Discussion on the Hawaii Ho'oponopono  

The story of a Hawaiian therapist

A Releasing Your Unlimited Creativity discussion topic

Copyright 2009 by K. Ferlic,   All Rights Reserved

There is a story circulating on the web around 2008 entitled Ho’oponopono. The story is based on the Hawaiian healing technique called ho’oponopono.

The process is really no different that what a shaman does in a soul retrieval or the rainmaker in brining forth the waters of life to a parched dry inner landscape. It is provided here as another example of how we can use the oneness of all Creation. It is to use the interconnectedness of All That Is to go within and address the changes within ourselves first and then have them become reflected externally. The story and explanation is consistent with the energy consciousness model. However a few caveats are discussed at the end. The basis for the need to become responsible or to take responsibility for all we experience as a creator is provided in the topics, "Origins of Creation" and the "Observer observed pair and the nature of duality" and associated discussion and hyperlink provides some thoughts as to how this process and be seen to work

HO'OPONOPONO
by Joe Vitale

"Two years ago, I heard about a therapist in Hawaii who cured a complete ward of criminally insane patients--without ever seeing any of them. The psychologist would study an inmate's chart and then look within himself to see how he created that person's illness. As he improved himself, the patient improved.

When I first heard this story, I thought it was an urban legend. How could anyone heal anyone else by healing himself? How could even the best self-improvement master cure the criminally insane? It didn't make any sense. It wasn't logical, so I dismissed the story.

However, I heard it again a year later. I heard that the therapist had used a Hawaiian healing process called ho 'oponopono. I had never heard of it, yet I couldn't let it leave my mind. If the story was at

all true, I had to know more. I had always understood 'total responsibility' to mean that I am responsible for what I think and do. Beyond that, it's out of my hands. I think that most people think of total responsibility that way. We're responsible for what we do, not what anyone else does--but that's wrong.

The Hawaiian therapist who healed those mentally ill people would teach me an advanced new perspective about total responsibility. His name is Dr. Ihaleakala Hew Len. We probably spent an hour talking on our first phone call. I asked him to tell me the complete story of his work as a therapist.

He explained that he worked at Hawaii State Hospital for four years.That ward where they kept the criminally insane was dangerous.

Psychologists quit on a monthly basis. The staff called in sick a lot or simply quit. People would walk through that ward with their backs against the wall, afraid of being attacked by patients. It was not a pleasant place to live, work, or visit.

Dr. Len told me that he never saw patients. He agreed to have an office and to review their files. While he looked at those files, he would work on himself. As he worked on himself, patients began to heal.

After a few months, patients that had to be shackled were being allowed to walk freely,' he told me. 'Others who had to be heavily medicated were getting off their medications. And those who had no

chance of ever being released were being freed.' I was in awe.'Not only that,' he went on, 'but the staff began to enjoy coming to work.

Absenteeism and turnover disappeared. We ended up with more staff than we needed because patients were being released, and all the staff was showing up to work. Today, that ward is closed.'

This is where I had to ask the million dollar question: 'What were you doing within yourself that caused those people to change?'

I was simply healing the part of me that created them,' he said. I didn't understand. Dr. Len explained that total responsibility for your life means that everything in your life--simply because it is in your life--is your responsibility. In a literal sense the entire world is your creation.

Whew. This is tough to swallow. Being responsible for what I say or do is one thing. Being responsible for what everyone in my life says or does is quite another. Yet, the truth is this: if you take complete responsibility for your life, then everything you see, hear, taste, touch, or in any way experience is your responsibility because it is in your life. This means that terrorist activity, the president, the economy or anything you experience and don't like--is up for you to heal. They don't exist, in a manner of speaking, except as projections from inside you. The problem isn't with them, it's with you, and to change them, you have to change you.

I know this is tough to grasp, let alone accept or actually live. Blame is far easier than total responsibility, but as I spoke with Dr. Len, I began to realize that healing for him and in ho 'oponopono means loving yourself.

If you want to improve your life, you have to heal your life. If you want to cure anyone, even a mentally ill criminal, you do it by healing youself.

I asked Dr. Len how he went about healing himself. What was he doing,exactly, when he looked at those patients' files?

''I just kept saying, 'I'm sorry' and 'I love you' over and over again,' he explained.

'That's it?

'That's it.

Turns out that loving yourself is the greatest way to improve yourself, and as you improve yourself, you improve your world.

Let me give you a quick example of how this works: one day, someone sent me an email that upset me. In the past I would have handled it by working on my emotional hot buttons or by trying to reason with the person who sent the nasty message.

This time, I decided to try Dr. Len's method. I kept silently saying, 'I'm sorry' and 'I love you,' I didn't say it to anyone in particular. I was simply evoking the spirit of love to heal within me what was

creating the outer circumstance.

