Most people see cancer as a devastating or life-threatening illness. When the individual looks deeper, he or she will also discover that this illness is also a message which is designed to forever change your awareness. The message is designed to teach you and help you, and actually help you learn how to heal. The deep message is that now is the time to examine and then transform your inner life. It is time to discover and enact the important changes in your life that you were afraid, or unable, to make on your own. Cancer is the message that there are subconscious feelings, thoughts, perceptions, attitudes, and fears that have helped to lead you down a path of "dis-ease". You must confront all of these dissonant elements, and then transform them to achieve the inner harmony you have been missing, which helps you restore your overall health & well-being.

It has been reported over & over again that a strong 'fighting spirit" helps an individual overcome cancer. A strong will to live also seems to influence the outcome of cancer. A person's psychological makeup and mental attitudes help them recover from this illness. When a person refuses to give up in the fight against cancer, their odds of recovery improve dramatically. In such cases there have even been permanent remissions where the illness disappears completely without scientific explanation. These are unpredicted, spontaneous cures where the individual unexpectedly recovers rapidly and completely from their illness and remains totally free of cancer. One of the most apparent characteristics of these people is their attitude. These self-healers seem to perceive cancer as a transforming life experience. They perceive that much of their life has deviated from their true innermost goals & desires; they have traveled a route that is substantially different from their intuitive life path. Healing consists of correcting their inner life, and rediscovering that true life path.

These self-healers seem to modify and improve their lives according to some inner guide. They have come to realize that the difficulty with their bodies is just the outer sign of a powerful inner disharmony. So knowing this, they set about to make all of the necessary changes to put them back on their true life path. Somehow they are aware that deep inner change in many areas of their lives will bring a healthy restoration to their body. In essence, one confronts the reality of cancer best by healing all the elements of the individual-Mind, Body, Feelings, & Spirit. Each constitutional element of every person is equally important and each deserves appropriate attention. Self-healing in inner awareness helps you prevail by creating a harmony & balance within each of these elements. Most people with cancer understandably are concerned only with the treatment of their bodies. Most people do not realize that cancer is never genuinely healed until you have also resolved all of those issues within the Mind, Body, Feelings, & Spirit that precede & accompany the development of cancer.

Self-healing in inner awareness is used as an adjunct & supplement to traditional care. It is first utilized to help the cancer patient deal with the physical changes & symptoms of the Body. It is also used to relieve the physical discomfort following surgery & to promote accelerated healing afterward. Self-healing & deep relaxation are utilized to prevent or eliminate the noxious side effects of radiation & chemotherapy treatments. Medical treatments are far more comfortable with the help of self-healing and deep relaxation.

Concurrent with their other therapies, one begins the process of totally healing the Mind, Feelings, & Spirit. Total healing starts within the subconscious mind by evaluating one's deepest thoughts, one's innermost feelings & one's most personal perceptions. Over time, these elements are transformed with self-healing, so as to promote healing & restore wellness. Self-healing in inner awareness also teaches individuals to acknowledge and fully express any troubled emotions brought on by the illness & ongoing cancer therapies. Most importantly, self-healing in inner awareness is used to dissolve away deeply repressed emotions that have been in the body for years. This helps remove the deep inner physical stress & tension that may have helped to weaken the immune system over a prolonged period of time. Finally, with self-healing, the Spirit of the individual is restored with an exuberant confidence & self-esteem so that there is a new enthusiasm for life and wellness.

Self-healing in inner awareness is not an alternative treatment to cancer. It is a companion therapy that is designed to heal the entire individual rather than just the Body. Understand that oncology procedures are only designed to cut out or destroy abnormal cells, or shrink growths & tumors. Oncology is not a process of healing. Healing lies within you. Healing is your own ability to restore all of the constitutional elements in your life to an enhanced state. Self-healing in inner awareness is used with all forms of cancer, no matter what the status of your illness, with any type of diagnosis or prognosis, whether contained or metastasized, whether slow moving or rapidly progressing, operable or inoperable, survivable or so called "non-survivable", initial occurrence or recurring, responsive to treatment or non-responsive. Self-healing in inner awareness is also highly beneficial to all of those who have finished their medical treatments, & must now totally heal the remaining elements of their system- Mind, Feelings, & Spirit.

