What if sickness is a choice and not a ‘thing’ that happens to us?

Firstly, I’d like to state for the record how amazed I am that it’s been 3 years since I last wrote anything! I mean, what the? As I consciously think back over that time, it all feels like a blur; literally like I’ve been walking and talking and doing everything in a daze. Whoa!!

The past 3 years have been somewhat of a transitional phase for me, as I moved out of religion and began to detox from the ideas and beliefs I had accumulated from the years I had been exposed to them. Not that those ideas or those that taught them to me were ‘bad’, though they were certainly limiting and harmful to my peace of mind, as I see things now.

Something else that is quite funny is that during the time I wrote all my previous articles I was getting sick all the time… LOL… and since I stopped writing I can hardly recall a time where I was sick; hypocritical much? Although in saying that, my definitions of sick and sickness are changing all the time. Sickness to me used to be getting colds or flus, headaches, fevers etc., and now it’s more to include things like boils, pimples, scratches, cuts, blocked nose etc.

For roughly a 3 year period, around 2011-2013, I had multiple boils appear in various places around my body. These appeared every few months or so even while I was writing previously about what sickness was and how to heal oneself from it/prevent it. Funny how things work really, isn’t it? As I look back on the past few years, I can see how I was too focussed on the intellectual side of things and wasn’t really applying/living it. Since I last wrote I’ve been gradually moving away from the head and more into the heart. It surely isn’t a coincidence then that I haven’t had a boil in roughly 2 years and other minor sicknesses are becoming less prevalent in my experience/body.

Which leads us to the question that titles this article, what if sickness is a choice and not a ‘thing’ that happens to us? I have had different views on sickness for quite some time now that I forget what it used to be like when I thought I was a ‘victim’ to these painful ailments that afflicted me. So many times I asked myself, “why is this happening to me?” and “why me and not someone else?” and so on and so forth. But what if we stepped out of this type of thinking for a second, and really, sincerely asked ourselves, what is sickness? Is it actually something that happens to us or is it something we do to ourselves?

Now I realise that last question might be quite offensive at first, but putting the offense aside, can you seriously reflect on what that question entails? What if sickness wasn’t an external ‘thing’? If you’re someone that is constantly afflicted by different ailments and/or you’re in constant pain, how significant would it be if these things were not happening to you, but buy you! Not by some external, devious force that is after you, but buy an innocent, unconscious thought system you had no idea about. Would this be a game changer?

Everybody is on their own path and going about things in their own way, which is perfectly fine. There is no right path or wrong path, no slow path or fast path, no this path is better than that path; just different paths that are ultimately leading to the same destination. Even this might not be something you agree with, and that is perfectly fine too. The trick to all of this is in realising that allowance creates health, and judgement/resistance makes sickness. For those who are brave enough to swallow it and look honestly within, you will realise that the more judgemental you are, the more sickness and pain you experience.

This is certainly something I have become aware of since I started moving out of the head and into the heart so to speak. As each day passes I am better able to see the link between my state of mind and what I experience in the body and in the world around me. The typical way to look at this is to say that we feel crappy inside because of what is happening in the world outside us or in/on our body. But this is just a form of denial, a form a denial that we all experience, myself included of course.

The truth of the matter is, we experience inside our mind first, and then in the body and world around us. Mind is always cause, the within; whereas the world and body is the effect, the external. Only once we start to accept this, even if only a miniscule amount, will we start to see that it is true. We always experience our beliefs; this is just the way it works. The only way to experience something different is either to change the belief, or let go of the belief entirely. When you let go of belief, you experience what is, otherwise known as truth, reality, or whatever else you like to call it.

It does take faith to step into the unknown. It takes faith to cast off so many years of believing one thing to realise, or start to realise, that you had been wrong all that time. Not wrong in the sense of bad or needing punishment, but wrong in the sense that you had placed your trust in something that did not have your best interests at heart. Ultimately, any belief is limiting. All beliefs, sooner or later, will manifest in some type of sickness or disease. This is simply because beliefs are an interpretation of reality, not reality itself. Health is the manifestation of reality, whereas sickness is the manifestation of unreality.

