Can positive thinking change your karma?
Short Answer: Yes, but it doesn’t mean that your past karma goes unaccounted for.

Long Answer…
Karma means action.  And by positive thinking you have already acted in a way that will help you.
But I’m going to assume that you meant “Can it change my past karma ( either past life or current)?” The answer is: Yes only after you have completely paid back your previous karmic debts.
Karmic debts are usually no different from the financial debts in our little Wall street world. There is one exception; there is no bankruptcy law here. You cannot bail out without payback. The only good news is that your payback can be negotiated in any form acceptable to the other person and yourself. If you are reading this, the negotiation you are thinking about has already happened in the astral before birth (if you consider time as a linear). It will most probably not happen in the way you might think right now but the opportunity will show itself when its time. Act then. Act wise, rationalize and see compassionately. This is the crux and core of positive thinking.

How do I know this?
I can only speak from personal experience. My current life karma becomes obvious over time. One instance I remember clearly was a scene on the Basketball Court. I remember falling and tumbling on the court after being tripped by a newbie during a layup. This immediately took me to the time I was a newbie and I did the same thing unintentionally to someone else. I remember him tumbling and falling the same way.  For my past life karma, I cross check with my wife’s help. She astral projects into our past lives to verify the payback. Since not everyone has this privilege, the only way is to go with the flow and act wisely and rationally (and this is obviously universal advice.)

Here’s my personal account…
It took me about two years from the time I decided to love myself unconditionally till I discovered how I could be truly selfless towards others. I saw this as a move from being selfish to selfless. I started by demanding that others love and accept me for who I was, just like what my mom would do for me. But most of all, I wanted this special someone to accept me as is, for my mistakes, my flaws and my foolishness; to love me for me and not for what I do or say.
With this big expectation that seemed quite easy for others, I was missing a big reality.
The chances of this happening the way I expected was not in my favor. I was battling time and patience.

~The Secret (movie)~

Around this period the inspirational movie – ‘The Secret’ made waves. But as much as it had its media and skeptic back lash, I found a value in the law of attraction i.e. ‘Like attracts like’; the concept of compatibility.
I asked myself ‘what was it that I wanted to attract?’
I wanted others to love me unconditionally just as I love myself. That’s all.

Then it hit me…
In order to be loved and accepted by others unconditionally, I had to first love and accept them unconditionally, i.e. I had to be like them to attract them.

It was a tough thought to accept for the longest time. I didn’t need to consciously apply this to my parents while I was younger; but I guess I always accepted them unconditionally without knowing. And now, to be compatible with this new breed of people, I had to become those qualities that I wanted from them. It seemed to follow the age old wisdom that ‘I have to give love to get love in return’ or ‘Giving away something from your closet to make room for something new.’

~Unselfish Moral Obligations v/s Selfish Heart’s Desire~

From the kind of society we come from and with the constant battles we fight within ourselves and outside, it is a bit difficult to be truly unselfish without understanding or taking help from any source. Even though we try to listen closely to our conscience, we confuse ourselves over moral obligations. Its very unfair that we argue ourselves over what we morally ‘ought’ to do versus what we desire to do. Some moral duties as taught to us by parents and society are the most heart breaking of them all. To make things worse, we sometimes hear disheartening and un-supportive statements from them when we divert away from our moral obligations. We silently punish ourselves by thinking how cruel and un-sacrificial we really are even though we did it in innocence for ourselves.

Here’s a list of popular taunts from my hay days :
You are self centered.
Its all about you.
All you think and care about is yourself.
You are selfish.
You always have vested interests.
You always want something.

Here’s another list of what I secretly tell myself but I deny being it when others question me!
What am I going to get from this?
How am I going to gain if I help others?
What is in it for me?
What’s the point if I get nothing in return?

These are just normal behaviors found in most people who have been trying to help themselves by unconditionally loving themselves. It sounds a bit superficial when I say it but unless they completely help themselves, they cannot help others. What can I offer you if I can’t offer much to myself?

~finding that balance~

When I learned how to balance a bicycle, I’ve noticed that I fell at least once to the left and once to the right. It seemed natural to tip, twist & turn before balancing myself right. Only when I learned and realized the extremities of these 2 ends, that I slowly wavered to a center point decreasing my chances of error. This comes with practice, sheer determination and the understanding that I don’t have to be perfect to appreciate my constant efforts.
I don’t race against time, but I take my time. The same applies to finding a balance between selflessness and selfishness. As long as you are on the earth plane, you have to find a balance between the two. You cannot sustain being entirely selfless or selfish. Experience both extremities before finding what you like. In all cases, humans in general are naturally selfless most of the time as well as naturally confused about it . but as always you are the best judge to know what is a good balance for you.

