Personal Letter from Cynthia Hutchison to the Healing Touch Community 4/30/08 Dear Healing Touch Community, This is written for anyone who is interested in my perspective of the current status of HT organizations. It is time to share my personal experience related to the last five years working with Janet Mentgen and her two daughters and son. This is a long letter that comes from my heart. My prayer is that I can convey both truth and integrity in the sharing of my story, which I have been asked by many in the HT Community to do, for the purpose of increasing understanding of where I stand and why. I trust this letter will serve some higher purpose. It is not a business or legal document, but truly what I consider highlights of my personal story as related to what has unfolded in our HT organizations since Janet’s death, September 15, 2005. The confusion and pain that the HTP‐HTI split has created is an unfortunate part of the process of change and growth that we are experiencing at personal, organizational and global levels. Paradigm shift and unexpected / unwelcome change is part of the human condition, as is the natural resistance and fear of this change. The paradigm shift in our organizations is a necessary change and not a diminishment of the value of healing work or of those of us who do this work, whether aligned with HTP, HTI or neither. Life is about change and change always has the potential and likelihood of evolution and positive growth. Let us move forward in that faith and in the spirit of growth. My sincere hope in writing this letter is to give you enough information about Lisa Mentgen Gordon, Bill Mentgen (CFO), myself, and the leadership team of Healing Touch Program (HTP) that you can discern a sense of trust in the way we are striving to continue to carry HT into the future. The world desperately needs Healing Touch as we go into ever more challenging earth and human conditions. I do not pretend to know what the highest good is for Healing Touch or how things are “supposed to look” in the long run. I ultimately must release my attachment to what I believe is the “right way”, since as a human being, I know I am limited in my thinking and my vision. Having said that, I also acknowledge that the vision that Janet and I strove to carry into the future is not of two (or more) HT programs (HTP and HTI). A bit of my personal history with Healing Touch: I took my first class in 1992 after practicing ten years of Therapeutic Touch, including direct studies with Dolores Krieger and Dora Kunz (founders of TT). I moved to Boulder, Colorado in 1993 and I became a Healing Touch instructor in 1994. That year, I also asked Janet to allow me to begin a research program for HT in order to help HT gain acceptance in the healthcare and consumer arenas. She enthusiastically supported this idea and after HTI was founded in 1996, we agreed to fund my position as Director of Research from there. After I resigned from that position in 2000, she took me on board as a level 4‐5 instructor. In 2003, during a challenging personal time, I experienced a four night traditional Native American Vision Quest in which I prayed and opened myself to the highest good for the next chapter of my life. I trusted and waited. Janet called me about a month later and invited me for a conversation. We met weekly for a month and then decided we would work together on administrating the Healing Touch Program into the 1
future. My title would be “Assistant Program Director” and she would mentor me to eventually become the Program Director (which occurred in May 2005). She shared with me what a huge decision this was for her and all the considerations and prayer she had put into making this decision. I later found out that the President of HTI at that time, Diane Wardell, had recommended me to Janet for this role. Janet asked me what some of my hopes were and she approved of them: 1) to bring HT into nursing schools as part of the core curriculum; and 2) to bring HT into long term care centers. We were very excited about working together. I was Janet’s usual companion to her frequent chemotherapy sessions in downtown Denver. I also gave her HT sessions most days that we were together. During our time, we talked about various topics and teachings related to HT Program. We also shared frequent conversations about holistic health, esoteric Christianity, theories of healing and energy, leadership, HT history, challenges, personal attacks and recoveries she had experienced in bringing HT into the world, family stories, personal beliefs, and visions for the future. She wasn’t much for small talk, and often we didn’t talk at all during our togetherness. I co‐taught the local Path of the Healer course with her during those years. While Janet did not easily let others into her emotional world, she did not hesitate to pass on her wisdom, opinions and mandates. She would admonish me when I didn’t show enough confidence in myself and she said that I had to be strong and self‐confident to prepare for the future. Though she didn’t easily extend compliments to people, she did once tell me that my skills in communication and my heart‐centeredness would go a long way