Chapter 20 - On Spiritual Healing - Strength for the Journey
Dreams, Illnesses, & Thought-Forms
Before we begin to delve into what one might personally consider to be an esoteric subject matter, it is best that we review a few definitions and concepts.
Spiritual Healing places the responsibility of improvement squarely on the patient's own shoulders, with no direct external assistance. The advising individual can only be qualified through means of an extended internal transformative journey. He (or She) must be a devoted student of the Art of Spiritual Living, well acquainted with the pitfalls & hazards arising constantly in daily existence. This 'practitioner', then, is simply any individual who has come to understand the deeper spiritual significance of seemingly unrelated events, incidents & experiences, and has learned the 'cure', or prescribed method of Spiritual treatment.
The practice of Spiritual Healing does not stand opposed to more contemporary healing arts. In fact, the practitioner is primarily a diagnostician, able to convey to the 'patient' the larger picture of the problem at hand. Advice offered by any such an advisor is done so with the belief that physical, emotional, and mental maladies have a spiritual cause. The discovery of that cause by the patient does not instantly eliminate these issues, and in the majority of cases, they must still be dealt with. This falls within the practical purview of practitioners of the appropriate healing modalities.
How can one be sure they are dealing with an authentically qualified practitioner of Spiritual Healing? I offer a few basic evaluative standards:
• Does the advice align with common sense?
• Is the advice simplistic, not requiring a complex mental strain to comprehend the diagnosis?
• Is the application of advice of no personal profit to the practitioner?
After this extended review of fundamental concepts, we are now prepared to discuss the topic at hand. I write this simply as a dedicated servant & student of Spiritual Healing, holding no external qualifications in any sort of healing modality. Test my words for yourself, and follow at your own risk.
Dreams, illnesses, and personal experiences with thought-forms and/or non-physical entities provide us with a great deal of vital information, applicable to the process of spiritual alchemy, aka self-improvement.
Specifically, dreams provide us an opportunity to modify our deeply ingrained behavioral patterns, imperfect thought processes, and emotional excesses. However, when these opportunities are ignored and remain unleveraged, we may end up countering and/or undoing any profitable work performed in the waking state of consciousness, completely without our awareness. We must strive to bring our emotional, mental & physical self-discipline to our dream-life. Even when we do not have lucid awareness of our dreams, this is still attainable. It is unwise to assume that all (or even many) dream impressions are 'correct', or 'valid', providing us with higher, unfiltered insight. In many cases, dreams do confuse & confound us, and in fact, much of this is intentional.
As we develop wiser approaches to life, we are given chances to test our mettle, as it were. Dreams can enable us to overcome challenges that would be physically difficult to do under waking life circumstances. This can help us move past roadblocks much quicker than having to slog through them day by day, over a long period of time. In essence, dreams can be a sort of 'turbo mode' for spiritual growth. However, this is a double-edged sword. In the unaware, this often manifests in a situation where one is making serious & dedicated efforts in their waking life, yet is faced with the fact that they appear to be making no real progress towards their goals. Dreams cannot be used to fulfill our repressed fantasies, if we hope to get anywhere. We must acknowledge these fantasies, and consciously choose to let go of them, once we have the heartfelt realization that they are unhealthy to us, and not truly in line with our desires.
Illnesses, Thought-Forms, and Entity Experiences are similar & related phenomenon, manifesting at various levels of consciousness. They exist because we spiritually need them to, and once we decide we no longer need them, we will cease accepting their inevitability, let go of our cultivated interest in them, and seriously work towards healing them. This is not to say that there is any element of punishment involved. We 'need' these things in the way that we 'need' road signs, or symptoms. They are indicators to us that we have an unresolved issue in our spiritual life. We all have such issues, so why the different manifestations? These experiences have far more helpful information held in them than we first realize. The exact nature of an ailment, once spiritually understood, always suggests an exact method of cure.
There is no element of judgment for the True practitioner, as he (or she) has no personal vested interest in the concern. They only offer their aid because Nature and the Divine Principle have previously provided them wisdom on their own pressing questions. They must answer the call of service when it is received, and they realize that unsolicited advice is unnecessary. With True Spiritual Healing, the patient themselves will be 'mysteriously' directed to an understanding of their ailment(s), and the associated cure(s), either through direct internal insight, external pressures and/or wisdom, or a combination of all of the above.
Thought-Forms, and in many cases, Entity Experiences, both 'positive' and 'negative', are often drastically misunderstood. These experiences are not, as many skeptical individuals are quick to determine, psychosomatic or imaginary. However, there is indeed an element of self-involvement on the part of the affected individual. Science is as yet unaware of our creative abilities & powers. We can each create our own angels, demons, and/or spirits, and we can also experience such Thought-Forms or Entities as created (or suggested) by others. This does not mean they are in any way unreal, no, these things can have very real & semi-independent existences. They are quite capable of influencing even the physical world that we typically have more awareness of than the more metaphysical dimensions.
This information may be unsettling, or may be entirely unbelievable. No matter, one need not be convinced of this viewpoint to apply the subsequent spiritual prescription. Thought-Forms bother us because they are imperfect creations, in desperate need of their own Spiritual Healing. Either we have created them, in which case, we can work directly to heal them internally, or they are the creations of others, and their involvement with us demonstrates an internal spiritual susceptibility to their influences. We must face and release the fear we experience in these encounters, focusing on our underlying spiritual growth, and just as physical illnesses are healed, these things will transmute and not bother us anymore. External assistance can be called in to provide some relief, but this is similar to the physical management of symptoms, and will not represent a permanent clearing, unless sufficient internal follow-on work is performed by the afflicted individual.