Lindsey Gallegos, an Intuitive Soul Guide™ and Yogic Healing Expert, draws on over 20 years of experience as a social worker to provide holistic wellness coaching centered around the mind, body, and spirit. A 500 RYT yoga instructor in both Hatha and Vinyasa styles, Lindsey has 8 years of experience teaching adults and children. As a Reiki Master and Certified Mindfulness Meditation Instructor, she combines her expertise to guide individuals through transformation and personal growth. Her life’s purpose is to help people elevate their lives through nutrition, yoga, meditation, and soul healing. MysticMag finds out more.
You’ve delved into various holistic practices, including Yoga Nidra, somatic healing sessions, and spiritual coaching. How do these diverse modalities synergize in helping individuals connect with their soul purpose and navigate their healing journeys?
As I began my own spiritual journey, I was seeking something to heal me personally. I am not a big fan of talking about my stress and trauma. I am a very introspective person. In fact, this is what bothered me the most about employing traditional therapeutic practices in my work as a social worker. I worked with kids who had no recollection of their trauma or kids who did not want to talk about their traumatic experiences. However, their bodies were showing the impact of their traumatic histories. That is why somatic healing, yoga, and Nidra attracted me so much. I didn’t have to talk about my experiences, I could move through and release them in experiential ways rather than verbally. I remember the first time I connected to my soul through Nidra. I experienced my soul as a giant ball of light. I felt deeply attuned and comforted in a way that I never had before. It felt like coming home. When I came out of Nidra, I realized that I could connect to this inner-source of energy at any time and that it was ever abundant.
By connecting to this source when I experience somatic issues such as fatigue, pain, and illness, I am guided to what practices are beneficial to heal my physical body. It is similar when I feel lost, lonely, or off-purpose – connecting to this inner-resource guides me back on my path. It all starts with connecting to our soul and recognizing it as a resource and then following the guidance for what practices we should do to heal effectively and efficiently. Nidra is a great way to connect to our inner-source because it works at the subconscious level. It can happen with traditional meditation but Nidra is quicker. In addition, somatic healing practices calm our nervous system so that we can relax and be available for subconscious practices like Nidra and meditation.
The impact of Yoga Nidra seems profound, offering benefits like deep relaxation, trauma healing, and alleviation of anxiety. Could you share an example or experience where this practice significantly impacted someone’s healing or transformation?
I host weekly Nidra meditations both in-person in Colorado and virtually. I have heard so many stories of how beneficial these sessions have been. I often don’t push people to talk about their experiences during Nidra because it can be so personal. I have several clients who have shared that their anxiety about a certain thing disappeared after practicing Nidra for a few weeks. I’ve had children with ADHD appear more focused and relaxed.
I’ve worked with children and adults with sleep disorders that were able to decrease their insomnia symptoms. It doesn’t seem to happen in one session but by repeating the same intentional Nidra, the eventual effects have been reported as decreases in depression, anxiety, physical pain, illness, distractive behaviors, hyperactivity, and sleep issues. I had one client who was struggling to lose weight. She was severely stressed with an overactive nervous system. She was attacking her weight loss with nutrition and exercise alone and nothing was happening. In fact, she was gaining weight. I helped her create a specific sankalpa (subconscious intention) and a specific Nidra visualization to calm the nervous system and release stress-related weight. After listening to it once, the scale finally moved and after a month she had lost 5 pounds. In addition to all the healthy things she was doing, Nidra was the tipping point that helped her finally reach her goals.
I had another client during COVID who was experiencing such a profound amount of stress that she was actually shutting down mentally and physically. I created a Nidra for her that focused on empowerment and locus of control. She listened to it for several months and gradually began to pull out of her dissociation and become an active member of her family and workplace.
Your journey with yoga and meditation began during challenging life phases. How have these practices personally supported you through difficult moments, and how do they influence your approach in guiding others through their healing processes?
When I began my healing journey, I was a mess. I had effectively hit the proverbial “rock bottom.” I had completely depleted my inner-resources and had also completely disconnected from my soul. I was just living day to day, going through the motions in a state of apathy. I didn’t know how to find my way back. I was divinely guided to attend a sound healing meditation and after that meditation, my healing journey began. There is something so profound in rediscovering who you are at the divine level and realizing that you can connect to that inner-resource at any time.
People often believe that our physical bodies dictate our existence on Earth but that is a misunderstanding. Our bodies are just vessels for the work we need to do here on Earth. True healing is possible when it is directed at the soul level. However, we are used to the “quick fix” mentality and a healing journey is not quick. In addition, humans often wait until they are so unbalanced, sick, and distraught before seeking or engaging in any type of healing. That is why Western medicine is so symptom-based because science only knows how to treat the physical body and doesn’t take into account the imbalances in the mind, body, and soul. So many of our issues as humans occur because of a disconnect between our body and soul causing our minds to run free with anxiety, depression, and fear. If we heal that connection to our souls, we heal the body and mind and we eventually heal our interactions and the planet. That is what I learned on my journey back to my soul.
