Southampton - In deepest winter, it's tempting to delve deeply inward to seek the source of peace and connect to the life force. Energy practitioners, a breed that abounds in the Hamptons, aid in our introspection ironically by connecting us to the energy fields that surround us.

For those who don't believe what they can't see, harnessing the "energy" of the universe to balance our body, mind, spirit may all sound very woo-woo. But take note: science is giving more and more credence to these self-healing modalities.

A client is draped with healing crystals at Gurney's Inn. (Courtesy Photo: Bay MacKall)

Crystal Therapy
At $105, Bay Mackall, located at Gurney's Inn Resort Spa, 290 Old Montauk Highway, Montauk, 631-668-1892, www.gurneysinn.com and www.bayholisticcenter.com
When the doctors had given up on her, Bay MacKall feels she cured herself of melanoma when she was 18. Since then she has devoted herself to holistic healing, which is a good thing because when she was later diagnosed with Bi-Polar Disorder, she was given so many prescription drugs that she developed a host of debilitating conditions including a thyroid imbalance and arthritis. "There was a domino effect from the side effects," she says. "I was so sick I realized had to do something else." That was when she was introduced to crystals. Experimenting on herself, she began to wear a necklace made of white topaz. She soon realized that her hair, which had been falling out, had grown back. She looked up the stone and found that white topaz is prescribed for hair and nails. Another time, during an asthma attack, she sought the crystals prescribed for the condition, but they had no effect. When she accidentally happened upon green turquoise, there was a brief respite from the episode. She was hooked. Becoming a diligent student, she memorized hundreds of stones along with the body part each harmonized with: hematite and red coral to build blood, cinnabar for Lyme's Disease, serphanite for cancer. "After a one-hour session with a client with ovarian cancer, the woman's doctors couldn't find the tumor," she says. In a typical session, Bay drapes the client with crystals from head to toe. She treats for many conditions and has had particular success with nerve damage such as sciatica and rashes. Bay also works with Integrative Energy Therapy (similar to Reiki) which she says works on a cellular level. The crystals enhance that healing. "It's like having more arms," she says. She's using crystals to "retrain the brain" and treat her own Bi-Polar condition. The crystals, she reports, have allowed her to get off most of her meds and use more gentle healing herbs to keep her issues in check. If ever you run into Bay and she's wearing a necklace of bright blue lapis, you'll know she's aiming to quiet her mind and bring out her inner queen.

Poet-musician-yogini Megan Chaskey practices a Kabbalah-sourced energy called Harmonyum. (Courtesy Photo: Rowenna Chaskey)

Harmonyum: Bio-Metaphysical Medicine
At $150, Megan Chaskey, located at The Juicy Naam, 51 Division Street, Sag Harbor, 917-379-6306, www.thejuicynaam.com. Musician, energy healer, Naam Yoga therapist, and poet Megan Chaskey teaches yoga at the Ross School and KamaDeva in East Hampton and is married to fellow poet Scott Chaskey, farm manager of Quail Hill Farm in Amagansett. Like many energy healers, she became a Reiki Master but looked beyond that modality to seek out more tools to add to her repetoire. Harmonyum, an "esoteric wisdom" drawing on laws of Kabbalah, works on the "three levels of the human being: physical, etheric, and divine." It helps to reduce negative, karmic influences and stimulate the inner healing intelligence of the person to bring balance and harmony between body, mind and spirit. Placing her client on a massage table (at her home or yours), she works with her hands to channel the energy of sunlight - she calls herself an "instrument of light" - holding them at spots along the spine, and swirling them in patterns over the back. "Our bones are condensed sunlight," she says, and it's hard not to think of Vitamin D and its manufacture by the sun. "To say I'm working with light is not just a metaphor," she says. "I'm a true conduit." Focusing it on the spinal column, she says the light "nourishes nerves, balances the nervous system, and brings a feeling of rejuvenation." The treatment "initiates a process that releases divine light to create a feeling of cosmic peace." On a physical level, Harmonyum supports the parasympathetic system allowing the body to assimilate nutrients, repair cellular damage, and sleep better. According to its principles, when modern stresses dominate we leave ourselves open to disease. "By receiving Harmonyum regularly, the body is able to repair itself completely, enhance immune response and regulate glands."

Mia Bowling uses colored lights and other tools. (Courtesy Photo: Bowling)

Acupuncture/Gem Light Therapy
At $120, Mia Bowling MSTOM, L.M.T, L.Ac., located in East Hampton, 516-477-1471, mariabowling.com. Former textile designer and current acupuncturist and massage therapist, Mia Bowling uses Chinese herbs, flower essences, gemstones and colored lights as tools along with needles and hands. Before any session, Mia looks at your tongue and reads your pulses. During a recent acupressure session in her Springs office, she used fingertip pressure on meridian points instead of needles to bring the body back into balance. While she attended to the body, firmly pressing on points to open up channels enabling qi to flow unimpeded, she shone serene green light onto the patient's head to sedate the nervous system. Developed by Jon Whale to cleanse, strengthen immunity, cool inflammation and promote circulation, Gem Light Therapy works by shifting our frequencies. The colors are achieved by directing special lamps through her collection of multi-hued gems and filters. While orange and red impart warmth (to heat up chronically cold areas), violet is cooling. Her well-worn indigo filters testify to the fact that many of her patients require its calming influence. "Effects are subtle," she says. "Everything I do is very gentle; gentleness helps to open things up." To intensify the unblocking of qi, she will also place essential oils, flower essences, light, and sometimes even "gem elixirs" on acupoints. Flower essences, in which the electromagnetic imprint of the plant is transferred to water through sunlight, are considered "vibrational remedies", and "work with the natural intelligence of the body," she says. These essences, which she sources from the four corners of the globe, are used to treat a variety of conditions and emotional states. The practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine is highly trained in herbology and prepares formulas from the leaves, stems, flowers, roots, barks and rhizomes of plants customized for particular conditions. Mia sees patients presenting with a wide range of complaints from insomnia and pain to arthritis and depression. Using some or all of the tools of her trade, she "creates a recipe for each session."

Britta Dubbels and pal. (Courtesy Photo: Robin Saidman)

Transformational Healing
At $195, Britta Dubbels C.Ht, located in Southampton, 631-379-8844, www.presentinc.com. Her bright green brochures are placed strategically around the Hamptons where like-minded people congregate - from Provisions in Sag Harbor to Wild by Nature in Hampton Bays - touting her credentials as "hypnotist, Reiki master, imagery master and awareness consultant." Britta Dubbels, a former model began life in Germany where she discovered early on that she had a "natural ability to see the other side." Suffering through a difficult childhood, she was guided by a "spirit friend," and when she and her grandmother, who could also "see," visited cemeteries they witnessed a lot of spectral activity. So, it's not surprising that she spent several years in Los Angeles refining her otherworldly talents in order to heal others. Her sixth sense allows her to "see beyond" a person's physical symptoms and psychic pain and to help them access their inner power. Her clients lie on a massage table in her North Sea office and focus on breathing deeply from their bellies, "the seat of emotions," while she tunes into her guides and waves her hands around to open up a "sacred space" through which she can channel negative energy back from whence it came. "Most of us need a healthy dose of 'clearing' away old patterns that no longer serve us, allowing us to connect with inner resources and our higher conscious mind." During the session, Britta talks both to her spirit friends - "I'm with the other side all the time," - and to her clients who are in a deeply relaxed and receptive state, encouraging them to release blocked emotions and limiting beliefs, change old habits, and access their creative flow. "I help empower people to make needed changes."