It wasn’t until I studied holistic therapies that I became aware of the word ‘practitioner’. For me, this meant someone that had trained in something specific, such as massage, physiotherapy, counselling or aromatherapy. If I am really honest, once I got my qualification in Reflexology and holistic therapies and started practising, there was definitely an element of “Here I am – I have finally got somewhere in my life,” even though I knew I was kidding myself and it was only the beginning and there was a lot more to learn.
Indeed, there was a lot more to learn! Even though I was a ‘practitioner’, I was not looking after my health and wellbeing, or taking care of myself. I was not eating well, I was eating on the go, and not listening to or honouring my body, which eventually led to an illness that forced me to stop being a ‘practitioner’ and go back to work in an office environment while looking at my health.
It wasn’t until a few years later that I heard the term ‘practitioner’ being used in the office workplace. People were calling themselves practitioners and at the time I felt this was really strange. Why would you do that? A practitioner was someone that had a qualification and worked in the bodywork / therapy industry, not a team Manager!
Through Universal Medicine, what I have come to realise is that actually we are all practitioners, no matter what our age, qualifications or job role; that each and every one of us has something to bring or reflect to another person.
This was made really clear to me while I was on a recent training course, where the room was set up with the person at the front of the room as the trainer ‘teacher’, and the people listening as the ‘students’.
It was a long and painful day and it wasn’t until the end of the day, when we did a group exercise, that everyone in the room came alive. The ‘students’ were talking about the young people they were working with, sharing their experiences until eventually at one point everyone in the room was helping each other with the cases they were working on.
For me this was gold and very valuable, far more valuable than everyone sitting facing one person listening to them talk. It emphasised that we are all practitioners, that is, we all have our lived experiences and know if these have truly supported ourselves and others, or not. We all have access to the same innate wisdom within us, whether young or old. It is just a case of whether we know how to connect to this or not. Being a practitioner is not a title, it is a way of living – how we live and what we learn from choices, either good or bad, that we have made. It is a forever learning and evolving.
I am continually inspired by Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine who consistently reflect to me that we are all practitioners of life.
By Vicky Cooke, London
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I agree with you Vicky when you say
“Being a practitioner is not a title, it is a way of living – how we live and what we learn from choices, either good or bad, that we have made. It is a forever learning and evolving.”
What life is showing me is that every day is the same day repeated over and over again, it is what we do with the day that matters. We have an opportunity to imprint each day and build on the day before, to look at what happened and to then go forward knowing that we can change how we are. Every day is a fresh start a new potential. This changes everything, as how can we find life dull or boring if every day we have the possibility of starting afresh.
Our Livingness will keep us practicing life and all the things that as a practitioner are required for us to reflect the Love of God to everyone we meet.
When we consider ourselves practitioners within our workplaces it makes us aware of the responsibility we have in sharing our wisdom – so we all keep learning and growing alongside each other.
I totally agree that we are ‘practitioners of life’ and age is not a factor, wisdom is within us all. This is removing this old belief that our young ones voice isn’t important, they are just as wise and their presence is just as equal as our elders.
So true – we are already an authority, of our own life – whatever that is we are living and that doesn’t need a qualification, and that is what we practice, through our skills and expertise. It’s the communication and exchange of vibrations.
It’s wonderful to redefine the word practitioner… In the same way that so many words… Commitment, purpose, religion and love are being redefined
It is becoming so obvious to me that, yes, I am a practitioner of life, but that starts with being my own practitioner first, in the way I care for myself and the choices I make every day. If I chose not to look after me in the most loving way then what quality of livingness do I bring to another, whether it is at work, at home or simply being out in life? Being a practitioner of life comes with the responsibility of living a life that is truly loving, for self and for all.
I recently had a moment where I could feel something changing within me and it had to do with religion, in that many religions teach us to look outside of ourselves to worship God. This is the lie the majority of us have fallen for. When we stop looking outside of ourselves and turn inwards, then we will find the treasure we have all been looking for; it is our connection to God and heaven. When we connect to this pot of gold, then we can share this with all others so that they can find their pot of gold within themselves too.
‘Practitioner’ someone who practices, so as we are all practicing how to evolve each lifetime we are all practitioners of life.
Again the corruption of words interferes with us embracing the power of our livingness, and in this case with the misunderstanding of what a practitioner means. For a true practitioner is one that reflects the quality of our Soul, in which a healing room, workplace, at home or in every aspect of our lives, all hold equal value. We all are born fully qualified to practice such a way of living, which we all can activate whenever we are willing to connect to our Soul.
What I love about what you have shared here Carola is ‘we are all born fully qualified to practice such a way of living’. Currently I do not feel that we, humanity, as a whole get that life is a lesson for us to heal and change old ways, to practice something different, to make more loving choices, therefore being a practitioner of our own life which is very empowering.
That is correct we all have a place in this world and how awesome will it be when we realise this and can benefit from each others expertise.
I too held this belief that ‘practitioners’ were people who came under the umbrella of health or healing modalities. But what’s been shared here is so true and confirming, we are all practitioners of life and we could offer this to others.
I currently have a work colleague who is showing me that it is possible to keep changing and not get stuck in a comfortable life. This person has had to make many changes in their life which they found very challenging at first, but now they are reaping the benefits by putting all the doubts and struggles that they had to one side and come out of their comfort zone and embrace life. If they can do this then surely I can too.
Simply reconnecting to our bodies, allowing ourselves to go through those doorways within, we all do become practitioners, integrity, honesty and clear living.
It is definitely not about knowledge; it is about being able to connect to a deeper wisdom and start walking it.
Yes and in walking our truth, impulsed by our connection to our Soul we reflect the vibration that we all are in essence, one that offers evolution.
