I recently had a wonderful experience with a little physical challenge. I woke up with two small spots on the side of my face. They were about the size of small pimples, and I didn’t think too much about them. They got bigger. So, I must admit, I interfered: I scrubbed them. Then instead of two spots, I had one big inflamed spot. I continued to interfere; I dabbed it with antiseptic. It became more inflamed. My wife gave me an antibiotic cream. I tried it once and had a big gooey mess, and my eye was now beginning to be inflamed, plus I had three spots on my neck, two more on my face, and one over my ear. I decided to become my own patient. I left it alone. I increased my chiropractic checkups to once per day, and my wife Carolyn gave me Reiki treatments every day. I also discussed it at a group, looking for any mental changes that were needed. I changed my mind and attitude about certain aspects of my life. It took about four weeks to get all cleared up, and I still have a slight discoloration of the skin in the area. What made the experience wonderful? My reaction and the reaction of those around me. For example, a patient and I were discussing what I jokingly refer to as my "affliction." "What was it?" He asked. "I don’t know." "You just let it run its course — wow, that takes a lot of faith." "No matter what you do, it takes a lot of faith." Think about it. If you go to a medical doctor, you must have faith in the diagnosis. You then must have faith in the ability of the doctor to give you the right prescription: proper medication and proper dosage. Then you must have faith in the pharmacy to fill the doctor’s order. Then you must have faith in the drug to heal you without making you worse. If you get better, you give the doctor and the medication the credit. If you get worse or fail to get better, you seldom realize that perhaps it was your interference that kept you sick. Where is faith in all this? Do you believe that within you there is an intelligence that keeps you healthy and, when you are sick, gets you well? Most people do, but believe it has limitations. It needs help. How much help does it need? How do we know? Due to publicity and other clever marketing tactics, such as indoctrination of school children in "health" classes, many have lost faith in the remarkable ability of the body to keep us well and to reestablish health when we feel bad. Many now run to doctors for everything and are sure they need some pill, potion, or powder to make them well. Their decisions are based on the idle gossip of their peers, sayings passed down from their parents, and their own personal experience with drugs, not scientific evidence. For example, one day a woman was leaving my office and said that her next stop was to take her grandson to a different medical doctor. She was quite upset because the child had coughed for several days and the (now former) doctor said he would be fine. "He needs an antibiotic, and I’m going to a different doctor," she said. The first doctor was probably correct. Antibiotics are not only uncalled for in viral infections, but when prescribed, they help create resistant organisms. However, the woman’s faith was not in the innate intelligence of her grandson, nor in the medical training of the former doctor. Her faith was in her own, albeit limited, experience in diagnoses and treatment of disease, and she was going to find a doctor who agreed with her. It was extremely interesting to listen to people tell me that I should run to a physician and find out "what it is." "Don’t wait too long, your eye looks pretty bad." "You don’t want to go blind." Many seemed to think I was being silly. All seemed to forget that I have been trained in anatomy, physiology, and diagnosis. There seemed to be this feeling that chiropractic was okay if you had a bad back, but if you were sick, you’d better get some drugs. I got the impression that they believed that I had never been sick, had never seen sickness, and didn’t know what to do. It was a reasonable conclusion. I am rarely symptomatic. However, when a teenager on the farm, I saw cattle go blind with "pinkeye" in spite of treatment. I have a patient right now who was diagnosed with an infection that no treatment helped in spite of her having seen the "best" physician in the Northwest. The patient finally had a cornea transplant. I saw my sister-in-law’s eye swell shut when she used an antibiotic cream to which she was allergic. No, it wasn’t ignorance that kept me away from the medical doctor; it was knowledge. When should one seek medical help? It is a tough question. Certainly, there are times when the desirability of medicine and surgery seem obvious: bones set, bleeding stopped, bullets removed, etc. However, it is the times when we refuse to use medication that strengthen faith. I have seen many patients get well from unknown infections and recover from inaccurate diagnoses. In fact, as a child, I had mumps, measles, chicken pox, flu, and colds, and never saw a medical doctor. Seeing what the body does without intervention strengthens my faith. Often, medical treatment is not about fighting infections or helping innate intelligence, but actually fighting the body’s natural healing process. From a chiropractic viewpoint, I was never sick — I never needed an adjustment — and the process ran a natural course. For example, inflammation is defined as swelling, redness, heat, and pain. The side of my face was inflamed. However, swelling and redness are indicators of increased blood flow. In fact, I could see the swollen blood vessels in my eye. Remember: inflammation is not the same as infection. The inflamed area was much broader than the focalized areas, which were oozing a slightly colored fluid. The increased blood flow brings more white blood cells to the area. The white blood cells are part of the body’s natural immune response, so I had a wide area being walled off by fluid filled with white blood cells. The wide area of inflammation trapped and focalized the problem. Ice or a steroid cream might have reduced the inflammation and made the area look and feel better, but would reduced inflammation have been as effective in trapping and focalizing the problem? Who decides? The medical doctor? Me? Or my own innate intelligence? In this case, the body seemed to be working perfectly well without medical intervention. However, if I had chosen ice, steroids, antibiotics, etc. I hope I would still have had the good sense not to substitute the medical approach for those steps I did take. If I had, I would not have received the real blessing of the condition. I mentioned getting daily chiropractic checkups. Yes, I do have a few tests that I believe indicate whether patients need a chiropractic adjustment. However, it is not the adjustment that gets sick people well; it is their own life, innate intelligence, nature, or whatever you choose to call it. Although I was checked daily, I never needed a chiropractic adjustment. I received daily Reiki treatments. Although the chiropractic tests indicated that no chiropractic adjustment was necessary, the tests improved after Reiki treatments. It only makes sense to me that if my nervous system is clear from a chiropractic standpoint, then improving my vibration with Reiki helps the cells resonate to the signals of innate intelligence. I changed my mental outlook. The role of the mind in disease is constantly under study, and cannot be dismissed. Is it possible that my affliction was merely a warning signal, a sign to be heeded, a physical message from my own innate intelligence? I took no chances. Although it was proven that a diagnosis wasn’t necessary for me to get well, some still want to know, "What was it?" I reply, "I don’t know, but it was the worst case of whatever the hell it was I have ever had." In conclusion, my faith is in my own innate intelligence. I have now recovered, and my faith is stronger. My body is vibrating differently due to a changed mental outlook and daily Reiki treatments. Those who know me got to see what innate intelligence can do without medical intervention. It truly was a wonderful experience. Robert Clyde Affolter is an author, businessman, chiropractor, inventor, and speaker. His book, Moments of Wisdom: A Guide to Self-Counseling, is now available at <http://barnesandnoble.com/>, <http://www.amazon.com/>, and <http://borders.com/>. For more information on reaching your potential through books, chiropractic, and metaphysical medicine visit <http://innatefoundation.com/>. |