These are questions that I have been pondering for 31 years now since I had many health problems starting at 15 years old. I have changed my understanding many times since then.
What is healing, or to be healed?
I believe that true healing at the deepest level is spiritual in nature. What does that mean you ask? I mean that there is a hierarchy of healing levels or health energies in our bodies. If our bodies, minds and souls are to be happy joyous and free then all the energy within us needs to resonate at the most efficient vibration possible. I used to watch a colleague of mine patch clamp single cells to measure their energy. He could really measure the energy of a single cell. If all of our cells are vibrating at the optimum energetic level then we should feel like we are on top of the world. I believe that the human body is perpetually trying to optimize this resonation.
Many different schools of medicine from ancient times to now describe this process in various ways, and how to attain this. After going to school for more than twelve years and learning a multitude of healing techniques to heal on the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual levels, as well as years of my own experimentation to find the perfect cure and now practicing medicine and witnessing my patients triumphant break- thrus I have come up with a philosophy pertaining to the different healing methods and why they heal and at what level the healing is taking place ( I use all of them at different times and places).
At the bottom of the heap (because they are the heaviest and move the least amount of energy) we have drugs and surgery, I call these the Mac Trucks as they seem to plow right through a person and change only on a physical level moving the disease around the body to different places.
Then there are the nutraceuticals, massage and physical medicine they are a little lighter and move some energy but still pretty bulky. The next level up are the botanicals, and lighter still are homeopathic medicines. At the top of the heap are any of the spiritual types of healing techniques, such as qigong, yoga, prayer… I find that depending upon the patient I may use any or all of these techniques at anytime. The most profound healings I have seen are in the latter two categories. Of which I have experienced amazing results.
What is disease?
I believe that disease or dis-ease or disharmony is when our energies are depleted and not resonating properly. This manifests in many ways. The physical manifestation is the last step of the dis-resonation. If we can know when this process starts to take place then we can prevent it from happening. I think that the most people know inherently when this process is stating but ignore it.
I feel that we should be able to see the beginning of this process way before it gets to the physical level. This is what I call my brand of preventative Heartfelt Medicine. Although many times the disease process comes to me full blown or has been smoldering for a long time and is chronic. This is a little more difficult to treat but possible to have complete restoration of health and well being if the principles of Naturopathic medicine are followed.
What makes our bodies lose energy, disrhythmic, and eventually disease?
If the physical level is the last step or just a symptom of the greater whole then where does the process start? There has been a debate about how and why we get sick for a long time. Naturopaths have spoken about “terrain” for a long time; this means the condition of the body: how does the condition or terrain of our bodies affect our disease or health process. Others have spoken about microbes making us sick. My argument is why in a room filled with the common cold virus where everyone gets exposed, do only some of the people get a cold? This is what I mean by terrain, the people that did not get the cold had good terrain and the others had sub optimal terrain.
Terrain is not just simply how well your immune system is working. It is the sum of all the parts that encompass us. Everything we do, say and think affects our health. I have heard over and over that stress is a killer and how stressful my life is and this stress is making me sick. If we can see the stressful events in a different light and not be challenged by them then can these stressors affect our terrain? I think not, but to do this we must first acknowledge that their is something wrong inside us and we are not perceiving the world as beneficially as we could, or we may be in complete delusion with a certain paradigm and not know it.
To have optimum health and well being we must search inside ourselves, not look outside to blame the stressors in our lives. If we change our way of thinking then these perceived stressors can melt away and then we become lighter and happier because our internal energy is resonating at a higher level. No, I have not forgotten about all the toxins in our bodies and in our environment. I have seen that when our internal energy is good then they are not as much of problem. I also use very powerful detoxification protocols to address the physical level here, and medicinal super foods to give your body all the nutrients it can handle.
Medicine is an Art and a Science
Voltaire said that the art of medicine is to distract the patient long enough to let them heal themselves. We as doctors do not do the healing the patient does the healing. It is within all of us to be able to heal and it is programmed into us to do this at every moment. We are part of nature not at the top of the food chain separate from the rest of the species. Here I must say that if we think of ourselves as part of the earth and not separate from it, running it, then how can anything synthetic made in a sterile lab help our bodies to heal? This is my back to nature speech but it makes good sense, the only substances that can really help our bodies to heal come from the same cloth as we do; nature not adulterated by technology. I have found from my own healing journey that any synthetic substances that I had been using to feel better were always short lived and fraught with side effects.
To help someone heal we must first find out how far the person is on their healing path. Then we must meet the person where they are at, not at the level that we are at. This is very important, we must be open and intuitive enough to perceive this or the treatment will not work, not work as well as it could, or they will not come back. Then we must treat on all levels: physical, mental, emotional and spiritual. If any one level is left out then we will miss the opportunity to increase their quality of life optimally.
To do this, many healing modalities must be combined and interwoven synergistically at the precise times. We must be able to think completely out of the box using our philosophy that the human body has the inherent blue print for healing and find out exactly how to assist the body. The most important thing to remember is that the more we open up and work on ourselves the more we are able to serve others and help them heal on all levels.
* Sincerely, Dana Churchill, N.M.D.
Dr. Dana Churchill attended Rutgers University in New Jersey where he obtained a BA in Nutritional Biochemistry. Before that Dr. Churchill went to culinary school in New York City and worked in the international gourmet hospitality industry. Dr. Churchill uses these past experiences to create innovative tasty health conscious menus for his patients, as well as having the biochemical food knowledge to make up pathology specific diets.
While at Rutgers University Dr. Churchill worked as a research assistant to a neonatologist and a respiratory physiologist at the UMDNJ, looking at specific SIDS mechanisms. After Rutgers Dr. Churchill decided to go an organic route and enrolled in the National College of Naturopathic Medicine, the oldest college of Naturopathy in North America.
There he worked closely with world renowned homeopath, Will Taylor MD for five years in addition to the rest of his naturopathic education. While at NCNM he did an internship with Roberta Morgan DO, studying anti aging and longevity medicine. Research has always been a primary aspect of Dr. Churchill’s work and study within the healthcare industry. While at NCNM he wrote a research grant proposal. The research proposed studying the stress response (changes over time of both cortisol and DHEA) of Falun Dafa (a Chinese meditation practice) practitioners vs. non-practitioners. To this date the grant proposal has not been funded. Dr. Churchill is also very active at all levels of government in trying to stop the persecution, organ harvesting for profit from live unwilling people, and subsequent genocide of Falun Dafa practitioners by the Chinese Communist Party.