I met an older Danish man named Bernhard, and without realizing it at first, my understanding of life quietly began to change. Bernhard lived in a way that immediately caught my attention. He traveled freely, worked with purpose, and expressed his gifts without apology or spectacle. What struck me most was not what he did, but how he did it—with genuine care, humility, and unwavering respect for the people he helped. Whether someone was struggling physically, emotionally, or in ways that were harder to name, Bernhard showed up fully for them. He listened. He observed. He cared deeply about their health and well-being. Watching him work, I began to understand that life was not always what it appeared to be at first glance.
I found myself wondering—sometimes confused, sometimes quietly fascinated—how exactly he was helping people. I had already heard of ancient Chinese practices like acupuncture and acupressure, and I knew that many cultures around the world worked with the body in ways that went beyond Western medicine. I had also been exposed to Kirlian photography, which revealed something invisible to the naked eye: energetic fields surrounding plants, animals, and people. I remember learning how a plant branch, even after part of it was cut off, still appeared whole in these photographs—as if the energy remembered what the eye could no longer see.
As Bernhard worked with these unseen energies, I was slowly educated into an entirely new way of thinking. What mattered most to me was not theory or explanation—it was results. People improved. They felt better. Something real was happening, even if it could not always be neatly explained.
Over the two years I spent traveling with him, visiting people in their homes, and learning this unfamiliar philosophy, my mind stretched far beyond the limits it once knew. Up until then, my work as a nurse had focused almost entirely on the physical body. That was the framework the institution believed in, and it was the one I had been trained to serve.
But I had also heard stories—stories that stayed with me. I’d heard of Filipino healers who worked with their hands in ways that defied conventional understanding. A friend once told me about developing a kidney stone while she was in the Philippines and seeking help from one of these healers. She described the experience vividly and later showed me what she believed to be the stone—a small, irregular white piece she had brought home. What stayed with me wasn’t whether anyone could explain it, but that her pain had disappeared afterward.
I have always been open-minded, and that openness made a deep impression on me.
Looking back, I believe Bernhard appeared in my life for a reason. I was meant to widen my thinking—to step beyond familiar boundaries and explore other ways of helping people. So I did. I followed that curiosity into new countries, new conversations, and new understandings of healing.
Alternative medicine was beginning to grow, but for me it wasn’t about trends or industries. It was about expanding the definition of care. I began to see that healing could involve emotional states, belief, intention, and relationship. The placebo effect alone suggested that the mind played a far greater role than we had been taught to acknowledge. And “old folklore”—wisdom used for thousands of years across cultures—suddenly felt less dismissible and far more deserving of respect.
This chapter of my life didn’t replace what I had learned as a nurse. It added to it. It expanded my horizons and softened rigid ideas about what healing must look like. I began to understand that caring for people could include far more than the physical body—it could include the unseen, the emotional, and the deeply human layers that connect us all.
And once that door opened, there was no closing it again.
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