Emotional
Transformation
& Cellular Healing
BY KEVIN BILLETT
First Published In 'Positive Health' Magazine (Feb. 1999)
There
is a myth passed down through the ages that if you are sick
you must have done something wrong. Religions have fostered
the idea for millennia. In The Bible, when people were 'struck
down' with diseases, it was believed to be God's punishment
for some sin committed. In the Middle Ages, society, including
your own family often shunned you if you were ill- believing
you to he guilty and cursed by God.
And even in this more 'enlightened' age, the myth is
perpetuated in a different form. The belief that we are to
blame for our sickness is still endemic, but it's no longer
God who is punishing us. We are doing it to ourselves through
our unhealthy thoughts or negative emotions. Certainly, there
is a lot of evidence to corroborate this belief.
Psycho-neuro immuriology research has produced compelling
evidence that our thought patterns directly and instantaneously
affect our whole body chemistry and can suppress our immune
system. We all 'know' that angry people get more heart attacks,
and stressed-out people get ulcers.
Only happy is healthy, and some evidence even links fear or
resentment to cancer. So, if all these intense emotions can
create disease, is it healthy to even think or feel anything
negative? So much of modem personal growth and mind-body healing
therapies focus on ridding ourselves of these dangerous, thoughts
and emotions. In Neuro-Linguistic programming we learn to
re-frame them, make them seem smaller or defocused and push
them away. In creative visualisation we are taught to picture
positive thoughts instead of negative ones. Some therapists
believe in the power of affirmations, of repeating positive
statements to ourselves. Others teach the efficacy of meditation
as a mind stilling practice. Some workshops offer emotional
catharsis, while others focus on analysing and identifying
who is to blame for why you feel the way you do. It is all
about getting rid of negative thoughts and emotions.
But
why is it that people who do all of these things still get
sick? Why is it that someone who feels balanced, centred and
fulfilled, one who is eating healthily and getting fresh air
and exercise can still get cancer? If our current thoughts
and feelings are the cause of disease, how then can disease
strike down someone at the peak of good health?
A
person who has had first-hand experience of this is Brandon
Bays, having been one of those who had 'done everything right`.
She had been in the alternative healthcare profession for
12 years, and was teaching nutrition, health and well being.
She ate a healthy vegetarian diet, exercised daily, lived
in a sea-front cottage, breathed fresh air and drank only
purified water. More important, she was fulfilled in her 18
year old marriage, and felt deeply at peace with herself.
Yet, in 1992 she was diagnosed with a tumour 'the size of
a basketball'. She says, "I was forced to go beyond everything
I had learned in the alternative field - it clearly hadn't
been the complete answer. I was driven to look beneath the
surface for something deeper. And I was catapulted into, a
soul searching, and ultimately freeing healing process.
"I underwent a profound process of introspection. To my surprise
I discovered that stored inside the tumour was an old unresolved
traumatic memory from my childhood. Through a powerful process,
I was able to finally face, resolve, forgive and complete
that old issue. When it was complete my body went about the
natural process of healing on its own. I didn’t have to visualise
the tumour gone, make affirmations about it or reframe my
emotions. It had absolutely nothing to do with my current
diet, lifestyle, thoughts or emotions”. Six and a half weeks
later, she was pronounced ‘textbook perfect clean’, tumour
free. She had taken no drugs, and had undergone no surgery.
"I cannot tell anyone how to heal. Part of the healing process
is that each of us or her own truth" What Brandon thinks she
may have experienced was the effect of cell memory. In 1989,
Dr Deepak Chopra in his book Quantum Healing published the
theory that trauma and suppressed negative emotions are often
stored as ‘phantom memories' in our cells. He argued that
these cellular memories act subtly over long periods of time,
and can cause disease and illness many years after they have
first been put m place. What Brandon may have discovered,
was how to access specific cell memories and, more important
how to actively resolve and let go of the stored issues.
"It
was only when I had uncovered the root cause or my current
condition”, she continues, that my body could naturally go
about the process of healing itself. My body healed completely
and perfectly think without me having to do a thing." She
believes that the possibility exists for each of us to participate
in our own healing process. “I cannot tell anyone how to heal.
Part of the healing process is that each of us must discover
his or her own truth. But, what I can do is point people in
a direction than can help them to uncover the issues they
have stored deep inside, and offer tools that help resolve
and let them go. Their body wisdom knows how to handle the
rest.”
“It can work for anyone open to the possibility that they
can participate in their own healing process,” she affirms“Using
this process, hundreds of people have the freed themselves
from all manner of emotional and physical issues. These powerful
processes have the remarkably profound and lasting effects.
Chronic pain simply vanishes. A long-standing panic attack
problem simply disappears. Self esteem issues dissolve, addictions
fall away, and illnesses – chronic and acute – can resolve
and heal. The countless letters people have written me are
a testament to their own courage, and proof that the body's
innate intelligence is its own remedy"
She
illustrates the point with the story of Jack, feisty 67-year-old,
who three years ago was diagnosed with an egg-size cancerous
lung tumour. He was given three -months to live. A combination
of chemotherapy, radiotherapy and jack's fighting spirit had
arrested the growth of the cancer, yet, with knowledge of
alternative health beliefs, Jack knew that a piece of the
puzzle was still missing. He came to Brandon wanting to know
why the tumour had occurred in the first place. He knew he
hadn't learned something the disease had to teach him and
he didn't want it showing up somewhere else in his body at
a later time.
