Listen to Your Body Talk

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Bruce Lipton: Mind Over Genes

There is Hope for Post Partum Depression: BodyTalk!

The Lark Letter, March 2006 Volume 13, Number 3

Bruce Lipton: Mind Over Genes

Earlier in my career as a research scientist and medical school professor, I actively supported the perspective that the human body was a "biochemical machine ‘programmed’ by its genes. We scientists believed that our strengths, such as artistic or intellectual abilities, and our weaknesses, such as cardiovascular disease, cancer or depression, represented traits that were preprogrammed into our genes. Hence I perceived life’s attributes and deficits, as well as our health and our frailties as merely a reflection of our heredity expression.

Until recently, it was thought that genes were self-actualizing…that genes could ‘turn themselves on and off.’ Such behavior is required in order for genes to control biology. Though the power of genes is still emphasized in current biology courses and textbooks, a radically new understanding has emerged at the leading edge of cell science. It is now recognized that the environment, and more specifically, our perception (interpretation)of the environment, directly controls the activity of our genes. Environment controls gene activity through a process known as epigenetic control.

This new perspective of human biology does not view the body as just a mechanical device, but rather incorporates the role of a mind and spirit. This breakthrough in biology is fundamental in all healing for it recognizes that when we change our perception or beliefs we send totally different messages to our cells and reprogram their expression. The new-biology reveals why people can have spontaneous remissions or recover from injuries deemed to be permanent disabilities.

The functional units of life are the individual cells that comprise our bodies. Though every cell is innately intelligent and can survive on its own when removed from the body, in the body, each cell foregoes its individuality and becomes a member of a multicellular community. The body really represents the cooperative effort of a community of perhaps fifty trillion single cells. By definition, a community is an organization of individuals committed to supporting a shared vision. Consequently, while every cell is a free-living entity, the body’s community accommodates the wishes and intents of its ‘central voice,’ a character we perceive as the mind and spirit.

When the mind perceives that the environment is safe and supportive, the cells are preoccupied with the growth and maintenance of the body. In stressful situations, cells forego their normal growth functions and adopt a defensive ‘protection’ posture. The body’s energy resources normally used to sustain growth are diverted to systems that provide protection during periods of stress. Simply, growth processes are restricted or suspended in a stressed system. While our systems can accommodate periods of acute (brief) stress, prolonged or chronic stress is debilitating for its energy demands interfere with the required maintenance of the body, and as a consequence, leads to dysfunction and disease.

The principle source of stress is the system’s ‘central voice,’ the mind. The mind is like the driver of a vehicle. With good driving skills, a vehicle can be maintained and provide good performance throughout its life. Bad driving skills generate most of the wrecks that litter the roadside or are stacked in junkyards. If we employ good “driving skills” in managing our behaviors and dealing with our emotions, then we should anticipate a long, happy and productive life. In contrast, inappropriate behaviors and dysfunctional emotional management, like a bad driver, stress the cellular ‘vehicle,’ interfering with its performance and provoking a breakdown.

Are you a good driver or a bad driver? Before you answer that question, realize that there are two separate minds that create the body’s controlling ‘central voice.’ The (self)conscious mind is the thinking ‘you,’ it is the creative mind that expresses free-will. Its supporting partner is the subconscious mind, a super computer loaded with a database of programmed behaviors. Some programs are derived from genetics, these are our instincts and they represent nature. However, the vast majority of the subconscious programs are acquired through our developmental learning experiences, they represent nurture.

The subconscious mind is not a seat of reasoning or creative consciousness, it is strictly a stimulus-response device. When an environmental signal is perceived, the subconscious mind reflexively activates a previously stored behavioral response…no thinking required. The subconscious mind is a programmable autopilot that can navigate the vehicle without the observation or awareness of the pilot—the conscious mind. When the subconscious autopilot is controlling behavior, consciousness is free to dream into the future or review the past.

The dual-mind system’s effectiveness is defined by the quality of the programs carried in the subconscious mind. Essentially, the person who taught you to drive molds your driving skills. For example, if you were taught to drive with one foot on the gas and the other on the brake, no matter how many vehicles you owned, each will inevitably express premature brake and engine failure.

Similarly, if our subconscious mind is programmed with inappropriate behavioral responses to life’s experiences, then our sub-optimum ‘driving skills’ will contribute to a life of crash and burn experiences. For example, cardiovascular disease, the leading cause of death, is directly attributable to behavioral programs that mismanage the body’s response to stress.

