques, energy healing practices, and gentle somatic movements, we calm the central nervous system and reconnect with our embodied self. These practices help shift us from reactivity to a state of presence. Stress, tension, and urgency give way to clarity, compassion, and grounded awareness. For those with physical limitations, all practices can be modified to meet your body's needs, breathwork can be done seated or lying down, energy healing is naturally accessible, and somatic movements can be adapted to any level of mobility while still facilitating profound emotional transformation.
3. Embody
In this final stage, we integrate the lessons and the light we've uncovered. Our bodies become safe spaces for the soul to fully land.
What does this look like in daily life? Instead of automatically saying 'yes' to every request when you feel overwhelmed, you might pause and check in with your body first. Rather than scrolling your phone when anxiety arises, you might choose to take three conscious breaths. You may find yourself having difficult conversations with kindness rather than avoiding them, or making career choices based on what truly fulfills you rather than what others expect. These aren't dramatic life overhauls, they're the small, consistent choices that honor your authentic self and meet your nervous system's needs.
As you progress in this journey, you'll notice deeper signs of integration becoming evident. A profound sense of peace begins to settle in your nervous system. You respond to old triggers with calm acceptance rather than immediate reactivity. Your sleep patterns improve, anxiety levels decrease, and emotional stability becomes your new baseline. Increased energy and mental clarity enable more focused and deliberate decision-making, rooted in authenticity rather than fear.
We move forward with emotional resilience, aligned action, and a deeper connection to our true selves. This is embodiment living from the wholeness that was always there, simply waiting to be remembered and reclaimed.
The nervous system connection
The Spiral’s power lies in how it engages multiple layers of the nervous system:
CNS (Brain + Spine): Calms looping thoughts and rewires emotional patterns.
Somatic System: Restores connection to your body and physical empowerment.
Sympathetic (Fight/Flight): Releases stored stress, tension, and urgency.
Parasympathetic (Rest/Repair): Activates deep calm, safety, and compassion.
When we support both regulation and energetic release, we give ourselves the space to respond to life rather than react from old wounds.
Your first step into the spiral
Today, you can pause, place a hand over your heart, and ask yourself. What am I truly feeling in this moment?
You don't need to begin with a grand transformation or dramatic life changes. Every small step you take is not only valuable, it's enough. These seemingly tiny actions create ripples of healing that extend far beyond what we can see in the moment.
Starting small honors your nervous system's need for safety and makes it easier to build momentum with confidence rather than overwhelm.
Then, give that feeling permission to exist without needing to fix, change, or even label it. Simply let it be present. This small act of self-compassion, this willingness to meet yourself exactly where you are, is the first turn of the spiral.
The magic isn't in getting it perfect. It's in showing up for yourself with curiosity instead of judgment, with presence instead of pressure.
"Healing is not about becoming someone new. It is about returning to who you have always been."
The Alchemical Spiral of Healing™ invites you to meet yourself with radical honesty, transform what no longer serves your highest good, and step fully into the wholeness that has always been your birthright.
When we heal ourselves, we become living proof that transformation is possible. Our regulated nervous systems, our authentic presence, and our embodied wisdom create ripples that extend far beyond our own lives. We become safe spaces for others to feel their own emotions, permission-givers for authenticity, and quiet revolutionaries in a world that often asks us to disconnect from our truth.
Every conversation becomes different. Every relationship shifts. Every room we enter carries a different energy, not because we're trying to change anyone else, but because we've remembered how to be fully ourselves.
This is how healing becomes a gift not just to ourselves, but to our families, our communities, and ultimately, to the world.
Ready to begin your spiral?
I'm opening just 5 spots for private 1:1 Alchemical Spiral sessions beginning October 13th. This intimate container is designed for women ready to transform emotional suppression into embodied wholeness through personalized nervous system healing. If you felt a sense of calling while reading this, that's your inner wisdom speaking. Apply for your spot through the Contact form here or email me at hello@lovelachemylife.com. Applications close on October 10th or when spots are filled.
Read more from Ada Garza
Ada Garza, Embodied Resilience Guide
Ada Garza brings a steady, emotionally intelligent presence to her work as an Embodied Resilience Guide, offering both practical and strategic guidance to help individuals and leaders navigate life transitions with clarity and confidence. She sees emotions as valuable signals, data points that reveal deeper truths, unmet needs, and growth opportunities. Rather than viewing them as obstacles, she teaches clients to work with their emotional landscape as a pathway to resilience, self-awareness, and empowered decision-making. Through this approach, Ada supports her clients in developing emotional maturity, enhancing communication, and embracing personal and professional change with greater stability, purpose, and authenticity.
Reference:
[1] ("Human Aura", 2020)
