rick sibley: renaisance healer
by joan medlicott

Rick Sibley is a good and kind man, generous of spirit, and possessed of an insatiable passion for learning.

He began his career as a Physical Therapist with a degree from Eastern Carolina University, and for many years practiced physical therapy at local hospitals. But his quest for knowledge drew him to further exploration of the human body through workshops and clinics from Florida, to California, to New England, and as far afield as China.

In Florida, Rick trained at the Upledger Institute’s Brain and Spinal Cord Foundation and in the techniques of Cranio-Sacral Therapy. John Upledger invited him to join his staff, but Rick, a divorced father devoted to his two sons, and loving the mountains as he does, declined.

I had been a patient of Dr. Upledger’s in Florida, and I recall when I came to Asheville thirteen years ago how relieved I was after my first visit to Rick. “This man is a natural healer,” I thought. Cranio-Sacral Therapy, and it’s superb practitioner, keep my neck, shoulders, and back free of the tightness, stiffness, and kinks associated with being a writer.

Like steps on a ladder Rick has added to his repertoire. He is certified in the Rocobado Technique, which evaluates and treats head, face and spine dysfunction’s such as TMJ and headaches. He is both an instructor and practitioner of the ancient art of Qi Gong, a technique that focuses and uses energy in healing and has studied and trained in China with Qi Gong master, Tian Shin Hao.

And then there is NAET, Nanbueripad’s Allergy Elimination Treatment which uses kinesiology and acupressure to desensitize a person to his or her allergies. One forgets one’s allergies when they no longer make you ill and miserable. A client told me that after being treated she can drive by fields of hay being cut or lawns being mowed without tearing, sneezing, or headache. Another is delighted that she can breathe freely around her dogs now that she is no longer allergic to their dander.
Rick is an involved practitioner. He is open and honest and a good listener. His patients, many of whom, like myself, have been seeing him for years, feel his concern for us and his interest in us as if he were an old friend.

The sign on Rick’s office door reads, New Horizons of Healing, an appropriate name for a man dedicated to mastering a wide variety of non-invasive healing arts. Rick and I sit in his fourth floor office at Woodfin # 70 just off Charlotte Street. I ask him what his personal philosophy is. His eyes twinkle. “Striving to learn,” he says, “and I reject complacency.” I would add that Rick is a man who continually invents his life. Take his passion for the theater. Challenged by fear of addressing a group -- with a lump in his throat and butterflies in his stomach -- he enrolled in an acting class and was hooked. He has appeared as Michael in the drama Dancing at Lugnafo and in three other plays at HART, the Haywood Arts Repertory Theater, in Waynesville, and was recently selected to play Mac Sam in the comedy in The Miss Firecracker Contest which is scheduled to open at HART the last two week-ends of August. Kudos to you, Rick!

Rick lives in South Asheville with his wife Pam.

Joan Medlicott began her career as a writer at age 63. Joan’s work includes several self-published books about the Virgin Islands (where she was born and raised), a non fiction Celibate Wives: Breaking the Silence, and in the last three years, the Ladies of Covington Send Their Love, The Gardens of Covington, From the Heart of Covington and the soon to be published, The Spirit of Covington. Joan lives with her husband and two dogs in Barnardsville.