The Power of Light Therapy with Jennifer Waters | Wellness Sherpa with Jenn Payeur

Welcome to the Wellness Sherpa Podcast, where we engage with passionate leaders, holistic thinkers, and disruptors who courageously share their personal journey, mission and wisdom with you. Together, we create a safe space to empower you to live your best, most vital life. Thanks for being here. Well, I am so thrilled to be here today. We with Jennifer Waters, who is an acupuncturist. She's been in her practice for 27 years. And the thing that really intrigues me, I mean, I love acupuncture, but she is a certified light therapist. So I can't wait to dig in and learn more about that and how you use that in your practice and why everybody needs it. Because I think everybody does need it.

So welcome. Thank you, Jen. It's an honor to be here. I feel like I know you because I've listened to so many of your podcasts and I'm absolutely in love with Nature provides and the PSCs in particular.

Wow.

Thank you.

And they have light in them and we can talk about that too. Who knew?

So. Oh, not me. Yeah.

So share a little bit about your background. How did you, like, what motivated you to go into acupuncture and become a light therapist? So just a little bit about your.

Background and how it was a bit of a calling. From a young age, I knew I wanted to enter a career that I would never get bored with, that I could do anywhere, and that was actually helping people. So When I was 24, I went to acupuncture school. I spent some time in China prior to that, and it turned out to be a very good career path. So acupuncture, I've never gotten bored. It actually helps people and I can do it pretty much anywhere. So fast forward into how I got involved with light therapy. I actually was diagnosed with a labral tear in my hip. And I didn't really understand at the time the synergistic nutrients connected with the tissue types. So now I know I was very deficient in whole food vitamin C complex, so to for the cartilage and connective tissue. But at the time I didn't know that. And a friend just happened to put LED light so light emitting diodes on my hip. The first 20 minute session, all the pain was gone and I had done quite a bit. I did acupuncture, massage, and everything helped a little bit, but I knew the tear was still there and the surgeon told me I had two options, blah, blah, blah. Anyways, so I thought, wow, this is really interesting. The pain is gone. It started coming back about five days later, I went back for a second session, and it actually, I could feel it. It repaired the tear. So two 20 minutes, 40 minutes total of LED light therapy, which is right here behind me, repaired my labral tear, prevented me from having surgery. I didn't do any research. I just bought the device. That was it. I said, this is a miracle. I want this. I need it. I bought it, and I've been using it now for almost 20 years in my clinic. Wow.

So is that green light?

It sure is, yes. It's the newest color with the company that I am a dealer with. Full disclosure, I am biased. So we have green, We. We have red and blue. Near infrared is invisible. And they recently added the green.

Yeah. So talk a little bit about that because the green is fairly new.

It is. It is, definitely. So, you know, it comes down to depth of penetration. Right. So the blue is the most superficially absorbed. The red is a little bit deeper. Those colors warm up the tissue. So the near infrared can pass through and into the bone layer or into the organ layer. If we're using, you know, light therapy for ovarian stimulation or, you know, liver repair, depending on how much fascia there is, we need to warm up the tissue so the near infrared can pass through. Green is in between. So the company said they created green for hair regrowth, so follicle level, skin pigmentation, and cellulite reduction. It's fairly new. I don't have any firsthand experience with that. I like it. Oh, and also for. So the red is stimulating, the blue is sedating, the green is more normalizing. So we use. Well, I can talk about that in a minute. Why I like this particular unit.

Yeah, I'll ask about that in a minute. But can you. Can you clarify, by normalizing, do you mean balancing?

Yes.

Okay.

Balancing. So they say it's good for folks that have ptsd, which I think is all of us, pretty much. So it's. It's calming. And, you know, my clients, patients always ask me, well, what is this for? And I never tell them. I said, I'm going to put it on you. Why don't you let me know how you feel at the end? And they 100% all say the same thing. I just feel more balanced. I just feel calmer. I feel better.

And so do you pair that with acupuncture points?

Yeah. Oh, I do. I am the queen of combining things. I think it's because I'm a Pisces. You know, the two fish swimming in opposite directions. But I Love to well a get the job done quickly. I want to give people as much as I can in one hour so that they can heal themselves and maybe not come back. I don't know what's going to happen in one session. But the body, healthy tissue responds very quickly. So I combine acupuncture with light.

Awesome. I figured you did. So that's why I wanted to ask that question. And you mentioned something, Jennifer, about you know, warming up the fascia, getting the tissue ready. What happens if somebody has a fascia issue? Because again, I think most people do, they have a fascia issue, they have lymphatic issues. We're sitting too much, Right. We're not moving enough. So how do you address that?

