Defining Together With Treating The “Whole Person”
Let's outset past times considering ii articles published inwards the past times few months most mental illness, which select to lite the staggering costs of not treating psychological problems (i.e., problems rooted inwards the mental as well as emotional components) because our monastic enjoin consider physical (i.e., body) wellness to last much to a greater extent than of import than psychological health.
In May 2008, a New York Times article, titled "The Murky Politics of Mind-Body" discussed scientific evidence showing that mental (psychological) problems such equally severe depression, addiction, as well as schizophrenia accept a physiological base, including encephalon abnormalities, problems inwards encephalon circuitry, as well as genetic factors. In the past times I've written most this number at this link.
Note, however, that this intersection betwixt hear as well as trunk genuinely includes to a greater extent than than emotions, such as:
- The effects of our beliefs on our physical health, which I've discussed this inwards an before serial of spider web log posts starting at this link.
- The connector betwixt thinking as well as doing, i.e., how our thoughts Pb to specific actions, which may last salubrious as well as adaptive or unhealthy as well as maladaptive. In healthcare, this connector includes your powerfulness to depict your symptoms to your doctor, your doctor's powerfulness to examine your trunk as well as diagnose a problem, likewise equally your powerfulness to sympathise how to cope chronic conditions.
Now to the large oval—the "Spiritual Force" (aka "life-force," "inner-self," consciousness, "soul," "qi/chi")—which encompasses the whole person … mind, body, as well as emotions. From a philosophical (cosmological) perspective, the spiritual forcefulness enables us to have a mind, trunk as well as emotions. In other words, this cosmic loose energy gives us the powerfulness to last aware, to sense as well as perceive the globe simply about us. It allows us to create, limited ourselves, feel, accept intuition, remember, speak, move, think, grow, etc. It's the forcefulness that builds our bodies from genetic information, as well as that transforms the electrical activity inwards our nervous systems into thoughts, emotions, as well as behaviors. At its most basic (and abstract) level, the spiritual forcefulness tin transportation away last idea of equally life itself, which gives us the potential to railroad train our minds as well as bodies. Some mightiness fifty-fifty country it is a "piece of God" inside each of us.
While sure enough Eastern (e.g., traditional Chinese) medicines attend to the spiritual forcefulness when treating patients, Western medicine by as well as large ignores it because this forcefulness cannot last observed or measured scientifically (see this link for a comparison of Eastern as well as Western medicine, as well as this link for to a greater extent than most complementary as well as option medicine).
So, is at that spot a meaningful connector betwixt the iii components of the whole person—mind, emotions, as well as body—in which each components affects the others? YES!
Is at that spot existent value inwards treating the whole individual past times seriously considering the interactions betwixt these iii components? YES!
And, if yous desire to larn philosophical, is it reasonable to conclude that a spiritual forcefulness gives ascension to all thoughts, feelings, as well as physiology? YES! As such, mightiness it last beneficial to a improve agreement of how this forcefulness tin transportation away last applied to healthcare inwards the Western societies? YES!