“If you want things to stay as they are, things will have
to change.” - Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
So, how do you put together a different way of seeing your life?
I’ve talked about how you are a whole, intact system or network unto yourself - and that you are both part of larger networks (social groups, etc.) and made up of smaller, interdependent networks (circulatory system, immune system, digestive system, etc.).
Our treatment options involve different levels of health care options - some, such as conventional drugs, target very specific body parts. By their nature, these targeted treatments can help in the short-term, especially in a specific part of the body that may be malfunctioning.
However, it is many of the options available in CAM, complementary and alternative medicine, that are broader in their effects. Rather than targeting a body part, these treatment options tend to have effects throughout you as a whole person, a whole network or system.
In fact, the essential nature of certain approaches is very much whole-person oriented. These include traditional Chinese medicine, with acupuncture, classical homeopathy, and Ayurveda. These whole systems of CAM intend to treat the whole person at once to restore balance throughout
the system.
It is possible for a practitioner to use techniques from these systems in a drug-like way to force a local body part to work better for a while. But that use defeats the value and purpose of whole person-oriented healing.
It is better to find a practitioner who offers these treatments as a whole systems foundation for whatever else you do in getting treatment for your chronic disorder or disease.
The thing is, we as living systems are dynamic or dynamical - we change all the time. Our lives are in ever so subtle (or not so subtle) patterns of change moment to moment, day to day, month to month, year to year.
When we develop a chronic disorder or disease, we have fallen into a kind of rut, or stuck place, in our dynamics. We are changing, but within a narrow pattern. When life throws us a curve, we can’t bounce back to health as quickly as someone who doesn’t have our health problem.
The advantage of using whole systems of CAM - Chinese medicine, classical homeopathy, or Ayurveda - is that they seem to be able to get back into the controller box for our dynamics and
unlock us from our ruts.
When that happens, we begin to shift, to change, to have the freedom to establish healthier patterns of being as a whole system.
What does that look like for people who undergo these kinds of changes? Research has shown that people may go to a practitioner of one of these whole systems of CAM for a specific problem - after all, what we all mostly know is the conventional Western medical way of wanting a specific drug-
like treatment for whatever ails us.
But what starts happening, when it works properly for people, is that the whole systems of CAM set a much larger pattern of changes into motion gradually and gently over time. What people say then is that their energy and sense of well-being are much better in general. Symptoms that they never even mentioned have improved or gone away. Their outlook on life, even their sense of purpose is renewed and changed in a better, positive way.
And, oh yes, their original specific problem or symptom happens also to be improved along the way too.
One of the keys to setting up a good treatment plan for your self is to learn more about whole systems of CAM and choose a system and a practitioner that fit with your preferences, interests, health problems, and resources.
To learn more about these, take a look at the http://www.nccam.nih.gov website. The consumer section of the website has many useful bits of information to help you begin your search for help.
To your health,
Iris R. Bell, MD PhD
Alternative medicine information from a doctor who is also a patient.
book http://gettingwhole.com