What Does Healing Really Mean?
True healing—whether physical, psychological, or spiritual—relies on three essential elements:
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The restoration of wholeness
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The elimination of pathogens
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The easing of suffering
These elements are easy to understand in relation to the physical body. When bones or tissues are injured, they must be repaired. When pathogens make us sick, they must be eliminated. And when there is suffering, it must be soothed.
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But what about the non-physical aspects of who we are—our minds, hearts, spirits, and souls? These parts of us, though intangible, are also subject to damage, toxicity, and suffering. We speak of broken hearts, broken spirits, and broken wills for a reason—they reflect very real internal wounds. Likewise, relationships between our inner family of “subpersonalities” can break apart—just like any relationship in the outer world.
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The pathogens that afflict our inner world aren’t viral or bacterial in nature. They take the form of toxic judgments, beliefs, thought patterns, and emotions that make us feel unwell mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. To heal, we must not only repair what has been broken and remove what is harmful—we must also ease our inner suffering with loving care.​
The Medicine for Self-Healing
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Healing the non-physical self doesn’t involve surgery or medication. Instead, it requires the medicine of unconditional love. Empathy, compassion, mercy, forgiveness, release of judgment, acceptance, reassurance, affirmation, and presence, represent the healing ingredients of unconditional love.
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But knowing what medicine is needed is not the same as knowing how to deliver it. Healing requires both a relationship and a means of communication to administer this medicine to those places within us that need it. This is why personal healing ordinarily takes place in the presence of a skilled therapist or other healing guide. But it is also possible to create these same conditions within ourselves to make self-healing possible.​
Communicating with your Inner Self
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There are several powerful therapeutic modalities that support internal dialogue. One of the most widely known today is Internal Family Systems (IFS), developed by Richard Schwartz, Ph.D., which teaches us to relate compassionately with our various subpersonalities.
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​But decades earlier, psychologist and self-healing pioneer Lucia Capacchione, Ph.D. developed a remarkably simple and effective method for self-healing using two-handed writing. This technique allows the conscious self (writing with the dominant hand) to enter into healing dialogues with subpersonalities (responding through the non-dominant hand). These dialogues become the bridge through which empathy, compassion, and unconditional love can flow directly to the places inside that need them most.​
Most of the healing exercises found at FreeSelfHealing.org take advantage of the two-handed writing method. They consist of guided dialogues that help you restore wholeness, eliminate inner toxicity, and ease suffering. These are tools empowering you to become your own healer—no appointment, diagnosis, or payment required.
Healing yourself is not only possible—it’s one of the most loving things you can do.
To heal yourself is to love yourself.