Looking Back, Moving Forward: Great Teachers and Practitioners of Homeopathy by Rowena Jade Ronson

Looking Back, Moving Forward: Great Teachers and Practitioners of Homeopathy, based in the UK, share their stories, wisdom, experience and insights (2007) by Rowena Jade Ronson edited by Rebecca Knorr. Published by https://shapeshift-healing.com/ . ISBN: 978-0954703332; 7” x 9.5”; quality paperback; 500pp; 22 euro + s/h

“If you throw a stone in a crowd in India, it will hit a homeopath!”–Subrata Kumar Banerjea

Ms. Ronson (b. 1965) has been active in the health care field from an unusually early age:

“I started my journey as a ‘therapist’ more than thirty-five years ago when I attended a year long evening class in counselling. I had felt the calling to help others early in life. I had just turned twenty and was the youngest by far. In fact I was almost discouraged to join, as the facilitator believed that it is best to have some life experience when practising in a caring profession. And of course he was totally right!

“I have a very curious mind, which certainly helps working in the way I do. I am forever on a quest to learn and I have trained as a Functional Medicine Practitioner, counsellor, lecturer, homeopath, life coach, relationship counsellor, doula, Reiki healer, nutrition adviser and natural detox therapist. I have also studied Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP), Transactional Analysis (TA), Gestalt and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) and I am a graduate of Dynamis...”–https:// shapeshift-healing.com/ (accessed January 27, 2022).

Her book, which appeared in 2007, resulted from a two and a half-year period of concentrated curiosity, a self-admitted aspect of her personality, resulting in the production of Looking Back, Moving Forward, a truly fine assemblage of interviews.

For this lively book of interviews, which you might (will) have trouble putting down, she interviewed the following British homeopaths: Subrata Kumar Banerjea, Mike Bridger, Peter Chappell, Kate Chatfield, Sheilah Creasy, Robert Davidson, Annette Gamblin, Lesley Gregerson, Linda Gwillim, Barbara Harwood, Brian Kaplan, Ellen Kramer, Martin Miles, Lionel Milgrom, Misha Norland, Nicky Pool, Rebecca Preston, Linda Razzell, Ernest Roberts, Bill Rumble, Gordon Sambidge, Roger Savage, Yubraj Sharma, Jeremy Sherr, Myriam Shivadikar, Sue Sternberg, Dion Tabrett, Simon Taffler, Francis Treuherz, Charles Wansbrough, Anne Waters, Jerome Whitney, Kaaren Whitney and Carol Wise.

Ronson trained in homeopathy at the London College of Classical Homeopathy, graduating in 2001, and since then she has been in a full-time evolving practice in St Albans and in Mill Hill, London. She is a teacher herself, and in her practice uniquely combines homeopathy, psychotherapy, nutrition and functional medicine for individuals, couples and families.

Rowena's inspiration for compiling this book came out of her 2004 interview of George Vithoulkas when she visited Greece with a colleague, Nigel Summerley, that summer. During that interview she asked George whom he thought were currently the great teachers of homeopathy in the world. He mentioned a few names, none of them British.

It was then that she decided to interview British teachers, some 34 of them (she wanted to interview another twenty but that would have added an inordinate amount of space and time to the project): “I felt that by hearing from our UK teachers we, as a profession, would be able to discover who and what is influencing the homeopaths of tomorrow.”–Rowena Ronson (p. 1).

This review is based on a second reading of her book, which I doubly enjoyed: (I should have re-read it years ago).

Nonetheless, I had a difficult time deciding how to approach this review and, in the end, settled on offering a quote from not all but some of the interviewees.

On page 394, Ronson comments “What a fascinating lady” about her interview of Barbara Harwood. This easily applies to all. So here goes!

“...I had a girlfriend who invited me in to her parents' home for a cup of tea. It was a grand house on the Regent's Canal, and in the living room was a huge glass fronted cabinet full of weird bottle with cork stoppers. Upon closer inspection I read the names in copperplate script on the labels - Argentum nitricum, Aconitum napellus, etc. etc. I was transported into a feeling of awe and magic - like being in an alchemist's laboratory - time literally stood still for a few moments. “What are they?” I asked. “Homeopathic medicines,” she replied, “My dad is an amateur homeopath.” ...I guess that is when the call came...”–Bill Rumble

“From my perspective if I had to say what is crucial to learn, I would say an understanding of transference and countertransference. This is basic stuff in psychology and if we don't know about it, we can damage the patient by saying and doing the wrong things.”–Brian Kaplan, MD

“I think that one of those absolute keys to being a successful homeopath is having a curiosity for knowledge. once you think you know it, you haven't got it at all.”–Myriam Shivadikar

“If you think you are going to be a homeopath without evolving in some way you are mistaken because your patients will take you down places you don't want to go. People change subtly; they don't realise they are doing it. But you have some people who find practitioner development a bit challenging for them so they try and sneak off, but I know who they are and unfortunately they are the very people who need to do it the most.”–Ellen Kramer

“I have to say one of the weaknesses I perceive in homeopathy is that homeopaths are not sufficiently trained; they haven't done enough internal, therapeutic inner training. The world is emotionally illiterate and I think emotional intelligence in homeopathy is still limited.”–Peter Chappell

“My fundamental social role is that of disruptor and I have faithfully stuck to that over the years and, as such, those who have an agenda don't like me because I will disrupt it.”–Robert Davidson

“I have a sort of prayer to the universe, a wish list, for homeopathy. The wish is that those who practise homeopathy should keep on looking; keep on looking at the world out there and the world inside themselves.”–Misha Norland

“If you can understand homeopathy, then you can approach it authentically from your own place of truth rather than from what this or that teacher says. I think students have to find their own way of doing that.”–Annette Gamblin

