Mahatma Gandhi practiced Nature Cure in his own life and contributed immensely in development of naturopathy in our country. As a result, those who believe in ideology of Gandhi & Vinoba have faith in Naturopathy. I was born in a family who tried to live life in accordance with the ideology of Gandhiji & Vinobaji. However, I studied Allopathy. When I passed out after my studies, I carried an impression that Allopathy is the only scientific system for health care. I never thought of naturopathy as a scientific system. But as time passed and my understanding widened, I now believe that naturopathy is the best system to take care of our health. I am surprised that how great personalities like Gandhiji & Vinobaji could visualize so far! The problems in health sector that we are facing today must have been foreseen by them about a hundred years ago! And not only in the field of health, but in various other spheres of life too, Gandhi-Vinoba’s philosophy has potential to give solutions for many of the problems faced today. I was fortunate to stay in Rishi Vinobaji’s Ashram during my childhood. He used to involve us children while he cleaned the campus or take us to-gather while going for a walk. I considered it to be my great privilege having been blessed by such a great personality in my childhood.
I will try to talk about how I remain attracted to naturopathy and how I can associate it with the philosophy of Gandhiji & Vinobaji. But before that, as preface, I would like to elaborate a bit about what I understand about Naturopathy. There are various kinds of impressions about Naturopathy in the society. Some believe that it is a system for reducing weight. Many doctors ask their patients with obesity to go to nature cure centers for reducing weight. Some understand that naturopathy is about massage, steam-bath and enema. Providing treatment with herbal supplements is considered as naturopathy in western countries. Some believe that providing treatment with natural resources is naturopathy. The best definition of naturopathy, I have found is: “Naturopathy is a system that utilizes the inherent healing forces available within the body and mind to help person maintain health and get rid of diseases.”
It will be better to understand this definition by an illustration. When the skin is cut during an injury, we go to a doctor. If the cut is long enough, the doctor will take sutures to stitch the skin and then ask us to come after ten days to remove them. If someone is impatient and asks the doctor to give medicine or to do whatever required so that the stitches can be removed in three days, then what the doctor will say? He will say that it is not possible. The role of a doctor is limited to keep the cut ends of skin to-gather. Healing of the skin is done by our body itself. It is the inherent healing force provided by the nature that heals the skin. There is a similar case for fracture of bones. When a bone gets fractured, doctor keeps the two broken ends to-gather by applying a plaster. Healing of bone is done by inherent healing force of our body itself! It is this healing force that is available in each organ and each cell of our body and it keeps on working incessantly to maintain health. Our job is to provide supportive environment to the healing force so that body can work upon itself to keep it healthy.
Human body is a marvelous machine created by Nature. It is also self-programmed. All the required processes are regulated automatically. The heart continues to beat whether we are awake or sleeping. If we run fast, heart starts beating faster. It slows down when you go to sleep. If we eat fruits, it takes one to one and a half hours to digest. If we consume heavier food like sweets, it takes about four to five hours to digest. Such adjustments happen automatically.
When an embryo develops in womb of a mother, a well-developed human body made up of billions of cells is formed out of a single cell of fertilized ovum. Delicate cornea is formed from that one cell and from the same cell, strong bones are also formed. The same cell grows to make heart, kidneys, etc. Each cell has different structure and performs different functions. But all of them arise of that ONE SINGLE CELL! And all this happen automatically. It is all self-programmed! Billions of cells die each day, billions are created a new and still the body functions as regularly and as efficiently as ever. Thus, the process of formation, maintenance and destruction of our body is self–programmed. Nature has mastery over these processes, i.e. when to start, how to maintain and when to stop them. Our job is to provide supportive environment and, at the least, not to interfere in this natural phenomenon.
Billions of dollars are spent after researching how the human body works. But, till now, we do not have the complete understanding about how it functions. And that is why, if we temper our body with our in-complete understanding, at times, we may seem to get benefits, but there are more chances of being harmed. Therefore, allopathic medicines are more likely to cause side effects. The diseases which occur due to side effects of medicines are known as Iatrogenic Diseases. Such diseases contribute as fifth major cause of death world-wide.
How do we provide supportive environment to our body? Naturopathy advises us to follow certain simple rules of natural life-style. What are these simple rules?
- First and most important is our diet. Our diet should be hygienic, balanced, easily digestible and Satvik. The timings, processes and mental state while consuming food are also important so that the ingested food is easily digested, assimilated and give us adequate nutrition.
