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by June Rouse |
From ancient wisdom and unconventional alternatives - to new approaches and fresh perspectives, a new weekly series for Public Television focuses on the balance of mind, body and spirit. A preview tape of the January encore of Body & Soul series shows it to be a well thought out vehicle for alternative healing resources and research. The host is Emmy Award-winning journalist Gail Harris, who began reporting on the relationship between mind and body more than two decades ago. Each half-hour program reports two key stories from the field, bridged by a provocative and informative interview. A follow-up 300-page hardcover companion book, Body & Soul: Your guide to Health, Happiness and Total Well-Being, by Gail Harris, will be available in the first quarter of this year or by calling PBS Video at 1-800-PLAY-PBS. Videocassettes of individual episodes or the entire series may be ordered from PBX Video at 1-800-PLAY-PBS. The Body & Soul website will be online as of January 1 via www.pbs.org. It will allow viewer feedback and offer even more information on the topics covered by the series.
We've done our best to keep pace with the field of healing, and beyond even the good offices of what's on the PBS series, the next generation of healing has arrived and is being practiced. Our first report of such goings on was a review of the work of Dr. Valerie Hunt of the University of California at Berkeley (November '97), whose documented research using scientific instrumentation showed the effects of the work of energy healers on the human body.
Thanks to the synchronicity of Spirit, necessary prerequisites to advanced healthcare information arrived here step by step - the way so smoothed that had the information arrived without fanfare of prior understanding, it would have fallen on barren ground. Here's what happened.
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I finally sat down with Rosalyn Bruyere's elementary classic on energy healing, Wheels of Light (288 pages, $14, a Fireside Book published by Simon & Schuster), underlining as I went to get the basics from one of the esteemed godmothers of the movement.
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No sooner had I laid down Bruyere's book than Julie Motz's Hands of Life was placed on my desk. Motz, who also heals on an energy level, "lucked" into assisting patients in operating theatres of major hospitals (working both with organ transplant recipients and the "new" organ, healing their grief of loss and preparing them for life together; and with cancer and cardiac patients). As hospitals open up to this work, Julie will surely be counted in the same courageous pioneer genre as Elisabeth Kübler Ross in her work with the dying. Hands of Life offers insights into healing energy work that you may not have encountered elsewhere, introducing concepts in the realm of healing such as the role genetics play in each person's bio-energetic matrix - including even generations-old cellular memories of historical significance. Some new, basic insights here. (300 pp, $24.95, Bantam) This book is a featured choice of One Spirit book club, a spiritual spinoff of Book of the Month Club.
Next, a friend sent a gift of a clay and a gel charged with the same vibrational energy as given off by a healer's hands as he or she is giving a healing. Healer Victor Roerich was one of the few worldwide who were open to info from the Universe about duplicating this vibrational quality, and adding it to a pure carrier for others to use. Skeptical, I tried it, watchful for being impressed because I wanted to be. After enough trials, I was skeptical no longer, and truly grateful for a gift that imparted the edge that it took to keep going when it was greatly needed. Since then, I've talked with physicians and dentists whose varied uses of it has impressed them mightily.
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Then came the bell-ringer, Sanctuary: The Path to Consciousness, a remarkable "novel" by Stephen Lewis and Evan Slawson. That the authors chose a story format to present their work was a worthy device to give the reader esoteric information about a new energetic model of the body, the spirit and the nature of the physical world. If this is your cup of tea, you won't notice that the story is short on plot. The characters advance the information in such a way that concept builds upon concept, and upon re-reading as necessary, I was enabled to enter the quantum consciousness universe of potential.
If you accept that the energy matrix of the body is where health (or lack thereof) begins, you'll be a step along before you begin to read. The healing techniques described by Lewis and Slawson are a true breakthrough in the possibilities of well-being, bringing into balance negative energetic frequencies that are both inherited and inflicted. The energy balancing techniques presented in Sanctuary are not only futuristic . . . they're already available. The technology is as good an example of the New Paradigm as anything in America - or, perhaps, the world.
The story that carries the information is a fast read. "In a hidden desert retreat, Max Stevens devotes his life to making miracles of healing for which he takes no credit. Jane, whose terminal illness defies the powers of conventional medicine, is delivered to Max by caring friends. Using the remarkable techniques he has developed, Max identifies the subtle-energy imbalances in Jane's life. He removes them, enabling Jane to transform herself and achieve her full physical, emotional and spiritual potential.
"Do such amazing methods really work? In this unique, fictionalized yet factual account, you share Jane's and her friend's odyssey of self-discovery and learn that this system for health, self-awareness and spiritual development is a reality. Reading Sanctuary may well change your life. It will certainly open your mind to a greater consciousness" (215 pp, $24.95, HTT Press).
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There have been a bunch of witchy books published in the last few months, and I have been like a kid in a candy store trying to figure out which to delve into first. Usually there is quite an surge of Wiccan material during the month of October (hmm, wonder why) but this year the trend has continued right through to the end of the year. I have just finished going through Book of Shadows by Phyllis Curott (302 pp, $25, Broadway Books) and it's one of the top good reads from these new releases.
Book of Shadows is Curott's retelling of her introduction and initiation into a Wiccan coven. Done with sort of a journaling style, Curott successfully draws you into the wild ride that was her life at this time. Balancing being an Ivy-League lawyer in her daytime life and an apprentice Wiccan in her night-time ways sure does lead to some interesting times, about which she opens up her most intimate and inner workings. The most endearing thing about this book, for me, is its very detailed and human approach to the process of becoming a spiritual person. Not only does the book go into the normal, physical workings of an initiation, but Curott also shares with you the internal changes and challenges she goes through during the process. For those of you who have been on the spiritual path for awhile, this book will bring back memories of those startling beginning experiences that filled you with such wonder and awe. For those starting out or just curious, it will give a nice picture of what could come and happens for most. Curott shares a lot of detail about this transition of her life - and most of the time it works well, although I must admit that the last third of the book gets awfully weighed down by the sheer amount of information she wants to convey. Persevere through this and you will come to a very empowering and uplifting ending.
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Continuing from last month's selection of children's books, I have yet another treasure for you. Personally I love Creation myths. It seems to me that this genre of myth is so fascinating because it holds a core essence and lesson, working as a great way to help children of all ages understand the complexity and wonder we are as a global village. A dear favorite of mine, and a classic for many, is Old Turtle by Douglas Wood with watercolors by Cheng-Khee Chee ($17.95, Pfeifer-Hamilton Publishers). Reading almost like a poem, the story tells of how in the beginning the different forces of nature quarreled over what or who God was but came to peace with the help and wisdom of Old Turtle, who shows them how "God IS" everything. It goes on to bring this oh-so-critical message to mankind, the newcomers on the Earth. The eloquent writing and the beautiful art will make this a special book for anyone who owns it.
