I am working on two of my more complex and long term problems- the first, relating to a particular relationship and the second is related to career and life path.

Over the next few weeks I will report on some of my personal experiences with this therapy, including any tips that occur to me and any pitfalls I may have encountered. This feedback is particularly directed at people who are interested in trying symbol therapy for themselves but is also quite relevant for other forms of transpersonal therapy.

Daily practice-(If you have trouble concentrating on your symbol for two minutes- like I do):

• Make yourself comfortable but not too comfortable. Remember you want your body relaxed and your mind alert, not asleep.
• Draw your healing symbol (concentrating on the colour) and have it with you whilst doing your practice.
• Carry your symbol with you at other times, especially if you may be confronted with the issue you are trying to improve.
• Don’t be too hard on yourself. If you’ve ever learnt the art of meditation you’ll realise that it takes quite a lot of practice and patience to concentrate exclusively on one thing for more that a few seconds. It is quite astounding the amount of stuff that can flow through an undisciplined mind!
• Create a space where you can get some peace & quiet for the few minutes required and perhaps use an induction (any conscious act that will help you move into the different space), ie; lighting a candle.
• Try to do your practice when you are not too tired and not too stressed

General points:

• Make sure you devote quite a good deal of time and energy defining your problem and the associated feelings you experience, when embarking on this kind of therapy. It’s a good idea to keep playing back your words and checking how you feel about them. If your problem sounds too vague or your feelings are too general your results will be minimal or you will find it more difficult to commit yourself to your daily practice.
• It is important to have a reliable measure for your suffering, especially so that you can measure your progress. I found the wording provided in the ‘table to measure your suffering’ in chapter five didn’t seem relevant to my particular issues. I ended up using my problem symbols as guides alone. I will formulate my own table in the future though, as I think this type of guide has a valuable place alongside the symbol work to help measure progress.

• If you are working on a complex problem remember to start off addressing the whole issue in the first two weeks then move onto deeper levels later on. For example:
  By the end of the two weeks the problem symbol for my relationship issue had grown from a petrified walnut to an entire petrified tree plus walnut! ! Funnily enough I wasn’t surprised or too disappointed. My feedback was not that my problem had worsened but that the larger scale of my problem was shown to me. It felt simply that my original definition of the problem was addressing only a small aspect of the whole problem and I needed to go back to the broader issue.
  

• Remember to be open to changes and improvement in the situation that may not occur the way you expect or even originally hoped for. For example:
  Relating to my relationship issue, in the back of my mind I expected (and secretly desired) all tensions and difficulties with that person to simply melt away. Instead I found an irresistible urge to speak up for myself and confront the person over an issue that had arisen during the first week. I had been avoiding confrontation with the person for a long time and all of a sudden I was compelled to voice my anger to them. Why? Because that was what I really needed to do to kick off on the road to healing.
• Another point I noticed was that the feelings that my problem symbol brought up for me helped to inform me when redefining my problem the second time around. For example:
  In the first two weeks I was addressing feelings of irritability and annoyance and I noted in my journal that my problem symbol felt very hostile towards me. When I did my two week assessment and my problem symbol changed, I noted upon drawing the tree that it evoked feelings of sadness and desolation. So I have changed my wording to address these feelings first. There is no doubt that I experience more angry feelings with regards to this issue but I believe that the sadness came first and is more closely related to the whole aspect of the problem.
• Keep a journal with drawings of your symbols and notes on anything that comes to you (as a small but worthwhile side track go here for some great inspiring video tips on creating your own art journal). As well as assisting you in remembering your thoughts and feelings it will help you open up to the subtle changes you experience or the chance encounters or the little sign posts directing you towards a solution.

• The colour of the symbol really is important.
  I found that the colour of the symbol was like the vehicle that carried the symbol through my body. For instance I was given a silver stone for my healing symbol related to my career issue. When I breathed the bright silver through my body I felt light and bright and far less serious, which was very healing.

I will keep you posted on how my own personal practice is going with this method, including some tips and pitfalls I have found along the way. I have to say that so far it has been easy to fit into my daily life and even before the two weeks are up I have noticed some changes occurring (though not as I expected! – more on that in the next post)

Eight years ago I completed a diploma in Transpersonal Counselling through the IKON Institute (Ikon’s courses now delivered by the Phoenix institute here in Melbourne), and found Transpersonal Psychology a perfect modality for me to practice in the field of healing. This approach and the effect it had on my life is largely what led me to my passion for symbol work.

Ulli’s approach is quite different to the way I work with symbols on this site, and yet I think it is quite complimentary. My usual approach is to research a suitable symbol, based on historical uses, in order to assist with a person’s problem or need. The symbol is then taken away to be worked with in a way that suits the client.

With Symbol Therapy once you have defined your problem you ask your HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS for a healing symbol which you then go on to work with. The difference being that the client does the work to find their own symbol by accessing their HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS rather than finding a healing symbol using their, or my, ‘ordinary waking state’ (OWS) or ‘conscious mind’.

Symbol therapy takes us into the realm of the HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS first so that we are given just the right symbol for our unique and individual problem. Our Higher Consciousness is not influenced by trends, aesthetics or belief systems that don’t completely match our own.

Some people may not be familiar or comfortable with the notion of HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS. Symbol Therapy is based on a model of the human mind which basically has three parts: The conscious mind (everyday mind, personal mind, ordinary waking state), The unconscious mind (contains a lot more than our conscious mind, like our complete store room of experiences including lots of things we may not be aware of), and our Higher Consciousness (the universal unlimited part of ourselves that we share with every being in the universe)

You may wish to replace this term or idea with, for instance: God, Buddha, Great Spirit or whatever suits you. The most important thing you need to be able to embrace is the concept that there is a great wisdom and love out there, in us and all around us that we all have access to, every single one of us (I will continue to use the term HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS in this article because that’s what I’m most comfortable with).

Our HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS has only the best of intentions for us and is most willing to direct us on our life paths if we are able to listen. Our HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS is what connects us to all other beings and it is from this assumption that we can begin to achieve our own healing.

Below is a basic outline of what the book covers and how the process works:

• Define your problem and the associated feelings you experience.
• Measure your suffering- a scale is provided in the book which will help you measure your progress at the end of the two week period of your practice.
• Relaxation- learn and practice an induction that will enable you to reach a place where your body is completely relaxed but your mind is completely alert.
• Explore your life path- find out where you are on your LIFE PATH when you are suffering from the feelings related to your particular problem.
• Ask for a Healing symbol- This symbol should be pleasing to you and be a vibrant colour (the colour is most important). You will go on to breath through your body for two minutes at a time, twice a day for two weeks after your first session.
• Breath your healing symbol-starting with a loving declaration for yourself in your suffering from the feelings related to your particular problem.
• Ask for your problem symbol- This symbol is very useful for also measuring your progress at the end of the two weeks. This symbol should not be so pleasing to you but should become more so after two weeks if healing is occurring.
• After two weeks check in with your problem symbol to note the changes. Also have a look at the scale of suffering. Your suffering should feel less.

There are many other aspects to this therapy covered in the book, such as:

• What happens after the two weeks?
• Working on many different problems at once.
• Working on different aspects of deep problems.
• What happens if the process doesn’t seem to be working etc.?

I only provided an outline for people to get an idea on whether they would like to learn more. If you would, I highly recommend purchasing the book or seeking out a Transpersonal Counsellor who can guide you in this process. If you have any questions regarding the therapy that I haven’t covered please contact me and I will do my best to answer you.

Please forgive the lack of image today but I am working on a borrowed computer (my hard drive died last week) and I don’t have access to my usual tools and images. :)