ABOUT
HEALING...An Essay on Theoretical Aspects of
Healing
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I wish to examine
different aspects of the Mind/Body connection; the splitting
of the mind and the body; its historical context; the
consequences of this spit within our health care services
and the consequences to us as individuals; to explore the
evidence of the Mind/Body connections and how one's approach
to working with people differs when recognition of the
Mind/Body or conversely the Body/Mind connection
occurs.
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- The split between
the mind and the body is obvious in most facets of
medical practice within our culture today. Our approach
in healthcare is based on the paradigm of the western
biomedical model, which generally fails to embrace the
Mind/Body connection. Historically the creation of the
split between mind and body is attributed to Rene
Descartes who published a book in 1642 entitled
Meditations in which he expounded the view that thoughts
and things were quite separate and neither could effect
the other. His thinking on this strongly influenced the
medical world view at the time and does so to this day.
Capra (1983) highlights this when he states:
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- The
biomedical model is firmly grounded in
Cartesian
thought.
Descartes
introduced the strict separation of mind and
body, along with the idea that the body is a
machine that can be understood completely in
terms of the arrangement and functioning of
parts. A healthy person was like a well-made
clock in perfect mechanical condition, a sick
person like a clock whose parts were not
functioning properly. (p.
138)
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- As a consequence
of this mind/body split a person's health problem or
illness is viewed and treated in a compartmentalised
manner. Their illness will generally be diagnosed in
isolation from other aspects of their being, with little
attempt to view the person and their problem/s from an
holistic viewpoint. In psychiatry I often see patients
being treated for depression and or anxiety with no
acknowledgment or real probing as to what may have
contributed to this. Many times patients are grieving for
major losses in their lives, but unfortunately this is
overlooked, and so rather than their experience being
normalised within the context of a grief reaction, they
are labelled as having a depressive illness which is
invariably treated with anti-depressants and sometimes
ECT. This approach prevents the person from being able to
process their grief experience in a way that allows
growth and real healing of their emotional wounds. Capra
(1983) describes this well when he says:
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- By concentrating
on smaller and smaller fragments of the body, modern
medicine often loses sight of the patient as a human
being, and by reducing health to mechanical functioning,
it is no longer able to deal with the phenomenon of
healing. (p.118).
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- Obviously this
type of blinkered view does little to empower us, or our
society, in learning how to heal ourselves. It is not
possible to maintain balance and integration, which are
inherent components in the healing process in our lives,
whilst we continue to deny the interrelationship between
how and what we think, and how we feel with how we are in
our physical bodies. It seems absurd that the biomedical
model along with the general population of the western
world (due to the strong influence of the former), lack
the awareness of the body/mind connection.
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- In our western
society we are not taught or really given any inkling
that there is a connection between our mind and our
bodies. We respond in surprise at the notion that what we
think can influence our emotions and/or our physiological
responses, or conversely what we experience through our
bodies can influence our emotions and our thinking. When
we know this we are empowered, we can start to live our
lives more fully, but mostly, we live fractured
existences due to the alienation of the awareness of the
interrelationships of all aspects of our being. At worst,
we hand over power to the medical profession to fix us,
usually by the use of chemical or surgical interventions.
It is difficult, or one could even say, it is impossible,
to take responsibility for one's wellbeing, if one does
not have the knowledge and awareness of the Mind/Body
connection.
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- Many people are
like `walking heads', always thinking and
intellectualising and generally disconnected and
dissociated from their bodys and emotions. The only time
the body is noticed is when it hurts or is uncomfortable
in some way, hence their relationship with their body is
a negative one, leading to further alienation and
disconnection in their overall being. They do not realize
the destructive potential that their negative thoughts
can have upon their physical wellbeing. The goal is for
them to learn to embrace all aspects of themselves, to
understand the close relationship between the way one
thinks and how one feels and on how the body responds. To
achieve this understanding and awareness allows a sense
of control and empowerment in understanding and by
accepting the interconnectedness of all these aspects of
oneself usually creates an improvement in one's overall
wellbeing.
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- Until we
understand this Mind/Body connection we cannot 'be behind
the driver's wheel in our own lives'. As stated
previously this awareness opens up many empowering
possibilities for people in their pursuit of health and
healing.
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There
is now sound, sophisticated scientific knowledge
emerging to further illustrate this mind/body
connection. One of the exciting areas of
research is known as psychoneuroimmunology
(PNI). This area of science has been able to
show the important role that the mind has on the
body. According to Ford (1993):
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- the
discovery of endorphins and enkephalins (both names for
the same substance) led to the discovery of an entirely
new class of brain chemicals called neuropeptides -
endorphins were just one of sixty to one hundred
neuropeptides found in the brain. (p.52)
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- Candace Pert and
her colleagues (Ford, 1993, p53). were able to use
radioactive material to tag molecules which showed
receptor sites in the limbic system of the brain which is
an area of the brain that regulates organ function and
emotions. Ford (1993) goes on to say:
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- The
first pieces of the PNI puzzle were slipping into place.
Areas of the brain associated with with emotions and
organ function had high concentrations of neuropeptide
receptors. These same neuropeptides controlled the
transmission of impulses over the nervous system - nerve
cells had neuropeptide receptor sites. And these same
neuropeptides programmed the activity of the immune
system - white blood cells also had neuropeptide receptor
sites.
