me&my health up

Exploring The Lightning Process for Chronic Fatigue, Anxiety and High Performance!

September 11, 2020 me&my wellness / Amanda Sully Season 1 Episode 17
me&my health up
Exploring The Lightning Process for Chronic Fatigue, Anxiety and High Performance!
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Show Notes Transcript

In this episode we explore The Lightning Process for chronic fatigue, anxiety and high performance with Lightning Process Practitioner - Amanda Sully.  We discuss:
- what is it?
- how it works?
- the benefits!
- who can benefit from it!

To connect with Amanda visit her website or Facebook page:
Website: https://www.mindbodywealth.com/
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/MindBodyWealth.AmandaSully

About the Podcast & Host

me&my Health Up seeks to enhance and enlighten the wellbeing of others. Host Anthony Hartcher is the founder and CEO of me&my wellness which provides holistic health solutions using food is medicine, combined with a holistic, balanced, lifestyle approach. Anthony holds three bachelor degrees in Complementary Medicine; Nutrition and Dietetic Medicine; and Chemical Engineering. https://meandmywellness.com.au/

Podcast Disclaimer
Any information, advice, opinions or statements within it do not constitute medical, health care or other professional advice, and are provided for general information purposes only. All care is taken in the preparation of the information in this Podcast. [Connected Wellness Pty Ltd] operating under the brand of “me&my health up”..click here for more

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Anthony Hartcher:

Welcome to another amazing episode of health up with your host Anthony Hartcher. Healths Up seeks to inspire and enhance and lighten the well being of others. Today we are blessed to have with us a Lightning Process Practitioner. Her name's Amanda Sally. Welcome, Amanda.

Amanda Sully:

Thank you very much Anthony. Great to be here.

Anthony Hartcher:

So Amanda specialises in helping those who suffer chronic fatigue. And today we're going to be talking more about how lightening process can help those with chronic fatigue. So Amanda please share with us how you arrived to what you're doing today.

Amanda Sully:

Okay, thanks Anthony. So I've been I've been interested in health for 30 years for a really, really long time. I've always been interested in all sorts of different health modalities, and I've been on a bit of a long health journey myself. And a couple of years ago, one of my best friends in England, her son got chronic fatigue. Well, three years ago, now, he had giardia, and then didn't kind of recover from that and ended up having to be taken out of school. He was bedridden for two years, aged 14 to 16. And Sarah tried everything. I mean, she took him to all sorts of different practitioners from traditional medicine through alternative stuff, she spent 1000s trying to sort him out, but nothing worked. And then she heard about this course, the Lightening Process. And funnily enough, she heard about it a year in to his illness and dismissed it. And was just saying, because it works with the mind and the body. And she was like, Oh, it's nothing to do with his mind is to do with his guts. No, thanks. Another year went past and, and then she heard about it again. And this time, it's sort of resonated with her. And she was like, Yeah, this is what's going to fix him. And so yeah, so she took him on the three day Lightening Process course. And very shortly after that, he got his life back, started going back to school started playing rugby again. And I was just blown away. I mean, I've heard about obviously, all sorts of different health modalities, helping people with different conditions. But for me, I was like, and for Sarah, it was just like, wow, that's just an amazing transformation in a really short space of time. So that was the catalyst for me and Sarah, training to become Lightening Process practitioners. So she's working in the UK, and I'm over here in Australia.

Anthony Hartcher:

Wow, that's an incredible success story. You know, inspirational, I can see how you got attracted to doing what you're doing. So I'm really intrigued as to what it is and how it works.

