Human-‘Being’ or Human-‘Doing’

Sixth Post – Series ‘Reloading Mental Health’ – June 2020

An excerpt from ‘The Shift’ by Dr. Wayne W. Dyer –

“Since our childhood, we learn that doing things, especially if we do them earlier and better than others, is rewarding. We learn to be more of a human ‘doing’ than a human ‘being’ (who just has to be). We took on an identity that told us, “When you do things, and do them better and sooner than your counterparts, then you have value”. We are rewarded for our accomplishments with praise. Our education system emphasizes accomplishment – no ‘Gold Star’ is interpreted as no value as a person. We’re defined by how well we do. If we don’t do well, we’re labeled ‘underachievers’. The popular saying ‘Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing’ makes losers out of 50% of competitors, since every competition that has a winner must also have a loser. Every time we feel as though we’ve failed, we place our worth as human ‘being’ in jeopardy. If we’re sick or injured and can no longer perform according to our standards, we also become candidates for depression or are susceptible to a multitude of physical ailments. I’ve reached the age that many refer to as ‘retirement time’. But I’m not my work. I’m not my accomplishment. I’m not my resume. I live, breathe and work for and work from my authentic self. How’s the concept of retirement even possible? How can I retire from who I am? And who I am allows this writing and speaking and everything else I do take place.”

How to be?

One of the hard-hitting subtle damages of COVID-19 is that it has snatched away the normal way of ‘doings’ from the majority of world population, to the extent that everyone is losing their sane self. The reason is that because we are defined by our doings, it becomes difficult to dis-identify from them and just ‘be’. This shift from ‘doing’ to a partial sense of ‘being’ is leading to emotional disturbances in majority of population during this lockdown. People know how to handle their physical ailments but are clueless of what to do and when to seek help for emotional trauma. This is a serious issue that is not to be overlooked. Emotional health is as important as physical illness, but the sudden change of lifestyle has rendered countless silent sufferers of depression, anxiety, stress and panic attacks. The solution to this problem is self-analysis from time-to-time. Any kind of feeling of unrest is not to be ignored. It is to be reported to the family physician.

Ayurveda is largely a counseling based system of health. Being holistic in approach, it takes all the physical and emotional ailments together without their actual separation. Seek help whenever required.

Connect here – drnilima@ayurpride.com / info@ayurpride.com

Source: ‘The Shift’ – Dr. Wayne W. Dyer

Other Posts – Series ‘Reloading Mental Health’ –

Jan2020 ; Feb2020 ; March2020 ; April2020 ; May2020 ; July2020

Aug2020 ; Sep2020 ; Oct2020 ; Nov2020 ;  Dec2020  .

Advertisement

Fear of Death in COVID-19

Fifth Post – Series ‘Reloading Mental Health’ – May 2020

COVID-19 has given rise to a collective consciousness of ‘Fear’. The collective consciousness of fear is a low frequency vibration. This can be overcome by raising the frequency of our individual consciousness. Connecting our individual consciousness to the higher frequency consciousness can do this. Thoughts of happiness, pleasure, good health, and perfect wellness are some examples of higher frequency consciousness. Consciousness affects our biological and physiological processes of the body. Global researchers in the field of cell biology have testified this fact over a period of few decades now. The experiments done by cell biologists verify that a cell’s chemistry is affected by the thoughts. Dr. Bruce H. Lipton, Ph.D., is an internationally recognized authority in Cell Biology. He says –

‘Human body is a communion of 50 trillion cells. Cells are the living entity in a human body. In a normal body, hundreds of billion cells die every day – e.g. hair cells, skin cells, blood cells and so on. Obviously, something is replacing the dying cells everyday. In our body there are stem cells. These cells are capable of self-renewal. The cells respond to the environment. They respond to the chemistry of blood.

Question – ‘Who is the chemist who puts the chemistry into the blood?’

Answer – ‘The brain is the chemist.’

Question – ‘What chemicals should the brain put into the blood?’ This is important because if we change the chemicals, we change the fate of the cells.