Most people bounce between these two extremities (selfless and selfish).
As they confuse themselves over it, they tend to make life miserable for the ones they love but worse off, they make life miserable for themselves. If they can successfully understand what they are doing wrong, the only way is up!

~Unselfish with resentment aka Miss Doormat~
This is denial at its best. Miss Doormat is a person who loves to help but doesn’t know how to stop and where to draw the line. She needs to learn to help herself instead; she needs to know ‘when’ to say ‘No’ and when to say ‘Yes’. Without this, Miss Doormat is constantly denying herself the love and respect she deserves. I’ve seen my friends behave like doormats and it really upsets me to see them the way they are without seeking help. Worse off, they mostly get bad advice from very helpful friends who are clueless themselves.

~Selfishness with resentment/guilt~
When you recognize that you are selfish, you do so because you have the opposing desire to be what comes to you naturally; i.e. the act of being selfless. The only way to dissolve the guilt and resentment is to understand a certain reality. A reality that ‘you cannot give what you do not have enough of’, ‘you cannot make others happy if you are unhappy’ and that ‘you cannot love others if you cannot love yourself first’. You will also be the best judge to know when you are ready for this selfless leap. Morality is just a road block to attaining high levels of spirituality i.e. your best possible you.

From Miss Doormat’s point of view, she could be making efforts to say ‘No’ and help herself instead. Being in this new place, she may be confused with certain realities. She may be overly uncomfortable with being ‘not nice’ as she may see it. She may worry about what others think about her instead of what she thinks about herself. But putting others aside, if she recognizes herself to feel slightly good about being selfish, its a good thing, a time of self healing. Once she masters this state, she can progress to higher grounds of balance.

~Selfishness without resentment~
If you can be selfish without resentment without publicly denying it, it would be a good state to be in (on one condition). You would need to be truthful about it and make it clear to others that you are what you are i.e. self-centered. A bold statement like this is usually appreciated and well reciprocated. Either way, this stage is a definite stepping stone to finding a good balance. The best judge to know when you are ready to be a bit selfless is you.

~Un-Selfish without resentment~
People at this level are usually the spiritually evolved. I have a set of friends who I thought were like doormats but they never resented giving away what they had. In fact it didn’t really affect them if someone walked away thinking that they took advantage of them. They seemed to do this consciously with absolutely no resentment. But as much as it bothered me initially, I realized that every action they performed was equal to the weathering of rocks. It may not be visible today, but overtime it will weather even the strongest and biggest of stone hearts. They are ‘Time Surfers’ and made time their friend. They understand death, concepts of re-incarnation and the afterlife. They are my teachers in this lifetime and I realize that my life on earth is a like being in school. I am still learning.

I hope this helps you as much as it helped it me during my time of need.
Love & Peace out!

With the amount of mistakes I constantly made, I know I had many opportunities to understand trust and forgiveness through the pain, frustration and guilt in my life. At this point today, I believe in this quote: ‘If you haven’t made any mistakes, you haven’t taken enough risks.’ And I would have learned nothing.

It’s from these many learning opportunities I realized that if we have to forgive someone or carry a grudge, it is we who carry the emotional baggage and not them. When we truly forgive someone, it is we who feel really light hearted. They on the other hand have the choice to care less or help us heal. And as painful and heavy this is, there are ways to feel lighter without having to deal with the person or system we believe created this painful situation. Life teaches us lessons in unexpected ways and sadly this is one of them. If you are at this juncture, its also quite clear that the concepts of trust and faith have been misunderstood leading to this hurtful emotion.
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~Crossing a boundary?~

While somewhere we believe that some of our limits/boundaries have been crossed, some of us still keep the courage to do the right thing. In this article I will try to logically present the answer you are looking for with the best possible forms of reason. The concept of forgiveness is something that even people with healthy self esteem tend to confuse and struggle over. Bear with me as I demonstrate the ‘act of being unforgiving towards others’ is really an illusion and were are truly unforgiving of ourselves instead. It is then not ‘our’ boundary wall that they cross but it is the boundary wall we put around them that they cross. I will start with the basics of choice as the fundamentals to this understanding.
PS. I will not attempt to justify any form of forgiveness towards physical abuse at this time. But for those desperately seeking answers here, please read up on Past Life Karmas and Life Path to understand the holistic purpose of this act
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~Choice~

We all make choices. Some of us know the outcome and hence make informed choices. Some, on the other hand (mostly wishful thinkers), make choices with the expectation of a positive outcome, ignoring the other hurtful possibilities. The more experienced on the other hand makes a conscious choice after accepting the possibility of a bad outcome while hoping for the good. These are common in the stock market where a sensible investor takes a loss in the same spirit as he would take a profit. With every choice comes emotional responsibility for its outcome no matter how bad or good it maybe.

