Homeopathy and Mental Health...

In homeopathy we say, “healing happens with discharge in a safe place”. What do we mean by that?

When there are waste products, like urea in your bloodstream, your kidneys filter that urea out by producing urine. When there is carbon dioxide in your bloodstream, your lungs carry that out through your exhalation. When there are salts and drugs in your tissues, your perspiration carries them to the surface of your skin or the liver removes them from your bloodstream. Hence your skin, your liver, your lungs and your kidneys are all organs of elimination and detoxification. And yes there are things that you can do to promote that eliminative cycle, including homeopathy.

But when it is your toxic thoughts and consequently your unhealthy emotions, how are these removed? And first, how do we even know the toxic thoughts from the nontoxic thoughts? Pain, you say? Yes, when discharge from a safe place is impeded or restricted, that lack of ease (dis-ease) is experienced as pain, irritation and aggravation. So how do we open the gates of elimination for your mind and your emotions? How can we begin?

First we can acknowledge the reality of what is. And observe and report our thoughts and subsequent feelings. I call this Step 1: show up in your own life (notice that you cannot show up for anyone else).

Step 2 is to pay attention. As a homeopath I ask you to do this in the preliminary questionnaire and in the initial intake interview and in each and every follow up visit. Sometimes I even ask you annoying questions on the phone or in emails. I am asking you to pay attention.

Then Step 3 is to tell the truth… with kindness. Turn your thoughts around until you find the ‘kind’ truth, not the ugly truth or the brutal truth. Turn your thoughts around until the Wizard of Oz is unmasked and you know your own mind and your own heart and your own courage and your own way home.

Step 4 is to take responsibility for your part. Your part. Take responsibility for your thoughts, beliefs, projections, emotions, and behaviors. Yes that is a lot to take responsibility for. Notice how busy you will be taking responsibility for your part. Has to make you wonder how you ever had time to bother with what was other peoples’ business. Or with worrying about the future. Busy, busy.

And Step 5 is to let go of the outcome. Reality is much more fun when you are in agreement with it, when you are not ‘end gaming’ reality. Reality has way more possibilities, an infinite array of possibilities in fact, than you can ever ever think of or believe in. And all the hoping and wishing or bitching and complaining in the world won’t get you there. Things are how they are before they can be anything else.

When your homeopath listens to your story, that is what we hear, the thing in itself, and your reactions and beliefs about the thing in itself. And we hear your beliefs about reality, beliefs that are not necessarily true. Those beliefs, those thoughts are generously called ‘delusions’ in homeopathy. One of the most frequent delusions that I hear day in and day out is: “I am alone in the world or my mate does not love and honor me or no one loves me or I am unlovable”. First off, notice this within yourself right now. Pay attention. Is it true? Is it absolutely true? Sometimes I smile when I hear this from a client because it reminds me that I am hearing a delusion, an untruth about reality. How do I know that those thoughts are not true? Well, just biologically speaking, not only are you not alone in the world, but it is physically impossible to be alone, to be separated from all that is, all the billions of microorganisms that make their home with you and help you digest your food and form 2/3 of your fecal matter and eat the dead skin cells you shed constantly and keep parasitic organisms from overtaking your skin and……..

And this is not to mention the number of unseen and seen people in your life, who show up every day to make it possible for you to even flip on a light switch and have light or flush a toilet or wear pajamas when you feel so alone in the world. I cannot even think of 10 minutes in your life that are not populated by 10 billion living things making it possible for you to take your next breath. And if that is not love, what is? 10 billion beings loving you in less than 10 minutes, that is what you can be grateful for.

So now the delusion has disappeared momentarily, back into the collective dream from whence it came. And I will ask you about your dreams too. Not because the homeopath analyzes them in the traditional way, but because dreams are one of many ways that your thoughts and emotions can be released safely and gently. You might even say that dreams release your everyday delusions in a way we can all wake up to.

First published 20 March 2012