(by Denise Runyon, MSW, LISW)
Role of Healer/Teacher/Mystic
When I was invited to be on the teaching team for the first Hurqalya Method™ training program, my experience was akin to that of a fish who had been plucked from a small pond and placed in a much greater one. It has been an incredible process and an immersion experience of learning “by heart”, which has required more surrender and unlearning than I could imagine.
My developments as a teacher and as a healer have depended very much on my heart connection to Susanna and Puran, the unseen beings, my fellow teachers, students and clients. With the help of my mentor I cultivated faith and the power inherent in the action of “being willing to step forward”, and learned to turn my listening inward to the subtle energy of my heart and body.
My teaching could not depend solely on my expertise in healing because I was learning along with everyone else. My initial teaching base was my spiritual knowledge and experience, archetype and realization. My specialty was the capacity to hold a group and to listen deeply. When my limitations were mirrored back to me by challenges that arose, this signaled that the container was too small.
I had to learn to hold my students with a reach that could support a diversity of personal life experience and a wide range of IAM experience. I expanded my capacity to provide support and space for my students’ to progress in their healing effectiveness regardless of whether it was within or beyond my own ability.
In the language of Quakers this is called “servant leadership” which means a process that is in service to the Divine. It could be seen as an “empowerment wheel”; one in which the power does not come from the top down, but from the process of keeping the vision/goal/ heart in clear view at the center and connecting the skills and strengths of everyone.
In keeping with our healing model, we can call this a “Caduceus Leadership” style in which the group becomes one heart, mind and body. My role has been to keep the energy flowing and circulating. I also could metaphorically represent the throat, or height of the heart center of this being, passing instruction from Susanna and Puran to the group and facilitating an integration of knowledge and skill that moves everyone forward.
Ultimately this role contributed greatly to a clarification and change in my archetype and realization.
Personal Healing: Loss of integration and Re-integration
At the Hurqalya Healing residency in Aug 2016 I received a profound healing from Susanna and Puran that resolved my enmeshment with my mother.
My mother’s deep wounds from a traumatic and tragic childhood had overshadowed our relationship. From an early age I overextended myself to assure and stabilize her out of fear that I would not survive, and compassion for her suffering.
In this process, I lost awareness of my own self, and could not identify my needs nor regulate my emotions with any clarity of what was mine and what was not mine. I was largely unaware of this until recently. Now I see that due to my emotional flooding I lost love relationships in my adult life, just as my mother had. I also had great passion, again as she had and had supported in me, to find purpose and meaning in my life, and a great longing for spiritual connection.
During this healing I felt my energy field drop open at my solar plexus and new vision and light at my third eye and crown. This experience was such a sudden expansion that I could hardly speak. The energy was refined and enormous, and my vision became clear light that reached the orange of my third center. I had no sense of space and time.
I saw that my purpose had revolved around the intention to heal my mother’s suffering from deep trauma. My commitment to this, coupled with a sense of incompleteness that it had not been fully achieved before she died, had left me with a deep energy leak. However, I was not aware of it.
During the healing, I became aware that my mother’s suffering could be resolved. I was also more keenly aware of how desperately I desired this. I have complete faith that this was completed with the healing assistance of Susanna and Puran. Afterwards I felt at peace and saw a sign of affirmation that my mother had been able to return to her family of origin as she had longed for her entire life. I felt a refined buzzing of my own energy with this release and a great emotional satisfaction that my mission was accomplished.
This was a bigger than life experience. I’m certain my vibration changed although I can’t put any detail to it. Who got healed in that healing? Whose mission was that? It’s interesting how my perspective grew over time to realize that this had been my healing or perhaps both my mother and I were healed, although it had been framed in my mind at the time as my mother’s healing.
With this resolved I wondered what would unfold next as my purpose. I felt I needed to wait to receive this; give it some time and space to let this new birthing occur. This process of integration has taken most of the last year to stabilize and continues to unfold.
During my process of integration after the healing at residency, I experienced a number of stages, some of which seemed strange and confusing, and two issues that surfaced as physical symptoms.
Stages I went through following my healing:
- Peace and contentment – for about two months.
I asked internally, what is my purpose now?
- Out of rhythm for a month and off and on for about six months
After a month or so I began to feel like I was adrift, becoming out of rhythm and uncentered. My mentor gave me a combination of practices for light, clarity and subtle energy. I was irregular in my practice and apathetic.
- Routine lab work showed that my pituitary (crown center) and thyroid gland (throat center) were both abnormally low in functioning. It is unusual for this to occur in both. A re-check three months later indicated normal functioning.
- Dreams over a period of four months
- I had several review dreams that were vivid and uncomfortable in which I felt guilty and regretful about the suffering I had caused or not prevented.