~Mutual Respect~

We also expect others to respect our good and bad choices just as we respect theirs; especially their bad ones. A parent disapproving their daughter’s choices of a boyfriend in a dating scene usually results in the daughter being upset over it. She expects her parents to respect her choices just as she respects theirs. She expects that they trust her with the knowledge they themselves educated her with. Without mutual respect there is no healthy relationship.
In this personal journey of self discovery, everyone has the freedom to make mistakes, take responsibility and learn from it. The fear of the inability to cope is the only reason why we cannot accept a bad outcome. If we cannot accept the bad outcomes of our own choices, we can never accept the bad outcome of other’s choices either. In other words, if we cannot respect ourselves and our choices, we cannot respect others and theirs.

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~Forgiving others Or forgiving self?~

Usually when we are unforgiving of others, we are unforgiving of the choice they made. But, if somewhere in the back of our minds it clicks that those choices made by them should be respected as much as we’d expect them to respect our good and bad choices, only then will we understand that forgiving others is an illusion and that we are really trying to forgive ourselves for being ignorant of this concept (that we respect others for their choices good and bad as well, just as we expect them to respect ours). Forgiveness is a result of a misconception of trust.
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~But what is this painful feeling inside us when someone does something hurtful?~

This painful feeling is the dependence on that person or system for love, attention and fulfilling our expectations . Had we been strong enough to love ourselves instead, fulfill our own needs and give ourselves the attention we deserve, this need or dependence on others would disappear. We would then look at this whole situation very differently. We would see that this person is only making choices that he or she needs while in the process of self discovery. It has nothing to do with us and everything to do with only them. When we accept that, we unconditionally love and accept ourselves and unconditionally love and accept them. That’s true love.

~Empower Yourself~

However, many of us live outside this reality and play a painful game of master and slave where the slave seeks forgiveness from the master. One needs to remember that a master can control the slave as much as the slave allows the master to control him. The only next step to freedom is self empowerment and that comes with understanding the power of choice. The habit of being unforgiving is a global epidemic and only through the understanding of choice can we be free of the burden we carry.
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~Forgiveness in my relationship~

In my personal life a few years ago, I asked for forgiveness from two women I hurt through the choices I made. One of them said, “I will never forgive you for what you did to me,” and the other said “you are forgiven, I love you for who you are irrespective of your choices”. During that time I suffered low self esteem and the source of happiness in my life was the woman who did not forgive me. I never knew how to find happiness within myself and suffered a slave relationship trying to please her. As I grew stronger emotionally and built a healthy self esteem, I realized that I did not need others to forgive me for my choices. My choices were intended to make me happy. If I cannot be happy, I cannot make others happy and hence only through selfishness can come true authentic selflessness. If others cannot understand and respect this, it’s their inability to cope and not mine. I will make others happy only when I find happiness within myself. During that phase, I needed to forgive myself for the bad outcomes of my choices and learn to love myself unconditionally.

The power of forgiveness works at all times and for everyone. Forgive yourself, love yourself unconditionally, and help others heal just as you would heal yourself.

I would recommend two reads that really help.
The Transformative Power of Crisis

& Self Empowerment by Gary Zukav and Linda Francis

Love & Best Wishes!

I want us to think about the last time we put our trust or faith in someone and for some reason it ended up in a fiasco. I’m sure that we have all gone through this bit of personal regret while trusting others, and I’m even sure that somewhere we tell ourselves never to trust again, especially with matters very close to our heart. Somewhere and somehow we are losing faith in people and humanity in general. In all this, I ask just one question!

~what kind of a lesson is life teaching us about trust?~

The true reality is, we haven’t understood trust the way it really is, just as the many other things that we believe we know everything about. All that bickering, crying and sulking over blaming others might just go up in smoke after this read is complete. Let me make a quick analysis.

~what are we doing when we trust someone?~

We are placing our happiness in their hands. It could be something as simple as asking a friend to keep a secret from others; a rule that this friend now needs to follow. And when they do as we expect them to, we become or remain happy. The minute they let go of that rule or boundary we placed around them, we see them as letting us down and in turn we’re unhappy with them.
To begin with, is it fair that we put a boundary wall around people we care for as friends or family? Or is it us caring for ourselves and expecting them to care for us too? Trade places for a second now; how would we feel if we were made responsible to keep others happy most of the time? (or in other words carry their emotional baggage?) I know that most of us selflessly do it, but even carrying ones own weight gets tiring. Good friends think wisely before burdening others with their weight. When they do, they make it a point to pay back.

