In her book, Radical Remission, Kelly Turner, Ph.D. writes about her research of interviewing over a thousand people who have experienced a complete reversal of their cancer without the sole aid of conventional medicine. She lists nine key factors that people whom she interviewed all had in common. One of these factors was “Deepening your spiritual connection.”

I was definitely ready for a spontaneous remission of my mast cell activation, and after reading her book, I found that I was participating in the other eight key factors that she also lists. (I’ll allow you to read her book to find out about these other key factors.) However, my spiritual life needed a little more attention.

I was unfettered by any real religious training during my childhood. While we would go to various different church denominations, as a family we really didn’t have a spiritual practice. There was no talk of following a set of principles, or believing in certain ways. My most prevalent memory was being infatuated with the altar boy at a church we attended when I was in high school. My grandmother, who lived with us during those years, was more interested in what clothing people wore to church. Needless to say, we missed the point of why we were sitting in church, and any spiritual message that was delivered wasn’t heard.

I was open to learning more about how to enhance my spiritual connection with a higher power, and when my husband got invited in late 2014 to attend a New Thought center in Colorado Springs called Center for Spiritual Living (CSL), I came along to check it out.

New Thought is more of a philosophy than a religion, which suited me perfectly. They believe that God is within each of us, not “out there” somewhere; and they believe that we are each created in the image of the Divine. Ernest Holmes, the Founder of Religious Science, which is part of the greater New Thought movement, wrote about this spiritual philosophy in a book titled The Science of Mind. Center for Spiritual Living counts Ernest Holmes as their founder.

The language used by the minister at the first service I attended sounded very much like what I had read in Dr. Joe Dispenza’s books. A quote from Ernest Holmes was shared, “Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life.” I realized that I needed more support with training my mind to think differently, and my husband and I became regular attendees at the Center every week.

Frequently I heard the minister say “You are perfect, whole and complete.” This felt like salve on a wound for me, and encouraged me to accept myself as I was trying to heal. There were many things that I wanted to change in my life from how I felt physically to how I responded to other people. Yet remembering that I am one with the universal God, the universal love energy, helped me become more grounded and balanced.

Ernest Holmes wrote in his book, This Thing Called You, “If you wish to be healed you must expect to be made whole.” My expectations weren’t near that bold! And then I began to wonder why weren’t they? Why shouldn’t I be able to heal? I understood the power of a placebo in scientific research studies, where people who were given a pill and told it would heal their symptoms would actually experience healing, only to later find out it was just a sugar pill. Dr. Joe goes through numerous placebo studies and stories of patients in his book You Are the Placebo, which not only furthered my understanding of placebos but also confirmed my suspicions that my mind is more powerful than I realize.

I needed assistance to be able to harness that power and truly experience the healing I sought, first in my mind, to be able to create it in my life. New Thought uses a five-step prayer sequence bringing in affirmations of what I know to be true utilizing statements combined with the emotion to generate the result. “I know my gut is healed” would bring about such energy and power, that I truly was able to feel a shift in my body. Prayer also includes gratitude, not only for what I have now but what I know is forthcoming through expectancy. I would express gratitude for a healed gut as if it had already happened. Since my body is just following the direction of my mind, my body would think that everything is already healed.

I also started taking classes at CSL to better understand the philosophy and to read the writings of Ernest Holmes, Emma Curtis Hopkins, Thomas Troward, and Ralph Waldo Emerson. I began to realize that my mind was so powerful that it could literally make me feel sick. I saw that if my mind had that kind of power, then it could also heal me.

One class I took at CSL was about Visioning. In the class, I made a vision board about what I wanted in my life. I included the vision to be medication-free; to be able to eat out at a restaurant again; to eat a wide variety of foods and digest them enjoyably; to be able to travel without having to always bring my own foods; to sleep through the night and awaken rested; and to have no more stomach pain. I focused all my energies on getting well by getting a picture of what that would look like and then I’d also bring in the emotions of what that would feel like and how happy I would be. I included those emotional pictures on my vision board also. With practice, I was able to conjure up the euphoria at that statement and see and feel myself eating fish or carrots with joy!

I combined these pictures on my vision board with my daily meditation. I spent my meditation feeling what emotions and physical abilities I would have when I was healed. And what I wanted to be able to experience. It was very empowering.

To read about Healing through Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), click here.