I often use the phrase ‘healing from the inside out’. The first time I heard it, I wondered what it really meant. I suspect that you also wonder that same thing.
Let’s start by looking at different health care models:
Allopathic Medicine.
Per the National Cancer Institute, allopathic medicine is a system in which medical doctors and other health care professionals (such as nurses, pharmacists, and therapists) treat symptoms and diseases using drugs, radiation, or surgery. Also called bio-medicine, conventional medicine, mainstream medicine, orthodox medicine, and Western medicine.
Green Health Care
A system of health care in which natural, alternative, and holistic practitioners address symptoms using natural herbs, supplements and other holistic modalities, which could include acupuncture, massage, aromatherapy, and many others.
Many of these practitioners work to alleviate symptoms while also exploring and addressing the deeper causes the the illness. It depends on the practitioner, their approach, perspective, training and expertise.
Healing from the inside out.
A system of wellness care that uses detective work to identify underlying cause of symptoms and then supports the body in healing itself. This is based on the understanding that the body heals itself. Your entire body was built from 2 cells joining together. Every function in your body was created from those two cells. If the human body is capable of that, then it is also capable of healing almost anything that goes wrong in the body.
It is also important to alleviate symptoms along the way. This is called smart or holistic symptom relief.
All three approaches have their place.
The patient or client needs to work with their practitioners to find the right balance of the three models. They each have their own pros and cons.
Let’s explore the Healing from the Inside Out model.
From my perspective, the body is designed to heal itself. When the body is exposed to stresses, it is designed to meet and resolve the stress and return to homeostasis. When the body is not healthy, it means that the body is not able to meet and resolve the stresses. This can be caused by many factors and in the case of chronic illness, it is that there are more stresses that the body can handle, and the dis-ease process has been initiated.
A common mis-understanding is the symptoms themselves.
Our society commonly see symptoms as something bad that needs to be gotten rid of. From the inside out perspective, symptoms are either a sign that the body is healing or a message from the body that something has gone wrong and we need to grab our detective hats and get to the investigation.
A symptom can be a sign that the body is healing itself.
When the body is healing itself, there will almost always be a symptom. You cut your finger and it become red, inflamed and sore. That is the body sending energy and healing chemicals to the cut. If you wash the cut, and keep it from getting infected, the finger will heal. Nothing else needs to be done. This is a very simple example, and yet often our symptoms are just that, the body in the process of healing itself.
Our symptoms may be the body telling us that something is wrong.
Imagine that the oil light came on in your car. Rather than putting more oil in the car, you snipped the connection to the light so that the oil light didn’t come on. Without the simple act of adding oil, you might very well burn out or freeze the engine.
Maybe your fatigue is because you aren’t getting enough sleep. Your heartburn is caused by eating too much of the wrong foods. Sure, you can take a medication or supplement to make the symptom go away, but without addressing and resolving the underlying cause, the health of the body may decline, the symptoms may reappear or show up in a different and perhaps a more serious problem.
From my understanding, this is what happens in our body when we use drugs, supplements and other tools to ‘stop’ the symptoms. Sometimes intelligent symptom alleviation is appropriate, but it is best used along with a deeper look and resolution of the underlying cause.
Finding a practitioner who is seasoned in supporting the body in healing itself
A practitioner who is skilled in assisting an individual to heal from the inside out will have many ways to inquire, identify and resolve the underlying causes of symptoms. As the underlying causes are identified and resolved, then the problematic symptoms simply go away.
Supporting the body to heal from the inside out.
I spent a lot of years chasing symptoms with both allopathic medicine and green medicine. In order to fulfill my desire to completely heal myself, I needed to go deeper. I could manage my symptoms with supplements, but I couldn’t make them completely go away. My intention was to be symptom free. So I continued searching.
I studied wholistic health from many angles, including physical, emotional, mental, energetic and spiritual aspects. I am also very intuitive. By blending my studies with my intuition, I was able to identify and resolve the underlying causes of my symptoms and they began falling away.
Now talking with an individual, listening, and asking for questionnaires to be completed I can have a pretty good idea of the areas of stress. Then comes the work of identifying specifics and using the right tools to neutralize the stresses.
Healing from the inside out can seem to take longer and be more expensive than the allopathic approach, but in my experience the opposite is true. It embraces the whole being and becomes an experience of tapping into and neutralizing stresses that you never knew were lurking under the surface. These stresses impact you on all levels, robbing you of your vitality, inner peace and satisfaction in life.
The result of healing from the inside out is that you discover a new you that may be well beyond what you ever imagined possible. That is true healing.
Stayed tuned. Next week, we will look at the kinds of stresses that underlie the experience of fibromyalgia.
