Understanding Acute and Chronic Diseases: A Natural Approach to Healing

We often take our health for granted, enjoying restful sleep and waking up refreshed. However, when acute illnesses like colds, vomiting, diarrhoea, or fever strike, we may find ourselves feeling weak despite adequate rest. This weakness isn’t a sign of further decline; it’s an indication that our body’s vital energy is being redirected inward for a crucial internal cleansing process. This blog post explores the reasons behind acute and chronic diseases, highlighting common mistakes we make and offering a natural approach to healing.

The Body’s Natural Cleansing Process and Our Mistakes

In the face of acute illness, our bodies operate on a principle called the “Law of Power Distribution.” Just as an inverter prioritizes power distribution during an outage, our bodies allocate vital energy for internal cleaning during illness. This may lead to temporary weakness in limbs. Unfortunately, we often hinder this natural process by making three key mistakes:

1. Ignoring the Illness: We often try to power through illness with painkillers or stimulants, prioritizing work or other commitments. This suppresses the body’s natural cleansing process, pushing the illness deeper.
2. Continuing to Eat: During acute illness, our appetite naturally diminishes. This is because the body needs all its energy for healing, not digestion. Forcing food consumption diverts vital energy away from cleansing, prolonging the illness. Animals instinctively fast when ill, recognizing the body’s need to focus on repair.
3. Taking Medication: Often, we rush to take medication to stop symptoms like diarrhoea or a runny nose. While these symptoms might seem inconvenient, they are often the body’s way of expelling toxins. Suppressing them can lead to chronic health issues later.

The Progression from Acute to Chronic to Destructive Diseases

Modern lifestyles often involve suppressing acute illnesses with medication, preventing the body from fully eliminating toxins. This suppression can lead to the second stage: chronic diseases like high blood pressure, diabetes, joint pain, asthma, and skin problems. If these chronic conditions are left unaddressed or are further suppressed with medication, they can progress to the third stage: destructive diseases like heart attacks, kidney failure, strokes, and cancer.

The key takeaway here is that if acute illnesses are not suppressed, chronic diseases are less likely to develop. Similarly, if chronic diseases are managed effectively, the risk of destructive diseases can be significantly reduced. It’s possible to reverse this progression by adopting a natural lifestyle and correcting past mistakes. This allows the body to gradually eliminate accumulated toxins through subsequent acute episodes, leading to improved health and well-being.

The Unity of Diseases: Understanding the Root Cause

Diseases are not arbitrary afflictions; they are signals from our bodies. Consider kidney stones. The pain associated with kidney stones is a warning sign that something is amiss in our diet or lifestyle, causing the formation of stones. Ignoring this pain and opting for surgery only removes the symptom (the stone) without addressing the underlying cause. Consequently, stones are likely to form again. Similarly, medications often mask symptoms without addressing the root cause of the illness.

The Real Treatment: Rest and Natural Elements

True healing involves providing physical and mental rest. Rest allows the body’s internal organs to recover and function optimally. This can be achieved through the five elements of nature – sky (fasting), air (fresh air), fire (moderate sun exposure), water (clean water intake), and earth (contact with nature) – and by cultivating mental well-being through virtuous behaviour.

The body possesses an innate healing power. When a bone breaks, a cast helps stabilize it, but the bone heals itself. This internal healing power also cures diseases. Just as overworked employees might leave a company, overworked internal organs become diseased. Restoring them through a natural lifestyle allows them to regain health and function.

The Secret of Vital Force: The Key to Healing

The secret to healing and maintaining health lies in understanding our Vital Force. We are born with a reserve of this vital energy, which is replenished daily through rest. This energy powers all bodily functions, including healing. As we age, our vital force gradually diminishes, explaining why younger individuals heal faster than older individuals.

The “Law of Action” states that any reaction in the body or mind is a manifestation of this Vital Force. Medicines or natural remedies only work when this vital force is present. This underscores the importance of nurturing and preserving our Vital Force through natural living.