Are you a good driver or a bad driver? The answer is difficult for in our conscious creative mind we may consider ourselves as good drivers, however self-sabotaging or limiting behavioral programs in our subconscious unobservedly undermine our efforts. We are generally consciously unaware of our fundamental perceptions or beliefs about life. The reason is that the prenatal and neonatal brain is predominately operating in delta and theta EEG frequencies through the first six years of our lives.

This low level of brain activity is referred to as the hypnogogic state. While in this hypnotic trance, a child does not have to be actively coached by its parents for they obtain their behavioral programs simply by observing their parents, siblings, peers and teachers. Did your early developmental experiences provide you with good models of behavior to use in the unfoldment of your own life?

During the first six years of life a child unconsciously acquires the behavioral repertoire needed to become a functional member of society. In addition, a child’s subconscious mind also downloads beliefs relating to self. When a parent tells a young child it is stupid, undeserving or any other negative trait, this too is downloaded as a ‘fact’ into the youngster’s subconscious mind. These acquired beliefs constitute the ‘central voice’ that controls the fate of the body’s cellular community. While the conscious mind may hold one’s self in high regard, the more powerful unconscious mind may simultaneously engage in self-destructive behavior.

The insidious part of the autopilot mechanism is that subconscious behaviors are programmed to engage without the control of, or the observation by, the conscious self. Since most of our behaviors are under the control of the subconscious mind, we rarely observe them or much less know that they are even engaged. While your conscious mind perceives you are a good driver, the unconscious mind that has its hands on the wheel most of the time, may be driving you down the road to ruin.

We have been led to believe that by using will power, we can override the negative programs of our subconscious mind. Unfortunately, to do that, you really have to emphasize the word ‘power,’ for one must keep a constant vigil on one’s own behavior. The moment you lapse in consciousness, the subconscious mind will automatically engage and play its previously recorded experience-based programs.

The subconscious mind is really a tape player. There is no observing entity in the subconscious mind reviewing the behavioral tapes. Consequently, there is no discernment as to whether a subconscious behavioral program is good or bad…they are just tapes. The subconscious is strictly a playback machine, perceived stimuli engage preprogrammed behaviors. In fact, people upon seeing their own subconscious programs play out frequently say something like, “That guy just pushed my buttons!”

In contrast to the power of the conscious mind, the subconscious mind is a million times more powerful an information processor. Also, as neuroscientists emphasize, the conscious mind provides 5% or less of the cognitive activity during the day. Ninety-five to ninety-nine percent of our behavior is directly derived from the subconscious. Hence the use of the word ‘power’ in the concept of will power, it takes significant effort for the conscious mind to keep tabs on the subconscious behavior. Positive thinking is primarily effective if the subconscious supports the conscious intention.

The problem with trying to reprogram the subconscious is that we fail to realize it is playing behavioral ‘tapes.’ To understand why conscious awareness does not readily change subconscious programs, consider this instructive analogy: I provide you with a cassette tape and you put it into your player and push the play button. As the tape plays the program, you realize that you do not like it. So, you yell at the tape player to change the program, you ask it to play something different.

After awhile of not getting a response, you yell louder and get angrier at the tape player because of the lack of a response to your request. Then when it seems hopeless, you beseech God to help you change the program. The point is simple, no matter how much you yell at the tape player it will not change the program. To change a tape, you have to push the record button and then rerecord the program incorporating the desired changes.

There are two ways out of the problem. Firstly, we can become more conscious, and rely less on automated subconscious programs. By being fully conscious, we become the masters of our fates rather than the ‘victims’ of our programs. This path is similar to Buddhist mindfulness. Secondly, we can use a variety of new energy psychology modalities that enable a rapid and profound reprogramming of limiting subconscious beliefs.
These new energy modalities provide the ability to rewrite limiting perceptions (beliefs) and self-sabotaging behaviors using processes that are mechanistically similar to pushing the record program on the subconscious mind’s tape player. With conscious awareness, one can actively transform the character of their lives into ones filled with love, health and prosperity. The use of these new modalities provides a key to personal growth and transformation. A variety of energy psychology modalities, such as Psych-K, Holographic Repatterning and BodyTalk, are among the variety of programs that can be found on the web.

There is Hope for Post Partum Depression: BodyTalk!

Dr Ka’imi Pilipovich, DAc, LMT, CBI

Sara is a happy mother with a new baby. She was able to have a natural childbirth, at home with a midwife assisting. With no anesthesia dulling her experience she was able to fully bond with her little girl right away. She recovered quickly from her birth, and was able to delight in her precious addition to the family. Her first childbirth was a vastly different story, however. She had been induced into labor with drugs by her physician. The labor had been long and arduous and she had lost a lot of blood.