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- Neuropeptide
receptor sites have been found to be present throughout
the body, in muscle tissue, in the spinal cord and around
organs and in the blood stream in the monocytes. These
receptor sites accept only matching molecules in the form
of neuropeptides which Pert and others described as
"information messengers" (Ford, 1993, p.53). Further on
Ford (1993) says:
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- The
presence of neuropeptides modifies how these cells
receive and pass along sensory information. Thus the same
neuropeptides that regulate emotion in the brain regulate
our perception of sensory stimuli through the skin.
Feeling has always had two meanings: one related to
emotional experience, the other related to sensation
through the skin. In reality these two meanings are
nothing more than different aspects of the same process.
(p.55)
Much of what one
reads in relationship to PNI is complicated and complex
scientific data, but the message is a clear one, that
proves conclusively and scientifically the existence of
the Mind/Body connection.
- Some of this data
is having an impact on some of the medical fraternity.
David Wignall is a Melbourne doctor, with an abiding
interest in the the realm of Mind/Body medicine. Wignall
(1993) states:
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- Mind/Body
Medicine works with problems of the physical Body through
working in the general area of Mind. There is an ever
increasing body of research which supports such an
approach - in particular in the form of the modern
sciences of psychoneuroimmunology and
psychoneuroendocrinology which have shown that emotions,
stress, relationships and other life problems are capable
of influencing basic physiological processes through-out
Body at a very deep level and thus are also capable of
producing disease states. (p.4)
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- It is exciting and
refreshing that Dr Wignall, along with a growing group of
other medical practitioners, are forerunners in a
paradigm shift that is occurring in relation to working
consciously with a Mind/Body approach within their
medical practices. In personal conversation with Dr
Wignall, he spoke of further evidence of this shift,
which included the formation of an organisation, which
consists of 40 medical practitioners (approximately 30 of
whom are resident in Victoria), named 'The Australian
College of Mind/Body Medicine' (ACOMBM). According to
their information document the members of this
organisation tend..
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- "....
to value the health-enhancing and healing role of such
things as: communication and listening; emotional
ventilation and release; stress release; positive
emotional states; positive attitude; states of
relaxation; meditative & trance states;
visualisation; inner process or deep inner work"
(Wignall, p.2)
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- Whereas the
above-mentioned people embrace the mind/body connection,
they do so mostly from the perspective of the Mind;
utilising approaches that work with the Mind to have an
effect on the physical and emotional wellbeing of their
patient/client. However there are many of us, including
the author, who approach working with patients/clients
from the perspective of the Body, with the same goal
being to increase the integration of the body/mind
connection and hence improve the physical and emotional
wellbeing of our patient/client. Whilst in many instances
it may not matter which approach occurs, Ford (1993)
makes these remarks in relation to working with adult
survivors of sexual abuse. He says:
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- While
the body is both the instrument and object of sexual and
physical abuse, we primarily treat abusers and survivors
with various forms of talk therapy. This is a half
solution because the body does not have a central role in
the recovery process.......Years later, when evidence of
the abuse surfaces, how can we ignore the body's role in
the healing process? After all, the body was intimately
involved in the original trauma. I believe these feeling
and memories can be best accessed through the body, and
that talking is often the least effective or meaningful
way of reaching these stored experiences. Touch and
movement - the body's native language - can be powerful
therapeutic tools in recovery and healing. (p.
19,20)
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- In my work both as
a psychiatric nurse and in my private practice I have
found that gentle nurturing touch (with permission) which
may take the form of Reiki; or a form of bodywork that I
practice, called Ortho-Bionomy is able to bring people
into relationship with themselves in ways that are at
times extraordinary. It seems to me that sometimes
emotional traumas are stored in the body tissues and are
able to be resolved without major emotional catharsis, as
in Gestalt work.
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It
seems that when working with the physical
body that the memory of the emotional trauma
is set free and is able to melt away,
sometimes as if magically.
Working
from the perspective of the body 'grounds'
people into the 'here and now'; reminding
them through their bodies of what being
comfortable feels like again.....this appears
to open up new and different ways of thinking
and perceiving in their
world.
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- The increasing
awareness and acceptance of the Mind/Body and or
Body/Mind connection has the capacity to impact strongly
on the way that health and healing is viewed and
experienced in our society. It provides all of us who
work in the area of health a challenge to continue to
broaden our perceptions and understandings of the
Mind/Body & Body/Mind connections and to share our
understanding and knowledge of this with our
clients/patients, colleagues, families and with who ever
else will listen to us. By doing this, we will all share
in creating shifts in our world view, which up to now has
been overly influenced by the biomedical paradigm. The
Mind/Body split has lasted three hundred and fifty-four
years. It is time to bury this notion in the past where
it well and truly belongs.
-
Ellie
Large
©
1996
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REFERENCES:
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- Ford, C. W.
(1993).Compassionate
Touch: The Role of Human of Human Touch in Healing
and Recovery
- New York:
Fireside/Parkside.
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- The Australian
College of Mind/Body Medicine (ACOMBM)
handout.
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- Capra, F. (1983).
The Turning Point: Science, Society and the Rising
Culture.
- London:
Flamingo.
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- Wignall, D.
(1993). The Neurohumoral Axis. Journal of The New
Physician 3 4.
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Go to
Reference
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more 'healing related' books
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