We are all trained in a variety of techniques to assist our patients. What usually brings them into our clinics are their needs to look younger, get free of pain or to get more healthy. Basically, most people want to be free to do what they want without dysfunction. If it were only that easy.
This let me to an exploration of spiritual and root healing systems, including eight years of dedicated participation at a metaphysical healing school in Montana. Such explorations involve a lot of sorting; hopefully keeping and integrating the valuable teachings and discarding those that are irrelevant.
Now I do feel much more ability and confidence in attracting and helping people who are motivated to clear their inner blocks so they can flourish in their life expression. You might think that my journey to help people free their spirits would have moved me toward less reliance on physical healing methods and tools, but this has not been the case. I actually appreciate my acupuncture and energy-healing tools even more. The purpose of this article is to explain why the combination of soul healing and energy medical methods is so powerful and valuable.
What is Soul Healing?
To answer this, we need to first define what the soul is. Various spiritual traditions describe the soul in many different ways. Dr. Zhi Gung Sha, author of many books on soul healing, states that the soul is a golden, light being that lives inside our bodies. The location of the soul in the body depends on each person's level of spiritual evolution. The soul has its own personality, memory, likes and dislikes. The soul is also tapped into infinite knowledge and wisdom. To the extent our lives are healthy, happy and abundant, our mind and personality are attuned to our soul and looking to it for guidance. To the extent that we are suffering with chronic pain and disease, premature aging, or feel blocked and frustrated in aspects of our emotions or life expression, we are probably at odds with our souls.
Chronic pain and disease, or blocks to successful life expression are therefore largely due to ongoing disharmony between our minds (personality) and our souls. It can also be due to unpleasant karma from the past that is burdening us. Obviously, it is not easy to change these negative patterns, or most people would have done it by now and there would be little need for health care practitioners. The fact that there is increased demand for our services is proof enough of the challenges in permanently shifting old negative patterns.
It is beyond the scope of this article to thoroughly teach the methods of soul healing. I refer you to Dr. Sha's books, as well as other good teachers, for full details on soul-healing methods. Here are some important principles of soul healing that I use in my acupuncture and microlight therapy practice:
When doing therapy or healing, consciously acknowledge the soul of the aspect of the person you are working on (Dr. Sha calls this Say Hello Healing). This simple, but very powerful method is based on the truth that all things have a soul - each organ, meridian, hormone, disease, plant, rock, animal and even country. The soul is the formative and animating power behind all manifested things and beings. According to Dr. Sha: "Heal the soul first and the mind and body will follow." This is very profound and extremely applicable to clinical practice. Say Hello healing is based on acknowledging, greeting and honoring the soul of an ailing body part prior to, or as part of, treating it.
Consciously connecting with and appreciating the soul of a person or body part prior to offering a treatment makes a lot of sense when you think about it. Let's start with a more familiar analogy. If your partner is relaxing in their recliner and you want them to help you with a household project, it's unlikely they will read your mind and get up and do what you want. Or, if you just ask them to help you in a curt way, or take for granted that they should help, your chances of getting what you want are not all that hopeful. But if you address your partner with love and respect, give them appreciation and then ask for a favor, it is much more likely they will help you.
It is the same way with the soul. The soul is tapped into infinite universal healing power. The soul is also intimate with our subconscious minds; the fount of so many autonomic processes and a major determining factor of our success or lack thereof. It is much more likely the soul will bring these awesome resources to your aid if you respect and acknowledge it first.
As an example, I recently treated an elderly patient with chronic knee pain. This is not always easy to relieve, as so much of the body's weight is constantly on the knees, and their complex architecture allows the joint to pivot in many directions. As people age, the knee tendons tend to shorten or get less flexible. In addition to all this, decline in the energy of the kidneys or other organs can reduce vital energy available to keep the knees supple and strong, and this can lead to chronic pain and stiffness. I have usually had good results with knee pain using a combination of acupuncture and microcurrent, but there have been those people who did not respond, or with whom the pain recurred.
This patient had long-term knee pain which had been resistant to many treatments from other professionals. Because I had just returned from a soul-healing workshop, I added a new element to my treatment. As I started, I silently addressed the soul of this man's knees. I greeted the soul, offered my love and appreciation to it, and told it that it had the power to heal the man's physical knees and asked it to do a good job doing so. I concluded by thanking the soul for what it did and for its healing blessing.
I felt an interesting connection to the soul of the patient and his knees that I had not often experienced before - like I was more present to the inner workings of healing. I then inserted a few constitutional and distal needles and used microlight probe therapies to treat acupoints around the knees and some polarized treatment connecting the knees to the lower back and opposite arm. As I usually do, I asked the patient to move his knees while I was applying the microlight therapy, and then asked him to get off the table and walk around the room. He did report a remarkable relief of the pain in his knees, more than can often be hoped for in an initial treatment like this.
My own experience offers another useful story. I recently had a recurrence of an old back injury from 10 years ago that had made me look like a pretzel for several months. The one practitioner I could count on to help me correct it was out of town for an extended time. Not wanting to be bent while waiting for his return, I spoke to the soul of my back, disks and musculature, gave them love and appreciation, and asked for healing. I also balanced the meridians of the region. Within a few hours, my back was completely straight and has been so ever since. Based on my past patterns of aggravation and healing with this issue, this was a remarkably rapid recovery.
Soul Healing and Energy Medicine
There is a powerful therapeutic synergy between soul healing and the application of external healing energies to the physical body. Success with pain relief and healing depend on effectively restoring and promoting the free flow of vital energy within the cells and tissues of the body. This is one of the major purposes of acupuncture. How does this work?
In the science of Body Space Medicine (as taught by Dr. Zhi Chen Guo), it is stated that cells continually oscillate between contraction (yin) and expansion (yang). This vibration creates an energy field around the cell, and groups of vibrating cells collectively create fields around tissues and organs. As each cell oscillates, energy moves from within the cell out into the spaces between the cells. Many pathogenic factors cause the cell vibrations to increase, thus putting out extra energy. When the body is unable to circulate and disperse this extra energy, it accumulates and causes pain, inflammation and disease. According to Dr. Guo about 85 percent of diseases are due to too much energy accumulated in the spaces between the cells. The other 15 percent are due to too little energy between the cells. This manifests as degenerative diseases and chronic fatigue.
Soul healing helps inflamed or diseased tissues to promote powerful healing from within. This can be sufficient for healing and resolution over a period of time.
Energy medicine works toward the same purpose from the outside, and can usually accelerate results. It is well-established that application of specific frequencies of microcurrent, colors (wavelengths) of light and healing sounds can quickly relieve pain and speed up healing. Microcurrent and light are highly effective at helping clear the intercellular spaces of toxic accumulated energies and promote better fluid movements through the body's lymphatic system. Microcurrent and light therapies have also been proven to increase ATP levels within the cells, which releases added energy for circulation, repair and regeneration.
Therefore, we can see that soul healing works from the inside out to heal and clear cells and tissues, while energy medical applications work from the outside in for the same purpose. After 26 years in practice, I am very excited by the patient responses I am seeing when I combine soul healing with microlight therapy. I encourage readers who find this subject of interest to read Dr. Sha's books. Please experiment with combining the methods of soul healing taught in that book with your other clinical methods, especially the use of vibrational medical methods such as microcurrent, light and sound therapies. I welcome you to correspond with me directly on what you discover.
Click here for previous articles by Darren Starwynn, OMD, LAc.