How to heal your body

I first learned about healing when I had to. It was about six months after I'd been diagnosed with a brain tumour. I had been through the agonies that come with learning you have a potentially terminal condition. In the immediate aftermath of the diagnosis I was like putty in the doctors' hands. The neurologist who gave me the results of the scan told me the tumour would have to be removed. Certainly. This would mean cutting open my face down the side of my nose leaving a scar that wouldn't be too visible in time. Err OK. Alternatively they could take the top of my skull off, lift the brain aside and reach the tumour that way. No comment...

The ensuing months were racked with fear as I ploughed through the opinions of various doctors. It was a terrible time, yet now I can see that even then, the seeds of a new life that I find richer and more fulfilling were growing.

In the first place, a terminal diagnosis makes you rapidly reassess your priorities. You focus on what is really important to you, and you ditch those aspects of your life which no longer make you happy.

Secondly I was forced to think about who was responsible for my body. That sounds stupid, but after the diagnosis it really felt as though my head and its contents belonged to one doctor or the other. Mentally I kept repeating to them, 'Take care. This is my head and I've only got one of them.' The National Health Service is a wonderful institution, but the downside to it is that we've gradually become less inclined to take care of our bodies, believing that any bodily 'fault' is a case that a doctor will be able to solve. Generally, nothing could be further from the truth.

So then there was the third discovery that my illness brought me: the power of my mind to influence the health of my body, and the power I have to reach beyond my body and heal others.

I was lucky in many ways. Surgery proved impossible, and the experts couldn't agree on the cause of my tumour or the likely prognosis. I was looking for a way out of this painfully confusing situation and I found Martin Brofman and the system of healing he has developed called Body Mirror Healing.

Martin is an American who was diagnosed with terminal cancer himself nearly 40 years ago, when he was working as a computer systems analyst on Wall Street. He had an inoperable tumour on his spinal cord that had paralysed the left side of his body. He sought the advice of various healers and it was in the aftermath of his successful battle with this tumour that he devised his Body Mirror technique of healing others.

The first thing Martin said to me when I met him was 'We work with the idea that the body is a mirror of your consciousness.' I wasn't sure that I knew what this meant until Martin had sat me down in a chair, and asked me to close my eyes and do nothing while he gave me a healing. I felt a charge like electricity surge through the part of my head where the tumour was, while Martin lightly touched those parts of my body that correspond to the 'chakras' in the ancient yogic analysis of the body. The chakras are centres of energy that correspond to the main nervous and endocrine centres in the western anatomy of the body. When he had finished I stood up, feeling indefinably altered. Like Alice in Wonderland, I felt a long way away from my feet.

This was not the first time I had been given healing, but it was Martin's explanation of what he had done and seen in my body that made it a decisive event in my life. What he said afterwards made it clear to me that long-forgotten childhood emotions were still apparent in my chakras, and causing my problems. Emotional reactions that I thought I no longer felt were visible to him in the colours of my body. This is what he meant when he said that my body was a mirror of my consciousness. To change the state of my body, it was necessary to examine my deepest feelings and beliefs and release them if they no longer served any purpose for me.

What makes the Body Mirror technique so powerful is the fact that, as well as the unexplained power of a healing, it gives you something you recognize that you can work with to bring about change. It's as though it gives us a key to understand the language the body speaks. Tension about different aspects of our lives shows up in the corresponding area of our body. Problems with our relationships will show up in the heart chakra, in the breast or lung area, for example. Problems with money, home or jobs will show up in our teeth, legs or skeleton. The system is simple, but profound and powerful.

My life has changed since that day I met Martin. I was so struck by the accuracy of his diagnosis that I began to unravel the tangle of emotions I unconsciously carried with me. I used meditation to know myself better and release the feelings that came up, and I discovered how powerful my thoughts could be. I also took time to visualise the tumour healing, which the MRI scans eventually proved to be the case. I learned the Body Mirror Healing system and began to heal people on a regular basis myself. Healing has been a profound discovery that has taught me how to live a happier life and help others to do the same.

If you would like to know more or discuss a treatment you can contact Anna on 0781 806 1605 or see www.hunahealing.co.uk or www.healer.ch