Why is healing so difficult?

I am not referring to disease management here. I am talking about cures and restoration of health. This is the subject increasingly being picked up by doctors worldwide who have realized that managing one named disease simply leads to another disease condition besides the adverse effects the prescribed drugs bring in their wake. This is now a hot topic in a group that I am a silent observer in.

There are many healing modalities and each acknowledges that there are challenges and that healing is becoming increasingly difficult. The systems that aim at cures tap the body's own healing system. The body is designed to heal. We observe that when we recover from acute illnesses without medication or when we observe the healing of wounds. What we often do not know is that the body is capable of healing itself from chronic conditions too. Normally it uses acute disease conditions to deal with chronic problems. There is a set pattern the body goes through that has been observed throughout history and Dr Constantine Herring put a shape to it by spelling out the laws which are today known as Herring's laws that were ratified by Dr J T Kent after him. Dr Hugh Harrison has also developed a flow chart based on it.

But cutting across modalities doctors have observed that they face cases where healing is not easy. There are two prime causes for this. A body must be allowed to grow naturally to its full potential in order to be best prepared for healing. By interfering with pregnancy, child birth, and then with the routine childhood illnesses that are a passage to health and a necessary route that shrugs off inherited disease loads and forms and strengthens the immune system we are not allowing the body to develop naturally. The increasingly prevalent cases of various development disorders and stunting that we witness in children today are an indication of that.

The next issue is that of the vital force inherent in the body. Immunologists are now coming to the conclusion that immunity is not a separate function of the body but an overall part that also looks after other aspects. The body does not work in bits and parts but is ruled by an overall energy system that is cell and organ specific and also has the mind and emotions as components. Mitochondrial energy, nutrition inputs, freedom from toxic burden, mental strength, and emotional balance and wellness are a very important part of overall immunity. The healing modalities call this the vital force or vitality. Thus they advocate both judicious conservation of energy as well as physical and mental exercises to maintain and increase it. Those practicing various forms of genuine tantra perhaps add to the vital energy. Today our lifestyle, mentality, environment, and lack of real energy giving food is depleting this vital force making healing difficult.

Each modality also has defined challenges that are often about body constitution types whose peculiarities have to be addressed. Homeopathy, ayurveda and Unani are based on such constitutions that when compared are very similar. Naturopathy also has its own constitution system that is again similar to the above systems. Homeopathy has psora, syphilis, sycosis, tubercular, and cancer miasms. The rest are centered around bile, phlegm, air, and space. Unani does not have the space element.

But there are other challenges too that traditional cultures have seriously delved into. Healing often eludes the best of physicians and the most obedient of subjects. It is as if some external force or circumstance is preventing that healing. It is as if that person is destined to suffer. These obstacles were then found or assumed to be karmic in nature. The world is a school where students come to learn and gather both knowledge and experiences. The schools have tests and examinations to pass. One cannot bypass that system. However compassionate physicians were moved by the suffering and thus arose the need for physicians to develop a spiritual outlook and study philosophy, tantra and astrology. Subjects that are now increasingly being taken up by earnest doctors worldwide, thanks to efforts of doctors like Vasant Lad, David Frawley, Deepak Chopra and psychoanalysts like Brian Weiss and many others.

Through this process the subject can be empowered to overcome karmic influences. What is very interesting is observations of physicians who speak of experiencing suffering themselves as the patient improves. Karma is a tough guy to negotiate. Astrologers too experience the same and that is why they perform various rituals and penance to ward off the effects on themselves. The best of astrologers often are doomed to lead miserable existence. The world has set laws and there are consequences of trying to influence them.

Then there are also diseases that spiritual aspirants go through caused by the intensity of their aspirations, the practices that change both body and mind, and the inevitable shedding of past karma that the body then takes up. Realized souls who come as Gurus take up the karmic load of their devotees. I have personally observed this by associating with lofty spiritual souls. After they take up the role of the Guru they develop serious illnesses. Ayurveda has methods to deal with these kinds of suffering. Often the subconscious mind of the aspirants too provides answers to help them in mitigating these.

Who takes up the suffering of the whole world? Lord Shiva. He carries that intense suffering in his throat region and turns blue due to the toxic impact and therefore he is also called the Neelakantha. That is why it is the duty of every devotee to pour water on the Shiva Linga to ease that suffering. Both Sri Ramakrishna and Bhagawan Sri Ramana Maharshi have clearly stated that it is the supreme consciousness that actually bears the extreme burden of the world. Both of them too took on extreme suffering themselves and bore it with amazing patience.

These are broadly the important obstacles. There can of course be many others.