PHILOSOPHY OF HEALTH
“A human being is part of the whole, called by us the “Universe,” a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts, and feelings, as something separated from the rest–a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
(Albert Einstein)
At the MOMO centre, we adhere to a philosophy of health that links well-being to our ability to live effectively within an evolving reality without disturbing the greater, spontaneous patterns of our natural environment.
Modern conventional medicine covers four fields of activity: drugs or chemotherapy, surgery, genetic intervention and nuclear medicine. Its aim is to take control of disease and mortality with the most advanced technology available. Though the results are dramatic, most of these procedures put a high demand on our biological systems and their natural feedback mechanisms. Long-term medication for heart, metabolic and psychiatric conditions, for example, significantly disturbs most of the body’s normal balancing processes. High tech examinations and treatment procedures are extremely invasive, affecting all the subtle aspects of recovery and rebalancing.
Complementary health fields, on the other hand, may restore and maintain our total system with their focus on diet, bio-energetic regeneration, detoxification, and environmental hygiene. However, they are often idealistic and inconsistent, providing a convenient stage for miracle mongers.
At MOMO, we see healing as an unfolding experience sustained by intrinsic forces. Even though we are unique, nothing exists in isolation; we as well as everything inside us are part of ever-changing networks of dynamic interactivity. At the MOMO centre, therefore, we manage all illness, acute or chronic, according to five dynamic, interactive fields:
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Nutrition, which demands a balanced diet and adequate hydration. The catchwords here are balanced and adequate, two natural abilities that are often lost in the chaos of a modern lifestyle. With a well-developed bio-self we eat and drink with a sense of healthy delight to optimally meet our individual needs.
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Rest and relaxation, which restore damaged and disoriented parts of our system. When certain areas have been strained without restoration, all the functions of our body and mind are disrupted, resulting in acute and chronic illness. Our bio-self thrives on rebuilding techniques such as deep muscle relaxation, balanced breathing, imagery and meditation with differential body awareness.
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Mental and physical exercise, which strengthen the balancing and protective systems of the body and mind. This reduces the risk of future damage and premature ageing. We all know that physical exercise improves the prognosis of metabolic and immune related illnesses such as cancer, heart attacks, diabetes, high blood pressure, depression, osteoporosis and obesity. Even so, we often fail to make exercise an essential and conscious aspect of our bio-self. Learning true awareness during exercise not only improves its quality but increases its appeal and our enjoyment of movement. The same is true for cultivating mental abilities in the form of cognitive exercises, training in critical thinking and exercises which improve memory and attention.
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Social interaction and emotional support, which promote a personal identity and affective safety. This is a widely neglected aspect of health in modern life. Research leaves little doubt of the importance of relating to others and being cared for, to sustain health. Sharing our discomforts, dreams and emotional needs with someone trustworthy is crucial for biological well-being. A healthy bio-self will instinctively try to avoid the harsh effects of isolation and loneliness.
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Collective design for existence, which supports a personal, innate belief system. We need to feel a meaningful coherence with the world around us. This will sustain new integration and growth during insecurity and trauma. Religion and intuitive conviction are seldom taken into account in contemporary views about health, but no proper bio-self can secure its existence without a clear image of life in its entirety, including the unknown.
No illness or disease can thus be diagnosed or treated without considering these five fields of natural health. Interestingly these five levels of everyday well being synchronize well with the five functional layers of our biological system’s natural organization as described in bio-analysis. This corroborates our basic philosophy that it is possible to define inner, outer and interactive influences on our system according to a coherent dynamic matrix.