What is energy healing & how does it actually work?

Energy healing is a healing modality where the practitioner uses gentle hand movements, massage and touch to channel through healing energy (also called life force energy) through the client’s body to activate the body’s own restorative and healing functions. I come from a very scientific background and when I first heard about energy healing I thought it’s completely woo woo and didn’t believe in it at all. What I couldn’t deny, though, are the positive effects it had on my body right from the first treatment, so I kept going. Years and multiple sessions later, it’s one of the healing modalities that’s helped me the most and the benefits span across mental, emotional and physical wellbeing (more on this here). I’ve also learnt more about what energy healing actually does to the body, and in this article I want to explain the physiology behind this beautiful healing modality to hopefully explain the ‘magic‘ a little bit and show that it’s not complete woo woo.

To understand how energy healing works, we need to understand the peripheral nervous system, which relay information between our brain and the rest of the body. The below image illustrates this.

For the context of this article, I’ll focus on the autonomic nervous system today e.g. the system that controls our unconscious bodily functions.

Sympathetic nervous system: Our stress response

When we think about stress or being stressed out, what often comes to mind is work related stress or having too much to do. The reality is, however, that our stress response can be triggered by multiple different things such as for example: work, relationship problems, the bus being late, weather conditions, worrying about the past or the future, organising a wedding, dating, a newborn baby, childhood trauma, financial worries, living in a big city with lots of traffic and buzz, reading the news, scrolling on social media, the passing of a loved one etc. Stress is extremely individual, what I may consider stressful might not be stressful for someone else.

What I’m aiming to point out here is that how we experience something (our thoughts) affect out emotions, which directly affects our nervous system. An example of this would be that someone is reading the news about dramatic events that have occurred in another country (thinking), this triggers worry in them (emotion), which activates their sympathetic nervous system (stress response).

How does the stress response affect our body then? The stress response releases energy in the body and tenses our involuntary muscles to prepare us to run or fight because it doesn’t see a difference between being chased by a lion or the bus being late (the intensity does vary, but the reaction follows the same pattern). If we go about our day without releasing this excess energy and muscle tension through crying, screaming, running, fighting, moving, etc. it gets stored in the body. Different emotions get stored or affect different areas of the body and how these show up is individual. For me, anxiety shows up as a tension on my upper back between my shoulder blades and my chest. Getting a massage or stretching might offer temporary release, but it doesn’t address the root cause of the problem (pent up anxiety).

Most of us are not taught effective ways to emotionally release or process emotions and therefore have a lifetime’s worth of pent up emotions, stress & trauma stored in our bodies. This will undoubtedly affect our mental, emotional and physical health.

Parasympathetic nervous system: Our rest & digest response is strongly activated by energy healing

Energy healing strongly activates the parasympathetic nervous system where the body goes into a state of recovery and self-healing, and therefore puts a stop on the fight or flight or stress response in the body. In addition to relieving stress that is experienced in the moment, the deep restorative state also allows the body to begin releasing old pent up stress, emotions and trauma. The effects are more powerful than your average relaxation technique or sleeping (!!!):

  • Relaxation of voluntary and involuntary muscles: reduces muscle aches, body aches, head aches, migraines, tension in the body.

  • Digestion speeds up: helps with stomach problems, bloating, water retention.

  • Removal of metabolic waste to naturally cleanse the body: this can temporarily result in cleanse symptoms such as fatigue, head ache, aches and pains, flue like symptoms as the body cleanses itself from unnecessary and toxic substances, old emotions etc.

  • Release of pent up emotions: through crying, laughing, shaking etc.

  • Increasing the efficiency of the natural healing processes in the body: such as the immune system, cell division etc. to restore balance.

  • Tissue repair: in cases of muscle tears, broken bones, brain damage, organ damage etc.

This means that energy healing gives relief and heals mental, emotional and physical problems by treating the root cause. What’s also noteworthy is that we don’t have to be aware of what’s releasing or what needs to be released, the body does this for us.

I often get the question whether energy healing works if someone doesn’t believe in it, and the answer is yes. As it activates the autonomic nervous system, which isn’t in our control, someone’s thoughts or beliefs don’t impact the session.

I offer in-person energy healing sessions in Helsinki. Click here to book a session or here to find out more.

Previous
Previous

What’s the difference between a massage and somatic unwinding?

Next
Next

Managing hyper sensitivity in an office environment