Energy
MULTI-DIMENSIONAL HEALING
We are spiritual beings having a human experience. We are also part of nature and the cosmos; the microcosm that mirrors the macrocosm. In my practice, I embrace a multi-dimensional approach to healing, weaving together healing modalities that address the physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual aspects of being a human being.
Body Intuitive
Body Intuitive is a powerful new energy healing modality that marries current western medical science with Classical Chinese Medicine. It was created by molecular biologist Laura Stuve, Ph.D., and Chinese Medicine Doctor, Janet Galipo, DOM. Body Intuitive evolved from the BodyTalk System, and like Body Talk, it is a system of healing that takes the mind, body, and spirit of a person into consideration. It uses a variety of techniques to tap into the body’s innate wisdom and natural capacity for self-healing. A fundamental premise of Body Intuitive is that all types of stressors impact health, including but not limited to, adverse childhood experiences as well as traumatic experiences throughout the life-cycle, lifestyle habits and environmental factors, ancestral history, and genetics. These factors impact the function of bodily systems and affect their ability to communicate effectively with each other and undermine optimal health and well-being.
Body Intuitive is based upon the premise that cells in the body communicate with one another constantly via subtle energetic circuitry and that stress compromises this dialogue. Self-healing is facilitated by a Body Intuitive practitioner who discerns imbalances in the patient through structured intuition and neuromuscular feedback. Using a variety of techniques, energetic connections in the mind, body, and spirit that have been interrupted are re-established and balance is restored.
Energy healing modalities that practitioners and patients alike find valuable and effective, are generally not supported by evidence-based research studies. My perspective is that the proof of the pudding is in the eating. There was a recent article in the April 2020 issue of the Atlantic Magazine titled “Reiki Cannot Possibly Work. So Why Does It?”
Body Intuitive can be practiced equally effectively at a distance as in person.
Reiki
I recently completed training in the Second Degree of the Usui System of Reiki Healing. I am not sure yet how I will integrate this simple, magical and beautiful healing modality into my practice, as psychiatrists are not supposed to touch their patients, and Reiki is typically done by placing the hands on the body or near the body of the recipient. A Second Degree Reiki practitioner is trained, however, to also send healing energy without physical contact, so this would be a possibility.
Meanwhile, through regular practice of Reiki on myself for often not more than ten minutes a day, I feel calmer and happier, my life is flowing with greater ease, doors are opening and significant people are coming into my life.
I received my training locally from the gifted and inspired Reiki Master, Robynn Stewart. Some of the following material is adapted from an informational sheet for the lay person that Robynn wrote about Reiki:
What is Reiki?
The word REIKI means “Universal Life Energy”.
REIKI refers to an Eastern healing modality that began in Japan in the early 1900’s. It is a healing method that harnesses the energy of the Universe, where the practitioner acts as a conduit, directing and transferring the universal life force to the recipient. Human beings are energy systems. Reiki is based upon the idea that we are alive because there is a universal life force flowing through us. If our life force is blocked or weakened, we become vulnerable to stress and illness, and if it is flowing and abundant, we feel happy and enjoy radiant health.
Though Reiki is a spiritual practice, it is not religious, and you do not need to believe in it in order to respond to its effects.
What are the benefits of Reiki?
While Reiki is used for stress-reduction, it also helps boost the immune system, and activates the body’s natural ability to heal itself. Reiki is an integrative medical modality and is used in most hospitals, holistic centers and hospice facilities.
Since stress and the environment are considered to be major contributors to disease, the benefits of this healing technique are many and sometimes unexpected. The cells of the recipient are always in charge, so Reiki will go where it is needed and can never be harmful in any instance.
Reiki practitioners are encouraged to live by 5 principles:
To let go of anger
To let go of worries
To cultivate a heart-felt sense of gratitude
To strive and to be and do our very best
To cultivate loving-kindness
Reiki can be used solely for self-care. I have begun to encourage some of my patients to learn Reiki so that they can practice on themselves. It is a very effective method and remarkably easy to learn. Self-Reiki creates a feeling of deep peace, security and well-being.
One of the qualities that I love about self-Reiki is that you can practice it while doing other things. It’s not like meditation, where dedicated time needs to be set aside, and thus sometimes one just does not make time for it. One can set a Reiki intention and place the hand on the heart while driving, or waiting in line, or when you wake up in the morning or before you fall asleep at night. This makes it so portable, convenient and possible to seamlessly integrate it into your life without adding another thing to your to do list.
Many of my readers suffer from psychiatric, digestive and other conditions related to dysregulated immunity. Self-Reiki is a perfect tool to balance and strengthen your health using a spiritual approach, in addition to all of the familiar physical modalities such as proper diet, supplementation, detoxification and life style. Self-Reiki can be a precious gift to yourself. I believe that you will be amazed at the power of this very simple technique.
The Tarot
The 78 cards of the Tarot comprehensively encompass universal aspects of human experience. I use them exclusively to expand awareness and cannot use them to predict the future.
There are 6 foundational spiritual premises upon which the Tarot are based. These concepts are beautifully outlined in Paul Quinn‘s accessible and inspiring book Tarot for Life.
Six Principles Underlying the Tarot
- As Above So Below: This points to the divine in each of us, and the presence of divine intelligence in everything.
- The Law of Attraction: The Tarot offers a tool for increasing our awareness of what we are attracting into our lives through where we place our attention.
- Synchronicity: This is an idea belonging to Carl Jung, the Swiss psychoanalyst which states that coincidence is meaningful. Thus the specific cards we draw are meant to help us answer our questions.
