Trust is everything

I was thinking that I should redo my home page to state that my goal is more about spiritual awakening than it is about healing from thyroid cancer. Of course I want to heal from thyroid cancer, but my main goal is spiritual awakening.

I have been reading Adyashanti’s book The End of Your World. In it he describes how he had a partial awakening when he was 25, but that it took 7 more years before he fully awakened. During this time he got very sick. At the time he was a competitive biker, and the sicknesses made his body so weak that he finally had to give up this view of himself. He had to let go of his attachment to being a strong, healthy, exceptionally good biker.

With all my new health issues, I am wondering if these are part of my spiritual path too. I mean, the answer is yes since everything is part of our spiritual path. But it is possible for me to look at my new health problems through my ego and get very frustrated. Here I’ve spent nearly 3 years doing all sort of alternative means to heal my body; I think I’ve begun to make progress– I got far fewer colds this winter than I have in years, the tumor shrunk last September, my allergies seem to have improved–when a whole new slew of symptoms come in.

It’s kind of ironic. I had always wanted to write a blog about healing naturally from thyroid cancer. I was holding off because I wanted to write a success story. This is what I was looking for when I was first diagnosed– for someone to tell me how they had healed their thyroid without getting it taken out. And I almost thought I was in the homestretch when I started writing in January– that it was still a little hairy but that it would be good to show people how I could keep the faith through difficult times and then come out strong in the end.

But what is happening is that my body is bringing up new problems. Problems I’ve never had before. I’m weary of the effort that alternative healing takes, and I’m willing to do almost anything to just get my health problems behind me. Enough of health problems! There is a lot more to life than obsessing over your body.

But I am also seeing how all of this could really be for my spiritual growth. Part of my path. Here are some various ideas that came to me today:

• Holy Spirit told Regina Akers to go to McDonald’s. She hated McDonald’s. She thought it was a horrible company making terrible food for people. But her daughter loved it, and as an assignment, Holy Spirit told her to go to McDonald’s whenever her daughter asked. Regina said that for a while she was going as much as twice a week.

I bring this up because it shows that the form doesn’t really matter. I have the belief that McDonald’s food is terrible for you; that Holy Spirit would be damaging Regina by making her eat there, but it’s not true. It’s just a belief. We give everything all the meaning it has for us.

Somehow I find some reassurance in this– that even if I get put on a gluten-free or dairy-free diet (my biggest fears:), it will just be an exercise. If I trust in it it can work. There aren’t truly any bad foods.

•  Adyashanti got very sick as a way to release his attachment to his physical body. It could be that my getting sick when I believe I should be getting better is simply a lesson come to teach me that I am not in charge and I cannot be in charge of my own healing. I have tried to be in charge of my healing and I have failed miserably. My only option now is to surrender to Holy Spirit. To surrender to what is. To let it all take its course.

• Michael Langford says that practicing awareness watching awareness is the quickest way to wake up, but if you don’t want to do it, suffering is another option. I was kind of smiling today when I thought of this. When I read in The Most Direct Means to Eternal Bliss that you’re supposed to meditate a minimum of 2 hours a day, I thought that was so demanding. But is making myself go through cancer and hormone problems, allergy testing, and on and on actually better? I am clearly on the suffering path. Meditating sounds a lot more rewarding.

• And I reread this today in The Impersonal Life: “But in all your seeking and all your striving, let it be with faith and trust in Me, your True Self within, and without being anxious about the results; for the results are all in My keeping, and I will take care of them.  Your doubts and your anxiety are but of the personality, and if allowed to persist will lead only to failure and disappointment.”

I can see that what I need to do is trust. I am going to do whatever this new doctor says. I have come to him with the purpose of healing. It is his purpose to heal me too. I am going to do my best to trust him. To trust that it is Holy Spirit working through him and everyone else he is sending me to. I am going to let go. I’ll do whatever diet is recommended to the best of my ability, but I won’t stress about it. Holy Spirit sent Regina to McDonald’s. I don’t think it’s the form that matters.

I think the important thing is for me to trust. To let go and trust. Trust is the antidote to everything.

An alternative doctor and a healing plan

I went to an alternative doctor today, a doctor who is interested in healing the cause of illness, not in treating the symptoms. It seems like such an obvious response, but it’s not. My primary care doctor, who is part of a “holistic” practice has never expressed any interest in figuring out what is at the root of the cancer.

I have been trying to make sense of my thoughts and feelings since the appointment. First I’ll say that the doctor said that he doesn’t think I have low thyroid. He thinks I have a hormone imbalance (I have a low sex drive, screwed up menstrual cycle, and now more and more frequent mood shifts– what I notice mainly is a heavy sadness that seems to fall on me). He says he could fix these symptoms with hormone therapy but that that wouldn’t get at the root of the cause.

