BODY: RIGHT AND LEFT SIDES

Physical lateralities of the symptoms are quite revealing of what is going on inside of us. It is possible that many readers that are interested in self-healing and who have read other authors, will be surprised when I state, that for me, the right side, it’s a symbol of “the mother, the feminine” and the left side it’s a symbol of “the father, the masculine.”

When I became interested in holistic healing, I learned the opposite. That is, that the right side of the body, governed by the left hemisphere, was related to action, reasoning, Yang energy and therefore with the male symbol, the father and all that it represents, authority figures, etc. And that the left side, governed by the right hemisphere, was associated with intuition, Yin energy, with the feminine symbol, the mother and all that it represents institutions, society, etc.

We could conclude, then, that conditions affecting the right side are related to a conflict with a male element in our lives, be it a son, our father, our boss, authority figures, etc. In the same way, the left side would be evoking difficulties related to a feminine element in our lives, be it our daughter, our mother, our home, society, etc.

However, despite the fact that this statement is true from a physiological or scientific point of view, it is not valid for deciphering the body language since it is based on an error.

Human beings have two very defined nervous systems operating in the body: the central nervous system or cerebrospinal which is regulated by our brain and our conscious self and the autonomous or autonomic nervous system, which is totally unconscious. Also, the autonomic nervous system is divided into two: the sympathetic system and the parasympathetic (vagal).

The central nervous system is the one that regulates all the aspects of our life that are conscious and voluntary. The information is received through the senses and greatly impacts all the processes that a human being voluntarily does, like walking, picking up a glass, hugging, etc. This is due to the fact that it acts on the “white” muscle fibers which are located mainly on arms and legs.

On the other hand, the autonomic nervous system regulates all the aspects of our body that are unconscious and involuntary, such as digestion, immune system, heart functions, etc. and it also controls almost all “red” fibers, such as the heart, pancreas, liver, etc.

However, unlike the central nervous system, which as we have seen, crosses at the level of the throat, resulting in a cerebral hemisphere governing the opposite side of the body, the autonomic nervous system, does not cross at all, it extends from a central axis. From head to toes, the right remains to the right and the left to the left.

Keeping in mind, that it is not the brain, through its central nervous system, the one acting on diseases and accidents, since they are not considered to be voluntary processes of human beings (nobody gets sick intentionally), but rather unconscious and therefore, deriving from the autonomic nervous system, which is governed by our Unconscious self, I am convinced that the lateralization we must consider when facing a lateralized symptom is: right as a symbol of “the mother, the feminine” and left as a symbol of the “the father, the masculine” This is true for all right-handed people and the opposite is true for all people biologically born left-handed.

There is also a more subtle explanation: according to psychology, every human being holds both male and female polarities. One is more visible, the other is more occult, we both, physically and psychologically tend to develop one more over the other, leaving one of them in the shadow. According to C.G. Jung, the shadow is the sum of all the different rejected facets of a person. Since the person does not recognize or does not want to recognize those aspects of the self as part of his personality, he discards them. Not recognizing the shadow, those hidden aspects of our personality, causes suffering and pain. When a person internally rejects a certain principle, every time he finds it on the outside world, it will trigger in him a reaction of anxiety and rejection, usually resulting in the projection of that aspect into his spouse or partner. From projection, comes the tendency to highlight the qualities or defects of another person, which in reality, only reflect like a mirror, the beauty and the imperfections of our own soul.

With this theory, we can understand, that the root of our trouble is not in the visible, that part of us that we identify ourselves with, but it comes from the invisible, the part we don’t want to see. For example, when a person has some negative symptoms on his/her right knee, which is a symbol of action and of reason since it is governed by the left hemisphere (male), the person could be experiencing some conflict with his/her invisible part, that is, with his/her female hidden aspect. 

There is probably a woman from his/her environment confronting this person with his/ her female hidden aspect, which will bring this person to new awareness’s about the conflict he/she has with his/her feminine aspect.

After my training in psychodecoding of the illness, I must admit that in certain diseases such as those affecting the breasts, shoulders, arms, bronchi, thyroid, feet, legs, bones, etc. it is difficult in many cases to decipher the exact laterality. Although we have a female brain that handles female emotions and a male brain that regulates male emotions it is important to consider that a person can be biologically a woman and have predominantly male energy and vice versa.

Then again, there is the ambidextrous person, who can be biologically right-handed or biologically left-handed depending on whether it is a man or a woman.

We can even have opposed laterality. For example, there are cases of some parents of left-handed children, who respond to social/ family influences and force the children to use the right hand to eat and to writhe. These children become functional right-handed but continue to be biologically left-handed.

Dr. Salomon Sellam, in his book Los Huesos, (The Bones), published by Ediciones Berangel, offers us two options, two alternatives to support us in deciphering laterality so that we can better identify the origin of our conflict.

On the one hand, it mentions “the side of the neuro-motor impact.” When the danger, the problem or the conflictive situation comes from the right side and the neuro-motor impact is engraved on the same side, we would be talking of a right-handed person. Sellam gives the example of a firefighter with problems in his right shoulder. He was not able to open the door of a burning house by pushing with his right side of the body. As a result, a person that was inside of the house died. The firefighter felt invaded by great guilt which settled on his devalued right shoulder. If instead of using his right shoulder to try to open the door, he had used his left shoulder, of course, the pathology would have settled on his left shoulder.

And secondly, he recommends his own version, which he explains, has helped him enormously to decipher laterality and, consequently, the source of the emotional conflict.

A pathology located on the right side: this would be related to the emotional aspect, the interior self, the house, the home, conceiving a project, a desire, most of the times, contradicted. “I would like to do that, I would like to achieve that… but I am incapable, I can’t because I feel unappreciated, I have no value in the eyes of others.”

Pathology located on the left side: this is closely related to action, danger, the outside, work, the carrying out of a project often contradicted, followed by feeling devalued. “I have done this or that and I repent it, I have no value, I have failed to discern, etc.”

Here are some other views of lateralization from different perspectives:

From an energetical point of view, the right side of the body refers to the male aspects: (The sun, the giver, the father) and the left side refers to the feminine aspects: (Receptivity, the moon, empathy, the mother).

From a mental point of view, the right hemisphere is associated with the feminine: (Intuition, imagination, music, and art) and the left hemisphere is associated with the masculine: (Reason, language, science and math).

From the biological perspective the right hemisphere is related to the masculine: (it controls the organs and male functions) and the left hemisphere is related to the feminine: (it controls the organs and female functions).

Here are several tests to determine biological laterality:

Applause: The people who applaud having a flat left hand and strike the left with the right hand are biologically right-handed. The ones that have a flat right hand and use the left hand to strike the right are biologically left-handed. People who applaud right in the middle are considered to have a double brain, that is, they work with both hemispheres.

Breastfeeding a baby: If the person carries the baby with the left arm, they have the right hand free to do something else; the stronger side will be free. If they are left-handed, it will just be the opposite. With which hand do you give a baby the bottle?

Thread a needle: the right-handed person will hold the needle with the left hand; the left-handed will hold it with the right.

Hammer and nail: the right-handed person will hold the nail with the left hand, the left-handed with the right.

Stair climbing: which foot climbs the first step?

Laterality associated conflicts:

Dyslexia can be related to laterality conflicts. In fact, there might be some contradictory laterality. The biological laterality must be found, although there might be some transgenerational memories as well.

Another conflict would be for a person to confuse right and left. This can be related to memories of being an unwanted child or being from a different gender than the one the parents desired (being a boy when the parents wanted a girl or vice versa).

If you want to know more about the emotional origin of diseases, you can purchase my book by clicking on the Amazon link: