Flesh and Stone

Public embraces holistic healing, conventional medicine follows

Kathlyn Stone — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 14:25:00 -0500

Ruth Ann Plourde suddenly interrupted the workshop as her class was trying to recreate the graceful but agonizingly slow T’ai Chi forms she’d taught moments before. “How’s the monkey chatter now?” she asked. “Are you feeling in the present?”

No doubt about that. It took all one’s concentration to put the right foot out in front, lean into it, and simultaneously do the choo-choo move with the arms. No one was thinking about irritations at work, the price of gas, or picking up the kids. At the end of the class participants said they felt focused and relaxed.

Ruth Ann Plourde, an assistant professor in the Holistic Health Studies Program at the University of St. Catherine, demonstrates T'ai Chi at Restore, a holistic health conference held in Minneapolis. Photo: K Stone

An assistant professor of holistic health at the University of St. Catherine, Plourde teaches T’ai Chi and Qigong classes and brings the exercises into the workplace through her company, “Innergize.”

She was one of more than 30 holistic health teachers giving hour-long introductory workshops and presentations at “Restore,” a conference held recently at the Aveda Institute in Minneapolis attended by several hundred women and a handful of men.

Warren King, a licensed acupuncturist and specialist in auricular medicine (based on taking cues from the energy emanating from a patient’s ears to detect and treat illness) focused much of his talk on environmental toxins and how they affect our health. “You might be taking your neighbor’s drugs,” he offered, underlining the revelation that scientists have found traces of prescription drugs in drinking water tested around the country. King believes many common illnesses can be traced to arsenic in chicken, mercury fillings in our teeth, rocket fuel in tap water, and the prevalence of parasites, particularly among travelers to the tropics. Coupled with a diet of unprocessed and simple foods, “80 to 90 percent of the time herbs or homeopathic medicine can kill off” the toxins or parasites that are causing chronic fatigue, nausea or PMS, said King.

Several healing touch practitioners volunteered to give 15-minute sessions throughout the day, including Aimee Prasek, an organizer of the event and alum of the holistic health studies program at the University of St. Catherine. Healing touch is an energy therapy that uses gentle hand techniques, on or off the body, that are thought to open the patient’s energy field and get the energy moving to accelerate healing of the body, mind and spirit.

Kathy Kerber demonstrates "healing touch" at a holistic health conference. A nurse with a master's degree in holistic health studies, Kerber uses energy healing in her practice at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis. Photo: K Stone

While some people feel no sensation under healing touch, others describe a sensation of flowing energy, relaxation, feeling supported or nurtured, and they may sense images and colors. Some patients may feel an emotional release or have a sudden insight into their lives. And some might elicit an unexpected stomach gurgling or need to cough during an energy session. “That’s typical,” said Prasek. “Things are opening up and moving around.”

Patients and healthy individuals have been turning to alternative healing methods such as energy work, meditation and yoga for years, and in the case of chiropractic, for decades. Now conventional Western medicine is getting on board with what it calls “complementary and alternative medicine” or “CAM.” (The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine defines CAM as "a group of diverse medical and health care systems, practices, and products that are not presently considered to be part of conventional medicine.") The NCCAM estimates that 36 percent of American adults are using some form of CAM. When megavitamin therapy and prayer specifically for health reasons are included, that number rises to 62 percent.

Conventional or not, most leading teaching hospitals and major universities in the United States now offer CAM training programs and despite tighter budgets, hospitals across the country are launching new holistic healing centers for patient care. Sponsors of Restore included the University of Minnesota, the Mayo Clinic, Abbott Northwestern, and the University of St. Catherine, among two dozen other CAM-focused organizations and businesses.

Brent Bauer, MD, director of the Mayo Clinic’s Complimentary and Integrative Medicine program, said “physicians are slowly coming around” to acknowledging the benefits of CAM. He highlighted key findings of published studies undertaken by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, Mayo Clinic, MD Anderson Cancer Center, and other giants in health care research that provide evidence that alternative health therapies like acupuncture, meditation and yoga help reduce pain, improve overall quality of life, and reduce stress. That’s significant since stress is accepted as a leading contributor to many diseases as well as premature aging.

Most traditional medicine practitioners are unwilling to say that CAM does more than reduce stress because it’s currently next to impossible to gather evidence, measure, or quantify changes that take place during alternative healing, especially those based on moving one’s energy field.