- We give adequate and regular exercise to our body.
- We take enough rest and sleep.
- We make regular and conscious efforts to keep our mind quiet and peaceful.
- We keep our emotions healthy and positive.
- The environment which nourishes us should be kept clean and pure.
- When we become sick, we need to understand and respect signals and messages that our body gives. During illness, when we lose appetite or mouth tastes bitter, we need to reduce food intake or take liquid diet or observe fast for a couple of days. If we feel fatigued, we allow the body to rest. If the body wants to throw out something and we get couple of vomiting, let it come out. If we get fever, let it happen. We need to keep patience, observe and allow the body work upon itself, at least, for some time.
We can provide supportive environment to the body by observing such simple rules. It helps enormously to keep us healthy. If the dis-ease still persists, then we can take help of water, soil, air and herbs that are easily available in the surroundings. And then if required, one can also take help of Ayurveda, Homeopathy, Allopathic medicines or technology. There is no harm in taking help from other systems of medicine or using technology, if it helps a person to solve the problem or to improve functionality. But, it will not give us proper results, if we use any treatment method leaving aside the basic laws of natural life-style. And if we follow such laws genuinely, then the need for other interventions will be reduced drastically.
Dr. Dean Ornish is a well-known Cardiologist in America. He carried out various studies and proved that healthy lifestyle can remove atherosclerotic plaque deposited in the coronary artery and can reverse the heart disease. Many other doctors have also proved that many diseases like Diabetes and High blood pressure can be reversed by following healthy lifestyle. It is also proved that positive changes in the lifestyle can lead to switching off the disease producing genes and even cancer causing genes. Thus, our lifestyle plays very important role in maintaining health and getting rid of diseases. Naturopathy and Ayurveda emphasize on lifestyle. Modern medical science has attained extraordinary heights in the field of emergency medicine and surgery. While suggesting about preference for the treatment methods, Vinobaji writes, “most important is Natural life style, second one is Nature Cure, the third one is Ayurveda. After that, Homeopathy and thereafter Allopathy.”
Naturopathy has certain unique characteristics:
- Nature cure is a holistic system. It is undoubtedly understood today that there are many factors that play their role in occurrence of a disease, may it be common cold or cancer. In technical terminology, it is called “multifactorial etiology.”
We know it very well now that diet plays an important role in causation of diseases. Lack of exercise or lack of adequate rest can also cause many diseases. Our thoughts and emotions are associated with secretions of more than one thousand natural chemicals in our body. It is also well understood that peace of mind and positive emotions release secretion of healthy chemicals, whereas stressful mind and negative emotions release secretions of harmful chemicals. And the process of secretions of such chemicals go on continuously, 24 hours a day! Therefore, it is said that we have 24-hour open pharmacy working in our body and the key lies with the mind. With each thought or each emotion, there are secretions of certain neuro-transmitters and neuro-peptides and this process go on continuously round the clock. That is why, thoughts and emotions are very very important for our health. Our environment, air, water and land is heavily polluted today. Many of us may not be aware that the water we drink today, contains plastic particles and they have already entered into our body. Environmental pollution is also a major cause of diseases.
Thus, our body is continuously being affected by our diet, exercise, rest, thoughts, emotions and the environment we live in and they have profound impact on our health. Although we know that our well-being is dependent on so many factors, but we try to find the cure with just medicines! It is very obvious that the effect of such a ‘cure’ will be superficial and short-lived, if we do not relate the diseases with their root causes and keep treating them with the medicines only. That is why, we experience that, in most of the chronic diseases, our approach is to continue medicines lifelong and to keep the symptoms under control! And that is the reason we observe increase in prevalence of diseases in-spite of increase in number of doctors and hospitals. It has become absolutely essential now that we pay attention to various factors affecting our health, analyze them and eliminate the root causes of the diseases. I feel that genuine services in health-care cannot be possible unless we adopt such a fundamental and holistic approach.
- Environmental conservation is inherent part in Naturopathy. Nature cure uses ether, air, Sun, water and mud as part of treatment methodology. Our nature is made up of five elements, the Panchamahabhootas. Our body is also made up of the same five elements. We remain connected with nature by applying these five elements in our treatments and thus we learn to live in harmony with nature. It is not possible to practice naturopathy without accepting, respecting and co-existing with living and non-living beings of the universe. Naturopathy acknowledges harmony in the universe as well as in the body. There is no animosity in nature cure. Naturopathy does not consider even disease as an enemy. It believes that diseases appear to cleanse our body and carry messages for our own development. And hence, disease is considered a friend that provides opportunity to purify both our body and mind.
