Great Lakes Provings Philosophy
Samuel Hahnemann developed the principles of homeopathy based in part on Paracelsus’ theory of harmony between man and nature. According to Paracelsus, sickness and health in the body relied on the harmony of man (the microcosm) and Nature (the macrocosm). The universe is represented in every person (Debus & Multhauf, Alchemy and Chemistry in the Seventeenth Century, William Andrews Clark Memoria,1966). Provings demonstrate that we are in everything and everything is within us. Therefore, we are in relationship to everything in the universe.
Paracelsus’ Doctrine of Signatures represented the connection between man and nature. As it is currently understood, the Doctrine of Signatures states that plants resembling various parts of the body can be used to treat those parts. However, we believe this to be a very superficial understanding and that in fact, provings reveal the real depth and complexity of this doctrine. They allow us to reveal the healing properties of substances in relationship to all other things. Therefore, we have found that provings must be grounded in an understanding of these interrelationships. In order to honor and truly understand the substances we prove, we view their impact on many levels: mythological, archetypal, historical, cultural, political, and in their relation to the natural world. This comprehensive process allows for a deep understanding that reveals the greatest possible use of the remedy.
Proving Dynamics
In provings we transcend the boundaries, accessing the essential energetic nature of the substance as it relates to healing. We experience others’ suffering through a resonance with our own susceptibility. We have found this to occur in simple triturations as well as in full Hahnemannian provings.
Because we are transcending boundaries it is critical to create a structure within which this can happen. There are two critical aspects of creating such a structure: one is supervision and the other is the creation of a container to hold the entire proving process from intention to extraction. Once the group's attention is focused and the trituration begins, an energy field is created. It is important that the supervisors create a boundry between themselves and the provers - as they would in a homepathic consultation - in order to clearly observe the trituration dynamis. Supervision must continue for the next two weeks of the proving, so that provers have support.
The group process of triturating the substance is as important as what unfolds during the Hahnemannian portion that follows. Because important themes are revealed during the group interaction of triturating, it is essential for supervisors to observe and record the process.The themes that emerge will be confirmed and further developed during the rest of the proving.
Popular scientific belief holds that provings are more valid when they are conducted in a blind fashion. Our experience supports the fact that the transcendence of physical boundaries during the proving process renders blind studies irrelevant. When conducting your own proving you may choose to do it blind or not.
The Great Lakes Proving Protocol is designed to disseminate the proving results quickly. Thus, collation and publication should be immediate. In order to honor the fullness of the substance’s role in healing, it should be researched in relation to mythology, cultures, history, natural sciences, etc. This information should be included in the documentation of the proving.
THE GREAT LAKES PROTOCOL
In any experiment it is critical to create a consistent, repeatable process.
Choosing a substance
a. Consider toxicology: The Environmental Working Group has a fairly comprehensive list of chemicals: http://www.ewg.org/chemindex/list. This method is NOT appropriate for viruses or bacteria. We recommend Hahnemannian provings for infectious agents.
b. Consider gaps in our materia medica, e.g. plant families or kingdoms that lack information.
c. External verification of the substance’s identity is critical.
“It would be ideal if a zoologist or botanist can verify and give a statement in writing regarding the species. This is important because there are remedies in our traditional homeopathic literature which appear with reasonable certainty to not be the species they have been named as, e.g. Tarantula Hispanica. There are also huge generalizations [from unclear sourcing] which have created confusion, e.g. Medusa and others which escape definition and can only be assumed as to their makeup, e.g. Petroleum.“
Bob Lawrence, Helios Pharmacy
d. Consider timing: organic substances must be triturated to a 3C level within 24 hours.
Roles
a. Master or Co-Master Provers:
The master prover is ultimately responsible for the proving, ensures that the integrity of the process is honored and that all parts of the protocol are followed.
>Choose, research and verify the substance.
>Provide the provers and supervisors with an informed consent form. (See informed consent page.)
>Instruct supervisors in the process for explaining and securing informed consent from volunteer provers.
>Prepare the medicating potency.
>Ensure effective communication between supervisors and provers.
>Conducts the information extraction.
>Organize final collation protecting all identities.
>Publish the findings when complete with a spirit of immediacy.
b. Supervisors:
>Explain informed consent process.
>Review informed consent form with provers.
>Secure informed consent from each prover prior to proving.
>Pre-screen provers alert master prover of any concerns.
>Observe and record the trituration process.
>Monitor health and safety of the provers for a full fourteen days.
>Assist in the information extraction.
>Assist in the collation process.
c. Provers:
>Honestly and clearly communicate their health status during the screening.
>Participate in the trituration and take the remedy as instructed.
>Record all reactions and observations in a journal during the trituration and for the full fourteen days following.
>Clearly and freely communicate about their health status throughout the process.
>Participate in the information extraction meeting.