~true happiness and misconception of trust~

If we understand that true happiness comes from within ourselves, then we will also understand that the happiness that comes from fulfilling the ‘trust’ bestowed on others is highly superficial. Somewhere even though we may deny it, we are really seeking acceptance and attention from the ones we trust. It has everything to do with making us happy and not them. Further more, the truth of the matter is that we haven’t yet accepted ourselves for who we are. We lack healthy self esteem and we constantly need someone else to fill in our voids. Hence the ‘trust’ we think we know is a pure misconception.

~true trust & faith~

Trust in others is having faith that they will do their best even though they are vulnerable to mistakes like we all are. Its only human to err. We trust that someday they will learn from their mistakes (if they believe its a mistake) and do the best for themselves; and that’s all that matters. Trusting others with something important means that you are happily ready to accept failure when it happens just as much as you would happily accept success. It’s a package deal and anything less is hypocrisy and leads to the concept of forgiveness. Forgiveness is nothing a but an unhappy seed that arises when trust is misunderstood. More on this in a later post.

~trusting others trails trusting ourselves~

In reality, we need to first trust ourselves to find happiness through a deeper understanding of ourself and not through superficial means. When we lose trust in others, or claim that others have broken our trust, we are really saying that we do not understand the true concept of trust. We have in turn lost trust in ourselves. Its only when we trust ourselves completely, can we trust others with ease. Whatever wrong they do will not affect the true happiness we get from within ourselves. For the fact that every time we superficially trust and it fails us should ring a bell that somewhere we got something figured wrong. Trusting others must never define our happiness; just theirs. Trusting ourselves defines ours.

~what about trusting others to do something I don’t know how to do myself?~

If we want to do something right and its very important to us, its best to do it ourselves. The process of doing it ourselves has many hidden lessons of life. If we don’t know how, we can always learn. If we don’t have the time, we can pay a professional to do it to our expectations. If we just want to find excuses, it boils down to the fact that we don’t trust ourselves enough.

PS. I have faith in you because I have faith in myself. The time to learn is immaterial.

~introduction~

I started off writing this as ‘happiness within loneliness’ as the perfect high but it took a different turn as I typed along. Some may take this concept as leaving a relationship or circle of companions to be happy, but that’s not the intent. I want to talk about authentic joy that comes from within. And mine came after a really long struggle. This kind of joy is known within the circle as the type that comes from meditating, talking to oneself, living in the moment or being happy without help from external objects or people. It can be achieved in spite of being dumped with other’s emotional baggage. The happiness here is infinite and leaves within the ability to spread joy to those needing it; but to get to it requires changing and evolving self. To some, like myself this understanding came much after what has been popularly termed as a mid life crisis. I resisted as much as I could and pushing back pained me in equal amounts. I should have just accepted what was in store. Age is clearly no bar to this new exciting yet equally depressing phase.

~the Midlife crisis~

My adventure started at 26 (after 5 years of marriage), although society has known a midlife crisis to occur around the age of 35 or more. I’ve observed a midlife crisis to occur after hitting a plateau in life. In my case, I had achieved all my personal and career goals by the age of 29 and then remained clueless on what to do next. I worked hard in my marriage, even harder at work and did everything I could do to be the best I could be. But I was still unhappy. I did not want a child then but I definitely wanted more excitement. The only excitement easily achievable came from breaking rules; rules of personal integrity, marriage and society. I led a crazy party life and saw myself slowly crossing boundaries in secrecy. Sometimes I wish I had just jumped right in instead of resisting temptation and trying to talk  myself out of it. I was clearly on the verge of a midlife crisis.

On that note, it would be great if we’d all ‘welcome a midlife crisis” like we’d welcome a new born child. I’ve realized that it can lead to a spiritual awakening with sincere self introspection. In all this realization and after researching the definition on Wikipedia and other places, I summarize the concept of a ‘mid life crisis’ to making life altering changes in an attempt to find true happiness. I’ve seen such life altering changes creep up in the form of a divorce, buying a sports car or a yacht, having an extra marital affair, getting a new look, doing things that one may have missed out on while growing up, finding a purpose or the meaning of life, living on the edge, etc. Some of these sound quite normal and it really is. A midlife crisis is not age dependent but experience dependent. It can occur at any age when we feel we have reached a peak in our lives in terms of career or personal success. It’s purely a mental state and has nothing to do with the physical age even though statistics dictate otherwise. For me, it brought clarity to thought and a clear life purpose. I learned to maintain my boundaries and maintain healthy self esteem.

~Boundaries Not to Cross in a midlife crisis~

None. Cross every boundary except physical abuse. In my strongest belief, all boundaries must be explored in an attempt to understand oneself. This is devastating advice to people in relationships, but a truth like this is bitter in its first taste before it sets one free.  It usually takes many years before a loved one finally figures out their truth and submit themselves in service of you or family.  My wife knew this painful truth and overlooked all the things she doubted about me. She considered this as true love for me; when she said she loves me, it was about me and what I wanted, not her or her expectations. Then I asked her; “who loves you when you are busy loving me?”

