Tired of pain and promises, I turned to my Spirit for discernment on what to do next in the healing of my wrist…..When we aren’t awake as either healer or the person accepting healing, we simply “don’t realize what we do.”….Our Spirit doesn’t make any mistake when it guides the mind, which in turn guides the body.
Each moment we enter our pain with merciful awareness is a moment of healing. Each moment we touch suffering with love we are healed.
Steven Levine
Words are the most powerful drug used by mankind
Rudyard Kipling
Several years ago, I was drilling a hole through a wood beam in my house. The powerful drill motor I was using, caught on some metal imbedded in the beam, stopped, and twisted suddenly in my hands. I immediately let go, but felt the pain of what I thought was a severe sprain in my right wrist. I did my usual inner dialogue, asking that healing love, warmth and nurturance be sent to the area that hurt. My experience had taught me, that after a day or two, the pain would be alleviated in this kind of injury once the body’s healing mechanisms were supported and well established. The pain did not subside after several days. I was concerned I had broken a bone. All this brought me into more lessons of discernment.
A practitioner, who was interested in my work with people in mind, body, Spirit interconnectedness, saw my discomfort with my wrist and said he could help. He used (his form of) reflexology as his initial test. I had experienced reflexology (sometimes called muscle testing) before and had been impressed at its accuracy in trusted practitioners. I also had read scientific studies that demonstrated its efficacy in finding hidden processes in the body, when applied by seasoned practitioners. He told me that my body was communicating, “just a sprain, no broken bones.” He then took an X-ray and did some gentle neurological balancing interventions. Afterwards, he said that all his tests indicated no broken bones, only a sprain and that it would be all right to move my wrist gently. I did move my wrist in a protected fashion and with limited range of motion. The pain remained and even intensified with any movement.
A week later, a well-known practitioner, who I had contacted on another matter, saw my painful struggle and said he could help. I left myself open to this, without discernment. He said he had some new equipment that could measure polarities within the body and pinpoint the difficulties with great accuracy. I had worked with biofeedback and other physiological monitoring equipment and was easily seduced, since I have always been interested in new advances in equipment that open windows to view the body’s processes. Before “hooking me up” to his new instrument, the practitioner again tested using reflexology. He stated that his testing showed there were no broken bones in my wrist. He then said he would use his new equipment to check the polarities of my body within the injured area and then take an X-ray. According to him, the polarity measurements and the X-ray, showed no breakage. He concluded that carpal tunnel syndrome had been developing in my wrist over time and was now manifesting more because of the recent injury. He grabbed my hand and with a quick snap maneuver that was accompanied by my crying out in pain said he had reopened the carpal bone in my wrist so healing could take place in that nerve.
I have witnessed many times in patients, how particularly intense physical maneuvers of the spine or other body parts, trigger a release of endorphins and sometimes dynorphins (1000 times more powerful than endorphins) that temporarily reduce the pain from trauma. This can perpetuate two kinds of illusions in healing. One leads to the patient assuming that their pain is diminished because of the intervention, and that the area is now healing or nearly healed. What may really be occurring is that endorphins are being released in response to further trauma, (the practitioner snapping my wrist), caused by the “so called” healing intervention to the injured area. The apparent diminishing of pain may not be the promotion of actual healing, but the pain killing endorphins triggered by the area being re-injured, re-releasing more endorphins.
The other illusion is that a cycle of dependence on the practitioner can be created. When the endorphin response wears off and the pain returns to the area, the body re-signals the healing process through pain again in the area, and thus more treatments. Pain is a signal that warns that there is something wrong. It is also a trigger for the body’s healing mechanisms so they can be focused on the injury. Several days after his intervention, my pain was back and worse than ever. Without discerning awareness, my pain could have easily prompted me to seek another treatment with the same practitioner.
Our mind is intricately interwoven with the fabric of the body. It anticipates healing from interventions and that anticipation, itself, can support the healing, that was already underway. This is the essence of the placebo effect, which occurs about one third of the time in all interventions, traditional and complementary. The mind, separate from body and Spirit, fools itself, thinking the intervention is causing the healing. With the mind no longer interfering with healing, the body’s natural proclivity for healing more readily takes place. Much healing can occur without the mind’s awareness. Our Spirit always helps us to see the bigger picture, particularly when the healing process is being blocked or congested by the mind’s ideas. Our Spirit doesn’t make any mistake when it guides the mind, which in turn guides the body.
Tired of pain and promises, and needing to learn again, what I teach in my seminars, I turned to my Spirit for discernment on what to do next in the healing of my wrist. What popped into my head effortlessly was that I see a friend of mine, who is a chiropractic practitioner, that I’ve always trusted my body, mind and Spirit with. When I saw her, she tested me with reflexology and carefully examined how my right wrist was behaving in relation to the rest of my body. She immediately saw the muscles around my wrist as being flaccid and said, “your body is telling that area not to move and protecting it from motion by keeping the muscles flaccid.” Nothing was cloaked in gadgets or disguised in what she said to me. Everything was direct and straightforward, and easily understood by me. She explained that the body behaves in such a manner when there is a break and that the body protects the area by keeping it immobile. She recommended that I have my wrist X-rayed by someone experienced and thorough. I had this done. A hairline fracture was discovered in one of the bones of my wrist, with recommendation that all motion be minimized with a sling to support it.
Too often I have seen tests ordered, using very advanced technology, where either physicians or complementary practitioners interpret results erroneously. This seems to occur when their minds are clouded by their egos deciding, in advance, what is wrong with someone. In regards to this ego centrism, that can entrap any of us, we are not centered when we need to justify that we are “right.” All real wisdom comes from the Divine. Any of us can be the instruments of Divine Love and then, the best technology and intervention is enacted as part of the healing process. All of us can know, under the guidance of our truly loving Spirit, when our body is being treated with the deepest reverence. We can know deeply from our Spirit when Divine Care is guiding the interventions.
A practitioner of either allopathic or complementary medicine, unguided by spirit, can have the latest technology or technique, but misinterpret information by the same clouding of the mind that takes place when ego dominates consciousness. In my situation with the practitioner who snapped my wrist, he assumed it was carpal tunnel. More injury occurred and healing was postponed, though endorphins were released alleviating the pain from the so-called “intervention.” When we aren’t awake as either healer or the person accepting healing, we simply “don’t realize what we do.”
Diagnostic techniques and electronic physiological monitoring devices are only as good as the interpreter. The minds of practitioners can project their interpretations onto the data from these devices as easily as they can project diagnosis onto a patient. Wherever there is gold, there are counterfeiters. Complementary medicine, just as traditional medicine, when accomplished in an assembly line manner, lends itself to ego-laced intervention that can bring harm rather than healing. The practitioners may find it difficult to hold the body of their patients with sufficient reverence to support real change and transformation. They can induce further suffering, avoid getting to the real etiology of disease or injury, and perpetuate illness rather than moving beyond it. However, each of us can learn about discernment, even in being mislead by snake oil salesmen. Hopefully, through this learning we discover the allopathic, homeopathic, and other complementary therapies that are grounded in science, that acknowledge and support the Creator’s designs in the healing of our bodies.