He says my body is not detoxing properly and has ordered a series of blood (and other) tests to look for suspicious toxins. I know fungus and mold were two of them. He has also told me to  go to an endocrinologist to get a full battery of tests and a diagnosis, to get skin patch allergy tests, and then to follow up with a nutritionist to be put on a diet that works with whatever food allergies I may have. He said I look like I have food allergies. (Do you think that’s a compliment?)

In general he thinks there’s something fairly seriously out of balance. When I told him my experience of waking up in the middle of the night from taking Iodoral, he said that very few people had adverse reactions to Iodoral and this was another red flag.

After I left I felt like crying. And why? In part I think because of this hormonal thing. I felt that same heavy sadness descend. But also it seemed like too much—too much to have to go to all these appointments, too much to have to follow a diet, too much to have all this hormonal problems coming in now after 3 years of effort at healing naturally. And then it occurred to me that perhaps this was all a gift from Holy Spirit to nudge me out of my small self, to push me into surrender. Because honestly I don’t feel like I can do all of this on my own.

On the way home I got pulled over by a policeman for driving through a stop sign. Thankfully he only gave me a warning. While I was waiting for him to write it up I was thinking about how I had attracted all this with my gloomy mood, and then I thought about how I couldn’t bear to be in charge of attracting the right things to myself. I couldn’t bear to be in charge of making sure that my thoughts were aligned rightly, that I was focusing on the proper things. Certainly I can’t bear to focus on my healing any more. I am so sick of it.

It was kind of funny. When the doctor was saying he could give me something to fix my hormone imbalance, I was thinking, “Give it to me!” I don’t really feel this way totally, but part of me is so tired of all this healing effort. I don’t even care if I’m fully healed anymore. I just want to be like everyone else and make the problem go away as fast as possible.

The tumor is hurting today a bit. Little twinges of slight pain. I asked the doctor if he thought I should get surgery, and he said he really couldn’t say. Then I asked if he thought surgery would interfere with his plan to get at the root cause, and he said it wouldn’t.

I have another ultrasound in a week and a half. I will make an appointment with the endocrinologist tomorrow, and hopefully he will be able to recommend a good thyroid surgeon.

An alternative doctor and supplementing with iodine again

All that said about wanting to heal through the mind, I am quite happy because I have found an alternative doctor who I think supports iodine therapy, and I have an appointment to see him in two weeks. He specializes in environmental medicine, which I need to read more about. But this includes allergies, which are a major issue for me in the spring and late summer.

I spent a good deal of time (way too much time) this week reading more about iodine and how to implement it. Yahoo groups are great, but I would search the Yahoo Iodine Group for a specific thing like, which type of selenium to take, and I would get over 1000 results. How long do you spend looking?

One thing I downloaded and read was a .pdf file called The Guide to Supplementing with Iodine. You can download it for free from that link. I am going to try iodine again, but this time use all of the supplements that are recommended.  The first time I tried iodine, a couple months ago, I took it with a very high dose of Vitamin C (which upset my stomach) and Celtic sea salt. This time I am going to add in selenium, magnesium, ATP Cofactors, and an adrenal health supporting herb. I got all of these at iherb, which is a good site. I got a buffered version of Vitamin C, which should help with my stomach problems, and I got a version of magnesium that is supposed to be easy on your stomach also.

Here are screenshots of my order in case you want to see exactly what I decided on. I did afterall spend 2000 hours researching the types before I ordered:)

I am excited to start them because a lot of the reviews on iHerb had people talking about what a big difference some of them had made. I’m starting with all the supplements except Iodoral. I will add that in after I talk to the doctor in two weeks.  A lot of the information says it’s best to do tests and monitor things when you’re taking Iodoral.

Just to review my main symptoms now are: low sex drive, more frequent periods, occasional low energy, and occasional unexplained weight gain. I have had low sex drive since the birth of my second daughter 7 years ago. The problems with my period seem to have developed in the last 6 months; the unexplained weight gain has been happening for the last two years– but in spurts, not all of the time; and the low energy seems very related to allergies and has been consistently happening in the spring and late summer. Overall, however, my health seems very good. I run and do sports and function normally most of the time.

I will post again after my doctor’s visit.

Letting go of addictive fears

I was just listening to a teaching by Regina Dawn Akers that is really helpful in relation to believing in your own healing.  Here is the link to the audio teaching. You need to scroll down on the page to get to “I place the future in the Hands of God.” It’s a fairly long teaching and has two parts. The part that applies to healing from cancer (or any physical illness) is from about 40 minutes onward in Part 1.

Holy Spirit defines addictive fears as those fears we have that seem like truth. So for instance if you have a fear/judgment that you are fat and you want to let it go, it can seem very difficult to do so when every time you look in the mirror your belief is confirmed. Addictive fears seem like facts. So for me, one addictive fear is the tumor on my neck. I know that I need to believe that I am healed to be healed, but this can seem like a very challenging thing to do when I am constantly reminded of the tumor every time I look in the mirror. Regina explains it very clearly in her teaching.

