In the last two blogs, I discussed the meaning of holistic health care, why conventional veterinary medicine is a conditioned perspective dealing with an imbalanced mindset and why it is imperative that a new paradigm occurs if we are to truly move into a holistic health care for our pets and ourselves. Only then will we start healing instead of treating.
Using the old left-brain, right-brain understanding as to how the personal mind works, it is obvious that conventional medicine is predominantly a left-brain perspective. Physicians and veterinarians are highly educated and subsequently practice from a mindset that deals almost exclusively with left brain function; linear thinking, cause and effect, reductionist in nature and thrives on predictability. This is why we clinicians give you a prognosis. We feel, whether consciously or unconsciously, that it is better to predict that a disease will kill your pet in six months instead of being open to all possibilities (uncertainty).
Right-brain function, on the other hand, deals with circular, interconnectedness, intuitive, holistic and uncertainty. Very few clinicians have the ability to tap into this part of the mind due to long-term conditioning. Right brain knowingness instead of left brain thinkingness is ok that your pet has an uncertain future; possible instead of probable. Logic tells us that it is better than a certain death prognosis based on intellectual thinking. The personal mind cannot work in both modes, it has to be one or the other, and since the left-brain mind is dominant over the right-brain, in most clinicians, the right-brain mindset never plays a role in patient assessment.
Left-brain mindset can only deal with experience or referenced material. It might be the clinician’s experience or that of someone else, in the way of research, articles, etc. It has to have a reference point based on previous knowledge. It is not difficult to understand how this approach can offer very little in the way of guidance to questions that have no definite answers such as when is it time to let my pet go or is it in my pet’s best interest to have chemotherapy for its cancer.
Right-brain mindset functions entirely different. It offers guidance in the way of intuitive thought or insight. The information comes from a higher source of consciousness and it is mostly felt as a sense. Some people describe it as a gut feeling. It cannot be explained and certainly should not be ignored. A lady called me once and told me that her vet had sent home medication for her dog’s illness (symptoms). She said that she didn’t “feel” right about giving the medication. I told her that I could not give her advice but that deep feelings should not be ignored. I asked her if she had given the medication and she said that she had not. Then, she explained that the problem had occurred a couple of weeks prior and that the illness had resolved itself, without the medication. Her intuitive mind guided her not to give the medication, but now, her intellect mind was overriding this guidance and telling her that she should have given the medication.
Any pet caretaker who spends time with their pet knows of the deep, energetic connection between themselves and their pet. This is the source of the intuitive guiding system that comes when we are in the right-brain mindset. It can only be present when the dominant, left-brain is quiet. Because we are conditioned to try to resolve things, figure out a solution, etc., we immediately turn all of our attention on the reasoning, left brain mindset. More often than not, we get frustrated and anxious because we cannot solve the problem, make the illness go away. This only leads to our suffering and certainly does not resolve the situation.
Left brain intelligence is doing. Right brain intuitiveness is allowing. Intelligence is personal mind. Intuitiveness is grace. We will not be effective if we are only focused on doing and we will not get anywhere if we are only focused on allowing. To create effectively, and that is what healing truly is, we must participate in both.
We have to learn to be mind-balanced. Our vets and physicians need to learn to be mind-balanced. If not, we will continue to run around in circles, looking for answers that we cannot find. We will continue to treat our pets and ourselves, hoping for a cure, but never healing. Healing comes from awareness and awareness comes from intuitive knowingness. It can’t work any other way. Once we become aware, then we can turn to our intellect to formulate a plan.
I was in a car accident a while back and I had some pain in my neck and some tingling in my right hand. I also had some dizziness and instability while walking. This is a sure indication of peripheral nerves on the right side of the spinal cord at the level of the neck being irritated by the trauma as well as some brain dysfunction that is was affecting the vestibular system.
The doctor asked me a lot of questions, typed all of the information on her computer without looking up, did a two minute examination; listened to my heart and took my pulse. She never checked my nerve function, nor even looked at my pupils. She prescribed some pain medications and told me to contact her if I did not improve. Is this what our health care system has become? It has likely happened to you and I am sure that it likely has happened to your pet.
We clinicians have become so left-brain dominated that we don’t even focus on the pet anymore. We listen for a short while, do a cursory examination and order a barrage of tests, and from that we make a diagnosis. If it becomes complicated, we send it to a specialist. We have forgotten to use the most sophisticated instrument that we have, our mind. Something has to change.
So, what does a holistic clinician look like. She is a person who takes a few minutes with her patient, quiets her mind and connects with the patient at a deeper level. She looks at her patient, touches her patient, listens to her patient with complete focus without a reactive, conditioned mind. Insight and intuitive guidance comes forward and she is aware of the patient’s needs. It might not even seem logical but she knows the importance of awareness and she follows her instincts. Then, she turns to her intellectual mind and creates a plan that will work, because it is being guided by a higher source of consciousness, not an ego-centered intellect. All involved will be for the better because guidance always gives what is for the higher good for all of those involved. This is awareness. This is holism. This is healing.
