I was recently approached by a parent concerned about an adult child who is addicted to a dangerous illegal street drug. This parent, like almost all of us who are parents, wanted to help the child. However, I was unable to help parent by receiving a healing message for the adult child for several reasons.
The first is the most obvious: The adult child is an adult. I can not help anyone over 18 who is not incapacitated (such as with those who have advanced Alzheimer's or are in a coma) without their explicit permission. For me to contact higher powers on that person’s behalf without permission would be a serious spiritual violation. Many psychics and intuitives will do this, and it always floors me when they do. Some will actually commit spiritual assaults: in trying to show off their metaphysical abilities, the psychics will start doing a reading for someone in public without the person’s explicit consent. I know one psychic who did this at a dinner party she was at, revealing all kinds of difficult and traumatic information about another woman at the gathering. The targeted woman was understandably upset, but other women at the dinner praised the psychic for doing a good thing and forcing the traumatized woman to deal with her past whether she wanted to or not. Situations like this make me sick to my stomach because it is spiritual assault, and it creates an entirely new level of trauma on top of the original one. I would never want someone to do that to me, and I will not do it to others.
The second reason involves commitment. If people don't want to stop using whatever substance they are addicted to, they will very likely relapse; that had already happened once very recently in this situation after the adult child left rehab after only three days. Families may be able to involuntarily commit loved ones to a rehab center in some states, but whether or not people ultimately succeed in stopping their drug use depends on their own spirits and their own recovery work. (I am completely aware that relapses may happen for some people; it’s part of their individual healing process. Relapses with a desire to quit are a far different situation than continuing ongoing substance abuse without a conscious desire to stop.) In this particular case, the adult child had not yet hit the point of being able to say, “I want to be clean.” The adult child was still wanting to return to a romantic partner who was also abusing drugs. What the parent was asking me to do was find a miracle cure that the parent could give the adult child that would make the adult child see the situation clearly and would help create change. Unfortunately, I can’t do that. The person involved has to take the first step and contact me, and even then, I do not offer or promise miracle cures.
This willingness to heal is only the first part of why I can only work with patients committed to achieving sobriety. The other reason is that substance abuse drags our metaphysical energy down. Much of the energy work I do aims to raise one’s energy level up so that one can heal the traumas that have damaged us during this and other lives. If one is still drinking or using, then one is actively (though unintentionally) pulling one’s energy down. If I were to attempt to help someone who was still using, we very likely would not make progress. The positive energy changes I would be helping create would be counteracted by the ongoing substance use creating negative energy changes. It’s like a tug of war where no one is going to win. I’m not the only healer who has found this to be true: there is a therapist in town whom I refer people to who uses EMDR with her clients. She requires them to be 100% free of recreational drugs and alcohol during the time period that they work together (and not just during actual sessions). She has found through years of experience that if clients are using any kind of mind altering substance, the EMDR will not “stick” and both client and therapist are wasting their time.
If someone has reached the point of wanting to heal, then I absolutely can help them. Once that person recovering from substance abuse reaches out to me, I have literally hundreds of flower essences in my collection to help the individual with the energetic issues that contribute to the problem of addiction; many are alcohol free, and others can be adapted to evade the alcohol in them. The essences alone will not help a person to quit using; the client will also need to be working with a licensed therapist and/or support program. However, the flower essences and other techniques that I employ can help the person to address the genetic, biological, emotional, and spiritual triggers that create the addiction situation in the first place. These triggers are often deeply buried emotions and traumas that none of us want to confront. However, by bringing the triggers to the surface using energy healing, the person has a better chance for a full recovery because they will be confronting the issues that caused them to start abusing in the first place.
The work I do is one more way to support oneself during the difficult periods of recovery. It’s not a miracle cure-all. It still requires that those involved want to help themselves. In the case of the adult child above, I was able to help support the parent with the parent’s issues around the adult child’s addiction plus give suggestions of over the counter vitamins and supplements to talk to the adult child's doctors about using in order to help facilitate detoxification when the adult child does decide to stop using. However, until the adult child reaches out to me (and to many others) with the desire to heal, the best I can do is send positive thoughts and prayers that person may find the desire to heal sooner rather than later.
© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC
The first is the most obvious: The adult child is an adult. I can not help anyone over 18 who is not incapacitated (such as with those who have advanced Alzheimer's or are in a coma) without their explicit permission. For me to contact higher powers on that person’s behalf without permission would be a serious spiritual violation. Many psychics and intuitives will do this, and it always floors me when they do. Some will actually commit spiritual assaults: in trying to show off their metaphysical abilities, the psychics will start doing a reading for someone in public without the person’s explicit consent. I know one psychic who did this at a dinner party she was at, revealing all kinds of difficult and traumatic information about another woman at the gathering. The targeted woman was understandably upset, but other women at the dinner praised the psychic for doing a good thing and forcing the traumatized woman to deal with her past whether she wanted to or not. Situations like this make me sick to my stomach because it is spiritual assault, and it creates an entirely new level of trauma on top of the original one. I would never want someone to do that to me, and I will not do it to others.
The second reason involves commitment. If people don't want to stop using whatever substance they are addicted to, they will very likely relapse; that had already happened once very recently in this situation after the adult child left rehab after only three days. Families may be able to involuntarily commit loved ones to a rehab center in some states, but whether or not people ultimately succeed in stopping their drug use depends on their own spirits and their own recovery work. (I am completely aware that relapses may happen for some people; it’s part of their individual healing process. Relapses with a desire to quit are a far different situation than continuing ongoing substance abuse without a conscious desire to stop.) In this particular case, the adult child had not yet hit the point of being able to say, “I want to be clean.” The adult child was still wanting to return to a romantic partner who was also abusing drugs. What the parent was asking me to do was find a miracle cure that the parent could give the adult child that would make the adult child see the situation clearly and would help create change. Unfortunately, I can’t do that. The person involved has to take the first step and contact me, and even then, I do not offer or promise miracle cures.
This willingness to heal is only the first part of why I can only work with patients committed to achieving sobriety. The other reason is that substance abuse drags our metaphysical energy down. Much of the energy work I do aims to raise one’s energy level up so that one can heal the traumas that have damaged us during this and other lives. If one is still drinking or using, then one is actively (though unintentionally) pulling one’s energy down. If I were to attempt to help someone who was still using, we very likely would not make progress. The positive energy changes I would be helping create would be counteracted by the ongoing substance use creating negative energy changes. It’s like a tug of war where no one is going to win. I’m not the only healer who has found this to be true: there is a therapist in town whom I refer people to who uses EMDR with her clients. She requires them to be 100% free of recreational drugs and alcohol during the time period that they work together (and not just during actual sessions). She has found through years of experience that if clients are using any kind of mind altering substance, the EMDR will not “stick” and both client and therapist are wasting their time.
If someone has reached the point of wanting to heal, then I absolutely can help them. Once that person recovering from substance abuse reaches out to me, I have literally hundreds of flower essences in my collection to help the individual with the energetic issues that contribute to the problem of addiction; many are alcohol free, and others can be adapted to evade the alcohol in them. The essences alone will not help a person to quit using; the client will also need to be working with a licensed therapist and/or support program. However, the flower essences and other techniques that I employ can help the person to address the genetic, biological, emotional, and spiritual triggers that create the addiction situation in the first place. These triggers are often deeply buried emotions and traumas that none of us want to confront. However, by bringing the triggers to the surface using energy healing, the person has a better chance for a full recovery because they will be confronting the issues that caused them to start abusing in the first place.
The work I do is one more way to support oneself during the difficult periods of recovery. It’s not a miracle cure-all. It still requires that those involved want to help themselves. In the case of the adult child above, I was able to help support the parent with the parent’s issues around the adult child’s addiction plus give suggestions of over the counter vitamins and supplements to talk to the adult child's doctors about using in order to help facilitate detoxification when the adult child does decide to stop using. However, until the adult child reaches out to me (and to many others) with the desire to heal, the best I can do is send positive thoughts and prayers that person may find the desire to heal sooner rather than later.
© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC
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