The Concepts of Illness and Healing - Essay Example

The concepts of illness, healing; the control of mind over physicality and illness; the role of culture in the way we cope; the social negatives andconflicts; the solutions offered; their relevance.and inapplicability. Introductory: Twentieth century is a melting pot. It is the period of people at war with themselves; People who are atonce the perpetrators and victims of their own ideologies and values. The era use language to communicate, as well as to obfuscate Truth .They are beset not just with illness, ill effects of environmental corruption, but also with the malady of the metaphors and myths of their own coinage. Relief must come for all the ailments, self inflicted, or imposed by others. This essay deals with the trying problems and life of the 20th century and the Literature of Healing that came into being during this period.The essay tries to evaluate the solutions offered by different writers. The exploration of the problems by different authors are analyzed and summed up; then the essay arrives at an Argument that could best combine all these perspectives and address the situation. THE ARGUMENT The twentieth century is a scene of devastation, with the ozone depletion, nuclear Waste, water shortage and environmental degradation. . The resource-starved people are rapacious and are out to get their fill of pleasure at any cost, even through violent means, depriving others of their rightful shares of resources and property. The male female divide is an unbridgeable chasm; prejudices against a race, language. Homo hatred and sex hatred flourish. Even when some illness breaks out, people are more concerned about its origin - whether it is East- or -West. Prejudices and hatred bread violence Homosexuality, lesbianism and many other unorthodox ways of living shock some, and people react differently to these situations. Inequalities also breed war. Historically, the Twentieth century America has also been ripped by the Vietnam war. Young men died in thousands , and were in the grip of despair and fear; they were reckless because of the certainty of their death in war. AIDS broke out in the 80s as the most telling commentary on the calamity of the century. There was no way the people could cope. Here too prejudices and hatred held sway. The literature that tried to answer and guide people during the century, had to be either Utopian or dystopian, showing them the ideal ways of living and ideal solutions. or, hold a mirror to their mistakes by showing a world where everything is wrong. (The dystopia Novel). The solution should be somewhere in between and include all perspectives and points of view. NATURE WRITING movement started by Henry David Thoreau pointed to ways of living fundamentally divergent from the ones laid down by dominant dictates and attitudes of society. (David L.Barnhill).Other authors have followed in the footsteps giving their poetic solutions in their Fictions and Essays. Iron John , is a Work of the Vietnam war trying earnestly to heal the wounds and bring together the alienated members of the society. The book talks about the industrial civilization which cut asunder the father and son who once worked shoulder to shoulder , teaching and learning , bonded by that common experience. The father figure is no longer a reality in the war- ravaged America. He is at best a frustrated, battered man who returns from the pressures and stress of the workplace, too irritable to empathize, and at worst, a drunk, and more often, a deserter of the family. The youth are angry with the older men for pushing them into a war, butchering them without mercy while they themselves are safe .Old men fend for themselves and have not time to spend in understanding the grievance of the younger generation. Men just grow up angry at the loss of their childhood, disappointed with the barrenness of their manhood and tired of having to play roles imposed on them by society;they become estranged; the women finding them boring and the children find them disgusting. IRON John argues that the cause lies in the death of the old and ancient ways of living and working .Caring relations have broken down at every level. Robert Bly 's solution is that our boys must be taught while very young, to FEEL their way through life; they have to experience the society of old and wise men of the community .They should be initiated by these patriarchs into the ways of wisdom. Initiation means dreams and visions that would visit the Novice shaping his spirituality. He would return to nature and the "Noble savage man" model and learn the natural way of understanding things from inside.(Robert Bly) Bly thinks that the Modern man does not know how to react to situations like aggression and violence. He is soft, and shies away. But that is wrong; for, he must have the instinctive answer to the challenge of violence. Men must not be playing roles according to societal demands. The boys, in order to achieve this instinctive wisdom, must be early on removed from their mothers and even fathers, to learn in a commune as in all ancient cultures and civilizations.( BLY) Bly's conviction is that Man must mature and discover his maleness , by not losing touch with the earth ,and the historic and anthropologic roots of Masculinity. This world demands that Man must be successful. He obeys and achieves it, but at a cost. His vitality is lost. Instead, Bly asks them to turn to the inner consciousness "from where all poetry and mythology springs."