to move HTP forward. A few times before she died, she told me that she loved me and that she was proud of me. I promised her I would do my best to carry her work forward. Janet promoted me from Assistant Program Director of HT on May 17, 2005. In June of 2005, Janet arranged a sacred ceremony with 44 Healing Touch Program Instructors to officially recognize her passing on the leadership role of Program Director to me. This was done at the Shadowcliff Retreat Center at Grand Lake, Colorado, the place where she first envisioned Healing Touch many years before. At the September 2005 annual HT conference in Breckenridge, Colorado, Janet publicly passed on leadership /ownership of the Healing Touch Program (legally registered as Healing Touch Program prior to her death based on her wishes) to her two daughters and son: Lisa Gordon (CEO), Bill Mentgen (CFO) and Lynn Gillespie. (See photo to right). I shared a hotel suite with her at conference and helped her to get ready for each day and to go to bed at night. She reaffirmed her confidence in me. Later that week, I had the privilege to spend the whole day with her on the day she died and to 2
be with her when she took her last breath. I reaffirmed my promise to her that day to support Lisa and Bill to carry forward her work using my talents and dedication to lead Healing Touch as her chosen Program Director. When she died after conference (which felt unbelievably unreal and even impossible), the Mentgens and I struggled with how to move forward. Where to start? How to create a harmonious team? The business was not in good order and many things had to be figured and searched out. The Mentgens were new leaders and unsure of themselves. Without having the luxury of time to properly mourn their mother, they had to take on the reins of the business and hope for guidance and direction. I also didn’t feel ready to take on my role completely and felt anxious. The Mentgens and I also didn’t know each other very well and the love and trust we now have in each other did not exist at that time. We would have to grow into it. And we did during the first year of our working together. Mistakes were made more than a few times during our learning curve and a few personalities clashed between HTI and HTP. However, I found Lisa, as our CEO, to be humble, able to apologize and to learn from errors of the past, open to feedback, able to laugh often, and extremely grateful for support and the work that individuals and teams put forth. I found that she said “Thank You” frequently and meant it. From the beginning, Lisa has worked with instructors and communities needing financial assistance to make the classes a go. She created a win‐win situation in every case that has been presented to her so that classes could take place and students could attend. As for me, I slowly developed self‐confidence in myself, and confidence in them. I counted on my HT leadership mentors and colleagues to assist me in my thinking and decision‐making related to my program and curriculum responsibilities. As of today, two and one half years past Janet’s death, we are now in a place where I believe the HT community can objectively and fairly evaluate what HTP has been able to do to move Healing Touch into the future. Despite the difficulty of dealing with organizational conflict and divorce with HTI, the accomplishments have been remarkable: most of you know the long list. Examples include: professionalization of curriculum; comprehensive teaching and reference materials; Technique Review Cards; two years of a monthly on‐line magazine (Energy Magazine) featuring inspiring stories for HT practitioners and students; a Presentations class to spur HT interest in communities and build classes for instructors; a business infrastructure that supports students, coordinators, practitioners and instructors; data base placement to create interchange and communications with students, practitioners and instructors; regional Community Newsletters; several types of brochures to spread the word about HT to potential HT clients, students and hospitals; a Healthcare Facilities Packet as a tool to help practitioners bring HT to their hospitals; a professional introductory DVD on HT; Self‐Care class; professional affiliation with Dr. Jean Watson and Caring Theory, a new international certification body, an international conference and instructor meeting and more. While I have heard one instructor blaming HTP for ”stepping out of the dance” with HTI, and I have seen/heard statements made by HTI that they strived for two years to try to work with HTP, this is a very misleading statement. I can only simply tell you that from my perspective, I have never experienced HTP (including myself as Program Director or the Mentgens as the new owners) as ever being invited to step “into the dance” with HTI from the time Janet died through the time that separation was seriously 3
