Wouldn’t you agree that no one person on this planet cares more about you than you? Even if the health care system provided disease prevention, health promotion, education to keep both mind and body healthy, and excellent disease management capabilities, you would still need to be your first doctor. Unfortunately, today we do not have a good health management and preventive care system; thus, it is even more important for you to be your first doctor.
What I am saying is that no matter how good health care reforms take place, you still need to be your first doctor. Therefore, start with what you control. Reform yourself to start taking charge of your own health. You need to start understanding your own body’s disease and wellness tendencies. You need to start paying attention to what foods agree with you more and what foods are problematic. You need to become familiar with herbs and spices that are friendly to your body. You need to create a suitable (to you) menu of foods in your daily regimen. The idea here is to use food as your first medicine and the kitchen as your first pharmacy. You will discover how in the next chapter.
The purpose here is for you to heal yourself at the first signs of imbalance (a dynamic model of health). Here, healing means removing the cause behind the symptoms, not just removing the symptoms as is typically done in conventional medicine. If you only remove the symptoms and not the cause, then the cause continues to fester underneath while you continue to suppress symptoms on the surface. This strategy only delays the onslaught of a disease in its more ferocious form. Later, you would require stronger measures to deal with the problem like surgery, stronger medicine, and perhaps developing a lifelong dependency on medication with a risk of side effects.
A recent study conducted by the U.S. National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) and by Lori Knutson, executive director at the Penny George Institute for Health and Healing, pleasantly surprised everyone: 76 percent of healthcare workers, 3 out of every 4, selected from a wide range of complementary and alternative natural methods rather than conventional medicine to stay healthy. Could it be that they see firsthand the side effects of prescription medicine in their patients? Or could it be that they know the medicine will only suppress the symptoms but not remove the cause? Whatever the reason, the important point to note is: Acting as their first doctor, healthcare workers selected natural alternative remedies to stay healthy.
So far, the focus has only been on the physical. What about the mental part? From a holistic point of view, the root cause of the disease primarily lies in the mind. Conventional medicine, for the most part, doesn’t address the mental part of health care; however, to stay healthy, you need to discover the weaknesses and strengths of your own mind. You need to become aware of what situations can trigger an adverse reaction in you. Only you, as your first doctor, can prepare to diffuse the situation and not carry mental “heaviness” or stress from it.
In addition, your spiritual part plays a very important role in helping you shift negative mental attitudes such as selfishness, greed, vengeance, etc. that are causing trouble to your mind. As you develop your spiritual side and become more aware of your mind-body and spiritual connections, either consciously or unconsciously, you discover the capacity to heal (balance) yourself from within. Different sections in “Health + Happiness = Wellness” book cover this subject in more detail.
