We begin with accepting responsibility, with love and compassion, for our own wellbeing. As long as we believe someone or something else is responsible for our health, we remain powerless victims. Accepting responsibility, we accept dis-ease as our companion and guide, a message from our body that something isn't quite right. We re-cognize our dis-ease as a metaphor.

Firmly but gently putting aside any sounds of guilt or blame - and perhaps with the help of a relaxation technique such as deep breathing, visualization, or music - we center in the loving compassion of our heart. We direct our attention gently into any area where we feel pain or discomfort, not with the intent to over-power the dis-ease, by attacking or cutting it away, but with a loving desire to explore.

We can look for metaphors or symbols that may offer insight into the reason for the dis-ease, remembering these - like dreams - are very personal expressions of truth, unique to the individual manifesting them. Guiding questions at this time are "Where is the pain?" "What does this part of the body mean to me?" "What does the pain look and feel like?" "What was happening in my life prior to my manifesting this pain?" "What purpose does it serve for me - a means of getting attention, love, or avoiding some situation?" "How am I blocking my energy, and how may I unblock it?"

The choice to contract a specific dis-ease in order to learn whatever can be learned from that dis-ease, may be made on a deeper level than is presently accessible. There is a point at which asking "why" does not help. It becomes nothing more than a justification for feeling guilty and an excuse for procrastination. It keeps us locked in, looking backwards rather than embracing the opportunities in this moment. At this point, we accept "this is what is." "What am I going to do now?" "How can I respond, in this moment, in a loving response-able way?"

Contracting a life threatening dis-ease can create a time for a crucial evaluation of our lives. In addition to the above, we can ask questions like: "What am I doing/where am I going with my life?" "How am I feeling about it?" "What do I want to do with it?" "Is this pain/dis-ease in some way a reflection of my life?"

In each moment we are choosing either to fight and resist or to embrace the pain, and face our fears. Within each fear is the potential of great courage. By naming our fears, they no longer have power-over us. We move into a place of reclaiming power-with. Confronting painful issues releases a tremendous amount of energy that was previously tied up by guilt, fear, or unexpressed anger.

We all use pain very differently. For some of us, it may be a centering force, a means of taking us very deeply into ourselves. For others, pain captivates us in a cycle of fear and helplessness that perpetuates the pain and detracts from any efforts to heal. Taken wisely, medications and other physical approaches to healing, by inducing physiologic changes and alleviating pain, can support us in moving beyond the pain and fear, toward healing. The danger is that such physical palliatives may become stopping places. As long as the underlying cause remains untouched, it will surface again, in the same or some other form.

Affirming and visualizing physical changes needed to relieve disease can offer a tremendous impetus to healing the afflicted area by tapping into our own internal healing power. However, if they are only repeated mechanically, without feeling, they will do little more than imprint on our conscious mind - not a very active agent in the healing process. Spoken and visualized from the heart, they strengthen our belief, and in the very act of believing we set the healing forces of the universe in motion.

Every situation is unique. Understanding the "why" behind the dis-ease does not always remove the dis-ease. But we can be sure that our earnest desire to look into our soul will take us into depths of being and beauty that we will never know as long as we deny part of the entirety of who we are.

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