Taking the leap of experiencing a healing modality such as healing touch, Qigong or acupuncture requires an open mind, but not a leap of faith nor a turning away from conventional medicine. In fact, many nurses and a growing number of doctors are trained in CAM therapies and offer them in their practices. Almost everyone approaches their first energy healing session with some skepticism. We’ve been programmed that illnesses and injuries are treated with surgery and drugs. There’s been little advocacy of preventative health care beyond the fundamentals of eating a healthy diet and getting adequate exercise.

So now CAM is coming into the mainstream and conventional medicine is following the trend. Might we soon see national TV ads for FDA-approved natural herbs, 1-800 phone healings and meditations that will help you reach a state of non-thinking bliss alongside the ads for Cialis?

Heal your body by giving voice to your soul: An interview with John Fox

Kathlyn Stone — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 23:30:00 -0500

John Fox is a certified poetry therapist, an adjunct associate professor at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, and author of two books on poetry and healing. He founded the Institute for Poetic Medicine in 2005 after two decades of engaging people with poetry as a healing tool. He has led poetic medicine workshops in seven countries for both general and special audiences. Fox says poetry therapy is "the intentional use of poetry and other forms of literature for healing and personal growth."

What is the Institute for Poetic Medicine?

It’s a nonprofit I founded three years ago. It’s an outgrowth of my work over the past 20 to 25 years of working with people using poetry as a healing path, a healing modality. Over the years I’ve seen the value that poetry has to help people dealing with a range of issues — cancer, loss, veterans dealing with trauma, and for people in the medical profession to help them stay connected to the human side of what healing is meant to be about, the pastoral people who are wanting to make a genuine, authentic connection with the people they work with. But what I didn’t have in this work was a container to be able to tell these various stories, and be able to draw support from others who could be involved in it. There are many people doing this kind of work in very creative ways that I am not, and so I want the Institute to be about more than me.

How many people have gone through your workshops?

In the course of a year -- a couple thousand people.

When in Minnesota earlier this year you presented at universities and Hope Lodge, sponsored by the American Cancer Society.

Yes, I held public workshops at Macalester College and the College of St. Catherine’s. I also did a workshop for students and staff of St. Catherine’s Graduate School of Holistic Studies and Century College. We did two workshops at Hope Lodge where people stay in residence while undergoing cancer therapy.

It seems many universities now have wellness and spirituality studies. That’s a fairly new development, isn’t it?

It’s been a new phenomenon over the past five to ten years. That’s in addition to the integrative medicine and medical humanities programs in medical schools which have been around a bit longer.

Why has there been that change? Do you think people are recognizing results from spiritual healing aspects that weren’t given credence before?

It’s been in the culture for a long time, but academic institutions -- partly because of research that’s been done that gives credence to these alternative methods and techniques -- are becoming more open to them, along with the students and people who want these things.

As we become more technological and as healthcare becomes more of a business run by HMOs, the patient becomes secondary to the financial considerations. The response has been that there’s got to be some kind of empowerment of people so we don't lose sight of what healing is really about. That’s true for both the holistic programs that are happening in colleges and universities and also in medical humanities where complementary programs are also being offered in the training of doctors.

It’s a difficult time right now. When there are financial difficulties holistic and complementary programs tend to be let go first. It’s important that people make it known that these are essential for the process of our healing, and these programs allow for that.

I think you’re aware of the work of James Pennebaker in a field that he calls “expressive writing.” Pennebaker’s clinical research has found that when people write their raw emotions down, even in a very prescribed, specific timeframe, their immune system function is enhanced. They’ve done double-blind studies with people with asthma and their symptoms may improve as much as 17 percent through writing.

Visionary people who are working in the field of health also realize this and they’re willing to work to include these tools.

Is there an association that accredits poetry therapists?

Yes, just like there is for art or dance or drama or music or psychodrama, there’s a field with a course of study with history, research and a training program in poetry therapy. The organization is the National Association for Poetry Therapy. The training organization for that is a separate entity called the Federation for Biblio/Poetry Therapy.

But I’ll add that people who are involved in healthcare, pastoral care, are doing therapeutic work, or are community activists who bring poetry into halfway houses or prisons, do fine work. I don't think it’s an absolute requirement that somebody receive training in poetry therapy.

Poetry therapy sort of coalesced into a field in 1981 and I came along about three years later. Poetry therapy is like the younger sibling of all the creative art therapies like dance, drama, music and art. They’ve been around longer.

