Sensation Method: Removing the "Ghost" Inside Us
The History of Homeopathy
Many holistic health advocates are familiar with homeopathy – the field of holistic medicine that utilizes infinitesimally small amounts of a plant, animal or mineral prescribed to resonate with the problems, or distortion pattern, of a particular patient. Originating through the brilliant mind of Dr. Samuel Hahnemann in Europe in 1789 (7 years before the first vaccine was given by Jenner), homeopathy is based on the Law of Similars. This law, also known as "like cures like," states that healing occurs when a homeopathic remedy is taken that is similar to the existing pattern of disturbance in a particular patient. This single potentized (i.e., energetically charged through hand succussion, or shaking, of the remedy) remedy can then, over time, diminish the similar plant, animal or mineral pattern in a patient, analogous to when an opera singer hits the exact note that can actually shatter a glass. As the homeopathic remedy reduces the patient’s inherited or acquired distortion pattern (~ miasma or genetic tendency), this allows the patient’s healing forces (immune system, nervous system, circulatory system, etc.) to restore healthy regulation and functioning in the body. Dr. Hahnemann’s system of determining the correct remedy for a patient has been successfully used by homeopathic physicians and practitioners the world over, with minor variations, ever since.
The Success of Acute Homeopathy
This energetic system of healing has been exceptionally curative for over 2 centuries-especially in the case of acute homeopathy. (Acute refers to the use of a remedy that is prescribed based on the outstanding pathological symptoms of a patient, for a recent illness or injury, that lasts for a relatively short period of time.) For example, the use of Arnica montana 30C or 200C for the treatment of acute sprains and strains is well known in the holistic community, and has proven to be remarkably effective in the field of sports medicine. In fact, Arnica is so effective for healing bruising and normalizing blood flow that many plastic surgeons now use it after surgery. The use of acute homeopathic remedies has also been dramatic in the case of serious illness. During the great flu of 1918, 80% of those who were treated with allopathic medicine (pharmaceutical drugs) died, whereas 80% of those treated with homeopathic remedies lived (Naumann, E., Homeopathy for Epidemics). More recently, homeopathic medicine has been proven to be as effective and safer than Prozac at treating moderate to severe depression (Oxford University Press, July 09).
Past Frustration with Constitutional Homeopathy
However, homeopathy prescribed for chronic or constitutional treatment has not enjoyed the same level of success. (Chronic or constitutional homeopathy refers to a single remedy prescribed to treat a patient’s unique physical, mental, and emotional symptoms for his/her entire lifetime.) In fact, a not insignificant number of homeopathic patients have experienced quite a bit of frustration over the years, after receiving one constitutional remedy after another, with no real improvement in their symptoms. This is not due to a lack of trying from many earnest and well-meaning homeopaths, but simply from ineffective systems of analysis.
A Revolutionary New Method
However, recently a new and extraordinarily effective system has emerged from India. Dr. Divya Chhabra and Dr. Rajan Sankaran, a homeopathic couple from Mumbai (Bombay), are the originators of a new and revolutionary method that can most accurately determine a patient’s correct constitutional homeopathic remedy. After studying, practicing and teaching for decades, the "Sensation Method" finally coalesced into a complete and teachable method in the early part of the 21st century, which gave homeopaths the first authentic roadmap into most accurately determining a patient’s deepest remedy. One of the major tenets of this system is that through inquiry at the level of sensation – which is more deeply experienced than thoughts or emotions – the appropriate remedy can best be determined. This remedy, chosen in part by whether an individual exhibits a plant, mineral or animal (or other) non-human vital sensation, can then most effectively treat a patient’s chief issues. For example, someone who needs a plant remedy experiences a particular disturbing sensation and it’s opposite, such as feeling alternately tight and then loose, or feeling contracted and then at other times expansive, or feeling heavy and then light. Someone under the influence of a mineral remedy on the other hand, often has an underlying sense of a lack of structure and the feeling of incompleteness and instability. An animal remedy’s issues relate to survival, and this individual typically lives with an underlying chronic sense of aggression like a predator (lion, snake, spider, etc.), or feeling constantly victimized like a prey (rabbit, deer, insect, etc.). Through a careful interview (case-taking), the Sensation Method-trained homeopath can determine which particular plant, animal or mineral sensation or energy is existing in a patient, and then prescribe the appropriate remedy to clear this non-human, and therefore out of place, disturbance.
