Yesterday a healee* had come for her routine schedule of treatment**. It was her fourth follow-up visit. During her last visit, a sense of worry was apparent in her words. She has been tested for high blood pressure and has been under no medication despite the plethora of family persuasions. The symptoms she was experiencing, the dilemma to take or not medicines, the confusion imposed by people around, and the doubts about the efficiency of the treatment – she seemed deeply restless.
As she entered that day, however, she seemed unusually enthusiastic about something. No sooner she settled than she began to describe her new-found joy in discovering some subtle signs of the body that she hasn’t observed all these years. She had tried to be in attunement with what was going on within her body in the last week. She related how it is transforming the fears and uncertainties into acceptance of her health and trust in the process.
This incident brought the first fulfillment of my masters’ prophecy –
“What you learn here is only a little. Your healees out there are going to teach you the best!”
I have realized during my course the essentiality of discovering one’s language of body and mind, but
it was new learning that this discovery has the power to transform one’s perception of health.
*healee – an alternative term for a patient or one who needs treatment
** I am a budding Acuhealer. An acuhealer practices an Indian form of Acupuncture that’s rooted in the philosophy of natural healing. So, as a part of the treatment, reiterating the need to listen to one’s body is the second nature of this practice.
What does the word Nature mean to us? The lush green meadows, the tall forests, the snow-capped mountains – the natural environment, in general, isn’t it? When it is said, to be in nature, we perceive it as going outdoors and being in open air. When we say, I am taking a nature walk, we mean that we walk in a scenic landscape.
But, is that all Nature is about?
This series cannot move forward without bringing a change in the general perception of what Nature is, or at least what this series intends to refer to as Nature.
If one wants a definition of Nature quickly where are we likely to search? Google? Unfortunately, Google returns the journal Nature as its first search result. I find this an appropriate allegory indeed to how our perception of Nature has changed in modern times. A man-made product has gained significance over real Nature. Figuratively, this is the reality where man is heading to.
Nature, in this series, refers to universal truths.
They work the same way for everyone, everywhere, and under given conditions.
It’s just not that they don’t change; they cannot be changed.
Anything that’s thrown in the air ought to fall back to the ground. It is the nature of how matter interacts with the physical atmosphere we live in. We are sensible not to throw a glass plate because we are aware that if we did, it can break when it hits the ground.
If there occurred a deep cut on the little finger of a caveman, a 20th-century man, a Christian, a Muslim, a Hindu, an European, an African, an Indian, a tall woman, a short man, an infant, a rich man, a beggar, a vegetarian, a meat-eater – blood will leak out. This is one of the Nature of the human body. It’s common sense that we don’t inflict a cut on ourselves because we know how a human body would react to it.
To understand the two phenomena, one does not need to be educated, know science, be a philosopher, or a genius. We don’t need to google, record it, or cut the fingers of a million people to prove it. Observing and comprehending that things thrown fall, that a glass material can break upon exertion of force, and that a deep cut can expose the blood – is just enough!
The question now is, do we observe and comprehend Nature? Of course, we do! The Sun rises in the East and sets in the West. Ice is cold and summers are hot. Blood is red, leaves are green, and milk is white. How silly!!!
Now that you have lived in your body for 25, 30, or 40 years, have you ever counted how many breaths you take in a minute? Most would have, I suppose. Have you observed if you breathe through one nostril or both? If it is predominantly through one, have you observed how often the dominancy changes? Have you observed if there were changes in your thinking pattern with respect to the side of the nostril you breathe?
Can you answer these questions without googling? It’s not about if you are knowledgeable or know the science behind it. It’s simple – have you observed it in your body before?
The next question is, why should you observe it, anyway? Whether you observe it or not, it keeps happening. Of course!
I am ending this post here by leaving this question open-ended for you to think about, and to relate with the incident I started this post with.
Other posts in the series