- Nature Cure is a non-violent system of therapy. Many animals are sacrificed for research purposes in modern medicine. As per the estimate, around 5 to 10 crores animals are used for experimentation every year.
Some of us may be aware about Japanese Scientist, Masaru Emoto. He did some experiments with water. He exposed water samples to music, wrote word “LOVE” and pasted it on the bottle containing water. A group of people surrounded and sent the energy of gratitude to water. Masaru Emoto then examined crystals of water samples after such exposures. They were found to be “aesthetically pleasing” and “well organized”. He also examined crystals of water after exposing them to negative thoughts and negative energy. He observed that such crystals were ‘disconnected’, ‘disfigured’, and ‘unpleasant’. It proved that our thoughts and emotions affect molecules of water. The structure of a water molecule also changed with change in our thoughts and emotions! It is time we need to research the effect of screams of animals being sacrificed, on the medicines we are consuming and on our own health.
- Naturopathy has the highest possibility of self-reliance in health care. Nature cure treatments are easy to understand and simple to apply. It makes use of materials easily available in nature and also affirms the necessary life-style changes to remain healthy. These two aspects are very important to take control of our health in our own hands.
World over, medical expenses are considered as one of the most important causes for personal debt. In our country, every year, approximately five and a half crore people are pushed to poverty due to medical expenses. We can resolve many issues in the field of health care, if we can develop a system that empowers a person to take charge of his own health. However, we have not been able to effectively popularize naturopathy to the lower socio-economic strata of the society, the one that is most vulnerable for debt due to medical reasons and its consequences. The nature cure community in India needs to make enormous efforts in this direction.
- Last, but the most important characteristic of naturopathy, in accordance of Gandhi-Vinoba ideology is that this system is in conformity with the ultimate goal of human existence. Naturopathy proclaims restraint over the senses for maintaining health and get rid of diseases. Naturopathy cannot be applied without self-restraint and self-discipline. It is not possible to live a life style as per the wish and yet to practice naturopathy. These two things cannot go to-gather.
I was listening to a well-known doctor in the field of HIV-AIDS in a conference last year. He said, “Allopathy has made great advancements in the field of HIV-AIDS. Now, we have developed almost hundred percent effective pre-exposure medicines.” It means that you take the medicines and indulge in the sensual pleasure you like, you will not contract AIDS! You live a life leaving the senses at their free will and keep taking our medicines! We seriously need to consider that such kind of thinking will lead us where? Vinobaji has written, “Allopathy is a product of the West... The purpose of allopathy is to enjoy sensual pleasures (Bhog) through physical health. Such indulgence in sensual pleasures (Bhog) is the root cause of diseases, because there is no intent of purity in it.”
Naturopathy emphasizes purification at three levels; purification of body (sharir-shudhdhi), purification of mind (man-shudhdhi) and purification of the environment (paryavaran-shudhdhi).
Purification of mind (man-shudhdhi) cannot be achieved without Chitta-shudhdhi, and body cannot remain healthy without purifying mind (man-shudhdhi). That is why Vinobaji has termed naturopathy as “Satva-Chikitsa”. One cannot separate physical health from spiritual health in naturopathy. The process of acquiring physical health itself helps us to reach closer to our ultimate goal of life.
I believe that naturopathy has a special importance in the field of health care because of these unique characteristics. It does not mean that naturopathy has answer to cure all the diseases on earth, but it can definitely play a fundamental role in providing help for any health related ailment. There should not be any hesitation to take help of other systems of medicine as and when required. But if we move further leaving aside the fundamental rules of natural life-style and nature cure, perhaps, it will not be possible for us to build a healthy society.
- Dr. Bharat Shah
References:
1. Vinoba Sahitya - 18.418 – 419
2. Rafia Farooq et al. “Iatrogenesis: A review on nature, extent, and distribution of healthcare hazards.” J Family Med Prim Care. 2018 Mar-Apr; 7(2): 309–314.
3. https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/archive/comment/medical-debt-a-major-cause-of-poverty-in-india-866182
4. Dinesh K et al. “Animal use in pharmacology education and research: The changing scenario”. Indian J Pharmacol. 2014 May-Jun; 46(3): 257–265