Amanda Sully:

Sure. So we're so Lightening Process itself, it's, it's a, it's a classroom training. So it's not therapy, we're very much clearer to say this is a training course, you'll be learning a tool that you can then put into action that you can use in all different areas of your life, but mainly to do with your health is obviously what people come for. It's a three half day training. And it's standardised throughout the world. So whichever Lightening Process practitioner you see, in the whole of the world, you will always get the same training. And the Lightening Process essentially works with the science of the mind body connection. And it's based on sort of one main sort of concept, which is the stress response to the fight or flight response that our bodies have when it's perceived some kind of threat. And we actually call this the physical emergency response. Because sometimes when you say stress response, people think emotional stress, and we're not talking about emotional stress. Here we're talking about physical stress of it like the stress of a lorry on a bridge type of thing. So so when the body perceives this threat, the sympathetic nervous system is switched on as if we're kind of about to fight or flee from a tiger, that sort of thing. And so all the symptom leads, um, I can't think of responses. So all these responses in the body get turned on so that we can fight the tiger or we can flee the tiger. But when all of this is turned on, it also turns off what we call the parasympathetic nervous system, which is the part which heals the body which switches on the immune system, which has to do with sleep and all these things because these are things you don't need when you're running away from a tiger. And for some reason, when people activate this maybe it's to do with a virus that they get or they've had some kind of trauma or toxins you know, this can set the body off into this fight or flight, this physical emergency response and then for some reason with some people, this gets stuck up and it doesn't actually exist is designed To the really short term response, and then switch off again. But actually, there's some people this is continually perpetuated. And then because of that, all of the good stuff, all the healing side has been turned off. And so obviously, when that happens over a long period, and immune systems been sort of closed, not closed off, but has been sort of, you know, put to one side, the healing the sleep, all of those sort of kind of things have been sort of temporarily turned off while we're in this state. So over a long period, that then has massive impacts across the body, which obviously affects people's health and well being so. So the Lightening Process essentially teaches people how to spot when this PR when this physical emergency response is happening, it shows them how to calm that down, and how to kind of reset the body system. So then the healing part can kind of stopped kicking in again, and everything can kind of get back to homeostasis, which is where the body loves to be in the body loves to be in that kind of balanced state. So that's, that's the idea behind it all. I mean, the other thing, I would say, sorry, I'm saying, the other thing I would say is that we work very much with the neuroplasticity of the brains. So sort of years ago, they used to think the brain was hardwired, and we couldn't change it. But we now know known for a while that it actually is plastic that we can actually change those brains pathways. So again, we're working with people to be able to switch on the more helpful pathways and switch off maybe the ones that they've been kind of running for a while, which again, all impacts the body. So so we're changing the physiology through working with the neurology basically. I hope that makes sense. Okay. Yeah. So

Anthony Hartcher:

is that a number of techniques that you use? Like, is there? Like if you've got a toolkit and you apply it different technique to? Or is it a particular process? So it's more like, you've learned the technique, and then you teach the client, the technique on how to apply it? So how, how's it administered? So, obviously, you're a master of this Lightening Process And the clients actually need to go and do the training course or that or you just help them in terms of how how they can apply this technique once they have this awareness that their emergency response system is switched on?

Amanda Sully:

Yeah, sure. So. So essentially, just to kind of go back to the beginning, in terms of if somebody is looking to do the Lightning Process course. So the first step of the Lightning Process is actually to download or listen to an audio, which is on the main Lightning Process website. And I've got links to that on my website. And this is a sort of four to five hour audio, and you can select it for the different conditions. So there's one on pain as long as t that sort of type of thing. I think it's like four different ones. So you select the one that's appropriate for you. And you listen to that. So that's about 30 bucks. And that's the first step of the process anyway, so even through listening to the audio, people will have some aha moments, you know, kind of like, Oh, right. Okay, I didn't, I wasn't aware that I was kind of, you know, doing that or thinking that way, or whatever. So that initially will start to kind of wake up some people's neurology. And then once they've done that, that will give them a really good idea of a bit of the fundamentals of the Lightening Process, and then they'll get a feeling if that resonates for them, and the like, oh, yeah, I can understand how that would work for me now. And so then they would come and do the three half day course. And the initial part of that is basically training a lot about how the brain body connection works, how we can influence the body by using our mind, you know, we're these sort of type of things. So there's quite an educational piece to it. And then I teach them a sort of step through process, which they can use for all different states that they wish to get into. So if they want to get into a more calm state, they can use it for that if they want more confidence and more energy, you know, they do it for lots of different states, it's kind of the same process, but it can be applied across pretty much most things that they want to do. So it's, as I say, you can use it beyond health so people can use it to resolve their health issues. And then they can also use it for lots of other things in life, like on going for an interview or want to feel more confident, you know, so you can use it for that. So it's kind of got a multitude of, of uses. But yeah, so effectively, I'm teaching them how to put it into practice themselves, and then they basically go off and do it after they've done the three half day course they go off and they kind of use it in their lives. And notice the changes thinking like