(BLY) It is his prescription to cure the crippled inner life. Bly touched a cord in all the American minds that had also been smarting under the pain. But he also invited the criticism that he was propagating a male chauvinist society. For, he seemed to address only the White and did not seem to take the Homosexuals into his reckoning. Starhawk who wrote during the same period, and against the same Vietnam war backdrop, had an utopian solution to offer. She creates an oasis of verdant ,fruitful , and happy people of multi generation and multi culture living in harmony with nature and in amity among themselves. They are determined not to waste, nor hunger; they worship the four elements of Air, Fire , Water and earth; they believe that keeping these sacred and clean ,their fifth sacred thing, the spirit, would be for ever free. They have a history of conquering violence with non violence. (Starhawk) Illness is not unknown in this Utopian land. But there are healers too. Witches heal the sick and wounded with caring arms and gentle chants; Healing is free absolutely. They believe in the power of mind. Rhythmic chants and pipes and drums bring quiescence to their spirit. Faith heals all. Love is the remedy for all ills - love for one another and reverence for the earth. Illness has always been associated with sin and punishment. The societies through the centuries have treated illness as visitation from God to punish sins. (Susan Sontag) Susan Sontag who was afflicted by Cancer during seventies, wrote essays on Illness - Cancer, and Aids. Exploring these beliefs, she traces people's attitudes to illness and treatment of the sick. right from the Greeks through the times of Dickens up till Auden. Her conclusion is that mythology takes over whenever there is ignorance as to the cause of the desease.Whenver the etiology of the disease was established and cure found, the myths evaporated. When knowledge is lacking , metaphors are coined , and the mystery surrounding the diseases , acquire an awe and menace. Usually martial phrases were employed to describe the illness.Desease was an invader who insidiously worked inside the cells; it was a losing battle; endless battle and ended with the patients' death. Metaphors are only word pictures, which tried to describe one object by drawing parallels from another, often dissimilar object. But once the imagination is captured, the metaphors extend further. The patient loses hope and yields himself over to the disease without a fight. Says Sontag. She says that there should be greater candor among doctors in explaining to the patients the nature of their disease. The disease must be demystified by stripping away the metaphors and myths surrounding them. Ignorance has also lead to romanticizing a disease points out Susan. In Gothic literature, the Tubercular was depicted as an ethereal person, waif like and pale, disdainful of the earthly.(Sontag) Soon enough the TB vaccines were found and the myths wore off. Soon it was the turn of cancer during the 80.s , to be the "enemy within" or the death that arrived without knocking. AIDS broke out soon after. AIDS was pronounced to be a pay back for free sexuality and Homosexuality. The scene was like Apocalypse. Many were doing Propaganda that it originated from Africa; but knowledge dawned when revelation followed that it was not a new disease but had always been here, only not recognized till the eighties. If wars must be waged or faced against enemies who attack from outside, there are wars to be fought in the region of the consciousness too. Illness, and people's attitude towards illness and the sick, was one such battle- front. The ignorance of the cure and cause of an illness led to the isolation and suffering of patients who might otherwise have survived and been cured. People had their own notions that the noble way to die was to die in sleep without pain. The sick had to suffer further privations as fear of contamination condemned them to unclean environment. The sick were even ashamed and were assailed by guilt and hence unable to seek out remedies. Leo Tolstoy in his Death of Ivan Ilyvitch portrayed a man who loves to live in style. He feels the first symptoms of illness in himself and seeks physician's advise. But either the doctor doesn't understand it himself, or, it is the professional practice, not to be candid to the patient; he gives a confusing and frightening notion of the ailment. Ivan is told he suffers from something called the "floating kidney". Ivan is frightened and worried. It is this fear compounded by the disease itself perhaps, that makes him unsociable and irritable. People look at him furtively always, and give him a wide birth. The man is slowly isolated. Gradually he sinks into an existence of squalor and apathy. He can clearly read the false sense of pity and facile sympathy with which his wife and visitors view him during their obligatory visits. Ivan finds comfort only in the company of the servant boy who clears the stables as well as the sick room. The boy takes a casual view of the master's illness and executes his demands without any hesitation. The doctor who visits the patient comments about the patient's preferences for keeping his feet high; he thinks it is merely a sick man's whim a nuisance but must be indulged.(Leo Tolstoy) In the face of suspicion and alienation, sick men are often pushed towards death .. Both Tolstoy's " Death". and, Starhawker's Fifth sacred thing have yielded great insights into the working of the sick men's psyche. They have revealed to people the limitations of their own sympathies and the way they regarded ailments. Sontag 's book changed the way the Health care workers and writers described patients. More caring attitudes started prevailing after her books. The portrayal of illness as mere affliction of body which can be clinically dealt, with the patient's own willing co operation, was a path breaking information for the reading world. While Sontag made this as a thesis statement, Tolstoy tried to sensitize the people through depicting for them the plight of an afflicted man. CONCLUSION: The healing touch applied to the wounds and pain felt by the new century, had to touch the heart of the problems; the core of the disease. At the core of all the illness and pain are, unfulfilled potentials and unexpressed pains needing heeling .