The walking in our truth that you speak of Carola Woods comes from a stillness in our bodies, which I feel is the connection to our soul. The stillness is always there, we are not always aware of it because of the raciness or motion we accept as our ‘normal’ way of life. Our spirit has set up the raciness deliberately so we do not have the connection to the stillness. When we do finally reconnect back to the stillness it’s learning how to move in and with the stillness especially when we are driven by our spirit, who rejects any form of stillness and is the perpetrator of keeping us all in motion as in stillness it feels the pull of the one soul.
What a wonderful connection… Practitioner and integrity… Imagine them becoming synonymous with each other.
I was recently at an Esoteric Women’s Health event called Wellbeing for Women, it was local to my area and attended by 30-40 women. We had two hosts presenting but they really just initiated the conversation and women in the audience were adding to it, and then we spilt into small groups of 4 to workshop a topic together. It was so supper supportive because every women added to and expanded the conversation. Every women’s voice was needed for everyone to come to a place of greater healing. We are definitely all practitioners of life with much to offer.
Melinda it feels that what you are sharing was something that was practiced many years ago; that women gathered as a way of supporting themselves and the community, that women played a greater role in society than they do today. To me it feels as though it is the women who are the glue of society and if they are out of alignment to themselves then the rest of society is out of alignment, which I feel is what we are witnessing today.
We are all practitioners of life, but first and foremost, we are partitioners of ourselves.
When I have considered myself a practitioner in the mechanical field of work I am in, it has brought a whole new level of personal responsibility to everything I do, as I consider it the same as if I was doing direct body work on a client, whether I am interacting with my co-workers, at home making dinner, or talking on the phone with a friend. Every movement we make has an effect on our bodies and thus with not only everyone we are in direct contact with, but carries over to other people later on. So if I decide to just check out at night and watch a YouTube video on airplanes (speaking from experience here) because I don’t want to feel something that happened at work that day, when I go into work the next day I might carry over that same disconnected state of being and not be able to connect and work with other people as effectively, and am more likely to make mistakes.
It makes sense that the word ‘practtioner’ comes from the word ‘practice’ and we are all practicing how to live and when we work together to support each other we are all practitioners of life.
We have so much wisdom inside that we can connect to, it makes us all practitioners of life because when we allow it, the wisdom comes through us and everyone can access it.
Yes, I also love it in workshops when participants all start to interact, share together, help each other… It’s the way it can be.
True Vicky ‘being a practitioner is not a title, it is a way of living – how we live and what we learn from choices, either good or bad, that we have made. It is a forever learning and evolving.’ It is a responsibility we have 24/7 where ever we are or what we are doing, the accent is on the quality we bring.
I totally agree we are all practitioners of life, we all come with a different flavour and see things from different angles and because of this we all reflect the same thing slightly differently to each other.
I love the idea that I am a practitioner of life and that I am here to share my vast lived experience with the world. But I also realise that just because I have lived for many years it doesn’t make me any wiser than the young children that I am with often. Even though these beautiful children haven’t lived as many years as I have, the wisdom that they share that often stops me in my tracks makes them also, practitioners of life.
Hi Ingrid, very true, it is great to dispel the ill belief that the older people because of their age are wiser, they are not. A child can hold and express equally the same wisdom (if not more!) than an adult.
A practitioner to me, means responsibility, so why would we all not want to be responsible for how we are living and effecting others?
We are practitioners of our own lives as we observe and understand the choices we make in every aspect of our lives. We each have our own wisdom and light to share from our livingness.
“We all have access to the same innate wisdom within us, whether young or old. It is just a case of whether we know how to connect to this or not. Being a practitioner is not a title, it is a way of living…” This is a diamond of a sentence. So many young children speak pearls of wisdom – they have access which so often gets hidden as they grow, due to forces coming at them form their environment. But though hidden it need not be buried forever and can be re-discovered, as so many students of Universal Medicine have found.
Being a practitioner is simply the way we live… What a beautiful statement, and how this is so absolutely embodied in the esoteric practitioners association.
I recently attended Sacred Esoteric Healing Level 3 held by Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine in the UK. The course, amazing pails into insignificance with what was presented here. The quality, integrity, wisdom, care and absolute love was clearly felt. So much was given and nothing spared or held back .. it was life changing. During the course there were many times where each person is either a practitioner giving a session or a client or is a client receiving a session. I reflected this morning whilst driving ‘do I live the depth of care, presence love and magic that was offered to me whilst being a practitioner in my everyday life?’ .. the answer was no, not currently. Highlighting once again that being a practitioner of life is in the way we live and each move we make not in the role or roles we do. No judgement but great to feel so this can be changed.
A practitioner in life is testing out life in all situations and exploring, experimenting and refining all the time. A practitioner is not a comfort situation where everything is mapped out and we can follow a book. A practitioner is engaging with life in every moment and dealing with it as it happens. A practitioner is someone who is committed to being in a relationship with life.
Adele there is something in what you have shared here
“A practitioner is someone who is committed to being in a relationship with life.”
Is it possible we have forgotten how to be in a relationship with life and have instead withdrawn our full participation and in the withdrawn state we miss out on the magic that is there waiting to be shared?
It’s empowering to let go of the idea that without a qualification we don’t really qualify to be a member of society. It’s amazing just how much is there to be taught and learnt from our own selves.
We all equally have the same access to the wisdom of the Universe when we choose to align and live in connection to our soul.
We all have great wisdom to offer and share at any age throughout our life. As this wisdom is accessible to each and every one of us and is embodied as such through the way we choose to live, in which we can naturally then support, inspire and confirm each other to grow and evolve.
We each bring a piece of the party and it’s amazing when we all work together with that, it’s brings a greater depth for everyone. Everyone is needed.