Unit 8 - Mental/Spiritual Exercises toward Integral Health

Unit 8 – Review of Course Exercises


Our course textbook, Integral Health (Dacher, E.. 2006) has woven a pathway with the purpose of helping us discover and connect with our role as Healers. The author has accomplished this by presenting us with principles he has harvested from ancient Eastern practices and interpreted through the grid of a Western, academic approach. In my case, being familiar with anecdotal information as well as a bit of body, mind and spirit experience of my own, I had the impression at first, that the author’s approach was a bit antiseptic and subjective . . . In the process of the course, and my own practice of the exercises of The Subtle Mind, Universal Loving Kindness, and Meeting Asclepius I gained glimpses of realities that I did not fully grasped before. The first factor that came into play was my own resistance to being led in the exercises (giving my distrustful nature in things spiritual); however, as I found need to release myself more to these exercises because of the potential benefits I could see, I received a lot more than what I was expecting.



The Subtle Mind exercise and its effect of helping one to see one’s still mind was a breath of fresh air. I was skeptical about the possibility of finding that one would discover universal loving kindness through this exercise, however and have stated before that experiencing the still mind need could also lead to a glimpse of malevolent genius; depending on the person’s orientation, mental state, and even chemical balance. I was also resistant to the Universal Loving Kindness exercise, and stated that I did not feel I could wish health, wholeness and happiness on all living beings because some beings simply do not deserve that kind of goodness . . .


However, as I progressed in my reading and found that being able to experience the intention of Universal Loving Kindness would open me to becoming a more whole Healer, I practiced the exercise and found release for my own potential as a Healer.


Having listened t the Meeting Asclepius audio track before the courses began, I was also resistant to the visualization of a person who would become my “own” Asclepius. My objection to this exercise was on the basis of the very name of what I consider to be just another false god, Asclepius. At first, I tried my own sanitized version of Asclepius replacing his image with that of Jesus and found this to rub me totally the wrong way; Jesus does not need that kind of interpretation. However, once the image came to me of my own mentor, Father Bernie Menard, O.M.I, I was able to do the exercise, but dispensed with the artifice of visualizing light emanating from his mouth, hands and heart. I felt that such visualization was a bit hockey and artificial being that I had in real life experienced my mentor’s complete attention and unconditional love, and discovered that he indeed was a Healer; and now, in the present, I was now called to become a mentor in the same fashion, and as a conduit to other individual persons’ discovery of their own healing.


My conclusion in respect to the mental exercises presented in Integral Health, is that one can, in the role of Healer, serve as one who opens a safe space to others so that they can experience their own healing. The key word in my last statement is “individuals” – Without our intentional devotion to Universal Loving Kindness, one cannot meet an individual on the plane where his or her healing can take place. That requires our being present before that person in the here and now, unshackled from our own subjective experience and suffering so that we can help create the Kairos moment – The moment that presents many more possibilities than any other moment, so that healing can take place. This also brings to mind the very concept of “Healer”; the very act of capitalizing the word in an attempt to legitimize it as a profession for the sake of gain negates the role of one who serves others so that they can find healing. In truth, we are only servants.