Anthony Hartcher:

in terms of those other useful ways, given that it's centred around turning off that sympathetic nervous response and switching it to the parasympathetic response, and you know, helping that rest and digest function, as well as helping that creative thinking and you know, all those creative connections within the brain was thinking, is it something you can apply before you go into a meeting? Or is it you know, before you do a talk, so if you know, if you're in a high pressure situation presenting in front of 500 people, for example, is it something you could apply to yourself? Just before you walk on stage?

Amanda Sully:

Yeah, I did it before I did this. I did it. But yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And I use it for all sorts of different things. So yeah, definitely. And that's why it's awesome. And also Jack, my friend's son, there's a video of him on my website. And he, and he talks about that at the end, where he just says, you know, he uses it for his sport. Now he does, he plays a lot of rugby. And just yeah, as you say, just for other things in life. So you can you can use it for all Yeah, all sorts of things, all sorts of things. And once you start once you come on the course, it's quite interesting, because people then sort of kind of go, Oh, I could use it for that. Oh, hadn't thought about that. Oh, well, you know, you start kind of going, Wow, yeah, I can just use it for everything. So yeah, you're right.

Anthony Hartcher:

So how long did it take to apply the technique in terms of advocate life? So if I was about to do it, or you're about to jump on this podcast, for example? And how much time do you need to allow for you to get the benefit? And how quickly does the benefit come?

Amanda Sully:

That's a really good question. And it can take sort of like a few minutes. I mean, essentially, when we're triggering the sympathetic nervous system, we're also triggering a lot of stress hormones as well. And so the stress hormones, we can almost think of it a bit like having alcohol in the blood, you know, it takes a while to calm down. And to sort of, like dissipate. So you know, we'll do the process. And then we might sort of say, you know, divert, it's not like, I'll do the process immediately, it's changed, but actually, fairly quickly, after that, you do notice that you kind of calm down and that things do change. I wouldn't put a specific time on it, but maybe, like 20 minutes, or what I don't know, but sort of, you know, half an hour, that sort of type of time. I mean, some people will notice rate, you know, straightaway, things will start to change. But yeah, on the basis, the hormones have kind of built up, you sort of, as I say they take time to calm down as well. So, yeah, we've got the sorry, what we what we would always say is, the quicker the quicker, you can recognise when you're switching on the stress response, the better because then you can kind of get in there and calm everything down before it sort of kind of builds up if you see what I mean. So and that's one of the things that we teach people on the course is to kind of recognise when you're getting into that pattern to kind of be able to sort of stop it and, and change your physiology and move on sort of thing.

Anthony Hartcher:

So it's to, you know, you're applying the methodology to the person's thinking in terms of those thoughts they have, in terms of it. I'm just thinking, like, is, are they looking at a particular person, that person, you know, someone that's not on a good bond, a good book, so to speak? And that sends them off and sends a response? And so is it, you're then reframing that thinking process about that person? Or how are you? What's the god what's going on within the mind in terms of applying the process?

Amanda Sully:

I'm not quite sure what you meant there. Sorry, what were you? So you saying how you react to somebody? Is that what you're saying?

Anthony Hartcher:

Well, just is like a, you know, I guess is that I would it doesn't matter what causes a stress response? It's a tool that you can apply to damp. And and and I think, is that is that what you're applying the skill for?

