Holistic Healing Classes: Subjects of Study

Today, holistic healing classes are offered in simple learning platforms such as holistic seminars, workshops and in public community centers. As well, holistic healing classes may be more comprehensive in nature and integrated into certificate, degree and continuing education programs.

Students who desire to become holistic health practitioners can take holistic healing classes in healing alternatives, wellness and detoxification, energy medicine, mind-body-spirit medicine, and introductory Chinese herbal medicine. Others may elect to pursue holistic healing classes to become a spiritual healer. Certificate courses in this particular field of study involve studies in theology, prayer, mantra and meditation, spirituality, and other metaphysical subject matter.

Holistic healing classes in acupuncture may lead to a diploma, certificate or degree. Depending on the alternative health school in which you enroll, there are various holistic healing classes that are drawn from Oriental medicine philosophy and practices. While some holistic healing classes may be more geared toward needless techniques, such as acupressure, moxibustion, cupping and Chinese medical massage, other courses may involve more in-depth instruction in Tai Chi, Qi gong, acupuncture needling methods, TCM, herbal medicine, Chinese medical terminology and more.

A number of holistic healing classes entail studies in holistic divinity, animal healing, shamanic journeys, reiki, nutrition and supplements, essential oils, flower remedies, herbology, hypnotherapy, iridology, among others. In addition, there are very popular holistic healing classes that are centered on massage therapy. In these courses of study, students are taught about anatomy, kinesiology, physiology, and range of motion. Massage modalities that are offered through holistic healing classes encompass training in acupressure, deep tissue massage, sports massage, Swedish massage, touch therapy, medical massage, trigger point and countless other methodologies.

If earning your associates, bachelors, masters or doctorate is important to you then there are a number of holistic healing classes that are more advanced and comprehensive in nature. These holistic healing classes typically include practical and clinical instruction in chiropractic, naturopathy, Oriental medicine, orthomolecular medicine, and anti-aging and preventive medicine. In addition, professionals who have already attained some level of medical education will find that there are holistic healing classes in holistic nursing, holistic veterinarian and holistic M.D. programs.

There are several more holistic healing classes from which one can choose: some lesser known studies may include apitherapy (Bee products' therapy), animal therapy, bioenergetics, phytotherapy, naprapathy, Feldenkrais, Feng Shui, polarity therapy and many more.

If you (or someone you know) are interested in finding holistic healing classes, let career training within fast-growing industries like massage therapy, cosmetology, acupuncture, oriental medicine, Reiki, and others get you started! Explore career school programs near you.

Holistic Health Check Up

Having an holistic health check up is somewhat different than having a physical by a healthcare provider when your pulse is taken and a tongue depressor is stuck inside your mouth. Holistic care involves evaluating and nurturing all aspects of our bodies, not the physical body alone.

Here are some basic questions I have outlined for you to ask yourself and also to use as a guide enabling you to evaluate how in-balance your mind-body-spirit is. Included are some wellness resource links that offer avenues you can take and tools you can use to help to align yourself with optimal wellness. 

1) Are Your Chakras in Alignment?
Our chakras are our energy centers (vortexes) that are the openings for life energy to flow through. When they are blocked or closed we are functioning at a lower level than is desirable. 

2) Are You Breathing Properly? Say Ahhhh!
Probably one of the most common mistake people make is withholding breath. There are far too many shallow breathers on the planet. Training yourself how to breathe properly is very important!

3) Are Your Aura Colors Glowing Brightly or Murkish Gray?
Our auras are like magnets picking up vibrational energies that are floating around everywhere we go. It is important to cleanse our auras frequently to free them of foreign vibrations and negative energies.

4) How Deeply Rooted Are You?
When our spirits choose to incarnate into a human body it is understood that we are to respect and honor this outer garment we wear. There is much information and learning that can be accessed from our Earth energies when we grow our roots. Dig in and reach downward!

5) Are You Staying Within Your Own Energetic Boundaries? 
You will experience conflict within your "self" if you become confused by merging your own energies with energies of others. Make sure the emotions you are feeling belong to you.

