Several weeks ago I sent out an invitation to persons who receive my free newsletter to do an exercise I have found personally powerful that speaks to how to manifest recovery. The invitation was to jump ahead one year to and reflect back on everything you are grateful for. In other words, you set in motion the ability to manifest your dreams .

What follows is an email from Alan who has given permission to post here on the Parkinsons Recovery blog.

Robert Rodgers, Ph.D.
Pioneers of Recovery

Here is my list of gratitude on how to manifest recovery. I accompany it with a story from Autobiography of a Yogi, a long-standing classic.

A student went to his teacher/guru, having become quite sick.

“I see you have made yourself ill, said the teacher, but tomorrow you will feel better.”

Gladdened, the student went home and regained health. He returned to thank the teacher, who said,

“I see you have made yourself well. Who knows what tomorrow will bring?”

A wave of fear went through the student at the prospect of becoming ill again. He did become ill again and could hardly drag himself back to the teacher. Of course, the teacher said,

“You have again made yourself again indisposed.”

 The student, exhausted, asked the teacher what was going on.

“Really, it has been your thoughts that have alternatively made you feel weak and strong. You have seen how your health has exactly followed your subconscious expectations. Thought is a force, even as electricity or gravity.”

He then went on to explain that the mind is a spark of divine consciousness and that a thought, if believed intensely, would come to pass. pp.133-4.

I could certainly use some work on the intensity of thought, but doing the exercise that Robert suggested has helped me how to manifest recovery. I listened to his broadcast many times to be sure I understood it. Then, I took some planned time and made my list of improvements as if looking back on them from the previous year.

The next day, I found that I had planted those “subconscious expectations” mentioned above. For the past few weeks, that phrase “subconscious expectations” has been coming to mind. I wondered how I could set them up to be relieved of the symptoms of Parkinson’s. Without realizing it, this was the answer. Writing things out commits yourself to what you are writing. The next day. I kept thinking that change is possible and started acting as if it was happening.

The support for acting out change comes from within!! It is cool to see thought go to work for you. Everything will correspond. Of course, there is a battle between what is and what I can change. The nice thing is that the writing strongly plants new seeds in the mind of healthy thoughts because it is one of your actions–and it is free!

List of gratitude 

• • I restore full use of my left hand with flexibility and contractions are released.

• • My steady balance is restored.
  • I have excellent bladder control.
  • I regain and surpass the muscle mass that I have lost in the past few years.
  • I turn over spontaneously in bed while sleeping.
  • I live in a manner that improves my health, day by day.
  • As my symptoms disappear, my medications are reduced down to nothing.
  • Complete feeling returned to the left side of my body and face.

• • I advance in my career, personal growth, and wealth.

• • I easily chew and swallow all foods and liquids. Choking has ceased. I swallow saliva spontaneously.

• • I complete all tasks, intellectual and physical, easily with normal speed.

• • I walk efficiently with a normal gait and maintain a completely upright posture.

• • I lift and carry heavy items with ease.

• • I give positive encouragement to others.

It is necessary to have something in your mind besides devastation. I stayed positive and had faith in my first year and a half. I seemed to have spiritual healings but not so much physical ones. I was trying to defeat the “medical model”: it will progress.

That is all I knew and believed (from the Internet), and I did get worse in that time. I found Parkinsons Recovery at this time of year in 2008-9. I soon committed myself to recovery, starting with vitamins. I’ve had to fight progression, and it has been challenging. What is truly better this year is my eye viewing the scenery, close or far.

I am spontaneous at noticing things. My eyes flit about instead of stare, and I turn and notice things. Example: I heard some women laugh after a man spoke at the grocery checkout. I turned 180 degrees to see what that was. A tall man had just joked with three women who were facing him. I was surprised at my quick, turn around response. I have become more socially spontaneous, too.

Now, I hope to get into bodybuilding again. I understand how to manifest recovery. Two years ago, I couldn’t find any thoughts to desire it at all, and it had been a passion of mine. Listening to the music of Johann Strauss has freed me up to start thinking about mobility again. I can picture the ballroom dancers seen on youtube when I hear or think of this music. Prior to this, I couldn’t picture any motion at all.

Now, I need to expand my visualization to other activity. I used a study where one group exercised, one group imagined exercising, and another group did nothing. The second group improved, though not as much as the first. The third group made no improvement. This study told me that the mind will affect the body in regard to motion.

My biggest crisis this year was whether to go down in defeat or not. Howard Schifke said, if you fight Parkinson’s, it will fight you back. After that, I could see you can fight the whole thing–it may be fierce, but its fierceness does not have to beat you into a hole.

When you set up one therapy or practice you open up other possibilities of healing. I am excited with the effects already of making this list of gratitude for recovery in 2012.

Alan