To make sense of all the challenges I have encountered since June 23, not to mention those after my March 26 fall, I have decided to use Fr Belita’s discussion of shamanism as a kind of template.

I don’t pretend to be a scientist nor to be a scholar like my husband. At best, I write anecdotal records of real, personal experiences. With more than 32,000 readers for my website, I would like to believe I make some sense to at least a few.

I am emboldened by Dr Christine Page who wrote: “…it can be seen that inspirational thought i probably also not new but, because of time and space changes, will be approached in a different manner as if they are fresh. Any animating idea therefore will have been through several minds before reaching this point of evolution.”

My hope is that somebody more qualified than myself will pick up the observational data from my essays and come up with a research that could help those with :family, social conditioning and/or health issues.

I have chosen to examine my challenges  as signs of being initiated as a contemporary shaman. The signs are from Fr Belita’s “Release for Wellness”.

The first sign is ‘wandering and testing in the wilderness’. In my case, it is misplacing things and having wrong perceptions. I have been blinded so many times, not being able to see things even those in front of me. I have looked but couldn’t see.

I have been in the wilderness. Lost. I have been jolted out of past, comfortable paradigms. For example, I can no longer deal with Emil and Julie Anne with a soft, comfortable romantic love. I have had to shift to a kind of tough, detached love for the higher good of each of us.

For mobility and flexibility I even have to use new, originally crafted muscular movements especially for my left leg.

Another sign is ‘ordeal of hunger’. I can never allow myself to go hungry because of my blood sugar issue except for the much- dreaded fasting before a blood test. But I have been sticking to disciplined diets for health.

Still another sign is ‘sense deprivation’. Delayed gratification has been the rule for me for quite some time. Always waiting! To stop being judgmental, I often  have to suspend my thoughts and remind myself of Buddhist guidelines plus those from Rabbi Darfour and Michael Tamura.

Fr Belita has 2 or 3 more signs but I don’t have much to say about each. Instead I am happy to write about an effect: ‘personal sense of power and authority.’

The challenges have given me a kind of confidence. My inner knowing urges me to listen to my finer self even when I am fearful.

My belief in self-healing has been bolstered by Fr Belita’s “Release for Wholeness”. He wrote:
“…the body has a wisdom for healing and the brain takes command and marshalls all the body’s components for a task of healing.”

He also wrote:” Somatic manifestations disappear when order is restored.” I take this as affirming the guidelines I have learned from Sylvia Boorstein, Michael Tamura, Dr Lipton, Dr Sarno, Dr Netario Cruz etc.

Fr Belita affirmed the cognitive disposition this way: “For effective healing it does not have to be an explicit belief in God, but, as in the words of Gershon Winker, an author in shamanism, healing as  capacity for trust in the intelligence and self-sufficiency of the body….”

For the widest  possible audience reach, I have chosen like Sylvia Boorstein to share my personal experiences of : family, social conditioning, health and literary expressions to show how understanding one’s self leads to knowing and loving the Creator

Much of what I learned from home, school, church and society have become highly irrelevant if not harmful for a 73 yr old like me. I would be healthy and happy NOW had I lived in a culture that believed that God is within me, that God wants me happy and prosperous. For all that I have learned from Tato Malay, Dr Lipton etc I still find it difficult to make a leap of faith. It is difficult for me to discard my old beliefs even when I have seen how they limit me.

Sometimes, I wonder why or how I can have a spontaneous conversion like St Paul’s. I have had my own close wake-up calls: severe, clinical depression in the 90s, a mild stroke in 2012 and my fall last March 16.

Beliefs are part of the cognitive therapy I am using. Inspired by an Internet International  Yoga article about PSOAS muscles, I have been doing my originally crafted exercises. I have experienced some improvements in my standing and walking. I have gained more mobility and flexibility on my left thigh and leg.

The exercises together with the WAKI pen application for hours on end must have improved my blood circulation thereby easing the pains as what Dr John Sarno has written about.

Another improvement is that the WAKI pen must have removed blockages similar to what Fr Belita wrote about in “Release for Wellness”. The removal of blockages has been evidenced by farting. How unglamorous! But what a relief from stomach pains and even pains on the upper arms near the armpits.

My problem with mobility and flexibility may be related to what Dr Christine Page wrote about fear of going forward because of memories of the past and anxiety over the future.

As I discarded some limiting beliefs, I felt changes in my walking. I can’t say accurately which happened first- the change of beliefs or the improvements.

But I am sure that the improvement in my walking since June 27 happened after I discarded my limiting belief about not accepting visitors in our condo.

Several weeks ago I learned from the Internet that the Medical Society of America took “PAIN” off the list of vital signs. Accordingly I choose to write about Dr Jean Cruz’ magnesium spray not as a pain reliever but as an  aid to my blood circulation. With an improved circulation I no longer suffer from oxygen depletion therefore  my standing and walking have improved significantly.

The point of attraction is not the challenge/temptation/stimulus itself. It is the sacred moment when one reacts or responds to the challenge. Never before!

I learned this the hard way. I agonized for years after watching the documentary of “The Secret”. I stretched and stressed myself to perfection. (An impossibility)

During the day I would worry about Emil. At night I would worry about Julie Anne as she lived her day in London. I was on a 24 hour high-alert state. What with my fertile imagination! What if my worries attracted disasters to Emil and Anne?

I failed to realize that as I fought with my thoughts, the very struggle may have caused a version of ‘what you resist, persists’.

Lately, I finally understood what M. Tamura meant with:

“When crises arise in your life. they are not due to something inherently wrong with you.”
“Although you may take them personally, situations in your life don’t happen to you. They just happen. And you are involved in them according to the way you respond to [them]”

My favorite Dr Sarno quoted Benjamin Franklin: “Nor is it of much importance to us to know the manner in which nature executes her laws; tis enough to know the laws themselves.”

I don’t agree with Benjamin Franklin. I have an inquisitive and investigative mind. Family, culture and environment saved me from being a heretic. I have to admit I am a repressed iconoclast. I have had a difficult time accepting things in faith although for many, many years I was too compliant to authority. Too many years of conformity led to my severe , clinical depression in the 90s. I suspect my many ailment sprang from suppressed emotions. This I learned recently from reviewing a book of Dr John Sarno.

Much of what I have written in my website is “only circumstantial evidence, but it is highly suggestive” (Paraphrased from Dr Sarno)

I wish somebody more qualified han I am would pick up the data and conduct formal research.

According to Dr Sarno: “Modern medicine has been primarily mechanical and tructural in orientation. The body is viewed as an exceedingly complex machine and illness is a malfunction in the machine brought about by infection,trauma, inherited defects, degeneration, and of course, cancer. At the same time medical science has had a love affair with the laboratory, believing that nothing is valid unless it can be demonstrated in that arena.”

I know too well from experience my doctors require laboratory tests before each visit. It makes me feel that going to the doctors without laboratory result would be useless!

“Unfortunately, some things are difficult to study in the laboratory. One of these is the mind and its organ the brain.”

“But since most physicians see their role only as treating the body, the psychological part of the problem  is neglected even though its the basic cause.”