Organization of Provers and Supervisors
a. Assemble a group, ideally of 5-8 provers, to ensure as much diversity as possible in terms of age, gender, culture, and race.
b. Recruit one supervisor for no more than three provers to facilitate accurate, detailed observation and collation.
c. Supervisors must conduct screening interviews of provers before the proving begins to establish a health baseline for each participant.
d. Exclude people under 18, pregnant women, and people with serious mental, emotional or physical chronic illness.
e. Each prover must sign an informed consent and return the document to their Supervisor prior to their participation (see informed consent subpage).
Proving Process
a. At the beginning of the trituration, the Master Prover (or someone she/he chooses) sets the intention of the process to focus the group's attention. This may involve a statement or invocation to invite in the energetic nature of the substance and to open up the energetic field.
b. Provers are given as many ways to express themselves as possible and are provided with pen and paper. Provers are encouraged to converse, write, draw, and to move around.
c. Each prover takes two turns in a trituration cycle (see Trituration Method Page). The number of provers determines how many of these 10 minute double cycles each prover triturates.
d. Supervisors observe and record group dynamics and discussions verbatim.
e. At the completion of the 3C potency, the provers dilute and succuss a portion of the 3C to a 12 C. (See Korsakoff Method Page). The remainder of the 3C is dissolved in ethyl alcohol, topped up with distilled water, and sucussed to a 4C for shipment to the pharmacy.
f. The next day at a specified time, each prover takes a half dram of the 12C dilution sublingually and clearly records all observations, sensations, physical, mental and emotional changes experienced over the next 14 days. Provers should record by hand in a notebook rather than on the computer (handwriting and spelling anomalies may be important symptoms).
g. Supervision continues throughout the 14-day period, by phone, email, or in person.
h. At the end of the 14 day period it is essential to have a meeting to synthesize the provers experiences, to provide closure to the group process and to reveal the substance if the proving was blind. The extraction of information is as important as any other part of the process to prevent lingering effects from the proving.
i. During the extraction proving themes are identified.
The Collation Process
a. Each prover transcribes their journals to facilitate collation. The collation and journals are both sent to the master prover.
b. The master prover works with the supervisors to ensure that the final collation is assembled and combines it with the research of the substance into a final document.
c. Free, accessible and timely publication of the proving is an important part of proving process.
In the spirit of homeopathic community and for clarity, it is important to identify that your proving was carried out utilizing the Great Lakes Protocol. This essential information should always be included when publishing and when engaging homeopathic pharmacies to produce new remedies.
You are encouraged to do provings on a regular basis and to create your own website to publish them, adding to a network of free and accessible proving websites. Alternatively, we welcome you to send us your provings to publish on this website. To contact us directly please go to the Contact Us page.
Samuel Hahnemann developed the principles of homeopathy based in part on Paracelsus’ theory of harmony between man and nature. According to Paracelsus, sickness and health in the body relied on the harmony of man (the microcosm) and Nature (the macrocosm). The universe is represented in every person (Debus & Multhauf, Alchemy and Chemistry in the Seventeenth Century, William Andrews Clark Memoria,1966). Provings demonstrate that we are in everything and everything is within us. Therefore, we are in relationship to everything in the universe.
Paracelsus’ Doctrine of Signatures represented the connection between man and nature. As it is currently understood, the Doctrine of Signatures states that plants resembling various parts of the body can be used to treat those parts. However, we believe this to be a very superficial understanding and that in fact, provings reveal the real depth and complexity of this doctrine. They allow us to reveal the healing properties of substances in relationship to all other things. Therefore, we have found that provings must be grounded in an understanding of these interrelationships. In order to honor and truly understand the substances we prove, we view their impact on many levels: mythological, archetypal, historical, cultural, political, and in their relation to the natural world. This comprehensive process allows for a deep understanding that reveals the greatest possible use of the remedy.
Proving Dynamics
In provings we transcend the boundaries, accessing the essential energetic nature of the substance as it relates to healing. We experience others’ suffering through a resonance with our own susceptibility. We have found this to occur in simple triturations as well as in full Hahnemannian provings.
Because we are transcending boundaries it is critical to create a structure within which this can happen. There are two critical aspects of creating such a structure: one is supervision and the other is the creation of a container to hold the entire proving process from intention to extraction. Once the group's attention is focused and the trituration begins, an energy field is created. It is important that the supervisors create a boundry between themselves and the provers - as they would in a homepathic consultation - in order to clearly observe the trituration dynamis. Supervision must continue for the next two weeks of the proving, so that provers have support.
The group process of triturating the substance is as important as what unfolds during the Hahnemannian portion that follows. Because important themes are revealed during the group interaction of triturating, it is essential for supervisors to observe and record the process.The themes that emerge will be confirmed and further developed during the rest of the proving.
Popular scientific belief holds that provings are more valid when they are conducted in a blind fashion. Our experience supports the fact that the transcendence of physical boundaries during the proving process renders blind studies irrelevant. When conducting your own proving you may choose to do it blind or not.
The Great Lakes Proving Protocol is designed to disseminate the proving results quickly. Thus, collation and publication should be immediate. In order to honor the fullness of the substance’s role in healing, it should be researched in relation to mythology, cultures, history, natural sciences, etc. This information should be included in the documentation of the proving.
