The mind has always worked like this and humanity has always been aware of the need to heal these processes. Is there a commonality between the vast array of healing processes? When considering the different therapies in the light of the pure essence of an unhealed mental process (repeating negative mental contents based on past events) then universal techniques begin to emerge.
Perhaps the best known technique in the modern Western context is therapy. So here, you essentially go and talk about everything and talking makes it better. This theory goes back to Freud, who thought that childhood trauma becomes trapped as a kind of energy in repressed thoughts, i.e. people choose to not think painful things, and this causes anxiety (negative emotional states) , and negative thoughts and mental pictures, obsessions etc. keep arising from those states. So a therapist talks to find out what the original experiences were that caused the trauma, and it’s relived by talking about it, and the client learns to think about the memories, without repression, and to think about them in a logical way (for example, to not blame oneself for being abused). So the essence of the therapy technique is to:
1 – consciously recall bad memories
2 – relive them
3 – think about them differently in the future
4 – have different beliefs (self-talk) about them
Of course, there are different types of therapy that have a specific aim. Therapy and psychoanalysis are past based, whereas Cognitive Behavioural Therapy tends to be more present focus, i.e. based on what is happening now, and is rooted in logic. Here, you observe the mind to find the thoughts that are bothering you and this, these thoughts, are all written down. Now the actual mental process that bothers you could be repeating self-talk, or mental pictures (of the past, future or life), but either way, they are representing A BELIEF. YOU CAN ONLY HEAL BELIEFS. So then thoughts that cause pain are all variants of ten different kinds of mistake (distortions), for example, ‘fortune telling error’, worrying about something when you don’t know what’s going to happen in the future. So in the unexamined mind, this worry kept surfacing, probably as a mental picture of some negative outcome in a possible future, with a state of fear. There is the underlying belief that this future event is likely or possible to happen. So CBT teaches one that this is illogical, the illogical part in this instance is that you don’t know the future. It might or might not happen.
So the therapy works by writing down the incorrect thought, and then rewriting it without distortion, as a correct belief (that you don’t’ know the future). So in a way it’s a type of journaling that changes your beliefs about the contents of your mind, and so the emotion that is associated with them. Of course, you don’t do this once, you need to keep rereading what you have written.
Thus really, the healing practice here is to deliberately recall the same mental pictures (a possible negative outcome in the future) but from a different state, in other words, linking them to a different emotion (other than fear). In a way, it’s not so different to regular therapy, where you deliberately repeat unhealed mental pictures, but a conversation with a therapist helps you change the belief and then the magic is having the same mental pictures but while feeling a different emotion (being in a different state).
There are so many creative variants of similar things. Somantic experiencing, for example, teaches a client to recall trauma (repeating mental pictures and states based on the past) while focusing on sensations in the body. Sensations in the body are a manifestation of the emotional state, and so eventually, it progresses to holding and cycling the same mental pictures based on a different emotion. Another technique is hypnotherapy, which recalls traumatic mental pictures while in a state of deep relaxation.
Even more esoteric practices, like those of Franz Bardon, presented in Initiation into Hermetics is pinned onto the same framework. Here, you have a long period of observation of the mind, a few weeks, to create a log of all the unhealed (repeating) mental pictures, and this includes intentions and behaviours etc. Then they are grouped according to an element of air, fire, water, and earth. So water classifications are things that are very emotional and changeable in nature, and the healing practice is to *recall and HOLD the pictures* while breathing in the opposite element. So in this case the practitioner would imagine themselves surrounded by elemental fire and it being breathed in and accumulated while the pictures exist. In practice, one is ‘pore breathing’ the element essence through the entire body simultaneously, and this causes contrary bodily sensations which would usually be felt by these mental pictures — and bodily sensation is a manifestation of emotion. The pictures are being recalled and held but with a different emotion. So the steps are:
1 – Observe the mind
2 – Log unhealed pictures
3 – Classify them
4 – Recall and hold with a contrary emotion and an intention to heal them
Emotional freedom technique and ‘tapping’
Another popular example of healing is Emotional Freedom Technique, also known as tapping, which is another energetic technique (technically). Here, you work on one issue at a time. Identify the one you are going to work on. You rate the intensity of the emotion linked to the problem (the problem being a mental event/picture). This rating or writing things down is common in psychology and therapy because often change is incremental and people only realise how much they are changing by keeping records over time and then looking back. Although here the rating is for a short time, to see how effective the technique was in the moment and if it needs to be repeated.
The first step of EFT is what is known as the ‘set up statement’. You create a phrase that mentions what the issue is and expresses self-acceptance: such as ‘Even though I feel resentment at my bullying neighbour, I completely love and accept myself’. Then you tap your body in a sequence while repeating the statement, which generally takes less than a minute, perhaps half a minute. Lastly, you consider the emotional intensity, and if it hasn’t gone down significantly, then you repeat the process until it recedes.
This is very significant, because I think it really shows the common core in all the processes. Here, there isn’t any specific instruction to necessarily hold the mental pictures in question, but a verbal intention to heal is stated while the emotion is being felt. Now the question is, would the emotion recede even if you didn’t tap anything but just counted. It would, because THINGS UNHELD DISSOLVE. What I mean is, when you have this state, an emotion, when you clear the mind and just look right at it for a while, it fades. Usually things in the mind, fantasies, daydreams, emotions — are all swirling around and full of movement, but as soon as you stop and focus on one thing in the mind, then it unwinds and disappears. Not in a second, but pretty soon. So with EFT, there is a state, an emotional state, which would usually be swirling about, causing (radiating) different mental pictures and sensations and inner talk. But now, with an underlying intent to heal it, you stop and look at one state, and tap to feel sensations in one place, and the direct focus seems to melt the state somehow.
This technique is also interesting because it associates the mind with, what I would say is a type of mudra, which are hand gestures. OK, here, it’s not a hand gesture so much, but there is a sequence, a bodily movement, that is now being associated with stopping the mind, and letting go and focusing directly on a state with a healing intention. It is also something that Franz Bardon taught, but to learn to associate ritual intent with a certain gesture, and then using the gesture alone to inspire the feeling. For example, to do some kind of money spell but always close the ritual with the strong emotion of financial abundance and a mudra, or gesture of the hand and to do it until the gesture of the hand alone can spark the associated emotion.