The old monk was ill and far from his homeland. When asked about his illness, he had great difficulty making himself understood. Various tests were applied and remedies tried, but it was clear he was getting worse as each day passed. The abbot grew desperate and decided to send him to a nearby monastery up the California coast, famous for its beautiful grounds and near a well-established center for Chinese medicine. 

            Here the monk was received in a manner befitting one of so many vassas and assigned a vihara where he was to live with one other monk who would attend to his needs. The two men became friends from the first meeting. The days passed and the elderly monk was treated by the very best medical practitioners, but he grew worse. 

            The monk’s friend noticed that whenever the monk was asked to describe his symptoms, he repeated the same words and often he would point at the door or window and say these same words.The friend found several monks in the community who knew the ailing monk’s country and its language, but each of them upon hearing him speak would shake his head and say it was in a dialect rarely spoken these days, even in his native land. One day, however, a very learned monk came to visit the monastery from the homeland of the elderly monk. The friend, when told of this, rushed to find the visitor. Eagerly he told him the words his friend kept repeating. The visiting monk frowned, but then he began to nod.

            “Down wind from flowers,” he said, and a smiling light came into his eyes. “He wants to be down wind from flowers.”

            So each day the monk’s companion took him into the gardens along the hillside and saw to it that he sat on a bench in a sunny spot downwind from flowers. By the end of the summer he was healed and whole again. 

                        As told to R Messer by Dr. M. Adams 10/24/15

This is a true story, one of the most interesting aspects of which is that the monk intuitively knew what he needed to restore his health, body, mind, and soul: the essence he needed was the essence of flowers.

            (Some of you may be aware of Dr. Edward Bach’s work regarding flower remedies. Hanna Kroeger is another person who researched this area.)

            People have been healed by so call “Alternative” methods of healing ever since there have been healers; long before allelopathic medicine, M.D.s etc. came along.

Yet, doctors today by and large scorn treatment by herbs, laying on of hands, acupuncture, etc.

            These techniques, however, heal and save people who are ill every day.

Read the story Kristin Killops, as quoted in Andrew Weil’s book, Spontaneous Healing. The medical profession gave up on her. She, however, was determined to live and Laying on of Hands practitioners cured her. She was told her illness was beyond cure, she’d never have a child and yet gave birth to four healthy babies.