Here is the message that Regina is teaching from. It comes from Holy Spirit:

“Question: Please teach us how to stop listening to our addictive fears. I make this request in love and through a desire to know only thy Self.

Answer: Addictive fears are those same fears that come into your mind repeatedly over a period of time. They are the fears that scare you the most, because you believe they are true. They are the fears that seem to have evidence within your world, the fears that have already become manifest in your experience. Addictive fears are fears you are living now, and you cannot seem to turn your mind away from them because the evidence of your fear is a constant reminder that the fear you fear is real.

There are two ways to overcome addictive fears: faith and knowledge.

Faith is the first level of overcoming addictive fear. Faith works because you are that which you are. Faith works even if you do not have knowledge. It doesn’t matter what you put your faith in. It could be faith in God, faith in a person, faith in therapy or magic, incantation or medicine…but if you have faith in anything as a means of taking away that which you fear, that which you fear shall be taken away. You may not be aware that it was taken away through your faith, but your faith is the power that led to the change in experience.

Knowledge is the second level of healing or overcoming addictive fear. Knowledge as a means of healing is most useful to the mind because it teaches the mind that the truth is always true. Knowledge need not be complete in order to be useful for this purpose. Incomplete knowledge can be combined with faith, and a powerful teaching formula is enacted within the mind.

The knowledge that is helpful to your awakening is the knowledge that you are the power you call mind. When you realize that mind is your power and everything else is its effect, you realize there is nothing to fear. You realize there is only choice, and you are the one who chooses.

When your knowledge in this lifetime is near its completion, you will make a choice and see its effects immediately. But when this knowledge seems to be building within your mind…that is, when you are still accepting that the truth about you is true…you will seem to make a choice with fear and doubt still in the mind, so the effects of your choice may seem to take time. Do not let this discourage you. Continue to make the choice in faith. You are learning that which you desire to learn. You are learning that effects are the result of your choice. Even in the lack of immediacy, you are learning this, because you know there is fear in your mind and you can see the fear reflected in what seems to be a delay in results.

Do not lament the delay in results. Instead, rejoice. Rejoice that you are learning the truth is true! As you rejoice in this evidence, your fear will diminish and you will accept that mind is all there is. As you accept that mind is all there is, your desire to master the mind shall increase through love, and the effects that blossom forth out of love shall teach you the knowledge you rejoice in knowing.

The truth shall set you free because you are free. In this knowledge you know the sweet, sweet taste of your freedom.”

 

This is so much what I have been trying to do: to believe in my own healing and so experience it. I sometimes wonder why none of the alternative methods I have tried didn’t work for me. I wonder if I didn’t believe in them sufficiently. I think I was never certain that something would work for me (like the raw food diet, or a cancer diet, or Protocel, etc.), but I was always hopeful. And you always read things about people who say, “My husband never thought this would work for him, and it did!” which make it seem like you don’t actually have to believe it for it to work.

What I think now (not that it really matters what I think) is that these decisions are made by our higher Selves. I have a feeling that it is my path to search for healing through the mind, through Source; while for others it is their path to be healed by food or a supplement.

I have been focusing recently on watching myself and seeing that I am not the one making the decisions I make, taking the actions I take. A friend just recommended a book called The Impersonal Life, which I have been reading online. You can also find it on Amazon. It’s another channeled book, and the author talks about how we, as our personalities, think we are responsible for so many things when in fact it’s God or Source who is directing us in everything. It’s just that the personality through lots of time and practice, has found a way to twist our perception to make us think that we, the personality, are in charge when we’re not.

My point is that I can think and put all sorts of mental effort into making a certain outcome happen, but it’s our higher, “Impersonal Self” as the book calls it, that makes things happen or not happen. This feels quite freeing to me– like I (as my personality) have just been absolved of the responsibility for getting myself into this mess. My higher self was directing me all along.

One more thing, which is that Regina mentions that the only reason it might be “better” to be healed through conscious faith is that it teaches you who you really are– an extension of God. Whereas if you are healed through a pill, you’re still healed, but you continue to believe that you are simply a body.

 

 

Looking for love in all the wrong places and then in the right place

I have been continuing to waver between faith and fear. I found a number of websites that talk about the iodine protocol that Dr. Brownstein suggests. Here are the websites– they are all on thyroid issues and healing them using supplements and natural hormones:

Stop the Thyroid Madness a site which endorses using natural hormones rather than synthetic ones to fix thyroid problems.

Natural Thyroid Choices, the site and blog of a woman who had thyroid cancer which spread to her lymph nodes and how she healed. (She actually went to Dr. Brownstein.)

Iodine Yahoo Group, a discussion group for people using iodine to improve their health. I believe it was started by the woman from Natural Thyroid Choices.

