Meditation is a powerful preventive medicine tool. It can facilitate self-healing and inspire a deep sense of well-being. In this article, you’ll learn four ways to use meditation for health and wellness. You’ll also read an insightful story of how mindfulness and meditation cured a woman’s cancer.
Let’s start with this miracle healing story from “Meditation: A Detailed Guide” (Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2011) by Ian Gawler and Paul Bedson.
Bernice cures her cancer
(p.274-278, MAIG)
In 1980, Bernice Groeke was diagnosed with melanoma on her calf which had been surgically removed. A year and a half later, doctors found a melanoma in a lymph node in her groin and surgically removed it as well. A year and a half after that, the cancer had spread to her lungs, by which time doctors said it was inoperable. They said there was nothing medically they could do for her and that she only had a few months to live.
Bernice decided to join a 12-week cancer self-help group. Shortly after joining the group, the discussion turned to the effect of mindset on managing physical pain and the mental and emotional suffering of cancer. Bernice had never given much thought to her way of thinking.
However, as the group discussed the power of mindfulness and positive thinking, Bernice quickly recognized how negative her usual mindset tended to be. In fact, she had made it her duty to be on her guard and warn her family and friends of anything that might go wrong. On the other hand, she was also quick to warn herself and others not to get too excited about the new possibilities because they were likely to end in disappointment.
Bernice realized that her way of thinking was the definition of a “glass half empty” approach to life. So, after learning about the benefits of thinking more positively, he decided to change his usual way of thinking. To do this, she decided to repeat the statement “I am a positive person” whenever she recognized that she was becoming negative.
About six weeks into her new mindfulness and affirmation practice, she was sitting with her husband after dinner when she felt one of the melanomas pressing uncomfortably on her spine. Her husband noticed her shock and asked what was wrong with her.
Bernice responded, “Maybe the doctors are right. Maybe I’m just kidding myself. Maybe I should accept the fact that I’m going to die and give up all these other things.” (p.275, MAIG)
Her husband sympathized with her pain and was also aware of her new affirmation practice. So instead of just sympathizing, she responded, “Oh, that’s interesting. What are you?”
“What do you mean what am I?” She answered.
“Oh, I thought you were a positive person now,” he said.
Bernice reflected on this and responded, “You’re right, I am.”
Bernice remembered that as she said this, she felt a palpable change within her body, as if a switch had been flipped. From that moment on, she was able to see the positive in every situation.
Shortly after this inner change, she was meditating and praying in church and had a profound mystical experience of the Presence of God in which she understood the biblical phrase “Be still and know that I am God.” From that moment on, her faith was strengthened. She found it easier to follow her healthy diet and her healing efforts with meditation. She also became enthusiastic about serving others.
Within six months, scans revealed that her lungs were free of all tumors. And, within a year, to his surprise, the doctors proclaimed that she did not have cancer.
Soon after, Bernice volunteered to speak to meditation groups at the Gawler Foundation and tell them her story. She beamed as she spoke and her enthusiasm for her life was infectious. Ella bernice became an inspiring spiritual force.
Several years later, her husband died in the late eighties. Her friends and family wondered how Bernice would take her passing. After all, they had been together for over sixty years.
While she was appropriately grieving and deeply saddened, she surprised them with her resilience. She said, “Well, you know, it’s really sad that Wain is dead and I’ll miss him terribly, but it will be interesting… I’ve never lived alone before. I wonder what it’s like not having to.” take Wain more into account?”
Shortly thereafter, to help with expenses, Bernice took in a student living abroad. They quickly became the best of friends. She taught him about life in Australia and he gave her companionship and financial support. It was a beautiful new chapter in her life.
Then in 2009, at the age of 93 and 26 years after her cancer had disappeared, it reappeared. This time, he quickly deteriorated.
At first, she thought that she was to blame. She went to Gawler to express her disappointment with herself. Gawler hastened to remind him of her remarkable recovery. For more than 26 years, she had lived without cancer. He reminded her that we all die of something and we don’t always know why. He also reminded her of her faith.
