How Does Healing Happen?

Here’s a hint: You already have what it takes.

Something that has always been an open area of inquiry for me has to do with what the mechanisms behind healing, transformation and growth are.  Growing up, I was fascinated with taking things apart, I craved wanting to know how things worked.  There was a belief I held that told me that if I understood how something worked, then I would know how to fix it if it were to break.  This curiosity would seep into every aspect of my being, from taking apart my childhood toys, to electric guitars, and even cars.  For a long time I was primarily interested in things that were physical in nature, things that I could take apart and actually see how they worked.  For me, it was much easier to comprehend how things worked and how to fix them if I was able to see the individual parts that made them up.  Eventually, I would gain a confidence that I could expand my curiosity, and my search for understanding into realms that weren’t always able to be perceived by the naked eye.

Moving into this more abstract world, I begin to rely on making metaphor and drawing similarities between two different systems.  Learning how to relate phenomena from one system and applying it to another allowed for me to grasp new understandings.  It also taught me a valuable skill that I never would have imagined.  Most importantly, I learned that I can different pieces of knowledge, combine them in a new way, and create a new understanding about something I never understood before.  I learned that I can create new tools and new ways of thinking about the world that are applied to things that I can’t see with my naked eye.  I learned that I can do this and learn how to heal.  I also learned that it’s OK to ask for help.  I could do the work faster and more efficiently if I were to get the support I needed to grow.  That support would come by way of teachers, friends, and most of all healers.