Self-healing in inner awareness works to enhance your physical & emotional comfort during your current treatments. Then it enhances & remediates those important elements of the individual that are not addressed by standard cancer therapy. Self-healing in inner awareness can be used while you are undergoing medical treatments, or after you have finished your treatments, or at anytime if you have had recurrent bouts with cancer. A person cannot heal unless one fully utilizes a comprehensive method. Self-healing in inner awareness is the one method that deals with the whole individual & all the inner healing requirements of each individual. It is a procedure in which each person manages their own healing. In order to fully access the deepest elements of Mind, Body, Feelings, & Spirit, one must tap into the inner portions of the mind especially the subconscious mind. Self-healing allows each person to utilize the elements of their inner mind in a variety of ways to facilitate total healing, both now & in the future.

For years, hypnosis has been used to prevent or reduce the unpleasant side effects of cancer surgery, radiation, & chemotherapy. Today, however, the more modern Self-healing in inner awareness is used in a far more powerful & effective therapeutic role. As already mentioned, self-healing procedures are used to bring about the complete healing of all constitutional elements of the individual. Self-healing enhances those necessary areas of healing that are not typically addressed by oncology procedures. Self-healing helps relieve deep subconscious stress that can damage the immune system, dissolves away decades of repressed emotions; resolves hidden, cognitive conflicts in the mind; & improves troublesome, interfering & damaging subconscious thoughts, feelings, and perceptions. The experience of cancer is transformed into a process of learning, new understanding, self-growth, heightened self-esteem, improving immunity, and a strengthening of the life Spirit. Self-healing in inner awareness helps each person examine true life goals and coping strategies, and broadens personal understandings of the self & one's relationships with others. Utilizing all of these methods allows you to be your own healer. You are able to completely restore all the innermost elements of the Mind, Body, Feelings, & Spirit system.

Traditionally, hypnosis has been used to help cancer patients reduce the physical side effects from chemotherapy drugs and radiation treatments. Hypnosis was also utilized to lessen the fears, denial, doubts, anger, frustration & other emotional reactions that accompany the experience of having cancer & undergoing treatment. Hypnosis is still used for these purposes. However, in a more effective manner, contemporary therapists now use Self-healing and deep relaxation to help achieve a total healing of the individual. Every element of the human system is remediated in the most powerful way with self-healing in inner awareness.

The subconscious mind helps control all aspects of the body including physical sensations, physiologic reactions and bodily functions. This powerful ability of the mind to influence the body allows the healing therapist to lessen or alleviate the unpleasant physical side effects of cancer therapy. During the treatment phase of cancer, self-healing is used to lessen the physical symptoms & side effects induced by radiation & chemotherapy procedures. At times, the cancer treatment itself might be far more unpleasant than the actual condition. So using self-healing in inner awareness, patients are taught to use the subconscious mind to prevent or reduce side effects such as nausea and vomiting, pain, burning, malaise, weakness, fatigue & insomnia. In effect the inner mind is used to turn off or significantly subdue these physical reactions of the body. Self-healing also helps create greater energy, aids in restoring normal hunger & appetite, and can help diminish hair loss. Individuals also learn how to create "glove" anesthesia so that they can anesthetize areas of the body where hypodermic needles or IV's might be inserted. The cancer patient learns self-healing at home, and is often taught deep relaxation to use when they are at the hospital or treatment center. Coping with the effects of cancer treatment is now much easier using the process of self-healing in inner awareness.

