Physician, heal thyself.
In this article I share a personal experience to illustrate an effective way to heal yourself and your clients, regardless of the modality.
It’s nearly 9am Monday morning, my first patient will arrive shortly and I feel the stirrings of another flare up of arthritis in my knee joint. I knew that this twinge heralded another 4 month cycle of 7-10 days of excruciating pain with no relief. I was dreading it.
That was nearly a year ago. So far, I have not had a flare up.
“Physician, heal thyself.”
That proverb has resonated deeply with me through the years.
To me, it implied that an authentic doctor should be able correctly diagnose and treat whatever sickness they personally suffer from. That’s not been easy. After nearly a decade, that last attack was a hard wake up call to go deeper into healing myself.
I had tried everything from quick fixes to deep analysis, intensive meditations, qigong practice, elaborate diets and a host of essential oils, herbs and supplements. I'd consulted with the best, even resorting to painkillers. All to no avail. The pain would just run through the joints of my legs, taking me off my feet for 7-10 days, every few months.
Over the decades I have done much self-cultivation. These have all helped me become a better person and a more effective clinician. And yet this particular sickness was a persistent and recurrent reminder that there was something much deeper that I had yet to overcome.
At the time, I did not fully appreciate that these symptoms were drawing my attention to an underlying fear. Through the process of being facilitated I saw for myself that I had learned to resist facing the unpleasant emotions from my past. I had learned to keep them repressed in order to survive the hardship of those early years. And in the ensuing time, a lot of defences were built, for good reason, to protect myself from feeling those strong emotions; also avoiding ever going back to those kinds of situations. I think to some extent, this was what drove me to excel at what I do. However there were aspects that remained hidden from my intellect; only making themselves known through the language of the body’s felt sense (aka symptoms). I’d also learned to become risk averse - preferring comfort to being challenged in my life. As my partner often said, “you travel a lot in your mind, but not far with your body.” Ouch!
Healing began when I finally came home.
Coming Home
By subjecting myself to healing from this long standing health issue, I was initially confronted by my own resistances, judgements and fears. However the mentors, communities and strong friendships I’ve forged along the way have been transformative.
Through a series of insights and gently allowing myself to go deeper, I began to make peace with who I am; welcoming all my experiences, not resisting them. Through a gentle, easeful process of being facilitated, allowing myself to be held during sessions with my mentors and trusted peers, I fell deeper into a understanding of who I am and where my experiences come from.
I’ve come to a deeper appreciation that healing is an ongoing process. Whilst not without its challenges, when one learns to relax into the process, it becomes quite an enriching experience. I have witnessed many accounts, both personally and professionally, that we can grow immensely through summoning the courage to face the challenges and answering the call to greatness.
While there can be many personal reasons for resisting healing, I have discovered that it comes down to a lack of appreciation in our immense self-healing capacity and our social conditioning.
We have been conditioned to passively show up at these practitioners' offices or clinics. Upon entering their space, we hand over our power and innate wisdom. We then passively follow the advice of the people in white coats, wearing stethoscopes, wielding needles, prescribe herbs and give their expert advice and opinions.
Here’s the thing, our doctors, alternative health providers, and healers do not and cannot hold the final power over our health and healing. We do.
So whilst learning to self-heal isn’t always easy, the entire process becomes much more straightforward when we understand the underlying principles of how healing happens and what blocks it.
Whilst there are many way for healing to happen, I've found that in practice, this process is greatly enhanced when we relax and learn to let go of what ails us. Naturally we shall fall into our true self - a deeply capable, peaceful, loving and wise being - our innate health.
A Vision For Procuring Greatness
I have a vision to create an approach to healing and curing that emphasizes our innate capacity to be whole and well. It is a space where we honour our sovereignty whilst nurturing the call to greatness within each of us. In order to truly heal, we need to become an active participant in the process. And in order to facilitate healing in others, we need to immerse ourselves in learning and embodying the underlying principles of healing.
I shall continue to unpack these insights in future articles.
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