When symptom removal is not possible or appropriate

When I first started learning intuitive healing techniques, I was green and overeager, and I charged around trying to “fix” every deformed chakra and suffering creature I encountered. Sometimes the miracles happened, more often, they didn’t. Frustrated, I wanted to know why, why, why (I, of course, wanted to be able to fix everyone-as much to boost my uncertain ego, I’m afraid, as to be of service.). And then I had a shocking insight.

If, when I was in the midst of my eating disorder, my frantic mother or I had called up some healing practitioner and asked them to “fix” me-and if someone had, in fact, zapped me with iridescent blue light and rearranged my chakras and “cured” my eating disorder for me, I would have lost far, far more than I gained. The very thought of some well-meaning stranger barging in to “fix” me like that repulses me. Because the slow, clumsy, painful, hesitant path I made out of that eating disorder was mine to make. The slow process of healing taught me the intuitive skills I use now to understand animals. It taught me to know and use and trust my own deep power. It was my first initiation. My struggle. My test to pass. In the end, that eating disorder introduced me to my own spirit and my own real self. Anorexia and bulimia was only a symptom of my soul’s distress, and removing that symptom would have done little to empower or heal me in the truest sense of the word. (I speak here only of my experience, not of eating disorders in general.)

And yet, when I began this work, I was exactly the sort of allopathic intuitive healer I now so distrust! Now I have a much more circumspect approach. I know that sometimes my best efforts can facilitate the miracle of healing, and sometimes they can’t. When my work can help, we all celebrate, give thanks, and shake our heads in wonder. When my best efforts are no help, sometimes it is because the problem is out of my depth, and I simply do not have the power or the wisdom or the courage to be of any use. Sometimes I learn quickly, and after a couple of sessions can change my stance and effectively help resolve the problem. Sometimes a healing session for the person can do wonders to relieve the suffering of their animal. But sometimes the healing simply needs to come from within the being herself. Period.

Our true home is in the present moment.
To live in the present moment is a miracle.
The miracle is not to walk on water.
The miracle is to walk on the green Earth in the present moment,
to appreciate the peace and beauty that are available now.
Peace is all around us-
in the world and in nature-
and within us-
in our bodies and our spirits.
Once we learn to touch this peace,
we will be healed and transformed.
It is not a matter of faith;
it is a matter of practice.
       ~Tich Nhat Hanh

To my mind, healing is a journey. The quest to heal ourselves or ease the suffering of a loved one is just that-an ongoing quest. Each situation is unique. My work may be an important stage of your journey to wholeness. It may be a guidepost pointing you in a fresh new direction. It may be a frustrating cul-de-sac. It may be the glorious and final yippeeeeee! conclusion of a very important chapter. I never know. All I can promise you is that when I work I will try my level, earnest best to serve the highest good and deepest healing for all of us. If I can’t help ease your symptoms and solve your problem, I will seek instead to understand why this problem continues to manifest so insistently in your life. If I can’t help you understand the deeper purpose of this problem, I will do my best to refer to someone who can.

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.” ~Louise Erdrich