Answer -Whatever picture you hold in your mind, the brain translates that picture into a chemistry that complements the picture, and puts that chemistry into the blood; and the body responds to that picture in your mind. You can have a picture of health; you can have a picture of fear. Both have different chemistry. When you are in love, brain releases love chemistry, which is like Dopamine pleasure. That’s why falling in love creates great pleasure and also releases Oxytocin, which bonds you to the source of your love. It releases one more chemical, Vasopressin, which makes you more attractive to your partner so that your biology is now advertising that ‘I am a healthy, happy person’. The Growth Hormone, which is released into the blood provides a chemistry of extreme health. That’s why people, when they are in love, they glow, they are so healthy. That’s chemistry.

Let’s now get today’s COVID-19 chemistry – i.e. Fear –

The picture of fear in mind causes the stress hormone, Cortisol, which shuts down the immune system or the cytokines. So the blood of a person in love has different chemistry than the blood in a person with fear. The first principle of Quantum Physics is that ‘Consciousness is creating your life experience’. We are creating our life experiences with our consciousness.

Question – ‘Where are you getting your consciousness from?’

Answer – ‘From whatever information you are putting in the brain.’ This is because the information you put in brain will be translated directly into your biology. We are being told we are going to die, and we go on and create stress hormones (cortisol) and reduce our immunity. These fears are the primary things that inhibit the function of the immune system. Norman Cousins (1915-1990) healed himself from a lethal disease by locking himself in a hotel room. He bought all kinds of comedies, Marx brothers, and things like that. He just sat there and enjoyed life and laughed; and he overcame that what should’ve killed him. Half the people tested positive with COVID-19 don’t even have symptoms. So it’s not as lethal as they say, it’s the fear of death that is the problem that we must deal with today in the times of COVID-19.’

Role of Ayurveda –

Thousands of years back, long before Western scientists discovered the laws of Quantum Physics, Ayurveda had its principles based on the deeper understanding of Quantum Physics and the Universe. Though the terminology in Ayurveda is  different from the modern terminology, it echoes the concepts of Quantum Physics. Ayurveda considers human body to be a dynamic field of energy that presents itself as microcosm of the macrocosmic universe. This is in sync with the principle of quantum physics, which considers energy exchange as an important basis of health and wellbeing. Fear is a concept of mind, which is created for a situation that has not yet happened, so it is a fictitious life challenge. Fear has to be crushed. Positive thinking, along with the active treatment for infection accelerates the healing process. This is the best way to come out of the chaos and fear of COVID-19.

Source: Excerpts from interview – Dr. Bruce Lipton for ‘London Real’

Other Posts – Series ‘Reloading Mental Health’ –

June2020

January 2020 ; February 2020 ; March 2020 ; April 2020

July2020 ;  Aug2020  ;   Sept2020  ;  Oct2020  ;  Nov2020  ;  Dec2020  .

Stress and Immunity

Fourth post – Series ‘Reloading Mental Health’ – April 2020

Immunity is of great importance in the time when the world is struggling to fight with the COVID19 pandemic.

An excerpt from ‘The Wisdom of Healing’ by Dr. David Simon –

Mental state influences Physical wellbeing. This is the fundamental doctrine of mind-body medicine in Ayurveda. A 1985 editorial in the ‘New England Journal of Medicine’, the Bible of Western medicine, characterized the ‘presumed’ relationship between the mind and physical illness as ‘largely folklore’, but today modern science is recognizing the dynamic relationship between our emotions, our brain chemistry, and our physical bodies. This has created a new scientific field called ‘Psychoneuroimmunology’. This studies the relationships between the mind (psyche), brain (neuro) and immune system (immunology). Ayurveda has always asserted the mind’s influence on the body, but modern science is just beginning to understand how thoughts, feelings can influence wellbeing. When our lives are in balance and our internal dialogue is harmonious, our immune systems and every other aspect of our being receive the message of health.

