The Art of Healing

Contrary to what the title initially brings to mind, this humble compilation of words is a rather simple empathetic illustration of how an individual can help heal another, regardless of the predicament or hurt deep-rooted in them. This concept is in line with the fact that healing in itself is a term that encompasses a broad spectrum of actions, words, and even a glimmer hope not limited to one’s self; healing is a light bulb that you can help switch on in all the dark rooms you come across, and watch as the shadows slowly inch back, leaving the place whole with happiness knocking on the door.

Having described the term, now we can pick apart the process hidden behind the seven-letter word. Perhaps, the most essential ingredient required in order to help heal someone is to have enough of a degree of sensitivity in your heart to feel what they feel, and not just in their tough moments, but also in the happier ones. Healing is ongoing – bound by no time, circumstance or person – and that is why it is a powerful thing which needs to be propagated. To understand, we must truly place ourselves in the other’s silhouette, and try to identify what makes them happy or unhappy. It is in those moments of self-detachment that we truly identify the degrees of grey they experience, and why they experience them.

This process of identification is then followed by the commitment to aid that particular person through their turbulent times, and this commitment is usually easy to find considering we, as humans, are biologically hardwired to feel empathy for the ones we love and care for; and if they were to suffer, the inbuilt rules of survival kick in and we do commit to healing the people we love regardless of how they might make us feel.

Here, I’d like to give an example not too foreign to me; a friend of mine suffers from a chronic mental illness. Although I don’t sit by their side twenty-four hours a day, there’s this feeling of commitment inside my heart that pushes me to place a small piece of myself in their aura to make sure the gaps aren’t too big for them to feel like they’ve ruptured – because they truly haven’t. They’re worth more than what that particular illness makes them feel. This commitment I speak of also comes with understanding the fact that you might never get anything back for what you do, and that warm feeling inside your chest will have to suffice for all that you’ve sacrificed for them, and that is the true meaning of the term “selflessness”. So, to commit is to care, and that is a form of immortal love; you in all your selfless entirety will be immortal love.

The last component that resides under the umbrella, is to do. By that, I mean, is to actually do all that is required of you in a balanced manner so as to not intrude into their own process, while never truly leaving them alone. In moments they will call at 3 am and you will have to converse in love to a fall of tears, self-doubt and sheer heartbreak on the other side of that phone call. You will have to drive for hours down winding roads to help them escape the panic they feel, or hum to them a lullaby that puts them to ease as if they were a child.

What you truly need to do is to be human and accept that we all suffer, and the best ones out of us will always be those sterling individuals that put themselves second for the sake of someone else. We do not exist alone; we exist with each other and in every single creation of God that can make us feel, and when we resonate this energy with a person bound by hurt, and they – in very real terms – heal, we get to witness the world become a better place. When we help others truly live, we ourselves feel alive, and that will always be worth more than each day spent surviving.