The Body Whisperer: Your Symptoms Tell Me Your Truth

Preface

We each see the world through a different lens. The colors on your lens are a composite of your upbringing, life experiences, and your character. When it comes to money, I may see the world through rose-colored glasses, while your lens may be a muddy brown in that topic area. How we live in the world depends on how opaque or transparent our lens is, allowing us to accurately perceive our life. I believe that a powerful journey—spiritual or otherwise—results in an improvement of one’s lens; a clearing of the dark colors and the addition of positive, more transparent hues. My spiritual journey was unplanned, as so many are, and I was introduced to a new way of seeing the world while pursuing a cure for my allergies.

Sometimes I explain what I see in terms of television channels. If I ask you to describe the color of the wall in front of you and then ask you to describe its texture, you may feel like you change channels in your brain in order to register the different types of information. Most of us go through life with the equivalent of basic cable—we see what we can readily observe through our five senses. Nearly twenty years ago, I learned that there are hundreds of other channels available to us if we make the effort to tune in to them. Once you believe that these channels exist, you can begin developing the ability to tune in to them.

As a lawyer, I was trained to look for what was already wrong and what could go wrong. During my healing journey, I learned that the skills that made me a good lawyer—like the ability to spot a potential problem almost anywhere—made me a rather negative and unhappy person. I was difficult to please as I always saw room for improvement—in myself and in situations. My bosses may have enjoyed my perfectionist style, but my escalating allergies were my body’s form of protest.

Learning to see the world energetically has meant understanding that the Universe is perfect just as it is. Given the mass suffering that happens daily on this planet, this approach may seem delusional, but over the last two decades, I’ve been privileged to sit with thousands of clients and speak to their spirits while They explain the grace behind each instance of suffering the client has endured. No injury happens without planning on the part of the Universe; there is intentionality behind each event. Every occurrence happens as part of a greater agenda, orchestrated by every spirit involved. Nothing occurs that does not in some way benefit everyone concerned. It’s very common for clients to arrive not able to fathom how their pain could be of benefit to anyone. It’s equally common for them to leave my treatment room in awe of the complex orchestration behind the events in their lives.

My statements are not meant to imply that suffering does not exist. Suffering is very real and invites us to have compassion for ourselves and for others. But we can think of instances where suffering is necessary and produces great miracles: the suffering of childbirth or the bittersweet suffering of watching one’s child leave for his first day of kindergarten or college. We can recognize this suffering as painful but important, and I assert that your spirit views every instance of your suffering this way. Many years later most people can list the gifts that grew out of a painful situation, but at the time, they could only perceive the pain. It’s my job to hold onto the larger perspective/truth while feeling compassion for the suffering occurring in the present moment.

My enhanced way of viewing the world has brought me a deep peace that comes from knowing that the world is not random and cruel. I still have stress—most definitely! But within a short period of time, I can reorient myself back into my knowing that every moment of stress serves as a compass helping me find my way back to my truth. I can resent the stress, or I can get quiet and still for a moment and feel the wisdom that is being offered to me. It is my hope that the stories offered here will convey some of what I’ve learned from the spirits that I’ve had the privilege of speaking with over the years and afford you some of this same sense of peace and knowing.

On a practical note: The stories in this book are not literally true in every detail. Names and identifying features of each client have been changed in order to protect their privacy. I’ve tried to write about issues that I see frequently among my clients and within my own life in the hopes that these are issues that will also apply to readers. There are friends and family members who’ve allowed me to use their actual names in this book. They are Joe, Thomas, Dana, Sandy, and my boys Joey and Justin. Please assume that every other name used throughout this book is fictional.

And lastly, I would like to pass along advice that the Buddha gave to his students (forgive my paraphrasing). He advised them to try on his teachings like a pair of shoes. If they did not seem like a good fit, then they should leave them behind. I believe that there is no one correct religion, spiritual practice, or belief system. My hope is that each person’s beliefs guide them to be happy, empowered, and compassionate. If this is your result, then I don’t care if you worship chocolate (and some people seem to).

Chapter 1 -

Becoming a Body Whisperer

M adonna adopts George Clooney’s love child! was the headline I pretended not to read as I stood in line at the grocery store. As the person in front of me pushed her loaded cart towards the parking lot, I made eye contact with the cashier and smiled. Immediately I noticed a band of red energy across her forehead. It looked painful, and I squinted without realizing it. The cashier raised an eyebrow and asked, Are you okay, Ma’am?

I answered without thinking (a bad habit that I don’t recommend), I’m okay, but do you have a headache?

Yes! she exclaimed, rubbing her forehead. I glanced down and noticed that she had dark, negative energy in her pelvic area, which I often see when people feel a lack of power in some way.

Did something happen today that made you feel powerless? I ventured.

