“ON RESISTANCE TO HEAL” – Extract from Newsletters by Linda Madani
A family member of clients shared this great article with me today … it is so important to understand the resistance to heal.
The below is just an extract, the link is at the bottom for complete article.
“The biggest one is our ‘attachment’ to our pain. People sometimes delay their own healing processes due to their unconscious and inner resistance.
Many ‘look for pain,’ and therefore constantly re-awaken that pain; many also do the same thing with their emotional pain, which can also affect the way their body works, and how they feel about themselves, life, love, and the universe.
Some people, knowing that they have pain, and that it can be a constant thing in an otherwise uncertain world, prevent themselves from ‘letting go’ of that pain, as it is familiar to them. Many people like the familiar, even though it may be unpleasant. Much in the same way that a child who is being abused will not want to be separated from their abusers, (don’t take me away from Mommy/Daddy’), many are unwilling to be separated from that which causes their problem.
Some people actually define themselves by their illness or condition. It becomes a part of their ‘identity,’ and therefore they are reluctant to ‘let go.’ Carolyne Myss in her book ‘Why People Don’t Heal and How They Can’ refers to this as ‘woundology’.
Many doubt that they have the ability to get better, and this doubt is yet another hindrance in their quest for healing. Some may even become doubtful when they are healed, and still look for the pain, which may have been a part of their life for a very long time. I have often heard my beloved teacher Tjokorda Rai saying this person suffers from the “illness of doubt”.
Impatience can be another threat to healing. Some people don’t want to wait to be healed, they want it now, and as a result, they sabotage the very thing that they are attempting to achieve. Remember the story of the rice farmer. “There was a farmer who was impatient by nature. He thought his rice shoots were growing too slowly, so he decided to help them by pulling them. One day at dusk, he went back home dog-tired and said to his family: “I helped the rice shoots grow today.” Hearing this, his son hurried to the field, only to find that all the plants had withered.”
For some, there is the need to maintain control; this control can be the ability to get their families or people in their environment to do what we want them to, because they are ‘ill or have a disability.’ Many do not wish to let go of that control.
Other barriers that prevent people from healing are fear and denial. When we feel fear, we produce adrenaline, (the ‘fight or flight’ hormone,) and the production of this makes us feel scared so we shy away from it; ‘there is nothing to fear, but fear itself.’
Denial of something that we cannot necessarily ‘see’ can also prevent people from seeing the reality, which is there, all around them. If only they could stop being scared, and take the time to actually look and be willing to see the truth and allow the veil of illusion to dissolve.”