She said, “I found the strength to love myself.” And that is something that hit a chord deep inside me. Her words resonated with those of my therapist. ‘No one can love others if they cannot love themselves.’ Right then I had another moment of epiphany. Every time people like me do what society considers hurtful, we’re actually figuring out ways to love ourselves. These ways can be quite daunting, confusing and even  illegal, but its a journey into an inner truth. Unfortunately, the only way to accept such behavior is with compassion and empathy.

My extra marital affair fell apart as quickly as it started. I was also lucky that I did not get cited for what was considered as a misdemeanor in this state. My spouse knew what I was upto and yet refused to confront me; she waited in faith. A few months later in complete realization, I walked back into her ever open arms and centered myself within our relationship.  She never did stop me once from making mistakes and she always understood me after I made them. She was my spiritual guru and she led by example. Since then, I’ve been infected with her ability of tolerance and today I continue to understand and spread my experience to those who wish to listen. The peace from it is intoxicating; a higher than high High!

Peace.

The following terms bear similar meaning with reference to spiritual awakening:
Awakening, Awareness, Conscious, Rising of the Kundalini, Escaping the Matrix, Realization or Enlightenment.

Also, check this article out; it has good details.
http://www.livinginmyownworld.com/50-signs-of-spiritual-awakening/

And as always in the words of Buddha,
Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.

]]> http://eryanh.com/2008/04/03/am-i-spiritually-awakened-how-do-i-know-what-are-signs/feed/ 0 Evans http://eryanh.com/2008/03/20/how-are-divinations-like-astrology-numerology-i-ching-or-tarot-related-to-spirituality-reiki-holistic-healing-the-stock-market/ http://eryanh.com/2008/03/20/how-are-divinations-like-astrology-numerology-i-ching-or-tarot-related-to-spirituality-reiki-holistic-healing-the-stock-market/#comments Thu, 20 Mar 2008 04:36:33 +0000 Evans http://evansnf.wordpress.com/?p=42 ]]> If you’ve read my previous writes on spiritual subjects such as black magic, holistic therapy, spirits & ghosts, but have always wondered about what role divinations like astrology or numerology play in it, this write should spell out some simple explanations.

(this piece of work will be enhanced as thoughts and ideas manifest)

AcuEnergetics:
Same as Chakra Therapy in a nutshell. Its also known as Harmonics Energy Balance. Therapists use a concepts in Chakra therapy to heal. The basic principles are the same but with a different name. Read on Chakra Therapy in this post.

Acupressure:
In the first part I mentioned that our astral / emotional body is attached to our physical body at various points along its length. These points have various names as chakras, pressure points, vortexes, psychic centers, meridians, energy centers, etc. Acupressure is associated with applying physical pressure to these points and transferring emotional energy, chi or prana through fingers unblocking the blocked chakra. Hands are considered healing agents in every form of physical contact therapy. Pressure points are gateways that channel healing energies to the main chakras. You would need to understand the concept of chakras before this entirely makes sense. Try this link healing.about.com for some basic clarity on chakras.

Acupuncture:
This is very similar to acupressure; the only difference being the use of pricks via pins or needles at the same points. This is also called Meridian Healing. Medicine.net has a great FAQ on this subject.

Aromatherapy:
Its the therapy where the use of scents from essential oils are used to heal certain common ailments. This educational site offers some great information on some more basics and is worth a quick glance.

Astral Projection:
Healing through Astral Projection or Astral Travel usually works by just understanding the experience of the non physical universe. The other term for it is ‘Out of body experience’ or soul travel. This is the phenomenon of your soul or mind leaving your body. Some use Astral Projection to perform a Past Life Memory investigation which can be very healing. It helps to understand how one may suffer certain trying disorders in spite of medication. For the most part, it helps with building confidence in the greater purpose of life and karma.

Auric Healing (Aura Healing):
Auras are created by the energies from each chakra. The strength of an aura reflects the emotional IQ of the person. Better the Aura, better the E-IQ. The basic principles for healing are the same as Chakra Therapy. Read on Chakra Therapy in this post.

Chakra Therapy (Chakra Balancing):
If you have read about chakras from part 1 of this post, you would understand that the mental or astral body has 7 chakras along the length of a person’s physical body. Each of these 7 points are associated with emotional and physiological illness that represents a physical organ or gland. Before a physical illness appears, an emotional illness is considered to be the cause of the fall in bodily defenses. Chakra therapy is the foundation of every other therapy. Further information can be found from the combination of both these sites Astral Mate & The School of Tantra. On a another note, there is a correlation between Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and The Chakra System (highlighted by Norwick Gray).

