Aligning Your Mind and Body
Could you be bringing on your own illnesses or attracting misfortune in your life through the power of negative thought? If so, doesn't it make sense that changing your thoughts could change your life for the better?
The Tibetan Buddhist approach to healing necessarily begins in the mind. The Buddhist philosophy teaches that the mind is the creator of all problems and remedies, good fortune and bad, health and sickness. Buddhists believe in the law of karma. Each person is constantly sowing karmic seeds that persist until the right circumstances occur to cause the seeds to bear their karmic fruit.
Negative karma manifests as problems, disease, and suffering, while positive karma shows up as success, good fortune, and vibrant health. To the degree that you can control your emotions and thought patterns, you can influence your karma and, thus, your health and vitality.
Avoid Harming Yourself and Others
Mindfulness means being present in each moment and noticing the quality of your thoughts even as you are being observant. Standing sentinel at the doorway of your consciousness to guard against creating seeds of negative thought (which, in turn, creates negative karma, according to Buddhism) is the way to avert sickness of the body and mind.
The Buddhist philosophy states that you must avoid any action that is harmful to yourself or others and that you must remain vigilant in monitoring your thoughts. In that way, you avoid attracting ill health to yourself in this life as well as in any future incarnations. Negative thoughts, words, and actions are like poison arrows that are destined to return to the sender.
What is Ayurveda?
Ayurveda is an ancient health care system that originated on the Indian subcontinent. It utilizes knowledge of the body, soul, mind, and senses to promote healthy living. Ayurveda means “knowledge of life.” The principles of Ayurveda (associated with the Vedic culture) influenced Tibetan and Chinese medicine as well as Unani medical practices that originated in Persia in circa A.D. 980.
Align your expectation and desire with the Law of Attraction if you want good health; what your mind believes about and expects from your body and its mental, emotional, and physical condition is what you receive more of.
Make Peace with Your Body
Accept and appreciate your body. Think of it as your friend. Instead of constantly criticizing how you feel or look, decide on what positive things you can do to effect the changes you desire. When illness comes, don't think of the body as betraying you. Work with your body to rid it of wrong thinking and feeling.
You praise the townsman's, I the rustic's state: Admiring others' lots, our own we hate: Each blames the place he lives in: but the mind Is most in fault, which ne'er leaves self behind. — Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace), “Villice Silvarum” (Letter to His Bailiff)
While self-love and self-respect are necessary for self-esteem, obsessive self-focus and selfishness can cause you to think and act in ways that can be detrimental to your health and well-being. The seeds of selfishness often sprout into anger, greed, and jealousy that, in turn, can fuel feelings of haughtiness or superiority over other beings. In Buddhist thought, selfishness is the root cause of all problems and disease. When you feel hostility, you attract more of it to you.
Attentive breathing is a simple technique to help relieve pain. If you have pain from a pulled muscle in your leg, for example, focus your conscious mind upon the painful area, breathe in, and imagine the painful tension as a dark, hard knot shattering under the energy of your attention. Breathe out, releasing the broken pieces. Keep doing the technique until the pain subsides or completely dissipates, and you won't have to reach for your painkillers.
Practice Thought Transformation
According to the ancient practice of feng shui, you preserve your store of energy when you avoid people who leach energy from you. Since energy flows from high to low, think of people who drain your energy and others who seem to energize you. The body is like a battery that stores and dispenses energy, but when energy is depleted, proper functioning is impossible.
Another Buddhist idea is the transforming of negative thought or labels into positive ones. For example, when a doctor tells you that you have a disease, you may react to her labeling of your affliction with fear, horror, and helplessness. You may see the disease as a problem, but you could also see it as a positive element in your life, the fruition of some karmic seed and the means to consciously alter your lifestyle in order to live in more balanced and spiritual ways.
You could work on developing a compassionate mind. The transformation of negative thoughts into positive ones can effect changes in the body, restoring health. The body, after all, is our physical dwelling.
The Magical World Within
Imagination is much more powerful than reason. The magical kind of thinking that goes on in the imagination addresses the subconscious mind, which is childlike in that it does not question directives that are both simple and repetitive — for example, an affirmation that your left knee is in the process of healing so you can again dance the tango. To stimulate the mind's fantasizing abilities, use colorful imagery rather than dry data and facts.
