[2026 May DCTB Mindfulness Tip]
Healing happens on its own. There’s nothing we do to make healing occur. Like joy, healing is ever-present. This does not mean we ignore the wounds. Ignoring the hurts creates more issues to heal.
The practice of Trikaya Buddhism shows us our innate joy. The path reveals how whenever we are not happy, there is a reason. If we address that reason, even if we cannot fully solve it, we touch upon the joy beneath. This joy brings us clarity and peace, which makes it easier to then deal with whatever is blocking our Buddha-nature from fully manifesting.
Healing works the same way. Life is self-repairing without any intentional input. Just as reasons for suffering can prevent us from feeling our inner Light, complications can create more work for the natural healing response. While the Light is always here it can seem like it is not. The same is true with how complications create the appearance of healing stalling out.
A month ago I fell and scraped the front part of my ankle and my knee. On my knee, the light scuff to the skin healed within a few days. The scrape on the front part of my ankle began to heal during the same time. However it was deeper than I thought. I cleaned the wound, but after a couple of days I stopped covering it. A scab had formed, so it seemed all was secure. Over the course of the night as I did my normal tossing and turning, the sheets on the bed tore the scab and re-opened the wound. Yet by morning, healing had once again begun and new natural bandage had formed.
I did not have to tell my body to repair itself. The cells instantly responded to the initial injury, and then again even when I neglected to properly care for it.
If we do not give kind attention to the wounds we experience, we find ourselves in a cycle of partial healing, re-injury, healing and injury. The body, the mind, the society, the earth, continues through the cycle as healing happens on its own. Resources that could have been used elsewhere become devoted to the one area of hurt, building deeper and stronger scar tissue.
When I started caring for the wound the second time, cleaning it and covering it, it looked angry, swollen, and red, and throbbed with pain. I continued to give it a supportive environment, starting with gauze and tape. Within a week, I was able to use a large store bought bandage, then a medium size one, and after three weeks a small bandage. A month later, the rough top scab fell away, leaving a smooth hard pad of white scar tissue. A week more and even this hard scar dropped away, revealing new tender skin. What an amazing process!
I did not have to intend to heal the cut. I did not have to figure out how I had managed to scrape the front side of my ankle – and I still don’t know. I did not have to fix or figure out anything. I watched the healing happen on its own.
What I did need to do is give my ankle the type of support it needed. This meant I had to stop creating an abrasive environment around the cut. I needed to protect it from the elements, and keep it clean and moisturized. In this case, because it was on the bendy part of my ankle, I had to gently move it throughout the day so the skin could stretch without breaking. In short, I had to stop hurting it so the healing could continue faster than any new injury.
We can spend lifetimes chasing healing, without ever catching it because it is an ongoing process. For those interested in Awakening, a better strategy is to observe how healing works. To notice that we do not need to do anything for healing to occur. To understand that sending healing energy does not mean to push anything on the body. Rather, it means to create the energetic space and resources needed for healing to naturally occur, and of course to do what is required in the physical.
As someone with chronic illness, this is a tough one for me to accept. I want to control the pain, control the dysfunction, to make it stop, and be fully healed once and for all. But if I am honest, I see the microscopic communities within this body working hard to heal and maintain every aspect of my being. There’s nothing I can do to force healing to happen.
What I can do is stop giving my body even more things to heal. Instead I can do my best to create a supportive environment. This is also the best thing we can do to foster the embodiment of Enlightenment in this world: we can stop collecting things that block our joy and we can build into our life a supportive environment for our practice.
The scar on my ankle is now a deep purple. Most likely, the skin will never be the same. Embracing that change is part of the healing process. It is also part of the Enlightenment cycle: with each new epiphany, we are never the same. And that is a beautiful, miraculous, awe-inspiring thing.
This is an ongoing journey, and I welcome you to walk with us on the pathway of Trikaya Buddhism. Click here to find us at Dharma Center.
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