Cognitive Therapy:
Also called Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, the focal point is tuning emotions and hence the outcome of thoughts. The targeted outcome is to change the way we think. Most therapists use this method to help clients empower themselves to solve their emotional issues. It goes by many names: Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy, Rational Behavior Therapy, Rational Living Therapy, Cognitive Therapy and Dialectic Behavior Therapy. The National Association of Cognitive Behavioral Therapists have a quick read on this subject. This form of therapy does not specifically aim at resolving physical illness.

Color Therapy:
The same as chakra therapy but using colors to heal. Certain colors tend to magnify certain emotions or the lack of it. By understanding the need for certain colors you understand personal issues that one faces and its physical consequence. Gemstones therapy is a subset of color therapy and color therapy is a subset of chakra therapy. For example, if your favorite color is blue, it indicates that you might have issues speaking up or being open and frank with people. Here’s a link to a chart in Chakra Therapy; each color representing physical ailments and emotional symptoms. Please refer to Chakra Therapy in this post for additional info.

Crystal Healing:
Read on Gemstone Therapy in this post.

Energy Balancing:
Read up on Chakra Therapy. Its the same base concept.

Exorcism:
Please read up on Spirit Releasement Therapy in this post.

Expressive Therapy:
A form of therapy that is targeted to clear blockages in the 5th or throat chakra. The 5th chakra represents innermost creative expression. Expression can occur in any creative form; through writing, dance, vocals, music, painting, craft, sculpting, architecting, etc. The Wikipedia has great examples on this subject.

Food Therapy:
A process using healing properties of various natural foods to cure ailments. I dug out this site (natali.co.uk) that has an illness to food matches.

Gemstone Therapy:
The concept of gemstone therapy arises from the theory of color therapy. Color therapy in turn associates its roots from Chakra therapy. This article clearly describes the roots of Gemstone Therapy. However, these forms of therapy creates dependencies on external objects; its best to resolve emotional issues associated with each unbalanced chakra to completely balance self.

Gestalt Therapy:
The concepts in Gestalt Therapy served to evolve into NLP. See NLP in this post. More history here @ wikipedia.

Guided Imagery
Have you heard of a therapist who asks you to imagine lying on a beach.  And from there on, he or she tells you to imagine a further sequence of steps as narrated by him/her? This is guided imagery.   Visualizations that use the imagination to heal both mind and body. It boils down to restoring balance in every chakra using the third eye or 6th chakra (ajna). Since the obvious form of modality here is using the mind to heal, it brings focus to Chakra therapy as the base foundation for identifying symptoms, emotional causes and implementing fixes. Eupsychia has some good information on definitions and how-to.

Harmonics Energy Balancing:
Read up on Chakra Therapy. Its the same base concept.

Hecatean Projection
A type of astral projection where one gets projected into a negative emotional area made of fear, hate, jealousy, anger and other remaining deadly sins. It is definitely not therapeutic. Read up on astral projection for more information on how projections can be therapeutic.

Energy Healing with Chi, Ruah, Prana:
Chi, Ruah or Prana refer to the same energy: ‘emotions’. Since Chakra therapy is about healing using emotions, please refer to chakra therapy for details.

Herbal Therapy:
The use of twigs, leaves, flowers or the entire plant to create healing teas, soups, powders or just skin patches. Ancient Ayurvedic Medicine from India and Herbology in witchcraft are such forms of herbal therapy. Herb to disease matching can be found here (herbsandcures.com).

Homeopathy:
Just like the other forms of therapy, this form of therapy is targeted at the same emotional energy system in the body. The National Center for Complimentary Medicine has explained this concept pretty well. Homeopaths use the concept of ‘like attracts like’, which is the ‘Law of Attraction’.

Hypnotherapy:
Using hypnosis to heal mental and physical conditions. While most sites explain it as using alternate states of your consciousness to heal, these consciousness could be your own, or your Higher Self (spirit guides / guardian angels), or vampiric consciousness that linger from a previous incarnation. New age movements see this as your past consciousness (egos) or other vampiric consciousness creating blockages against self healing. By engaging these consciousnesses and walking through causations of their own emotional blockages, the emotional block in the client clears. As per chakra therapy, these forms of emotional blockages cause physical illnesses; and by clearing these, physical balance is eventually restored.

Landscape Therapy:
Watching natural serenity in pictures, photo slides or in person can have a very soothing effect on your mind. A combination of the sounds of nature, its panaromic views and the natural smell of the earth does relax one’s mind. This is achieved through slide shows as well. That’s all that this form of therapy is – a relaxation technique engaging the visual senses through color combinations and visualizations.

Light Body Activation:
Same as Chakra Therapy in a nutshell. For more details on how this therapy is practiced, read up on an article by Laughing Life coach and Merkaba.