There’s no full course that you can attend at a university for poetry therapy, so you work with a mentor and then take courses that fit the requirements.

Tell me about the film Healing Words: Poetry in the Art of Medicine that's been airing on PBS stations.

Healing Words is a film made by a physician, Dr. David Watts, at the University of California-San Francisco, working with a wonderful team of filmmakers. They followed me to Shands Hospital in Gainesville, Florida, where they’ve had a very well-developed arts and medicine program for about 16 years. Artists on the hospital staff bring dance, music, art and drama to the patients. People also do oral histories and creative writing. I’ve been bringing in poetry when I go there. Two filmmakers documented my work with patients and conversations with doctors and the patients about why poetry was helpful to them.

What led you into this type of work?

Well, a number of really strong threads were working for me in the past. I always enjoyed writing, even when I was a child. I liked to write stories, and I liked to make things and put things together. In fifth grade I started a little newspaper called the 005 Press. This was about 1967, you know, so it was like James Bond was there.

I had reporters getting sports stories. It had jokes. Somebody wrote a little mystery.

I loved writing and in eleventh grade decided to go to school to be a writer. I applied to Boston University because they had a good writing program. George Starbuck, former director at the University of Iowa, was there. The poet Anne Sexton was there. I didn’t know about her difficulties, but the second year that I was at BU, she had committed suicide. At the same time, the situation with my leg had gotten much more difficult, and I was faced with a decision to have my leg amputated.

It was between my freshman and sophomore years that I was faced with this, and writing became very important. I was able to write about some really difficult things. It seemed different than going to work on a poem for the craft of it or get it in a workshop.

About five years after completing my degree in English and creative writing I met Stephen Levine who was working with people dealing with issues of death and dying and loss, and he helped me a lot with the loss of my leg. At the same time he gave me the opportunity to read some poems at some of his retreats. At one of the retreats I met a physician who told me about this field and introduced me to a wonderful person, Joy Shieman, who worked at El Camino Hospital.

She was designated as a training mentor by the Poetry Therapy Association at that time. I worked with her for about two-and-a-half years and that focused how I wanted to work with poetry.

She gave me the tools. She gave me a sense of a way to approach it. Even though I ended up doing it in a somewhat different fashion, it was certainly a good start.

It wasn’t until later than I could fully develop my own way.

It’s so personal, and I strove to make it authentic for myself which I think helps other people make it that way for themselves. Although I don't do meditation when I’m doing poetry therapy, learning how to meditate made a difference in learning how to listen and not rush in to make changes or put in my two cents. I just let people discover it for themselves.

Who do you think it can most benefit?

It’s so useful to all kinds of people. Those who are going toward retirement and feeling that they’re not quite sure what their life is about or who they are have found it a tool. It’s most helpful to people who can experience their own writing, and listen to themselves and notice how they’re discovering something which they hadn’t really taken time for before, and also hear others in a way that brings more meaning to their lives, and they decide to keep with it.

I just got an email from a woman who’s a minister at a church here in Minneapolis. She wrote and said, “You know, the workshop really inspired me. It reminded me of 10 years ago when I was faced with a real crisis, that poetry really helped me, and now I want to bring this into my work with others.” It helps most the people who decide to make it their own.

There’s a group of women veterans in Atlanta. A teacher who had taken one of my workshops got in touch with a psychotherapist working with them and they decided to work together on writing with the group. About a year ago I went and did a workshop with them. These are women who had been through a lot of trauma but they wanted to share with other women veterans the value that writing had brought to them. After a time they decided to form a group, called the Women Veterans Writers Collective. They were able to get some funding and to create a publication. So they made it their own and decided to do something with it.

I heard from a woman in Ontario, Canada, working with people suffering from Alzheimer’s and dementia, who uses Haiku. Haiku is a short form of a poem. It’s just 17 syllables, 3 lines. The people are making their own Haiku, and then seeing it in a published form. And it can make a difference if, even for a short while, for a moment, they get a sense of joy from having their voices heard.

I think it is especially effective for people who are dealing with illness and perhaps feeling disempowered and overwhelmed from having to go through treatments and a hospital system that would often treat them like a disease rather than a person.

If someone will listen to you and hear what your fears are you can release it and just let go of it. You can discover things you didn’t know before you wrote and read the poem. An insight may come.