You will notice as you look at the world around you, that beliefs divide, not unite. Yes, you will occasionally see people who share certain beliefs unite together, but only while the belief stays shared. As soon as one or multiple differing beliefs are detected, these people will no longer associate with each other and may even go to the other extreme to try and harm or kill each other, all over belief. If you ever doubt the power of the mind, or that the mind is the cause, look no further than these types of examples in your life and the world around you.

The word belief can be substituted for any of its cousins, namely values, goals and judgements to name a few. They are all essentially the same thing and accomplish the task of separating us from one another. Anything that separates will cause sickness, just the same as anything that unites will heal. And remember, all this is in relation to the mind. Only the mind can judge, and only the mind can forgive.

Is any of this causing a shift in your perception yet? Is it helping you to see that things might not be as what they seem? Because the secret is that there is no secret. There is no secret remedy because there is no secret cause. There is no secret cause because all cause is in your mind. If you would but look there you would see it, looking at you in plain sight, where it has always been. There is no enemy virus out to get you. There are no bacteria stalking you, waiting for you to slip into its grasp. We are not a victim to any disease or sickness that previously existed, that currently exists or will exist in the future.

All these things are but outward manifestations of internal ideas. These ideas may vary in form, but they produce the same results: sickness and dis-ease. It is our mind that is at dis-ease, not our body. The body is nothing in and of itself, it receives its dictates from the mind. The evidence of this is clear and plain to see, for those who are willing to see it. What use is there in swallowing a pill to cure an idea, a sick thought? It is ideas in the mind that need to be healed, not the body. It is the beliefs, values and judgements that we hold so dear that are responsible for everything that we experience in ourselves, in our bodies and in the world around us.

The clearest example I can use from my own life was in the case of the auto immune disease I developed in my early 20’s. The symptoms of the disease were that the cells in my body were attacking themselves. Put simply, my body attacked itself. Now, if the body was cause and my mind effect, there would be nothing I could do about it, I would essentially be doomed except for maybe a few drugs or lifestyle changes that might limit the damage. But, if looked at from the other way, that the mind is cause, I could do something about it. And I did. I realised that the body was merely reflecting the thoughts I had about myself. During this time I constantly attacked myself by telling myself I was useless, not good enough and many more, much more explicit than those. And so, as things work, I manifested an outward condition that mirrored my inner condition.

That is the most crystal clear example in my own life where it demonstrates that the mind is the only thing that needs healing, because it is the only thing that can create anything. Only once I realised there was a choice in the matter could I do anything about it. Only once I realised sickness and disease are not ‘things’ out there, external to me, could I do anything about it. I have countless examples of healing other ailments over the years on top of this that have solidified the fact that we do indeed have a choice to be sick or not to be sick, as we so choose.

How to Heal Your Life of Sickness and Disease

When it comes to healing and sickness and everything in between, it can often be a touchy subject and one that has the potential to ruffle a few feathers and cause certain emotional reactions, mainly because it hits so close to home for all of us. In line with this, it is natural for all of us to be skeptical about alternative views and ideas about health, wellbeing and things to do with sickness and disease in general.

I have had a certain amount of feedback in regards to my previous articles, especially my last one titled “You’re Not What You Eat, But What You Think” where people have expressed that my approach is simply about mind over matter, that I believe you can use the power of your mind to directly heal anything and everything. I admit that while it could be read and interpreted that way on the surface, it most certainly isn't about that. So, in order to help clarify this and provide a bit more insight into my previous articles, this article has been written to clarify on this a bit further.

As has been stated in my previous articles, my approach teaches that illness and disease is not an enemy but a friend; not something that is trying to harm us, but something that is trying to free and liberate us. It is simply matter of perception, or how we look at it. If someone sees illness as a nuisance or a foreign invader that is trying to harm them, then it will seem the way it is perceived. But the key is to realise that it is just a matter of perception.