Bernice admitted that she had lost touch with her faith a bit and now had some doubts and fears of dying.
Gawler told him that doubts and fears were natural human feelings, especially in the face of death. He encouraged her to consciously acknowledge her doubts and fears and accept them for what they were: natural feelings for facing the unknown. He also suggested to Bernice that dying was like “going home.”
She reminded Berenice of her faith and encouraged her to imagine what it would be like to rest in the Divine Presence. He told her that “dying was easy, that he had led a good life, and that he could look back with sweet satisfaction and no regrets. To die, he had only to exhale and not inhale again. It would be easy.” “
Buoyed by Gawler’s words, Bernice decided to focus on the Divine Presence and imagine merging with it when the time came.
Bernice died less than a week later, peacefully. And, her funeral was a joyful celebration of her life. Family, friends and crowds of those she had touched with her smiling service came to celebrate what she had meant to them.
A beautiful story.
4 Ways Meditation Supports Health and Healing
So what can we take from Bernice’s story that can help us heal and become healthier?
1. The way you think affects your ability to heal
As we saw with Bernice, her healing began with the healing of her attitude, her habitual way of thinking. She recognized her habit of looking at life through a negative, fear-based lens. She was always alert, on guard and expecting the worst. Before attending the cancer self-help group, she hadn’t realized that it was a mindset or that it was harmful; she just thought that she was being conscientious, responsible and careful.
Bernice learned to change her mindset by saying, “I am a positive person.”
Now having a positive mindset is not about making things up or making things better than they really are. It is about realizing the opportunities that are present in every situation. It’s about seeing what can be done instead of focusing on what can’t. It’s about being present with “what is” and realizing what you can do to move things in a good direction.
When you do this, you open yourself up to a wider range of possibilities and become more inspired to take positive action.
2. The decisions you make matter
As you open yourself to a wider range of possibilities, you find that you can choose to take action that makes a positive difference to yourself and others. Things are not “just the way they are”, they are the result of a series of choices that combine to create specific results.
Meditation supports a state of clear vision in which you can recognize options and make good decisions. Through meditation, you become more able to choose what works and let go of what doesn’t.
As Bernice opened up to the possibility of healing, she began to make different decisions. She chose to say positive affirmations for her to reset her mindset. She adopted a healthier diet. She meditated daily. She increased her efforts to serve others. She expanded her community.
Over time, these combined with other unseen forces to create healing.
3. Meditation itself supports healing
One of the most important things you can do to facilitate healing, whether physical or mental-emotional, is to activate your body’s natural relaxation response.
When you’re in stress mode, too busy and overwhelmed, your body restricts the flow of energy to your digestive, immune and higher thought processes. Your sympathetic nervous system directs all energy outward and you lose the ability to absorb nutrients, repair your cells, and make good decisions.
Our bodies are made to alternate between periods of activity and rest. Most err on the side of too much activity. We go from one thing to another and do not give ourselves time to consciously process the events of the day. We then spend our sleeping hours actively processing the life in our dreams. This makes deep rest and recovery difficult.
When you consciously relax, using a tool like meditation, you activate your parasympathetic nervous system, your natural recovery and repair mode. This brings digestive, immune, and higher thinking abilities back into line. You also begin to process and integrate the events of the day and of your life so far, so that you can let go of the past and be more present with what is.
For these reasons, it is vitally important to consciously activate the Relaxation Response at least once a day using a tool such as meditation for at least 10-20 minutes.
4. Meaningful images support healing
Berenice had great faith in God. Because of this, she found it very helpful and healing to imagine herself immersed in the Divine Presence. This calmed and comforted her. Her faith also prompted her to take other actions of healing, serving others, and building community.
When we think only of ourselves and our own suffering, it’s easy to get bogged down in the “Woe is me” feeling. Expanding your vision to realize your Oneness with the larger field of Life inspires and heals. Health and healing occur naturally as a result of the Universal Life Force flowing strongly and smoothly through your entire being. Meditation is a powerful way to mindfully acknowledge blockages to this flow, release them, and focus on this deeper, life-giving Presence.
Enjoy your practice!
