Mystery of healing in light of recent scientific research
by Mihaela Sandu
Since the dawn of history, people mentioned that healing could be conducted with the help of hands and prayers. In any society, there were people who claimed to possess the possibilities to improve and heal the symptoms of any diseases. People subjected to such treatments, experienced feelings of cold, heat, shivers and other similar sensations. People treated often noticed significant improvement of all types of pain, associated to the increased (or even fast) recovery of their state of health. There were also certain rare cases of instantaneous healing, even in the event of serious diseases such as cancer for instance.
Modern science always tended to doubt the effectiveness of healing, as it considered it to be nothing more than a ritual or magic belief. It therefore assigned the healing process to the spontaneous regression of the diseases, for which the egotistic modern science can provide no liable explanation or theory.
Recently, a few receptive scientists with a broader horizon and no prejudices, started to pay attention to the healing cases and closely examine their results. Although the mechanisms lying beyond such healing is a mystery nevertheless answers start emerging.
In his book on healing, “The PSI of Relief”, American psychiatrist, doctor Daniel J. Benor, re-examined the literature up to date in the area of healing researches. He found more than 100 carefully and thoroughly conducted experiments exploring the effects of healing forces. Experiments had been conducted on enzymes, bacteria, protozoan, plants, animals and humans. Over three fourths of these experiments showed important positive effects, some of them being dealt with in this book.
Healing – a psychometric connection
Dr. Bernard Grad tested Oscar Estebany, an experienced healer, in his lab at the Montreal McGill University. Dr. Grad anaesthetized a large number of mice after which he cut off a tiny fragment on their back skin and then applied the healer’s powers a few times a days. Other mice were allowed to heal by themselves, without any interventions. The wounds of mice subjected to Estebany’s treatment healed much faster than the others’. Dr. Grad repeated his experiment according to much thorough criteria and once again he obtained much improved results.
Doctor Grad asked Oscar Estebany to treat mice in order to prevent the development of goiter induced through a low content iodine diet. Estebany hesitated in spending that long a time with mice while he could have treated people instead and suggested mice treatment with cotton wool – that Estenaby had previously charged with the healing energy preventing the development of goiter in the case of mice. The wool had to be placed in their cages.
Although skeptical, Dr. Grad carefully analyzed Estenaby’s reports. Estebany claimed that he had cured people by giving them various materials previously impregnated with healing qualities and decided to continue the experiment in that manner. He placed the cotton wool previously treated by Estenaby in some of the mice cages featuring iodine deficiencies in their bodies and also placed untreated cotton wool in the cages of the other mice. The conclusion? In the case of the first group a decreased tendency towards goiter development was observed in the case of the first group.
It is still unclear the way that such healing works. A version would be that the healing energy is stored in the intermediary object while another version states that the object in question serves as psychometric connection between the healer and the patient in order to facilitate healing. Although several studies were conducted in relation to such healing processes, it seems to consist in a much more complex mechanism, acting simultaneously at the physical, astral and mental level.
People are endowed with healing abilities
A group of scientists from the North Carolina Parapsychology Institute conducted several experiments related to remote healing, by using pairs of anaesthetized mice. They requested several healers to wake up one of the two mice sooner than the other one. They discovered that the healers managed to do this at the highest degree of accuracy even behind a mirror, a few meters away form the mice. Marilyn Schlitz, from “Mind Science Foundation” from San Antonio, Texas, copied these automatic synchronizing experiments in the case of mice awakening and also achieved important positive results.
Healers claim that most people are endowed with healing abilities. At the “Saint Joseph University” from Philadelphia, dr. Carrol Nash studied the students’ abilities to increase or delay the growth of laboratory bacterial cultures. Students claiming to possess healing abilities managed very well with both tasks by using remote healing. For his doctorate paper, Joyce Goodrich, New York psychologist, investigated sensations experienced by human patients to see whether remote healing can be perceived. She asked to stay aware of the healing flow at a certain hour of the day. Without them knowing it, the healing flow was only sent on certain days. Specialists used the patients’ testimonies in order to identify the days when the healing flow was transmitted.
Healing can be learnt
To a certain extent, healing can be learnt. At the New York University, two skillful clairvoyants and healers, dr. Dolores Krieger and Dora Kunz developed a healing method called Therapeutic touch. They trained thousands of nurses and non-professionals from the United States and several other countries to develop their healing abilities. Together with a few of her students, Dr. Krieger conducted experiments proving that therapeutic touch is liable to increase the hemoglobin level, reduce anxiety and remove headaches.
During the first lessons, the students – future healers – silently focus their attention upon a single thing. The following step consists in passing their hands above the patient’s body without touching him while seeking to perceive sensations such as warm, cold, shivering. Next they inform the patients with regard to the sick and healthy areas of their body. Then they treat the areas where there is too much or too little energy by placing their hands near that area or on the body and by visualizing the energy transfer between them and the patient.
Dr. Lawrence Leshan, New York psychologist, treated many patients sick with cancer. He had initially began to study this type of healing because he wanted to present it as a dangerous fraud, and warn people with regard to con men offering false hopes. At that point, he seriously believed that people wasted precious time when they could have benefited from conventional therapy. However after spending some time around gifted healers he changed his mind, impressed by the fact that healing had the expected results.
He identified three steps associated to haling: concentration, the care for the patient and the focus upon the healer-patient connection as well as upon the whole thing. Starting with meditation, he discovered that he was able to make those steps on his own. He thus turned into a healer himself and also taught the methods to others.
Healers claim that the beneficent effects may occur along several levels: the mental, emotional and spiritual level, even when there are no visible results at the physical level. Faith alonfiltered= the patient needs to believe in the healer or in his methods, in order for the healing effects to occur yet he also needs to believe in his own healing abilities.
Healing – a science?
In Great Britain, most people learnt how to develop their healing abilities by attending certain organization such as the National Federation for Spiritual Healing. Most organizations were later on merged bearing the name of Confederation of Healing Organizations. They teach elements with regard to manners of conduct, organize clinical experiments in order to prove healing effectiveness and strive for better cooperation among doctors. Due to CHO, a third of medical authorities agreed to distribute lists of registered healers that patients may address, to doctors.
In the USA, healing is an individual issue. Although people may study particular techniques, there is no well defined organization where they could practice. Within conventional science, healing does not consist of a well defined context around which a theory may be built. However modern physics contains hypothesis – regarding waves and particles, remote action, the interaction between the observer and matter or substance – which might suggest the initiation of a connecting bridge between a former folk custom that today promises to turn into a genuine science.
yogaesoteric
June 2006
