“The sin which is unpardonable is knowingly and wilfully to reject truth, to fear knowledge lest that knowledge pander not to thy prejudices.”
― Aleister Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA: Book 4
Just read back over this before I posted and thought I might insert this small disclaimer: Oops, cranky alert… Also, minor potty mouth.
I’m all for magical thinking, and (as you’ve probably worked out!) as a practicing psychic and metaphysical teacher (yes, that’s what I do for a living) I’m totally open to thoughts, emotions and beliefs helping or hindering our healing process. In fact I’ve had some incredible health breakthroughs using mind-body medicine, and in facing and working through my own paradigm.
But you know what? I’m also a cheerleader for….
wait for it….
SCIENCE.
Yep. Science rocks. I respect the science that stands behind modern medicine, and many of the traditional healing therapies. Medically speaking, science has saved my life on more than one occasion. I believe that science and medicine can be a spiritual life path or calling. I also believe that it is not a cop out for me, a magical thinking kind of person, to use modern medicine and science in my own wellness journey.
So, please, crazy people, stop messaging me in response to my post yesterday to tell me that my current bladder incontinence is simply a manifestation of me being ‘pissed off’ and ‘anxious’. Don’t quote me any more passages of Louise Hay’s ‘You Can Heal Your Life’. Spare me the messages that tell me one session of past-life regression to resolve all the bad karmic shit I did in previous lifetimes will miraculously cure me (or anyone else) of all my physical and any other ills.
First of all, don’t you reckon that over the last thirty years, and given my background in spirituality and metaphysics, that I haven’t already explored all of this stuff? I have. And some of it has been really useful.
Secondly, cause and effect. Do you remember that stuff from science at school? I am suffering neurological incontinence right now as a direct result of medication, and its effect on my body and the disease that the medication is treating.
When I stop the medication, the incontinence goes away…
(But I may be a bit pissed off now anyway, actually, given some of the crazy-pants simplistic-thinking messages you’ve been sending.)
Also, stop with the guilt thing. I’m fortunate that I don’t buy into your arguments. But please, stop berating my friends and fellow illness-sufferers with all of this poorly-informed rubbish about them being responsible for their illness, or that their thinking or stupid dietary choices (ie not vegan, or eating of non-organic, or gluten, dairy, sugar, not prayed over, possible GMO soy choices) caused their cancer/car accident/marriage breakup/congenital heart defect/gay child/lyme disease/miscarriage/sudden hospitalisation after ruptured appendix. I’m totally bowled over by this judgemental and mean nonsense. What happened to kindness? What happened to good old-fashioned common sense?
Humans are complex beings. Incredibly so.
We are fortunate to live in an era where science and metaphysics are aligning, and where we have a wide array of healing methods and tools at our disposal. There is not a one-cure-fits-all cure for anything. Ask any healer – western, eastern, metaphysical, scientific or otherwise. If they are honest they will tell you that the treatment that cured someone will have also failed to cure another with the same malady.
Did I mention that we are complex and bio-diverse?
Lastly, in response to the ‘new age leader’ who emailed me to say that I am a disgrace to the movement for even using modern medicine at all, and setting such a poor example to others. Sorry, but WTF? When someone I know suffered a horrific injury with a chainsaw do you think I should have stood over them waving my crystals and chanting positive affirmations? What healed them was an incredibly skilful and careful surgeon who took three hours to irrigate their wound before using microsurgery to stitch them up, restoring full limb function. Modern drugs – a truckload of antibiotics, was another useful tool in that healing mix.
Pilates, rather than positive thinking, fixed one friend’s bladder weakness and leakage. Another friend found her cure through an excellent physiotherapist.
I’m always open to new ideas, treatments, and modalities.
But I am not open to your lack of open-mindedness.
Engage brains, people. They are one of the most magical-thinking, cosmically-cool healing tools you have.
I pray that if you are ever unfortunate enough to experience a chronic illness, injury, accident or awful life circumstance that the people who reach out to you do so with kindness and wisdom rather than judgement.
Rant over.
PS: I wrote another post on this same topic some time back. You may find it useful:
Sad Unicorns OR Is Your New Age Thinking Positively Unhelpful?
