Acharya Mahaprajna
Deccan Herald
Many diseases descend from the mind. They are not only physical ailments, but are psychosomatic.
The cause of psychosomatic ailments is found in the internal world - the world of the psyche. Freud has used the word 'mind'. Jung did very subtle studies in the field of psychology. He explained that our consciousness has two levels: mind and psyche (consciousness). Psyche is beyond mind. Numerous ailments emerge from the psyche, the world of emotions. Both the terms 'healthy' and 'unhealthy' are related to the emotional world.
A person gets very angry. As soon as the intensity of anger increases, the heart is stimulated and its beats become faster. Anger is the enemy of the heart. When anger crosses its limits, it damages the functioning of the heart.
The growth of fear disturbs the functions of the heart, the lungs and the kidneys. Some ask why their kidneys malfunction when they neither consume excess salt nor spicy food. Our emotional world is a subtler cause than our food. If a person is frightened, fear leads to malfunctioning of the kidneys.
Our emotions affect the functioning of the organs of our body, and our organs affect our emotions. The two are intertwined. If any part of our body is diseased, it has a direct effect on the emotional status of the person. When a person's liver is infected, he will become quarrelsome. There is no medication for removing quarrelsome traits.
But analysing from the perspective of emotions, a person with a quarrelsome nature should get his liver diagnosed. Malfunctioning of the liver can also lead to depression without any apparent reason.
From the standpoint of Preksha meditation, while discussing the causes of good health and sickness, we should not get stuck only on the external causes. Of course, the causes could be external. But we should also be aware of each and every organ of our body and see what is going on there.
Whenever there is turbulence in our emotions, we should find out how our body is functioning. Similarly, when the parts of our body are malfunctioning, we should crosscheck how our emotions are. Both of them are interconnected. It is necessary for the trainers of Preksha meditation to know this fact.
The principle of Preksha meditation is that balanced emotions lead to a healthy body and unbalanced emotions lead to an unhealthy body. Unbalanced emotions make a person unhealthy and an unhealthy body will trigger the emotions.