A Layman's Guide to New Age & Spiritual Terms

Elaine Murray

In searching for her own personal answers to the meaning of life, Elaine read a multitude of books, attended seminars and lectures in metaphysics and parapsychology, and investigated a variety of spiritual traditions. She encountered a variety of words and terms that just can't be found in traditional dictionaries. To aid those on the same quest, she has put some of the things she learned all under one roof, in alphabetical order, with personal comments and experiences. Included are definitions of over 200 terms, everything you've wondered about, from absent healing, angels, auras, chakras, crystals, and drumming ... to ultra-sensitives, white light, yoga and Zoroastrianism.

ABSENT HEALING

Absent healing is a healing which results from the sending of healing thoughts, prayers, or energy to and for someone who is absent from the person or group sending the healing.

Comment: I guess my first encounter with the idea of absent healing happened during my childhood. When I was nine years old, I witnessed the death of my younger brother, Lloyd. A steel-wheeled farm wagon, loaded with bags of grain, ran over his head, crushing it. Dad pumped cold water from the well and washed the terrible wounds but he could not save my brother. Lloyd died in minutes. Father's grief was inconsolable.

My father has a difficult time adjusting to my brother's death, and began his spiritual search which would bring him some peace of mind. Consequently, for the next few years, I was taken to church twice every Sunday. We must have visited every Protestant church within a radius of fifty miles. I used to hear people praying at these meetings that so-and-so might be healed of their afflictions. It was at that young age that I began to believe absent healings were possible.

In the '70s I took a Mind Awareness course from a Toronto-based organization. We were taught how to visualize candidates for absent healing. I surprised myself with the accuracy of these visualizations.

It was not until some years later that I had a real confirmation that absent healings can be so dramatic. At that time, I sat with a meditation circle. The group decided to work on healings for several months. One night the name "Kirby" was given to the group. He was a young boy. I immediately had trouble breathing - to the point where it frightened me. When I finally realized the sensation was foreign to my usual responses ... the shortness of breath vanished.

"Good grief," I exclaimed. "Does this boy have asthma?"

It turned out Kirby was asthmatic, and after the group sent healing, he was free from attacks for some time thereafter.

Blue Dolphin Publishing, 1993

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