Sat Dharam Kaur has been a practicing naturopathic doctor since 1989, with a focus on women’s health, cancer and mind-body approaches to healing. Since 2012, she has been studying, hosting, working and teaching with Dr. Gabor Maté. She structured his work in a format that could be taught
to others, the Compassionate Inquiry® Professional Online Training.
This post is a short edited excerpt of Sat Dharam’s reflections on fulfilling her youthful dreams, her current focus, and excitement for what’s ahead. Hear her full interview on The Gifts of Trauma Podcast.
Image author: Julia Pomodoro from Corelens
At this moment in my life I’m a grandmother, a farmer, a yogi, a naturopathic doctor, a Compassionate Inquiry® (CI) practitioner, facilitator and Co-Director with Gabor. My tasks are to allow CI to unfold organically, in the best possible way, and to both hold space for, and lightly oversee, that magnificent group of people; the administrators, the facilitators and the participants. I also work as a Naturopathic doctor, I teach and train people in Kundalini yoga, and I’m a seeker. I’ve always been a seeker.
I feel absolutely blessed in my life right now. I have great freedom, my family is well, I don’t have any major burdens and I live in a wonderful place. My heart and soul are full, grateful, happy, peaceful and excited about whatever’s coming next.
Recently, after a huge flood, everything not impacted was packed into boxes. When it came time to empty the boxes, I found my old journals, and a description of who I wanted to be when I grew up. As I read it, I realized, I am all of that, right now! It was a beautiful reconnection to my younger self, and victory, but it also raised the question. “I’ve done all of that, now what?” So today I’m an open canvas, literally and metaphorically. And despite being very busy, I create space for whatever wants to come through next.
When I applied to Art School, my intention was to integrate art, science and spirituality in my work. I love biology and nature and I revere creation—that constant beautiful miracle of light, unfolding all around me. As a teenager, one big piece of me loved nature, another loved the arts, poetry and beauty, and another was both curious about human nature and psychology, and eager to help. Today I continue to want to express my love of art, science, spirituality and my reverence for nature, visually, poetically, and in the way I live. It was all there from the start. If you look at my life, it’s what I’m already doing and want to expand. We need sustainability for our collective future, not just for our species, but the whole environment. I want to be a voice for that, however or wherever that may be.
Over the past two decades, I’ve focused on developing teaching systems. Right now I’m integrating psychology and spirituality at deep levels, and expressing that both in my teaching and by being drawn back to personal self-expression; writing, poetry and art. It’s deeply connected with Source and with what’s happening in the world.
Last week I led a 9-day Beyond Addiction workshop. I was teaching, practicing yoga and doing Compassionate Inquiry with the participants, who were going deep into their own trauma wounds. Afterwards, I brought them to the farm to plant blueberries—a beautiful integration. This is what it’s all about. And yes, it takes time to create integration in our own lives.
If you are wondering, how does this align with trauma healing, that’s a very good question.
As a naturopathic doctor, I was trained to treat the whole person; their environments, physical, emotional,spiritual aspects. As living organisms, we’re all connected to our environments.
As a synthesizer and integrator, while I can focus on the micro, my nature is to always see the big picture. What I’m noticing right now in the trauma world, is an absence of nature, biology and creativity when we work with people’s trauma. As a naturopathic doctor, I see these missing pieces. As a human and a biologist I recognize the importance of nature. As a Yogi I recognize the importance of spirituality. But… how much can you put into one discipline or one approach? I don’t know that we can add anything to Compassionate Inquiry, but we can certainly invite people to link to those aspects which make them whole by asking, “How’s your relationship to the land? Where does your creativity flow? How is that expressing itself these days? Who are you relating to in terms of other species? When was the last time you swam in the lake?”
An individual can’t be separated from their culture or environment, from their sources of nourishment, their land, air or water. I think that’s a huge missing piece in most forms of psychotherapy, the total absence of what’s going on outside our clients’ doors. That’s to our detriment as a species.
Much of our environment today is digital which lacks the nurturing nature provides. We’re so narrowly focused that we’re losing our connection to the whole. We’re not aware of the impact of our actions on the whole, or how we need to change our actions for the betterment of the whole. So that’s another question, “How much of your environment is digital?”
Great writers, poets and spiritual teachers always draw us back to the importance of wholeness, of seeing everything as one; connected and interdependent. Humanity seems to be going to the digital, the unreal, the artificial intelligence rather than the real. But we all have a deep need to be connected to the environment, to other species, to the soil, water, food, air and to each other. This connection creates the space needed for psychological, spiritual and environmental healing.
It would be wonderful if we all opened our eyes, ears and senses to the world around us, to the other humans and animals, to the lakes, the mountains, the soil. If we began considering the well-being of the whole and making that our priority. Not the well-being of one individual or one nation, but the well-being of the whole, which includes everything on this beautiful planet.
The Gifts of Trauma is a weekly podcast that features personal stories of trauma, transformation, healing, and the gifts revealed on the path to authenticity. Listen to the interview, and if you like it, please subscribe and share.
