FAQ

  1. On science and non-pharmaceutical therapies
  2. Selecting therapies
  3. Selecting therapists
  4. Self healing
  5. Classification

Selecting therapies

A variety of non-pharmaceutical therapies, some ancient, some recent, are available nowadays. Many of them, while using different terminologies and models, tend to offer equivalent approaches. Some of these therapies, unfortunately, should be discouraged, while others offer consistent results and can be used to successfully heal complex pathologies. 

  1. Important : transition to non-pharmaceutical solutions gradually in cases of chronic diseases such as diabetes, or other impairments which require daily attention. In these cases, make sure changes in health condition are stable over a reasonable amount of time before lowering the intake of pharmaceutical solutions.
     
  2. It is advised to select more than one therapy, and address ailments on more than the symptomatic, physical level. In fact, the body's immune system, under optimal conditions (given sufficient time and resources to adapt to a threat), is able to handle all imbalances and challenges. Therefore, a chronic disease, or a tendency to catch a given disease repeatedly, suggest root causes beyond physical symptoms.
     
  3. Working on the physical and etheric bodies at once can resolve most impairments. In all schools of thought, including occidental medicine, therapists believe the root cause of many diseases is a combination of mental and physical factors. This has been proved, for example, for back pains (often related to stress), or intestinal difficulties (apparently linked to social anxiety), and is being actively researched regarding other health impairments. For these reasons we highly recommend, for chronic physical diseases, to address the physical condition itself, and also, to explore and heal relevant areas of the conscious mind (etheric body - see our classification system).
     
  4. We recommend selecting therapies you feel attracted to. It is easier to progress when the patient and therapist enjoy exchanging and communicating, and selecting therapies which seem consistent with your belief system facilitates this. For example, if you enjoy martial arts, Chinese methods such as Chi-Gong or Tuina might be the way to go, and an opportunity for you to further explore the development of these traditions alongside martial arts.
     
  5. Obtain reliable information about the therapies you have selected. In the context of Ayurveda, for example, many scientific research papers are freely available, and the original methodology itself is freely available. A brief look at information specific to the relevant ailment will help you validate the work performed by a therapist, and some of the hundreds of recommended solutions of this tradition could be prepared at home.
     
  6. Favour the traditional approach to your healing methods of choice. For example, production of industrial medicines based on Ayurvedic teachings has sometimes caused unwanted incidents, while ritual preparation of such solutions has often raised interest in the scientific community - due to clear results on challenging pathologies. Similarly, the Ayahuasca experience with trained shamen doesn't compare to the occidentalized practice, for the natural context itself influences results.
     
  7. Patience and perseverance will help you assess the effect of a therapy. While many of the therapies listed in this directory can be used to rapidly heal simple physical diseases, such as a flu, more complex pathologies require some time and sustained work. Do not persist with a therapy/therapist if you see no noticeable progress over a reasonable amount of time, but do not expect, or demand, a one shot, miracle solution either - from any form of medicine. A wise and experienced healer will rarely promise, or sell, such solutions for they only exist for a few cases, and reclaiming the "one shot fix" might put a strain on genuine practitioners.
     
  8. We have observed the resolution of extremely severe impairments, typically, reconstruction of nervous tissue over a few months, yielding recovery from paralysis : we do believe that whenever there is living tissue to work with, an appropriate combination of therapies can restore full capabilities. But we also believe patience and perseverance are needed to obtain these results.
     

Selecting therapists

  1. Choose therapists who work out of compassion. Compassion is the single most important characteristic of health experts, and this is true across traditions. The priority of your therapist should be to make quality health care available to as many people as possible. This ensures their dedication. Generally, their pricing formula reflects this choice, with low to medium fees and, in cases where long term support is needed, accommodations, and for some of them, compensation being left to the patient's appreciation.
     
  2. Trust experience, not diplomas. While many occidentalized schools have appeared and do deliver licenses, such licenses do not, in most cases, reflect the actual competence of a therapist. This is partly due to the lack of public teaching methodologies, which are being defined at the moment for therapies like acupuncture. It is therefore advised to seek for recommendations, or try to assess the personal experience of the therapist with related disciplines (acupressure and Tuina for acupuncture practitioners, for example - see our glossary for more).
     
  3. Be wary of over-commitment. While we firmly believe that wherever there is living tissue, healing can restore organs to full capability, "one shot" solutions apply to rare cases, and methods and techniques exposed in this guide generally involve a latency between application and effect.
     
  4. Be wary of under-commitment. Therapists who pretend they can't heal you might be trying to avoid the responsibility of fully carrying through with their assistance. In reality, whenever there is living tissue, there always is a way to improve the condition and completely recover.
     
  5. Be ready to actively take part in the healing process. Devoting one to two hours a day to any regular activity which supports health in general, and a specific condition, is easy (for example, by applying health care principles to nutrition) and beneficial. See our self healing tutorials for more.
     
  6. Take recommendations from your favourite therapists. They generally know a few competent colleagues, often, from complementary backgrounds.
     

Self healing tutorials

  1. The Chakra System - the essential element of many healing traditions.
  2. Chakra cleansing overview - how to prepare one's own chakra system for self-healing.
  3. Pranic breathing - an additional technique for wellness and self-healing.
  4. Self-healing and healing basics - general guidelines and a case study.
     

Classification

To highlight which therapies are suitable for a given category of impairments, we use the four icons described here. The classification we propose is based on the Buddhist models of individuality, as well as Carl Jung's model of the human psyche.

  • physicalThe physical body is the "action body", the one intended to directly interact with its environment.
  • spiritThe etheric body, or astral body in non-pharmaceutical healing traditions, represents the conscious mind, and is tightly interconnected with the physical body. Reportedly, actions performed on either of the physical or etheric bodies directly impact the other. However, alterations of the etheric body generally must be repeated and sustained for some time in order to "sink into" the physical form, whereas alterations of the physical form immediately reflect on the etheric body.
  • mindThe mental body represents unconscious impulses. Analytic psychology refers to the sum of these impulses as the unconscious mind. These are the individual drives which cause the creation of conscious forms (ideas), then transposed to actions by the physical body.
  • emotionsThe emotional body represents all emotions which provoke mental impulses, and reflects the collective unconscious - the common trends underlying all responses of living beings, and of a given species. For example, the desires for friendship, kinship, and partnership, Universal.