Can choosing a way of thinking based on happiness affect our health and healing? I think it definitely can, although there may also be other factors as well. What does it mean to base your way of thinking on happiness?
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What happened to all my old friends?
Recently I received an e-mail from an old friend, and he caught me up on what had been going on in the lives of our mutual friends from the “good old days,” the days when we were all studying philosophy in grad school. Person after person seemed to have suffered various kinds of illnesses, ranging from chronic pain and discomfort and disability, to surgical rebuilding of joints, to life-threatening (and even fatal) diseases.
When I wrote him back, I felt a little sheepish about telling him how my wife and I, who are in the same age range as all our friends, have been and continue to be in excellent health. We haven’t suffered any severe illness, no hospitalizations, no surgeries, no repair and replacing of joints, no chronic pain or disability. And I wondered why we have had such a different life experience. Could we have had anything to do with this, or was it just the luck of the draw?
And this got me thinking about happiness and healing and health.
Why do some people get sick?
Ultimately, I don’t know why some people get sick and others do not. Or why some people seem to have one huge crisis after another, while others seem to live a more even-keeled and even charmed life. I’m not sure what part we have in choosing the circumstances of our lives. But I do firmly believe that we can determine how we respond to those circumstances. And our response can play either a healing role in our lives, or can exacerbate and prolong our suffering. To take this one step further, our response to the suffering of others can play either a healing role for them or can reinforce their suffering.
A “healing” role implies the disappearance of suffering. Suffering is a quality of experience and not a state of affairs. Healing may or may not include the disappearance of the disease or the injury.
All this may have nothing to do with my friends …
But back to my question: why do I think that my wife and I have had such a different kind of life experience than so many of my friends from my philosophy grad school days?
Before I launch into this, I should hasten to add that my thoughts here might not have anything to do with my old friends and their life experiences. Ultimately I don’t know why one person gets sick, while another remains well. I don’t know what has gone on in their own minds over the intervening years since we all philosophized together into the wee hours of the night. But thinking about all this clarified some important things in my own mind, and I’m sharing them here. I am certainly not blaming anyone for anything. I’m just trying to make sense of life for myself—make sense of it in a way that allows me to be as peaceful and happy as possible, and to contribute to the peace and happiness of others.
What role our beliefs play in healing?
I do think that our beliefs play a major and essential role in opening our minds to a healing transformation of our experience. And I do agree with the Buddha that liberation from suffering is possible, although I realize that doesn’t necessarily mean the end of all sickness and pain.
So what kind of thinking might contribute to the experience of illness and suffering? (Hint: in this case the answer is more subtle than simply “negative thinking,”) And how can we choose beliefs that best contribute to our own healing and happiness and well-being (to whatever extent beliefs can affect these experiences)? See the subsequent posts in this series for one possible answer to these questions. And please share whatever ideas you have as we go. (To be continued ….)
Happiness is a state of mind ...