The diagnosis of cancer can bring about intense emotional reactions, constant worry & troubling thoughts. All of this is normal. The emotions vary as time progresses, but strong feelings are present before, during & even after one's treatment. Individuals usually experience the gamut of emotions from shock & disbelief to denial, fear & anger, followed by guilt or depression. Using self-healing, individuals are not allowed to disregard their feelings. All emotions are acknowledged, fully experienced, and completely expressed. Troubling emotions that remain are dissolved away with cathartic self-healing to create inner peace, calm, & physical relaxation. Positive & exuberant emotions are then encouraged so as to produce emotional harmony.

Anything & everything related to cancer diagnosis, treatment & recovery can cause anxiety, frustration, apprehension, & even deep fear. Choosing a doctor, visiting medical facilities, undergoing the treatments, and having repeated tests can all generate significant stress & tension. This stress is called "daily" or "situational" stress. It results from what we are experiencing at the "present" time. Self-healing in inner awareness is used to handle this type of stress. Tension is actually prevented from occurring in the subconscious mind and so the body never experiences the discomforts of stress. After this, additional calm & relaxation are created through the use of subconscious visual imagery, and relaxation exercises. Self-healing creates relaxation by specifically activating all of the natural relaxation responses of the individual's autonomic nervous system. This creates a profound relaxation, far deeper than methods of the conscious mind can achieve. The removal of daily stress and then establishing a calm & totally peaceful demeanor is a significant step in the process of healing the body & helping the immune system. However complete healing will occur only when we eliminate the concealed stress caused by the "pre-cancer" conditions within Mind, Body, Feelings, & Spirit .

After looking at the traditional uses of hypnosis with the cancer patient, let us now consider the other factors and conditions that can be greatly improved with self-healingin inner awareness. Medical research with psychological studies proves that cancer does not just emerge from unknown sources. It is the cataclysmic culmination of genetic, biochemical, organic, immune, mental, emotional & psychological processes. Research over the last 25 years also points to certain psychological components of personality as being very crucial factors in the development of cancer. In the second century A.D., the physician Galen noted that "cheerful women were less prone to cancer than were women of a depressed nature." Similar clinical observations have been made down through the centuries. Now about 1,900 years later, studies of cancer patients have shown over & over again that many people who develop cancer have certain character traits, attitudes, life perceptions, coping strategies, and specific emotional characteristics in common. These fundamental components of the total personality are the inner mechanisms by which the individual deals with life events & situations.

In her book, "The Type 'C' Connection: The Mind-Body Link To Cancer & Your Health", Lydia Temoshok, Ph.D. comments on her psychological studies, & the psychobiological research of dozens of other investigators:

"Can the emotions & behavior affect our risk of cancer, or our recovery should we contract the disease? After a decade of study, I am convinced that a specific behavior pattern.... does indeed alter both cancer risk & recovery. My own (..research...) results converged with findings from scores of other published studies to paint a striking picture of how the mind may influence cancer development."

From all of those studies, it appears that early in life the cancer prone individual develops particular personality characteristics & life coping skills that are limited in scope & social effectiveness. These individuals are unpretentious and uncomplicated. Ironically these traits are initially quite successful as the individual deals with the rather basic relationships with parents, friends, relatives & teachers. However, as circumstances of adult life become more complex, their unsophisticated life coping strategies are often too narrow in perspective to achieve success. Life becomes more challenging & far more complex; simplistic problem solving & relationship strategies are no longer successful. The limiting personality characteristics ultimately prevent the individual from adequately handling some of life's most challenging situations. Over many years that inability to successfully deal with difficult life circumstances can eventually result in the buildup of intense stress deep within the body.