6) Are You Tending To Your Physical Needs?
Are you honoring the physical component of your being by giving it the proper foods/drinks and regular exercise.

7) Do You Allow Yourself Time/Space To Recoup Spent Energies?
It is far too easy to get wrapped up in day to day tasks and responsibilities, forgetting to take care of yourself. Choose from a variety of practices that can easily be incorporated a few minutes each day to bring about inner peace and contentment. Here are a few suggestions.

Yoga

If there is no yoga instructor or experienced person in your area to guide you in selecting an effective series of exercises, breathing techniques and deep relaxation best suited to you, do the best you can with the following guidelines. Be aware, however, of the fact that no guideline is absolute and that each body has different needs and each person a different life-style which may or may not allow him to abide by the guidelines given. Thus, you will have to be creative and resourceful in seeing how you can apply these techniques to your life.

1. WITH EXERCISES should be done in each case will be discussed in the section on specific problems. In general, we do the dynamic exercises which wake up the body and make its energies flow more freely in the morning, so as to prepare ourselves for our day's activities. The more static and relaxing exercises are usually done in the evening when we want to relax the body and the mind from the various tensions which have accumulated, at the same time revitalizing them for the evening activities.

If, however, someone cannot abide by this suggestion, he can make his own program. For example, he may have time only once a day and want to combine both types of exercises together in the morning or in the evening. Or, he may have time only in the afternoon (but not after the meal, please). Others may simply freely that their body prefers some other timing.

It is important, if at all possible, to do some exercise which brings blood to the head towards the late afternoon or evening or even before bed if no other time is possible. Most of us have a lack of flow of blood and thus oxygen, nutrients and hormones to the brain. The more hours we are sitting or standing, the more the blood tends to gravitate towards the feet. Thus, it is useful to do some exercise, such as the half shoulder stand or the prayer position, so as to replenish the blood supply to the brain. In the case of the half shoulder stand, which is essential for all, but especially for those with varicose veins or other problems of the legs, such as swelling. Bringing blood to the head is especially important to all those who have low blood pressure, anemia or hormonal problems. Check, however, with the chart of contraindications to see if perhaps you have some problem which prevents you from being able to do the half shoulder stand. Alternatively, check with your doctor or yoga instructor.

Back-bending exercises should be balanced by forward-bending ones and movements to the right balanced by movements to the left.

2. THE LENGTH OF THE EXERCISE PERIOD will depend on how much time you are willing to spend each day on revitalizing your self. We will give various series for each specific problem. There will be the basic series of absolutely necessary exercises which you will have to perform if you want to get some help in overcoming that problem. This is for those who are willing to do only the absolute minimum. We do not recommend this series for most. It is just the best we can do for someone who is unwilling to pay real attention to his health. Then we will give the series which would be what one should really do if he wants to harmonize his body and mind. Then, in the section on comments, we will give additional exercises which will aid you even further in creating a healthy body and mind, if you can spare that time. For more exercises it will be best to consult an instructor.

3. THE ORDER IN WHICH THE EXERCISES SHOULD BE DONE will be given in each case. If, foe some reason, this does not suit you, you may adjust it by following your inner voice or consult an instructor, if there is one available. Most series will finish up with some breathing exercises and deep relaxation, possibly involving some positive imagery. If you are unable, for reasons of time or unsuitable environment, to complete the series with a relaxation at that time, then try to do it some time in the afternoon, after the evening exercises or even before going to sleep, if there is no other solution. Relaxation will be suggested after both the morning and evening series. Best results can be obtained if you can do both. If there is no time, select the most suitable hour of the day for yourself to do your relaxation. Relaxation is a very important aspect of your self-healing; in some cases it is even more important than the exercises, especially in psychosomatic illnesses.

4. TAKE YOUR HEALTH INTO YOUR HANDS. Be sensitive to your body's needs and be creative in developing a daily program for maintaining your health.

Bad body image

Question

I have such a bad body image, what can I do about it? 

