As Arizona Public Media (APM) reported in 2015, Native American healing traditions are embraced by treatment facilities of a wide variety–drug rehabilitation, domestic violence, abuse and trauma centers, and more. As the APM “Native Healing” video describes, “[m]ore and more mental health and substance abuse treatment facilities are turning to traditional American Indian ceremonies and practices, yet researchers are still trying to figure out why they help people heal.” And, yet, it is working.
You can find people of Native American heritage inhabiting every corner of the North American continent today. And, their history of Native American healing traditions reach back as early as the migration of Native peoples’ ancestors from Eurasia to the Americas approximately 60,000 to 25,000 years ago.
These Native American healing traditions include a far-ranging group of spiritual healing practices, some of which I’ll go into here, but foremost, we all must reflect on the profound effect culture-based healing has on our understanding and relationship of modern medical science.
Integrating Spiritual Healing and Western Medicine
A complication with the spiritual healing practices of the indigenous American peoples is that no two tribes or practices are the same. Small differences in rituals abound among the various nations. These healing traditions pass down orally throughout the generations, so it’s natural that minor changes occur. Notwithstanding, they have a common thread that weaves them together across these tribes. And, the veracity of these healing practices continue to prove useful in traditional healthcare environments. So much so, that last year, Melissa Lewis, PhD, at the University of Minnesota Medical School, Duluth campus, as reported by the Association of American Medical Colleges, led the first required medical school curriculum on Native American healing customs.
It’s also worth noting that while these are spiritual practices, they are not specifically religious doctrines. You can embrace these Native cultural healing practices without changing belief systems. It’s about embracing your connection to your own spiritual being.
As an example, a research study out of Montclair University, entitled “An Exploration of Physiological Responses to the Native American Flute,” concluded that, “the Native American flute may merit a more prominent role in music therapy and that a study of the effects of flute playing on clinical conditions, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), hypertension, anxiety, and major depressive disorder, is warranted.” In connecting with the music and your own spirit, as is customary in these healing rituals, this Native American music therapy has shown great promise in helping with these illnesses and disorders.
In the 2011 National Institutes of Health’s National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine study, “Indigenous Native American Healing Traditions,” modern “Native Americans frequently combine traditional healing practices with allopathic medicine to promote health and wellbeing. Ceremony, native herbal remedies, and allopathic medications are used side by side. Spiritual treatments are thus an integral part of health promotion and healing in Native American culture.” Without the discomfort of connecting spirit and body, mind and emotions, allopathic healthcare providers can provide greater care to patients, as is evidenced by the work of Native American healers.
Four Directions and the Medicine Wheel
Four Directions Wellness is founded on the conceptual framework of the body, emotion, mind and spirit. And, it’s not by coincidence that the Native American culture is also based on these four fundamental elements. They are not simply these four components, as they can be looked at in many ways; the four seasons (i.e., summer, winter, spring and autumn), elements (air, earth, fire and water), stages of life (birth, youth, adulthood and death), and so on.
This multifaceted view of the way in which all things are connected, Native American culture and its health are uniquely intertwined. This is also sometimes called the Medicine Wheel, or Sacred Hoop, and is a way of viewing the world that is different from the more limited scope of traditional medicine.
In a future article, I will explore the Native American ceremonies, tools, and plant-based medicines that are incorporated into the Medicine Wheel and the Native Americans’ views of whole being health and wellness.
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Americans tend to be rapt in the narrative about the devastation inflicted upon the indigenous peoples of our continent. The robbery of language, culture and land. However, it is just as important to attend to the positive and radical acceptance of Native American healers. They are accepting of healthcare practitioners learning from Native American healing traditions and helping others with their ancient wisdom. We cannot rewrite history for the better, but we can write new chapters for the mind, body, emotion and spirit connected by many cultures to heal, together.
If we can continue to study the effects of Native American healing practices in complement with allopathic medicine, this integrative, complementary medicine approach will allow for a culture affected so greatly to flourish again in new and exciting ways.