Chapter 5: Drop Worry and Pick Up Health
A SMALL STORY
(His Divine Holiness Bhagavan Sri Nithyananda Paramashivam has delivered almost 20,000 hours of recorded talks till date. As part of the talks, He shares simple small stories that give powerful cognitive shifts to the listener. Following is one such story.)
When you create more thoughts inside you through worry, the load on the navel region increases. It is from the navel region that thoughts or worries arise. When you create more and more thoughts, you feel the heaviness in your stomach. There is an energy center in the navel area called the manipuraka chakra*. This energy center starts shrinking with the heaviness of worry. This energy center responds directly to worry, and affects the stomach. That is why when you worry about something, your stomach starts becoming uneasy. Or when you hear shocking news you say, 'I can'tdigest it...' Any disturbing news causes your stomach to churn. The stomach is very sensitive to thoughts. You may have observed that those who are very ambitious, and who are perfectionists, will end up with ulcers. Too much perfectionism leads to stomach troubles and ulcers. Such people worry too much. Ulcers are due to continuously suffering with worries.
When worry becomes a habit, it causes many psychosomatic diseases and even cancer. It doesn't affect only certain parts of the body. Worry can affect any part of the body. Psychosomatic diseases don't have any carrier. They happen purely due to the way the mind and body of a person interact. That is why worry needs to be addressed and removed from the system.
There was a doctor famous for his extraordinary and effective treatment of arthritis. He always had a waiting room full of people.
One day an old lady with her back badly bent entered the office, with the aid of a stick. When her turn came, she went into the doctor's room and amazingly, came out within five minutes, walking completely erect, with her head high.
A woman in the waiting room ran to her and said, 'It's a miracle! You walked in bent and now you are walking erect! What did that doctor do?'
The old lady replied, 'He gave me a longer cane.'
Sometimes we are so used to living in a certain way that we can't see a better way to live. Worry is that habit that keeps us from living to our full potential and invites disease into the body. Disease starts in the mind.
Too much perfectionism leads to stomach troubles and ulcers.
There are extreme forms of worry that may become habitual and slow down the functioning of the individual. This form of worry is diagnosed as Generalized Anxiety Disorder, called GAD. It is much
more than the normal anxiety people experience day to day. According to research done by the National Institute of Mental Health in the USA, GAD affects about 6.8 million adult Americans and twice as many women as men. Understanding brings the energy of insight into the flow of time, the laws of the universe, and cause and effect of the many things that happen in the universe. Out of this arises a deep peaceful acceptance and reverence for the universe and its ways. You remain cheerful, come what may. You enter into life with laughter and bliss. A blissful person's life is so rich that there is no space or time for worry.
How meditation helps
Once worry happens, we visit psychiatrists.The cause of worry is in the mind, not outside. Then how will medicine alone help?
A large number of people in the world visit psychiatrists for the treatment of worry. Medication is all right, but for psychosomatic conditions like worry, meditation is also needed.
In places such as war-torn Iran, research groups have studied the *Transcendental Meditation-Sidhi program designed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi*, a 20th century teacher from India. When meditators did the TM Sidhi program in high conflict areas, the crime rates, violence, and anxiety all reduced and the quality of life around them improved dramatically!
Meditation softens you. When you soften, love and gratitude start happening in you. Then slowly, there is no room for worry.
Worry is also a form of violence. It is a subtle form of violence. It is a disguised agitation in the system.
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi - Indian spiritual teacher and promoter of Transcendental Meditation TM.
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