So one thing I've really learned in my decades of practice is to not make generalizations. It really is host dependent. So one person is going to respond very differently based on, oh, they have abdominal scar tissue which is affecting the fascia versus another tissue. And what is the difference? It's all of the above. It's their psycho emotional state which we always undervalue. It's the health of their tissue which is nutrients, vitamins, minerals and the structure. Right. Is their pelvis aligned or misaligned? So it really depends. So people ask me all the time, you know, how many sessions do I need? I have no idea. It could take one, it could take ten. We don't know. Yeah.

And I, I, I love what you say because it's so true. We've kind of taken the allopathic paradigm, which is the standard of care, one size fits all. And then in the holistic world, everybody says, give me the protocol, you know, so for example, you know, we have multiple plants that work on the liver, that work on hormones and it's different, you know, hops may work for one person. I know people that it works super well for, for getting rid of hot flashes and calming the, the symptoms of menopause. I take it. And I get worse. Right? Yeah. So for me, because my hot flashes are coming from a different issue.

Right.

So when you look at the root cause, that's where getting to the root cause is so valuable. But it's so challenging to say here is a one size fits all protocol even in the holistic world. Because we're all different.

Yes. And depending on what stage of life you're in, it's different. Every decade has a story is what I like to say. Depending on where you live, there's so many variables and we have to allow ourselves to change through the seasons. Through the decades and adapt and be okay with working more or working less, resting more or whatever.

Right, Absolutely. So what can people do to stay healthy or prevent imbalances?

That's a good question. You know, so that is a question I've answered for a long time. And I, you know, five years ago I probably would have said eat well, take whole food vitamin complexes versus synthetic isolated nutrients. This is one of my big passions in life now because I really believe the vitamin industry has been taken over by the pharmaceutical industry. And you know, like for example, Pfizer owns Centrum and a lot of companies, even though they're made in America, they're getting all of their ingredients from China.

Absolutely. Metals and all kinds of.

Right. The litmus test on any label is if it says vitamin C is ascorbic acid, then you know, this is not a good company. Vitamin C is not ascorbic acid. It is part of the vitamin C complex. It's the most fibrous part. So it's the easiest part for them to harvest. But mostly it's coming in from China. People are taking it in high doses and it's functioning as a drug. It's not, it's no longer reparative. And so when it functions as a drug, it can often create imbalances in the body. So this is not a good long term thing. So anyways, so I would say stop taking the poison, stop taking synthetic vitamins and work on your emotions. Happy people get better. Right.

Now, I was just going to add there when you made that comment. We just came back from a two and a half week trip in Italy where this was our second year of taking doctors and practitioners there to go see the whole plant stem cell class.

Cannot wait to go. Cannot wait. Yeah.

Well, we already have our dates for next year and we're working on the itinerary. Just a life changing trip because, you know, first of all, the superpower of the Italians, they have zero stress. So they don't necessarily eat the healthiest. They're drinking alcohol, you know, every day, but they're stressed or lunch.

I know, right.

And they're, they're emotionally balanced. You know, they're just happy, happy people.

And that's why they live long. Right.

Without a shadow of a doubt that their superpower of living long is because they aren't stressed and they're happy.

Right. You know, unity, connections, relationships. They're not feeling isolated. It's huge. It's much bigger than almost everybody I listen to talks about. Yeah, it's always undervalued.

The emotions, I think it's the most important thing, to be honest. And, you know, it's fascinating. Through my own personal healing journey, I am, you know, connected to a lot of doctors who run these huge C clinics, as we said, you know, the cancer word.

Right.

They run these big clinics to support people holistically. And they've all said the one thing that every one of their patients has in common is trauma, emotional trauma, emotional baggage that has not been resolved or released.

And it's not everybody has. Everybody mostly. Yeah.

You can look at every chronic illness and we all get them for different reasons.

Right.

If the common foundation is emotional trauma or emotions that have not been worked through, that's pretty profound. And why we aren't talking about it more is kind of surprising to me.

Right, exactly. The issues in the tissue, the body keeps score. We know it all. But to really pull it all together. And that is part of what drew me into Chinese medicine. Because the traditional Chinese medicine, they always do. Right. You know, pms, for example, we know it's related to the liver and we can talk about toxins and all this stuff. Stuck cheese, stuck blood, but what about the repressed rage? And they always put it together. Yes.

I love that.

Yeah.

