Tracie Fights Back

My cancer-beating plan is to employ anything and everything in my battle against the invaders. Detoxes, parasite cleanses, alkaline diet, the removal of every cleaning product from the house – including the so-called “earth friendly” ones – in favor of plain old distilled Everclear and water. Borax instead of laundry soap, which often hold the same chemicals as oven cleaner. Baking soda on my teeth. Organic olive oil on my skin instead of chemically laden lotions.

So when Lynn Arthur, my life- and detox-coach, offered a session with her daughter Michelle, a healer who uses sound to open energy channels, I figured at worst it wouldn’t hurt and at best I would feel better AND have a blog entry.

I had no idea what to expect as this woman who exudes love and contentment spread out a collection of seven large quartz bowls that she said were tuned to the body’s seven chakras, those whorls of life-force energy that are the basis of traditional Indian medicine.

Having lived my life as a professional skeptic, I was unclear exactly what vibrating bowls might do in my fight against this disease. In my new incarnation as a believer that the body can heal itself if it is perfectly in-tuned, I am learning that the path to restoring my healthy body will take many turns. Only one of those leads into chemotherapy administration lab.

The bowls work under the same principle as the vibrating crystal glass. My mother used to hate it when we would sit at her beautiful Thanksgiving table and run our fingers around the edge of the crystal water glasses to coax them into humming in unison. These bowls are gallons bigger.

Everyone’s experience is different, but I will try to sum up what I felt as she moved from my root chakra to my head, rubbing the edge of the appropriate bowl as we progressed, 10 minutes at a time. The pulsing vibrations are intense, like standing by speakers at a concert. At first I felt a little wobbly, as if being battered by ocean waves. I imagined a spinning top right before it falls. But somewhere in the process a change came. The vibrations balanced out, uplifting me rather than battering. She proceeded to the crown chakra at the top of my head, where the circular vibrations I perceived as individual spinning circles suddenly changed directions. The pulses shot up and down my body. I imagined that was the moment the seven energy forces united in one, creating a force uniting my good cells against the foe.

Afterward Michelle made observations about me that were amazingly accurate. I’ll tell you one: my sacral chakra was stuck. I need to experience full-on joy, she said. Do something silly. Laugh uncontrollably. Don’t get so caught up in the task I am facing that I forget about the things that make life worth hanging onto.

So one of my new challenges is to achieve unbridled joy, the kind that turns life from a series of obstacles to overcome into a series of experiences to be savored. I will embrace this new task as vigorously as I have embraced fighting my disease.

In the end, life is short no matter how long it lasts. Cancer is teaching me to focus on the good, to appreciate my health and to rejoice over little things, like an uplifting email or a day without nausea.

In spite of my temporary predicament, I have never felt better or more loved. And that, my friends, gives me JOY.

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