Dr. Gary Schwartz, researcher in consciousness and holistic healing, has conducted landmark research at the University of Arizona, including research sponsored by The National Institutes of Health Center on Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Reports published in journals and described in his book The Energy Healing Experiments, demonstrate that energy healing therapies have shown impressive benefits in experimental research. The benefits of massage and acupuncture have been well documented in medical research, yet many physicians and laypersons are skeptical of therapies that claim to produce an effect without the need for any physical pressure or touch. There are a multitude of studies that show how vibrational energies affect our physiological and psychological states. Thus, therapies that apply vibrational energies would logically tend to show some effect. The vibrational energies can include sound, light, color, electromagnetic frequencies, and the energies that radiate from a healer's hands.

Energy healing treatments have been shown to support pain relief, to speed up healing and recovery from illnesses and injuries, to lower blood pressure in those with hypertension, to help relieve stress, depression, and anxiety, and even to enhance the health and growth of animals and plants. Energy healing therapies appear to be a valuable and important component of holistic health care and health maintenance. Energy healing treatments are difficult to standardize for research, since each healer is unique in his/her skill of projecting energy and intention for healing purposes, and there is an intuitive element in assessing the energy state of the recipient and guiding the application of energy to restore a healthy, balanced energy flow. At present, it appears unlikely that Western allopathic medicine will provide much acceptance for energy healing therapies, since these approaches are patient-centered rather than disease-focused or standardized according to a diagnosis and prescribed treatment model. Additionally, many energy therapies can be applied by anyone, including laypersons, and would reduce the need for professional physicians and pharmaceutical medicine treatments. This could be seen as a challenge to the economic viability of existing treatment institutions and has already produced resistance from these institutions, even while energy therapies have provided sometimes dramatic benefits to recipients.

Therapies such as Reiki, Therapeutic Touch, Healing Touch, Quantum Touch, Pranic Healing, and other energy healing and spiritual healing techniques can be applied with or without touching the recipient. Those experiencing these treatments often report feelings of warmth, tingling, and other sensations that occur as the energy field radiating from the healer interacts with their own energy system. Experiences of deep relaxation or tension release are also typical of these energy healing therapies. Some people compare these therapies to massage, as massage helps release tension in muscles and other tissues through physical manipulation. Energy healing therapies can be seen as releasing tension on deeper levels of one's energy system. By using the term "deeper," it is non-physical layers of one's being that are being referred to. Rather than applying pressure more deeply to the body as in deep tissue massage, energy healers can tune into deeper layers of a person's energy system and access the layers where emotions, subconscious memories, and thought patterns are held. These layers govern what is being manifested on the physical level, so there are many physical issues that can be healed or alleviated through energy healing therapies.


Jed Shlackman, LMHC, C.Ht. is a Reiki Master/Energy Healer and a Counselor in Miami, Florida.  Jed teaches Reiki Courses and offers Reiki Circles and healing sessions.  Jed's web page is http://www.phinsights.com