Healing vs Being healthy

Clarifying terminology for trusting your body’s process

I’d like to discuss some terminology that I believe is often misused in conversations around health: Healing, Being Healed, and Being Healthy.

I think it is important to clarify them because it removes some of the fear that people often have around health, and what is actually happening in their body.

What Does "Healthy" Really Mean?

A ‘healthy’ person expresses symptoms appropriately, as their body adapts to stresses. Never having symptoms should not be the goal. Instead, the goal is to move through symptoms, supporting the body as it goes through the required processes to heal.

Life involves stress—it’s part of the human experience and necessary for growth. When we experience a stress, we have the opportunity to adapt, learn and grow from it, making us stronger and wiser.

To me, being "healthy" means having the capacity to navigate the stresses we face—whether physical, emotional, social, dietary, environmental (think EMFs, toxins, etc.), or even imagined stresses.

Health isn’t about avoiding all stresses—it's about building the resilience to handle them. Here are some key factors that help strengthen that resilience:

• Physical fitness: To perform the tasks we need to in life, we must be fit enough to do so.

• Nutrition: Eating nutritious food is important to fuel our body, giving it the resources it needs to heal and adapt when stress hits.

• Water: Water is required for every healing process in the body, so we need quality water to support that.

• Mindset: Fear of foods, EMFs, mould, or any other potential stressors is counterproductive. Awareness to make better choices is key, but living in fear can actually create the same symptoms you're trying to avoid.

• Self-responsibility & joy: A healthy person is someone who is self-responsible, resilient, and joyful. They live meaningfully and have a support network—people they can talk to, laugh with and share the burdens they carry.

Healing: The Body's Response to Stress

Now, let’s talk about healing. Healing is what happens after your body has experienced stress. We adapted in the moment to be able to cope. Then as soon as that conflict is resolved, the adaptation is no longer needed, and healing begins. This is the moment when symptoms begin as the body needs to repair or break down the tissue that was required.

Symptoms don’t mean you’re not healthy. In fact, symptoms are often a sign that healing is underway. Let that sink in: symptoms arise as you are healing.

Shifting perspective here can be incredibly powerful! Yes, you still need to have the capacity to heal. Yes, moving through the symptoms can be shitty, uncomfortable and inconvenient, but when you can acknowledge that you have symptoms because you actually just resolved something, the view of your body and health is so much more empowered.

Healing is not something that is done to you. Your body does the healing. A healer can guide you or support you, but ultimately, it’s your innate intelligence that drives the process. You can make choices to support or suppress the natural process, but the body will always be trying to help you.

Being Healed: What Does It Look Like?

So, what does it mean to be healed? When you’re healed, the body has completed the healing process. You’ve moved through the stress and come out on the other side with an "upgrade" in your system.

You know you're healed when the stress no longer has a charge over you. You can laugh about it without ruminating or feeling triggered. It no longer affects your emotional state or your health.

If symptoms are part of healing then “Why Do People Die from Their Symptoms?”

The answer is that some stresses are simply too big to recover from.

People can reach a point where their capacity for adaptation is overwhelmed. Sometimes, there’s a regular reactivation of the conflict, meaning they never fully heal because they’re constantly adapting to the stress. Other times, there’s a lack of support (such as feeling abandonment, rejection, or isolation) that amplifies the healing process. In German New Medicine (GNM), this is called ‘The Syndrome’. The fluid being held with this conflict creates larger or more severe symptoms in the healing process, which may be too large to resolve.

Final Reflection

Being healthy is about more than just avoiding illness or discomfort—it’s about adapting to life’s experiences, understanding that stress and healing are part of growth. By rethinking how we define health and healing, we can release fear, trust in our innate capacity to heal, and live with more resilience and ease.