Once I met a woman at a new age expo and offered her a healing, to which she replied, “As far as I know, there’s nothin’ wrong with me.” Her concept of healing required that she be seriously ill or in the midst of major trauma to receive it. She was not totally happy, but she missed this opportunity to feel even better, because she figured the way she’d always felt was “good enough” and did not warrant healing.
Others come to me obsessed with he-said, she-said, wanting to know what every nuance of past conversation meant. Some freak out over every little blemish or bump, their fears making problems where there weren’t any.
What is healing? Is it a magic pill or occurrence that makes all our problems go away?
When is it needed? When there is something wrong with us or in our environment? When we are in so much pain we can’t stand it? Or every time there is a fly in our soup?
The more I experience healing myself and others, the more I see it as an undoing rather than a doing. It is a restoring of balance and wholeness that was there already, yet forgotten. Whenever I feel really good, really clear, I am in a space of confidence, peace, without a care, knowing I can take care of anything and at the same time connected, open-hearted. I am guided by the flow of an inner joy.
So often I have attempted to give a healing to someone who says they want my assistance, and I know in their hearts that they want it, even desperately. Unfortunately sometimes this desperation manifests as a frantic recounting of all their “problems”, as if continuously listing and analyzing every little problem will ensure the healing.
Far from it. The very insistence on-- aka attachment-- to problems requires that they remain because we are falsely convinced that they are part of our identity.
It is good to take a neutral look at what is going on. It is good to talk about things, to uncover any buried feelings or thoughts that fester beneath our awareness causing harm. But once they are uncovered, that is enough.
Someone once said that anything we find ourselves defending is not actually ours—that is why we feel a need to defend it. Might it also be true that whatever problems we get stuck on aren’t really ours either?
If something is yours, whether this is a feeling or thought or problem, you can process and solve it. If you cannot resolve it, ask yourself whose it is and when it originated. It may be someone else’s, or it may be yours from 20 years ago. Either way, do you need to keep it?
Your true feelings, when felt, are like waves you can ride to breakthrough. Even though they feel scary at first, you can get through them and feel better.
Your actual problems, no matter how big, are more like creative challenges you can tackle and come out feeling stronger for the experience. But dwelling in obsessions or preoccupations will take over your life and weaken you.
Look at your life and begin to notice what is yours and what is not yours. What are you ready to let go today? This week? This month? This year?
Healing is so simple. It occurs when we are truly seen, recognized. When you run into a stranger and find you have some random thing in common, when you’re with a close friend or lover who knows you like no one else, when someone perceives something you haven’t told anyone—these are all effortless examples of healing.
Healing between healer and healee occurs when the healer can hold space for the healee that they cannot yet hold for themselves. For example, if you see yourself as unlovable and I see your beauty and point out your virtues, I can help because I am not stuck in your patterns of self-judgment. If your family patterns don’t support you being successful, you may not believe it is possible, where I can see clearly your skills and virtues.
This works, not because I do something to you or convince you that you are something other than what you believe, but because we are all sensitive energetic beings and it we tend to match each others’ vibrations. For instance, in any given group of people you will see similarities in dress, lifestyle, beliefs, etc... Around a sad person it’s easy to slump into the blues, but with cheerful company we remember our enthusiasm.
So, if one person has space for something the other doesn’t and they get together, healing can happen simply by osmosis. This is why seekers love to be around enlightened masters; even if they never speak, the master’s very presence is healing.
If you are reading this you are probably a natural healer. Think of a time you have been able to recognize something in someone else that they could not see in themselves. Think of an issue you don’t have that someone you know has. Maybe they like to be around you because you are a go-getter where they are fearful, you are flexible where they are rigid, or you are patient where they rush and stress constantly.
To heal yourself, you don’t have to go to an “official” healer. You can do this for yourself by remembering what brings you joy. Those things connect you to your soul and help you transcend problems rather than go in circles trying to fix them.
I find my greatest joy in nature, music, dancing, good food, meditation and yoga. Some find it in movies, art, parties, family, sports, travel, technology, or intellectual stimulation.
When do you remember your joy? Do those things, be that person, even if you think it is frivolous or takes too much time. Trust me, they will give you so much more than they take.
Breathe deep, close your eyes and imagine a huge golden sun above your head. Imagine that this sun magnetizes all of your energy you’ve projected into other people or places, into the past or future, and most importantly into worries or imagined problems. Let the sun shimmer with incredibly radiant gold of your inner light, and then let it pour into your entire being and energy field.
From here ask if maybe, just maybe you are more than your problems. I think that the woman who said “As far as I know there’s nothin’ wrong with me” was on to something after all.
copyright 2007 Ann O'Brien- All Rights Reserved.
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