“The more ways we have to connect, the more many of us seem desperate to unplug.”
Not long ago I was advised, in the gentlest and most encouraging way, to “unplug” from technology and work. The person who said it knows how much I love technology and my work, but also knows how much I need a break to refuel. I also know how much quiet I need to reconnect with myself, my inner world.
For so many of us, stress can be a disconnection from self. Our outer world of connection ironically pulls us away from the one relationship that nurtures and sustains us, our relationship with ourselves, our soul.
Like taking an exciting journey, technology can take us to faraway places. Travel by internet can be invigorating and inspiring, but it can also leave us with a longing to return home to what is simple: time to unplug from the world and return home to the inner quiet.
So, when summer arrives, I find myself ‘unplugging’ and returning to my inner home, reconnecting with flowers, busy sparrows, magpies, green grass, rain, gentle breezes, and adolescent crows squawking for food when they are of a size that makes you stop and ask aloud, “Really? Aren’t you a little big to be begging from your mommy?” I am returning home where there is all the time in the world to journal with paper and pen, time to read murder mysteries and self-help books, time for meditation — and time to dream big dreams with endless amounts of inner quiet.
Where is home for you?
And what does this have to do with homeopathy? There is a rubric (a rubric is a sentence that describes a symptom of the person and the remedy, and all symptoms are in a book called a repertory) that reads, “Home: desires to go home and when there, they want to go out” — which simply means there is a desire to go home and, when home, a desire to go out. A desire to travel with a longing to return home. A love of technology with a longing to unplug. Maybe a similar state?
Sometimes, stress expresses itself as a kind of restlessness. We struggle knowing what it is exactly that we want or need. I often wonder, if when stressed and disconnected, what we are really longing for is a sense of being loved – connection that says simply – ‘It’s OK to just be. Unplug, stop the doing, abandon the distraction and return to a place of self-love and self-acceptance…even when all around there is chaos, return to the feeling of home within yourself.”
HOMEOPATHY FOR RESTLESSNESS, DISCONNECT and STRESS
The Homeopathic Remedy Calcarea phosphorica
One of the homeopathic remedies that best fits this restless and disconnected state is Calcarea phosphorica, a constituent of bone.
Dr. Rajan Sankaran offers a modern take on understanding what kind of person might need Calc phos. (Calc phos is the abbreviated name for Calcarea phosphorica) Calcium phosphate (the mineral) is an important mineral for bone growth. Bones give us stability and bones also allow us mobility – the structure that gives us the ability to grow and to move.
“The main feeling of Calcarea phosphorica is “I am not loved at the place of security (home), so I should seek love elsewhere (outside of home) and come home for security”. This is seen in the rubric:
Home, desires to go and when there to go out. Calcarea persons need to have people around, they want to feel protected as they feel insecure. The feeling of Phosphorous is “I must prepare to live alone, to be ableto live on a distant island. Thus, Calcarea phosphorica has the need for e unity, but the ability to live alone if the need arises.”
Making connections
The ability to make new connections also comes from the Phosphorous element of Calcarea phosphorica. Calcarea phosphorica people are friendly and make friends easily. They love to travel. Calcarea phosphorica persons tend to make a new home wherever they go. The friend’s home becomes their home. They care even for strangers in such a way that they soon become part of that family. This may seem like Phosphorous, but the difference is that Phosphorous persons do not make a home wherever they go – this additional element is found in Calcarea phosphorica because of the Calcarea element, with its need for stability and security.
Calcarea phosphorica is a chief mineral component of bone which not only provides and stability to the body but also facilitates its mobility. The Calcarea phosphorica people are active physically as well as mentally and are very sensitive.
Homeopathy Rubrics for Calcarea phosphorica: some examples
(A rubric is a statement of a symptom organized alphabetically in a repertory)
- Anxiety in children when lifted from the cradle
- House, desires to go, and when there to go out
- Travel, desire to
- Jealousy
- Desire for smoked meat, fat, ham
- Disorders of growth (growing pains in children)
Quoted from Sankaran’s book The Soul of Remedies: How do I find home within?
Even though I was technically unplugged from the net, I found someone new – Pico Iyer. (It is very hard for me to unplug – research for me is a wonderful distraction when I am stressed.)
While watching and listening to Pico Iyer’s 14-minute TED talk ‘Where is Home?’ – a reflection “on the meaning of home, the joy of traveling and the serenity of standing still’ I resonated with his insightful reflection on home, unplugging, and the Calc phos state:
“…it’s only by stopping movement that you can see where to go. And it’s only by stepping out of your life and the world that you can see what you most deeply care about and find a home. And I’ve noticed so many people now take conscious measures to sit quietly for 30 minutes every morning just collecting themselves in one corner of the room without their devices, or go running every evening, or leave their cell phones behind when they go to have a long conversation with a friend. Movement is a fantastic privilege, and it allows us to do so much that our grandparents could never have dreamed of doing. But movement ultimately only has meaning if you have a home to go back to. And home, in the end, is of course not just the place where you sleep. It’s the place where you stand.”
Yours in health and healing,
Donna