I actually work with the plant stem cells and try to align as best as I can to the Chinese clock. So I used to, you know, I used to take my liver once in the morning and then I said, huh, why am I doing that? The liver regenerates at night.

Right.

11 to 3am I might as well. So I shifted and I, I try, you know, I will now take liver before I go to sleep.

I love that. Yes.

Working with my body with that, not, not against it.

Right. More of a prevention rather than a symptomatic treatment. Yes, I like that. That's a great idea.

So let's come back to light for a minute because I love what light does. I went to a four year energy healing school. So I think energy is again, another one of those very underrated things that we don't talk about enough. That we're all energy and it's affecting us whether we're aware of it or not.

Right.

So let's talk about the light and how that is impacting the energy body. And then.

Good question. Well, thanks to you, Jen, now all I think about our cells and the intoxication of the cells. So, you know, nothing is disconnected, you know, nothing is compartmentalized. So how we feel is affecting everything. And the main reason that I like the enlightened therapy system the system behind me is because we have the eye mask. They call it the face mask, but I call it the eye mask. Okay, See, so, you know, when I got involved with light 20 years ago, no, really not that many people knew about it. Now it's everywhere. And 100%. Either you'll see somebody under a panel and they have goggles on, right, to block out the light, or they have the mask with the eyes cut out. Right. So they are missing out on what I feel is the most important aspect here. We are designed to receive light through our eyes. It is actually integrative endocrinology because we're utilizing the optic nerve, which we can detoxify with light to access the higher glands in the head, the hypothalamus and pituitary. So to not do that is a huge disadvantage for regulating the autonomic nervous system, one of the three most important systems. So we're trying to get people out of fight or flight into rest and digest. And then people are missing out on this. So that's huge. You can also use it diagnostically, like in the clinic. If I put the, you know, I get everybody going cooking, I get them cooking. That's what I call it. Needles in, lights on, I leave them, I come back. Now, we do have different settings. Some is more energizing, some is more relaxing. But if I put them on a relaxation setting and I come back into the treatment room 10 minutes in and they're, you know, wide awake, ready to chat, then I know their nervous system is dysregulated, seriously. And we have to do something a little bit more, you know, intensive to shift them. Most people, I come back in and they are totally relaxed, they're asleep, they're in the bliss mode, I call it.

And so for the eyes, because I agree, I've. I've heard that a lot, that don't ever put light in the eyes. You could harm the eyes. Right. And against that fear piece, how is the green light different than like a far infrared light coming into the eyes?

Right. So again, it's frequency, so it's a little bit different. So here's the thing. So in our, we have two eye masks, one is green and the other one is red and blue. We don't use near infrared directly over the eyes because the FDA says we're not really sure how it's going to affect you. So we're just going to say don't do it. However, those of us that have been using these pads for a long time, we do, we do. I Don't put the goggles on when I put this because for anti aging, let's face it, it is the near infrared wavelength that is penetrating the deepest to get the collagen to produce. So if you want to use it for fine lines, wrinkles, but also get into your gums and teeth, you want to use that, the invisible, the near infrared over your face. So I don't put goggles on for that. But you know, depending on the person, you do have to be careful, there are some contraindications. Right. Okay.

So tell me about your journey with the plant stem cells and how you're using them in your practice and then we can talk about the light.

So I'm a very new practitioner. The company that I've been working with, it took me four years of continuous study to understand the product line and what it's good for and all of that. So I was, I'm very hesitant to jump in because it's a whole new body of knowledge. But I got, you know, a few testimonials in the past few weeks. I am in hook, line and sinker because. So I use different kinds of light in the clinic. I started with LED light, then I added a rife device which is a very different way to affect the cells. And the old model is push, pull, push, pull. Right. We push out the toxins, then we pull them out with binders. And that's what I've been doing, you know, and I've been doing purification programs quite a bit. I put together a really cool one that I think you would love that's using the vibration plate and then sauna and then the purification bath with borax, really pulling thing out and then ending with the foot bath. So we are, I mean, I felt seven years younger after this 80 minute experience that I did over the winter. I spent some time like, let me just experience, experiment and see what really is going to feel good here. But again, it's that old model. Push, pull, push, pull. So when Karen Dallas told me about that we don't need a binder for these, that we are actually detoxifying and draining the cell and we don't need a binder, I thought, wow, that's really. Is that really true? You know. So that began my journey. I did get this book recently, Dr. Marcus Graves. I'm sure you've seen it. Got it.

I've got every book on the market that exists.

