Until 1977 I was an unshakable disbeliever in ‘subtle energy’ and the vague, rambling ‘explanations’ associated with it. But that was to change.
In August I attended the Second International Healing Arts Conference in Ward, Colorado, intending to learn the latest physical bodywork techniques. On the third day I joined a workshop titled “Healing with the Subtle Bodies” though I had no clue as to what a subtle body was. As I entered the class I noticed a chart of the chakras at the front of the class. Oh, No!

Before I could dredge up enough courage to leave, the teacher instructed us to face the nearest person, raise our hands with the palms near our partner’s, without touching and “Send energy from your right palm to your partner’s left palm.” Reluctantly, I did – and was shocked to feel something between my right hand and my partner’s left! I was thunderstruck – I didn’t believe in “energies” but I couldn’t deny what I was feeling! Before I could sort myself out, we were instructed, “Now try to send the energy from your left hands.”

Wow! whatever I had been feeling in my right hand was magnified ten-fold in my left! Before I could speak my partner exclaimed, “My, that’s a lot of energy coming from your left hand!” With that independent validation of what I felt I was forced to accept that a biofield existed. An unbidden thought flashed through me, “Now I know why I came into this life – it’s to bring this out of metaphysics into physics.” For me ‘science’ had already begun; the
polarity between my hands indicated that I was dealing with a field in physics—because all fields in physics have polarities.

Three days later, I joined a class in ‘energy healing’ where we were asked to choose a partner, scan his or her body to find the hot and cold areas and apply the ‘energy’ from our hands so as to balance our partner’s body temperature. A middle-aged woman who appeared depressed and worn out approached and asked to partner with me adding, “I don’t have very much energy so maybe you could give me some and then I could give you some back.”
Less than thrilled, I agreed. She reclined and I scanned her body with the palm of my hand to discover that her abdomen was very hot but her right thigh was very cold. I remarked on that and she responded, “There is a sharp pain along that line.” Oddly that seemed to make sense. With that I placed my sending hand on her abdomen and my receiving on her thigh to balance the temperature and unleashed a chain of completely unanticipated reactions. The hair on my arms began to rise, my arms grew hot, she began quietly sobbing and her abdomen began contracting.

Then Everything intensified. At that point I realized that the contractions resembled birth contractions. I said nothing because it was clear she was not giving birth. Eventually everything peaked and subsided. She sat up saying, “I feel as if I just gave birth to myself,” a completely illogical yet profound statement, especially since her contractions had seemed like birth contractions to me.

I saw her every day for the next few days and she always remarked, “I don’t know what happened but the world is different.” I didn’t think it was but maybe hers was, so I said nothing. Four days later she left the conference and I thought I would never see her again.

But we did, six weeks later we met at a Halloween party. She strode up to me wearing a vivid red dress with a large black widow spider clutching her right breast, and exclaimed, “I still don’t know what you did to me back then, but I’m different!” This was resoundingly seconded by several of her friends. After a bit I hesitantly asked about the spider. She replied, more nonchalantly that I thought possible, “Oh, I had a mastectomy six months ago.”

What I had done six weeks before in the workshop in the mountains of Colorado had released the trauma of her mastectomy and helped recover her self confidence. 

That was the start. With that I began a two-fold study of the biofield; both of its physics and its relation to emotion and health. It has been a long, sometimes difficult but fulfilling journey,

Richard Pavek,
SHEN’s developer