Self-Healing

The healing journey is ultimately one of self-healing. The body is a marvelous self-healing mechanism. It contains the knowledge of how to function properly and bring itself back into balance. Our job is to learn to align ourselves with the natural, healing processes of nature. A healer may help to bring us into alignment, but it is ultimately up to us to integrate and sustain the results of the healing.

A good healer will empower you in your own self-healing rather than create a dependency on their healing work. Being able to reach out and receive help is crucial to healing, but equally important is the ability to follow through with good self-care. In the long run, developing and exercising our ability to self-heal will bring the most lasting and significant change.

What do we need to be able to self-heal? Listed below are the “Seven Essentials of Self-Healing”.

Seven Essentials of Self-Healing

1. self-awareness — including awareness of our bodies, emotions, thought patterns, and the spiritual dimension of ourselves
2. knowledge — including knowledge of our body; the role that our emotions and beliefs play in the functioning of our bodies; and of ways to bring greater health to all these levels of our being
3. motivation — a strong enough desire to have greater health and well-being to motivate us to take action
4. self-love — the ability receive and to care for ourselves with kindness
5. courage — the courage to move out of our comfort zone and experience the feelings we have as we change
6. self-authority (or self-responsibility) — being responsible for our own decisions regarding our self-care as opposed to relying solely on the opinion of authorities
7. self-care — taking practical steps to heal is essential, but without the first six essentials we won’t do this in an effective, consistent way

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Usually we start with essential #7, self-care, putting the cart before the horse. There are tons of wonderful self-care techniques available. The challenge is finding which ones will work for your situation, and actually putting them to use. Without the other six essentials, significant self-healing cannot really happen. We need to develop those in order to find the right methods of self-care, use them consistently and use them in a manner which is truly healing. A good healer will help you to develop those six essentials. As you become more established in them, you will grow in your ability for self-care and become more and more self-sufficient in your healing journey.

The single most important essential for self-healing is self-love. Everything else grows out of the ability to regard ourselves with compassion and treat ourselves with kindness. With all healing techniques, it’s not so much what you do but how you do it that counts. If you eat healthy foods, but are not enjoying them, your body will not utilize all the nourishment they contain. Perhaps you are thinking about vitamins, minerals or calorie count as you eat and are lost in a mental world rather than savoring the taste and enjoying the sensual experience of eating. Perhaps you’ve started stretching, but rather than enjoy the pleasurable sensations in your body as you stretch, you are all caught up in how far you can go. The result is that you strain and force your body rather than nurturing it. Are your self-care endeavors fear-based? Are you straining or forcing yourself in some way? Or are you genuinely enjoying your self-care activities as you feel yourself nurturing your body, mind and spirit? Above all, self-care has to be done gently, with love.

Comments

8 Responses to “Self-Healing”

  1. brittany on March 16th, 2009 5:41 pm

    How do you heal a broken heart without breaking it again.

  2. Mary on March 17th, 2009 3:11 pm

    This is really good question, brittany, but please share a bit more about what you mean. Why would the healing process break it again?

  3. phiG on March 29th, 2009 7:34 am

    i am curious about how to best self-repair when one has a history of deep seated damage that stems from earlier recordings. i myself am trying to work my way out of a cycle that i’ve lived in where our family seems to neglect each other and then we project [very abusefully] that resentment at whoever is left. i finally had to walk away, but i’m noticing the pattern in other intimate relationships where i’m battling not to put up with crap, but i feel like i’m losing the war when it comes to demeaning those who find a way to access those hurts. how do you heal something that’s broken inside that you’ve never seen a working model of?

  4. Mary on March 29th, 2009 8:57 am

    Hi phiG,
    Changing deep-seated patterns is a gradual process. It takes time and “work”. It’s not easy, but you can most definitely heal and change. In some cases, this would be very difficult to do on your own. Finding and working with the right counsellor or therapist can really help. In our self-healing we use various “tools” and sometimes that’s a professional. We still have to do the emotional work, but the therapist can help provide a “working model” and give you tools and support to move forward. Wishing you well!

  5. hope on April 10th, 2009 5:47 pm

    I suffer depression since childhood and right now I have so many sickness. My hair starting to turn gray when I was early 20, now I am 40. Right now I have gallstone and kidneystone. I am lack of energy and vitality. Can self-healing help me?

  6. Mary on April 11th, 2009 9:18 am

    Hope,
    These are obviously problems that you need professional help with, and I will assume you have been getting medical care for these problems. In addition to that, the way that you take care of yourself is important and that’s where “self-healing” comes in. We never know how much something will be able to heal. Not everything becomes completely healed, but it’s always possible to improve our situation in some way.

  7. Jana Dyason on October 27th, 2009 2:04 am

    I am able to feel my energy points all along my body but not the two above my shoulders. could they be blocked and if so, what could i do to unblock them.

  8. Mary on October 28th, 2009 1:09 pm

    Jane, Any energy work technique that gets energy flowing through the whole system helps to resolve blocks. Reiki, Healing Touch, Therapeutic Touch might all help (as well as many others).

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