I understand being so low that you can’t comprehend a way to claw yourself back up to health. I have tools and techniques that can give clients quick wins so they are motivated to continue on their journey. I know what it is like on the other side of devastation and I can paint the picture of how that feels for those who are still stuck. I know these things work (maybe not as quick as medicine – but definitely more sustainable) because I have experienced them. I often tell people that I can’t “heal” anyone, the only one with the power to heal the self is the individual. I can guide, encourage, teach, and hold space with the hope that the client will take the reins and follow their own soul’s path toward healing.
Your work with children in schools, implementing breathwork and yoga, led to transformative outcomes. How do you adapt these practices for different age groups, and what insights have you gained from introducing these methods in educational settings?
I’ve learned so much from the children I work with. Children are open vessels. They haven’t become jaded or disconnected from their source like many adults have. Even the children experiencing acute or chronic trauma still maintain a childlike innocence in their perception of the world. When I first started doing this work in the schools, it was because of two children, siblings who had experienced some of the worst caregiver trauma I had ever witnessed. Abuse ranging from physical, sexual, and neglectful as well as being witnesses to extreme violence. I actually remember not knowing how to help them. I even felt a bit hopeless about their potential progress. One thing I knew was that “talk therapy” or “play therapy” was not going to help. 90% of the time they were engaging little children and 10% of the time, when they became triggered and would either become catatonic or aggressive. During the engaging times, I taught them how to breathe deeply and with intention. We used a pulsometer to measure their heart rate and they became “scientists” of their own body. Seeing how their breathing affected their heart rate. I taught them gentle stretches and somatic movements and we charted their heart rate in correlation to those as well. I taught them how to connect to their “resting place” which is the term I use for the soul when working with children.
During the triggering times, not much could be done other than ensuring their safety but the engaging times is when the magic happened. By the end of the year, both kids had reached their treatment goals and that 10% of time spent triggered had decreased to 3%. I learned so much about humans and trauma while working with these children as well as all the others over the years. We place so much emphasis on curing the triggering 10% and pay little attention to how well we are functioning in the 90%. All humans have to have a level of internal motivation to kickstart the healing process. For these children it was seeing the direct result of their breathing in their heart rates. For others it could be a yoga pose, a Nidra session, or time spent in nature that inspires a moment of connection to their soul or their resting place and the motivation is the desire to return to that place over and over again. It doesn’t matter how old a person is, if we have become disconnected to our source, we will disintegrate until we find a way back and there is always a way – even when starting at the very bottom.
Balancing a rich family life, professional commitments, and guiding others through healing requires considerable energy. How do you maintain your personal well-being and energy while being a source of healing and guidance for others?
To be honest, if I maintain my connection to my soul, my inner-source, I don’t run out of energy often. If I focus on my own healing practices and stay consistent with my connection, I have plenty to offer to others. There is a popular saying that, “you can’t pour from an empty cup.” The idea is that you must fill your own cup with energy before giving to others. But I have found a bit of a fallacy in this. I have learned that our cup should always be full and what we give to others is from our overflow. When we have an abundance of energy and resources, that is when we give. If our cup is full but we don’t have extra we don’t give to others, we just work to maintain. If our cup begins to deplete, we take a break until we can be full again. So my goal is to maintain a full cup and then call in more energy so I have overflow to give to others. I do this by having a routine, planning, and organizing.
I have a daily meditation, yoga, and connection routine. I use calendars and lists to make sure I stay on top of things and don’t suddenly become overwhelmed and depleted. In addition to that, I rely on establishing solid and consistent boundaries. Saying “no” is one of the most powerful things we can do in this modern society. I say “no” to things that don’t light up my soul or don’t align with my soul’s guidance. If my cup starts to deplete, I retreat. I take time to heal with nutrition, sleep, quiet, and self-compassion. I don’t put pressure on myself to do all the things – especially with my children. The other night, my daughter asked if I would play a game with her. I had a headache, which is a sign that my cup is depleting. I simply told her “not right now, my cup is getting empty and I need to recharge. Give me a few minutes to recharge alone and we will reassess.” I think by being honest and stating these things, I am giving her permission to establish these boundaries as well. I also knit and tie malas which are such nurturing and mindful activities for me.
If you would like to find out more about Lindsey Gallegos, please visit https://lindseygallegos.com/