considered last summer. This point cannot be emphasized enough from my point of view and is backed by numerous and significant objective examples . Basic psychological teachings tell us that when people or organizations do not have opportunities to work together, solve problems together, create together or play together‐that feelings of warmth, trust, friendship, teamwork and affinity will not be fostered. Continued separation leads to mistrust, apathy, and negativity in working together. I am known to be an easy person to work with and communicate with and I work out of a spirit of teamwork. Though I longed for and asked to be included with HTI, I was basically ignored and not invited to participate as Program Director with any HTI activities or meetings from the get go. HTI may argue that this was their way of keeping “church and state” separate. I can tell you from my experience being a psychotherapist and mental health clinical specialist, that excluding a colleague or organization which should be part of the process and team work in working with the WHOLE (meaning the three organizations that represented HT) will only lead to more separation and alienation. Recently, after months of struggling with what to do, we (HTP) decided to recreate the two pieces necessary for HTP to be a complete organizational body and to maintain and build its professional status and growth. HTP announced last month a new professional association (HT Professional Association/HTPA) and a new autonomous certification body (Healing Touch Certification/HTC). Many practitioners and instructors wanted a professional membership organization, which would truly give them a voice, a sense of ownership and the power to participate and share as fully as they desired. For the last few years, many had felt limited, uninvited, suppressed and /or uninspired from their past experience within the HTI membership body. I am happy to say that membership with HTPA is steadily growing and members are excited and thankful. We were asked to create a new organization and we chose to meet this expressed need. We will celebrate our new form at our HTP August inaugural international conference August 1st – 3rd (see the May Energy Magazine). Regarding certification, a new autonomous panel was created so that we could have a harmonious and appreciative working relationship between HTP and certification administration to better serve our student applicants and instructor applicants. (This includes something which had not taken place over the last two years: that is, communication to me as the Program Director after each round of certification, so that I could communicate with instructors and mentors teaching Healing Touch in the community and provide them feedback on the certification process.) A seasoned, professional and dedicated group of long time HT instructors came forth to apply to be part of that body under the leadership of Sharon Scandrett‐Hibdon, RN PhD, who was president of AHNA when they embraced Healing Touch in 1989. The certification application packet has been slightly enhanced to better reflect the competencies of the applicants and to make their preparations more personally meaningful. Many who have read and used the packet have extended gratitude for the love and care that was put into it. You can download it from the HTP website. A natural result of the separation also included the need to create an annual conference. HTP is hosting an international conference and instructor gathering August 1‐3 in Denver (the theme title being “Joining Hearts…Joining Voices!”) in order to provide the opportunity for group learning, networking, 4
sharing, celebrating and truly hearing each other. The voices of many practitioners and instructors will be heard at this conference in both presentations and interchange regarding how we all want HT to move forward into the future. I hope you can all join us! We intend to recapture the wonderful essence that historically has been part of our annual reunion with old and new friends and colleagues. In March, I submitted the HTP application for program endorsement to American Holistic Nurses’ Association. AHNA has supported the HT Program and curriculum for many years. For those of you for whom AHNA endorsement is important, you can know that HTP is addressing this need. There are some falsehoods and other statements I also want to address in this letter… 1. Neither HTI nor AHNA own Healing Touch curriculum, the terminal objectives or the Basic Healing Touch Sequence. Janet and Dorothea Hover Kramer wrote the terminal objectives together and they legally belong with HTP only. Sadly, large amounts of monies have had to be paid to attorneys to defend HT Program rights and properties as a response to HTI allegations that HTP does not own the curriculum or the objectives we teach from. (You may ask to see these letters if you like.) Recently, HTI claimed to own the Basic Healing Touch Sequence based on an article written by Diane Wardell in the HT Newsletter (May 2003). This is ironic because HTI admitted to HTP in writing last year (via Sue Kagel) that they (HTI) wrongfully registered it in their name and would take actions to return it to HTP. Even Diane Wind Wardell’s article in the HT Newsletter (May 2003) on the BHTS states “The BHTS found in the Level 1 Notebook (Mentgen & Bulbrook, 2002) describes the basic process and interventions by which Healing Touch is conducted.” Her statement clearly demonstrates acknowledgement that BHTS was created by Janet with Mary Jo’s support; therefore their claim of ownership is untrue and misguiding. 