By Terrah Baker Lilian Bern sits in one of her favorite spots at the Rogers Adult Welness Center. She said being in nature is healing, which is why she focuses one of her workshops specifically towards "The Healing Power of Nature."
“Understanding energy anatomy holds the key to true healing, rather than just masking our symptoms, because it offers a comprehensive and holistic view of how each of us co-creates health or disease.” – Christiane Northrup, M.D.
By Terrah Baker
Since she was a little girl growing up in South America, Lilian Bern, M.F.C.T., knew her mission was to help heal the world – animals, humans and the environment.
Before she could do that, she had to address one of the most troubling questions many healers often do – why do people hurt each other, and themselves so much?
By combining her interest in biology from when she first began her education, her lingering interest in humanistic studies, and her spiritual way of understanding the world, she discovered what she feels is the most affective way of carrying out her life’s mission – holistic healing.
For someone first delving into the theories behind holistic healing, it can get confusing with its intertwining ideas and concepts. In fact, the problem with much of our society is that we can’t see how things are interconnected, and how one destructive pattern can fuel another.
“I think systemically between people, and the world and the universe. It’s all interrelated,” Bern said. “So I made up the name holistic therapist because I’ve always seen the world as a whole, and how everything is connected and influences everything else.”
Under this theory, for someone to truly heal and begin being healthy, they must first understand how they think, because it determines what they do. The other important concept lies in understanding the flaws in the traditional practice of medicine and psychology.
“When we have manifestations of something we don’t want, something that’s troublesome or a symptom or an ache, traditional medicine will treat the last manifestation or symptom. In a holistic approach, that makes no sense at all,” she said.
In her approach, Bern realizes that the origin of the disturbance is what’s important, not the disturbance itself. So in her practice, she looks for the multiple causes, going deep into the history and mindset of her patients and those who attend her workshops.
“One of the misconceptions is that it’s linear – One cause, one consequence. It really looks like a spiral – one cause creates some consequences and it goes on. The causes are never in the symptom itself,” she said.
After studying humanistic psychology, where she learned her traditional skills of therapy, she began to study how people communicate with each other through family therapy, which allowed her to see how people interact and trigger each other. She then became a Milton Erickson, M.D. hypnotherapist to learn how to address the subconscious and the unconscious.
Bern’s said one important way to heal holistically is to realize that the unconscious is actually present in our own bodies.
“The unconscious is not out there somewhere, it’s here, in the energy field that’s part of our being and in the body. People’s unconscious memories are physical,” she explained.
Knowing this, she can better understand how people’s past experiences affect their overall health, and style of communication.
She has taught her Effective and Compassionate Communication workshop for the last 40 years, improving it along the way, she said. This class – one of which is set to be held at Unity of Fayetteville starting Sept. 13 – is meant to help people begin the process of healing through communicating without arguing, avoiding or fighting.
“We practice internal attitudes of openness, nonjudgment and willingness to connect and respect,” Bern said.
Her workshops vary and include concepts like the healing power of nature, holistic living, youthing instead of aging, cellular trauma release work and even conversational Spanish. With these classes, which are often paid for on a sliding income-scale, she hopes she can make some progress on her childhood dream of healing the world.
For more information about Bern’s classes or holistic healing methods, contact her at lilianbern@aol.com or by phone at 479-387-2108.
