Summary: Jill Kuykendall, RPT, is a registered physical therapist, as well as a minister of The Church of the Sacred Earth. She has worked within the standard Western medical paradigm for over 25 years, often in an advisory role to bring transpersonal medicine and its practices to the healthcare community, practitioners and patients alike. For five years prior to leaving California in 2007, she facilitated a Women's Shamanic Drumming Circle for personal growth and community development. Jill co-authored *Spirit Medicine: Healing in the Sacred Realm* with her husband, Hank Wesselman (Hay House publisher, 2004) and is on the faculty of the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, CA. Jill is currently living and farming in South Kona, Hawaii and in private practice at the Honauanau Healing Center, with a specialty in the transpersonal healing modality generally known as Soul Retrieval. Among the indigenous peoples of the world, it is generally understood that traumatic life experiences can result in the fragmentation of our inner, vital essence or soul, and the subsequent loss or disassociation of parts of the self often results, a phenomenon generally known as 'soul loss'. Among the traditionals, soul loss is regarded as the primary cause of serious illness and premature death, yet curiously, it is not even mentioned in our Western medical textbooks, and our contemporary physicians are often at a complete loss at recognizing it as well as knowing how to reverse its effects. Soul loss often occurs in response to severe life traumas such as physical, emotional, or sexual abuse, a molestation experience during childhood or being ruthlessly teased, a bitter divorce, a shocking betrayal, a sexual assault, a surgery, or a terrible car accident, to name just a few. The post-traumatic stress syndrome that was experienced by military veterans from Viet Nam and Operation Desert Storm is a classic example of soul loss.
