Real Integrative Medicine
My journey to understanding our multidimensional reality
- Dr. Brendan McLaughlin
Integrative what?
In today’s evolving healthcare landscape, more physicians are adopting the term “integrative medicine” in their practice. But what truly defines an integrative physician, and how does this approach differ from conventional medical care?
Many practitioners who identify as integrative physicians have traditional medical training and simply supplement standard protocols with alternatives like CBD, vitamins, or IV therapies. While these additions can be valuable, they only scratch the surface of true integrative medicine.
At its core, authentic integrative medicine embraces the complete human experience – the intricate dance between mind, body, and spirit. A genuine integrative physician recognizes that healing requires addressing all dimensions of human health, not just physical symptoms.
For me to truly be a integrative physician you have to understand the profound interconnectedness of physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being and draw from diverse healing modalities that go beyond “take X for Y symptom”.
True integrative medicine isn’t about adding a few alternative treatments to conventional care – it’s about fundamentally reimagining how we approach healing and wellness and what makes us human.
This is why I have spent so much time discussing the Levels of Healing.
Let’s Backtrack
Recently, while discussing healing approaches with a colleague, I realized something: while I’ve extensively shared the levels of healing methodologies we use in our clinics, I’ve never fully explained the journey that led me here. This story matters because it might help others recognize that there’s so much more to healing than what we see on the surface.
Our current healthcare paradigm, firmly rooted in materialism and mechanistic thinking, has dominated the past century. While this approach has its merits, particularly in acute emergency care, it represents a dramatic departure from how humans understood health and healing for the entirety of our existence. More importantly, its limitations are becoming increasingly apparent in addressing chronic illness and overall wellness.
This recognition led me on a two decades-long quest for deeper understanding. My journey has taken me far beyond traditional medical circles, learning from an extraordinary spectrum of healers and wisdom-keepers: physicians and researchers, priests and shamans, exorcists and dowsers, farmers and ecologists, chefs and traditional healers. Each has contributed to my evolving understanding of what truly drives illness and health.
A year and a half ago, I wrote about how our society is adrift when it comes to health. In a post pandemic era we stand at a crucial crossroads: either we actively develop a more holistic understanding of health, or we risk having a limited paradigm imposed upon us – one that may not serve our highest good.
While many recognize the limitations of conventional medicine (particularly its devolution over the past two decades), finding alternatives can feel overwhelming. Even within alternative medicine, practitioners often disagree on fundamental principles. Yet they share one crucial insight: the human body operates in ways far more sophisticated than our outdated medical textbooks suggest.
Our current overspecialized approach to medicine – both in allopathic and alternative circles – stems from an outdated metaphor comparing the human body to a machine with separate, independent parts. This model entirely overlooks the divine and interconnected nature of human existence. Consider, for instance, the profound mysteries revealed through near-death experiences and the fascinating phenomenon of cellular memory in organ transplants.
It’s worth noting that across multiple scientific disciplines, religions, and spiritual practices, there’s growing recognition of how matter (including our physical bodies) interfaces with the spiritual realm. This understanding is held by physicists, researchers, priests, and philosophers alike. Yet many physicians dismiss these insights as “unscientific” or “too ethereal” simply because they weren’t part of traditional medical education and don’t “fit the narrative”.
As Rupert Sheldrake astutely observes in his book “Science and Spiritual Practices,” this separation wasn’t accidental. The divide between holistic and mechanistic thinking emerged from a historical agreement between Church and Science to remain in separate domains. But common sense – which, as the saying goes, isn’t always common – suggests this artificial separation no longer serves us.
Beyond institutional perspectives, the reality remains: we exist across multiple dimensions. Most wisdom traditions recognize seven distinct planes or levels of existence, each contributing to our overall health and well-being. Understanding and working with these “divisions” offers a path to deeper, more comprehensive healing.
Screenshot of a presentation I gave several years ago showcasing the fact that a subdivision of matter- of our being – has been studied and understand from antiquity to the present day.
These well-documented dimensions of existence aren’t merely theoretical constructs – they form the very essence of our being. True healing emerges only when we acknowledge and work with all these levels, understanding their intricate dance in both health and disease.
The irony of modern medicine lies in its tools. While the medical establishment largely dismisses energy and information fields, many of its most advanced diagnostic technologies – MRI machines, electrocardiograms, electroencephalograms – actually function by reading the body’s subtle energy fields. These devices peer beyond the physical, capturing images and information from higher vibrational levels of our existence.