Right. So I'm learning some new words like emuncteries. That's not a word I ever use. Like that's very interesting. And gibber. Ellen's gibberlins, the plant, like these new words for me. And I'm a word person. I love to learn, and so. And I like to combine things. And like I said, I like to get the job done quickly. I like to send people home with the tools that they can help themselves. So the last kind of light that I added was the phototherapy patches. So I do use these quite a bit. And I patch on especially. I do a lot of fertility treatments. My specialty is preventing miscarriage. I feel it's really understood. It's become very complicated in the naturopathic and functional medicine world. You know, sometimes testing is okay. I don't really feel we need a ton of testing. It's not that reliable. And we can get back to some of the basics, the hormone making, nutrients, and how do we fix the cells? How are we going to support your ovaries to do their job? How can we get the thyroid to start functioning? We don't need tons of blood work to figure it out. So I. I tend to simplify things because I want it to be simple for people, and I like to get results. And I really have. Combining things like light with the plant stem cells.

Yes.

Yeah. Yeah.

That's what we do in our practice, too. Yeah. So, you know, it's actually Dr. Canillo, who founded these 36 years ago, is the one who literally was walking by in his lab, walking by a blue light, and one of the test tubes lit up, and that's when he said, what the heck is that? And it's. It's like fluorescent light. So he put it under the microscope. Luckily, he has a lab right there. Put it under the microscope, and he saw these dodecahedron shapes in the water. That's sacred geometry. Right? Looks like. And so he kept studying, and he found these carbon nano dots of light that are actually in the cellular water of the plant buds.

Wow.

So how cool is that? And these nano dots are what are helping to clean out the body. Taking the waste, the toxins, to an emunctory organ. And if that organ is not fully functioning, they have the intelligence to then go find the next organ to get them out.

So. So. Wow.

Which is pretty amazing.

That is incredible. That was the missing piece. Karen and I were just talking about this because I was trying to understand the monkery aspect. And is it just in the cell, in the blood, or is it in the organ? So you just answered it. Wow. Yes.

So it's cleaning up the organs. It's also cleaning up the cellular matrix, the extracellular matrix. Right. So your communication network.

Yes.

And then it's regenerating things with those juvenile phytohormones. Those are the gilbillerans, the auxins, the cytokinens. So those are unique to the plant buds. You cannot find those in adult plants.

Wow. Wow. It is fascinating. So interesting.

That's the magic, I think the magic formula of these things. And I always joke that if an adult herb and homeopathy had a baby, it would be the plant stem cells because they beautiful energetic component. But they also have this biologic impact in the body.

And so that's really well put the.

Intersection of those two. So that's why they're so magical. And then to pair it with lights, it just.

Yeah.

It's like. I call that jing it up. You're zhuzhing it up even more in the body. Right.

You sure are.

Allowing the body to experience it and move through things a lot quicker.

Light is the great accelerator. It's just, you know, the way I explain it, it's like just, you know, putting the pedal to the metal. We are going to accelerate your healing response here. Yes. And whatever's supposed to happen will happen because light brings the body back to balance. And sometimes you feel worse. Sometimes you're going to detox. Sometimes things are going to come out through the skin. But that's good in my world.

Yes.

And now with the plant stem cells, I feel confident that when somebody's going into that Herxheimer reaction that I can help them through that instead of taking a lot of charcoal or whatever it is. Yeah. To bind it out. So this is amazing. Thank you.

Yeah. And the problem with the charcoal and the zeolite and all these binders is they're also pulling out the good stuff too.

Too. Right. They're not. Right. Except the new ones. There's a new company. Their claim to fame is that they don't. But it's still a lot of synthetic. It's just a lot of pill popping. People are over it. Nobody wants to take pills anymore in my world. I'm with you.

I am totally with you.

Yeah.

Simplified, you know. I know at one point in my healing journey, I was taking 120 supplements a day.

That's impressive number.

And nothing was getting into my body because my lymphatic. I was in fight or flight. My body was like, oh no, nothing's getting in here. Right. Lockdown. And again, the nervous system 10 years ago was not really talked about a whole lot.

Even holistic realms Right, right, exactly. A lot has changed in the past.

Yes. In the past 10 years, things have radically changed on that front.

Yeah.

So just to wrap up, what are three things that people can do from your perspective as a healer? You're a healer. To stay healthy.

Get to know yourself really well. The more you know yourself, the easier it is to overcome whatever obstacles there are. I love all systems of self understanding, whether it's astrology or archetypal theory or. So I identify as a rebel healer. I'm not a classic healer. I'm much more of a rebel and I love helping people, but in, you know, not in the standard way. I. So I anyways, so get to know yourself really well. Which I guess would then include identify your triggers, notice what you're reacting to, because that's how you can free yourself emotionally. For me, spiritual practice is reducing negative emotions. And the first step to that is just seeing how often we're reacting. And that's the fight or flight. Right. Most people aren't even aware I'm reacting constantly.

