Holistic is a word so often used by Natural Health Practitioners to describe their treatments, but what does it actually mean?

OED description under "Philosophy" states: "characterized by the belief that the parts of something are intimately interconnected and explicable only by reference to the whole"

and under "Medicine" states "characterized by the treatment of the whole person, taking into account mental and social factors, rather than just the symptoms of a disease"

Well as a Kinesiologist I am proud that each of my kinesiology sessions with clients does cover mental (I prefer emotional.!) and social factors rather than just the symptoms of a disease, but I would venture to go even further

We have so many tools and techniques blended from East and West within kinesiology that also cover, chemical, nutritional, structural, physical and energetical impacts on our health, as well as emotional and social factors.  That’s where I believe kinesiology differs from other treatments (and believe me I’m not knocking other forms of treatment – I often refer clients who need more specialist help in one realm, for example, structural, than I can personally give, and regularly partake of my own paid treatments from other disciplines)

So if “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts” do we actually look at the whole?   Well I believe we are certainly able to look at the components of the whole and piece together the bits of the puzzle that have created the health problem.   I would also suggest that kinesiology is the only modality that is actually able to do this.  I believe that the cells of the body hold all the information about a person’s wellbeing, experiences and traumas and that we can access, via muscle testing, these subconscious thoughts that play havoc with our health.   We can find elements that affect the muscle test, that we are unaware of, such as thoughts, beliefs, emotions, nutrition, chemicals, lymphatic massage and more and help the client make changes to positively impact their wellbeing.   However, do we really get the actual essence of a person, that unquantifiable, untouchable kernel and spirit that makes someone truly individual – well, maybe, sometimes, we can glimpse it, but I’m not sure that is our role.   We work within a clients’ capabilities, personality and requirements  certainly – that enable THEM to be the whole they want to be.  This is a diagram we use when teaching Systematic Kinesiology that demonstrates the "whole" to us.