When Someone Deeply Listens to You

When someone deeply listens to you

it is like holding out a dented cup

you’ve had since childhood

and watching it fill up

with cold, fresh water.

When it balances on top of the brim,

you are understood.

When it overflows and touches your skin,

you are loved.

When someone deeply listens to you,

the room where you stay

starts a new life

and the place where you wrote

your first poem

begins to glow in your mind’s eye.

It is as if gold has been discovered!

When someone deeply listens to you,

your bare feet are on the earth

and a beloved land that seemed distant

is now at home within you.

— John Fox

More poems by John Fox.

Interview conducted, edited and condensed by Kathlyn Stone

A relationship journey to wholeness

Kathlyn Stone — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 12:40:00 -0500

 Image: CC DerrikT

"Relationships are work because they relate to creating a third entity and they are not about personal benefits." -- Bernie Siegel MD

Pam and I have had more than 25 years together to work on the third entity described by Dr. Siegel. From our first date we seemed to share a deep connection. At the end of that date we sat for a half hour in my car in front of her apartment, with the street light illuminating our faces. We looked deeply into each others’ eyes and there was a language of the soul occurring -- a recognition.

"Over time, however, as often happens in relationships, some of those same things that attracted me to her started to drive me crazy."

I was attracted to Pam on many levels. Over time, however, as often happens in relationships, some of those same things that attracted me to her started to drive me crazy. She was so sweet and nice and agreeable, which eventually became aggravating because she wouldn't offer a strong opinion. I liked to make fast decisions and talk about things; she liked to keep her own council and mull things over, occasionally sharing her conclusions with me days later. Sometimes I could have shaken her to get those words to spill out! This was just the beginning of my education in learning patience and trust in another's style of communication.

I came from a family that would fight about everything. Pam's family, on the other hand, never fought. In fact, they were hesitant to express any strong feelings, even affection.

As you can imagine, this made early fights between Pam and I quite interesting, with me yelling and stomping like Yosemite Sam (from the cartoons) and Pam standing there like Bugs Bunny, pretending to ignore me while she chewed a proverbial carrot. This, of course, made me even angrier. “Come fight, show me who you are, show me you care!” I thought that was the purpose of fighting.

One of the first and most important things a couple needs to learn is how to fight. We carry with us what we learned from our parents, and this third entity, the relationship, needs to develop its own way of resolving conflict. Pam and I learned how to fight in a way that worked for both of us. I helped Pam to demonstrate her anger. Previously she would swallow her anger, and it would come out sideways.

As Pam learned to be passionate in her anger, I remember my shock and glee the first time she told me to ‘shove it.’ I couldn't help but smile, which made her even angrier. She was out of the closet! Conversely, she helped me learn to create a pause between an event and expressing my anger, to hold my tongue and let the thunder roll in the clouds of my mind instead of reactively striking out at the people around me, often out of proportion to the event itself. Most importantly, this helped me reduce the need to be right all the time.

Being young when we met, we each had natural strengths as well as underdeveloped areas, and our pieces seemed to fit together well. Eventually, I focused more on my career and ran the financial part of our relationship, and Pam, especially once the girls came, focused more on the house and kids.

After our first daughter arrived, Pam attempted to go back to work full-time teaching German and being a housemaster at a boarding high school. Both our jobs required long days and carried a lot of stress, and it quickly became apparent that we were all miserable. One morning as I dropped our four-month-old daughter off at day care, I saw the fear in her eyes as we headed inside. And my heart said, 'This must end.' My brain's concern about financial stability was overruled and we chose to leap into a new family dynamic. Pam resigned the next day, only staying until they could find a replacement. We even took the leap of buying our first house, a huge financial commitment, at the same time we would lose Pam's income.

As often happens when we make tough decisions for the right reasons, Pam loved being a stay-at-home mom, our daughters thrived for having her home with them, and I quickly was promoted and made more money than we had ever made combined.

Yet, we were still not whole in and of ourselves because we depended on the other with attachment, expecting each other to fulfill our assigned societal roles in certain ways. Pam and I each took on responsibility for things that the other felt less inclined to do, or perhaps felt inadequate to do. So if the children were sick, Pam would be the one to stay up with them all night because I had to head off to work the next morning, and frankly, I was glad for this excuse.

