The first thing that strikes you about Master Stephen Co is his dynamic energy, his sense of humor and his saying it like it is. A mesmerizing speaker, he also found himself as part of a CBS Special investigative report, when he healed a woman who turned out to be the daughter of an Emmy award winning producer.
But that is not something Stephen Co, an analytical, skeptical engineer would have imagined a place he would be in many years ago.
‘I grew up in the Philippines and went to Catholic school and followed the sacraments. But if you are looking for someone to tell you, that I was always on a quest for enlightenment, or dabbling in alternative healing, then I’m the wrong man. My only exposure was to the Catholic Church and to fortune tellers my mother often took me to. By the time I grew up I became an engineer and a Baptist. And for me, anything that didn’t come from the Church came from the other side.’
"When I was 24 years old, my wife fell and broke her hip." The doctor told Stephen Co it was a compound fracture and it would be 3 to 4 months before his wife would walk again. “At that time I took a visualization class called Silva Method, and there someone told me about Pranic Healing. I said - 'okay, I’m skeptical but I will try it if it heals my wife.'”
Stephen Co went to the class. The teacher was Master Choa Kok Sui.
What was his first reaction to the Master? Stephen Co said with a laugh, “Again, no lightening struck, no bells rang. For me he was just another guy teaching this class that I was quite skeptical about. You may get some awe struck responses from others about their first meeting with Master Choa, but not from me! I even remember one time I volunteered to scan someone and I wasn’t doing a good job and Master Choa just waved to me and dismissed me, 'Hey you, go sit down,' and I really didn’t care. I said, 'Okay whatever.' “
Stephen Co says he could not feel anything in his hands for four years and could not scan well. “I started teaching classes and just memorized the whole book. So I would guide the students according to the instructions in the books and the funniest thing was that all the students felt the sensations in their hands, but the one man who felt nothing was the one teaching them the class, me! So I could really never show them, all I did was just guide them. It was another 4 years before I could actually scan right. Even today, I use my logical mind first, by asking the person who comes in, about the problem, what was the medical diagnosis, and then use the protocol based on knowledge gained from asking. Of course while healing I get impressions. I work very differently from other Masters”.
What have been his most exciting healings? “Well, there was the young lady whose father was the CBS producer. She came in to get healing for her boy friend who had back pain and then requested a healing for herself. When asked what area she needed healing in, she mentioned a couple of general things and then wrote, Blind in one eye. I said well if you are blind, then you are blind, I don’t think I can do anything about it. When she said, 'please try,' I started working on her trying a particular technique. When I started, all she saw was pitch black darkness. Ten minutes later she started seeing grey. Another 10 minutes and she started seeing light as if someone had poked a hole in that grey film. I finished working on her in 45 minutes and then walked away because I was afraid nothing would happen. Then I said from a distance, 'Open your eye Jill.' I heard a scream and she said, 'I can see.' I didn’t believe it myself. I went to check if she had her other good eye closed and wasn’t peeking from it. She wasn’t. She could see. I can say this happens always -the healer is more shocked than the one being healed.”
"I understand skepticism quite clearly because I was a skeptic myself. In my eyes a skeptic is one who feels he or she does not have enough information to take that leap of faith. I would not have believed it or got involved with Pranic Healing either if my wife had not broken her hip. I worked on her three times a day and in 2 weeks she could walk. She was healed in a very short time, far lesser than what was predicted by doctors. Even when I was treating her I didn’t feel anything in my hands, luckily she did. So when skeptics share their disbelief I don’t take it personally. I tell them I completely agree and had it not been for my own personal experience, I too would have dismissed it."
Another challenging case happened when during a lecture Master Stephen Co asked for a volunteer with simple back pain. “The person who stood up and started walking towards me from the back of the room was a woman on crutches who also announced that she had a morphine bag attached to her waist because she was in severe pain. Then she said she was going to turn off the morphine because she wanted to put Pranic Healing to the test. I tell you I was sweating bullets at that moment and praying fervently to Master Choa that if he helped I would remain grateful and humble!”
When the woman slowly and laboriously made her way to the stage Stephen Co was nervous. “But as soon as she sat down I forgot everything and focused on her. When I was done, I don’t know why this thought came to me of Jesus saying, 'Get up and walk.' And so I said to her, 'Get up and walk.' Then kicked myself in the next moment, 'you idiot, what did you do? What if she doesn’t walk?' But she stood up and walked and she was pain free. It was amazing but one of my toughest cases.”
Pranic Healing doesn’t just work on physical ailments; it heals psychological ailments as well.
Stephen Co remembers two such cases-a woman with a phobia of needles and another who was petrified of spiders. “I remember the organizer picked up a needle and the woman screamed and jumped up. After we did 15 minutes of healing, she walked up, picked up the needle and started playing with it. The woman with the fear of spiders had had the phobia for 40 years. Again after 15 minutes of healing, she picked up the bottle with the spider in it and let it out.”
Stephen Co has also done demonstrations in healing open wounds. “By applying this technique taught in Pranic Healing we have healed open wounds in 15-20 minutes before the viewers.”
Stephen Co said that while there are books written by Master Choa Kok Sui, the creator of the Pranic healing technique, that are quite comprehensive there is a lot that is passed on orally in many workshops by him and other masters. What Master Choa wrote and left was merely the tip of the iceberg.
“I was with him at many workshops and I often saw him teach the same technique 5 different ways. When I asked him the reason, he said he saw the energy and the capability of the class before him and taught accordingly, and so for many higher level workshops we share the knowledge the same way.”
Stephen Co has co-authored the book, ‘Your Hands Can Heal You,” with physician Eric Robins who incorporates Pranic Healing in his treatment of patients.
So are physicians becoming more open minded? And how does Master Co deal with skepticism? “ I think more and more physicians are becoming open minded about alternative and complementary medicine, and those who are not, will become the dinosaurs of the medical field.
"I understand skepticism quite clearly because I was a skeptic myself. In my eyes a skeptic is one who feels he or she does not have enough information to take that leap of faith. I would not have believed it or got involved with Pranic Healing either if my wife had not broken her hip. I worked on her three times a day and in 2 weeks she could walk. She was healed in a very short time, far lesser than what was predicted by doctors. Even when I was treating her I didn’t feel anything in my hands, luckily she did. So when skeptics share their disbelief I don’t take it personally. I tell them I completely agree and had it not been for my own personal experience, I too would have dismissed it. When I share my personal experiences, most people listen. I think even those who don’t identify with Pranic Healing on an intellectual level, are still touched emotionally when personal experiences are shared, because you can never run away from facts.”
by Kaveta A Chhibber
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