The first time I tried it I was about eight years old. My father had had a heart attack after World War II had ended and I was about six. We were living in Holland. In those days, people with heart disease were put in bed rest for months on end. My father used to get angina pains in his chest, and besides a nitroglycerine pill, he used the services of a woman to do laying-on of hands on him and take the pain away. It seemed to give him relief.
A couple of years later, because of all kinds of complicated circumstances, we emigrated to Argentina. There was no woman there to lay her hands on my Dad when he had chest pains. One day he was really suffering, and I felt really bad for him, so I decided to try. I put my hands on his chest and concentrated, wishing the pain away. Soon enough I began to feel a nasty pain creeping up my arms. “Ah,“ I thought, “so this is what it feels like.“ When it got to my elbows I did what I had seen the woman in Holland do — I shook my hands to get it out, and lo and behold, the pain left me. My father said he felt better.
After that, I decided to use this new skill with great care, only when needed. I used it for my father, and occasionally for my brother when he had a headache. But then, when I was nineteen, my father died in my arms, and I decided that I wasn’t very good at this healing business, so I quit using it.