Our Precious Health

I used to be a purist,  having much faith in alternative medicine. The stories of Louise Hay, Professor Lai Chiu-Nan, Ann Wigmore, to name a few, are almost miraculous. These are people with success stories to tell, using purely the holistic approach. However, after following the experiences of my terminally ill friends, I must admit that alternative therapies have lost their lustre somewhat. How many ordinary people out there have met such success?  How many can successfully shrink a growth or tumour? I am not putting a damper on those following the holistic approach. Neither am I advocating only Western medicine.

I don't believe healing from chronic diseases is as straightforward as changing one's diet alone. Nor is it about going through the list of alternative therapies available and trying them out one after another. Healing is more complex than that. One has to find the root cause of one's disease in order to have a good success rate in healing. One also has to have alot of patience as well as diligence. A great deal of effort is needed. And many a time, it demands change. Change in eating habits, lifestyle, mental  and emotional patterns. At a time when a person is down with a sickness, how much willpower and stamina does one have to do so much?

It makes sense, then, to learn healthy living habits and to teach our children to do the same. Healthy living includes not only eating correctly but being able to connect with what is going on within us, in our minds. Knowing how to manage life and our expectations. Knowing how to manage our emotions.

As human beings, there is a tendency to take things for granted. It sometimes take many knocks for us to realise this. We neglect our precious health in our youth and treat our bodies like machines, for a variety of reasons like earning money, etc. In our later years, we spend the same hard earned money trying to heal. Where does that get us? It may not seem seem very wise but that is what it takes for us to learn sometimes, through pain. But is it really necessary to walk that path?