Report of Last Meeting, April 3rd.
Pat Sawyer. NLP in Health and Healing.

Pat began with her personal story of how she dealt with an aggressive lymphoma in her neck. This was the start of an empowering and fascinating session, full of inspiration and told with humour and sensitivity.

Pat started by relating her early committment, once the cancer was diagnosed, to find her own 'self-healing' package to bring herself back to optimum health without the cancer. She was determined to avoid chemotherapy & radiotherapy, but kept close contact with the cancer unit and specialists at her local hospital, for whom she was full of praise. Pat emphasied throughout her talk that she had devised her own system and her role as a coach for others who have cancer is to empower them to choose the path that best suits them, to incorporate their own mix of therapies, including drugs and NHS help if that is important to them.

Pat's first decision was to produce a model of healing for herself. This involved 1) stopping the cancer cells from growing further; 2) Boosting her immune system; 3) working to promote general good health.
Dealing with No 1 when she had ruled out chemotherapy and radiotherapy meant finding alternative treatments, and Pat researched widely via health professionals and the internet to come up with anti cancer treatment that fitted into her model of healing. An important part of this was to create a strong internal reference (mental picture / visualisation) of the site of the cancer, which was a large lump on her neck. Pat turned this into a 'Hospice' for the cancer cells and set her 'T' cells the task of loooking after and caring for the dying cancer cells. She would visit the 'Hospice' several times a day and talk to the dying cells and to the caring 'T' cells. The visualisation grew as the cancer cells died off to include a special tunnel from the hospice to the organs of elimination, which was a totally protected passage for disposal of dead cells. This was all part of Pat's containment process to keep all cancer cells in one place and one place only in her body. She chose the 'Hospice' because, after all, the cancer cells were part of her and she wanted to treat them with the respect that she wanted for the rest of her body. She also undertook to fund her own treatment, an important part of taking full responsibility for her own recovery.
Pat's prior knowledge of immunity from her work as a body therapist helped her to focus on how best to boost her system and she used a combination of diet and supplements to help her, and to bring her body to optimum health.

Having got a grasp on her bodily needs, Pat turned her attention to enlisting a team to support her Emotionally, Spiritually and Physically. This was a time to notice who in her life was positive and helpful and who took more than they gave. As a 'giver' by nature Pat made a conscious effort to avoid people who drained her energy and sought out people who boosted her energy. To become well again meant putting herself first.
Pat used 'very basic' NLP techniques. Empowering questions; Reframing and the use of humour, (don't become the condition); Visualisation; Parts work; Chunking; Rapport; Self talk; Resource gathering; and doubtless many others she forgot to mention.!

We all got very involved in asking Pat questions and exploring our own understanding of cancer and its treatment / care, so we reached the drinks break without having done any of the exercises that Pat had prepared for us. Resolving to do better after the break we split into groups of three and played with the sample questions Pat had brought us. I found a small condition to question and discovered that something I considered to be unimportant and beyond my control (limiting belief?) could be usefully reframed. The questions certainly help to expose things I am hanging onto for no good reason.

Unfortunately we ran out of time before we could play with Visualisations or the Healing Paradigm exercises, both look good to explore, for personal use and with others.
Thank you Pat for sharing your story with us and also your own solutions. All through the evening I was aware of Pat's congruity with the pre-supposition of NLP that 'Everyone is doing the best they can', and to allow other people to operate effectively in 'their own model of the world'.
Pat has written a book, "Coaching through Cancer"
The book is for people concerned about cancer, to give them hope, ideas and inspiration. It is for the medical profession, as a small contribution to the wake up call that chemotherapy and radiation are NOT the only way forward.
Pat has written the book in the same attitude that she lives her life with humour ever present or bubbling under the surface. It is a light hearted and honest account of her journey through cancer.
ISBN 1-903970-64-4 price £7.99
For details on purchasing send an e-mail to Chris Senior, address below or ask your regular book supplier, quoting the ISBN number.:-
chris@centralpublishing.fsnet.co.uk
 

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