Yeah! I got a speeding ticket today that I totally didn’t deserve! The guy in front of me was going way faster than I was and— Hey, wait! she interrupted herself and looked confused for a second. How did you know that I had a headache?

Yes, how did I know that? And how was I going to explain what I was seeing? And why did I keep putting myself in these situations? I really needed to train myself not to jump in and offer help when it wasn’t requested. To fully explain how I knew she had a headache would take a long time, and the customers in line behind me looked impatient, so I opted for a short answer.

I can see energy, and I don’t have time now to tell you much more, but if I can put some energy into your abdomen, your headache will probably diminish.

She looked hesitant. I can’t really leave this register…and there’s a line of customers.

The lady in line behind me scowled, warning us to not even mention the possibility of delaying her.

Ughhh, gross, said the teenaged bag boy packing my groceries. He had been absorbed in what I was saying and not paying attention, and he’d smashed my eggs with a carton of milk. He looked up sheepishly and said, I’m sorry, Ma’am. I’ll go to the back of the store and get you more eggs.

I recognized an opportunity when I saw it, and I quickly moved around behind the counter while the guy ran off to get the eggs. I used my hands to place some healing energy into the cashier and felt her sigh with relief as her body began to unclench in response to the positive energy flowing into her body. Just as I finished, the bag boy returned with my eggs, the cashier finished ringing me up, and I left.

For the next two months whenever that cashier saw me heading to the checkout area, she would wave her hand and say, Over here! Over here! This register’s open! I learned to avoid her because she would flood me with questions like: Who do you think will win homecoming queen at my school? Do you know the winning lottery numbers? Do you think that I’ll do well on my history final? What color is my energy when I think of Bobby? Situations like these are how I’ve trained myself (slowly, I admit) to think before I open my mouth about what I perceive in people.

I wasn’t always this way. I was raised by entrepreneurial parents, and I thought of myself as someone who came from a smart and successful gene pool. I grew up valuing intelligence, power, and money—probably in that order. I went to college and law school, and after graduating law school, I fell in love with a man who lived in Charlotte, North Carolina. We got married, and I moved to the South and practiced law as an in-house lawyer for a large bank. I was on my way to a great life, according to all the American standards I grew up with.

But during my first year of law school, I developed allergies. My doctor said I was allergic to dust, which exists everywhere (I think even on the moon!). So my choices were: 1) to take antihistamines each day, which made me very drowsy, or 2) to carry around a box of tissues and blow my nose constantly. (This was before the days of the drugs we have now which don’t cause drowsiness.) I alternated between these two options for a couple of years, using caffeine to combat the drowsiness and whining about how much mucous the body could produce when not held back by antihistamines.

I was thrilled when my doctor recommended a steroid-based inhaler that suppressed my allergies to the point that they seemed to disappear. Everything was great until I talked to my doctor about getting pregnant and was told that I would have to give up my steroid inhaler once I got pregnant. That’s when the stubborn, demanding lawyer side of me took over, and I refused to go back to blowing my nose 150 times a day.

I had been to rural China on business trips with my husband and watched hundreds of women working in rice fields. None of them were carrying tissue boxes, and I was pretty sure that there was no local store carrying steroid-based inhalers. So what were they using for allergy relief? I began studying Chinese herbs and was encouraged by the concept of retraining my immune system instead of just trying to suppress my body’s allergic reactions.

In the early 1980s a reliable source of Chinese herbs was not easy to find in my town, so I began to investigate homeopathic medicine. I studied homeopathy like I was pursuing another law degree, attending conferences and study groups and reading dozens of books. Using homeopathic remedies and what I learned about rebalancing the body, I was able to get rid of approximately fifty percent of my allergies. I still needed some tissues, but I knew that I was on the right track. I began recommending homeopathic remedies to friends and family members, and their various symptoms improved as well.

The relief that homeopathy provided convinced me that energy medicine was real, and so I plunged into the study of energy. I read books on quantum physics, feeling more comfortable with hard science than anything metaphysical. I came from a background that valued analytical reasoning, and most metaphysical books seemed too airy-fairy for me. But when I began taking tai chi lessons from a woman who seemed incredibly peaceful, I had to look at spirituality differently. Don’t get me wrong, I was still the cynical lawyer, but there was no denying that when I spent time around this teacher, I felt different. More relaxed, calm, and somehow…safer. I began hanging around after class, and my instructor taught me about Taoism and living in balance. I began meditating, which was comical at first because my brain, so long worshipped by me, refused to quiet down. I wanted more answers, so I began studying Buddhism in addition to Taoism. The books, retreats, and workshops began making a real difference in how I felt, so I continued to meditate daily, even though on some days my busy mind offered me more frustration than inner peace.

