Treating Yourself

One might think that because you are a homeopath that you would be the best observer of yourself. This could very well be true if we are clear about our suffering and what the most optimum state of health is. In order to treat anyone, the homeopath must know health from dis-ease. But sometimes this is more difficult to see in ourselves than it is to see in others.

The more a homeopath has experience with others, the more they will know themselves. This happens because we learn better as time passes what is health and what is dis-ease. Homeopaths can only successfully treat those individuals that are sicker than themselves. This is because if a person who is the client is healthier than the homeopath, the homeopath will not be able to see beyond his own dis-ease to perceive the dis-ease of the healthier individual.

When we suffer, it feels normal to feel how we feel. It can be often that we suffer and do not even know it. We may be completely unaware of our own process that is keeping us from being a clear channel in our own self-observation. Inherited conditions and attitudes create a prejudice that are hard to see in ourselves. We assume that how we were introduced to the world is accurate and true. It will be true for each of us because this is how we came to know our world. But this is sometimes akin to wearing colored glasses and not even knowing it. We may come to see the sky as blue and agree with everyone about that, but when the glasses are removed, only then do we realize what blue sky looks like. When we put the glasses back on, we now realize that we have been seeing the sky as green all of the time before, but calling it blue.

This example is so subtle that only when our own state of consciousness is clear enough could we see clearly dis-ease in ourselves or another. Homeopathic treatment and healing is the very best way to inspire this type of healing. But to do this, one must know what is asking to be healed. This is often the most difficult question for the homeopath and is the most essential to proper prescribing. So knowing what is asking to be healed in ourselves usually evades our consciousness. The ego-mind has great ways of convincing ourselves that we are right or justified in all of our thinking. It takes great freedom of consciousness to be able to step back from our own suffering long enough to be unprejudiced about ourselves. I often use the saying that it is impossible to see the back of our own heads. Even when we can, by looking into two mirrors, it is a very distorted picture compared to direct observation. There will always be things about ourselves that will not be clear enough for us to see what is asking to be healed.

In acute conditions, we can be moderately successful. When we are more constitutionally prescribing to help ourselves move forward in our own spiritual/life evolution, we usually do not have enough of a perspective to know where we are at. Often we cannot see the forest because of the trees. We will miss the bigger pattern in our life by being caught in the details of our suffering; thereby always searching for an acute remedy when a different remedy may very well be the one that inspires true cure.

When this is the case, we will be giving ourselves many remedies. This is not good homeopathy; we end up chasing the tail of our own dis-ease. Each episode of suffering becomes the next remedy prescription. It is difficult to tell where we are in the healing process even if we did give ourselves the right remedy. How do we know the difference between the remedy not working and an aggravation? It is much easier to see this in another than in ourselves. When a person gives their case to the homeopath, the choice of their words and actions as they describe their suffering will be perfect. It will be the vital force’s expression that can be clearly observed by the homeopath. When we try to receive our own case, it is a little difficult to perceive ourselves giving and receiving at the same time. Our mental process does not allow that kind of clarity.  We become stuck in our own muddled thoughts. It is a rare individual who can see themselves clearly enough. 

Because of this, we must be very careful about self-prescribing and taking too many remedies. I recommend having a qualified homeopath take your case. For practitioners, it may be one of our teachers or respected associates. As homeopaths, we can spend many years continuing our suffering by self-prescribing when we could be moving ahead with very good homeopathy by allowing a trusted homeopath to treat us.