As our girls grew older, Pam became a life coach, and moved in new directions beyond home and family. A large part of my identity had been tied up in being a professional money manager, which I loved, and yet the time came when I knew it was time for me to leave that role. Despite the significant ramifications this had for our lifestyle, Pam whole heartedly supported this life-change. As a life coach who advocated trusting one's inner guidance and following one's heart, she trusted that things would indeed work out, even though it wasn't obvious just how at that point. Yet she also supported this in part because she no longer wanted to be married to "an empty suit" -- even if it was hand-tailored and fit the societal norms.

From that point forward, our journey toward wholeness accelerated. We've reconsidered who does what from a pragmatic view, and have shifted what society might define as roles for husbands and wives. I do healing work, lead workshops, and drive the children to school and on field trips, while doing more of the domestic chores. Pam is a business coach and earns the majority of the money that supports our family. She now handles all of our financial matters, from paying bills to doing taxes. This is what our relationship offered us, the opportunity to reclaim aspects of ourselves that had not previously been tapped. This greater access to expanded definitions of who we are and what is possible created more balance inside each of us and within the relationship -- a richer expression of the potential in all three entities.

Ironically, as we become more whole, we need each other less, yet want each other more. Our relationship isn't based on attachment or fear, but on co-creation. We are mirrors for each other, reflecting back what is inside of us.

David Nelson is a Reiki and Qigong practitioner and wellness coach based in Minneapolis, MN.

Energy healer David Nelson explains Qigong to a novice

Kathlyn Stone — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 20:16:00 -0600

Back in 1984, Minnesota medical device and technology companies, health plans and insurance companies, hospitals and consultants of all kinds, formed a trade association, named it Medical Alley, and planned to create an ambiance about the technology rich region that would capture the imagination of people around the world. They dubbed the state: “Health Care’s Silicon Valley.”

Today Minnesota seems to be a growing hub for a new kind of medicine: Qigong. Master Chunyi Lin’s Spring Forest Qigong school and clinic based in Eden Prairie draws people from around the country. The National Qigong Association is headquartered here, there are many private practitioners, courses for credit at Normandale and Anoka-Ramsey Community Colleges, and you can find Qigong offered at alternative health clinics. The University of Minnesota Center for Spirituality and Healing’s web site features Qigong and other mind-body therapies. Researchers at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester have found Qigong effective for patients with depression, arthritis and other illnesses. I asked David Nelson, a Qigong energy healer and wellness coach, to explain what it means.

What is Qigong?

Qigong, a form of traditional Chinese medicine, was founded about 7,000 years ago. Qi, pronounced ‘chee,’ refers to the energy that flows through all things in the universe. Gong, pronounced ‘gung,’ means skill or steady practice. Qigong combines physical exercise, meditation and energy to remove energy blockages within the body and to help the body’s energy flow. Helping energy move in a natural fashion allows the body to heal itself and increase one’s energy. Ten thousand years ago, of course, there were no modern Western medical devices or techniques. This is how people adapted and lived and, in combination with herbs, healed injuries, recovered from disease and increased their vitality.

That sounds like free universal health care. How did you come to practice it and use it to help others?

For 20 years after college I was a banker, left-brained, intellectual. I didn’t understand, didn’t want to understand, and viewed somewhat suspiciously, the types of things that I’m now doing. But I started to explore what my purpose is on earth. One of the things I was exposed to was Reiki, which is a Japanese energy or healing art. I was taught Reiki by Catholic nuns at a university in Cleveland. Quite to my surprise, I found that I could feel this energy that could not be seen or measured or tested in any other way, and I could also move this energy. It was quite a wonderful experience and also a little disconcerting.

Shortly after that, I realized it was time to leave banking. I went through a period of reintegration and letting go of who I was before, and accepting who I am now. I spent a two-year mentorship with a man who does healing “earth work,” by the name of Warren Grossman, who’s written a beautiful book called “To Be Healed by the Earth.”

Back in Cleveland I had learned there was a master Qigong teacher here, and a number of different people I met either took one of his classes or had a healing session with him and spoke quite highly of it. It sounded intriguing so after we moved back to Minnesota I signed up to a attend a class at Spring Forest Qigong, which is the name of Master Chunyi Lin’s school in Eden Prairie, a Twin Cities suburb, and he offers courses through Normandale Community College.

