It is fortunate that mainstream culture is beginning, at last, to accept some of the wonderful ideas found in traditional methods of healing. This change of heart is hopeful for many reasons. Paramount is the fact that traditional healing offers us something we lack-specifically, a sane perspective on caring for our health. This situation is filled with irony since health care is what we in the West do best. We do it so well that it has become more than just a harmless preoccupation: unfortunately, it has become an unhealthy obsession. Each new day bring an announcement of yet another "major medical breakthrough," another "miracle drug," another "surgical procedure." This seemingly endless tide of medical discoveries is supported by a zealous health-care industry seeking to capitalize on each advance. As a result, health care monopolizes much of our attention and consumes ever more of our resources. Many reasonable people feel that the time has come to take countermeasures and adopt a new health-care model. If we use care and discretion, we may find elements of a more balanced model in the traditional healing systems, which are still relatively intact in the world’s traditional cultures. Some of these ancient systems are geared largely towards healing accidents or sudden illnesses. Others, much like our own system, prepare medications in anticipation of future difficulties. But despite great differences, most ancient traditions have a vital element in common-the willingness to rely on spirit to aid the healing process. The notion of spirit as a health transforming agent is conspicuously absent from modern medical practice. While a few courageous doctors have sought to reinstate prayer, meditation, visualization, and other spiritual practices as aids to healing, the majority, it seems, have neither the training nor the inclination to pursue practices that go beyond the accepted medical paradigm.
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