Do I Really Have the Power to Heal?

Do I Really Have the Power to Heal?
Excerpt from Heal Yourself–Heal the World, by Deborah King

Is there really a healing power that exists within you? Absolutely! The first place you need to look is at the source of this power, which is in your body’s own field of energy. Let me explain how it works.

There are many forms of energy surrounding us every day. We turn on our televisions, boot up our computers, recharge our smart phones, and turn on our car headlights without thinking twice about the electrical energy that powers it all. There is also the type of energy you probably feel surge through you when you eat your quinoa and kale, or even when you devour your pizza and ice cream. Then there’s the solar energy that warms this great planet of ours, and the wind energies that we hope will someday replace the power now provided by fossil fuels and nuclear power plants.

The energy that is the source of your healing power is similar to these forms of energy. This energy is a living force within you that originates both inside and outside of you. You may already know several names for it. The Hindus call it prana, the Chinese call it chi, and the Japanese call it qi. It’s within you right now—invisible streams of get-up-and-go flowing through all of your body’s energy channels or meridians.

This primal force of energy is connected to your spirit as well as to your physical, emotional, and mental bodies. In fact, it’s the substance of spirit. I like to call this LifeForce Energy because it combines the powerful energies of your personal energy field and the universal energy field, which includes everyone and everything.

Once you understand how you and the rest of the world run on this universal field of energy, you’ll be able to learn how to use your innate power to tap into this field. You’ll be able to harness this energy and use it to activate any changes you desire. Perhaps you want to heal a part of your body, fix a relationship, or deepen your spirituality. You can plug into this energy to get answers to your deepest questions. You may even want to train further in how to manage this energy by becoming an energy healer who helps humanity at large.

Now, before you make the decision to develop this vibrant gift that lies within you, I’d like to share a little about my personal story and how I first learned about this very powerful gift that transformed my life.

How I Discovered My Innate Power to Heal

I discovered my own innate power to heal when I was smacked hard by a traumatic event in my mid-twenties. One day everything seemed to be going well, and the next day my doctor brought my life to a standstill. She said the words no one wants to hear: “You have cancer.”

I had cervical cancer.

Looking back, it seems that the trouble started in my tumultuous childhood, growing up in a home with a family member who sexually abused me. I didn’t know how to handle all of the emotions I was feeling, so I began to bury them under a thick shadow of addictions and behaviors of acting out. From the time I was a teenager to a young adult, I used alcohol, drugs, and a risk-taking lifestyle to deal with my pain.

When I was in my early twenties, I was a workaholic, fresh out of law school and trying cases. I was an athlete, drawn to extreme sports like mountain climbing and ski racing, and at times I was a model, which meant maintaining a size 2 body. My life was go, go, go—fueled by cigarettes and booze, Valium and diet soda. I always kept my attention directed anywhere other than my inner pain. I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to think about it. And I certainly didn’t want anybody to know about it. I just wanted it to go away.

Then came that shocking diagnosis: cancer.

At the time, medical options for cervical cancer were grim, with all fingers pointing to radical surgery. I knew in my gut there had to be another way to beat it, so I went to my doctors and asked how much time I had before I had to make a decision. They gave me the window of a few months. That was all I needed to hear.

Right away I knew I had to clean up my act—namely my addictions. The first item on my agenda was to find a 12-step program. I lived in a tiny town where everyone knew everyone else’s business. Of course, the last thing I wanted was for anyone in the community to know that I had a drinking problem. No one around me, not even my closest business partners, knew (or so I kidded myself). I still remember getting ready to go to that first meeting. Like most alcoholics, I wanted to look like I had it together, so I got dressed to the teeth for the gathering, even donning a flashy pair of cowboy boots. I walked into the room and couldn’t believe what I saw. Right away, I recognized three other local lawyers. “Oh, I didn’t know . . . ” They looked quite amused. “Well, we didn’t know about you either.” At the first meeting I attended, I rediscovered my spiritual roots when they said the Serenity Prayer. As a Catholic child, I had a deep connection to Jesus and the saints, so it wasn’t hard to reestablish my connection to the Divine, which I had shut down as a teenager.

Once alcohol and Valium were out of the picture, I wanted to get in touch with my emotions, sensing that they were connected to the cancer. I had buried them for so long, they were screaming inside me to be released. I knew that in order to heal, I had to find them. I started to take note of what I was feeling, even jotting down words in the margins of my legal briefs to put a name to my emotions as I experienced them. Jealousy. Anger. Fear. Shame. I had a lot more going on inside than I had realized.

Figuring I had to look within more closely, I began to meditate—a practice I have expanded and built upon and continue to this day. I also took up journaling, and that’s when the pain of my childhood poured out (parts of my journal from that time wound up in my first bestselling book, Truth Heals).

As part of my healing journey, I began seeing practitioners for acupuncture and massage. It was then that I first heard about energy medicine. I had visited a new massage therapist, and at the end of the session, out of the blue she said, “You could benefit from energy healing. I’m going to give you a referral. Call her.” I couldn’t sleep when I went to bed that night. A strong vibration kept me awake for the next few nights.

I called the referral number and then drove three hours to see the energy healer. When the healer walked into the waiting room, she was dressed like I was, in a business suit and pearls. Highly intuitive, she had purposely dressed like that to put me at ease. I had an amazing transformation during the next hour on her table. I could feel her focused energy. It calmed and renewed my spirit. For the first time in longer than I could remember, I felt a sense of peace as though she had healed my emotional turmoil and my spirit. This in turn gave my body the strength and support it needed to fight the cancer. At the third session with the energy healer, I felt a major shift in my body and sensed healing. The very next day, I returned to my medical doctor for tests and was informed that no further medical intervention was necessary—I had undergone a “spontaneous remission.” I knew that I owed my remission to the power of energy healing.

At that point I wanted to know more about this amazing power, so I began what would turn into decades of study and training with shamans, sages, and healers from every walk of life, from esoteric Christians in the West, to seers in the East, to shamanic traditions from Native American and South American cultures. I wanted to know anything and everything about this healing force. I wanted to use this healing energy in my own life as well as share it with others so they too could heal.

Over the years I became a teacher of energy healing and developed a technique of my own. I’ve shared this knowledge in my workshops, lectures, and online classes. But I wanted to do more. I knew in my heart that this gift of energy healing was something that everyone could embrace. I wanted to shout this message out to the world!

That’s why I’m writing this book—to give you the ultimate guide on how you can activate your internal healing power and use it to enrich your own life as well as the lives of the people around you. Just like the proverbial stone thrown into the pond that creates ever-expanding circles in the water, the power of energy healing can be multiplied in healing circles to expand out and heal the world.