Disease of Modern Society

ISHA FOUNDATION

Cancer is not really an ailment in the standard understanding of what an ailment is. In some way, the cells in our own body are turning against us; it could be stimulated or instigated from outside situations. The number of stimulations or instigations from the outside has considerably increased in these so-called “modern societies,” and there are innumerable reasons why this happens. To look at it in a very fundamental way, it is a bad organization of the five elements – earth, water, fire, wind and space. The way we consume food, drink water, and the type of air that we breathe are affecting our system and forcing it to turn against itself. Genetic factors may set a predisposition, but it is not the actual cause of cancer.

Reversing this trend is not an easy process because society is lunging towards a certain type of lifestyle that is bound to disturb the human system in many different ways. Because of the use of chemicals and preservatives in food substances, and the air and water we have poisoned, the incidence of cancer is only geared to rise. One simple thing we can do is move into more natural atmospheres where we breathe fresh air, drink clean water from nature – not from the bottle – and eat food that is grown from land around us. In the yogic system, it was always said that you must only eat food from land near you, within a walking distance of one day. Today, such a thing is not possible. We are very proud of our apples from New Zealand and Australia, our grapes from China, something else is coming from somewhere else. We are proud of the way we have built our market capabilities. It is wonderful on one level, but it has its consequences.  

Medical science has found many solutions, but it does not matter how many solutions they find, there will be new problems because that is the nature of life. If you try to block something one way, it will find another way and another way. More and more complex forms of cancer will come as we learn to treat it with medication in its existing forms. This is something modern societies have to live with because being modern has become synonymous with being unnatural. If you live naturally, as nature dictates, you are considered archaic. Only if you are completely divorced from the natural process of life are you considered modern. The increase in the number of people being diagnosed with cancer is in part due to more efficient detection. Earlier, many people died without diagnosis. Still, until we change this fundamental idea of modernity, which works against our own well-being, the rise of cancer will continue.

The complex influences happening upon our body is not something one can yet figure out because too many things are happening around us, including the vibrations we have set forth in the form of telecommunications, microwaves and other varieties of transmissions. In Bengaluru, for example, the whole city is buzzing; you cannot hear anything apart from the disastrous traffic. In that region, there used to be millions of sparrows, but most of them have fallen dead due to the radiation effects and electromagnetic fields of mobile phone towers.  Human beings may be a slightly bigger form of life, but do not think the damage has not been done. Certain studies show what kind of damage these reverberations do to the human system.

Our exploration of technology is quite juvenile and childish.  Whatever we can do, we want to do, and only determine the consequences twenty-five years later. Until our science and technology matures into using only what is good for us and rejecting what is not, in spite of all the attraction, and its commercial value, the rise of cancer will continue. I know it is not possible in today’s life to avoid these things; even to read this Spot you are in front of your computer, so you are not only getting my vibes but the computer’s vibes! You can’t help it; it has become a part of life to go through this. But, to whatever extent possible, you can at least keep your areas of sleep and meditation free from these reverberations. It is not a one-hundred percent solution, but if we bring in yogic practices, and lifestyle choices that are more oriented towards our natural existence, we can definitely reduce the percentage of cancer.