Sharon Martin – Shamanic Healing
Sharon Martin holds a doctorate in Physiology and worked as a research scientist and as faculty at Emory University School of Medicine. At Emory, she was awarded the University-wide teaching award. Subsequently, she trained at and graduated from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and finished a medical residency in Internal Medicine. Dr. Martin served as Chief Resident during her last Internal Medicine residency year. Dr. Martin holds membership in the American College of Physicians, the national organization for Internal Medicine physicians. She is certified by the National American Board of Internal Medicine. Dr. Martin is a certified graduate of the Four Winds Society’s Healing the Light Body curriculum, a premier training program in shamanic energy medicine. She is currently the Medical Director of a Rural Health Clinic in south-central Pennsylvania. She also hosts two radio shows, Maximum Medicine and Sacred Magic, aired on the syndicated network Transformation Talk Radio.
On Interview with Sharon Martin – Shamanic Healing
OMTimes: You are a medical doctor treating people daily. Why have you embraced the work of shamanic healers?
Sharon Martin: For me, the first benefit is knowing, as the ancient healers knew, that unseen forces are at play in our human destiny and that to ally ourselves with these forces can significantly shift the outcome of any life challenge. To truly work holistically with someone, I need to view that person in all their capacities, including their soul’s journey, and see the changes in their energy field. The shamanic approach to healing is holistic and all-encompassing. Humans are not separate from the rest of the seen or unseen world, a knowing the ancient medicine men and women lived and breathed.
OMTimes: How do you incorporate your shamanic work in your day-to-day clinical work?
Sharon Martin: One of the principal teachings in shamanic techniques is that of perspective. Something may look true from one lens but entirely different when seen through another. For example, someone may complain about chronic back pain, but the pain persists despite multiple traditional interventions. When seen as the downstream effect of a soul contract, one’s perspective is shifted to recognizing that the wayward physical state should be fixed at a deeper soul level. In looking through all lenses, one can more easily find the solution.
OMTimes: What did training in shamanic healing teach you?
Sharon Martin: It taught me that humans are far greater than we know and have access to resources in realms we may not see. Learning and then deeply knowing that we are part of the vast, interdependent web of consciousness was marvelous, expanded knowledge.
OMTimes: What can we do to heal ourselves?
Sharon Martin: The first essential step is to believe that our thoughts create our reality and that our thoughts when laser-beam focused into intentions, can shift our destiny. Focusing our awareness on our desire to heal dramatically impacts our ability to change the outcome. A second critical step is cultivating our alliances with higher energy resources – Nature, Spirit, and enlightened beings. We are not alone and can call on these Helpers to assist in transforming our challenges.
OMTimes: Why do you think including the mystical in your work is important?
Sharon Martin: Bringing in the mystical opens the windows of our world and expands our sense of Self and our place in the cosmos. Just experiencing that expansion is healing in and of itself.
OMTimes: How would you describe energy medicine, and how can it help the average patient in your office?
Sharon Martin: For me, energy medicine’s primary teaching is that we have an energy field that interacts with people, places, times, and events and influences our physiology. Multiple stories and avenues for changing the predominant physical state are held within the energy field. Even without being a trained practitioner of energy medicine, a patient can start to sense their energy body and, with focused awareness and thought, communicate with the energy body to improve how chi or life force flows from the energy body into the physical. I teach several techniques in my book, Maximize Your Healing Power.
OMTimes: Is it possible for all of us to work with the energy field, and if so, where do we start?
Sharon Martin: As I teach in my book, cultivating our ability to sense our energy field allows us to visualize when and where our field is in disrepair. The Peruvian Inca, and other indigenous peoples, see the energy body as an egg-shaped field around us, extending outside our physical form, pulsing with vibratory Life Force. We then can sense this for ourselves or practice looking at the energy fields of others. Quickly, we can see where things are stagnant or blooming and where things are depleted or overly full. Then, we move on to focused awareness and directed thoughts to make shifts. I call these clearing practices.
OMTimes: What role do our thoughts and beliefs play in our illnesses and healing?
Sharon Martin: Nothing is more potent than our beliefs. If we do not believe we can heal or change the outcome, it is doubtful that we will. If the best we can do at the time is to suspend disbelief, then one should start there. Suspend disbelief and allow the possibility that something could be different. Then a significant hurdle is overcome.
OMTimes: Why are Nature and the Earth so important to your teachings?
Sharon Martin: First, humans do not exist separately from the Earth and the elements of Nature inhabiting the Earth. Second, the forces of the Earth and Nature are vastly more potent than one human being; being aware of these forces, working in concert with these forces, and even making alliances with these forces adds substantial power to the trajectory of our destiny.
OMTimes: In the Maximize Your Healing Power, you also talk about Nature providing helpers such as nature spirits, dragons, and power animals. How is connecting to these things help our healing?
Sharon Martin: The Universe has many different energetic currents and vibratory patterns. Some are called enlightened beings, nature spirits, dragons, etc. Some hold energies that resonate with the healing currents we wish to have for ourselves. When we connect with these energies, we ask our field to align with these, and in doing so, we are expanding the repertoire of our field. These alignments can shift our current energetic pattern into a better, more healed one.
OMTimes: Medicine seems to be becoming more technical and rooted in the Western scientific model – are we moving toward more technology? Or can these simple traditional teachings also influence how the medical world works with patients in the future?
Sharon Martin: The best medicine is a Venn diagram of the intersection between mainstream medicine, shamanic techniques, and energy medicine. The more expanded the awareness of the practitioner and the more willing they are to pull from different schools of thought can only benefit the client.
OMTimes: Why is ritual important in the healing process?
Sharon Martin: A ritual done in concert with Spirit (in sacred space) invokes the highest of ourselves and our consciousness and brings that to bear on the healing intention. And, if rituals have been performed for millennia, the very act comes with the energies of thousands who have passed before. The power, therefore, is incredible.
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