She was tired for a long time. But the worst aspect was that she was not happy with being a mother. It took a year before she could really say she loved her new baby. She never told anyone how she felt, however, she just felt like a bad mother. It wasn’t until she had a healthy delivery that she realized that you could love your baby instantly. Then she could talk about her experience with her first child.

Many mothers feel inexplicably “down” after birth. This feeling can manifest as lethargy, moderate depression, or even the feeling that their life is ruined - or worse. Post partum depression (PPD) affects many mothers to varying degrees, but is greatly under-reported by many physicians as it is poorly understood in allopathic medicine. Too often, it is “treated” with a “pep talk.” But to a mother who is suffering from PPD it is very real: symptoms can range from nagging guilt over not feeling strong enough to be the mother they want to be in mild cases to severe depression including suicidal thoughts, disturbing dreams, and even thoughts of harming or killing their newborn babies in the most severe cases.

My training and experience in acupuncture and osteopathic medicine has led me to understand that PPD has understandable and treatable causes. In most cases, PPD is strongly linked to a stressful childbirth. To fully address PPD, you should start with proper prenatal care designed to prepare the mother for a healthy, quick labor. And then follow up with therapy that can effectively help the mother recover from the labor and birthing process.

One of the differences between Sara’s first childbirth experience and subsequent PPD and her recent uplifting childbirth is that she came to see me while she was pregnant. Her first visit was at about seven months. She was experiencing back pain, tidal fevers, night sweats and was showing some signs of gestational diabetes. After one session using the The BodyTalk System™ her all of her symptoms disappeared and she was sleeping restfully at night.

A follow up BodyTalk session two weeks before her delivery addressed mobility of the pelvic joints as well as synchronization and balancing of blood and nerve supply to the muscles of the uterus. Sara reported that her experience of her contractions was very different from her first birth. She described them as very productive, efficiently moving the baby into position for final stage labor and effecting cervical dilation. The entire labor was about three hours from start to finish.

Sara’s most recent birth is of course exemplifies the best goal in addressing PPD: take steps to maximize the chances for a healthy birth process, and hence avoiding the need for postnatal therapy for PPD. But even in the best of circumstances and preparation, complications can develop resulting in an inability of the mother to recover quickly from the birth. Fortunately, effective in post-natal care is available to address PPD in these cases.

I’ve found in my practice that the best way to address prenatal and postnatal care is by using The BodyTalk System™. BodyTalk is a system of health care founded on the observation that the body is complex system of interacting parts and functions that must work together to produce health. In order to work together, all the various parts of the body must be in communication with each other. BodyTalk focuses on restoring communication in the bodymind using light hand contacts and a gentle tapping technique.

It is gentle, non-invasive, safe and yet extraordinarily effective. The communication “links” that are necessary to restore health in a particular client are discovered by following the innate wisdom of the client’s body by using a comprehensive protocol of questions and neuromuscular biofeedback in the form of light muscle testing. In my practice, I have virtually stopped using acupuncture and manipulative therapies, and yet my results are faster and longer lasting in all types of cases, from musculo-skeletal disorders to internal medicine issues to disorders that are considered more psychological in nature.

Before I can discuss how BodyTalk applies to PPD, I need to briefly present some of the major causes of PPD. Although there can be many causes, I will focus on just two major factors that account for a great deal of PPD as away to illustrate that help is possible and how BodyTalk can apply. The two main causes of PPD that I see in my practice are blood deficiency and distortions or fixations in the cranial-sacral system. Blood deficiency is a major cause of depression in traditional Chinese medicine. This term is broader in scope than the western concept of anemia. It includes anemia, but it also covers deficiencies of other blood constituents and nutrients as well as deficient blood volume. Osteopathic research has traced an extremely strong correlation between compression and fixation/or of several key joints in the axial spine and depression.

