Russell McNeil, LCH           

In the state of health the spirit-like vital force (dynamis) animating the material human organism reigns in supreme sovereignty.  It maintains the sensations and activities of all the parts of the living organism in a harmony that obliges wonderment.  The reasoning spirit who inhabits the organism can thus freely use this healthy living instrument to reach the lofty goal of human existence.
                                                    Samuel Hahnemann, The Organon of Medicine

Homoeopathy is a healing system that operates on an energy level, where illness begins.

  How do we get ill?  This century has focused primarily on germ theory as revealing the cause of illness.  We are told that sickness and disease are caused by viruses or bacteria or by sudden unexplained pathological changes in cells in the body.  The assumption is that illnesses begin at a cellular level and can be cured on that level.  Conventional western medicine also assumes there is a model of 'diseases' which are seen as separate entities from those who are ill and are something which you can 'catch'.   Although these are purely interpretations of observable data, they have assumed the status of universal truths in our society.

  There is another way of looking at illnesses and diseases.  In the model proposed by homoeopathy, all ill health begins on the energy or dynamic level, called by homoeopaths 'vital force'.  This is the energy that differentiates between a living organism and a dead one.  Samuel Hahnemann, who discovered and developed homoeopathy, observed that all illness results form a disturbance in the vital force and that therefore all healing begins at this level.  All symptoms, whether physical, emotional, mental or spiritual are signs of this inner disturbance in health.  The vital force is not separate from these other levels but permeates them all.  In fact, these are not separate because no illness manifests on one level alone.

  Homoeopaths work to help the patient to heal this inner disturbance by prescribing energy medicines.  These are called potentised or dynamised remedies.  These are prepared by taking a substance such as a herbal tincture of Pulsatilla and subjecting it to a process of dilution and succussion (shaking by banging against a firm object).  In this way the healing energy of the substance is liberated and magnified.  Perhaps an analogy is the release of atomic energy with the splitting of the atom.  Any substance can be dynamised in this way to create a remedy, even materials which are poisons or substances which are medicinally inert in their unpotentised forms.  It is as if these substances are transformed by the dynamisation to allow their healing powers to be available to the planet.  Homoeopaths use plants, minerals, animal venoms, and even products of disease as healing agents.

  An example of this healing power is illustrated in the following case:  A woman developed pneumonia and then asthma after her husband's sudden illness and death.  Two years later she came to homoeopathy.  My perception was that grief was the underlying symptom.  Pulsatilla fitted her symptoms and she was given a single dose of Pulsatilla intramuscularly.  The same day she was able to stop using her inhaler and she felt much better over the next week.  Others noticed the improvement in her health.  Dynamised Pulsatilla reached into her disturbance at a deep level and the healing process began.

What a substance can cause it can also cure.

  Central to homoeopathy is the 'Law of Similars', or 'like cures like'.  Although the principle was known to Hippocrates, Hahnemann was the first to develop this observation into a complete system of healing.  Remedies are tested on healthy human volunteers known as 'provers'.  A proving should be done as follows:  A homoeopathic pharmacist potentises the substance to several strengths.  He also prepares several doses of inert substance as a placebo for comparison and all the packets are coded with numbers whose meaning is known only to the pharmacist.    These are provided to the proving director who does not know which is remedy and which is placebo.  The packets are allotted to the provers who are under the supervision of proving assistants.  The provers take several doses from the packets given to them and meticulously record any symptoms they may experience.  They will have had a full homoeopathic case taking before the proving to make clear any pre-existing symptoms.  On completion of the proving, all information is collated and this becomes the remedy picture of the symptoms that this substance can cause.  This is then available for use when treating an ill person.

  How do homoeopaths match the symptoms of the patient to those of the remedy?  The first step is in the Homoeopathic case taking, which is almost unique in its thoroughness and depth.  All aspects of a patient's state of health are covered and as complete a picture as possible of them as a whole is revealed.  The symptoms which are most important are those that reveal the patient's uniqueness.  This process requires patience, skill and empathy on the part of the homoeopath.  He or she must be sensitive to all the subtle nuances of the patient and not just rely on physical symptoms.  After this process is completed the homoeopath then matches the essence of the patient to that of the remedy.  Homoeopathy is both an art and a science.

  When a suitable remedy is prescribed the whole state of the patient's health can be changed to a higher level.  Potentised remedies, by mirroring a person's disturbed health, trigger a healing process.  This means that disturbances at all levels, including physical, emotional, mental and spiritual have the potential to be healed.

  Remedies can be the catalyst for change as can any form of energy healing.  I say the catalyst because I believe that it is the patients who heal themselves and the practitioners and their system of healing are the tools which patients use to do so.  The vital force is a naturally self-healing mechanism which becomes stuck when burdened with chronic disease and the various systems of energy healing are in the world to be available to assist people to deal with this process.

  I hope that this explanation will help healers and doctors to understand the link between their work and that of Homoeopaths.

  We are all treating people on the deeper levels where illnesses begin .  Each can play a vital role in helping patients and ourselves to heal - not just the illnesses of individuals but of the planet we all share.
Russell McNeil is a homeopath who also does bodywork and hands-on healing, occasionally seeing the same clients as his wife, Delcia, who is a psychotherapist and healer.  He teaches introductory classes in homoeopathy and runs workshops on Healing the Wounds, for those who have been traumatised by medical treatments.

      Flat 2, 56 Queens Avenue, Muswell Hill, London N10 3NU  081-442 0391

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Copyright © Daniel J. Benor, M.D. 1993 Reprinted with permission of the author P.O. Box 76 Bellmawr, NJ 08099 www.WholisticHealingResearch.com   DB@WholisticHealingResearch.com

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