Fact. Chronic diseases are on the rise, predominately in developed nations. Fact. Modern drugs and hospital treatments are to an extent able to deal with the symptoms but struggle to address the exact cause of these diseases.
Fact. Preventative medicine is going to be absolutely vital in the future if we are to decrease our dependence on pharmaceutical drugs and professional medical care.
How often do we witness people taking a pill just because the doctor ordered it? What does this healing business mean and who going to do the hard work? Is any practitioner able to heal another person in the first place? Or can a doctor, therapist or 3th generation shaman only support another being in their own healing process, at very best?
How detached have we become from our own health? Maybe we are just so caught up in this journey of becoming happy, and rich and healthy that we just don’t have time to listen to ourselves, that’s if we even remember who that ‘self’ is. In the unfortunate case that we do get sick we simply throw ourselves at the mercy of a GP or surgeon and scream ‘heal me doctor!’ So what can we do to support our health? Well you’ve probably read these articles as well.
Eat your greens. 2.0. New Age style. Cut out wheat unless you shoot straight wheat grass juice shots. Chocolate must now be raw. Gggrrrr. Don’t have a cacao tree out the back of your house? No worries. Find the trendiest inner city café and they are sure to be retailing fine raw chocolate at about $19 a bar. Lasagna for dinner? Sure. Raw! With raw cashew cheese. And raw dessert too. Raw cheesecake. Raw! Long Live Raw! Of course you need to practice yoga, preferably ashtanga, hatha, kundalini but if you are a truly self respecting health hero you go for no less than Bikram yoga. Spend 2 hours of raw stretching and breathing at a body temperature heated room, taking sweating to a whole new level. Don’t worry, your bright green lulu lemon shorts will have a state of the art body juice reservoir build in, designed for the most brutal bikram bender.
You meditate, it’s so hot these days, all the famous people do it. Ever tried meditating in the sand dunes so hard that you just levitate your way to the ocean, have all the surfers applaud you? Or do what the real sick people do. Take your work stress up to the point that you are about to burn out, than lock yourself into a super conservative Buddhist monastery for 21 day vippassana ‘holiday’ which involves no talking, booze or sex and a good long, hard stare at your innermost ugliness. Come home like a new person. That’s if you survive it.
Sarcasm aside, there’s a common denominator in the above cases. We are trying to find a way to relief the stress caused by our ever busy minds trough using this very busy mind. Of course taking time out to stretch, breath and eating vibrant food must be good for us. But how do we surpass our conditioned beliefs and attitudes about what good health needs to find that place deep in our inner being that is yearning for something special and specific? This catch 22 may be the very reason why people tend to give up so soon after initiating a radical life change. Let’s assume that there are two major categories that people tend to tackle on their journey to greater wellness. Visualise a triangle with perfect well being at the top. On the left side is diet and lifestyle which we can improve by choosing greater foods as well as suitable physical exercise. On the right side is mental, emotional and spiritual wellness. The more elusive of the 2, it involves relationships, acceptance of past, trust in the future and a great relationship with the here and now.
It’s improved by regular relaxation, spiritual practice and joyful activities. It can be radically changed by deep meditation journeys, holistic counselling and spiritual healing. These and many more aspects of wellness is what people may refer to when they say they are ‘working on themselves’ or ‘working on their stuff’. It’s common, now more than ever before for people to just be so full, so overwhelmed and so exhausted that they just don’t know where to start. It’s good to know these two sides of the triangle. Trust that by climbing one side, one step at a time, the other side automatically becomes less steep. You may decide to start healing your past, face your fears or quiet your mind to find that all of a sudden you have this spontaneous motivation to go for long walks or drink these intense and nourishing green smoothies.
Flow with that. Enjoy the journey because this is what you came here for. This is preventative medicine. Science is showing today what ancient cultures have always known and considered. Thoughts and attitudes create worlds and we as humans are capable to shape our very own reality to whatever extend we allow ourselves. The key may be just in that, allowing.
