Jul
Beyond the Clinic and Into the Realm of Uncommon Healing
Since I got sick many years ago, I have been on a learning journey and a quest for true healing. Although I healed my body and transformed my life, I continued this quest over the years … seeking new ways, old ways, and the best ways to heal the body, mind, heart, and spirit. This seeking and hunger for truth and healing led me to study Traditional Chinese Medicine, healing plants and foods, acupuncture and bodywork, Ayurveda, detoxification, fasting, and so many other modalities. The more I learned and the healthier I got, the more I was drawn away from the world that I knew and was drawn more and more into the depths of nature.
In 2005 I moved to the tropical rainforest of Costa Rica. During my first year, I lived in the center of the forest where there were no roads, and there was no electricity. I lived in a land thick with wildlife such as jaguars, monkeys, sloths, and parrots. I indulged in this exotic experience and I learned all I could from the local people. I learned how to stay strong and healthy in the forest. I learned how to heal the infections and illnesses that so often plagued the foreigners that visited these lands. This onsite and out of the ordinary way of learning lit a flame in me that burned hot for more.
The eternal student in me grew in curiosity and excitement, which helped lead me to indigenous traditions and ancient wisdom of the tribal cultures of the Americas. In 2007 I drank my first cup of Ayahuasca with a Peruvian medicine woman, in a mountain cave nestled behind a giant waterfall. That experience opened my eyes to possibilities for healing I had never known before. Although I had been on the path of conscious spiritual awakening for many years, this was the first time I saw such an obvious connection between spiritual, emotional, and physical healing. After 3 consecutive nights drinking ayahuasca in that sacred space, my life was forever changed.
Once I had a taste for these new dimensions of healing, the seeker in me was more excited than ever to dive deeper into the mysteries, and hopefully find that golden gem capable of healing all ills known to humankind. I have a huge humanitarian heart and a mission-based outlook on life. I have always felt that I am here to help heal the masses and restore peace of Earth. I even feel that my own illnesses were blessings in disguise - to help set me on the path of healing and learning, to initiate healing in myself and others.
Over the years that followed those auspicious days in the cave, I sought out every opportunity I could to learn from indigenous cultures and experience their traditions and medicines for healing. Although I still love and respect all the formative influences of my early healing arts education, I quickly awakened to the understanding that unless we incorporate spiritual healing, the healing is not complete. I saw time and time again, what some may consider miracles - as bodies were sometimes instantly healed after a spiritual healing took place. I learned of powerful medicines from deep in the forests and the sacred ceremonies and songs that have supported the use of these ambassadors of healing and transformation.
We live in a time when bridges are being made to connect us to ancient wisdom. We live in a time when many of the people of Earth are suffering and sick. This sickness has spilled over onto nature and we have witnessed the rapid destruction and contamination of our natural environment. As the forests are being cut, we risk not only the loss of wildlife and precious natural resources, but we also risk losing the wisdom of how to heal humanity and stop the destruction that could terminate our existence. Deep in these forests, with traditions and wisdom spanning back for uncountable ages, are cultures of wisdom keepers who hold the keys for unlocking the healing that is needed most at this time. These warriors of light and guardians of truth, have protected many sacred medicines and healing modalities that have the potential for true holistic healing - physical and spiritual.
The more I learn of these traditions, and the more I have the honour to witness and experience them, I grow in awe and respect. I have seen people heal illnesses and maladies that they were told may be “incurable.” Where modern science failed, I saw nature and spirit heal. When nature and spirit come together, true transformation is inevitable. This is what the ancient wisdom keepers understand. This is what the most potent of healing medicines of Mother Earth are showing us. The greatest and most powerful healing happens when we return to our true nature, when we align with nature, when we call in our spirit, and cleanse ourselves of all that is not true. Sickness in the body is only trying to tell us that we need to change our path … that we need to heal our soul.
As I see this truth more and more clearly, I can't help to realize that this is one of nature's built in defense mechanisms. If humanity is fully healed - body, mind, heart, and spirit - the destruction of nature will stop. As we allow ourselves to be fully healed, we create lifestyles that are in respectful alignment with nature. There is no separation. We are children of Earth. Our healing is Her healing. For us to be healed we need Her medicine. It is an intrinsic and symbiotic relationship. Far beyond the halls of hospitals and the classrooms of intellectual study, the golden gems and makers of miracles can be found far off the beaten path … down corridors of living emerald vibrance and amongst the traditions of ancient indigenous ways.
“The human spirit needs places where nature has not been rearranged by the hands of man” - unknown
“I believe that ancient tribal cultures have important lessons to teach the rest of the world about the inter-connectedness of all living things and the simple fact that our very existence is dependent upon the natural world we have been rapidly destroying.” - Cherokee Chief, Wilma Mankiller