Yet contemporary healthcare, driven by corporate interests, has narrowed its focus almost exclusively to the physical plane. This reductionist approach isn’t just limited – it’s a departure from ancient wisdom and modern physics alike. By restricting treatment to purely physical interventions, we’ve created a system that manages symptoms while missing opportunities for deeper healing.
This isn’t just a philosophical issue. When we ignore the body’s subtle energy fields and higher dimensions, we:
- Miss crucial diagnostic information
- Overlook powerful modes of healing
- Reduce complex beings to mere mechanical systems
- Prioritize profit-driven interventions over lasting, holistic healing
- Disconnect from millennia of ancestral healing wisdom
True healing requires us to reclaim this broader perspective. Just as quantum physics revealed that solid matter is mostly empty space filled with energy, modern medicine must embrace the reality that we are more than our physical forms.
Simply stated,
Our bodies are multidimensional energy systems that consist of physical, energetic, mental, emotional and spiritual levels. All levels are in a constant exchange of information within us and with our environment. It is this that makes us human.
Our approach to healing must reflect this fundamental truth.
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My Story
When I first chose medicine as my path, I had a simple motivation: to help people heal (and if we want to get really deep- unbeknownst to me at the time, heal myself). What I couldn’t have known then was how profoundly my rural upbringing would shape my approach to healing. In our home, medicine often came straight from the garden, and Andrew Weil’s books weren’t just shelf decorations – they were blueprints for a different kind of healing wisdom.
Life has a funny way of guiding us exactly where we need to go. In my case, at the start of my health education it led me to one of the world’s leading chiropractic schools. There, I didn’t just study the human body – I immersed myself in its intricacies, eventually publishing my doctoral thesis on new anatomical discoveries. More importantly, I discovered the profound connection between the physical body and the nervous system, a revelation that would become the foundation of my approach to healing.
Yet something was missing. While I gained a powerful understanding of how to heal bodies I knew there was more to the story. This recognition led me to study Medical Acupuncture, a Western adaptation of ancient wisdom. While this added valuable tools to my practice, it still felt incomplete. I continued my quest through Functional Neurology, Chinese Herbalism, Functional Medicine, and Nutrition, each discipline adding new layers to my understanding of physical and energetic healing.
Then came the watershed moment – my introduction to comprehensively evaluating the Autonomic Nervous System. I’ll never forget sitting in Dr. Klinghardt’s seminar, having what I can only describe as an rude awakening. “Sh*t. I’ve been looking at only part of the picture,” I realized. His brilliant framework forever changed my understanding of what it truly means to be a physician, providing the foundation I continue to build upon today.
This revelation opened extraordinary possibilities: the power to heal through sound, light, and frequency, working at higher energetic levels than I’d previously imagined possible. Yet my background in physical medicine taught me something crucial – the body must be a prepared vessel for this energetic work. It’s a bidirectional relationship: physical health supports energetic healing, and energetic balance promotes physical wellness.
After years of working with various healing technologies–from lasers to frequency machines to sound therapy–I discovered something remarkable: our most powerful healing frequency is our own voice. The specific words we speak, both to the world and to ourselves, shape our biology more profoundly than any supplement or exercise routine – especially when spoken with conscious intent.
This understanding led me to collaborate with cutting-edge researchers, developing therapeutic language protocols that address healing on physical, energetic, and emotional levels. These programs have helped people overcome seemingly incurable conditions, excel in professional athletics, and create more fulfilling lives.
But perhaps the most profound realization was this: true healing isn’t about adding something new. It’s about unshackling ourselves of the interferences that block our connection to the divine. When we clear these obstacles, we naturally reconnect with our soul’s purpose, allowing our inherent healing abilities to flourish.
The obstacles to optimal health exist across a broad spectrum, creating a complex web of interferences that block our natural state of wellness.
These barriers often manifest as:
- Nutritional deficiencies despite caloric abundance
- Physical injuries and surgical complications
- Chronic infections and toxic burden
- Deeply rooted limiting beliefs
- Unresolved emotional trauma
- Disconnection from spiritual purpose
But these challenges rarely exist in isolation. Instead, they interweave and compound, creating patterns of dysfunction that echo across all levels of our being.
What I’ve observed in my years of practice has led me to a compelling realization: most modern health challenges cluster at opposite ends of our existential spectrum. The ends of the spectrum most consciously avoid if I might add.