'He
was told his was the first documented case of this type of
cancer disappearing without surgery” In his Journey jack uncovered
a childhood memory. It was during World War II, and the air
raid sirens blasted. Avoiding his masters, jack ran out of
school and headed straight home to his mother. Unable to find
her, he tore frantically through the streets ignoring the
distant sound of exploding bombs. Eventually, he found his
way into what had been the High Street Buildings lay in ruin,
their rubble strewn across the road. It was there that he
found his mother. She lay undisturbed, as if asleep. He shook
her and shook her, imploring her to wake up - until a policeman
came and pulled him away with "She's dead, son.
"
He felt absolute rage - rage at the enemy for killing his
innocent mother, and rage at God for allowing her to be taken
before her time. How could they do this to her, an innocent
woman? How could this possibly be right? Not knowing what
else to do, or how to face the pain, young jack suppressed
it stuffing it away deep inside. He did his best to forget
if' and move on as we so often do. The profound uncovering
and revelation Jack underwent m his process allowed hint to
finally face, understand, forgive and ultimately come to peace
with a trauma that had happened more than 50 years before.
When he was complete, his face looked as it an angry mask,
had been replaced by a feeling of deep serenity. A few weeks
later, he had an MRI scan, and the doctors could rind no trace
or me tumour. There was just a hairline scar where it had
been. He was told his was the first documented case or this
type or cancer disappearing without surgery.
My
own experience, though less dramatic than Jack's, is no less
remarkable. Since my teens I had suffered from clinical depression.
Though a relatively successful businessman of mostly positive
and outgoing disposition, I would often find myself in despair,
not able to, get out of bed in the morning. I would take days
off work lying on the sofa, unable to motivate myself to do
more than watch television and sleep. My family's advice that
I should either 'learn to live with if or 'snap out of if
was of no solace.
Drugs were not an option I was prepared to consider. By my
late 30's, 1 was in an intolerable state. Mentally disassociated
from my friends and my family, 1 was unable to focus my attention
long enough to hold a simple intelligent conversation. Anxious
about every personal circumstance, 1 would often find myself
sitting in my car in remote places, not knowing how I had
got there. Suicidal with despair, 1 turned to my GP, who recommended
a psychiatrist. With no other realistic option, I numbly accepted
his prescription of 40mg of Prozac daily. The drug enabled
me to function normally, at least. Though it left me with
a sense of unreality and, more worrying, with an overt aggressiveness
that I did not recognise as part of my normal self. My greatest
fear was that my supply of Prozac would be interrupted, and
that 1 would plunge back into depression.
It
was then, in late 1994, that 1 first met Brandon Bays. A friend
suggested a therapy session – I agreed without excitement.
What I experienced was probably the most profound revelation
of my life to that date. Encouraged to uncover the emotional
layers which lay beneath my depression, I eventually encountered
a hopelessness so overwhelming that I had been prepared to
do anything in life to avoid it In finally facing it, its
hold on me evaporated. In resolving the childhood issue with
my father, which had originally put it in place, 1 felt a
sense of inner peace, stillness and confidence that I knew
no one could ever take away.
Within
48 hours it became more painful to keep taking the Prozac
than not. Against the advice of my psychiatrist, I stopped
the medication. Although I would never recommend anyone withdraw
from this type of drug so abruptly, I found that the depth
of well being I had discovered remained. I have not had a
moment of depression since that time.
"It
is my belief," says Brandon, "that thoughts are not inherently
detrimental to us. Its what we choose to do with them that
makes the difference. We can choose to accept our thoughts
and let them go, or we can choose to invest specific meaning
in them, and get attached to them or worse, become obsessed
with them Its only then that they become unhealthy to our
bodies. "Similarly with emotions. Feeling emotions is an essentially
healthy thing. If our emotions are fully felt, they normally
cannot last longer than a few minutes, and tend to 'clean
us out'. Its the telling ourselves stories about them, or
blaming ourselves and others that perpetuates the feelings.
If we then fail to express them, and instead repress them
they can end up stuffed in our bodies as the 'cell memories'
which can eventually cause us health problems.
"We don't need to rid ourselves of anything. We simply need
to accept, forgive and embrace what is already here. The possibility
exists for us all to have a healthy relationship with our
minds, bodies and emotions."
REFERENCES:
JEANNE
ACHTERBERG. Imagery in Healing Boston, Shambala 1985
R
J WEBER & C B PERT. Opiatergic Modulation of the immune System,
in E E Miller & Andrea R Genazinni. Central and Peripheral
Endorphins New York Raven Press. 1984 B S Linn, et 9 Degree
of Depression and immune Responsiveness, m Psychosomotic Medicine,
vol 44. 1982
IAN McDERMOTT & JOSEPH O'CONNOR NIP and Health London. Thorsons
1996
DR
DEEPAK CHOPRA, Quantum Healing Bantam Books, 1989. See also.
DR CHRISTIANE NORTHRUP, Womens Bodies, Womens Wisdom London
Piatkus 1995
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