Right.

So learn to undo that and then you can actually participate in sending out positive energy towards others. And, you know, obviously the basics, you want to get good water. The water issue is challenging. And drink good water. But. And I guess the third thing would be, is to understand that health is not formulaic. It's not. What worked for you might not work for somebody else. We have to customize it to the person. So if somebody's trying to get you to sign up for a program, I would proceed with caution.

And I would even add to that, Jennifer, that what worked for you 10 years ago, in a new decade may not work for you again.

Right.

I see that a lot of people say, well, I did, you know, keto, you know, eight years ago, and it worked great. And I lost those extra 10 pounds and now I can't lose it. Right.

Because they're right.

Completely different states.

Exactly, exactly. We have to adapt, we have to change, but we also have to be really aware of what we're thinking. So we know we have the subconscious mind which is really running the terrain. And that's harder to access unless you do hypnosis and all that. It's hugely important. But also really watch your thoughts. So many of our clients are coming in and they claim my arthritis, my depression, my. And I tell them, stop, don't say my anything. It's not.

Yes.

Oh, it was somebody's opinion. You have a collection of symptoms. Let's start unraveling it. And what I find is, is very Hard for people to do that.

Yeah, well, it's, you know, it's programming. Right. And one of the questions I often ask, and I find this a lot, especially with women, is what brings you joy? And I know on my own healing journey, a big pivotal moment was when I stopped asking myself, what did I get done today? What did I accomplish? And I started saying, what brought me joy today? And how much did I invest in that? And I had a two week period where I was so depressed because even the things I love to do became a check mark on my list of things to do. And that was such a game changer when I asked that question, especially to women, they often look at me with this deer in the headlights look because they're so disconnected from their emotional body and from that feeling of joy. Right. They're so in that fight or flight, getting things done, organizing the household. You know, I know as a young mother, I was taking care of schedules. Oh, they need a bath tonight. Oh, they have a field trip tomorrow.

Right.

So you're holding so, so much information that we lose touch with ourselves. And I say to this day, what saved my life was going to Barbara Brennan School of Healing. Because even though that was a school to teach energy modalities, what it really was was getting to know ourselves. So when we did homework and somebody scheduled an appointment to come practice with us, the questions were, where were you in transference? What was your higher self saying? What was your lower self saying? It was really about checking what was going on inside of us. When somebody scheduled, didn't, do we get fearful? Am I going to fail?

Right.

All of that psychosis that goes on in our mental body thousand, thousand times a day that we're not even paying attention to, and it's creating our reality. And so that was such a gift to have that tool back in 2008. That was a game changer. And so let me finish with this question for you. People are going to ask, how do I do that? I know I wanted, like, give me the directions on how to know myself. How does one get to know themselves? How do you support your patients when they come in and you say, notice where your triggers are. Notice this, notice this. What are, what's a tool?

Meditation. So I've been a meditation practitioner for 35 years now. I have to say I was very lucky. I started young, 1990, in the Zen tradition. I've been a zen practitioner for 35 years. Is that going to work for everybody? No. Obviously younger people are going to want to do apps and this and that I do think it's important when you start a meditation practice, find what's going to work for you. Now, a lot of folks listen to guided relaxation, and they think that that's meditation, and it's not. It's relaxation practice, which is wonderful. It can help you with stress and sleep and all of this, but meditation is really learning to pay attention to your thoughts and interrupt them and change them. And it's the only way. There's. I don't believe there's any way around it. If you really want to study your mind and understand what's going on in the chaos, you. You have to sit down, stop talking, and pay attention. Stillness. Exactly. And whether you do that in a formal way with a group or on your own, continue to try what works for you. Find, just like you said, what brings the spark of joy, you know, and. And try it. Try different things. I don't have the discipline to practice on my own, so I have to stay connected to the group. I never regret it, ever. It's hard to get to. It's this and that. It's another thing to do. But at the end, I am so glad I did it.

Yeah, I love that. Well, it's been such a joy having you here. Thank you for sharing your wisdom with so many different areas that can help so many. And how can people connect with you and find you?

My website is jenniferwaters.net net okay.

And we'll put that in the show notes so everybody can find you, connect with you. Do you work with people remotely at all?

Yes. Okay. I do. Yeah.

I had a sense you did. So perfect. All right. So much.