At one extreme, we face profound physical challenges – we’re overfed yet undernourished, chronically sedentary in a world built for movement. At the other end, we grapple with a deep spiritual poverty – disconnected from divine guidance and bound by limiting beliefs that silently govern our health and life choices.
This perspective sheds new light on the current focus in alternative medicine on chronic infections, toxicity, and “trauma”. Rather than seeing these as merely physical or psychological challenges, I’ve come to understand them as sacred invitations from our soul – calls to heal both ends of our being simultaneously.
Think of it as a two-way channel:
- Our physical body must be healthy enough to receive and integrate divine guidance
- Our spiritual connection must be strong enough to direct and maintain physical healing
The persistent health challenges we face – from chronic fatigue to autoimmune conditions – are sophisticated messages, urging us to address both our physical foundation and our spiritual connection. True healing emerges when we honor both ends of this spectrum, creating a bridge between our earthly existence and our divine nature.
The Story So Far
At its heart, all healing emerges from an exquisite interplay between three fundamental aspects of our existence: our consciousness, the bodies biophysical energy fields, and our biological systems. This trinity forms the foundation of true wellness, with each aspect intimately connected to and influencing the others in ways that mainstream medicine is only beginning to understand.
Biology, Biophysics and Consciousness make up the threefold aspect of our being.
I share this understanding not as mere theory, but as an invitation to explore and validate these truths for yourself. The evidence exists all around us, waiting to be discovered through multiple pathways of investigation and experience. Dive into the cutting-edge research in physics and biology, where science increasingly validates what ancient healers have known for millennia about the roles of energy, consciousness and spirit in health. The quantum realm reveals patterns of interconnection and influence that mirror traditional healing wisdom with remarkable precision.
Yet academic research is just one avenue of understanding. I encourage you to cultivate your own spiritual understanding through direct experience, to develop a personal relationship with God that transcends dogma and doctrine. Spend time in nature, observing its inherent wisdom and healing rhythms. Watch how living systems naturally maintain balance and harmony, and notice how your own body responds to this connection with the natural world.
There’s profound wisdom waiting to be rediscovered in your own ancestral lineage as well. Take time to learn your family’s traditional healing practices from parents and grandparents. These generational healing traditions, often dismissed in our modern rush toward technological solutions, carry deep wisdom about the interplay between physical health and spiritual wellbeing. They represent a heritage of healing knowledge refined through centuries of observation and experience.
My Role
As an integrative physician, I’ve come to understand that my responsibility extends far beyond treating physical symptoms. My role is to serve as a guide in identifying the true source of dysfunction across all levels of being – physical, energetic, and spiritual. This means looking beyond the obvious manifestations of illness to understand where the natural flow between consciousness, energy, and matter has been disrupted.
When patients come to me, they often arrive focused solely on their physical symptoms. My job is to help them recognize that these symptoms are actually sophisticated messengers, pointing us toward areas where the divine dance between consciousness, energy, and matter has lost its rhythm. True healing requires us to restore this sacred choreography, allowing each aspect of our being to move in harmony with the others.
This process involves not just addressing immediate health concerns, but helping patients recognize and release the deeper interferences that contributed to their illness in the first place. These interferences often exist simultaneously across multiple dimensions creating patterns of dysfunction that can’t be resolved by addressing any single aspect in isolation.
More importantly, this approach empowers patients to maintain harmony across all dimensions of their existence long after their immediate health challenges have been resolved. It’s about teaching them to recognize and respond to the subtle signals their body, energy field, and spirit send them before these messages need to manifest as physical symptoms.
This paradigm of healing represents both a return to ancient wisdom and an integration with our most advanced scientific understanding. We’re discovering that we are not just physical beings having a spiritual experience, but spiritual beings navigating a physical reality. Our health reflects the harmony between these dimensions, and our ability to maintain wellness depends on our willingness to work with all aspects of our being.
As we move forward in our understanding of health and healing, this integrated approach becomes not just beneficial but essential. The future of medicine lies not in further fragmentation and specialization, but in the recognition of the profound interconnections between consciousness, energy, and matter. When we honor and work with these connections, we don’t just treat illness – we restore wholeness, allowing the natural wisdom of the body to express itself fully in service of our highest potential.
Until next time.
This journey has taught me that authentic healing is a return to wholeness – a restoration of our natural connection to spirit, purpose, and the infinite wisdom that resides within each of us
If you need real answers on your healing journey
and let’s talk about how we can help.
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