What is Energy Healing?

"I don't know what you're doing, but it feels great," the student said. The instructor had her hands gently resting on the feet of the student. This wasn't a physical massage. There actually was very little visible body contact or movement going on. What you noticed was a deep relaxation and calm surrounding both women. Every once in awhile the instructor would move her hands in the space surrounding the student's body. "I feel relaxed and energized at the same time," said the student. The rest of the people in the class watched in fascination. Within the next two hours, each student would grow from a fascinated observer to an active participant as they learned to use this energy themselves. This is a typical scene in many workshops around the world where people are gathering to learn about energy healing.

People have been using energy healing since the matriarchal times over 15,000 years ago. Until recently, most of the knowledge of hands-on healing in this culture has been lost or ignored. However, at some level we remember. For instance, we instinctively put a hand on the hurt spot and rub it. If a child is crying, we caress her head to calm her.

Many people once again are studying these healing arts and being taken seriously as healers. What was once viewed as primitive medicine is reemerging as a healing science. One reason for this is the shift in the scientific community from Newtonian physics to quantum physics.

Most of us grew up thinking in terms of Newtonian physics. To begin, we were taught that, like a machine set in motion, the world was made up of concrete things that behaved under certain rules (like gravity) that were predictable. Secondly, we believed reality was "out there", going on whether we observed it or not. By the time we were in junior high school, we used the scientific method to confirm the existence of an objective reality. Lastly, we understood that matter and energy were separate. For example, matter, like tables or rocks, was solid, dense, and inanimate. While energy, like heat or light, was permeable, ever-changing, and active. Physicists discovered during this century that the world doesn't behave that way all the time, especially at the subatomic level. This new physics is called quantum mechanics.

Quantum mechanics is a different way of looking at reality. The world is not made up of concrete objects but of interconnected webs of energy. What appears to be solid actually is mutable. For example, the smallest "thing" in the universe, a subatomic particle, is not a concrete object. It is energy and mass in one-energy/mass. Also, rules like those that apply to solid objects don't work. For example, we cannot predict specific outcomes because a sub-atomic particle is unpredictable -- it is there, then it is not there.   Quantum, or subatomic particles, are "energy packets" that are thought of as "tendencies to exist" or "tendencies to happen". The best measurements of reality are probability waves. A single subatomic particle cannot be described. Knowing one thing about that particular particle changes the other things. Groups of subatomic particles can be measured in probabilities-how they probably will behave. Finally, whenever we observe something, we change it. Our inner world ("I") and our outer world ("out there") are the interconnected web of energy.

For example, experiments show conclusively light is made up of particles, if the experimenter is testing for particles. If, however, the experimenter is testing for light waves, then, lo and behold, light behaves in waves. Light cannot be both a particle and a wave. In this case, the inner world of the experimenter is changing the outer world of the experiment.

The following chart illustrates this contrast in world view:

Newtonian physics	Quantum mechanics
reality is solid	reality is ever-changing energy
energy and matter are separate	energy and matter are the same
things are predictable	individual subatomic particles aren't predictable
we can observe reality without changing it	when we observe reality, we change it

Already we can begin to see how this world view gives credence to energy healing. The interconnected web of energy correlating to the human body has been mapped.

For thousands of years saints, mystics, and other spiritual beings have been represented with halos around their heads. The halo is actually the aura of the human energy field. All of us have halos-or auras. The aura is composed of many layers of energy webs that correspond to the many layers of the human being. For example, our thoughts correspond to the mental auric body. Our physical body corresponds to the physical,  (or etheric) auric body, and so on. Because of this interconnectedness, physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects of the human being affect each other.

  

  In addition to the individual energy field, there are energy connections that correspond to our relationship to others and to our environment. Our language reflects this. For instance we say, "I have strong ties to this place."

Our individual and environmental energy/matter is also called chi, ki, prana, mana, or life force.

Health occurs when our energy field is in balance and harmony. Disease occurs when we are out of balance. Our energy gets stuck, is overactive, underactive, or misaligned due to our inherited energy patterns and/or our attempts to adjust to excessive stress.

Conventional medicine generally compartmentalizes health. If we are suffering a physical ailment, we see a specialist who treats us on the physical level with medicine or surgery. If we are suffering a psychological problem, we see a specialist who treats us on that level. On the other hand, holistic healing sees the person as a whole- mind/body/emotions/spirit- with an instinctual need for balance and harmony. Illness is the body's way of sending messages about an imbalance of the whole person. This imbalance may be physical, but it also has mental, emotional, and spiritual components.

Many types of energy balancing are available today. This type of health care works with animals as well as people.


Therapeutic touch and aura clearing work in the aura surrounding the physical body. The benefits of this type of energy balancing are similar to massage--helping circulation, encouraging removal of toxins and old habits or patterns no longer needed, relieving stress, and relaxing the body/mind.

Acupressure, acupuncture, and reflexology balance the human energy field through releases (finger pressure or needles) along the meridians on the physical body. The meridians are the major channels through which the energy flows. Meridians directly connect to body organs.

Chakra repair and Reiki work on the chakras - the major intersections of the meridians. The chakras are large processors of energy/matter - they bring it into and out of the mind/body. Torn, overactive, or underactive chakras create energy imbalances.
Reiki channels energy into the seven major chakras when the healer places her/his hands lightly on the body. It is like getting our battery recharged. The energy will go where it is needed.
Chakra repair is sewing the broken energy webs back together where they have gotten torn or misaligned. This work takes place in the aura surrounding the body, but often includes light touches on the physical body.              

There are other tools too, such as color and sound therapies, that harmonize chakra and aura energies.

In addition to the benefits listed above, other commonly reported improvements from energy healing are:
 

• increased self-awareness,
• spiritual expansion,
• clarity about major life decisions (relationship issues, career shifts),
• relief from depression,
• the power to create in new ways,
• a stronger immune system,
• quicker cell, tissue, and organ repair,
• and relief from pain.

 
 So, when someone talks of sensing auras or halos, we can look at them with skepticism because we are thinking like Sir Isaac Newton, or we can admit the possibility they are sensing subatomic realms. And if we open just a little to understand or experience this realm ourselves, well, we, like the experimenters testing light, probably will find what we are looking for.

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