There is good evidence that each and every thought, feeling, mood, desire, and experience is accompanied by corresponding and instantaneous changes in the brain’s chemical messengers. A groundbreaking study published a few years ago in the ‘New England Journal of Medicine’ measured people’s recent stress level and then had them sniff a dose of the virus that produces a cold. The study showed, that the more stressed you’ve been lately, the more likely you are to start coughing and sneezing soon. This study clearly shows that stress levels greatly influence the immune system of body.

Chronic stress is proven a killer. It weakens the immune system and can make one more susceptible to all kind of infections including coronavirus. Along with the necessary precautions, the need to strengthen body’s immunity by taking care of mental health.is equally essential in the pandemic of COVID-19.

Source: ‘The Wisdom of Healing’ – Dr. David Simon.

Other Posts – Series ‘Reloading Mental Health’ –

January 2020; February 2020; March 2020

June2020  ;  May 2020 

July2020 ;  Aug2020  ;  Sept2020  ;  Oct2020  ;  Nov2020  ;  Dec2020  .

Coronavirus and Ayurveda

UNDERSTANDING CORONAVIRUS –

Coronaviruses (CoVs) are a large family of enveloped RNA viruses that primarily target the human respiratory system with illness ranging from common cold to fatal death. They are highly infectious and cause worldwide epidemic. Previous outbreaks of coronaviruses include Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus (SARS-CoV), which was first reported in Guangdong province of China in 2002 and disappeared in 2004, and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus (MERS-CoV), which was first reported in Saudi Arabia in 2012 and still remains in circulation in camels. The most recently discovered coronavirus (December 2019) causes the infectious disease COVID-19. This new Coronavirus (nCoV), reported from Wuhan City of China, has not been previously identified in humans.

TRANSMISSION –

Coronaviruses are zoonotic in origin with their reservoirs in mammals and birds. They are transmitted amongst animals including humans. Several known CoVs are circulating in animals that have not yet infected humans. The CoVs already identified could be the tip of the iceberg, with potentially more new viruses yet to be revealed.

Person-to-person transmission of COVID-19 occurs primarily via direct contact or through droplet infection. Foecal transmission is doubtful but cannot be ruled out. Recommended precautions to prevent the spread include regular hand wash, covering mouth and nose when coughing and sneezing, thorough cooking of meat and eggs and avoiding close contact with anyone showing symptoms of respiratory illness such as coughing and sneezing.

INCUBATION PERIOD –

1 – 14 days. Most commonly 5 days.

SYMPTOMS –

Symptoms range from mild to severe illness and death. They begin gradually and are usually mild. Older people, and those with underlying medical conditions like high blood pressure, heart problems or diabetes, are more likely to develop serious illness. Lungs are the main organs affected by COVID-19 causing pneumonia and severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). Pneumonia and ARDS clog the airway leading to less circulation of oxygen. This lack of circulating oxygen affects rest of the organs including stomach, intestines, heart, liver and kidneys leading to death.

Range of Symptoms is –

Fever, fatigue, cough, body ache, nasal congestion, runny nose, sore throat, headache, haemoptysis, shortness of breath, diarrhoea and signs of organ failure.

TREATMENT –

At present, there are no specific antiviral drugs or vaccine against COVID-19 infection. The available options are broad-spectrum antivirals, inhalers and steroids. Treatment includes supplementing oxygen through mechanical ventilation, symptomatically supporting the patient and allowing the immune system to heal the body.

ROLE OF IMMUNITY –

Immunity is the body’s built-in line of defence against foreign invasions. This defence mechanism becomes active on locating any infection or invading cells (antigens) in the body.. It then produces antibodies to fight against those antigens. The damage to the body is not always directly caused by infection. It can also be a result of body’s response to infection.Stronger the immune system, greater is the body’s strength to fight infections. A weak immune system permits faster progression of viral infection and higher mortality rates, particularly in older individuals.

