Who Holds the Authority for Healing?

**Who holds the authority for healing?** Is it the therapist, the method, the diagnosis, the research—or the person actually living the experience? In this thought-provoking episode of *Be Well with Michelle Greenwell*, writer and conceptual artist **Mark A. Michaels** joins Michelle to explore some of the assumptions underlying traditional psychotherapy, contemporary psychedelic therapy, and our broader healing culture. Drawing from his forthcoming preprint, *Binaries, Multitudes, and Beyond*, Mark examines authority, expertise, personal agency, and what can happen when individuals are encouraged to engage critically and creatively with their own therapeutic experiences. Together, Michelle and Mark explore an important distinction: **expertise does not necessarily have to mean authority.** Can we value the knowledge of therapists, physicians, researchers, and facilitators while also honouring the lived experience and observations of the individual? Can healing language sometimes encourage us to continually search for something that needs fixing? And what becomes possible when we move beyond being a recipient of care and become an active participant in our own wellbeing? They also explore psychedelic therapy and vulnerability, creativity as another way of knowing, the surprising value of humour and irreverence, and one particularly important question: **If we remove the expert from the centre of the healing process, what belongs in the centre instead?** 🫖 **CommuniTEA Pause: SoulTEA Harbour** Michelle opens the conversation with SoulTEA Harbour from the Cape Breton Tea Company, highlighting anise and cardamom and the intention: **“Balance and Flow is possible when we open to be present for our true heart's desires. Come home to your heart.”** The harbour becomes a metaphor for the entire conversation: perhaps expertise can offer shelter, knowledge, perspective, and help with navigation—without determining our destination. During the episode, you’ll also be invited into simple experiential pauses to consider: What do I believe needs fixing? Where did I learn that? Whose definition of “better” am I using? What does my heart actually desire? And if nobody else were interpreting my experience for me, what would I notice? This isn't a conversation about rejecting expertise. It is an invitation to become curious about our relationship with it—and to consider how observation, choice, creativity, intuition, and personal participation can become part of our everyday experience of wellbeing. To reach Mark please go to: https://markamichaels.com/ Or locate him on IG: https://www.instagram.com/markamichaels/ 🎙️ *Be Well with Michelle Greenwell* Exploring possibilities for wellbeing through curiosity, awareness, creativity, and active participation. #BeWell #MichelleGreenwell #MarkAMichaels #Healing #PersonalAgency #Psychotherapy #PsychedelicTherapy #Wellbeing #SelfAwareness #Creativity #BioEnergeticWellness #SoulTEAHarbour Each episode of the Be Well with Dr. Michelle Greenwell podcast includes the BioEnergetic Wellness Formula.  That means that you have the opportunity to have a healing session while you listen based on the way the content is laid out and the activities we participate in.  Before listening you can create a goal or an intention of where you would like to be heading with an activity or in your life, then make your cup of tea, engage in the activities and celebrate at the end.  Are you looking for more resources?  The best way to find all the resources in one location is by visiting https://linktr.ee/greenwellcenter.  Become a regular listener of the podcast and purchase your own tea blends to assist you in transformation while you listen.  Our podcast is designed to bring balance and flow to your day, week, month, and year.  Thanks for sharing us with others who could also benefit.  Please send us your feedback and a review.  Support the show Dr. Michelle Greenwell, BA Psych, MSc CAM, Ph. D CIH (Complementary and Integrative Health).  Striving to support the public to choose self-care and well-being options that create ease and flow in their lives, Michelle specializes in using movement to heal the body.  Her BioEnergetic Formula for Success provides a means for everyone to set their intentions and create support and action for flow and ease to the goals.  Learn more at www.greenwellcenter.com.  Follow her YouTube channel and specialty playlists.  Find her full resource list here. She highlights her Tea Company: The Cape Breton Tea Company which you can find at www.capebretontea.ca.  Included is the specialty line of Tea with Intention, Harmony Blends and Coaster, and the focus on high quality organic black, green, herbal, rooibos, and honeybush tea.  Including tea with your podcast listening is a unique way to explore tea, create healthy habits, and have great conversations with friends and colleagues.