A Healthy Mind, Lighting the Way to Life Zhu Yingchun, Psychology Clinic, Beijing 306 Hospital In the earliest days of human development, happiness was related to the ability of our bodies to survive and the continuity of our lives, and it was considered to be a good life if people were able to protect themselves from harm and didn’t need to venture into dangerous situations. Throughout the long history of human civilization and culture, humans have developed a strong belief in religion and gods as a result of the uncertainty they feel in their existence. Until recent centuries, science has discovered a large number of agents (bacteria, viruses, and chemicals) that are harmful to human health, and these modern “little ghosts” have given rise to the same fears and superstitions. As a result, our relationship with the natural environment is increasingly positioned as one of mutual hostility. Healthy living depends on our control over the environment. Excessive fear of such invasive forces has led people to avoid all possible sources of pollution and to clean up the environment as much as possible, sometimes to a degree that goes far beyond what is reasonably necessary. This paranoid attitude is becoming more and more common in modern times. However, many of these “enemies” are omnipresent, living in harmony with us, even within us. For example, most cold viruses live for a long time in our throats, so why do we only get colds at certain times? Has it ever occurred to you that the cold is sometimes useful, and that the feeling of helplessness it creates may work in our favor? We know as children that this feeling of helplessness can bring many indirect benefits on our behalf – special attention, excuses not to do housework, not to go to school, not to do our homework. Is it possible that we grow up and still don’t want to let go of the pattern of getting benefits from the cold? Maybe we really need a good night’s rest but can’t ask for it because we feel guilty, and a cold just rationalizes that need? There is no doubt that in the atmosphere of our current times, the helpless receive far more attention and assistance than the able. The notion that we now have to start learning to take responsibility for our own patterns of illness may be difficult, and may explain certain behaviors that have been difficult to understand until now – why do people with obesity continue to overeat? Why do alcoholics continue to enjoy themselves and drink as much as they want when alcohol can ruin people’s lives? Why do patients with coronary heart disease or emphysema continue to smoke incessantly? Although these people prefer to believe that they are helpless victims of these addictions, they still benefit from the symptoms in some way. Perhaps the obesity patient syndrome is trying to fill out the body to avoid intimacy; perhaps the alcoholic continues to crave a drink for fear of facing possible failure, or perhaps the smoker is controlling his emotions for fear that if he reveals his true feelings (anger or passion), he will scare others away. Whatever they need, the body works with the symptoms to allow the disease process to meet their particular needs. So when a person has symptoms, or is diagnosed with a particular illness, there is some meaning behind those symptoms that is yet to be discovered. The body speaks what we are unable or unwilling to express in words. And when we repress our emotions, it creates blockages within the energy principal, and these repressed patterns can also cause illness on other levels of life (physical illness, psychological disorders, inner psychic pain. Environmental coping disorders, etc.). By not running away from fear, a person is able to allow emotions to come out, to face their inner psyche, to stop holding back, to be open to learning, to grow, and to be illuminated on the journey to physical health. By focusing on the psyche, you will grow in the three realms of body, mind and spirit!