What happened to the Life Force?

Traditional medical systems and their understanding of health

For more than five thousand years, traditional medical systems, such as the Chinese, the Vedic and the Tibetan healing arts have been focusing on the body's energy system as the basis of good health. A proper flow of energy within the body has been accounted for good health, while blockages, low energy or inadequate conductivity have been considered a degenerative state that leads to failure of one or a group of associated organs. By applying needles, pressure, heat or sound or vibrational frequencies to certain points of the body, the flow of energy has been enhanced and balanced and the energy circuits have been cleared of blockages, and the overall energetic condition and proper functioning of the body has been reestablished. Specific symptoms that had manifested were relieved by the use of specific herbs and minerals in addition to the energetic treatment. The cure of a disease was finally achieved by the body's own self healing mechanism, once the energetic system was brought back to normal operation.

In these traditions it was the patient who took care and responsibility of his own overall health by applying routine exercises and techniques, such as yoga, breathing exercises, massage and regular cleansing procedures. In Ayurveda particular seasonal or yearly cleansing routines are performed, to rid the body of built up toxins and waste matter, that interferes with the body's sophisticated and delicate functions. Toning herbs and essential foods are consumed to nourish and strengthen the tissues and to support cellular regeneration. Detoxifying, nutritional, remedial and energizing regimen have always been applied in combination for preventative as well as curative purpose; in fact, prevention and cure have been perceived as part of one and the same intention to maintain the organism at its peak performance. Health care, what it really is by the true meaning of the word, was in the hands of the patient who took over responsibility for his own health and the medical practitioner or doctor was just an assistant and advisor to the patient in this effort. It was even common practice in China to pay his adviser a regular advisory fee, but to discontinue the payments, when the patient fell ill, until his health was restored.

In our modern life we have more or less abandoned self responsibility and preventative self maintenance and we have delegated the maintenance of our personal physical well-being to an armada of specialized and certified health care professionals. Today's mainstream medical science has more or less abandoned the traditional view of bio-energetic processes as basis for good health and has instead adopted a view of the living organism as a biochemical reaction chamber, in which any occurring anomaly (symptom of disease) is rectified (treated) by inserting isolated, engineered and synthetic substances to suppress undesired (pathological) manifestations or to trigger certain desired (physiological) reactions. Degenerative manifestations in the body's structural constituents are commonly associated with 'wear and tear' and it is widely believed that such conditions could only be repaired by means of technical or surgical intvervention. For where these methods fail, the term "incurable" has been introduced. By observing larger societal health patterns and available statistical data however we can conclude that in spite of huge expenditures for sophisticated technological, structural and systematic development, perfect health has somehow remained elusive and seems to be available only for the lucky ones. Why is this? Are health or disease really subject to coincidental manifestation, like the upper side of a coin that has been flipped?