Have you even wondered if a Therapy – no matter how wonderful and effective – is enough or there really are some further steps you need to take after your current health problem is, hopefully, ’fixed’?
I assume that you are interested in staying healthy; or you may have a health problem you would like to resolve; or may be you are receiving some sort of a therapy, conventional or complementary. You may have regular therapy sessions; you may be very good with your self-help; you may have preferences for body therapy, talking therapy, or a diet: once something really worked for us we tend to stay loyal to that helpful thing.
When it comes to Natural Health we tend to either prefer ‘traditional’ therapies such as Acupuncture (Massage, Reflexology, Herbal Therapy) or explore fascinating relatively new additions (Colourpuncture falls in this category along with Cranio-Sacral therapy, Metamorphic Technique etc) – and indeed sometimes we combine the two (which is exactly what we do in our Clinic, we do Acupuncture and Colourpuncture, either each on their own or combined within one session).
But no matter the therapy, are you questioning yourself IF or WHEN your preferred therapy is enough and when it is not – after the original problem which brought you to a therapy in the first place is either resolved or successfully managed?
WHO definition of Health
Summarising the WHO definition of health which we covered in detail in What is Health? Four Forgotten Faces we need to be
- physically healthy
- adaptable to everyday stresses
- living out our potential
- be mentally well and socially integrated and
- contribute effectively to the world around us
1/5 healthy
Thinking about WHO health definition it becomes clear that a therapy intervention alone is only going to be enough when the other 4 (adaptability, self actualisation, mental wellbeing and social integration) are either
- already in place or
- you are well on your way of building them.
If this is not the case then a therapy alone is not going to create sustainable health. At best a therapy – conventional or complementary – can help us to reach a stage of ‘an absence of a disease’ and make us 1/5 healthy so to speak.
And yet the idea of ‘health’ being equal to physical health with no pain, injury or disease is somehow our default thinking pattern – with a strong mental health increasingly becoming a close second. But social connections? These are seen as ‘good things in life’ and some self sufficient people truly think that social integration is totally optional. Fulfilling of our potential? This tends to be thought of as ‘Personal Development’ assuming that this is a nice but somewhat ‘extra’. Effective contribution? Yes sure there are ‘lucky’ people for example in creative professions who truly are expressing their talents and gifts contributing in unique ways but is it really sustainable choice for everyone?
And yet if we look at it all from our Soul’s perspective the whole perception of 5 facets of health suddenly starts to feel very different. Our Soul loves experience and it grows and develops its powers, resilience and joys when we engaging actively in what is possible for us on individual level. Our Soul loves full expression and genuine Soul to Soul connections….Suddenly being healthy in a common sense which is an ‘absence of a disease’ simply isn’t enough anymore.
Even our most beautiful therapy, Colourpuncture, sometimes is not enough. Colourpuncture will give you a physical and emotional health, and unlike most therapies it will also give you insight on you life journey and even provides an initial impetus to go in the direction of your dreams, but to take the road is still up to you – unless you are well and truly on your Path already. This is where our Cafe Self, the place where you come to feed our Soul becomes important: here we fill the gaps to answer our own questions on every other aspect of full health.
Holidays for the Soul
You might wonder if there are actually people who ‘have it all’, who really do care about and manage well all the 5 aspects of health. Yes, there are!
I had such patients and I described one of the cases in ‘Holidays for the Soul’. This is just an example but I feel it is really good one as in this case a person acknowledged, cared for and developed a very clearly given talent and timely reacted to minor ‘deviations’ from the Path. True, oftentimes our talents are not as obvious or traditionally glorified such as an able and flexible body of an athlete or clear and powerful operatic singing voice. However, that doesn’t mean we need to give up on recognising and developing them crafting our unique Path, one turn at a time. We might need just some extra time and skills to tap into our talents, that’s all. And our Soul, enriched by experience of discovery and cultivation of our talents will shine no less brighter on its one-off stage.
Steps after a Therapy
So, basically in order to build sustainable health we might need to take further steps. Ideally we need to start on all aspects of health as soon as our physical (or mental) health is past an acute stage and we can take some action. Even just an awareness of the equal weight of 5 facets of health is an important insight to start taking some steps towards addressing it and so it will vastly improve our chances on full recovery, minimise relapses and build up our aspects of our health which we feel might be missing or incomplete.
My questions to you:
- Out of 4 forgotten faces of health (adaptability, self actualisation, mental wellbeing and social integration) which one you feel you struggle with most and so which one would be your next step to develop?
- How can you do it?
- What do you need?
- Who can help you?
Wishing you full health, wellbeing and joy:)
- This is a follow up from ‘What is Health? Four Forgotten Faces’
- Please check out our next post in this series ‘Why INTEGRATIVE therapies are important for sustainable health?’
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