We now know that prolonged stress eventually injures the organs & systems of the body, including the immune system. The extensive damage to the immune system includes a reduction of natural killer cells that remove growths & tumors from the body. Thus there is mounting evidence that the effects of subconscious attitudes and personality characteristics upon the immune system can make the "stressed out" individual more susceptible to the development of cancer. As we shall see, each of the character traits, attitudes, life perceptions, coping strategies, and emotional characteristics of the cancer susceptible individual can and do produce deep internal stress over time. In a broader perspective, we will also learn that each of these limited personality characteristics can effect the Mind, Body, Feelings, & Spirit of the individual. So let's examine each of these behavior characteristics in turn to discover how they might influence the eventual progression to serious illness. Following that, we will discuss the wonderful process of completely healing those individuals who might be more susceptible to the development of cancer.

Cancer prone individuals usually display significant emotional rigidity. That means they often fail to acknowledge, experience, & express their feelings, especially the so called 'negative' emotions like anger, rage, anxiety, fear & sadness. They consistently deny the natural need for all types of emotional awareness & expression in their personal life. This denial becomes so ingrained that these individuals are often completely unaware of any feelings of anger in the present or in the past. There is a strong tendency to repress emotions. Expressing "unpleasant" emotion to others is frequently avoided because of the fears of personal embarrassment. Revealing strong emotions is also seen as an unacceptable form of social interaction which could easily offend others. Sometimes this emotional constraint begins when the person has not really been emotionally close to one or both parents. Emotional rigidity can also be the result of being told as a young person not to allow themselves to become emotionally expressive. In effect they are told not to acknowledge & experience their uncomfortable feelings. The characteristic emotional rigidity of the cancer prone person leads to the repression of feelings over many years. Bottling up one's feelings inevitably adds to constantly intensifying the internal stresses of life.

The mind produces our thoughts, our attitudes, beliefs, as well as our perceptions of ourselves, the world, and our socially determined roles in the world. Our thoughts & attitudes can be creative, imaginative, broad and expansive. Or, as is the case of many cancer susceptible individuals, they can be overly focused, simplistic, unresourceful & restrictive. These individuals frequently have a very rigid outlook on the events of life. They maintain a rigid morality with inflexible standards so they often see life events as just "black or white" with no compromise or "gray" areas. They see life from a narrowed perspective and often have difficulty finding the "good" in life's challenging situations. Ordinary life events are perceived as being of great consequence. They obsess over situations that are not really that important in the grander scheme of life. If these events do not turn out as desired, the individual consistently becomes far more troubled and "stressed out" than the average person.

The desire for love & affection from others is an ingrained characteristic in all individuals. We are happy when we are loved & appreciated, and we are sorrowful & diminished in the absence of love. There are families, however, in which love is not easily expressed or readily shared; there are even families from which love is completely absent. When we are actually deprived of love in our relationships, or when our subconscious perceives that we are unloved, the mind will motivate us to procure that love by some other means. Two of the most common ways that the subconscious mind uses to hopefully experience love & affection is through perfectionism and constantly pleasing others.

Some cancer prone individuals frequently have a deep desire to please & care for others. Certainly this is an admirable & worthwhile trait. However the cancer prone person seems at times to be on an "obsessive mission". Pleasing others & caring for their needs becomes a significant part of their lives. They spend more & more time engaging in this admirable pursuit. Not only do they care for loved ones & friends, but soon they are consumed with the need to care for anyone & everyone experiencing difficult life circumstances. They sometimes find it just about impossible to say "NO!" and they often add more & more people to their "care" list over time. In essence, they are self-sacrificing to an extreme!

Pleasing & caring for others has one major drawback. The caring person's life is all about others & never about themselves. The love & affection that they seek by their constant attention to others is fleeting or nonexistent. This person still subconsciously perceives the absence of love. Worst of all, the constant ministrations to others doesn't allow the time or opportunity to properly nurture the self. They never take the necessary time to care for their deepest emotional & spiritual needs. They are lacking essential self-nourishment. This denial of one's emotional & spiritual needs causes intense sorrow within the deepest recesses of the subconscious mind. This sorrow for the self adds more unresolved inner stress & tension to the body.