- I had a dream in which I received physical healing in my right breast. This is the site of a complicated cyst that the mammogram radiologists are too interested in, in my opinion. I negotiated with them to wait and re-check it. Six months later a re-check revealed no change and the radiologist relaxed.
- I had a significant dream about being relocated to a new purpose although it was difficult for me to interpret until more time passed.
- I had a dream about uninvited beings in my house. I was initially confused but gathered my focus and asked them to leave. This seemed to indicate my personal integration was weakening. My mentor gave me a practice to clear my mental lens and strengthen my inner faith. (Ya Mumin)
5. During Susanna’s Women’s Retreat in PA, seven months after residency, I was inspired to work on the next layer of healing around a decision I had made at age 23 to have an abortion; a crucible event for me that has been a deep well for my spiritual seeking and healing.
I believe this second center issue contributed to a chronic low-level depression that I have had most of my adult life with two episodes of severe depression.
Re-Integration
Ya Quddous has been a significant practice for me in clearing my throat center and healing the corresponding wound in my second center. I am experiencing more subtle energy and an increase in light.
More emotions have surfaced recently. I learned that I have been largely invisible to myself, and efforts to see myself through others have not really helped. They couldn’t see me because I couldn’t see me. I have also realized that my second and third center wounds/pain of “failing my ideal” have been my long-awaiting teacher.
I have felt a renewal of self that reveals my archetype more clearly. As a result my new purpose is taking shape and I have a greater ability to communicate from a level of understanding that is of a more subtle light and vibration. I have glimpses of joyful energy. More is coming.
The Hurqalya Method™
In retrospect my experience since my profound healing at the 2016 Hurqalya residency has taught me, in practical terms for the Hurqalya Method™, to anticipate the need for integrating and balancing the individual energy system at the close of a healing session and to provide follow up in subsequent sessions after a profound healing. I believe there is a need to emphasize this in our protocol.
I have developed some insights from my personal process about the importance of the throat center for working with second center issues and in the integration process overall. I have identified practices for this purpose that has been helpful to me and which I hope will be beneficial in our work with clients.
The Importance of the Throat Center
The throat center has emerged as a focal point both in my personal healing and in the most significant healing I’ve had with clients. Certain qualities of the throat center related to communication and vibration were missing and distorted for me.
These aspects of the Throat Center are significant in my healing integration and movement. From the 105 IAMU Web Course:
The Throat Center is of vibration, sacredness, and communication. The ability of a plant to communicate with other plants, making up an ecology, shows the Throat Center’s energy. There is an overall coordination between plants that together create an ecosystem.
This center holds the disturbing influences that we have encountered, and especially the violation of the sacredness of the human being. It holds a less personal kind of hurt than the heart. This center gives the ability to be a good listener, sensitive to others even when they are not present, articulate, able to translate inner signals and emotions into clear ideas.
When the Throat Center is strong, a person becomes “fine,” subtle, with an atmosphere of sacredness. When weak, a person is offended by the grossness of some people, or even all people, leading one to be reclusive. Often, people who are over-weight are insulating themselves from the distressing vibrations of others and of inharmonious situations.
The Throat Center is a megaphone for one’s thoughts and, with maturity, the thoughts of others whom one admires and to whom one dedicates one’s life, which become one’s own thoughts.
| The natural Throat quality | Missing quality | Distorted Energy |
| Articulate, Communication | Unable to express oneself | talking too much, hiding out in a cloud of nonsense speech, preventing others from being expressive |
— This section is from “The Use of Self-generated Sound to Tune Consciousness in Stages from the Personal to the Transpersonal”, by Susanna M. Bair, MA, presented at the World Council of Psychotherapy, Vienna, Austria, July 1996, Transpersonal Psychology Section
Practices that have been most helpful in my integration process
Ya Nur : The light that permeates all things, the fabric of the universe. It has no shadow since it has no direction. Nur is the essence of existence. The light is not created, it simply IS, and all creation proceeds from it. From this light all forms and colors emerge.
Ya Quddous: The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Guidance; the soul of all souls, the source and goal of all things and all beings, from which all comes and to which all returns. It is the Ether Breath, which is the source of all the elements and contains the sound of the ocean roar, the wind in the trees, the buzzing bees and the “eu” .
Ya Mumin – Faith: Mumin operates the “mental Lens” between the Heart and the mind. When this lens is clear, the overarching light of the heart becomes available to the mind, giving one confidence in the wisdom of the heart, the self.
It is my belief that Ya Quddous and Ya Mumin integrate the internal voices of the self, or personality, and play an especially important role in maintaining one’s integrity of the individual self.
Related Healing Experiences with Clients
It is probably not surprising that many of my Hurqalya clients presented with throat chakra symptoms and second center wounds. The Hurqalya interventions for the throat chakra have been instrumental in successful healing for many of them.