- The Self and Individuation: The Tarot facilitates making what is unconscious conscious, thus increasing our awareness of more of our being and promoting wholeness. We become more fully ourselves and are able to be more fully present in our lives.
- Integration of Opposites: The cards help us become aware of and integrate contradictory parts of ourselves, which is an essential part of individuation, becoming more full ourselves and expressing more of our being,
- Masculine and Feminine: The process of owning aspects of ourselves that are commonly designated masculine or feminine is related to the integration of opposites. We are all both, and we become more alive as we embody both archetypes, rather than assigning parts of ourselves to others.
The cards function most usefully when we do not ask them to predict, but rather to direct our own initiative. In other words, the cards can point us in the most effective direction in terms of where to put our energy.
Thoughtful formulation of the question produces the most useful reading. For instance, it would not work well to ask “Will I get the job” but rather, “What do I need to be aware of in order to ensure that I am doing all I can to get the job?”
I view the reading as an interactive process. The querent tells me what he/she sees in the card. The personal response is then integrated with the traditional meaning of the card, in order to derive an interpretation that is unique and specific to the individual.
In accordance with the 6 principles outlined above, there is a belief that though the reading is not predictive, the particular cards that are chosen are not random either. Based upon the law of synchronicity, a querent will choose the particular cards needed to provide the most helpful information.
I use the Tarot as another collaborative method to expand consciousness and scope of awareness in the service of further progressive psycho/spiritual growth and development.
Astrology
The stars are like letters that inscribe themselves at every moment in the sky. Everything in the world is full of signs. All events are coordinated. All things depend on each other. Everything breathes together. Plotinus 204-270 C.E.
Astrology is a very ancient but still vital discipline, which has been practiced and valued by cultures all over the world. The observation and study of the heavens reveals a meaningful and influential correlation between the position and motion of the planets, stars and other celestial phenomena and our lives. Astrology rests upon the major spiritual premise of reincarnation. The belief is that the soul picks the precise time, place and family to be born into, in order to create the opportunity to fulfill its highest potential, as well as to resolve unfinished business from past lives.
A modern in depth examination of a person from an astrological perspective is a much more individualized, complex, layered and sophisticated analysis than the sun sign based Astrology that is typically found in newspapers or magazines. It can provide us with profound psychological and spiritual insight. A study of the position of the heavenly bodies at the moment of our birth, the natal horoscope, provides us with a symbolic map of our psyche, and a blue print for the evolution of our soul. The understanding of this map can be very useful in terms of providing insight into ourselves and others, making use of our strengths and compensating for our vulnerabilities, as well as providing us with essential messages and guidance about our life purpose and direction.
This map represents our potential, and not who we are in a static or fixed way. It is not fated, but rather it illuminates our choices. The study of the way the heavens can influence our lives, can empower us through increasing our conscious awareness of the energies of the moment. It puts us in a better position to harness these energies and flow with them, rather than to waste opportunity or to struggle against them. Through this awareness, personal freedom and choice is enhanced, as well as compassion for the self and others. It enables us to become conscious of our true potential, and the ways in which we needlessly limit ourselves.
Flower Essences
Flower essences are herbal infusions created from flowers and plants and can have a profound effect upon emotional and physical well being and psycho/spiritual development. They were first created by an English physician, Edward Bach, in the 1930s.
Like homeopathic remedies, their mechanism of action is vibrational in nature. They do not affect the biochemistry of the body, but rather their impact is through the subtle human energy fields, which influence physical, psychological and spiritual well-being.
Symptoms targeted by the flower essences are very nuanced and carefully characterized. This is not a one size fits all pharmaceutical approach which targets “depression” or “anxiety”, rather the flower remedies are extremely specific and nuanced in what they purport to heal.
Here are just a few examples:
Pine, one that many of my patients need, promotes self-acceptance and forgiveness, and freedom from inappropriate guilt and self-blame. A psychoanalytic framework would understand this as the “unconscious guilt” remedy. Unconscious guilt causes tremendous suffering. A patient with this problem does not feel as though he/she deserves happiness, or has a right to a life, and is likely to spoil permissible pleasure, sabotage themselves, and can make their life a monument to suffering. Along with therapeutic conversation, Pine can be a very helpful support in freeing someone from this terrible self undoing.
Walnut, another of my favorites, is particularly useful during times of life’s transitions, like starting or losing a job, moving, loss of a partner through death or divorce, starting college, or becoming a parent. It lends courage to follow one’s own path and destiny and to help free an individual from limiting influences. It is particularly useful for those people who feel overly constrained by social conventions or familial expectations. Walnut helps the soul to perceive and follow its purpose.
Scotch Broom is excellent for a particular sort of depression, one that is characterized by pessimism and despair regarding one’s personal relationship to world events. It is not appropriate for despair that is confined to feelings about one’s personal life, but rather for those who feel overwhelmed by the frightening state of the world. It helps them embrace a more hopeful and positive world future.
Red Chestnut is one of the “co-dependence” remedies”. It helps establish healthy boundaries for those individuals who are overly identified in the role of care-taker, and enmeshed in the psychic life of the other. Red Chestnut addresses this mental imbalance. It can help to transform negative anxiety and worry about another into healthy compassion and concern.
Since the time of Dr. Edward Bach, many new families of remedies have been formulated. The four I discussed above are from the original repertoire. Often 5 or 6 flower essences are combined together to create a unique personalized healing remedy for body, mind, heart, and spirit.
These remedies can be a useful and uplifting tool as part of a multi-modal healing approach.