What Holistic Healing Is and Why it Matters
What is holistic healing?
Holistic approaches to health date back to the time of Hippocrates, over 2,500 years ago, when the Father of Modern Medicine emphasized the importance of establishing “equilibrium” within individuals, viewing the person as a whole being made up of many parts working in concert with one another. Hippocrates stressed that it was insufficient to focus on one aspect of a person when working to heal them.
In the 20th century, the medical-model of health care reigned supreme and the care of certain symptoms was typically reduced to a single, isolated intervention. Any “issues” with the mind were typically treated with talk therapy. Physiological symptoms were considered entirely separate, often addressed with medical interventions like the prescription of drugs and the utilization of surgeries. The mind and body were consistently viewed as separate entities and socio-cultural and environmental factors were rarely considered.
This began to change in the 1970s, when Drs. George Engel and John Romano, introduced the idea that there are biological, psychological, and social determinants to health, including mental health. They referred to this model as the Biopsychosocial (BPS) Model of Health.
Using the BPS Model of Health, it is understood that biological, psychological, and socio-cultural factors interact and impact our health and well-being. For this reason, isolating the factors and considering them singly will not result in ideal or long-lasting desired outcomes.
We each have our own unique Biological, Psychological, and Socio-Cultural Factors that interact and influence our overall health and well-being. Often, the interaction of these factors, which are often in flux rather than fixed, play a vital role in how we cope and regulate our emotions. In therapy, we can work to understand what our unique Biopsychosocial factors are and work to radically accept those factors we cannot change and implement strategies to modulate those that we can change - if we choose.
Why holistic healing matters.
Holistic healing helps us hold both “nature” and “nurture” - it helps us radically accept those things we cannot change while implementing strategies to modulate those factors that we can change - if we choose. Holistic healing requires tending to our unique, individual BPS vulnerabilities. This leads to more positive outcomes and longer-lasting change.
If we fail to consider various BPS factors in counseling, then we fail to understand the whole individual, their unique story and needs. If we fail to understand the individual and fail to tend to each of their parts, we fail to support the individual in building their life worth living - that is a life guided by their values and a life of general contentment, joy, meaning, and purpose.
When BPS vulnerabilities are adequately addressed, we can see positive changes in thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. Because BPS factors interact with one another, we also see improvements in overall health and relationships.
This is why at Healgood, we use a holistic, inter-disciplinary approach to healing that looks at the interconnection between each individual's unique biological, psychological, and socio-cultural factors and how these factors play a role in their health and well-being.
This approach begins at the initial intake session where a BPS interview and assessment allows the clinician to more deeply understand the client and their lived experience. This intake session allows the client to relay important history and background information (including BPS factors of themselves), discuss in detail what brings them to counseling, and begin to identify specific therapy goals with their therapist.
References:
Borrell-Carrió, F., Suchman, A. L., & Epstein, R. M. (2004). The biopsychosocial model 25 years later: principles, practice, and scientific inquiry. Annals of family medicine, 2(6), 576–582. https://doi.org/10.1370/afm.245
Straub, R. O. (2012). Health psychology: A biopsychosocial approach. New York, NY: Worth Publishers.