Healing is anything that brings us closer to wholeness. It's not necessarily a cure, although physical healing may happen during the process. When we've taken a step towards wholeness, we know it! We know that we are changed in some fundamental way. We feel less broken. We have a sense of well-being. We have less pain, anger, frustration. Whatever it is that we're working through seems somehow easier to manage and we have been able to grow through the process. Whether that means a miraculous immediate change or a small slowly unfolding change it is yet another step taken on the journey towards wholeness and wellness.

Energy healing methods recognize that each and every one of us has a subtle energetic body as well as a physical body as part of our basic anatomy. These aspects interact with each other throughout our lives and form much of our experience of daily life. Your energy anatomy includes the chakras, the energetic meridians, and the human energy field, sometimes called the aura. These are all part of energetic medicine as it's practiced in the East and have been acknowledged, worked with and written about around the world for thousands of years. Unfortunately, our modern Western culture has mostly forgotten about this half of who we are and only seems to focus on the physical while completely missing the energetic part each one of us has. If we are truly seeking optimal health, wholeness and well-being in life, then how can we ever hope to do so while we ignore such a huge part of ourselves?

According to Traditional Chinese Medicine, the root cause of pain and disease is stagnation or blockage of optimal flow of life force energy (called “chi”) through the body. When we are able to sense the energy and assist in clearing out what is contributing to stagnation, it allows an opportunity for re-establishing optimal flow which can allow your body to heal and bring about a more harmonious relationship with yourself, others and the world at large. This promotes positive change and movement towards a life of greater peace, health and full expression of your true self.

Much of my training in energy healing has been focused on learning how to sense and work with energy. This allows a root cause analysis by tuning into the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual levels of the energy body to understand and convey the messages that are trying to be communicated through physical experience. After a while the traumas and misconceptions about the past have a way of unwinding themselves and eventually we shift our perspective. Life change can become much easier to do. Changes might still require effort but often it doesn’t seem quite as difficult as it did before hand. It could mean letting go of addictive patterns or committing to viewing yourself with more love and acceptance. Even small changes can really speed up your transformation into greater alignment with the path that your soul is trying to help you walk in life; they certainly did for me. As we bring our life into greater levels of alignment, maintaining optimal energetic flow becomes more automatic, and the inner promptings you might be receiving can become easier to recognize.

Of course, each one of us has free will, and we can choose to act on them or not as no changes are forced upon you. Sometimes you might feel like you’re not quite ready just yet, which is okay. It's all part of the process, and there might be some life circumstances that present to help you work through what is needed in order for you to be ready to take the next steps forward and make the shifts necessary to maintain positive changes in a lasting durable way. The key is maintaining a perspective that a life in harmony and alignment is something worth working towards daily.

I continue to receive support myself in the form of energy work because it helps me to continue to change and evolve as I move through life. There is much we can do on our own, but there are just some times that having the assistance of someone else during the healing process is very welcome and can make all the difference.

This website is called Healing Daruma because each and every one of us is on a healing journey that requires patience and perseverance. It requires hoping for wholeness with continuing cultivation and practice chipping away day after day until we are able to fully express our true self. The Daruma helps to remind us that we are not in that process alone, and our wish of healing can come true with determination and hard work.

I am a practicing Christian and do not feel that I could do this work without the faith that Christianity has helped me to cultivate over the years. This is not a complete explanation of something that is essentially mystical and mysterious but I am sharing some of my personal perspective on healing in case you might find it helpful.

From a Christian perspective, we are made in the image of God. So if something allows that innate goodness to shine forth more wholly and completely, it is helping to bring our life and our lived experience into greater alignment with God's plan for us individually and the Universe as a whole. To me, this is a very fundamental and important part of understanding healing. It necessitates an understanding that there's already a wholeness within us. It's been given to us before our birth. When we are able to live a virtuous life of faith and alignment, it is able to shine forth more fully. This call to a life of holiness is part of the life of any Christian who seeks to understand the teaching of Jesus Christ and live their life following the model He shared with us.