The desire to win favor with other people causes the cancer susceptible person to develop an all around acquiescent demeanor. Studies have shown that these individuals are patient to a fault; they allow life events to transpire without complaint or opposition. They are not assertive; they allow others to dominate & control them. They are cooperative with others in all or most areas of their lives. The cancer prone personality is appeasing in most occupational, social & family relationships. Additionally they are compliant with any and all figures of authority. The desire to truly express the self is suppressed by the perceived need to always acquiesce to others. Over many years, this total sublimation of the deepest self & the disregard for one's own emotional needs results in much additional frustration & tension within the body.

The roots of perfectionism are found in the basic emotional atmosphere of the family. In families that are not emotionally expressive, a young child is rarely or never told that she is loved. Needing love naturally, the child subconsciously decides to earn parental love. This will by accomplished, it is hoped, by being good, by doing all that is asked of her, by doing all things in the best possible manner. She perceives that she will receive parental acknowledgment when she does everything perfectly. The subconscious mind assumes that parental approval will insure the flow of unending & deeply needed parental love. So the "admirable" trait of perfectionism develops & quickly becomes ingrained in the personality structure of the child seeking love.

We all admire the individual who gets the job done, & always does it right the first time. Perfectionism is considered to be an admirable trait but striving to be perfect is one of the greatest stress producers in modern society. The paradox of perfectionism is that we human beings can never achieve total perfection. However, that does not prevent individuals from continually trying. People attempt to be perfect students, perfect kids, perfect teens, perfect parents, perfect workers, perfect members of the community with a perfect house, lawn & garden. Every aspect of our lives must be perfect...perfect...perfect...and perfect. Of course, there is no end to the pursuit of perfection, no real satisfaction, & no feeling of "perfect" accomplishment. Since one can never truly achieve perfection, there is a constant inner striving to attain the unattainable. Striving for continual perfection is highly stressful. As a person eventually realizes that total perfection has not always been achieved, this leads to deep subconscious disappointment & more inner tension.

After many years of trying to please everyone, to win favor with everyone, or to be perfect at all things, there is a subconscious awareness that these behavioral strategies are not truly bringing us the love we need & desire. We begin to feel an uncomfortable emotional void in our lives. To make ourselves feel better and to satisfy that unmet need for love, some people make another misdirected attempt to obtain all the love they crave. We deceive ourselves into thinking that having lots of material "things" will make us happy. Playing on our emotional needs, the unrelenting media advertisers deepen our emptiness by insisting that we need more designer clothes, expensive and oversized cars, more & more jewelry, new hairstyles, a gorgeous house filled with magnificent furniture, a vacation home, stocks & bonds, and scads of disposable income.

The pursuit of "things" in place of love may go on for years & years. In many unfortunate lives, there is never the realization that the individual is pursuing a phantom goal. What a person truly seeks does not exist in material things. The constant failure to find love, affection & emotional satisfaction by accumulating material things eventually results in subconscious frustration, anger, and more inner tension.

For all of the aforementioned reasons just discussed, there are numerous individuals whose inner stress levels are elevated for an extended period of time. While the stress is severe, it has not yet caused them to develop any serious illness. However, they are like a cauldron of water heating over a fire. The stressful pressure in their bodies is "bubbling up" with an incrementally increasing intensity as the years go by, but it has not yet "boiled over". On top of their many years of deep frustration with life & even themselves, the unkind winds of fate deal some people an especially cruel blow. They suffer a significant life trauma like the death or illness of a loved one, a divorce/separation, or loss of their job or home. This loss is typically something or someone in whom the individual has made an intense emotional investment. Usually the person does not have the necessary inner resources to cope with the intense tragedy. This highly charged traumatic life event(s) is often the "straw that breaks the camel's back". The severe pain & sorrow of this recent tragedy is piled upon the years of deeply embedded tension. The overwhelming stress exceeds the ability of the individual to subconsciously endure any further pressure, and then illness emerges. In fact, studies have shown that following a severe personal tragedy, the cancer prone individual will develop serious illness within the next one to two years.