2. Your professionalism or ability to be recognized as a professional is not endangered (as stated by HTI) by transferring your credential status with HTP. The credential status that HTI claims they are the source of, is totally based on the education and curriculum that has been offered through Janet’s program‐HTP‐which she first birthed into the world 19 years ago at her local community college. Without the curriculum that instructors have taught from over the years, based on Janet’s /HTP teachings, there would be no HTI certification. HTI would stand as an empty shell. HTI is now quickly creating their own new curriculum to replace what Janet created almost twenty years ago through her business/HTP (then known as CCHT), and what HTP has diligently enhanced and built upon to create the professional and comprehensive curriculum notebooks that you have been using the last year and a half. 3. By Practitioners and instructors who transfer their allegiance to HTI are leaving their foundation stone, HTP, the original source of HT and the well‐loved and respected core curriculum. The heart of Healing Touch lies with the program and education and not with a body that was mandated to administer the certification process. In an HT Newsletter article (November 2002) by Lisa Anselme, HTI Executive Director, the organizational chart she presents clearly shows HTI as the body that administers the certification process and houses membership, and HTP (CCHT) 5
as the program and curriculum. HTI was never mandated to, or function as, either “a” or “the” program or curriculum, even as verified by HTI in this publication. Another HTI document on the Healing Touch Certificate Program states that “All participants who successfully complete the core curriculum through Level 5 will receive a Certificate of Completion issued by the Healing Touch Program Director.” Without inviting conversation or notifying me, as Program Director, HTI removed the required Program Director’s signature from the HTI certification application packet two years ago. The response I received from HTI when I pointed out their change was that the PD signature was not necessary and created an inconvenience for the student. This is but one example of a strong pattern of exclusion. In my opinion, it is ludicrous and unethical for HTI to state that they reject the curriculum of Janet Mentgen that has served them and the world since the beginning of Healing Touch and to state that HTP no longer meets their certification criteria. Creating their own version of a HT program is stealing from the program that Janet created and left to her children and Program Director so that her legacy could be carried on. With Lisa and Bill’s experience in business, they knew that service to students, practitioners and instructors was a crucial piece for successfully moving HT forward. We have dedicated ourselves to that service. A huge amount of debt was inherited by the Mentgens upon Janet’s death from her two previous years of not teaching (and thus not subsidizing HTP which she always did). Lisa and Bill have poured much of their own resources into the program and still do. Product development, professional staff, marketing, and the creation of a new infrastructure and other business pieces put into place by HTP for global growth costs money. HTP is far from being out of debt, but there is promise for fair compensation to all in the long run as we strive to reach out in the world. Healing Touch remains the gold standard status for a worldwide energy medicine program with a strong research base, comprehensive and professional teaching materials and professional recognition by mainstream healthcare. Despite the class price increases, we remain the second least expensive program in the United States by a long shot. As stated previously, HTP has a reputation for being flexible and generous in accommodating financial needs of instructors and students so that classes can be held where and when desired. 4. From their inception, HTI historically has used the name “HTI Certificate Program” to refer to the fact that they historically represented the organization created by Janet to support HTP and hold the certification process for the students who matriculated from the five core curriculum levels of Healing Touch Program. Now they are using this exact name to refer to their new curriculum or HT program, which is a totally different meaning, structure and function than their legal mandate. This is confusing, misleading and unethical. They are giving the impression that they have always been a curriculum/program when in reality, they have only taken on this role in the last month. 5. I am weary of hearing HTI statements that emphasize their non‐profit status, implying that it is somehow more reputable, service‐oriented or holy than a for profit business. Anyone who 6