Some blood deficiency is to be expected even after a healthy childbirth, but a difficult or prolonged labor will often result in severe depletion. Symptoms of blood deficiency include weakness, fatigue, lethargy, low immune function, general debility, lack of motivation and/or depression, visual disturbances including hallucinations, poor sleep and very often disturbing dreams of a violent nature.
Obviously, if a mother is suffering from even just a few of the above symptoms caring for a newborn is going to seem more overwhelming and burdensome than joyful. Factors that contribute to blood deficiency are poor balance of electrolytes and other blood factors that control how much of the water in the body is held in the blood vessels rather than in the tissues. The ability of the digestive system to work effectively to digest food and assimilate nutrients is obviously a major factor in the ability to rebuild the blood and hence strength. And inability of the endocrine system to properly adjust to the new needs of a nursing mother after the extreme hormone swing during pregnancy is another major factor.
All of these causes of blood deficiency are the kinds of issues that BodyTalk works very well with: helping to restore communication within the body to restore adaptability and recovery. And the best thing is that a BodyTalk practitioner does not have to be able to diagnose which of the synchronization issues are relevant in order to offer help: they can just ask the innate wisdom of the body using the BodyTalk protocol. For example, the first day of BodyTalk training covers a procedure that addresses balancing water distribution in the body by combining a series of hand contacts over various areas of the brain with gentle tapping to stimulate the nervous system to address all of the many aspects of the this complex and delicate balance.

In birth, a woman’s pelvis goes through quite a dramatic distortion to allow for the passage of the baby through the birth canal. During pregnancy a hormone is produced to relax the ligaments that connect the pubic bones in the front as well as the joints between the sacrum and the hip bones in the back. This allows the pubic bones to spread apart and also allows the sacrum to tilt back and away. This allows a significant widening of the space available for the baby’s passage.
Ideally, the bones return to their natural position within a few days after birth. When this doesn’t happen, the resulting distortion of the pelvis causes compression of the lumbo-sacral joint and produces too much curvature in the low back, producing back pain. The stress of living with back pain (that was supposed to go away once the baby was born!) is hard enough. Osteopathic research has also shown that compression of the lumbosacral joint often leads to depression.

Unfortunately, the effects of pelvic distortion are not limited to low back pain. There is a complex mirroring of movement between the pelvic bones and certain bones in the cranium. This correspondence is part of both the natural movements of respiration as well as the symphony of coordinated upper body and lower body movements that happen when we walk. So when the ability of the pelvic bones to maintain proper alignment and flexibility is compromised, this will produce restrictions in the cranial bones.

Symptoms of the resulting cranial restrictions include restricted breathing, low vitality, headache, sinus infections, visual disturbances, TMJ, poor digestion, poor ability of the hypothalamus to moderate acidity in the digestive tract, poor endocrine regulation, mental fogginess, and depression. So let’s imagine what that would mean: your back still hurts so it hurts to pick and carry your baby. Your digestion isn’t very good, you get headaches, you feel hormonal swings all the time, you are tired all the time, and you can’t think straight. And your baby still needs you 24/7. I’m depressed just thinking about it.

The good news is that BodyTalk is superb at addressing just these kinds of musculo-skeletal distortions. The understanding of the importance of these reciprocal relationships between the various parts of the body that need to coordinate to allow smooth breathing and balance of the postural muscles in standing and walking is very strongly integrated into the BodyTalk system. As a case in point, just last week I had a woman referred to me who was 7 weeks pregnant.

This was to be her second child. It turned on that her sacrum had been stuck back ever since the first birth six years ago. She had low back pain all the time, her breathing was restricted, she had lots of sinus trouble, and she had stomach ulcers. While she was lying face up on my treatment table I could slide my hand completely under her low back due to the exaggerated arch in her lumbar spine. During her session, BodyTalk addressed restrictions in the sacrum, restrictions in a key joint the cranium, and balancing the relationships between key pelvic and cranial bones.

By the end of the session, her back was flat on the table, the back pain was gone, her breathing had freed up tremendously, and her stomach pain was almost gone. Needless to say, she was pretty excited about the changes after six years of living with these issues. Ideally, these problems could have been addressed right after he first birth, but better late than never and she is certainly in a better place for a healthy pregnancy with her second child.

There are other factors that can affect PPD, of course. But I hope this brief article has presented that case that the causes are understandable and treatable. And that this help can be fast and gentle when the therapy of choice is BodyTalk.

Having a baby should be a magical experience. I deal with a broad range of health issues in my practice, and yet it is hard to think of any branch of my practice that is as rewarding as my work with mothers in prenatal and postnatal care. Except of course, working with babies.

Dr. Pilipovich is an acupuncture physician and licensed massage therapist in Hawaii. He also a Senior Certified BodyTalk Instructor, and is on the faculty of the Traditional Chinese Medicine College of Hawaii. He lectures internationally on health care. For more information about BodyTalk and to find a practitioner near you, visit www.bodytalksystem.com. Dr. Pilipovich may be contacted at kaimi@bodytalkhawaii.com.

