Holistic healer Cyndi Dale concludes her discussion of the health ego-RHYTHM™ with a look at health, wholeness, lifestyle and service.
The health ego-RHYMER not only recognizes the inconsistency of health and life, but also serves as a healer. A healer is someone who perceives the gap between our innate goodness and our current state-of-affairs and is willing to “stand in this gap” to help close it for — and with — self and others. This act varies according to the healer’s gifts and circumstances, but it always involves three areas of commitment: personal transformation, service to others, and care for the world.
Regarding the first arena, the pledge to personal transformation, I can only share that I’ve spent considerable time and resources in this area. To date, I’ve chocked up three therapists named Marilyn (along with fistfuls of others), more time in 12 Step Programs than steps, and nearly infinite forays into the various corners of health care, from sacred plant medicine to Hawaiian massage, with regular annual check-ups to my allopathic physicians thrown in.
The second qualification for the health ego-RHYTHM™ is the promise to help others express and experience the wholeness within. Contrary to expectation, you don’t have to work in the health care field to be a health ego-RHYTHMIC. You might set bones or give shots all day, but you also could be a bank clerk, full-time parent, or an accountant. How do you know if you qualify as a healer? Your energy increases rather than decreases when you are helping others become more whole—or more of whom they really are.
Here’s an example of a “non-physician physician.” A few years ago, I worked with a woman who had just finished making her hundredth blanket. They were beautiful. Soft flannel, flecked with swirling colors set in unusual patterns. You know her “end user?” Autistic infants and toddlers. The designs actually altered the mapping of a child’s mind and therefore, brain chemistry, activating neurons for connection. This woman’s passion for helping the autistic created a new treatment modality.
One of my clients, a stockbroker, spends four weeks a year distributing food in Africa. Yet another is a surgeon who has quit her job to live in Appalachia and run a clinic for the underprivileged. Another donates time and money to a group that frees women slaves in the Middle East and finds them safe homes. These individuals are all healers, as are those of us who look to raise our own food and act so that others have enough to eat.
Passion is one thing; we all have a passion for something. The health ego-RHYMER, however, demonstrates the inner longing for love through a strange dichotomy, that of pursuing change and healing while accepting “what is” as “already perfect.” The best part—we don’t have to give up chocolate to be healthy!
Tell us, are there ways you are a healer in your own life? How do you give back, affect others, make a difference? We’d love to know. Thanks for sharing!