Answer

The word body image in and of itself reflects the problem. Your body needs to be loved and accepted for what it is. It is not an image; it is real flesh and blood. More importantly, it is you. It is the place where the real you lives and breathes. Do not be disheartened at the thought of this; this is your ticket to freedom and joy. Your relationship to your body is the most important relationship you will ever have on planet earth.

Our society has conditioned us into thinking that certain types of bodies are sexy and desirable, while other types are not. If we don't have those large breasts, small waists and that beautiful face, then we are out of luck. This is plain nonsense. If you've ever really noticed, we all have marvelously individualistic bodies just as we each have unique fingerprints.

As most of you know, in different cultures, different bodies are considered desirable. Women frequently reject their body because it does not fit into the ideal as defined by their particular society. When you do this, you are accepting society's definition of an ideal that does not even exist in reality.

Men are also defined by the size of their penis and the curve of their ass. If we accept these debilitating judgments as standards for ourselves, we end up thinking that our body is bad and we are bad. Then we have a bad body image. When we think this way, we inhibit ourselves and end up depressed and anxious.

An anorexic or bulimic adolescent goes to the extreme to fit into a certain "image." There is a frightening film called Edge City. It is based on a real event, which occurred on the edge of Philadelphia. It is realistically portrayed, showing a bulimic adolescent and how she got caught up in her peer group image and ends up being intimately involved in a group murder. A chilling reality. Trying to fit into any image frequently lead us into self-destructive acts and behaviors.  

Any way you look at it, it is not healthy to let others define you. You need to accept and love yourself-- just as goddess, god, and nature made you. Your body is your instrument for living. Your body is what houses your energy. When you reject any aspect of your body, you are rejecting yourself at the most basic level.

You reject yourself because you accept outside definitions of what you should be. When you do this, youspend all of your life and all of oyur energy seeking outside approval. If you live an image, your life is a shell and you cannot ever like yourself or feel good about yourself. Seeking approval is never going to satisfy your deep need to be loved. You can succeed at getting all the approval the world has to offer, just like Marilyn Monroe did, and you will end up feeling as empty as she did.

It is also common for both men and women to see themselves unrealistically. Once a person has been fat, she sees herself that way, even after she loses weight. Once a person sees himself as ugly, he sees himself as ugly no matter how attractive he may become.  

This distortion of current reality is curious because it simply doesn't change no matter how much or how many people try to get the person to see what is actually in the mirror; she still thinks she looks fat. This is because her beliefs are frozen into this fat body image and nothing is ever going to change her mind. She sees fat in the mirror.

Your "bad body image" sounds like you are carrying around the belief that you look bad and nothing is ever going to change your mind.

In this fat example, the physical body has changed but the issues that created the fat in the first place have not changed. This is the reason most fat people gain their weight loss back. The solution does not lie in the right diet or in self-control. 

In my experience the only thing that can ever change this frozen fat image or any other bad body image is to directly experience the real feelings that have not been experienced.  

Within this fat image, frozen in time and in your mind, your real feelings are waiting to be acknowledged. Even though you have changed, by force, physical reality, the fat image is your emotional issues. The fat itself was a result of deeply embedded, unexpressed emotions. These inexperienced emotions must be experienced.

When you do this, you move beyond your bad body image into reality. This is powerful living. Look in the mirror and keep looking until you are confronted with your own critical eye and your own self-hatred. Let this come up to your awareness. Keep looking until the self-hatred and judgments drop away. Keep looking until the shame and embarrassment vibrate through your body making you blush and feel uncomfortable. Keep looking until you can actually see what your body looks like in the mirror without society's conditioning defining what you see in the mirror. Now you are looking at the real you in the mirror.

When you can do this, you will see a naked body, innocent and pure. This natural creature can become vibrant and healthy, even if it is still fat.Loving your body as it really is will provide the fertilizer you need to grow into your potential. Each body can be full of vibrant and alive energy. And each body is unique and beautiful in its own way. It is our job to accept our body and take good care of our physical instrument so that our body can be its own best self. A body that is open and flowing will naturally be attractive and desirable.

Have you ever noticed how a face can go from being tight and critical and ugly into being open and bright and inviting? If you put your energy into being your best self rather than wasting your energy on an image, you will reap rewards.  