“Many homeopaths undersell and undervalue themselves. Some are unknowing of how to deal with money and how to present and publicise themselves.”–Francis Treuherz

“During my days with the Guild [Guild of Homeopaths] I started to develop the use of crystals, which is something similar to homeopathy but seems to work on another level. I was at the HIV Clinic some ten years ago and I was prescribing them left, right and centre which lead me on to develop a double tier system of treatment. When homeopathy didn't work I would use crystals at a higher level and these seemed to work perfectly, but I couldn't understand what was going on.”–Charles Wansbrough

“Even Thomas Maughan [1901-1976] said, ‘If it isn’t the simillimum, it isn't homeopathy.' “–Jerome Whitney

“I would probably recommend specifically The Best of Burnett but also some of Clarke's books. I think we draw too heavily on the American homeopaths, especially Kent, when we have a lot of philosophical lessons to learn from the old English homeopaths.”–Dion Tabrett

“I had a sick daughter of three and a half who received an immediate cure with homeopathy and I wanted to know more.”–Linda Gwillim

“I am classical but I am also contemporary... Kent became synonymous with prescribing only on mentals and emotionals because to prescribe on physicals would be suppressive. These misconception were responsible for a trend of amateur psychotherapy in the profession. My ‘practical homeopathy’ is basic Hahnemannian and Kentian homeopathy. It does me very well and it is contemporary.”–Mike Bridger

“In my opinion, the whole issue about methodolgies is ridiculous. It is breaking up homeopathy into neat compartments which is totally false.”–Ernest Roberts

“I want to set up a Fellowship of Homeopaths and I have spoken to a few of the homeopaths that I would like to join - Tony Hurley, Melissa Assilem, Colin Griffith, Martin Miles, Mike Bridger and Hilery Dorrian. I just want to see what happens with us spending time together debating - even our differences.”–Gordon Sambidge

“To cut a long story short, my grandmother taught me from about the age of eight, nine or ten what this thing called homeopathy was about so I was imbued with the idea from then.”–Sheilagh Creasy

“I am inspired by anybody who can commit their lives to the study and the expansion of the use of homeopathy.”–Kate Chatfield

“Patients may present to us in ‘layers,’ but we don't need to use these labels, because just as we are urged not to treat disease labels, so maybe if we did a little less labelling of philosophical concepts in our work there would be slightly fewer arguments.”–Roger Savage

“I am bringing in the spiritual concepts from the beginning, and bringing in the medical diseases and the models from an allopathic and esoteric perspective, and then getting people to grasp the spiritual anatomy.”–Yubraj Sharma

“If your goal is to do good homeopathy, then it is not going to be easy, but it will be wonderful. it depends on whether you want easy or wonderful.”–Kaaren Whitney

“I fundamentally believe that homeopathy is safe. I think you can have unsafe practitioners, but that is different.”–Anne Waters

“How many times can we honestly say we have given the simillimum? A series of good similar remedies will go a long way.”–Rebecca Preston

“I was always conscious that homeopathy was a tool of transformation, you could transform people out of their illnesses and their diseases and out of their miasms.”–Martin Miles

“Isn't all illness in the mind? Doctors differentiate between what is in the mind and what is in the physical; they fragment us. Illness is in the mind and it manifests physically.”–Carol Wise

“We hold a mirror up to our patients and they see themselves in it and what they see is a different future and a different possiblity. And people stop believing in the medical model! They stop hearing,

‘There's nothing we can do for you.’ “–Linda Razzell

“Jeremy Sherr explained how Hahnemann talked about the spirit of life and this encouraged me to include even more personal and practitioner development at Purton House. Hahnemann and Jung would have seen eye to eye in many things!”–Nicky Pool

“Altruistically, you can give so much and help so many with homeopathy. It is also possible to earn a good living. you can stretch your mind and never stop learning. so it covers just about everything.”– Lesley Gregerson

“I have never been able to understand how you can give several remedies at the same time and how they can all be similar. It doesn't make sense to me.”–Sue Sternberg

“It is fascinating, becoming a homeopath and looking back at conventional medicine and how scientists have completely missed that whole area of individual susceptibility.”–Lionel Milgrom

“I think one needs to practise patient centred homeopathy, rather than remedy centred homeopathy, and that means prioritising the relationship and looking after patients by, for example, creating expectations that can be met and helping the patient to be ‘process’ not ‘outcome’ oriented.”–Simon Taffler

“Nearly every patient to whom you give a good remedy will come back with a lesson for you. They will come back and say one little sentence that will resonate with you; they will come and give you their gift back.”–Jeremy Sherr

With great effort and determination Ms. Ronson assembled this volume of inspiring stories which should no doubt please any person involved with homeopathy and for those who might still be residing in skepticism.

I heartedly recommend this insightful book, which contains a good index and a bibliography of 140 entries. Allow me to further suggest that you read a chapter nightly before retiring. Well, at least that's how I've approached it, and with pen in hand to jot a few notes.

Though celebrating it's fifteenth birthday (does age matter?), this important tome relates endless captivating stories, opinions and laser-focused thoughts which just might cause a temporary insomnia. Yet, get it anyway and dream on.

Note:

• Thomas Lackenby-Maughan (10-27-1901 • 6-x-1976) was an influential British lay homeopath who taught and influenced countless numbers of homeopaths on the isle and other countries. He first learned homeopathy in the 1930s from William Wilson Rorke (c. 1886 • 1962) at the Royal London Homoeopathic Hospital (RLHH) and then went on to practice there for over 20 years. Others say he learned homeopathy from Wheeler, Kenyon and perhaps Clarke himself. Maughan was a colleague of several Faculty of Homeopathy members, i.e., Drs. Foubister, Blackie, and Tyler.

Publication History

Article published online:
29 December 2022