These websites have a lot of useful information, but I was looking for two things: a thyroid doctor recommendation in the Boston area and for someone who had had a similar experience as me when taking iodine. I have spent hours on these websites, and haven’t really found either. I did get one clue that my iodine experience might be due to adrenal overload.

I did find a thyroid doctor. He was recommended by my chiropractor’s wife. I made an appointment for June 20th, which was the first available.

And so what is my point here except that I have been delving into the world, looking for a solution to my thyroid issues, and it has been completely frustrating and mostly fruitless. Last night after spending two hours on the internet, hopping from link to link trying to get my questions answered, I wrote two emails. One to a medical intuitive I saw almost 3 summers ago when I first discovered the nodule, and one to the woman who runs the natural thyroid choices website. I asked the medical intuitive for a recommendation of a natural thyroid doctor, and I asked the website woman about having a consultation with her. (It says on her website that she does phone consultations. She is now a naturopathic doctor and specializes in all of this.) I promptly got two denials. The medical intuitive wrote this fast email without addressing me or signing off, saying that I should not go to an endocrinologist. That general practitioners were best. And the website woman said she was not doing consultations at this time.

It struck me as funny to get such abrupt and negative responses. Like it is confirmation that I am looking in the wrong place. It completely takes me out of my peace to scan the internet for information. There is a lot of fear and warnings on these websites. So much belief in the necessity of doing the right thing. So much belief that healing is found in the right combination of pills. I begin to buy into it. I wonder what the right thing is for me. I keep looking on the web. I hope that I can find someone who will help me find the right thing for me.

Then today I read from NTI, Luke, Chapter 22. It is an extremely helpful chapter for me. It’s kind of long and I didn’t want to copy the whole thing (though the whole thing is even better), so I’ve tried to excerpt some of the most important parts:

• “The thoughts within your mind can seem to take you in circles. You can seem to move from understanding to confusion at lightening speed, which makes you dizzy. Do not let this concern you. when this seems to happen within your mind, you are witnessing your own resistance struggling in a fight for survival. Remember that I have told you this is your fear of healing. Remember I have shown you that your fear of healing must be sickness. Be grateful that your sickness has come to the surface where it may be healed. Remember that the way in which you let sickness be healed is simply to rest in its presence.

• Do not get caught up in the struggle to understand what cannot be understood. Remember I have told you that this is a ploy of resistance. Instead, rest. Give your faith and willingness to Me, that you may be healed through your decision to rest and trust.

…

• You know that you want the comfort and peace of God. And now you know that this comfort and peace comes from within. So what you must do is choose the comfort and peace of God by denying anything that you recognize as alien to that comfort and peace. For if it is not of God, it does not exist. It is merely sickness born of imagined meaning. Therefore, there is nothing to do with it except let it be healed.

• Where you see a need to defend, rest and let that perception be healed. Where you see fear, rest and let that perception be healed. Where you see guilt, rest and let that perception be healed. Whenever you think you are not worthy of all of the glory of God, rest and let that perception be healed. As you rest, you will be healed.

• Within the mind of health, you will receive guidance. Trust and follow your guidance. It comes but from your true Self, which is based on truth, not illusion.

This last paragraph is where I get mixed up. I can see that I do all of what the other paragraphs talk about. In my search for the right mix of supplements, for the right doctor, I am seeing fear and the need to defend. That channel that I listened to a couple of weeks ago mentioned that I had waited a long time to with the cancer and that I could safely only wait another 6 months. So if this is true, I am feeling under the gun to heal. My ego mind tells me that if I wait until my doctor’s appointment on June 20th, it may be too late to implement iodine therapy, which is supposed to be so effective. This is fear. I should be resting and trusting. Not believing it and frantically searching the internet for answers.

Where I get mixed up is in trusting that I will receive guidance. And trusting in that guidance when I do receive it. When I asked the chiropractor for a thyroid doctor, the answer came so easily. Then I called up and the receptionist was kind and responsive. I think this was probably guidance. Whereas my fearful searching on the web has only led to two dead ends.

But even now I feel my ego tugging at me. To call the Broda Barnes Foundation again (even though I’ve left two messages) and try to find a doctor here who will work with me on the iodine therapy. My ego wants to take over. It wants to do something. It can’t stand resting and trusting.

I have been getting great comfort and peace from meditating with the Sacred Acoustics meditations. I listen to them and hold my hand over my thyroid. I took a reiki class last year, and there’s supposed to be healing coming out of my hands now. I make that sound so cynical. I actually do believe it, but I don’t think you necessarily have to take a reiki class for it to work. I think if you place your hand somewhere with the intention to heal, then it’s the intention that is healing through our One Mind, it’s not some secret thing that’s only granted to people who take a class.

If you are reading this I am sending you love and healing, too.