Massage Therapy:
Any form of physical contact therapy aimed at relaxation through overall body massage falls under this category. The names & techniques are aplenty. A consolidated list can be obtained here at Wikipedia.

NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming):
Mostly used in Professional and Self success management, this self empowerment technique is a very high level and neutral form of therapy used to perform self analysis and self rectification. This is best for skeptics who do not wish to engage in understanding spiritual therapy as the core of every alternative therapy. This form of therapy is not designed to heal physical illnesses either. The best source for NLP info is NLP.com. However, if you have faced a road block after using NLP, I suggest investigating the spiritual aspects that form the core of this training.

Past Life Regression Healing (PLR):
This is hypnosis on ‘steroids’ (without the use of any steroids of course). If you haven’t familiarized yourself with the concepts of hypnotherapy in this post, please do before moving forward. PLR is consciously knowing that you have lived in previous lives hence using hypnosis or trance to go back into those lifetimes. The healing effect comes into play when one understands his or her karmic debts from a past life. Past life negative karma’s can cause emotional blockages in any or many of the 7 chakras. By understanding and overcoming these emotional blockages, one can heal the physical and mental self. A clear and simple read can be found here. The site HealPastlives.com is considered to be one of the best sites detailing Past Life Regression Healing.

Pranic Healing:
Read up on Chakra Therapy. Its the same base concept.

Physical Fitness Form of Therapy:
A therapy involving Endorphin release through cardiovascular exercises. It may be assisted with weight training. I personally use the site exrx.net to learn and plan my routine.

Reflexology:
This falls under Massage / Touch therapy and attempts chakra balancing by applying pressure only at end points – hands, feet or ears. Wikipedia hosts a great article on this subject.

Shamanic Healing (Shamans):
Healing through the knowledge of the village medicine men or tribal witch doctors. They use a variety of healing methods that include herbal therapy, soul retrieval (past life regression healing), gemstone therapy (color therapy using gemstones), exorcism (using hypnotherapy) and spirit assistance (assisting consciousness in the afterlife). In the true meaning of the word ‘shamans’, alternative therapists are shamans as well. Its just a broad term encompassing various forms of therapy.

Sound Therapy (Mantra Therapy):
This form of therapy is closely tied to Chakra Therapy where the 7 musical notes (or mantras or chanting) assist in healing various ailments. Try this site (elivia.com) for detailed information and downloadable music notes. On another note, any sound or music that puts your mind at ease comes under this form of therapy. Most musical tunes have all 7 notes. You don’t really need to buy any expensive relaxation CD that claims wonders. Other forms of sound therapy are listed here (biowaves.com). It also include binaural beats from Monroe’s Institute of Hemisync Research.

Soul Retrieval:
It is healing using Past Life Regression. Please read on PLR in this post. A great note on soul retrieval by another author can be found here.

Spirit Releasement Therapy (Spirit Intrusion):
Also known as exorcism, this therapy involves identifying spirit consciousnesses that affect your current life. Known mental illnesses associated with these are schizophrenia, personality or identity disorders. The intruding spirits are identified and confronted through hypnotherapy aided with concepts in past life regression. Shamanic healers or past life regressionists are known for healing this. I’ve had fairly good success with the help of psychics as well; although the information was a bit obscure and left for interpretation. With two schizophrenics in my family, I took my wife’s psychic help to identify the intruding spirits causing them pain.
The spirits that linger around are dissatisfied emotional remains of physical people from your previous lives or in some extreme cases ‘wandering spirits’ that may not be related directly to you. Wandering spirits are easier to release and this can be termed as spirit assistance ( I wrote about spirit assistance in one of my posts here.) However, releasing spirits from your past lives require a little more work; work mostly on your part. These spirits are normally upset with you for a reason unknown to you in this lifetime; past life regression gives great insight on this reason. In most cases, these spirits are past life egos of your own consciousness itself; i.e. unsatisfied version(s) of your previous life. Schizophrenics are one example of this. Their unsatisfied spirit of a previous life constantly intrude and try to quickly resolve what has remained as unfinished business before they had physically died then. In all cases they use negative ways to achieve this; these include hate, anger, pride, self denial, greed, jealousy or any form of an insecure belief. Then there are those affected with personality disorders like MPD or DID. These folks are usually involuntary spirit mediums who host other consciousness in their physical body without control or knowledge. The only way to release these spirits in these cases requires complete the karmic debt payback. The time frame can be as long as paying back house loan payments. Hang in there and seek help from past life regression hypnotherapists on what you may have done in your last life to undergo this pain.

Talk Therapy:
It is just talking about your emotional issues. Please read up on Cognitive Therapy in this post. The definitions vary at various sites but if you look at all of it closely, you will find the commonality.