Each body can be a free and healthy instrument for naturally occurring feelings. Then joy and love and desire will vibrant through you several times a week! A magnetic personality is the result of energy, not an ideal body. A charismatic leader may or may not be that perfect ideal, but she is always full of life.

So put your awareness, time and energy into becoming your authentic self, letting all body images drop away. Keep breathing and looking in the mirror until you can see and accept what is really there. Your body will respond by becoming the most wonderful physical manifestation of you. It will also bring you much pleasure and satisfaction.

See Love your body for more information about the body and how important it is in feeling safe and secure. I hope this helps you live in your real body and enjoy it.

Anxiety and how to cope

Dr. Jeanette Answers Your Questions About Anxiety

Social Anxiety, Generalized Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks and Panic Attacks

 

Natural Anxiety Help Question

"My life is ruined with anxiety attacks and panic attacks. Is there any hope for me? I have tightness in the chest with anxiety and cannot breathe. Drugs do not help." Lisa in Australia

Natural Anxiety Treatment Answer

First, let me congratulate you on being aware of your anxiety. Most people live in denial and do not even know they are anxious even though their foot is jumping up and down and they are biting their nails.

You can learn how to overcome your anxiety attacks and panic attacks naturally.

First, let's review anxiety attack symptoms.

Anxiety Attack Symptoms:

1.  Tightness in the chest, heart pounding
2.  Upset guts, flipping stomach
3.  Hyperventilating
4.  Cannot catch breath
5.  Thinking something terrible is going to happen
6.  Racing thoughts of disaster
7.  Cannot perform the task you need to perform

If you have any of the above you are probably having an anxiety attack or panic attack.

Anxiety attacks and panic attacks are similar. A panic attack has a higher pitch than an anxiety attack.  In both situations, you are overwhelmed and are not relaxed and self confident.

What Causes Anxiety Attacks?

Panic attacks and anxiety attacks occur when your out of control thoughts attack you. You may or may not be aware of your negative, nasty, mean, obsessive thoughts. However, your judgmental thoughts are attacking you when you have an anxiety attack.

When you get caught up in your out of control mental energy, you become overwhelmed by your thoughts. This mental energy can become so overwhelming that it can completely paralyze you. This is when you panic.

Anxiety Treatments:

1. Medication

Drugs do not cure anxiety. Medication masks your anxiety problem and keeps you from reducing your anxiety unless you deliberately use the medication along with a desensitization plan to reduce your anxiety.

Legal medications are extremely harmful to your body and should only be used in an anxiety reduction program with an experienced holistic psychologist, relaxation therapy teacher or emotional health coach.

2. Systematic Desensitization

In the old days, during my post doctoral training at the Behavior Therapy Unit at Temple Medical School in the 1970's with Joe Wolpe, MD, Father of Behavior Therapy, we used systematic desensitization to treat anxiety.

With systematic desensitization we taught people to relax their body and then imagine the things they were afraid of in small steps until they were no longer afraid.

Systematic desensitization is very effective in reducing anxiety attacks, panic attacks, PTSD, phobias, stress anxiety, social anxiety and GAD symptoms.

Systematic desensitization is still the treatment of choice when the best anxiety help is available instead of quick, managed care solutions.

Learning Research Has Proven:

1. You do not have to live with high anxiety that ruins your life.

2. You do not have to suffer with or through anxiety attacks.

3. Anxiety is a learned behavior and you can unlearn it.

Therefore, you can use desensitization when you know exactly what scares you. For example, if you have a fear of driving crossing a bridge based on a past experience that really happened to you, use systematic desensitization to get rid of your anxiety.  It works.

3.  Cognitive Behavior Therapy

The most popular current treatment for anxiety is Cognitive Behavior Therapy. CBT teaches you to think positive thoughts.

Having to think about thinking positive thoughts is probably the reason Cognitive Behavior Therapy has a high recidivism rate according to the last study I read.

Another reason Cognitive Behavior Therapy is limited is you can obsess about positive thoughts in the exact same way you obsess about negative thoughts. Obsessing is the real problem. Thinking is the real problem.