The Lark Letter, March 2006 Volume 13, Number 3

Dear Friend,

In last month’s Miracle Corner, I shared with you the story of Ian Purse’s dramatic recovery from 12 years of debilitating chronic fatigue. His recovery came through the use of BodyTalk—an innovative new healing system that uses applied kinesiology, or muscle testing, to query the wisdom of the body and create a pathway for healing even the most difficult health problems.

I first found out about BodyTalk last year when my friend Brooke Baggett, a Reiki Master healer and acupuncturist, started to study this system. She wanted to use it with her other therapies to help heal her patients. I was quite intrigued by her description of BodyTalk, since I began to study and work with muscle testing many years ago and found that it did, indeed, provide a way of tapping into the body’s innate wisdom.

Brooke has since integrated BodyTalk into her practice and, like Ian, has had great success with its use. She has found BodyTalk to be very helpful for a variety of health issues—including asthma, reproductive disorders, allergies, chronic fatigue, infections, digestive disorders, Parkinson’s disease, anxiety, depression, learning disorders, back pain, and arthritis. She recently shared with me an interesting case history of one of her clients. For me, it reinforced the wonderful healing potential of BodyTalk, and I asked Brooke to share it with you in her own words:

Helping Marguerite

“When Marguerite first came to me, she appeared to be the picture of health. She was a young 42-year-old who exercised daily, ate healthfully, and seemed quite emotionally balanced. So, I was surprised to hear that her chief complaint was daily migraines, with pain so severe that she required prescription medication. I have been able to completely relieve the pain of migraines for many people with the use of acupuncture, so I thought I would have no trouble at all helping her.

“We started with a regimen of weekly acupuncture treatments, in the hopes of opening her energy flow and thus alleviating her migraine pain. The pain subsided a bit at first and she was able to take less medication. However, she reached a point where there was no more relief, and she was still suffering from migraine pain and still taking her medication a few times a week. For me, this was by no means a satisfactory result.

“I asked Marguerite if she would be willing to try BodyTalk. I explained that BodyTalk is able to determine on what level—physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual—the stresses of daily life have interrupted the body’s communication system. A BodyTalk practitioner can reconnect the lines of communication, thus encouraging the body/mind to do its own healing. She said she would be willing to try this method.

“When Marguerite came for her session, what we discovered changed the pattern of her migraines dramatically. Upon doing muscle testing, I picked up imbalances relating to the following information: 12 years old, grief, home and family, and maple and pine trees. Marguerite knew exactly what her body was trying to communicate. After shedding some tears, she told me she had lost her mother when she was 12 years old. This was something she had never verbally shared with me before, but her body knew it was a key to solving her migraines. Her mother had died from brain cancer, which at the time the doctors were treating as migraines. During her grieving process, she spent much time among the maples and pines near her home.

“I checked in with Marguerite several days later, and was thrilled to hear that she hadn’t experienced any migraine pain. The same was true a few weeks later. The wonderful news is that this is only one of many cases that show the amazing healing capacity of BodyTalk. I believe it will profoundly change the way we look at health care.

The BodyTalk Healing System

BodyTalk is based on the fact that every living thing is made of energy. When that energy is properly tuned and there are no blockages to its flow, then direct and efficient communication runs freely within your body—between one organ system and another, and between your body, mind, and spirit. It’s only when all the lines of communication are fully open that everything can function together for optimal health.

BodyTalk is a means of tapping into the body’s communication system to assess whether any of the lines are down—which can hinder healing from an illness or an injury. Through BodyTalk, it’s possible to figure out which lines are down, and then help the body reestablish communication and begin to heal.

What Is BodyTalk?

BodyTalk is noninvasive, simple, and effective—and there are no harmful side effects. Practitioners communicate with the body to locate the specific areas that need repair. This is done using neuromuscular biofeedback, or muscle testing, that allows the practitioner to have a dialogue with the innate wisdom of each individual’s body. Communication is reestablished between the various parts of the body by tapping specific points over the head and heart to recreate the healthy energetic linkages.

The main premise of BodyTalk is that the body can heal itself. With many healing techniques—both conventional and alternative—practitioners use their knowledge to try to figure out what’s wrong and fix it. But none of us will ever know the body as well as it knows itself. BodyTalk sees the body as being wise and brilliantly engineered, equipped with built-in analytic and therapeutic systems of its own. BodyTalk practitioners help channel this wisdom to promote optimal healing.

