3. Benefits of The Journey for children

By Caryl Morgan – Journey Accredited Therapist in Cape Town, South Africa

Jayshree Mannie (36), a school teacher of 10 to 13-year-olds in Kwazulu Natal, has led the world by introducing The Journey into the classroom with such positive results when it came to attendance, behaviour, self-confidence and academic results that she has now approached the Minister of Education, Kader Asmaal to discuss making it part of the curriculum throughout South Africa!

Jayshree discovered The Journey process, as pioneered by mind-body healing expert and author Brandon Bays, two years ago in her own quest to cure her acute acne – and also to help her eight-year-old daughter who had developed asthma. Inspired by the profound and permanent healing results obtained by both of them in just a few sessions, and having attended the first-ever weekend Journey Intensive held in South Africa with Brandon, Jayshree began to offer the Physical Journey to other children who found immediate relief from various prob-lems, including panic attacks, nightmares, sleep disturbances, depression, low self-esteem. Learners with concentration problems and attention deficit disorders due to emotional or physical stress began displaying improved behaviour pat-terns.

'The children came from impoverished cross-cultural backgrounds,' says Jay-shree. 'The results showed regular Journey processes - conducted both as fun group activities as well as on a one-to-one basis - made a noticeable differ-ence both academically and behaviourally.'

Over a two-month period (May/June 2001), Jayshree conducted her research scientifically on a total of 164 children split into groups of about 40 in three dif-ferent Grade 5 classes. Group 1 had no Journey process at all. Group 2 had Journey processes about twice a month, Group 3 had frequent Journey processes (as often as once a day) and began to shine head and shoulders above their peers. They were noticeably more attentive, less rowdy and concentrated easily. Academic marks soared on average to 93% in Group 3 – as compared to 76% and 77% in Group 1 and 2 respectively.

Healing painful childhood memories at soul level is a key to the powerfully effec-tive Journey process pioneered by Brandon in healing her football-size tumour in six-and-a-half weeks without drugs or surgery. 'I realised that I had stored in the tumour cells childhood emotions and memories that were too painful to face. Only when the issues were completed, healed and forgiven was the tumour able to leave.'

'Children are wonderful examples of openness and willingness to heal', says Brandon. In the Physical Journey they go into an imaginary magical space shuttle to whatever part of the body (organ, veins, bones etc.) that needs healing. They take with them a hero or a guardian angel who helps to uncover the memories stored in the cells. And they begin by shining imaginary torches around the area where they’ve landed. During the process they get balloons with resources like courage, strength and the ability to express their feelings or ask for help from the right people. They then replay the painful memory, as it would have taken place if they had had these resources at the time.

This is followed by a campfire process of 'speaking up' to whoever caused the pain in the memory and ultimately forgiveness or 'I'm sorry, it's okay'. After this, they take out their torches to look around the organ where they landed. It's extraordinary how quickly they see the cells beginning to change and how colourful – and even anatomically accurate - they are in their descriptions.

During the process the children uncover what inner qualities they have that are like the qualities of a hero – love, kindness, honesty, goodness, fun etc.

And as Jayshree Mannie can vouch – the results are profound and lasting. Despite the fact that she has now left the school, a year after her classroom experiment, her 'Journey' children are still ahead of their peers in all aspects of their work and behaviour - and even wrote letters to Brandon Bays thanking her for the fun they've had with The Journey!