Medicine and the Call To Action

I will start by saying, I do not know exactly what a soul is.

Next, I will tell you, I believe in soul loss and in soul retrieval. I know that I have assisted folks in getting parts of their soul back in their bodies after a long list of what it was that could have caused soul loss for them in the first place, leaving them, in many cases not knowing exactly what is missing or why.

Most people experience some sort of soul loss, in the course of her or his life. Some common reasons for this could be: connection to a person or people who absorb/take the chi or life force energy from someone who is either not aware what to do or that it is happening. One need not believe in energy to be affected by it. Similarly, one does not have to believe in Liver Cancer to die from it. Or, one need not believe in the cleansing properties of water or white sage smoke, to be cleansed by both.

Another cause of soul loss could be a pattern developed over time by someone who means well but continuously gives so much of themselves that there is not enough left for them. This could happen when someone is in love, they leave their body part way to send love and energy to the object of their affection but they are not careful to replenish and restore themselves after working with their energy in this way, a way they could not even explain much of the time. This sort of issue and related issues are dramatically common.

I have heard the word "soul" in many different contexts. People refer to the soul when they want to reference deep emotions, spiritual type contracts with other humans. They apply it to types of songs, a whole genre of music is called "soul". We even hear terms like "soul food". It seems that the word soul has been used to apply to so very many things that it has become hard for someone like me, seeking clarity, accuracy, authenticity and truth to give a definition of the word, one that can be used and agreed upon in more than one or two social circles.

We have heard about the belief that there is a God who wants to save our souls.

Our souls have been likened to energy, light, eternal spirits, our conscience, our deepest selves, our truest selves. There are quite a lot of ways people define this word. And yet, most of the time it gets tossed around as though we all know exactly what it means.

Clearly, we do not. We do not all subscribe to the Abrahamic faiths (Christianity, Islam, Judaism) and we do not all describe or define that which we are told is the soul in the same way.

What about the atheist or agnostic perspective? What about folks who believe in Gods and Goddesses, or just one Great Goddess? If I pray and I take gender out of the picture, by saying Great Spirit or Great Mystery or just simply "Spirit", does that take away the legitimacy of my definitions of that which has mostly been attributed to the type of God that is signed up to save this soul entity, and give us redemption, one and all?

These perspectives are considered to be in the minority but all over the world, they count for more than Americans realize. So, an Atheist, Agnostic, Pagan or others can take the word soul and bend it to fit what they experience as "soul". They can render it into a poem, the poem creates symbols, the symbols create new meanings.

Since meanings of words are often manipulated to fit certain agendas, it is only logical and natural that folks whose views are considered marginalized will find ways to bend the meanings of religious spiritual and even medical terms. These words are the terms we work with from the time we can start comprehending them.

So, why not create and spread the meanings of words on our own terms? By this I mean that spiritually and intellectually marginalized parts of the population find it necessary to redefine and reclaim terms that have been appropriated by more socially acceptable and generally more mainstream groups.

Another term we more commonly hear now, but in a new way, is "medicine". It still of course refers to what we think of, a course of antibiotics, pain killers like Tylenol and Motrin. However, in many cases, folks say these are not medicines, they are ways of masking the pain, curing nothing, healing nothing. The criticism of these Western medicine options gets massive backlash. I understand that. I am in awe of what many forms of Western Medicine and Western treatments can do for people who have a wide range of illnesses, chronic conditions and pain.

Yet there are authors such as Masuru Emoto, who discusses all sickness and wellness on the spectrum, as a form of hado. Hado is hard to translate but essentially points to the vibrational or subtle bodies of a person, animal, even a type of music or song. He is famous for, among other things, taking pictures of water crystals and with the naked eye, one can see how the crystal was affected by what was sung or spoken to it.

He created example after example, showing us that water has an energy and vibration that is receptive to and takes on the energy of what is projected toward it or what happens around it, keeping in mind that our bodies are immersed in vibrations with their own "hado" or subtle vibration with its own information and meanings. He even suggests music as possible treatments, and many people now incorporate music into many types of sessions.

If humanity truly evolves, we will be able to sidestep the battles, with each other and with ourselves and integrate that which works together and in harmony within numerous treatment plans, and in so doing, we will manifest an East and West compilation of offerings to those who are unwell, for an endless number of reasons.

The rejections of ideas and scornful disbelief going back and forth between Eastern practitioners and their advocates, and Western Practioners and their staunch advocates, are exactly what is keeping us from developing comprehensive packages for people who suffer from preventable, reversible suffering and disease.

Now, we can take a look at Folk medicine, or Ancient medicines in modern contexts and Holistic practices in Indigenous spaces. These include possible kinds of shamanism and many other ways that are lost to the more modern and urban communities. The "medicine" coming from these folks, and even the word "medicine" the way it is used by marginalized groups, is tightly bound in the context of culture and often tribe that it originates from.

With a conscious extraction of a term from its cultural and spiritual origins there is often pain and controversy. If anyone now says " medicine" and applies it broadly, claiming that an energy or a piece of art, or a type of love falls into this category may not know who they are borrowing from.

Controversy is good for us, but not if it is constant. If it pours light on a subject, a problem and effective discussions follow it, we are doing well. If controversy becomes overwhelming between two folks or even between groups of people, it has lost its most critical function. That function is to stir up feelings so that collectively we match up thoughts, ideas and emotions until there is a great exhale and letting go of what originally caused the battle.

When we move away from the discomfort of controversy, we should be taking away new emotional and spiritual contracts from the situation, a deeper understanding of why the negative feelings came up and what could be done on both sides to create solutions that work as well as can be at that time.

Allowing wounds to fester, with no real dialogue for solutions, allowing pain and resentment to build, without any functional and grounded forums to help people along their way toward what truly feels like justice, #reservationpoverty #blacklivesmatter #waterislife, rifts between individuals and groups just grow wider and the canyons between grow deeper.

I do not know what a soul exactly is.

However, my soul, however defined or left undefined, urges me to a Call to Action.. Complacency is stagnation. Stagnation creates disease. Movements, both physical and political, have the power to save our lives and improve our communities.

This Call to Action is sent out every time my whole being feels weighed down by the violence, injustice and the insanity of trying  the same thing over and over expecting different outcomes.

There is no election year, no attempt at an uncorrupted democracy that can come anywhere near the urgency of the Call to Action that I hear from deep within. If this resonates with you, take action, any action: small, medium, large. Start right where you are, and keep going.