Twelve years ago today, I got my final wake up call, my body’s final notification to make me sit up and take notice that there was something dreadfully wrong with my body…tremors.
As I have pointed out in the past, I had received polite, and not-so-polite, notifications that my physical body was falling into disrepair. I chose to ignore those notifications. Tremors got my attention.
I have discussed that the symptoms are not the problem with Parkinson’s, but instead, they are the messages that there is a problem, so we have to look behind them as to why we have them. Parkinson’s is a symptom…a message that says, “your life is out of balance.”
Parkinson’s…the symptom reflecting a life out of balance.
Physically, you are off balance. You move slowly and cautiously, often looking down instead of forward. What does that do? It puts your body in a posture that makes it virtually impossible to walk in a balanced manner. Your neck is bent, your spine is bent, the fluid in your semicircular canals is moved, and your visual frame of reference (important for balance) is your legs or the floor, and you acquire what is often referred to as a Parkinson’s gait.
Mentally, you then become off balance because you are afraid of falling or freezing, and you are afraid of the future with Parkinson’s. This is right where Parkinson’s wants you…not living in the moment, but instead living in the past (getting Parkinson’s) and being fearful of the future (life with long-term Parkinson’s).
Spiritually, you give up hope that you ever will get better. At that point Parkinson’s is winning.
Essentially, when you stare at your legs and feel unbalanced, you are looking at the past. When you feel unbalanced, you fear the future. How can you move forward in life in a balanced manner if you are staring backwards and it makes you fearful of where you are going? Faith.
Faith in yourself that you are the cure to your Parkinson’s, and that you can see your recovery through to the end. Yes, that carries a lot of responsibility, but you have help. You have the Parkinson’s Recipe for Recovery®. The Recipe is your road map to bring your soul, mind, and body back into balance.
Over time in my recovery, I came to see Parkinson’s as a grand opportunity to fix the things in my life that had gone out of balance. The Recipe provided me with the physical tools to re-balance my body, the mental tools to calm my mind and re-balance my emotions, and the spiritual tools to re-balance my soul and find again the essence of who I am.
Am I grateful for having had Parkinson’s? Yes. Through that bump in the road in a life already out of balance, Parkinson’s stood as a bump at a fork in the road leaving me two choices: 1. Fix the imbalances in my life and it would go away; and 2. Do not fix the imbalances in my life and it would stay with me forever. I chose the road less traveled, and I had no intention of doing anything other than the Recipe. Every day I did the Recipe to find balance in my life. And, every day that I awoke with Parkinson’s still there, it was a reminder that I still had more work to do.
However, in the end, when I awoke on June 12, 2010 with no Parkinson’s, I knew it was not coming back — I had re-balanced my soul, mind, and body, and I no longer needed the messages or symptoms known as Parkinson’s as a reminder that I had more work to do.
I was finished with that part of my life, and I am grateful for that as well.
You can do this, too. I know you can.
You are worth it!!!
All my best,
Howard
Yes we can do it! Yes we are worth it! Thank you very much Howard for constant reminders and encouragement!
Congratulations Howard for fighting and defeating Parkinson’s!
We are grateful for The Recipe and your willingness to share it. The positive impact of your work is real and appreciated.
Wow! It must be hard to imagine!
Godbless you Howard and your relentless positivity and encouragement, we are the lucky benefactors !!!!!
Looking forward to celebrating mine and my fellow warriors recovery one day soon too
Love, blessings and perseverance to ail – we don’t know what healings are around the next corner!
Hanging on in there Howard – you are a true inspiration. xx
Infinite gratitude Howard!!!!
We all are going to heal!!!! No doubt At all!!!!!
Love and gratitude to everyone!!!
When my hands first started moving without my willing them to, I didn’t even know the word “tremor”. But, yes, that really got my attention and brought forth a huge amount of fear, unlike anything I had experienced in my life. Fortunately for me~and that is an understatement !~ the internet existed and Howard had posted videos there of himself doing medical qigong. Qigong? I’d never heard that word either. He had an inspiring story, just what I needed to give me hope which I’d been lacking up until then.
I began to follow the Recipe for Recovery. I noticed that my tremors would subside while I did qigong and I enjoyed the qigong. I’d have liked to have just done qigong and not the other parts of the Recipe for Recovery. Something I had heard somewhere else in some other context said to “pay special attention to what you resist”, so I focused some attention on being sure that I wasn’t avoiding any parts of the Recipe. (I mention that here in case that resonates with someone who is skipping some part.)
Of the many wonderful metaphors Howard provided, for me, being inside an iceberg, chipping my way out was tremendously powerful.
All these years later, I can still see the image I formed clearly: me in the bluish light inside the iceberg, wearing a white lab coat, with my chisel, working steadily to carve my way to freedom. That image was empowering. And it also made me laugh and added a lightness to my endeavors.
What I have realized with time is that the me inside the iceberg working the chisel was the me who was already cured.
Very poetic, Marie. And an important reminder not to skip any part of the Recipe, although I find myself physically incapable of performing some elements. Also, although I do my best with the Medical Qigong for the Liver first thing in the morning, I am literally unable to do the evening repetitions because my balance has gone and my body is unresponsive. What do you do when you can’t do the Recipe? Thanks for sticking around to give us inspiration. And ever thanks to Howard for curing himself and then trying to take as many of us as possible with him. I wish we could have a mass outbreak of recovery!
Hello Val, Sorry, I did not see this until now. I always tried to do as much of the Recipe as I could and then to be grateful to myself for my efforts. I coupled my Persistence with Kindness to myself.
As for the limitations you currently have, one thing I have learned about qigong is that it is all about internal energy more than the movement. The movements help you to move your energy to remove blockages and balance your energy but you can also do it with a focused mind. If I were experiencing what you are, I would sit in a chair or lie in a bed and do any of the movement that I could, while visualizing the rest of it, focusing and trying to imagine how it would feel. For example, if you could bring your hands to the spots where they circle when you do the Medical Qigong for the Liver, and then think of moving the body side to side, as I’d you were doing the movement, then move your hands to the next place and think of the body bending forward and then standing. To me that is still worthwhile. You are doing it to the best of your current ability, neither giving up nor pushing yourself too hard.
That is what I do if for some reason I cannot do my qigong exercises. Sometimes I do them with my eyes closed, in my bed.
That is my own opinion. You might also ask Howard’s opinion.
Thanks, Marie. I love that realization about the me inside the iceberg working the chisel being the one who was already cured. That’s inspiring!
Again thank you for sharing this Howard. Very grateful. Still on my bike chipping away at it 😊 😀😀😀😀
Dearest Howard, have you been hiding your wings from us? Truly after one of our sessions or reading one of your blogs, both of which always arrive right when needed, I feel like I have been touched by an angel. Like my fellow warriors I salute you with gratitde and love. I am honored to be one of your students.
Thank you Howard and Marie for your inspirational stories. Hope someday it is all in the past for me too.
Thank you Howard and very grateful for sharing your inspirational recovery from PD. We too hope to recover one day.
Howard,
Thank you for your kind words of hope. I do the recovery plan daily because of PD.
I have a friend with Parkinsonism & I wonder if would work for her also. Her mobility and speech is poorly impacted.
Thank you, Howard, for cheering us “warriors” on! I am so grateful for your inspiration and for each one of you joining in this fight! Thank you!
Thank you dear Howard, and congratulation to your recovery 12 years ago, we
all can profit from you!!! We weren’t here on our healthy path, even we have to go still
towards recovery, if you wouldn’t have told us your wisdom!!! GREAT!!