4.  Meditation and mindfulness

Meditation and mindfulness are also used to treat anxiety with some success.  However, these are mind-trying-to-solve-its-own problem approaches.

Einstein said, “You cannot solve a problem from the same consciousness that created it. You must learn to see the world anew.”

This is absolutely correct when it comes to unlearning anxiety. This means you have to get out of your brain and the same consciousness that created your anxiety to find a successful treatment for anxiety.

5. Yoga

Use yoga if it works for you. Use anything if it works. Be glad it works.

However, yoga is a mental, mind treatment because your brain tells your body exactly how to posture itself.  Your brain is the dictator.

In addition, you are not paying any attention to your anxiety and your real fear.  This means you are NOT unlearning any of the anxiety responses and anxiety behaviors that you learned in your past. 

Relaxation Therapy and yoga without desensitizing your past anxiety responses is limited in value.

6. EMDR 

EMDR is a simple technique that falls under the systematic desensitization program mentioned above. Dr. Wolpe himself saw the value of EMDR before he died.

EMDR works to the degree that you are desensitizing your past memories and past conditioned responses so that you unlearn them.

For more about EMDR and learning research read this article, EMDR and Learning Theory, published in the Association for Humanist Psychology Publication.

What is the Best Anxiety Treatment?

Thinking positive thoughts is not enough. Talking about your anxiety is not enough. Relaxing is not even enough.

To be successful in reducing your anxiety you have to unlearn your unhealthy anxiety behaviors that you learned in your past.

To be self confident you must get to the root cause of your anxiety and unlearn your anxiety behaviors.   Then you will know what is really going on inside of you and you will know exactly how to help yourself.

Dr. Jeanette's Approach is Original

My holistic psychology approach is based on learning research with new, effective body awareness, energy awareness and emotional health additions that really work in real life.

As a holistic psychologist my approach is totally different from a traditional psychologist: If you do not know or understand the difference please read about the difference between the old and new psychology.

When you are in the middle of an anxiety attack, the first thing you need to do is learn how to stop hyperventilating. This is essential.

The first lesson in the online course, "Overcome Anxiety Naturally" teaches you how to stop hyperventilating using the simple method used at the Behavior Therapy Unit. Read more and order the Overcome Anxiety Naturally ecourse.

Next, you need to get back into your body and relax if you can relax.

However, often you cannot relax no matter how hard you try to relax. In this case, you need a more physical way to handle your excessive anxiety energy.

Let me explain. Your anxiety during an anxiety attack is fast and furious. This high level of anxiety is like lightning.

When you are anxious you are moving too fast. This fast energy is the real problem that you need to take care of immediately.

You do not need to ignore your anxiety, distract yourself or pretend like there is nothing to be afraid of.

This would be a serious mistake. Discounting your anxiety will only make you more anxious in the future. Anxiety builds up over time.

Instead, look to nature for answers. What happens to lighting in nature?

Lightening is immediately grounded.

Nature does not let fast and furious energy continue. It is not safe to do so. Nature stops lightning immediately. You need to do the same with your mental attacking energy.

Currently you let your out of control anxious energy go on and on. Fast and furious energy is dangerous.  This is the reason you are so scared during an anxiety attack.

Your nervous system becomes very upset. You could have an accident and harm your body.

This means you need to learn how to ground your energy so it does not harm you or others as soon as possible.

When you are overwhelmed, you need to learn how to bring yourself back into a safe, grounded state as soon as possible.

Can You Overcome Anxiety Naturally?

Yes!

You can learn to ground your energy and keep it grounded by living in your body.

This is one of the major ways my new, holistic psychology anxiety approach is different from others.  You will not be safe and secure until you get back into your body.

Nature made your body to ground your mental energy and keep you safe and secure. I discovered how to ground my energy when I was 34 years old. 

You too, can learn how to live in your body and be safe and secure.  You can definitely overcome your anxiety attacks without using drugs and live a rich and full life.

I have taught thousands of people via private sessions, groups sessions, workshops, and online courses how to stop mental anxiety attacks.