Energy and Healing

In an interesting article on Sunday by Prof. B.M.Hegde, a fromer professor of cardiology and former VC of Manipal University, in The Hindu, he speaks of the value of understanding the human body as a whole and not as just matter. He talks of how the human body is made of energy and how it cannot be treated in isolation as modern medicine does. He writes 'The human body is but the human mind in an illusory solid shape'. It all boils down to all of us emitting our own energy in a unique manner. I read this piece a week after I found myself arguing with my friend person who believes that all energy is sham.

Quoting from quantum physics and other newer areas of scientific discoveries Dr. Hegde says that we cannot treat humans based on organ based diseases, but as a whole energy field. He quotes Fritz-Albert Popp, a German scientist who defined health as 'a state where the cells are vibrating in synch with one another: disease is when they are out of synch". He points out that we now look at Whole Person Healing (WPH) in the future. He also gives out the new definition of health as having 'the enthusiasm to work and the enthusiasm to be compassionate'. He also says that ayurveda always followed these principles and those of quantum physics long before quantum physics was discovered.

Dr. Hegde emphasises on the mental nature of the universe - that studies have shown that ay drug helps only because of the faith the patient has in the doctor. He says that the right frequencies of electromagnetic waves can be used to heal any cell in any organ and such frequencies are being used to treat diseases of the heart and the brain already. More importantly he says that energy signals travel much faster than drugs and therefore, can heal much faster. He says that Ayurveda, Tibetan medicine, Traditional Chinese medicine and other such systems use energy channels to heal, which has now been proved to be scientific.

I believe in what Dr. Hegde says though I have limited understanding of it all. The human body is one, with its physical, mental and emotional aspects, and must be treated wholly. The current trend of treating only the physical by pure chemical or surgical interventions will not heal holistically. Apart from the traditional medicine which is based on ancient wisdom, forms such as reiki and other energy healing have their own place - even if it is to the extent to providing peace to the mind and putting the mind and emotions to rest. In her bestselling work 'You can heal your life' Lousie Hay shows how certain mental patterns can create certain diseases and any open thinking individual can understand the link between the pattern and the disease easily. Hay goes far beyond mere health, she talks of using and creating energy that creates a world of abundance and joy.

Ever since I lost my mother and seen other people in my life to cancer, I have felt that there is something that modern medicine is not looking at. Surgery, chemotherapy, more chemotherapy, radio therapy - it is all done in such business like, unemotional manner that no patient has a chance to survive. Even if they do, it is because of their own strength and not because of the treatment. I know what I am dong, get it done, if you're lucky you will survive and you are not, so be it, seems to be the attitude. Many times I have heard of relatives saying 'once you do surgery on the cancerous parts, the person deteriorates much much faster'.

It is not just loose talk, there are many things that one cannot prove and articulate, like love, life, death and this universe we live in itself. It is time modern medicine also realised that it does not know all the answers, that its main purpose is to find and provide succour to the ill and diseased, and that it could perhaps understand and look at healing in a holistic way. When I was first diagnosed with the nephrotic syndrome I took recourse to all alternate forms of healing, including energy healing, and I do believe that they all have their space. Each has provided me more faith in my body's ability to heal and consequently I rate my quick recovery and even the highly favorable results of the biopsy to my energy healing and alternate interventions. There is a greater design and if you fall in place and accept it, your recovery is bound to be much faster.

I still see the fear and apprehension on many people's faces when they are faced with a decision of going and trusting modern medicine completely. If they can avoid it they do. That is how far modern medicine is alienating itself from the ill. I am still looking for that one person who will combine it all and direct a patient to what may be appropriate - homeo, ayurveda, energy healing, modern medicine - and so many other branches of medicine which may act together or individually. But for the time being this world would be a better place if the ill were treated better, given respite and peace, and allowed to heal completely instead of being hustled into unwanted and unnecessary procedures, chemical attacks and psychological debilitation. It goes against the basic principles of the healer, however scientific.