(IRON JOHN) The remedy lay in the way we regard the wounds and pain in others ; we also need to take a second look into our own use of , and the meaning we give to, Images and metaphors. We have to rewrite the nature of war and its justification. We must realize that our sympathy is full of limitions , and that we tend to seek cover under condemnatory attitudes and thus satisfy the demands of our conscience. We have to settle for this attitude as our humaneness is a drying source. Our perception of the world is only through images and legacies inherited from our History and mythology. Thus, it is a vicious cycle we must break; our culture affecting and coloring our attitudes, and our attitudes concocting fantasy and mythology ,preventing us from being truthful. Such imaging affects the entire society. This in a way upholds the power that Mind has over Physicality. Though sometimes writers like Sontag bemoan the way we "psycholigise" what we don't know, we should not underrate the efficacy of Mind power. It is only through Intellectual clarity that we can dispel the false pictures masking Truth. This gives mastery for the mind over Fears and despair, which make us surrender to death and diseases even if there is no malignancy in the disease itself. Doctors must be Healers like the witches who are full time, hard working healers in the fiction of Starhawk. They must not take the viewpoint that, what they cannot diagnose, just doesn't exist and enter the premise that the patient is only imagining things. The power of mind is certainly great and deadly in such a way as to control physicality. But this has to be guided and informed by Truth and science, so that the patient can feel from within, the positive energy and assist his own heeling. When stressed or depressed, his immune system is also low and illness deepens. Thus Mind commands the physicality through metaphors and images. It also commands through well founded Hopes and Will power. When you lack the knowledge to cope with illness, you psychologies or mythologies. as coping mechanism. Then they start managing your attitudes and actions! They isolate the suffering. so the cycle must be reversed to make the power of the intellect to take over the lethal control of the metaphor(Sontag ). Susan condemns the stigmatizing of the desease.with blame laden terms. Some theories hold that diseases are caused by mental states. Will power cures them - The same formula drives the healing touch when applied to the society at large, torn by avarice, death of vitality and friendless loneliness .There has to be a qualified change to the nature of KNOWING. (Starhawk) People must experience the transforming power of Non violence. "Fight the virus of power; you become like them. Transformation must come in our own landscape which is the inner consciousness."- Maya the enchantress tells her people , even as the community is getting besieged by the South. (Fifth sacred Thing) Writers llike Starhawk have advocated egalitarian societies where all are free and people's only religion is Nature. (The denizens of the Fith- sacred- thing- Sanfrancisco bring to the Harvest Goddess as offering, water saved from the previous years' storm.)It is an ideal world, where the only slogan is " Not to waste, not to starve or thirst". Great men like Mahatma Gandhi and Henry David Thoreau have created such societies with some success. Indeed it is a very healing slogan to hear : "There is no Justice, but only consequence". It means that, we are responsible for our actions. We should not be judgmental Both starhawk and Bly , pitch their faith in the all knowing and encompassing powers of Nature. "Artistes of Unwaste" in the Sanfrancisco oasis (portrayed by Starhawk) have a certain reality. The idea is no mere fantasy. By revering nature and being responsible in the way we exploit her benefits, we only enrich ourselves. The toxic and nuclear wastes a will not cripple us Though it may not be possible to have a scenario of large scale paganism and nature worship, it has been done in the past in other ways. There have been Gandhi and Martin Luther King who have offered Non Violence in answer to Violence. Gandhi organized the beleaguered Indians of South Africa, into a democratic community, resisting the colonial rulers' despotism. He had called this Oasis , Tolstoy Farm. Similarly,Bly advocated a colony where the youth would be initiated into the world , by elderly men. But he has often been criticized by feminists for his seeming to advocate some patriarchal society, and gender bias. But what he advocates is still being practiced by many cultures including the Hindus in India, some Red Indian Tribes, and some Buddhists seminaries in Tibeth.Bly is offering alternate visions of manhood. Like so many attempts at Counter culture, the ways shown by Starhawk and Bly could also be answer to the withering away of human spirit . . Some basic values emerge from these authors of the Tradition of Healing. Tackling these issues, these books are hailed as "Liberating Books". They instruct "sacred Things are not for sale." They exhort : "Be Healers , not wasters"(Fifth sacred Thing) Bly's solution rings out to the men who confound masculinity with meaningless violence "Maintain only the male soul." (Iron John) They are united in their pronouncement that Ideologies often run counter to the sustainable relationship that Man must maintain with Nature. Being one with Nature endows people with psychic and spiritual powers. On the physical plane, Healers or doctors must be Truthful and humane and not brand and label their patients. but empower them. with facts of the case and enable their inner spirit to grapple and cope with the illness with positive results. Mainly cultures are responsible for the way people view Life and Death. Global Justice and anti war attitudes are answers to the substantial destructions caused by attitudes, prejudices and fundamentalist views. We need Understanding, and sympathy. This healing touch is the answer to the pains of rejection, shattered illusions and grief suffered by our modern community. .Sources: 1. Bly,Roberts. Iron John: A Book About Men: Addison-Wesley, NY 1990. ::: .2.Sontag,Susan : Illness as Metaphor & Illness as Metaphor& Aids and Its Metaphors Picador,2001. 3.starhawk : The Fifth Sacred Thing,NY,Bantom 1993 4.Tolstoy, Leo : The Cossacks/Happy Ever After and The Death of Ivan Ilych, Penguine classics. 5. Barnhill,David.L, :.At Home On Earth ,(University of California Press,1999) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------.END Read More