My career took a strange turn at this point. I left the practice of law to become a business consultant. One of my first clients was a veterinarian, and in chatting with him, I mentioned that I’d trained dogs and horses while I was in college. Before I realized what I was saying, I’d agreed to teach a dog-obedience class at his vet clinic. I thought it was a one-time thing, so I had fun with it, making people laugh and enjoying training the dogs and their owners. To my surprise, the class was a huge hit, and the receptionist at the vet’s office told me that there was a waiting list to take my next class. Next class? I asked incredulously.

I went home and thought about it and realized that I was hesitating about teaching more classes because it would likely mean choosing to be a dog trainer instead of a lawyer and business consultant. This seemed like a lot to give up. Graduating from a prestigious California law school had given me instant credentials, a sort of name tag that said, Pay attention—I’m a lawyer, which means that I’m smart and powerful. Telling people I was a dog trainer conveyed little of the same impressive ideas—hell, it didn’t even convey that I went to college.

My husband encouraged me to follow my heart, and I had to admit that dog training was so fun and easy, I was surprised that people were paying me so much to do it. So what began as a favor for a client blossomed into a local phenomenon, with me teaching classes five nights a week and getting referrals from most of the local vets, dog groomers, and animal-control officers. I made more money as a dog trainer than I did as a lawyer, which also helped to validate my decision. And teaching dog-obedience classes at night meant that I was free during the day to pursue my other passions—studying alternative medicines and Eastern religions.

At my tai chi instructor’s suggestion, I took a Reiki class. The purpose of the class was to teach me to channel healing energy through my hands and into my own body or someone else’s body to facilitate healing. I have to admit that ten minutes into the workshop, my inner lawyer reared her ugly head and scoffed at the hocus-pocus style of teaching that the Reiki teacher employed. I came home doubtful that any real transformation had occurred and didn’t try to work with healing energy for over a year.

About fourteen months later I was in San Francisco and watched a man performing energy healing on someone. A light bulb went off, and I knew or recognized that I had the same ability, and that it was time to start using it. With my interest and faith in energy healing reignited, I went home and began offering energy treatments to friends. While the energy treatments seemed to help alleviate their symptoms for awhile, invariably the symptoms would come back, and the friends would be back at my door asking for another treatment.

In an effort to be more focused while offering an energy treatment, I started meditating beforehand. I found that after meditating, I felt more certain about where to place the energy, and the healing seemed to last a bit longer. Then I began noticing that as I sat in meditation, a phrase or an image would float into my mind. I would usher it away like the other thoughts, but this one would keep floating back into my awareness. It was gentle, not agitated like my usual thoughts, and seemed nurturing somehow. I wondered if these pictures and phrases applied to the friend that I was about to channel energy into, and I began relaying the messages to my friends, asking if they made sense to them. To my surprise, the given phrase would usually elicit an ah-ha moment, and my friends would experience a revelation that seemed to correspond to the injury or ailment causing them suffering. And then the healing would hold—sometimes permanently!

This was the answer I was looking for about why energy healing—and so many forms of healing—only lasted a short time. There seemed to be an emotional connection that needed to be addressed in order for the body to release the symptom. And somehow I was being given this important information…by someone.

I sat in meditation in the hopes that this mysterious helpful stranger would reveal Herself to me. I raised my energy up to the middle of my forehead (the third-eye location) as I had been taught by my meditation teachers. Then I felt my energy being gently nudged up higher until it sat just above my head. And then I heard a soft voice say, Welcome home. I began to cry without understanding why. My spirit introduced Herself. She told me that we all receive guidance from our spirit, or soul, all the time. This guidance usually comes as feelings and occurs in our heart area, which is one of two portals through which we receive information from our spirit. The other portal is located above the head (also known as the 7th chakra), which is why She helped me move my energy up to that opening. She informed me that I could ask Her any question, and She would try to give me an answer that I could understand.

For the next six months, I was like a kid in a candy store! I sat in meditation for three to four hours a day, pummeling my ever-patient spirit with questions about everything. Why is there suffering in the world? Why do we age instead of just dropping over dead when we hit 100? Why do some people seem to have easier lives? Did God make a mistake when designing body parts that sag? (No, all of my questions were not profound.) And in between my barrage of questions, my spirit got Her lessons in, teaching me about the Universe and about illness, emotions, and healing. When I doubted myself and wondered if I was really hearing Her or just going crazy, She would direct me to a bookstore and a specific book and a specific page. And there on the specified page would be the very information that I had channeled earlier that day! My doubts would recede for awhile, and I would be back on my meditation cushion.

The friends who had experienced seemingly miraculous recoveries after receiving both energy and a message from me told some of their friends. And they told a few more friends, and soon complete strangers were calling me and asking for help. I was delighted to help, as these treatments gave my spirit a way to continue teaching me about emotional patterns present within different symptoms and how to promote healing.

Because I was still employed as a dog trainer, I sometimes worked with dogs and their owners privately in their homes. As I spent more time during the day meditating, I became more skillful