What is a Healing Therapy?

As part of the definition of Healing, I have differentiated between healing in the common sense, “the restoration of damaged living tissue to normal function”, and Healing in the wider sense that also includes, “that which clarifies our perception of our own true nature and of our relationship with others”. And I will show that what I have called ‘Healing’ is very often healing in the common sense also.

Any person can be a Healer if they are able fully to Meet with another person. It is possible to dig a ditch or to teach mathematics as a Healer, even though these activities are not, in and of themselves, usually associated with health and healing.

Any therapy can be Healing, even if the therapy has only healing in the common meaning as its aim, if a Meeting takes place between therapist and client. It is for this reason that the qualities of the individual therapist are of more importance in Healing than the philosophy or usual practice of the particular therapy that they offer.

Some therapies embrace Healing as a part of their aim, in that they acknowledge the vital role that is played by the conditions upon which Healing depend. Due mostly to the work of Carl Rogers and the humanistic philosophers and psychologists the principles of Healing, especially an appreciation of the central importance of the relationship between therapist and client, are increasingly finding their way into the training of therapists, educators and medical doctors, even where this is not the primary mechanism of these therapies as normally defined and practised.

Although Healing in this sense can occur in any therapy, Healing is generally more effective when it is the primary goal of the therapeutic session and it is generally most effective when it is the only goal of the therapeutic session. This is because Healer and Client are not distracted by other agendas which could divert them from their main work, the quality of their relationship.