Book Review: The Healer- A Guide to Spiritual Healing

Stacie Deyglio, ND

The Healer: A Guide to Spiritual Healing

As so many of us in practice know, the patients we see come to us for a reason. These reasons are not always implicitly clear, especially in the beginning of the relationship. The true nature of patient exchanges may not fully be recognized at any point during the interaction unless the physician is fully present. What does this mean, to be “fully present”? We hear and read about this state of being, frequently especially from the transformational spiritual community. The state of “being present” is far from common, nor is it easily achieved. It involves constant introspection, mindfulness, and meditation. It engrosses virtues of compassion, self-reflection, honesty, forgiveness, faith, and love. It is a continuum journey for the physician and the patient individually, an actuality that only exists through practice. In her book The Healer: A Guide to Spiritual Healing, Dr Tamsyn Freeman guides the reader to come closer to the realization of what it is like to be fully present for both the physician and the patient: “[T]he body can only heal if the mind is healed. The mind heals by changing perception of the current situation and sees it a different way” (page 18).

Dr Freeman’s book offers a complete guide for the physician and student, describing the complexity of healing and disease from the perspective of the self, with the self being described as a reference to the divine, higher self, God, soul spirit, or universe. Included in the book is a detailed description of the 6 disease roots, types of patients and healers, and the practical application of effective healing. Dr Freeman applies the use of different healing tools—such as true listening and seeing, understanding etheric and subtle energies during interaction, and the effects of consciousness on healing to differentiate perception—so that healing can occur naturally. In her book, she includes soul-level communication, distance healing, teaching and learning, challenges for the healer, achieving proper healing space, and the manifestation of self-healing and self-realization to effectively train the reader that all disease may be overcome. Included are Dr Freeman’s own experiences as an ND and a healer: “Works like any work, never exists alone on its own. It cannot. It is a reflection of each one of us. Of everyone we know—our true connection to one another. This reflects the true work of what is possible, of hope…of limitlessness. It reflects the strength that lies in each one of us. It reflects and illustrates and encourages this, to show you it can, has and will be done. No fear is too powerful, no disease too terrible, no cure unobtainable. This we know. We merely need to remember. All that has ever existed, does exist and will ever exist is love” (Prologue).

The specifics of effective spiritual presence and healing are described in Dr Freeman’s book. It provides a unique, lovingly supportive, and essential guide for any healer, physician, patient, or student engaged in the subtle yet deeply powerful act of true healing.

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