Root cause vs immediate cause

 The biggest difference between holistic oral health coaching and mainstream dentistry may be coaching’s consideration of the spiritual meanings of teeth. 

The spiritual meanings of teeth can help you to identify the root cause of your symptoms. Understanding the root cause is key to effective, sustainable holistic healing. 

The immediate cause that takes you to the dentist might be decay, a cavity, a trauma, an infection or abscess, or a mysterious toothache. On observing any of these symptoms, dentist will probably respond with a surgical intervention. The cavity is filled, the root is canaled or the tooth extracted. 

However, this purely physical response leaves unresolved energetic influences.

Dental interventions don’t address the root cause, so it can often cause problems later.

Such problems can :

• reappear in the same spot (eg failed root canals or implants, cavitation, ongoing decay),
• refer to another part of the mouth (eg another tooth or gum on the same meridian), or
• stir up trouble elsewhere in the body (often on the same meridian).

That’s why, with holistic coaching, we focus on understanding the root cause(s) of the symptoms, both physical and spiritual or metaphysical.

Teeth troubles are usually telling a complex story about interconnected influences including physical causes (eg certain nutrients lacking in your diet) and metaphysical causes (eg suppressed emotions from a childhood trauma).

Symptoms such as cavities are trying to alert you to something that needs to change in your life.

As we identify what your tooth really needs, we respond with appropriate strategies that meet those needs- that’s your personalised healing protocol.

We look to the root causes to decide which holistic strategies go into your protocol (eg herbs, exercises, spiritual healing etc).

Whereas the immediate cause or symptom tells us how intensely and for how long you need to apply the protocol.

Why look for spiritual meanings of teeth

Our teeth and gums need us to address both their metaphysical and the physical needs. 

Teeth are not only the gateway to our digestive system, they can also be a gateway to deeply transformative inner work and spiritual development. 

Our teeth act like stoic storehouses, holding onto suppressed or distorted emotional energy.  

My theory is that because teeth are some of the most dense matter in our physical bodies, they have an almost gravitational pull on emotional energy when it is suppressed instead of released.

Suppressing emotions is a survival tactic, so it makes sense that our body will compress those emotions somewhere secure, while we get on with doing what we have to to survive. 

When suppressed thoroughly enough, the energetic burden can accumulate for years. Sooner or later that stored emotional energy becomes embodied in the cells of our teeth even influencing the DNA to be passed down through families if we don’t release it first.

The energetic burden means the teeth are more vulnerable to physical pressures such as undernourishment, environmental toxins or simply wear and tear. That’s when teeth start clamoring for attention with symptoms. 

Not everyone’s teeth hold energy in this way. Some people store spiritual and emotional energy elsewhere in their bodies.

But for those of us plagued by chronic teeth troubles, it’s only when we address the metaphysical influences, that our teeth can finally heal.

Making sense of the spiritual meanings of teeth

Everyone’s mouth has a unique story that contains the solution to healing your symptoms. You just need to translate what your teeth are telling you, and then respond appropriately.

More and more people are turning to established metaphysical theories for understanding the spiritual meanings of teeth.

You may be familiar with writers such as Louise Hay or Evette Rose who offer spiritual meanings for different symptoms. However, the most well-known and long-standing theory of spiritual meanings for teeth comes from Traditional Chinese Medicine’s Meridian system.

You may be familiar with a version of the Teeth Meridians charts that show the association between each tooth and the organs it’s linked to via the Meridians.

In Traditional Chinese Medicine each tooth is associated with an organ that is in turn associated with certain emotions, and so those feelings can influence, or be influenced by your teeth.

All these systems can be used as basic vocabulary to help you start to make sense of why that particular tooth, or area of gum, is causing problems.

But, if you have ever landed somewhere you don’t speak the language, you know the limits of just having some vocabulary when you need a nuanced conversation.

You might be able to buy a ticket or find the bathroom, but you can’t really talk about anything abstract without good grammar, pronunciation and the kind of speed that comes with familiarity.

To have an in depth, meaningful and ultimately useful understanding of the root cause of your symptoms, you need to develop a conversational practice with your teeth and gums. That’s why I wrote The Secret Lives of Teeth: Understanding emotional influences on oral health as a practical self help guide and definite reference manual for metaphysical oral health.

Read a free sample from the book here.