understands tax status and business, knows that many non‐profits can make lots of money and many for‐profits barely get by or fail. HTP operates ethically and with dedication to carrying on Janet’s legacy for the good of all. Any organization, profit or non‐profit, should be evaluated by how it serves the world. Money and business are not “bad words” or aspiritual; in fact, most HT practitioners are striving to come into a rightful relationship with finances and to attract more abundance into their lives. We want to have faith that there is enough for everyone and not live from poverty mentality. HTP is striving to create a business model that will support everyone involved, especially practitioners who would like to earn a living doing the work they love and to instructors who love teaching and want to have more and more opportunities to teach Healing Touch. These goals will also be supported by the new HTPA. HTP actively supports practitioners, instructors and countries that are working from a lower economic base so that they may thrive. 6. The decision to split with HTI is a reflection of what Lisa and I have experienced as an unsuccessful relationship that resulted in energy drains and a progressively decreased feeling of joy for that aspect of our work. We wanted to instead focus on building and supporting HT. On a positive note, I would like to convey that my earlier experiences with HTI from its inception (1996) until two plus years ago was overall quite good. I always loved the annual HTI conference and the vision of what I believed we shared. I also am saddened by the split like many of you. I used to be employed by HTI as the Director of Research for five years and I was with HTI from its conception as a charter member, so it is a personal loss to me too. But I am unwilling to hold onto an organizational relationship for sentimental reasons that no longer serve what I discern as the path that I believe Janet would have for us. At our core, our soul identity or personal responsibility in life is not with the organizations we belong to, but with our individual spirit and how we do our work in the world. A change in organizational structure is not the end of the world, but an opportunity to shift the energy for growth and fresh perspective. I sincerely hope that my colleagues at HTI and I will find ourselves once again together in the same circle focused on “just doing the work”. I look forward to this transition of organizational paradigm shift being completed. 7. The work of HTP has been enormous and we have striven to meet our responsibilities with intention for the highest good, integrity, knowledge that we would make mistakes (and intention to learn from them), and to meet our work with the spirit of adventure and a light heart. I only ask those of you who are confused or who have separated yourselves from Healing Touch Program to objectively look at how HTP has grown in supporting Janet’s legacy. Don’t make a decision about your alignment based on fear, peer pressure, or choosing the “easier road”. Take the time to converse, read, contemplate and pray. Check in with your own sense of energy resonance. If your decision feels difficult or uncomfortable, take time to explore why. Making a decision from a place of equanimity will serve you best. Whatever you choose, be at peace with it and proceed with “doing the work”. 8. Despite HTI communications to the community that HTP curriculum and terminal objectives have changed, this is totally untrue. The curriculum remains the same. Some of the terminal 7
objectives were reworded to more accurately match and be true to the original, historical course content and to make the evaluations easier to understand and use. They were reworded with the assistance of Anne Day, Myra Tovey and Judy Turner who serve(d) as lead instructors with HTP. Both the Colorado Nurses’ Association and the National Certification Board for Therapeutic f Massage and Bodywork, who have awarded HTP providership of continuing education contact hours, have been notified of the rewording and curriculum updates and enhancements. I share this because an email from a prominent instructor has been going around accusing HTP of “changing curriculum and objectives” without going through the proper channels. Lisa and I have always been open to your feedback, communications, ideas and visions. We are excited about the new professional membership organization and the new certification body as well as our upcoming conference in Denver. Our entire leadership team values you and wants your input and participation. We know that the only way to grow HT into all the corners of the world is through you, your passion and dedication in “doing the work”. We are here to support you in doing that. Thank you for taking the time to read this lengthy letter. I hope it helps you to understand where I am coming from. I do not intend to write any more letters about this topic, but to focus my energies as completely as possible into the forward movement of growing Healing Touch and in the support of our new professional organizations created to better serve the HT community. Blessings and gratitude to you for all that you do to bring the gifts of Healing Touch to your communities. I deeply appreciate your patience and desire to understand during this time of change. Keep the faith and keep on “doing the work!” Cynthia Hutchison 8