ROLE OF AYURVEDA –

Ayurveda has a varied role in containing the fatality of coronavirus outbreak. Consciousness based understanding of Ayurveda reveals human body as a network of intelligence, which can influence health through the food we ingest, the emotions we experience and the sensory input we are exposed to. Application of the depth of this aspect, along with the active treatment of infection, accelerates the healing process. Additionally, the healing process cannot afford to ignore the significance of herbs as the latter potentiates to balance both physical and physiological defence mechanism that restores the impaired functions of body, hence boosting immune response.

REPORT STUDY: Role of herbs can be exemplified by a well-controlled clinical study in 2002 on Ginseng (Panax Ginseng), an ancient Chinese herb (TCM). It was noted that patients with COPD taking Ginseng experienced significant improvements in breathing and the ability to perform exercise compared to similar patients who received an inactive treatment. Another study examined the effects of a combination therapy, which included Ginseng and other Asian traditional healing herbs, versus no treatment at all. In this Chinese study, patients taking the Ginseng-based herbal blend experienced significant improvements in all measures of lung function, compared to subjects who received no treatment. The authors concluded that compared to no treatment, or treatment with standard medications alone, Ginseng offered some additional improvement in quality of life and lung function.

As the range of symptoms of COVID-19 is large, it becomes difficult to pinpoint a single herb or a group of herbs for treatment. But depending on the signs and symptoms, Ayurveda provides a diverse range of herbs and herbal formulations which can act centrally as immuno-modulators, adaptogens, anti-oxidants, anti-inflammatories, analgesics, anabolics and rejuvenators, as per the requisite. Besides this, there are precise and systematic classifications of herbs that can act locally on different systems of the body that require medication. The mode of functioning of herbs is described with utmost clarity in Ayurveda under the classifications of specific systems like respiratory, cardiac, gastrointestinal, endocrine, liver and renal.

Stick to the basics –

Apply the principle of Ayurveda – Prevention of disease, Promotion of Health and its Preservation. For this, simplify the diet and keep the bowels clear. Take all preventive and hygienic measures to cut down the spread of infection. Don’t panic. As per WHO, most people (about 80%) recover from the disease without needing special treatment. Reduce over-thinking and worrying. Stress precipitates the infection and reduces body’s ability to cope with infection. Rest your body and mind. Sleep enhances immunity and reduces oxidative stress.

Some commonly used herbs –

Zingiber officinalis (ginger), Coriandrum sativum (coriander), Foeniculum vulgare (fennel), Piper longum (long pepper) increase metabolic rate and ease digestion.

Fatigue – Ashwagandha (Withania Somnifera), Brahmi (Bacopa monnieri), Draksha (Vitis vinifera), Bala (Sida cardifolia)

Detoxificants – Aloe Vera, Neem (Azadirachta indica), Turmeric (Curcuma longa), Amalki (Embellica officinalis)

Anti inflammatory – Moringa Olifera (Moringa), Aegle Marmelos (Bilva), Embelica officinalis (Amla), Ocimum sanctum (Tulasi), Tinospora cardifolia (Giloya),Glycerrhiza glabra (Mulethi), Piccorhiza kurroa (Katuki), Boerhavia diffusa (Punarnava).

It is not that simple.

Self-medication, even in the intake of herbs, can be detrimental. Dr. James Cherry, a research professor of pediatrics in the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, says –

“While this immune response can rid the body of the infection, it can also sometimes cause collateral damage in the body. Due to intense inflammatory response, sometimes called a “cytokine storm.” The immune cells produce cytokines to fight infection, but if too many are released, it can cause problems in the body. Children have a less severe illness than adults during other kinds of infections. This may be because children have a “straightforward immune response,” whereas older people can sometimes have an “over-response.” It’s this excess immune response that causes some of the damage during infections.”

Thus a strict monitoring of all the stages of infection, the symptoms, the laboratory investigations and the effects of medication is essential, and this must be under the supervision of respective physicians.

Source: Websites – WHO, NIAID, CDC; Wisdom of healing – Dr. David Simon