I found Qigong fit very seamlessly for me between Reiki and earthwork. Qigong helped fill the middle even stronger. Earthwork, which is also my daily practice, helps me ground, get centered and connect to the energy. Qigong, even more than Reiki, allows me to integrate stronger with higher vibrational energies -- the universe’s energy --and bring it present when I do an energy session with someone. Master Lin’s Qigong technique incorporates the wisdom of a number of different masters he had in China. But in China Qigong is a very ritualistic, master-student relationship that lasts for 20 or even 40 years. Master Lin’s inspiration was to synthesize the wisdom of these different Masters and simplify the techniques to make them obtainable for everyone. His vision is that everyone can do this, that everyone is a healer and has the capacity to heal themselves or help others.

How long did you train, or how long have you been practicing? Better yet, what do you consider it, training or practicing or both?

Both. I’ve completed all four levels of Spring Forest Qigong. The higher levels tend to be for people who want to incorporate this into their practice or what they’re doing as far as trying to help others.

Can anyone do it?

Absolutely. One of the things I like about Spring Forest Qigong is anyone can learn this; it’s available to all of us. With some awareness, attention, and focus, we can actually become quite good at this. For example, I worked with a fourth grade school class on just some basic Qigong techniques, and things they can do when they have an injury in their arm to help make their arm feel better. And these kids immediately picked up on the technique and felt the difference in their own body. So even children have the availability -- maybe more so -- because their minds are more open to quickly pick this up. Master Lin repeatedly says about Qigong: “All we ever needed to know we learned in Level One.” So the other levels are to deepen the experiences, pay attention to them, and go more into them. This is very accessible and easy to understand if you come with an open mind and are willing to experience it for yourself. And there are CDs, DVDs and books available, by the way, for people who want to learn but can’t attend the class.

You’ve lived in far-flung places like Cleveland and New Zealand. Do you think it’s more popular here than other places?

There are many Qigong teachers here in the area, but if they’re not directly related to Master Lin, typically their focus is less on the energetic or healing aspects of Qigong and more into the practice as exercise, like Tai Chi. Spring Forest Qigong is unique. It just happens to be based here in the Twin Cities, but it’s really his creation from information he’s received from a lot of different sources, and he makes it very approachable and understandable for us Westerners.

If someone just heard about Qigong and wanted to pursue it, how would you recommend getting started?

First, I would recommend they experience a Qigong session. They could go to Spring Forest Qigong or come to someone like me who’s trained in Spring Forest Qigong. They could attend courses and gain some hands-on experience in actually doing it, and also practice exercises found in textbooks and CDs. You can and take this and apply it to your life. Master Lin is very good at saying, “Feel free to adapt this, take this, fit it into what you’re already doing,” and “find the parts that work for you.” He doesn’t believe that you have to do it just his way, but he shows what he has found powerful and effective for him. Typically, my wife, Pam, who is a life coach, and I do workshops and retreats. The idea is to give people exposure to these areas that are not traditionally shared or taught in Western society, especially in America, even though all this wisdom has come from Japan, China and India. These cultures have thousands of years of experience of having awareness of energy flows, their bodies, and the earth. Much of the vocabulary and techniques come from these cultures because Westerners don’t even have a word for it. Going to a workshop or a retreat gives you an opportunity to become aware of the energy, try it on, and see how it works for you. The same rules should apply: adapt it, change it, or don’t use it, whatever feels right for you, but at least there’s a sense of awareness and that’s very empowering. We like to focus on self-awareness and self-empowerment that allows people to increase and tap into their own wisdom to help themselves and those around them.

As far as health benefits, what are some of the things people typically want help with?

Energy healing works on the spiritual, physical and emotional and mental levels. It is very unlike seeing a medical doctor, because this is not a medical treatment, and it’s unlike seeing a counselor or a psychiatrist. It’s quite an amazing thing, it’s sort of a mystery to us all. Yet it’s really quite beautiful and the bottom line is people benefit from this. Some people with cancer who are going through chemotherapy or radiation find getting a Qigong or Reiki session helps support them while they’re getting their medical treatments. Energy work helps their body feel stronger and more vital and helps achieve more balance. Like Tai Chi exercise or meditation, Qigong helps us stay more centered and grounded and have some balance in our lives. When we get out of balance and especially when we’re in a state of fear from pain or illness or a big life change, we really need some support. My sense is this energetic support is pretty crucial, and is very clean, and so it’s not like there has to be a long-term relationship or there’s anything you have to take or anything you have to buy, you just need to show up, be present, and allow yourself to experience whatever you need to experience. For people who are looking to complement and support what else they’re doing, this ends up being a very positive and empowering experience. In my experience, when people come in during a time of need or a crisis, more often than not some thought or emotion seems to have some tie-in to their physical issues. If my knee hurts it may be that my body is trying to get my attention. If I get some support with it I can help keep that knee functioning. That’s the deeper aspect of this and where I think it differs from Western medicine which is much more dealing with symptoms and physical causes and cause and effect, whereas this is much more of an art than a science where there’s a level of mystery and beauty, and divinity, for lack of a better word, occurring.