The Body’s Wisdom and Our Disregard: A Path to Disease

We often find ourselves battling various diseases and sorrows, a consequence of neglecting the natural principles that govern our well-being. As J.C. Thomson, a renowned neurosurgeon, aptly stated, “Disease or health is not something that one person can give to another person. Health is the basic quality of life fibres, which one gets on its own by giving up disease-causing habits.” This resonates with the wisdom found in the Shri Guru Granth Sahibji, which proclaims, “Aape vaid aap Narayan, Ehi vaid jeev ka dukh laan,” meaning “God himself is the physician, and he alleviates the suffering of the soul.” This highlights the body’s innate capacity for self-healing.

The Body’s Cleansing Channels and the Accumulation of Waste

Our bodies are designed to cleanse themselves daily through four natural channels: defecation, urination, perspiration, and breathing. Just as we maintain the cleanliness of our homes, our bodies work tirelessly to eliminate waste products. However, when these channels become overburdened or compromised due to our lifestyle choices, waste accumulates within the body, leading to disease. This accumulation of toxins is the root cause of all ailments. When the body can no longer efficiently eliminate waste through the primary four channels, it ingeniously opens a fifth channel or accelerates one of the existing four. This process is what we perceive as an “acute disease.”

The Three Pillars of Health: Diet, Lifestyle, and Thought

The accumulation of waste, the precursor to disease, stems from violating nature’s principles in three fundamental areas:

1. Wrong Food and Drink: Consuming processed foods, artificial additives, and neglecting a balanced diet disrupts the body’s natural equilibrium, leading to toxin buildup.
2. Wrong Way of Living: A sedentary lifestyle, lack of sleep, and exposure to environmental toxins further hinder the body’s ability to cleanse itself.
3. Wrong Thinking: Chronic stress, negative emotions, and mental unrest create hormonal imbalances that negatively impact bodily functions, including digestion and detoxification.

The Four Mistakes of Eating: Hindering Digestion and Health

Despite increased awareness of healthy living, the prevalence of disease continues to rise. This suggests that what we perceive as “right” might not be aligned with nature’s laws. The presence of common digestive issues like gas, acidity, phlegm, or constipation indicates that food is not being digested properly. Four common eating habits contribute to this problem:

1. Eating Without Hunger: We often eat out of habit, boredom, or social pressure, even when we’re not truly hungry. This overloads the digestive system and hinders its efficiency.
2. Overeating: Consuming more food than the body requires overwhelms the digestive system, leading to incomplete digestion and waste accumulation.
3. Eating in a Restless Condition: Eating while experiencing anger, fear, or anxiety disrupts the digestive process. These negative emotions create physiological changes that impair digestion.
4. Wrong Choice of Food: Consuming processed, refined, and unnatural foods lacks the vital nutrients the body needs and often contains harmful substances that contribute to waste buildup.

Eating without genuine hunger is a common mistake. We may plan meals, but our bodies operate on physiological needs, not our schedules. Just as a car needs fuel only when it’s running low, our bodies require food only when we experience true hunger. Eating before feeling hungry is like putting fuel into a car that’s already full – it serves no purpose and can even be detrimental. True hunger is a signal from the body that it’s ready to receive and process nourishment. Ignoring this signal disrupts the natural digestive rhythm and contributes to waste accumulation. This principle applies to drinking water as well. We should drink when we are thirsty, not just because we think we should. By honouring these natural cues, we can support our body’s digestive processes and maintain optimal health.

Conclusion

Understanding the interconnectedness of acute, chronic, and destructive diseases, along with the body’s natural healing mechanisms, empowers us to take control of our health. By avoiding the common mistakes of suppressing acute illnesses, continuing to eat during illness, and relying solely on medication, we can support our body’s innate healing capabilities. Embracing a natural lifestyle that prioritizes rest, proper nutrition, and mental well-being allows us to tap into our Vital Force and achieve lasting health and vitality.