Man has no Body distinct from his Soul,
For that call’d Body is a portion of Soul
Discern’d by the five Senses,
The chief inlets of Soul in this age.
William Blake
Sciatica, ulcers, arthritis, and sclerosis are among the many bodily imbalances or forms of disease to which we can be exposed, but from which we would preferably avoid.
But what does “to become sick” really mean?
We get different answers depending on who we ask.
If we ask the general practitioner we are told that “there is a pinched nerve (sciatica), there is a wound on the stomach’s or duodenum’s mucous membrane (ulcer), there are the beginnings of changes in the joints as well as signs in the blood tests which point toward arthritis, and a CT scan shows changes which indicate multiple sclerosis.”
If we as an acupuncturist we might be told that “there is a blockage in the bladder meridian due to penetrating cold (sciatica), exhausted fire in the middle tree warmer (ulcer), build up of wind-cold-moisture in the joints (arthritis), and that the controlling vessels are being attacked by humid heat (sclerosis). A healer might not go into such bodily detail, but speak more of cosmic energies and unbalances in the aura. These answers seem to flutter in the wind without mutual relationships. Even so, if nothing else, these “answers from East and West” are a clear indication of the split perception of reality from which our materialistic and rootless society suffers.
For where does the psyche and meaningfulness go when we listen to the general practitioner? And what wonder of a body is the acupuncturist and the healer talking about?
All can find the inner healer
The aforementioned 3 answers to the nature of disease revolve around the fact that an inner subjective and individual world can be found, which can its own set of rules. This bodily inner world encompasses a natural ability for self healing. Unfortunately we primarily deny this side of the body to the advantage of its outer appearance. With some practice, anyone can learn how to sense their inner subjective world, and open up for the healing resources which the body encompasses.
The ability to sense your inner self can be strengthened through introspection and daily meditation. For example, by becoming more aware of bodily sensation in different situations in daily life, you can advance understanding of the body’s inner world.
How do you, for example, feel stress in the body, and where does stress reside in the body? And how does it feel in the body when you are unhappy, when you are mad or are feeling sad? By making listening to the body a daily routine, you will eventually realise that a subjective individual introvertedness in its best form supplements the objective outer “consensus reality.” This is exactly like yin’s, which in traditional Chinese medicine stands for the dark, unknown, inner world, contrast with yang, which represents the well known outer surface of the body.
Peptides and electricity communicate feelings
Susanna Ehdin addresses these aspects of understanding of disease and self healing in her book “The Self-Healing Human.” She emphasises the meaningful role that our feelings play in a healthy and optimal functioning body and mentions that modern brain research has shown that feeling have their neurological origin in the part of the brain which is called the limbic system. Ehdin is a psyc-neuro-immunologist, which is to say that she represents the branch of science which places the psyche, the neurological system, and the immune system together. Within this branch of science, feelings are a link in the communication between body and psyche and neurotransmitters, so called neuropeptides, are active messenger which are the bodily expression of differing concrete emotions.
The Canadian neurologist Penfield was one of the first to show the relationship between the brain and certain feelings.
He stimulated the limbic system electrically and was thereby able to provoke feelings of happiness, anger, or sadness in the person being stimulated. The way that the body and psyche can heal itself can occur in many ways and on many levels, depending on how you understand yourself and which method you use.
Only physical symptoms?
As a doctor, acupuncturist, and psychotherapist, I have my own approach to disease and health, body and psyche.
An example from my clinic: Nanna is a woman in her late 50’s. She is a nurse and is good at supporting her patients. But, like many professionals, she has difficulty managing her own illnesses. She has many different symptoms: pain, pressure and suppuration from her right ear, and slightly reducing hearing as well as diffuse stomach pain, extreme tiredness and difficulty sleeping. She is often overwhelmed by deep angst just as she is about to fall asleep. Her earlier professional happiness has evaporated. At her first consultation Nanna was convinced that all of her symptoms were completely physical and there nothing psychosomatic in nature was present, meaning that there were no psychic factors which manifested themselves physically in her body. But it soon became apparent that a difficult relationship to her father during childhood had matured into a marked need to achieve in order to feel acknowledged. In this process of always performing in order to feel worthwhile, Nanna had forgotten the importance of recognising the person that she really was. She had to a certain degree forgotten to listen to her heart and to her feelings. Psychosomatically, I saw her symptoms as an expression of that she didn’t “listen,” her nightly angst episodes as sign that she was loosing herself in her desire for recognition, and her stomach pain as a result of her not appreciating herself.
Healing without treatment
Acupuncture treatment helped the physical symptoms to a great degree, while the fact the Nanna “bought” my viewpoint that the reason for her symptoms were found in an emotional failure during childhood, supported the treatment from within. As Nanna looked inside herself in order to understand the inner psychodynamic processes, she experienced greater well-being and, renewed professional satisfaction, and better nights’ sleep. When it was difficult to sleep anyway, she used her new inner realizations as a way out. This kind of example could be seen as an expression of that the body has a kind of intelligence which wants the person to stop only living based on the requirements and norms of the outside world (in Nanna’s case, her father’s requirements especially) and instead live the life which comes from the heart. This is holistic medicine, the art of healing from a bodily, psychically, and spiritual whole. Numerous other modern doctors have contributed to the viewpoint the body and the psyches are intimately linked.
The surgeon Bernard Siegel discusses examples of cancer patients who, without medical treatment, were “spontaneously cured” in his book “Love, Medicine, and Miracles.” Siegel believes that these people have a unique courage, an unyielding zest for life, an unconquerable desire to live, and so on.
Healed by psychic change
The originally medically trained Richard Moss holds intensive seminars where the focus is expanded consciences and self insight.
During one of these seminars a powerful self healing of a cancer patient occurred while she was in the process of making her treatment life energy, as Moss calls the process. These seminars do not have the goal of curing physical illness, but that “happened spontaneously” for this woman. The incomparable story of the cancer patient, named Rachel, can be found in Richard Moss’s book “The Second Miracle.” I see Rachel’s story as an example of the limitlessness of self healing.
The Czech-American doctor Stanislav Grof has been a conscience researcher for more than 30 years. He first utilized conscience expanding drugs such as LSD in his research. When this became forbidden he developed a new research tool called holotropic breathwork, where a combination of powerful music, body motion, and intensive breathing brings forth deep changes in the psyche. His work had the aim of enriching the participants psyche with new health and there are many examples of patients who through the use of holopathic breathwork have eased their symptoms of have become entirely free of their physical symptoms.
The return of the paradigm of the soul
The reason that we in our modern civilization have put our inner emotional authority second to soulless and disease fixated medicine can be found in 16th century Europe. This is when the French philosopher said “Cogito, ergo sum,” (I think, therefore I am), He developed so called methodological doubt, where by doubting everything he believed he could find new lasting insight and knowledge. He could trust his thoughts, be he could not characterize his feelings enough that he dared rely upon them.
Descartes broke from Aristotle, whose ideas had dominated Europe for 2000 years. Aristotle believed that feelings had great worth and that the body existed only for the sake of the soul. Descartes set a new standard where a mechanic, split ideology was introduced. This enabled Descartes to pave the way for modern science and technology, but he also contributed to blocking us from our inner bodily knowledge of our feelings. A paradigm shift is luckily now on the way, which will enable us to fully appreciate our inner subjective world and allow us to let the outer objective world “fall into step” with our inner wisdom.