My sense of healing is not as a curing of physical symptoms, but more a sense of well-being, wholeness and empowerment. Our bodies seem to be great mirrors and maybe even canaries in the coal mine to let us know when things are a little out of whack somewhere. We need to be aware that our thoughts and emotions contribute to that as much as slipping on ice, or car accidents and things. My basic understanding is that healing is a more complex relationship than I was led to believe when I was growing up.

There’s a lot of discussion about the mind-body connection, and there are still many mysteries about the brain. We don’t understand how some things work and it’s been called “the last frontier” of science.

This is the cutting edge area. The tough part for Western scientific minds when talking about energy work is that it’s very hard for any instrument to measure it. We are getting some techniques, some research that does measure blood pressure, temperature changes, changes in brain activity. But this is a very subtle energy and difficult to measure using traditional instruments. Dr. Bruce Lipton, a biologist and Stanford researcher, authored a book called “The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Conciousness, Matter and Miracles” that I recommend to everyone. Lipton has come to understand cells and genes from a perspective that is very different from traditional scientific belief. His research found that genes can be turned off and on by environmental signals, including thoughts, feelings and emotions. We’re starting to realize that humans are a whole being. We are affected by our environment and by what we eat, by exercising, by stress, and by thoughts and emotions. We need to look at ourselves on all those levels. If there’s a behavior we want to change, energy work can support that exploration and wisdom and also supply some energy to take the place of the behavior we want to change. It’s really quite beautiful and exciting and complex, and there’s more to come. And science is, in some ways, starting to explore and catch up with what people in the East have known for centuries. It’s neat to see this synergy occurring.

How does Qigong differ from Reiki, healing touch, or any of the other energy modalities?

I’ve been trained in three different energy modalities and I’ve had exposure to probably five others. My sense is that they all get you to the same place. It’s really no different than one person enjoying the Salsa and one person enjoying the Waltz, it’s still dancing, and it’s what moves and works for you. I encourage people who are looking to explore this to try a couple different ways and see which ones speaks to them, and they’re most comfortable doing. Do some reading, ask some questions, and ask friends who maybe have done it. The provider of these services makes a big difference also. You know, we all try to stay very clean and just allow the energy to flow through us to benefit the person but there is a perfume or a sweetness or an essence that is also transmitted in the relationship. You need to be one with somebody that you trust and connect with, and that gives you results. When you’re done the session with them, you feel more peaceful, enlivened and aware.

How do people locate Qigong practitioners?

Referrals from other people is probably one of the best ways, and sometimes you have to rely on ads or searching on the Internet. Qigong right now is less known, less publicized and less available than say Reiki or healing touch. There are quite a few Reiki practitioners and others who do energy work. Lots of nurses study and practice healing touch and Reiki, and we’re starting to see more blending of traditional and alternative approaches to our overall well being. One of my goals is to make it better known in the mainstream. I think it’s becoming more accepted in our society, even in the medical profession. Some research has found Reiki, meditations and prayers to aid healing following operations.

I like the way you haven’t oversold the ability of energy practitioners or healers, or what I am coming to view as ‘awareness coaches.’ How can people guard against those practitioners that make claims like: “I guarantee you’re going to feel better, you’re going to do this and that…”

One of the first things I’d encourage people to do is to trust their heart. Almost all of us have a gut sense or a instinctual sense, a feeling that occurs. But often we let our brains talk us out of what we feel to be true. What we emphasize at our workshops and retreats is getting in touch with your wisdom. So that would be number one. Two, anytime you feel uncomfortable with the person, including in the middle of the session, you stop the session and you get up and leave, because whatever the reason is, you’re uncomfortable. You don’t have to make any excuses. Anytime you run into somebody who thinks they have all the answers and they know what’s best for you and they say, “You must come to me to get better or feel good” I would view it with suspicion. When somebody is more interested in keeping the knowledge and the power and there’s less for you then I think that’s something to be concerned about I often find people receive inspiration about themselves, their body or their life while we’re working together. But they’re receiving it, they’re getting it, you know. I may ask a question but I try not to label or diagnose or do anything that would be misperceived as me being an authority on you. You’re the authority on you. And I’m here to help you be more in touch with that.

