You have powerful tools for making progress right in your own hands—and your eyes, nose, mouth, ears and heart. By actively using all six of your senses, you can harness great energy for moving forward and be filled with pleasure in the process. Whether you need to make progress in healing or in realizing other goals, your senses are your inborn allies.

I say this with confidence because my own recovery from advanced cancer has been so empowered by engaging my senses. They have worked like keys to unlock deep resources and capacities. From my cells to my spirit, I have been blessed by my interaction with the living elements around me. In the face of intense challenge, they have helped me to become new. I hope this brief celebration of the senses will support you in your own exploration.

How Does It Work?

Using your senses to become new involves drawing in the beauty-essence of the natural world through each sensory channel. For instance, you can take in the sight of a colorful rose, inhale its scent and touch its soft petals. The uplifting beauty-essence of the flower is really the active agent, and your senses are the means by which you absorb that essence. Input from the senses triggers the organic messaging system that activates responses in your body, mind and spirit. Both modern science and sacred science confirm this effect. We are constantly responding to the sensory stimuli around us. When what we take in feels good to us, it alters our state toward health and optimum functioning.

I use the rose as an example because I have gotten so much healing pleasure from that specific plant. When I first got my diagnosis of stage 4 breast cancer, I knew I had to gain space from the doom that seemed to represent. I had been working with essential oils for some years and was aware that rose oil has perhaps the highest vibration of all the essences. The smell of roses has the capacity to truly lift the spirits and ease the heart. Whenever I began to feel stuck in negativity, I opened the bottle on my desk and breathed it in deeply. I had been lucky to receive a bottle of rose oil as a gift. Since it is extremely expensive, I mostly just smelled the oil. But if I felt overwhelmed, I would put a tiny drop on my heart. 

I grow roses on my deck, so I also spent time outside with the flowers. Their visible beauty gave me new life through my eyes, while their scent comforted me. I further worked with the roses by creating images out of them. My husband, David Sun Todd, and I create healing art sourced in natural objects. In this case, we put our rose blossoms directly on our digital scanner and turned them into vibrant mandalas. (See my "CenterPeace" Mandala, above right.)

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