This Blew My Mind...

Over 30 years ago, I came to yoga to help heal my lower back and anxiety that came with chronic pain. It was, and still is, a healing journey, as when I don't practice for a couple of days, my back starts to ache and my nervous system becomes tight and reactive. It's a lifestyle for me to practice every day to remain pain-free and cultivate a calm and centered mind.

This morning I tried something new in my meditation. I had listened to a podcast featuring Joe Vitale, a renowned healer featured in the movie The Secret, discussing the power of the Hawaiian Ho'oponopono healing chant:

I love you,

I'm sorry,

Please forgive me,

Thank you.

And I realized after internally repeating it, that many old belief systems I struggle with needed to be healed.

Vitale had heard about Dr. Hulen, a therapist who helped heal an entire ward of mentally ill criminals at a state hospital in Hawaii. He healed them by working on himself. He didn't do traditional therapy with the patients; he quietly chanted:

I love you, I'm sorry, please forgive me, thank you.

As a result, the patients got better.

Vitale thought this story sounded like an urban legend, but he then heard about it a few more times. He finally contacted Dr. Hulen and asked him about this healing chant. Dr. Hulen explained that he was doing some cleaning. The term Ho'oponopono is a Hawaiian word that means 'to make right'.

Dr Hulen explained that he was looking at criminals who had to be shackled or sedated regularly, so this was a dangerous place. He would examine the situation, review the patient's records, and look within himself to what he called his connection to the divine, repeating: I love you, I'm sorry, please forgive me, thank you.

He said this was a request to clean up his perceptions. To right his view.

And what he was making right was his perception that this was a tragedy, bad, awful, dangerous, and crazy. As he entered a peaceful state by chanting these four phrases, it was here that the miracle occurred. The outer reflected the inner.

Dr Hulen reported that the patients began to show improvement. They didn't have to be shackled, they didn't have to be sedated. Over time, many of them were pronounced as natural and normal and released back into society. After four years, every one of them was released.

So, what happened? We are so conditioned to think that it's about changing the other person or the situation, but that's not the case. It's entirely an inside job. When we change the way we look at things, the things we look at change.

Dr. Hulen continued to explain that when we examine a current problem in our lives, whether it involves a neighbor, coworker, family member, or a situation in which we are trying to attract something but it's not working out, we become frustrated.

Whatever it is, welcome it into your being and realize that it's not outside of you. You're experiencing it inside. You don't experience the issue outside of your body and mind; it's experienced within. That's the problem.

When repeating this Ho'oponopono, it doesn't matter what caused it or where it came from, or the belief or story. All we need to know is that it's disturbing us internally.

And by chanting these phrases, it's like a prayer to our divine self, or higher being stating "I'm sorry, I don't know where this problem came from, I don't know what part of me participated in creating or attracting it, but please forgive me, because I didn't know what I was doing, this is all unconscious to me. Thank you for resolving the problem, thank you for healing me, thank you for removing whatever was the trigger. I love you for this process. I love you for my life, I love you for this cleansing, and for taking care of this so it's gone forever."

This entire process is to be done silently, or with a murmured whisper, because... this is the hard part for most of us: it's not about the other people, it's about taking total responsibility.

We can all relate to someone who has hurt us and can't let it go. And in fact, trying to let it go only adds to the frustration; however, this simple four-phrase process is what helps with the inner cleansing and releasing.

If it's anger we're struggling with, we don't push the anger aside; it's the anger that needs the healing, otherwise it's killing us over time. We don't need to try to forgive the other person; it's forgiving the anger that's continually injuring us.

The problem isn't outside. We often want to blame the other, but what we are feeling is within us. That's what we focus on and clear up to heal.

This is a repeated practice, not a once-and-done. When the issue arises, we repeat internally: "I love you, I'm sorry, please forgive me, thank you," and the intensity slowly starts to disperse and heal.

Science shows that our thoughts affect our cells, so repeating negativity creates dis-ease within us. This is a profound way of self-healing that I am adding to my daily meditation as an inner cleanse.

I'd love to hear your thoughts about how it helps you.

From my heart to yours~

Namaste,

Maggie