THE GREAT LAKES PROTOCOL
In any experiment it is critical to create a consistent, repeatable process.
Choosing a substance
a. Consider toxicology: The Environmental Working Group has a fairly comprehensive list of chemicals: http://www.ewg.org/chemindex/list. This method is NOT appropriate for viruses or bacteria. We recommend Hahnemannian provings for infectious agents.
b. Consider gaps in our materia medica, e.g. plant families or kingdoms that lack information.
c. External verification of the substance’s identity is critical.
“It would be ideal if a zoologist or botanist can verify and give a statement in writing regarding the species. This is important because there are remedies in our traditional homeopathic literature which appear with reasonable certainty to not be the species they have been named as, e.g. Tarantula Hispanica. There are also huge generalizations [from unclear sourcing] which have created confusion, e.g. Medusa and others which escape definition and can only be assumed as to their makeup, e.g. Petroleum.“
Bob Lawrence, Helios Pharmacy
d. Consider timing: organic substances must be triturated to a 3C level within 24 hours.
Roles
a. Master or Co-Master Provers:
The master prover is ultimately responsible for the proving, ensures that the integrity of the process is honored and that all parts of the protocol are followed.
>Choose, research and verify the substance.
>Provide the provers and supervisors with an informed consent form. (See informed consent page.)
>Instruct supervisors in the process for explaining and securing informed consent from volunteer provers.
>Prepare the medicating potency.
>Ensure effective communication between supervisors and provers.
>Conducts the information extraction.
>Organize final collation protecting all identities.
>Publish the findings when complete with a spirit of immediacy.
b. Supervisors:
>Explain informed consent process.
>Review informed consent form with provers.
>Secure informed consent from each prover prior to proving.
>Pre-screen provers alert master prover of any concerns.
>Observe and record the trituration process.
>Monitor health and safety of the provers for a full fourteen days.
>Assist in the information extraction.
>Assist in the collation process.
c. Provers:
>Honestly and clearly communicate their health status during the screening.
>Participate in the trituration and take the remedy as instructed.
>Record all reactions and observations in a journal during the trituration and for the full fourteen days following.
>Clearly and freely communicate about their health status throughout the process.
>Participate in the information extraction meeting.
Organization of Provers and Supervisors
a. Assemble a group, ideally of 5-8 provers, to ensure as much diversity as possible in terms of age, gender, culture, and race.
b. Recruit one supervisor for no more than three provers to facilitate accurate, detailed observation and collation.
c. Supervisors must conduct screening interviews of provers before the proving begins to establish a health baseline for each participant.
d. Exclude people under 18, pregnant women, and people with serious mental, emotional or physical chronic illness.
e. Each prover must sign an informed consent and return the document to their Supervisor prior to their participation (see informed consent subpage).
Proving Process
a. At the beginning of the trituration, the Master Prover (or someone she/he chooses) sets the intention of the process to focus the group's attention. This may involve a statement or invocation to invite in the energetic nature of the substance and to open up the energetic field.
b. Provers are given as many ways to express themselves as possible and are provided with pen and paper. Provers are encouraged to converse, write, draw, and to move around.
c. Each prover takes two turns in a trituration cycle (see Trituration Method Page). The number of provers determines how many of these 10 minute double cycles each prover triturates.
d. Supervisors observe and record group dynamics and discussions verbatim.
e. At the completion of the 3C potency, the provers dilute and succuss a portion of the 3C to a 12 C. (See Korsakoff Method Page). The remainder of the 3C is dissolved in ethyl alcohol, topped up with distilled water, and sucussed to a 4C for shipment to the pharmacy.
f. The next day at a specified time, each prover takes a half dram of the 12C dilution sublingually and clearly records all observations, sensations, physical, mental and emotional changes experienced over the next 14 days. Provers should record by hand in a notebook rather than on the computer (handwriting and spelling anomalies may be important symptoms).
g. Supervision continues throughout the 14-day period, by phone, email, or in person.
h. At the end of the 14 day period it is essential to have a meeting to synthesize the provers experiences, to provide closure to the group process and to reveal the substance if the proving was blind. The extraction of information is as important as any other part of the process to prevent lingering effects from the proving.
i. During the extraction proving themes are identified.
The Collation Process
a. Each prover transcribes their journals to facilitate collation. The collation and journals are both sent to the master prover.
b. The master prover works with the supervisors to ensure that the final collation is assembled and combines it with the research of the substance into a final document.
c. Free, accessible and timely publication of the proving is an important part of proving process.
In the spirit of homeopathic community and for clarity, it is important to identify that your proving was carried out utilizing the Great Lakes Protocol. This essential information should always be included when publishing and when engaging homeopathic pharmacies to produce new remedies.
You are encouraged to do provings on a regular basis and to create your own website to publish them, adding to a network of free and accessible proving websites. Alternatively, we welcome you to send us your provings to publish on this website. To contact us directly please go to the Contact Us page.
