Last week, I offered you 5 reasons why some heal while some don’t.
In that video, I mentioned that there is a difference between Healing and Curing. Today we will dive deeper into that.
Let’s start by looking at the definitions from dictionary.com:
cure |kyo͝or|
verb [ with obj. ]
1 relieve (a person or animal) of the symptoms of a disease or condition: he was cured of the disease | figurative : centuries of science have not cured us of our superstitions.
• eliminate (a disease, condition, or injury) with medical treatment: this technology could be used to cure diabetes.
• solve (a problem): stopping foreign investment is no way to cure the fundamental problem.
heal |hēl|
verb [ with obj. ]
(of a person or treatment) cause (a wound, injury, or person) to become sound or healthy again: his concern is to heal sick people.
• [ no obj. ] become sound or healthy again: he would have to wait until his knee had healed.
• alleviate (a person’s distress or anguish): time can heal the pain of grief.
• correct or put right (an undesirable situation): the rift between them was never really healed.
I feel it safe to distill these down to curing being associated with the relief of symptoms, while healing is associated with becoming sound and healthy again by alleviating a person’s distress or anguish.
When a person is cured of some disease or disorder, you get the feeling she had symptoms extending from that disease and those symptoms simply went away. Very cool and very useful.
However, let me ask you a question:
Can somebody heal without being cured?
I’m going to suggest we answer this with a resounding “YES!”. So what’s the difference?
I think I could best break this down by stating that curing can happen without any internal wisdom being derived (in fact, quite the opposite sometimes), while healing is an internal journey, happening outside of the context of the disease, that leads the person to a place of wisdom and peace.
Sometimes, a person has a condition for which they seek treatment and they become cured of their condition. They don’t learn anything, and simply return to what they were doing before, which may even lay the foundation for the condition to return.
No wisdom gained.
Alternatively, a person may get a condition, perhaps even a terminal one, and by virtue of having that condition, the person starts to take radical personal responsibility and begins to effect meaningful changes in how they live their life, which unfolds a part of them connected to latent wisdom.
This wisdom has always been, but now is finally revealed, thanks to this person taking radical personal responsibility for their life. They might change their nutrition, their job or their relationship. They might move away from toxic people and situations they have felt obligated to stick with, and toward people and situations that support and uplift them. They might reach out to people they have wronged and attempt to make it right. They might learn to truly forgive them-self. The condition they suffer from may not go away, but they end up happy, grateful and at peace.
If you have ever been around a person who “found God/Peace” during a terminal condition, you know what I am talking about.
Wisdom revealed.
So, which camp would you like to be in? IF, you had to choose one, would you like to be in the cure camp, or the heal camp? How you answer that question should give you a pretty good idea of where you sit with this idea. Try and be as honest with yourself as possible.
Of course, sometimes both happen, and some cure themselves by learning to heal themselves. The last of the 5 reasons why some heal while others don’t that I gave last week was what I call The Spiritual Wildcard.
The Spiritual Wildcard
The Spiritual Wildcard honours the fact that some never cure themselves of the condition, no matter how much personal responsibility they take, and how many corrections they implement.
Nobody, and I mean nobody, will have a full understanding of what your spirit has in store for you over the long run. We like to think that conditions like cancer, arthritis, or diabetes come on suddenly, often as a result of our family genetics. But… (and hear this):
You are not a victim of your genetics!
Yes, you may have come in with a set of blueprints handed down from your family, but, as anyone who has built or renovated a house knows, you can change the blueprint. The message I am intending to deliver is this…
Why not start now?
Why not start to take what I call radical personal responsibility now? What does this mean?
It means taking responsibility for what you think others are responsible for; not for their actions, but your reaction to their actions.
It means taking a deep inventory of where you are being incongruent in your life, and taking steps to correct it.
It means making nutritional, exercise or relationship advice to others when you are not living it yourself. (I see this a lot.)
It means judging others without knowing their full story of how they got to that point.
It means knowing better, but not doing better?
Regardless of where you are at, you can make a different choice starting today. That is the promise of the Universe and Spirit. What makes humans different, per se, is that it is said that we have the ability to make a conscious choice that is not derived from being a victim to our instincts.
What is one choice that you can make differently today? Make it and act on it. It is that simple.

Photo by John Perry
Not always easy, but always that simple. 😉
You may not like the perceived consequence of that action, but that will tell you how much you truly desire a different outcome, that’s all. It’s not right or wrong. Just choice and consequence, or cause and effect.
My suggestion for you is to live at cause, and let go of what the effect might look like. Stick with cause, in fact be-cause.
Every time you hear the word because, feel free to have it help you remember to be-cause.
When you see a greeting card that says “Just because”, feel free to get the message just be cause.
I recommend using common items in daily life to help you remember that you are awesome and built for love, such as re-purposing a common word like because for your benefit. Be ‘cause’.
Have a super week!
PS – Share this post with someone who needs it!
PPS – What other words would you re-purpose to help you remember who you really are? Add them below and let’s build a dictionary for the determined!
I have to disagree on one simple point and empatically agree with the rest.
“It means judging others without knowing their full story of how they got to that point.”
Why is anyone judging at all?
Great question Ashly!
I realize that only people that have been coached by me would ‘get’ this up front, it would have been good of me to include the following in the post.
I have what I call, “The 2 Rules”, which are as follows:
RULE #1: Withhold judgement until you know the whole story.
RULE #2: You will never know the whole story.
What “The 2 Rules” does for your mind is to help it to avoid a polarized position with ‘rules’.
They allow for your mind to have permission to judge (Rule 1), which then leads to the mind to finding it self-evident that there is no value in doing so, (Rule 2).
When the mind receives rules it doesn’t agree with, it will have a tendency to polarize the relationship with that rule instead of simply looking for a more suitable and self-evident situation.
Does this help?
Tymothy