I have found “jaw tightness” as a presenting symptom in several of my clients who have had a history of second center injuries or wounds such as surgery in the sexual center organs, history of trauma, abortion, infertility or lack of sexual desire. While this jaw tightness symptom seems mild by comparison, and there may be no conscious connection to the second center on their part, I have actually found working on the throat center to be more effective than working on the second center directly.
Using interventions such as pull outs at the throat center and pairing the 2-5 centers has been every effective in relieving symptoms not only with the jaws but related emotional problems of the second center of depression and anxiety, shame, and distorted communication.
Case Example
My most profound healing experience has been with Client A. She’s a 64 year old woman who has done regular HRM meditation for several years.
She has few memories of her childhood and felt that she had “lost herself”. She presented with jaw tightness and a chronic ache in her SI joint on the left side. She’s had many years of massage and other kinds of energy work on these two areas without any lasting effects. These physical symptoms and history of family trauma point to a 2-5 energy center problem.
She talked about her family dynamics and the silence that surrounded a family tragedy when she was 13. Also around this same age, she experienced violence at home and a silence in her support community about it that undermined her faith.
During the recent political campaign for president, Client A had a dream in which she was being choked. This had been triggered by a public announcement about inappropriate sexual behavior by one of the candidates, and moreover, the lack of public concern in response, which implied a complicity by silence that was painfully close to her own experience of silence.
One session was particularly powerful. I worked on her jaws and throat center to address the jaw tightness. Client A had little to say and did not recall any memories, however she began to cough harshly, choke and gasp as her throat opened. I had never seen this strong a reaction before and offered to stop. She had such faith in Hurqalya Healing and such a desire to finally clear her problematic energy pattern that she asked to continue with the throat work.
When the session was completed she felt that a definite and profound release had occurred in her jaws and throat. Because she is an experienced HR Meditator, I gave her the Ya Quddous practice to support her healing process. This healing has been sustained for over six months at this point.
Emotionally she reported a clearing of shame and embarrassment that, in the past, she had felt after speaking in a group. She has also become more confident about expressing herself and better at listening to others.
Further, she strengthened her spiritual connection and trust in her heart’s desire. She had wanted to apply to IAMU for two years or more, but put it aside each time. This year she pursued application with the faith that she could work out any obstacles and she has been accepted to the IAMU class of 2019.
Conclusion
The throat center has become a key focus in my teaching role, my personal healing, and my professional development as a Hurqalya Method™ healer.
- Caduceus Leadership approaches a group as one heart, mind and body. Like the Hurqalya Method™ chakra model, this leadership centers on communication with attention to increasing and sustaining the flow and distribution of energy to serve the whole.
My role as a teacher evolved as one in which I represented the passageway of knowledge and transmission from Susanna and Puran to the students, and facilitated the space for students to voice their experiences, grow and learn from each other. As a result we all reached a higher level of heart consciousness, knowledge and practice skills.
Attention to integration is important in our Hurqalya Method™ process, especially after a large amount of energy has been shifted. These practices are particularly useful:
- H2 pairing of the corresponding centers (1-7,2-5,3-6) and connecting the chakras to the heart brings integration of the lower and higher energies of the chakras.
- The use of integrative breath and sound practices to bring the energies of the higher centers and the lower centers to harmonize in the heart.
- The H3 level of the Hurqalya Method™ to clear the lenses; to purify and integrate the light of the soul template, to the heart, mind, and body.
I believe the evidence is pointing to the following results that could be very interesting to track in the database about the benefits of working on the throat center:
- Physical: Relief of physical and emotional symptoms in the sexual center when the throat center (jaws, back of neck, thyroid) receives an energetic intervention.
- Emotional: Reduction in anxiety and depression, distortion in communication, related to trauma and shame (held in the back of the throat).
- Spiritual: When the throat passage opens, the energy flow between the upper chakras and the heart increases. The spirit of guidance (Ya Quddous) connects with the heart center and sustains the integrity of the individual self. The mental lens, Ya Mumin, increases confidence and faith in the Divine Unity of the Heart.
Bless All that We Receive in Thankfulness
I am deeply and forever grateful for this opportunity to participate in the birth of the Hurqalya Method™. To all those who have given their energy and love in the conception and gestation that preceded the manifestation of this program I bow with awe and grace to your faith, vision, light, and devotion, especially to Susanna and Puran Bair, my beloved teachers, mentors, and healers. To all those who follow in service to the path of the Hurqalya Method™, especially my beloved students, and all those who receive the services, I honor you. Praise be to Thee!
Denise is an iamHeart teacher, mentor and Co-Dean of the Hurqalya Method™ School of Healing. She aspires to Live from the Heart. She embraces and inspires personal, social, and spiritual healing and transformation using Heart Rhythm Meditation. This builds on her 30+ year career in community social work. Denise and her husband have founded the Friends of the Heart Center in Yellow Springs, Ohio to create the culture of the heart.