Within an hour I got an e-mail from the same person. He apologized for his previous message. Keep in mind that I didn't take any outward action to get that apology. I didn't even write him back. Yet, by saying 'I love you,' I somehow healed within me what was creating him.

I later attended a ho 'oponopono workshop run by Dr. Len. He's now 70 years old, considered a grandfatherly shaman, and is somewhat reclusive.

He praised my book, The Attractor Factor. He told me that as I improve myself, my book's vibration will raise, and everyone will feel it when they read it. In short, as I improve, my readers will improve.

''What about the books that are already sold and out there?' I asked.

''They aren't out there,' he explained, once again blowing my mind with his mystic wisdom. 'They are still in you.' In short, there is no out there. It would take a whole book to explain this advanced technique with the depth it deserves.

Suffice it to say that whenever you want to improve anything in your life, there's only one place to look: inside you. When you look, do it with love.'

Ho'oponopono is really very simple. For the ancient Hawaiians, all problems begin as thought. But having a thought is not the problem. So what's the problem? The problem is that all our thoughts are imbued with painful memories, memories of persons, places, or things.

The intellect working alone can't solve these problems, because the intellect only manages. Managing things is no way to solve problems. You want to let them go! When you do Ho'oponopono, what happens is that the Divinity takes the painful thought and neutralizes or purifies it. You don't purify the person, place, or thing. You neutralize the energy you associate with that person, place, or thing. So the first stage of Ho'oponopono is the purification of that energy.

Now something wonderful happens. Not only does that energy get neutralized; it also gets released, so there's a brand new slate.

To do Ho'oponopono, you don't have to know what the problem or error is. All you have to do is notice any problem you are experiencing physically, mentally, emotionally, whatever. Once you notice, your responsibility is to immediately begin to clean, to say, 'I'm sorry. Please forgive me.'"

Comments and caveats to this story

There is one addition to this story. When this story was circulated on the web there was a "youtube" video which was available. In the video, it was said Dr. Len placed no expectations on the outcome of his internal work. That is, he did not think beforehand how is inner work would be reflected externally. This is the equivalent statement of the rainmaker. That is, the rainmaker aligns himself with the Tao and the external world is then free to accordingly manifest I alignment with the Tao. If we do the inner work to heal we will experience corresponding external changes. However, what we expect is not controlled by our mind and it what it wants and/or desires. We act because it is correct to act and level the results to Creation to unfold.

We need to realize to be the creator in our power is to die to the ego and allow for the continual transformation of the ego and who and what we think we are. In the oneness of Creation, we must become different for any other to become different. There is always a sacrifice in the creative process and part of that sacrifice is how and what we currently think and believe. The bigger the change we wish to create in them, the greater the change we need to make within ourselves. If we wish to access the power within, the work we need to learn is how to continually die to what the situation calls us to do. It is a path of surrender and a path too much for the ego of most.

In the story above it was said, "I just kept saying, 'I'm sorry' and 'I love you' over and over again,'" But this statement is an incomplete telling of what was done and how it was done. It is true this is all that needs to be said. However, we also have to choose to become different and to act different. Dr Len was on a path of which ho’oponopono was only a technique. What he did and accomplished in and through the ho’oponopono technique was not the end product or end goal. He lived his life in a certain way and from a particular perception about Creation and what he desired to become in Creation. His intention, and what he desired to create and become in Creation, along with the realization he had to take responsibility for all that he experienced including the external world, allowed him to make the necessary internal changed that would become reflected externally in the world. But the story does not address how he live his life externally in the world along with the external changes in the hospital. It needs to be remember he was living a particular way in life. So too if we chose to use such a technique as a rainmaker, a shaman or a practitioner of ho’oponopono.

The recommendation as to how to use the fact that our inner world is reflected in the outer and we need to take responsibility for the all of the world we experience as reflected in the ho’oponopono technique without being a rainmaker, shaman or practitioner ho’oponopono is of as follows. Know that we cannot give what we do not have. The process starts with learning to love ourselves. Say the words "I'm sorry' and 'I love you' over and over again," directing it both inward and outward. Then ask your intuitive guidance, "What do I need to do, what do I need to become, how do I need to live my life to bring forth these changes I desire?" Then honor the guidance you get. We only need to realize that to take responsibility for the world we experience is to realize the world we experience is a result of how we are now choosing to live our life. To create something different and manifest the changes we desire, we need to become different in some way and that means to act different. We start by making the inner changes and have them reflected externally. We cannot expect to bring forth the desired changes and remain unchanged. We will need to change in someway both internally and externally.

Related topics
Story of the Rainmaker
Soul retrieval
How the inner reflects the outer 
Understanding the need for inner changes first

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