Amanda Sully:

Yeah, so basically, you're you're sort of choosing the state that you sort of want to be in effectively and how you're going to be reacting to something. So. So yeah, so as I say, you know, if you're going to be doing with presentation, you sort of think, Oh, I just want to have that calm confidence. And so you kind of do the process to have that kind of calm confidence. Or if you're about to kind of go for a run and you just want loads of energy, you can do the process to kind of get yourself into that really energetic state and just get get the body kind of ready for that. So is that what you mean? So it was kind of,

Anthony Hartcher:

yeah, so changing that state of how you're feeling about something into a more productive state?

Amanda Sully:

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I just kind of recognising when you're kind of going into that sort of like negative thinking when you're programming those negative pathways to kind of go, right, okay, I just need to recognise what I'm doing here stop and choose to do something more positive and, and kind of wire, new pathways are going to be more helpful for your health. Does that make sense?

Anthony Hartcher:

Yeah. I understand. So, other longer periods of time of applying this technique, a lot of these unresoursful habits of, you know, something triggering that thought or whatever, you can far greater turn that off that reaction, that response to that so intercepted earlier. Or that that trigger doesn't happen anymore, because you've totally read averted, you know, I guess, gone a better, more productive connection, or association to that event.

Amanda Sully:

Yeah, exactly. That's exactly it. So effectively, we're starting to, for the brain to kind of recognise when this happens, I feel like this when this happens, I feel like this, you know, into sort of, like you say, there's a switch going down different pathways, and the brain learns like, really super quickly. And that's the thing with neuroplasticity, we would sort of say it's always on be conscious of neuroplasticity is always on so the brain is always paying attention to what's going on. So the more you can kind of keep diverting it into a pathway that you want it to go down like you say it just it just learns that way. And then it just starts to become your neuro plastically Why's the nerves start to kind of move closer together because the brain likes to be super helpful. And then it's like the superhighway it can just run really easily going in a different direction. But unfortunately, for people who are stuck with a health condition, it's been running like a superhighway in the wrong direction. So we just need to change those pathways, those highways, and then things just change themselves. So yeah, you're absolutely spot on spot on Anthony welcome.

Anthony Hartcher:

I was just thinking, we've had a few other practitioners on here that do neural linguistic programming, and it sounds somewhat aligned or similar to how neural linguistic programming works. Is there some connection with neuro linguistic programming, or? It's Yes, entirely?

Amanda Sully:

Yes. I would say it's kind of it's broader than NLP. But there are NLP elements in it. There's sort of different there's elements of coaching, there's different elements involved in it. And but yes, in order to do the training to become a Lightening Process practitioner, we have to do the clinical diploma in NLP life coaching and hypnotherapy and also master NLP as well before we qualify to do the training as a Lightening Process practitioner. So we need to have those kind of NLP skills. But it is the it's more than just saying it's an NLP based course. Because we've had NLP practitioners come and do the Lightening Process. And yeah, it's it's different to that. But there is, but there is in there. So again, what

Anthony Hartcher:

do you find best response to this sort of process, the lightening process, like who gets the best results? I mean, a lot of people who are they for,

Amanda Sully:

I mean, it works really well for lots of different health conditions. Because essentially, with this, PR, stress response, that just impacts lots of different areas, lots of different systems in the body, which can affect lots of different health conditions. I mean, I would say probably the top four that people come for with the chronic fatigue, chronic pain, anxiety and depression, I don't know if they've actually ever listed which, but like that, those are the ones that we tend to sort of probably talk a bit more about that there's many, many, many health conditions, people have come and done the lightening process force. So those tend to be ones that we're probably known a bit more for. But yeah, there's, there's there's heaps, because it's, you know, it can be really helpful. As I say, Reese resetting that kind of stress response in the body just has, yeah, effect

Anthony Hartcher:

makes you more it makes you more resourceful. Yeah, you can better think about a more appropriate response as opposed to a knee jerk response because you're reacting to a situation so it's yeah, it's really applicable in the workforce, I can see you know, in within meetings and within presentations and you know, before present, you know, all that I can see it being very useful in terms of getting the person in that more creative, resourceful state to perform, essentially.