The Body’s Wisdom

The key to the BodyTalk system is order. Every cell within our bodies, every spark of emotion, every belief system, every one of our thought processes—all these things must be able to communicate together in an orderly fashion, so the body can coordinate the billions of bioelectrical, chemical, and energetic events that support life.

When something goes wrong, this rapid-fire internal dialogue allows the body’s own wisdom to determine the order in which repairs should be made, and then directs the body’s energy to heal the trouble spots in the most efficient manner. For example, your body may not want to detoxify its overly burdened liver until the digestive problem in the small intestine is healed—otherwise, toxins liberated from the liver can flood into the small intestine and be rapidly absorbed by the body through its raw, unhealed lining.

This cart-before-the-horse type of treatment is typical of many medical approaches, and it can create what is often referred to as a “healing crisis.” This isn’t to say that healing crises should never occur. But when treatment is done without consideration for priorities, the healing crisis can be much more intense than is necessary.

How BodyTalk Works

When an illness, injury, or trauma is too severe, the lines of communication in our bodies get jammed as a result. The BodyTalk system taps into our inner wisdom to find out where the problem is and which lines need to be re-linked—helping our bodies heal themselves, quickly, efficiently, and completely. Here’s how a typical session might go:

Partial List of Conditions Resolved Through BodyTalk

Allergies
Anxiety and depression
Asthma
Chronic fatigue
Digestive disorders
Emotional, self-esteem, and body image issues
Endocrine imbalances (thyroid, pineal, spleen, adrenals, etc.)
Fears, phobias
Female-related health problems (menopause, PMS, menstrual cramps)
Food intolerances
Headaches
Joint and back pain
Learning disorders
Reproductive disorders
Sexuality and relationship issues
Viruses and infections

Phase One: Gaining Permission. You begin the session by lying face up, fully clothed, on a massage table with your arms at your sides. The practitioner stands beside you and asks your four centers of awareness—your physical body, your conscious mind, your unconscious mind, and your higher, spiritual self—for permission to treat you. Each awareness center is given the opportunity to withhold permission. Responses are gauged through muscle testing. The BodyTalk system maximizes accuracy by isolating the test to a small but strong muscle in your arm.

Phase Two: Locating the Problem. Once permission has been secured, the practitioner locates the energy circuits in the body that need balancing by asking the body yes/no questions: “Are organs a priority?” (YES) “Lungs?” (NO) “Liver?” (YES)…and so forth. Once again, the body’s answers are determined through muscle testing. The practitioner follows the flow of answers until the precise location of the problem(s) has been mapped out.

Phase Three: Reestablishing the Linkages. Next, the practitioner focuses on each of the identified problem areas, usually placing the patient’s hand over the area. The practitioner then places his or her hand on each major body system in turn, asking where the linkage needs to be reestablished: “Link to heart?” (NO) “Lungs?” (NO) “Pancreas?” (YES)… For each linkage requested, the patient’s hand remains on the problem area while the practitioner touches the proper reflex point on the body that will link the system. The practitioner then lightly taps the patient’s head and heart, as described below.

Phase Four: Tapping and Breathing. Tapping the patient is done lightly on two areas of the body—on the top of the head, and on the sternum over the heart. Tapping the head alerts the brain to that particular linkage, and asks it to reactivate that line of communication. Tapping the heart alerts the heart to the repaired link, and asks it to make the link permanent. (In traditional Chinese medicine, the heart is the central coordinator and energy organizer of the body.) While the practitioner is tapping, the patient takes two cycles of deep, exaggerated breath to acknowledge and incorporate the corrections into the body’s awareness.

I find the BodyTalk System to be exciting because not only is it completely safe, but some people see dramatic results in as little as one session. It can be used as a stand-alone treatment, or to enhance the effectiveness of other therapies. In addition to its ability to affect physical, emotional, and spiritual healing, I particularly like the fact that this healing modality is respectful of the body’s wisdom. It reminds us, in essence, to listen. Our bodies will tell us what we need. They always have.

If you’re interested in trying BodyTalk and would like to find a qualified practitioner near you, go to www.bodytalksystem.com. If you live in northern California and want to contact BodyTalk practitioner Brooke Baggett directly, call 408-202-3444 (www.brookebaggett.com).

“This article is reprinted from the March 2006 issue of Women’s Wellness Today with permission from Healthy Directions, LLC. To subscribe to Women’s Wellness Today, call 1-888-787-7557 or visit www.drlark.com.”