Our review of energy healer Paul Lennard – Queen of Retreats, October 2015

The quick read: Energy healer Paul Lennard channels energy to help release trauma which is locked in our cell memory and said to cause physical illness or emotional distress. Depending on the client’s needs (and he treats both humans and animals), he uses a mixture of deep tissue massage, craniosacral therapy and Chi Nei Tsang (an effective stomach massage), along with Shamanic work. He says he’s often guided in his work and ‘sees’ things which help him to discover what’s wrong. Ailments he treats can be as wide ranging as backache or feeling slightly down to major depression and even cancer.

How it was for us: I went to see Paul Lennard at the swanky Como Shambhala Urban Escape at the Metropolitan Hotel in Mayfair. Cosseted inside the futuristically white waiting area, sipping the delicious signature ginger tea, you feel a million miles from busy Park Lane. I didn’t have any pressing physical or emotional need to visit Lennard but was curious after a friend told me that he had ‘transformed her life’. I’m not adverse to the odd healer; my sister is one and regularly mends me when I’m broken.

There’s not much talking once in the treatment room but then Lennard works on a more intuitive level and can ‘feel’ where the emotional blockages are. I was asked to lie down fully clothed on the bed while he got to work ‘scanning’ for energy blocks by floating his hands above the length of my body. It all felt rather relaxing.

False hope! After the body scan came the pressure points. When he pressed a finger into the area close to the bottom of my rib cage, the pain was excruciating. Ditto the points around my shoulders and on the back of my skull – these were places where I was storing emotional trauma apparently. But with each point there was a gradual unfurling, and as he continued to press the pain lessened and then disappeared.

The idea that your mind blocks emotional trauma but that this can get stored in your cell memory – and often lead to illness – is not new. Neuroscientist and leading clinical psychologist Dr David Servan Schreiber, in his seminal book Healing without Freud or Prozac, explains that we have two parts to our brain, “the cognitive brain – conscious, rational and geared towards the outside world….and the emotional or limbic brain, unconscious, primarily concerned with survival and above all tied to the body…Because of the emotional brain’s close relationship with the body it is often easier to act on it through the body rather than through language”.

And this is exactly what Lennard does. When he moved his hands over my body again, I could feel an intense heat exactly where his hands were, and then, when he placed his finger tips on the crown of my head, my legs felt like they were being inflated by a balloon pump as he worked his magic. At the end of the treatment I was exhausted and barely able to drive home – certainly something had shifted.

A few days on and the changes have been subtle rather than seismic, but all positive. I’ve been having very vivid dreams and I find it easier to make decisions both on a day-to-day level and about my long term future. The perfect treatment for damaged souls.

What’s queenly: Como Shambhala Urban Escape is a truly luxurious pampering zone. Lennard is a kindly, nurturing character who puts you at ease instantly.

>What’s lowly: If you like to talk about your problems, Paul probably isn’t your man. He works intuitively.

Insider tip: Leave yourself a few minutes to relax in the waiting area after the treatment with a cup of ginger tea. Don’t drive!

Book it: A 1 hour session costs £140, see paullennard.co.uk.

View this article at queenofretreats.com