Healing and Recovery: Yin-Yang of Medicine

Healing and Recovery: Yin-Yang of Medicine

It was recently an honor to be the keynote speaker at the opening of Anna Sienicka's clinic. Anna's practice 'Homeopathic Care Clinic' is Toronto's only alternative practice in an otherwise purely conventional medical facility, where alternative and conventional work together and do not compete with each other!

Undoubtedly, such collaboration will soon become a social norm. But did you already know? Both osteopathy and chiropractic came from a form of energy healing? 75 years ago, chiropractic was an alternative medicine. In fact, chiropractic was not recognized as conventional medicine until 1987, after courts ruled that the American Medical Association had engaged in unreasonable restraint of trade and conspiracy (against chiropractors). Now is the dawn of ancient practices such as homeopathy, naturopathy and Chinese medicine.

Regardless of whether a practice is alternative or mainstream, the most important factor in healthcare is the personal responsibility you take for your own body and emotions.Society is beginning to recognize how the primary role of responsibility for a patient's health lies in that patient's hands. The days of seeing doctors as the ultimate authorities on your health and well-being began to fade as patients began seeking “second opinions.”

As the rightful place of doctors in the outside world continues to be clarified, the next big challenge for people is the internal one, summarized as “how to meet a health crisis head on.” Relaxing into an illness or condition maximizes the natural healing ability you were born with. But often most people tense up instead of relaxing. and everything gets stressed out.

In a crisis, most people have learned to feel stressed. Medicine can now measure how your stress inhibits the immune system, to the point of a self-induced immunosuppressive state. The habit of tensing has been taught as a learned fear and has been passed down from generation to generation for centuries. So today it is triggered unconsciously without thinking about it.

The root of this fear of crisis goes back to the time when rituals were developed long ago to appease what people believed to be an angry god/force of nature. Over the millennia, the rituals have been incorporated into our traditions and beliefs and, in modern times, into institutions.

Rituals such as the mortification of the flesh, the self-inflicted pain suffered as an atoning act of penance for the atonement of sins, are clearly recreated in today's unsustainable corporate strategy for the beautiful planet and our natural resources.

The alternative to these institutionalized fears begins when people become increasingly aware of how to deal with their bodies and their emotions. It is at this level of self-care that the word “alternative” offers its greatest blessing.

Fear (of the unknown) is no substitute for the courage to truly face a crisis. Fear is no substitute for giving up the arrogance that falsely claims to know what to do even before understanding the problem.

Hope and positive thinking are useful tools, but the magic in these tools is at its best when it lies in the hands of acceptance.True acceptance is a strong assertiveness that opens a wave of stillness within and maximizes the opportunities for life to work its wonders.