Taste Therapy:
Therapy through taste has not yet been researched to a great extent. As stated, there are 6 tastes: sweet, bitter, sour, astringent, spicy hot & salty; this page talks about taste therapy and its association with healing.

Tantric Sex:
Sex in general is the most commonly played sport among humans. I hope we all agree that in the mammal world alone, it is the common form of ‘physical’ evolution (excluding artificial means). Fortunately, sex assists in mental evolution as well. Tantric sex is exactly what this is all about; mental / spiritual evolution through sex (i.e. maturity through sex). During a tantric orgasm, emotional energy or chi / prana flows up your spine inducing a fulfilling effect; which is why some have chills right after or during orgasms. As the chi rises, it clears blockages in all chakras having a healing effect. It is a self transforming process with the aim to finally achieve the art of making love in its purest form. The sole intent evolves into pleasing the other by attending to their every sexual and emotional desire. At every age, tantric sex heals, vitalizes and rejuvenates mind and body. Discovery Health has a good 5 page article on techniques and effects. I highly recommend this read.

Therapeutic Imagery:
Same a Guided Imagery listed in this post.

Touch Therapy:
This is the same as Massage Therapy listed in this post.

Visualization:
Its the same as Guided Imagery listed on this post.

Yoga (Hatha Yoga exercise):
The ancient Indian forms of physical exercise with poses targeted to heal specific illnesses. This site
(Truthstar.com/yoga) has some great information on specific exercises/poses to heal specific physical problems.

Enjoy your journey!

In 2006, I wanted to know all about these methods of spiritual healing. I didn’t know where to start and even though every text I read was helpful, I was a bit confused with the mass amounts of information on this subject. Over the past year, I put the pieces together and found out that a lot many of these have the same meaning. I finally realized that just like we have many cultures in many countries, we have many words for the same concepts. I will try to make sure that this read clarifies terms while you embark on your spiritual journey.

The following terms are synonyms and include every form of therapy that do not use conventional medical methods (allopathy):

Alternative Healing, Alternative Medicine, Complimentary Medicine, Etheric Hygiene and Holistic Therapy

• Therapy induced via physical means by third party:
  Acupressure, Acupuncture (or Meridian Healing), Homeopathy, Light Body Activation and Massage Therapy (or Touch Therapy), Reflexology & Tantric Sex (unforced sex)
• Self Therapy for the 5 Physical Senses and physical body:
  Sound Therapy, Color Therapy, Landscape Therapy, Taste Therapy, Aroma therapy, Physical Fitness Therapy, Herbal Therapy and Yoga

• Therapy induced via third party person (friend, therapist, certified hypnotherapist, counselor or psychologist):
  Cognitive Therapy, Gestalt Therapy, NLP, Expressive therapy, Guided Imagery (Therapeutic Imagery or Visualization), Hypnotherapy, Past Life Healing (or Past Life Regression), Shamanic Healing, Soul Retrieval, Spirit Releasement Therapy (or Exorcism) & Talk Therapy
• Therapy through Self Meditation:
  AcuEnergetics (or Chakra Balancing, Chakra Therapy, Energy Balancing, Harmonics Energy Balance or Aura/Auric Healing), Helionic Therapy (or Astral projection, Ethereal projection, OBE – out of body experience, Hecatean Projection Therapy), Pranic Healing (or Ruah Healing, Healing through Chi)
• Therapeutic healing through object belief:
  Crystal Healing, Gemstone Healing

Just like you, I looked everywhere for simple logical answers and not opinions. After months of researching various resources and attending courses, I know I have the simplest answer. All skeptics call these sort of concepts as delusional, paredolia, hallucinatory, illusions, fantasy, dreams and imagination; but if you “believe” or “know” otherwise, here is a short, simple and concise definition.

A ghost or spirit is a mind without or outside a physical body. That’s it.

Spirits, apparitions, angels, psyche, ego, id and souls are the synonyms of the same.

My wife and I deal with these on a daily basis. We have assisted over 50 spirits move into the light or back to source. After 13 years of witnessing my wife’s psychic experience, I have been able to completely understand and write about this. The text here is divided into multiple short easy reads.

They are related to you in some way and trying to talk to you
A past life or current life karma with them could need closure
To awaken your curiosity about the afterlife
To have you question traditional dogmas and doctrines
To have you question gaps in science itself
To have you question life in its biggest picture
To ask the really big questions!

There are plenty of reasons and you need to find that specific one.

Further Reading:
Here’s a link to Paranormal Terminology & thanks to a reader: a link to more terminology @ psychic-junkie.com

Here’s another one on how to spot a fake psychic. and one on the 5 Biggest Mistakes when selecting a Psychic