Spirit is our intrinsic zest and enthusiasm for life. Understanding, control, & knowledge of life, combined with relationship success, creates a strong Spirit. On the other hand, being overwhelmed, beaten down, traumatized, and oppressed by life diminishes the Spirit. Our Spirit is developed and influenced by our personality traits, beliefs, attitudes, life perceptions, coping strategies, and emotional characteristics. But our Spirit is far greater than the sum of all those parts. Transcending those parts, it is our essential vitality, our animating principle, the energy that propels us forward toward our destiny. Spirit is the basic substance of our being. A successful and healthy life depends upon an invincible and joyful Spirit.

The cancer prone individual, over time, develops a damaged Spirit caused by the ineffectiveness & psychological consequences of their personality traits. The inability to find & experience adequate love, and the inability to lead a life with normal emotional expression & harmony, obsessively trying to please others, perfectionism, an acquiescent life style, & consumerism are all coping strategies that the individual has used to contend with the difficulties of life. They are only partially successful in meeting life's challenges. So when a calamitous loss occurs, these limiting personality characteristics & coping techniques do not provide adequate strength. So the individual feels as if life has become far too difficult to manage successfully. Situations & events of life appear to be uncontrollable and completely overwhelming. The Spirit has become sorrowful, troubled, and distressed. The person therefore develops subconscious feelings of helplessness & hopelessness, both of which are the classic symptoms of the severely diminished Spirit. Research has shown that those intense feelings of helplessness & hopelessness immediately precede the development of serious illnesses including cancer.

The cancer prone individual typically is not willing to acknowledge & express a lot of emotion, especially so-called negative emotions. This life long habit of repressing one's feelings leads to the development of deep, subconscious, repressed stress. Once repressed, the individual is never aware of the existence of this deep stress. Unaware & unable to deal with it, the prolonged stress causes emotional disharmony as well as damage to many areas of the body. Many organs & systems of the body are weakened & exhausted, especially the immune system which is designed to protect us from cancer. The cancer prone individual is often giving & caring to an extreme. The person often spends disproportionate amounts of time, emotion and energy in the pursuit of helping others while ignoring his/her own needs to be loved & nurtured. This failure to nurture the self causes additional stress deep within the body, and it goes on without relief for many years.

The cancer prone individual tends to be overly agreeable, desiring not to upset or offend others, and to be as perfect as possible. These traits limit a person's perspectives, choices, & responses to the challenges of life. This rigidity of personality prevents the individual from coping with life's difficulties in a versatile & fully resourceful manner. Life is therefore more difficult than it has to be, and successes are not as frequent as desired. Over time, the subconscious perception is one of failure to successfully deal with life's circumstances & tribulations. This unrealistic perception leads inevitably to anger & frustration with the self. These perceptions & emotions inevitably lead to more internal tension which adds to all the stress that is already there in the body.

With all their accumulated internal stress, the entire body, including the immune system, becomes damaged. With all the deep emotional chaos, the cancer prone individual is often subconsciously teetering on the edge of emotional calamity. Then the cruel hands of destiny bring more suffering to this person in the form of a huge calamitous loss. This new catastrophe is the straw that breaks the camel's back; the individual is totally unable to cope with this tragic life event. The situation is so overwhelming that the individual develops feelings of total helplessness & hopelessness. Burdened by the years of repressed internal stress, compounded by a new & completely overwhelming disaster which leads to the perception of a hapless existence, the subconscious mind, in fact, gives up on life itself. There is the perception that fate has condemned them to unending misery from which there is no possible escape. The inner mind at some level feels deeply & profoundly that there is no longer any reason to go on. When this subconscious despair occurs, the development of serious illness is not far behind.

(Recommended reading: "The Type 'C' Connection: The Mind-Body Link To Cancer & Your Health", Lydia Temoshok, Ph.D., Henry Dreher, Penguin Books.)