There's a popular misconception that energy healing is good only for physical conditions. Perhaps that's because initially people rarely consult healers for anything else. And, sadly, they often stop treatment when the symptoms disappear. Unfortunately, without personal change, symptoms tend to reappear. Even though everyone knows that disease tendencies are inherited through genes, it is not necessary to take it fatalistically.

Although clients today have a far greater awareness than even a decade ago, a great deal of ignorance - and disbelief - remains. It's just too difficult for some people to accept that their diabetes or arthritis is not only the result of physical problems that stem from heredity, but also of unresolved emotional issues dating back to childhood.

There is no easy way to educate clients into understanding that, from the holistic perspective, the physical cannot remain healthy unless the emotional does too. There has to be a willingness on their part to look beyond the quick fix to the root cause. This is happening. People are realizing that the body, mind and emotion are completely inter-related. Every healing I have given has included all the levels of our being as well as our internationality or purpose, spirituality, higher mind, higher will, relational issues with others as well as ourselves, and how we take care of our bodies.

Physical illness invariably relates to an unmet need that usually goes back to the very early years when the child was not sufficiently nurtured, loved or acknowledged. Once the child is taught neglect and self-rejection in this way, it repeats the habit throughout adulthood. Repeated emotional injury eventually becomes physical.

Energy healing works directly on our energetic pathways, to open them through all the levels of our being, including our emotions and physical bodies. Through it we learn to meet our true needs. These needs can also be found in the disease tendencies of our gene pools. If we inherit a tendency for a particular disease, we need to meet all the special needs to ensure that the tendency does not manifest in our body.

For example, a person with a pancreatic problem will have experienced a lack of sweetness in early life. Not knowing true sweetness, such a person will seek the sweetness elsewhere. The world is full of sugar! The person with diabetic genes needs to take care of themselves with foods that have a low glycemic index. Yet, since the lack of sweetness in life can easily produce cravings for sweetness, one very important self care need is to feel the inherited pain to be able to deal with the craving. The same is true of alcohol. Resolving the pain helps one handle the tendency. This can be a long road, because significant life style changes are required. The support of an energy healer is extremely useful in such cases.

Lack of nurturing as a young child doesn't mean that the mother was 'bad,' just that she too was not fully nourished in infancy and didn't understand how to meet her child's needs.

An example of this is Pamela who suffered from weakness in the legs and who, in every sense, needed to learn to stand on her own two feet.

As a child, she had been expected to be the 'little mother' to her four much younger siblings. Pamela remembers her father as being strict with her while allowing the younger children infinitely greater latitude. She had to cook for him when he arrived home from work every night.

As an adult, she married a man very similar to her father. Not being received for what she was but for what others - parents, husband, relatives, friends - wanted her to be became particularly painful.

She was never able to stand her ground and claim what was hers. So, Pamela's way of dealing with this was to fall back into smoldering resentment, passive aggressive anger.

After several healings, a gradual change took place. Pamela spoke to her husband about all the issues that concern her - and he listened. She began working hard on being present, on dealing with problems as they arose and on manifesting outlets for her attention on creative energies. She is infinitely happier and, incidentally, her legs are much, much stronger.

But if we are going to feel and be well, to enjoy optimum health, we must be willing to explore, discover and work to satisfy our needs in all regions of the inner self - psychologically, spiritually, physically, relationally and even professionally. It's a tall order, but anyone can do it.

We all make up for our childhood insufficiencies in unhealthy ways and our bodies suffer. Consider what a healthy world would look like, one in which the majority of people had their needs met. So how can you meet yours? How is holding yourself back from your heart's desire affecting your life? What is it that you came here to do? Now would be a good time to start looking.