So what prevents us from just always expressing that at all times? It can be complex, but when we have trauma that we are responding to or we make choices that are not in alignment with our highest good or the highest good of those around us, we change how we are showing up in the world, we hide that magnificence. Whether that means we grab fig leaves or bury our talents out of a belief that we are inadequate. We doubt God’s love. Some view this as the impact of sin or living in a fallen world. Whatever the reason, something needs to happen in order for it to shine forth fully again.

This process of coming back into alignment can take many forms, but it seems to include these three phases each time: 1) We need to recognize the impact that being out of alignment is having on us through acknowledgment and acceptance of the issue that needs to change. 2) We find forgiveness and rediscover that we are still loved by the divine, and if God still loves us, maybe we are capable of loving and forgiving ourselves, possibly even others, too. 3) We honestly consider what reparation is needed as a result of our actions or beliefs, then we go about trying to repair what we can while trusting that God will be able to bring to completion anything that remains beyond our ability. All the while trusting in Divine timing to bring wholeness to the entire situation as we change our way of moving through life going forward.

It is only as we work through these phases that I have found that we can really let go of something completely and begin shining our light forth more fully again. In miraculous circumstances these phases can happen so quickly that it can be hard to see each of the phases clearly, but that is at God’s discretion. It is possible that there are reasons that certain stages might have already been fulfilled allowing for such rapid change to take place.

To me, this reconciliation process is foundational to an understanding of spiritual healing and energy healing. It is an understanding that all healing, even physical healing, includes a spiritual dimension to it. Our belief and understanding must change in response to our new relationship with ourselves, our life and God.

If you look at the Bible, Jesus says after healing has taken place something to the effect of “your faith has saved you; go in peace.” No doubt, He was there and was part of the process but is not embracing the spectacle. He is rather always seeking the greater glory of God and redirecting us into that deeper relationship that is available. This is important to remember. Some of the most profound shifts can be very subtle. They're not loud or flashy, but they can be some of the deepest, and they bring us in to deeper communion with ourselves and God. In my view, Jesus was clearly seeking to empower and remind people of the importance of faith with each miraculous deed and His teaching. An important reminder of the active role that we each have to play in the healing journey that is life.

When I facilitate a healing session with a client, one of my most sacred duties is not to diagnose what's wrong with you, but rather to hold an awareness and understanding of how you are already whole. You are loved, you are enough and you may have been through difficult experiences in life. The realization that with Divine love and support, the stories and experiences of the past don’t need to hold the same power over your current experience of life anymore. They can fall away like the crust that they are, and then your inner light that's been under a bushel basket can be revealed and shine forth more clearly.

Some people call this holding space; some people call this seeing Jesus in others, some people call this the Grace of the Holy Spirit. Maybe it's all of those? I don't pretend to have all the answers, but what I have observed over and over again is how profound change can come from this intimacy. The transformation that comes from being held in that space of love and acceptance is a very real reminder of how each and every one of us is greater than we know. We may have things that we need to cast away, stumbling blocks to work through, addictions to clear, but that doesn't make us any less beautiful or any less human or divine. God can already see our true potential and is just waiting for us to remember that we can see it too if we are willing to look past our fear.

I resisted this healing work for years because I felt that it would be hubris to assume that I could assist people in this way. Eventually I began to understand that the ability to sense energy and a continual draw towards understanding healing in my life was not some sort of mistake, it kept happening for a reason. My rejection of it was in fact coming from a place of fear and unintentional arrogance because I was basically rejecting a part of myself—as if I knew better than God what my life should be and could be. Through faith, trust and humble surrender over the years it has become clear to me that following the example Jesus sets for each Christian includes embracing our gifts in a very real way. When it is done as part of a desire to honor God and help our neighbor and ourselves, then it is part of this beautiful spiritual path we walk as Christians.

“May this work assist in sharing the Divine love that has been shared with me. May I continue to live my life seeking to love the Lord God with all my heart, all my soul and all my mind, while loving my neighbor as myself. Amen.”