We have been conditioned from an early age to think of illness and disease as an external thing, something that is separate from us. Whereas, I suggest, as many others are also beginning to suggest, that our health or lack thereof has more to do with things which are internal, factors which are inside us. This may come across as being a bit too “in your face,” but in my experience it is greatly liberating and empowering to know that I have more control over my health than it being mostly out of my ability to influence.

Let me ask you a question. If you had the choice between having direct control of your health or not having direct control, which would you choose? And from this I ask you another question. Would you not be empowered to know that the capability to heal illness and disease is already within you and that it is not dependent on medication, surgery or any other external source to bring about?

I am going to use the big scary “R” word now, one that scares many of us and still scares me to this day, and that is the word “responsibility.” We all admit that if we want to be successful in any area of our lives we need to take some type of responsibility over it. Now, when it comes to our health and wellbeing this is no different. If we want to bring about any type of healing or recovery there is to be a certain amount of personal responsibility taken on our part. Unless and until we take this responsibility, there will be no or very little change take place. Any and all types of change are hinged on personal responsibility and this is no different when it comes to our health and wellbeing.

And this leads us to the main shift in thinking that takes place when considering where this new approach comes from. Instead of illness and disease being an external thing trying to harm and hinder us, it is internal feedback that is trying to free and liberate us. Illness and disease is considered as feedback from a body that is trying to get our attention and that is trying to communicate something to us. It can be likened to a tap on the shoulder or the light on your car dashboard. They are both there to get your attention, and in the case of the light on the car dashboard, it is there to let you know that something is out of balance somewhere else and that it needs your attention.

In keeping with the light on the car dashboard analogy, once you correctly assimilate what the problem is in the car and then address and balance the problem, the light will disappear automatically and all by itself. Why? It is because you have removed the cause of the light coming on in the first place. In the same way, illness and its symptoms is likened to the light on the dashboard, as it is there to indicate an imbalance within us. In exactly the same way as the light on a car dashboard disappears once you have addressed the cause in the car, once you assimilate and address the cause of the problem within yourself, the symptoms and the illness disappear automatically in the body.

How is this possible? It is possible simply by understanding what illness and disease really is, as opposed to understanding what it is not. When we realise and accept that sickness in all its forms is not something that is there to hinder us, everything changes in an instant. When we begin to see that illness and its symptoms fulfill the same role as the light on the car dashboard, we begin to see and understand what is really taking place here.

Healing and recovery from illness and disease is not about using the power of your mind, having power of mind over matter or anything like unto it. Instead, it is about understanding what sickness and its symptoms really are and the purpose they serve. Trying to medicate a symptom is like trying to fix the car by merely focusing on the light on the dashboard. Just like the dashboard light is not the problem and only indicates what the problem is, so it is with sickness and any symptoms experienced in the body.

Illness and disease acts as an indicator, a communication device that is trying to tell you that something else is out of balance. In this way, the sickness and its symptoms are not the cause itself but the effect of something higher, something deeper. This aligns with a basic principle in the universe that states only a cause can create an effect; an effect cannot create another effect. In keeping with this, an effect can only be reversed or taken away on the level of cause, not on the level of effect.

Therefore, the way to treat the effect is to address the cause. Unless and until the actual cause is addressed no progress will be made. But, on the flip side, as soon as the cause has been addressed and balanced, healing and recovery is natural and the symptoms disappear all by themselves, just like the light on the car dashboard does once the cause of its coming on has been addressed.

The hardest part for us to accept is that the cause is within us and not outside of us. And this brings us back to the responsibility part. Although please be aware that taking responsibility has nothing to do with blame and it should not in any way engender guilt in any shape or form. This responsibility is to merely accept that there is an imbalance within us that needs to be addressed and then to take the appropriate action. It is an empowering and liberating process rather than a dis-empowering one that incites blame, shame or guilt.

In essence, illness and disease serves a great and wonderful purpose in our lives as it exists to serve us and help us move forward in life. As hard as it may be to accept at first, the reality is that illness and disease are there to help and serve you, not the opposite as is commonly believed. May you move forward in life in the knowledge that all things are there for your benefit, including sickness in whatever form in may take in your life and body.