Medicine and Magic

© by Link

Are we mere flesh and blood, or something more? Many believe that we have a spiritual as well as a physical existence. Call it a soul, an aura, whatever--we are energy linked to a physical shell. If this is true for us, can it also be true for the strange little life forms we call diseases?

Medicine works on the physical; it attacks an illness on a material level. An example of this is an antibiotic, which attacks the microscopic "bodies" of the invading disease. Other medical techniques also rely on the physical. Surgery, for example, is nothing more than cutting open a physical body and performing a tangible act, like moving a bone or taking out an organ. But in addition to the physical, many people use a variety of healing techniques which employ magic. These techniques rely on energy, not matter. Since we are made up of both matter and energy, results can be achieved by working the magical as well as the physical.

Both medicine and magic have their merits. They also have their limits. But when used together, they have synergy that makes them much more effective. Like any action, tangible deeds and magic can reinforce one another. Look for ways to see the magic within your medicine. It can be just like any magical tool! Are the pills round? Are they colored? If you should take them every 4 hours, can that be a cycle, a rhythm? Help your medicine be blessed and charged with the powers to heal.

How can energy be used to heal? There are very complex ways, but very simple ways too. The simplest may be the use of your own imagination! Does a hot bath feel good when you are sick? Try "steeping" the illness out of you, leaving it behind like flavor from a tea bag. Picture it leaving your body, soaking into the water and washing down the drain. This tea bag analogy is just one example of a very important magical principle: Looking at simple household activities can show us how nature functions. Often, what works for a small simple action, like a cup of tea, works on a larger scale. Making tea works by moving something from a higher concentration to a lower concentration. Water can absorb the tea's fragrant oils, aroma and color. Can water absorb other things as well? If so, then letting the water absorb away your illness is not that far fetched, is it? By understanding how things tend to move from higher to lower concentration, we can learn about much more than healing. Can our tea bag analogy apply to economics? Education? Giving emotional support to a friend? Remember this concept as you "steep" yourself within your own circle of friends, family, career or any other aspect of your environment. Are these surroundings positive-minded? Successful? Healthy? Wise? What do you absorb from them, and they from you? Remember that habits and attitudes are all forms of energy.

We often hear "drink lots of fluids" when we are sick. Water can work internally via beverages you drink, just as steeping in a bath works externally. Do you believe that you can magically charge water to help accomplish something magical? Can water absorb energy? If so, then drink in the cool clear water; perhaps it can be charged to wash away bits of your illness as it leaves you.

Can the temperature of your beverage work magically? When you have a fever, you take in cool water. When you release it hours later, it is much warmer and thus helps take away your excess body heat. When you have a cold, hot drinks often make you feel better. As a magician, can you focus the heat energy within a hot drink to help heal you? Does your frothy cup of hot cocoa contain the Element of Fire?

Visualization can be a magical tool in the metaphysician's medical bag. Use it to perform "psychic surgery" as you picture what your illness might look like. When people tell me they have a cold or a sore throat, I often ask them "What color is it?" (I am amazed at how quickly people can answer that question!) If you can visualize the energy of your illness, then just reach in and grab it. If you see your sore throat as red energy, then just reach in and take out handfuls of red. See it in your hands, glowing like a little ball of energy. One of the basic premises of this article is that you are both matter and energy. Can you apply that concept to a simple sore throat? Visualize your ball of red "sore throat" energy and shake it down the bathroom drain. Run the water, wash it down. (And as you might tell any four year old, "All gone!") Some healers might want to dispose of their illness by tossing it into a candle flame, since fire is often seen as a tool for purification. In essence, you can toss it any place that you perceive as safely throwing it away from yourself, without harming others.

Notice the symptoms of many illnesses are the body's own natural "output" devices. Coughing, sneezing, bleeding, vomiting, diarrhea and sweats all cast out a tiny bit of you--and perhaps the illness as well. See the illness leaving your body with these symptoms. Be projective; use them as your own magical output devices. This way, each sneeze is a step towards healing rather than a symptom of illness. Remember that most over-the-counter medications often cut down on your body's output devices; they dry up the sniffles, reduce the fever, calm the coughing. Might these drugs inadvertently be working against nature's healing process?

We often look to herbs for healing. Herbs are plants, and plants are alive. Remember this as you use them in your magic. Honor them as living breathing beings. Respect and thank them. Something lived (and died) so that you might enjoy a spoonful of leafy green life, whether used as a magical charm, incense, or just a hot cup of tea. Since life is energy, the energy within your herbs might be focused magically into your healing process.

We often say that this herb is good for healing, while that herb might be an aphrodisiac or a tonic. On the physical level, that is true. Just like you and me, plants have physical bodies that chemically react to create medicinal outcomes. But like you and me, plants also have spirit. Spirit is not as tangible or limited as the predictable, physical, chemical properties that plants possess. Perhaps certain herbs are powerful in ways beyond their medicinal value. Some plants, rich in nature's energy, might be useful for just about anything, for any outcome you wish. To make an analogy, you may have many different appliances in your home. Some might dry your hair, or light your kitchen. But they all run off the same basic electrical power source. By digging deeper into your herbal treasures, you may discover something very basic that all life has in common. This might remove a few limitations on what you perceive plants can or cannot do.

Garlic is one herb revered for healing and many other qualities. Garlic is an amazing creature! (And you need not be a magician to know its strength.) A clove of fresh garlic, unlike a dried herb, is still living. If planted it will grow; if left undisturbed in the back of your refrigerator, it will sprout. When you crush a garlic clove, you take a life. Such is the necessity of life's food chain, but in magic perhaps we might treat a living being with special care?

If you believe that magical acts repeated over and over build a reservoir of power, then healing is the perfect opportunity. This may be your first bout with a certain disease, but humans have been healing one another for thousands of years. Collectively, we've healed broken bones, gotten over the flu, and even beaten cancer--millions of times before. Tap into this great well. Call upon "that which has healed many, many times before" to be with you here and now.

See your doctors as healers, as true magicians. People attracted to the healthcare profession often have innate healing abilities, whether they are aware of such magical skills or not. Empower them. (My dental hygienist grins a bit when I ask her to cleanse and protect my teeth with "magical energy"--but she does it quite well!)

If medicine and magic can work well together, then perhaps we can do the same for habits which prevent illness. See your diet, exercise and general healthcare as magical events. Pray (and work) for the benefits of good health. An ounce of prevention is certainly worth a pound of cure.

About the author:

Link believes that the most sacred and magical things in life are the simple ones that you touch everyday in your ordinary surroundings. A member of CoG, he practices primarily as a Solitary .

Contact the author at:

Link (Anthony)
Suite A-211
203 Main Street
Flemington, NJ 08822
[email protected]