Amanda Sully:

Yeah, totally. Because obviously, when we're when we're running away from the tiger, all we need to think about is how do I get out of that? which is Quick Access, blah, blah, blah. You know, we don't need to think creatively in that instance, like, as soon as we switch that off, and then our brain can be like, Oh, now a bit more capacity to think more broadly about things. And yeah, now I'm going to compose little Sonic.

Anthony Hartcher:

And how can viewers listeners reach you?

Amanda Sully:

So I would say through my website, that's probably the easiest thing, I spent a very long time doing my website, because I wanted it to have a lot of information for people. So I wanted it to be a bit of a one stop shop, people could go there, and just sort of read it all and hopefully digest it. But equally, I'm totally happy for people to phoned me up and have a chat for you know, 20 minutes or whatever, to talk about what they're going through at the moment, and whether they think the lightening process is right for them. And so but I would say, so my website is mindbodywealth.com. And in there also is the, as I say, the links to the audios. So if people want to kind of have a bit of toe in the water, just sort of see see what it's all about, then, as I say, I think the audio is absolutely fantastic. And people really, really love those. So that's just a really great way to start. If you wanted to do that first. That's why you need to do that before eating the course anyway. But I mean, that is great. It's a great place to start, I think.

Anthony Hartcher:

Right? So mindbodywealth.com. Yes, fantastic. And absolutely. Okay to hear your number one tip for health and well being?

Amanda Sully:

Well, one of the things we talked about in the lining processes, you know, the power of your language, and often with people that are stuck with some health condition or another, they're often speaking in a specific way. And we would always sort of say, to when you're talking about what you want to focus on what you do want as opposed to what you don't want. So as opposed to saying, I don't want to be tired to say, I want to be energised or want to have energy, or instead of saying, you know, I don't want to feel anxious all the time to say I want to feel calm, because this sends a different message to the brain. So again, it's really important to use this sort of kind of language. And also not to say things like, I, I want to be pain free, because then the brain sort of hears pain, and goes off on this little pathway thinking about pain, so against us and want to be pain free miles per se, I want to feel comfortable in my body or something like that. So. So just think about that, in terms of asking for what you do want as a positive. And the other thing as well is just being kind to yourself. And this is something that we sort of talked about the lightening process as well. It's all really about that kind of kind, compassionate coaching to ourselves, you know, do you speak to yourself, like you would speak to your best friends? And most people would say, No, you know, if you spoke to your best friends, like I spoke to yourself all the time, you probably wouldn't have any friends. So again, just really be kind to yourself, you know, Phil always says that your brain is kind of like a little puppy dog, you know, you want to speak to it kindly. Because if we shouted it and get you know, it's a little bit scared in the brains of it like that. So it's just kind of just be kind, you know, speak to yourself, kindly be compassionate to yourself. Because that goes goes a really long way in terms of your health as well. So there's lots around language, but that was Yeah, a couple of things. There

Anthony Hartcher:

great tip. Excellent. Focus on what you want. And really be kind and yeah, look, yeah, yeah. Treat treat yourself like you treat others. Best friends. Exactly. So really, yeah. Thank you so much, Amanda, for, you know, passing on and sharing your knowledge about the lightening process. It's been enlightening to me in terms of, you know, what it is what's applicable to when and why you might be using it. And it's really a lifelong tool once you learn. So it's something that you can play through the rest of your life. It's not, you know, it's not a, I guess a pill that you take for a period of time. You don't have it yet, but it's a lifelong skill that you're learning this lightening process. So yeah, I recommend people get in touch with Amanda by her website mindbodywealth.com. And, again, Amanda.

Amanda Sully:

Thank you so much, Anthony. I really appreciate you having me. Thank you.

Anthony Hartcher:

Pleasure. Thank you for joining us. Thank you. All right. All right.