TLC
The Energy Healing You See on TLC’s ‘The Healer’ Isn’t as Weird as You Think
When you’re watching TLC’s new show, The Healer, it can be hard to wrap your head around what exactly Charlie Goldsmith is doing to “heal” his clients. As nice as it would be to have a handsome Aussie hover over you, it wouldn’t fix your neck pain or chronic migraines, right?
Actually, that’s up for debate. Charlie is an energy healer who claims to have discovered his gift at age 18. With the docuseries, he’s aiming to prove his abilities and further validate energy healing on a whole. In fact, he claims he can do so through scientific evidence, and before you discount him, bear in mind that you may have already experienced a type of energy healing.
Those considered energy healers include Reiki practitioners, acupuncturists, reflexologists, and even massage therapists — all services you’ve been exposed to or even use in your life. What ties them all together is the practice, which healer Marci Baron describes as “a holistic practice that activates the body’s subtle energy systems to remove blocks.” When those blocks are gone, the body is then able to inherently heal itself.
The way Charlie explains his method is a little more simplistic. He says he focuses his energy on the person’s issues, ranging from chronic pain to infections and autoimmune disorders. He says it’s similar to meditating, where you are “moving your awareness around the body,” except in this case, you’re aware of someone else’s body. This process is surprisingly quick, and often takes 60 seconds or less.
Some may call this “new age,” but it actually draws from ancient concepts. There are elements of the Hindus’ chakras, or the seven energy transmission centers in the body. You can also tie it to meridians — or the energy superhighways of the body — that are used in Chinese medicine and acupuncture.
If the history doesn’t convince you, there is that scientific foundation that Charlie has mentioned. Physics teaches us that all matter is made up of molecules, which are constantly moving — or, rather, vibrating. That’s why healers say people, places, and things all radiate energy.
The Healer star has put his methods to the scientific test in two studies — one currently ongoing, and another published in The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine in 2015. In that study, he treated 50 people suffering from pain at a reported 76 percent success rate, as well as 29 cases of non-pain problems at a reported 79 percent success rate. Hey, you can’t fake those kind of stats!
