Do Not Stand Between Yourself and Health

I watch a TV show called as Shark Tank, on YouTube. Its an incredible reality show to learn everything about business. In that show, there is one Mr Kevin. He often says to many participants – “You are your own enemy. You are standing in between yourself and success. You just don’t know that yet.”

Sometimes, I remember his words with a few. Some people with illness, concentrate too much on their disease. They search for root cause of the disease, they search for symptoms, they search for home remedies, they seek online advice, they go to one doctor to the other, they do all sort of things. But they fail to do only one thing that matters – to act on the disease.

When it comes to doing something to tackle the disease, they hesitate to take medicines, to follow doctor’s suggestions, to believe in his / her doctor rather than online information, to adjust lifestyle, to quit bad habits, to get up early and go to bed early, to eat and drink only when hungry and thirsty, to remember to take the medicines on time, to self evaluate one’s daily routine regularly and apply corrective measures an so on.

Gathering online information and doing something TODAY to treat the disease are two completely different things. 

Some patients get a prescription from the doctor. Do an online search about the medicines. Get uncomfortable. Read about certain other opinions from other patient experience, get interested in few other medicines, then go to another doctor, get their opinion, then ask the first doctor whether the second doctor is right, sometimes vice versa, then get confused whether to follow first doctor’s advice or the second, then go to the third doctor and there is again internet search…

Some even go to the extent of testing if the doctor knows about something that patient read on the internet. They would argue to prove the doctor is wrong. But if you beat your doctor in the argument, that does not solve the problem at hand. The problem at hand needing a solution is – your disease. 

For the patient, the one and only thing that matters is – how to get rid of his /her disease and how to get back to health. All the disease research, finding the root cause, theories, assumptions, knowledge of home remedy etc. do not matter. You are not getting a masters degree on that particular disease anyway. Once the disease is gone, you live on enjoying your health.

Do not just wander around your disease, its symptoms, pathology, physiology, microbiology, radiology etc. Concentrate more on – how you can get rid of the disease.
List down what you need to do today to get rid of the disease.

If you have enlisted few home remedies, short list them to 1 or 2 that suits you. Talk with the doctor to see if it helps and then go ahead and follow those home remedies judiciously. Act! 

See, When a baby holds tight on her mother, she completely believes on the love of her mother, that she will not drop the baby. when I sit in a bus, I have to believe in the ability of the bus driver. When a kid is learning to walk, she has to believe in her own strength. When I have friends, I have to believe that they will live up to my expectation and I will live up to their expectation. The belief is the greatest human strength. So, next time when you go to a doctor, have trust in him to follow his advice at least for 7 – 10 days. Even then things are not working out as per plan, then think of plan B.
Related: How to appreciate healing process

I am not asking you not to look for online information. I am only requesting you to concentrate more on the remedy for the disease, than other things. Because, only thing that matters at the end is, whether your disease is cured or not, whether you have done enough to take care of your disease.

Let me give an example: Suppose you have Asthma.

Do not waste time with
Excessive research about what is asthma, its genetic factor contribution, its patho-physiology etc.
Doubting your doctor’s prescription, thinking about changing the medicines / home remedies by yourself without consulting your doctor.
Checking with friends about their opinion on the disease and home remedies.
Consulting two doctors at one time and mixing and matching their prescription.

Do this –
a. Following diet advice:
Enlist the foods that you can take and food to avoid. Check with your doctor.
Take up the foods that you can have, delete the ones that you normally do not use.
With those food items that you normally use, figure out few of the dishes that you can make using those ingredients. Start making those dishes.

b. home remedies
Check with your doctor for home remedies – for example this simple home remedy for asthma
Go buy the herbs required and start off.

C. Lifestyle changes: 
Enlist the lifestyle changes that you need to make – such as getting up early in the morning (find out why it helps in Asthma), quitting smoking, avoiding heavy foods at night etc.
Discuss with your family members and friends. Ask for their help in incorporating these lifestyle changes. Get their support and win.

d. medicines:
Take medicines regularly and strictly.
Concentrate on whether to take before food or after food.
Concentrate on (co-drink – Anupana) whether the kashaya needs water dilution? If so, what is the dilution? and so on.
As far as possible take on the same timings everyday.
Do a search on medicines and make a note of possible side effects. keep them in mind. If you observe any such, contact your doctor.
(In case of asthma), even if there are no signs of improvement after a week’s time, then talk to your doctor.
Bottom line is, concentrate on how to tackle disease and win, rather than worrying about the pathology of disease, its complications, getting advice from your friends, comparing them with doctor’s advice, and so on.