Interview conducted and condensed by Kathlyn Stone

Divine Will

Kathlyn Stone — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 03:52:00 -0500

Our snow white cat, Will, drops his leather mouse at my feet, begging me to throw it so he can do the chase, and return the mouse to me.

Could this be an analogy for my relationship to the Divine?

Will soars over the couch, flying only in pursuit. Does God enjoy the toss and return as much as I do?

Do I go seek, and after I claim what God has spun off, proudly carry it back to God, and beg to let me seek it again? The co-creation of the experience is a joy that I sometimes misinterpret as a challenge.

Now Will slides his mouse underneath the love seat. He creates the challenge of fishing it out with one claw, but he often pushes it too far out of reach, and comes to me, complaining and wanting me to solve this self-induced problem.

Does my ego hide my treasures under similar seemingly insurmountable obstacles? Unlike Will, I've come to understand that the man in the chair, the love seat, the mouse and the cat are all made up of the same Divine energy. This energy may change form, but is always part of the whole.

I discovered that I was a healer under my own personal "love seat," and others helped me get it out from deep underneath the couch. But I'd shove it away from time to time, considering it something to play with, rather than something to integrate it into who I am. After 20 years as a successful banker, I was as surprised as anyone to find that "healer" was my mouse -- my path and my connection to the Divine.

As a healer, I must feel and know my connection to all things. I feel that I am part of the Earth, and it's a part of me; that I'm connected to others and the universe. "Healer" is a misnomer term for this role. "Healing midwife" is closer, reflecting the divine feminine present in the art of healing, helping to birth the healing process inside all of us. Or is it closer to "animal husbandry?" As a man do I bring healing husbandry, lending guidance and support to the healing process?

I also teach grounding, the practice of connecting one's energy to the Earth's energy. I struggled to find a term to describe this, finally turning one day in exasperation to my teenage daughter, who said simply, "Why Dad, you're an earth mentor." That's a better term than I could have come up with. This connecting to something larger than ourselves is key to knowing that we don't have to be in control all the time, and we are supported. The simple process of consciously connecting and trusting

I cannot heal without my heart open and full of this energy; nor can you. The goal is to help open any blockages to this natural flow of energy in the body, and support the opening of the heart. One of the benefits is that the surrender and trust that comes from connecting with the Earth allows the heart to open. This is essential.

When we lose sight of the truth underlying this game of go seek, we need to remember the essence of who we are and our connections to all things. It is a glorious connection available to all things.

As if on cue, Will, paying attention to his own inner rhythms, curls up on my lap and begins to purr.

David Nelson, EarthMentor, is a Reiki and Qigong practitioner and wellness coach based in Minneapolis, MN. A former banker, he has experienced the longest journey - the journey from the head to the heart - and feels blessed to now be able to support and empower others in their own personal journeys. For more information visit www.icoachlife.com.

PBS to air 'Healing Words: Poetry & Medicine' this summer

Kathlyn Stone — Mon, 05 May 2008 07:10:00 -0500

A growing body of medical studies, including one recently published in The Oncologist journal, demonstrate that writing helps patients change their thoughts about their illness and can help improve their quality of life.

The documentary Healing Words: Poetry & Medicine shows the power of poem-making in action while Dr. John Graham-Pole, a pediatric oncologist and professor of pediatrics at the University of Florida in Gainesville, and poetry therapist John Fox worked as a team helping patients write poems at Shands Hospital in Gainesville.

Fox is the author of Finding What You Didn't Lose: Expressing Your Truth and Creativity Through Poem-Making and Poetic Medicine: The Healing Art of Poem-Making. He founded the Institute for Poetic Medicine.

The producer is David Watts, MD, a clinical professor of medicine at the University of California-San Francisco, a TV host and producer, and a published poet.

The documentary will be fed by satellite to PBS stations across the country for broadcast on July 1. To see if your local PBS affiliate is airing the program visit PBS.org. You can request that your local station broadcast the documentary on July 1 or tape it for presentation later.

A film trailer is on the Poetic Medicine website.