The Non-Human Song, or "Ghost" Inside Us
How do these plant, animal or mineral patterns affect us? Literally these patterns are like living with a ghost or foreign entity. This "inner ghost," a non-human distortion pattern, adversely affects us in every aspect of our lives – physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. Dr. Rajan Sankaran describes this distortion pattern as "the other song" that is constantly playing within us, causing discord with our natural human song:
"There exists a duality. On one hand, each individual has his life as a human being, singing his own human song. On the other hand…there is a non-human world inside him that seems to sing another song altogether…The other spirit inside us is in itself melodious and complete. Yet it is out of place because it is not innately human, but is a reflection of a pattern we have borrowed from nature from the plant, animal, or mineral kingdoms. This different song in a human being creates disharmony and conflict. Further, the suppression of this non-human song crystallizes in physical and mental pathology." – Rajan Sankaran, MD in The Other Song: Discovering Your Parallel Self
The correctly prescribed plant, animal or mineral constitutional remedy resonates with this plant, animal or mineral distortion pattern, and slowly (or relatively quickly in some cases) but surely dissolves this non-human energy that is inappropriately residing within us. Over time the volume of this non-human song reduces, and eventually is completely muted, thus allowing our human song – that is, our truly human self – to more fully emerge, grow and develop.
A Great Fit with Psychospiritual Work
Many of us have learned in our psychological work that we are adversely imprinted and shaped by our unresolved past experiences (negative self-images, feelings of deficiency, suppression of painful memories from our family of origin, etc.), resulting in a habitual personality pattern that obscures our True Self, our True Nature, or Soul. What is little known, however, is that our soul is also greatly affected by another pattern – one that is non-human.
Similar to the most effective psychospiritual schools of healing (Somatic Experiencing by Levine, the Diamond Approach by Hameed Ali, John Welwood and other transpersonal psychologists, rebirthing and other forms of breath work, etc), a key principle of the Sensation System is that the most effective cures – and the prescription of the correct remedy – occur at the sensation level. This level – which is significantly deeper than the physical, emotional or mental planes of experience – can be reached through both psychotherapy and homeopathy. (The sensation level is where one directly experiences the "felt sense" of trauma in their body such as feeling stiff, heavy, squeezed, light, pressured, brittle, dazed, paralyzed, burning, trapped, floating, and so forth.) Thus, both these cutting edge schools of holistic healing – whether it’s psychospiritual work or constitutional homeopathy – have independently arrived at the same conclusion: Real change, and thus real cure, can only be achieved through reaching this deepest sensation level.
Further, homeopathy and psychotherapy are exceptionally synergistic. That is, while the correct constitutional homeopathic remedy is working to dissolve the non-human distortion pattern within us, psychospiritual work is invaluable to help the emerging being more fully develop. In fact, even those of us who have done decades of psychological work have noted a mild to moderate feeling of being rather unsettled and even estranged from ourselves at times on the correct homeopathic remedy. Thus, even though the constitutional remedy can be truly miraculous in removing our non-human patterns, it can be a bit disorienting to experience the loss of these self-sabotaging yet very familiar defensive patterns our egoic personality has structured itself around. (Of course, dysfunctional family dynamics also engender these egoic patterns, and quality psychological work is invaluable in helping to clear and help dismantle these resulting egoic patterns as well.) Therefore, in perfect conjunction with the ongoing dissolving of our non-human patterns through taking the homeopathic remedy, effective psychotherapy helps us simultaneously become more familiar with our humanness. Further, as the homeopathic remedy catabolizes (breaks down) our false personality shell, effective psychospiritual works in an anabolic (building up) manner, encouraging the individual to fully develop by experiencing more and more his/her soul, or true self.
Conclusion
Homeopathy has been a proven and effective form of natural healing for over two centuries. However, acute homeopathy has enjoyed more success than chronic, or constitutional, homeopathy. Recently though this has changed with the advent of the revolutionary new Sensation Method. This amazing system of analysis has proven so successful that it is now being taught to dedicated homeopaths all over the world. Further, in the author’s experience of almost thirty years of practice as a holistic physician, the Sensation System of constitutional homeopathy is the single most important form of healing presently known, and is sine qua non to true cure and achieving optimal health.