“Why is Stillness Healing so Powerful?”

Friday 12 May 2017

This is Part 2 of the previous blog “Consciousness is Us”

The one who delights in mindfulness (and) who regards unmindfulness with fear is not liable to regression. He is in the presence of Nirvana. --- Dhammapada verse 32.

As the verses from the Dhammapada imply, when one is established in mindfulness, the fetters that pull us back into the world become very visible and it is easier to see clearly. Mindfulness means being established in stillness such that the conditions of life are continuously seen arising from the stillness and finishing in the stillness. Bit by bit the perception of the practitioner will gradually start to switch until the still consciousness takes its proper order and becomes more real than the world and its conditions. The present moment will be known and given its full value in the way it contains the absolute truth with all its beauty. The Apparent and the Transcendent will be known.

The stage is now set to for an explanation as to “Why is Stillness Healing so Powerful”!    

As mentioned in my previous introductory blog “Consciousness is Us”, we can see that “Still Consciousness”, whether we see it as “Emptiness” or simply as “Space” has embodied in it, the entire energy of the Universe. We also see that each and every one of us has this potential inside us. It is there right at the heart of the present moment for anyone to discover. Having said this, it must also be recognised that this process will be difficult for most without some help to point the way. The apparent world is very real for us and if the physics is right, evolution has been in place for 14 billion years, and that is a lot of conditioning to see though. Even the Buddha said his teaching would only be really understood by “those with just a little dust in their eyes.”

The modality of “Stillness Healing” that I am developing as part of my Hypnotherapy practice is not so much to have my clients understand the theory behind the way all of this works, but to practically use its truth and efficacy to bring about the healing of suffering. It is great if clients do understand the theory behind the healing but it is OK to just take just the apparent positive benefits. This will gradually allow an understanding to grow anyway. It should be said that most of my clients do present with existential issues anyway, and they are people that I feel I am best suited to help, so stopping smoking and reducing weight clients are usually refereed to Hypnotherapists better suited for this task. I do recognise however that these day to day issues may be a symptom of something deeper, but generally my clients will know that and present accordingly.

So a typical scenario in my chair will be relaxing the client deeply and moving them into a deep trance so that the sub-conscious mind can be accessed. This process involves induction techniques to move the conscious mind out of the way, leaving the client relaxed and open. Suggestions are made for the sub-conscious mind to remember, after the event, any helpful metaphors about their relaxed feelings along with the imagined circumstance of place they may be seeing themselves in. This empowers them to practice at home. Time is spent pointing the subconscious mind towards the stillness of the present moment. The subconscious mind is encouraged to have this knowledge beyond thought and feelings. Time is spent anchoring this knowledge into the sub-conscious mind. When I am confident the client knows what I am pointing to and has stillness permeating their being, I then introduce the troublesome condition that they presented with. This is all worked out and understood in the pre-talk. (It should be said that the clients subconscious mind may have revealed the issue in a previous session --- perhaps even a past life session.)

Before proceeding I would like to side track and explain the connection between “Hooke’s Law” and “Sympathetic Vibration”. Hooke discovered that if he put two simple swinging pendulums on the same board, and set them swinging alternately, that they would eventually come into sync and swing sympathetically. This phenomenon is also used to good effect in power stations, where generators are placed on the same plinth, so that even if they start up rotating alternately, they will eventually come into sync and work more efficiently together --- and save money to boot. The same process can be seen working where many females are living together. If they remain together long enough eventually their monthly cycles will come in to sync. This phenomenon is known as “Sympathetic Vibration”.  

When the mind becomes aware of still consciousness, it sets up a powerful resonance in your body and mind. The verses from the Dhammapada used at the start of this and in the last blog illustrate this resonance well. The awareness of still consciousness helps to fast track the penetration into the troublesome conditions and starts breaking them down much faster than would ordinarily be the case. It is also reconditioning the habitual grasping and thinking around the trouble in question, reframing and reworking the way the client sees it. The suggestions that are made to the subconscious mind are designed to allow the client to keep this practice going after the session. In many ways this is a helpful process to kick start a good meditation practice, however I have noticed that clients with solid meditation experience understand this process very well and report very positive results. People who have never meditated also benefit mightily from these sessions.

Coming to terms with the mystery of our existence and understanding how consciousness brings this world and universe into existence is a real boon to anyone who is really interested to know. Some clients take the healing at face value and are grateful for that, others will take it and continue working to penetrate deeper into their consciousness to see where it might take them in this life. The truth and peace that the Buddha found is there for us all. He has left a powerful legacy of teachings. Finding the path is not easy and there are distractions everywhere we look to keep us ignorant and fully engaged on the wheel of Samsara. However it is also true that Dukka is a strong antidote to Samsara and it will always be a strong incentive to develop wisdom and mindfulness. When this happens stillness can come to the fore and allow mindfulness to penetrate deep into the present moment in order for us to know what the Buddha knows.

Heedfulness is the Deathless path,

Heedlessness, the path to death.

Those who are heedful do not die,

Heedless are like the dead.

Dhammapada Verse 21