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Home >> Wellbeing >> The inherent wisdom of the body

The inherent wisdom of the body

By Sai Priankaa B

“There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy” – Friedrich Nietzsche

For a long time, we’ve believed that the brain is the seat of intelligence and intelligence is centralised. However, recent researches reveal that every cell in our body is inherently intelligent. Meaning, it is not localised in our brains, like we used to believe, but is, in fact, decentralised. It suggests that our body is more than just a vessel of veins and bones. At the core, it is a stream of intelligence—an ebb and flow of energy vibrating at various frequencies. However, turning this limitless supply of intelligence into wisdom is man’s responsibility.

In today’s ‘pop-a-pill’ culture, we do not always acknowledge this wisdom. Neither do we respect the needs of our body in the first place, nor trust our body’s very own healing capacity. To refresh this perspective, Soulveda explores this inherent intelligence as it delves into a few modalities of alternative medicine.

Ayurveda

“The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of star-stuff.” – Carl Sagan.

As beings of this vast cosmos, we can assume that we are guided by an inherent invisible intelligence. Our physical body too functions in a systematic manner like a well-oiled machine. For instance, congenitally, we sleep at night and wake up in the morning. Our pupils dilate when we’re in dark environments and constrict when there is bright light. It is safe to assume that our lives have the influence of cosmic intelligence too.

According to the principles of Ayurveda, the more we become receptive to this cosmic intelligence, the more over a period, we’d notice a river of intelligence flowing within us. That is, we’d realise that we ourselves are the cosmos, and within us are present, all the secrets of the universe. Writes physician Aharya Shunya in the book Ayurveda Lifestyle Wisdom, “Fundamental to Ayurveda is the understanding that the microcosm (in this case, the body) known as the pindanda, is no different from the macrocosm (Nature or the universe) known as Brahmanda. This means that you and the universe are essentially one.”

Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy

“We all share in the cosmic rhythm… For all natural laws are like the rhythm of the strings of the harp.” – Ernesto Cardinal

Our universe exists within a sea of vibrations. And everything in it follows a specific rhythm. Be it the cyclical nature of night and day, or the turn of seasons, everything follows a pattern. Over time, as life evolved amidst this cosmic cadence, its various biological responses too were integrated with diurnal and seasonal cycles.

According to WG Sutherland, the founder of Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy (BCST), our bodies themselves are governed by rhythms. In fact, the whole body contracts and expands to a rhythmic ‘tidal wave’. He, in fact describes five key rhythms in the body—the movement of cranial bones, the vacillation of cerebrospinal fluid, the vibration of central nervous system and the reciprocal tension membranes, and the mobility of the sacrum between the ilia. And this rhythm is not localised but is expressed throughout the human system, and every cell is acutely aware of them, he says. Perhaps, that is why BCST hypothesises that every cell undergoes ‘primary respiration’—they inhale and exhale—in accordance to a greater rhythm—a ‘wider ordering principle’ called the ‘breath of life’.

Medicines administered must consider a person’s complete physiology as well as their overall psyche.

Traditional Chinese Medicine

“The law of yin and yang is the natural order of the universe, the foundation of all things, mother of all changes, the root of life and death.” – The Yellow Emperor

A famous Newtonian physics law goes, “For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” And just as the law states, we live in a world of opposites, a world of duality. We have hot and cold, male and female, energy and matter, positive and negative, so on and so forth. Interestingly, according to Traditional Chinese Medicine, this duality is present right within our bodies as Yin and Yang.

According to an ancient Chinese medicine text, the concept of yin-yang originated from the observation of natural phenomena. Its philosophy eventually extended to our very own physiology. Within us, yin represents matter and yang represents energy. Yin represents our internal organs, blood and body fluids, whereas yang represents muscles and the skin. Yin represents lethargy, a feeling of coldness in the limb. Yang, on the other hand, represents excessive energy and hyperactivity with a feeling of warmness in the limb. Ultimately, according to TCM, when yin and yang are in a state of balance, we feel healthy. But when they are imbalanced, we feel sick and come down with illness.

Interestingly, it is not just our physiology but also illnesses that are represented as yin-yang imbalance. Ancient healers have in fact catalogued different illnesses with a variety of yin-yang nature and patterns of their imbalances. Thanks to them, most clinical diagnoses today are simplified based on yin-yang imbalances, and treatments are administered accordingly.

Homeopathy

“The mind and body are like parallel universes. Anything that happens in the mental universe must leave tracks in the physical one.” – Dr Deepak Chopra

Today, we have medicines for common cold, headache, depression, anxiety, and various other diseases. We treat each of these symptoms separately and do not necessarily interlink them with one another. So, whenever one symptom arises, we arm ourselves with the corresponding medication and strive to supress them. But what if common cold is somehow connected with our level of stress?

Homeopathy works on the principle that no illness—physical or mental—is isolated. For instance, a foot pain need not always translate to a problem in the heel. It could be due to something seemingly unrelated like an emotional block or stress. Going by this logic, homeopathy propounds that there cannot be one universal medicine to treat a specific disease or a symptom. Medicines administered must consider a person’s complete physiology as well as their overall psyche. For it is only by looking at a person holistically, that one can hope to identify the root cause of the disease.

According to homeopathy, symptoms are not what’s wrong with our body. Instead, they are the signs that our body sends when it is trying to ward off an infection or heal itself from stress. In short, the body only creates symptoms such as inflammation, fever, lethargy, mood-swings, etc while attempting to restore itself to a state of inner balance. Therefore, by supressing the very symptoms, we are essentially working against the body and its intelligence.

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