5.Holistic Health and Healing.

Holistic Health and Healing – Dr.Bhushan Sood

Let me first express my heartfelt gratitude to the organizers, Mr.Suman K Sood and Mr.Chetan Sood to have given me this opportunity to reach this section of my community whom I always miss and cherish my childhood memories that are connected to India, Hoshiarpur in particular.

I graduated in Science, Dentistry and having practiced Dentistry for over two decades, my pursuit to explore more continued. The pharmaceutical industry is researching on regular basis and bringing in new products, discarding the old ones on the ground that some side effects or bad results were found after having marketed that old drug for some years. A particular drug may be allergic to one in ten patients or cause loose motions etc. Same goes with the Dental materials; Amalgam to be replaced with non-mercury products, resins to be replaced with first, second or third generation composites with better bonding capacities. Crowns, bridges and now the implants and so on..

I was directed to natural ways of maintaining the body through Pranayam, Kriya and yoga Asana or postures. These are wonderful processes to detoxify the body. Astrology gives further clarity..events are guided , controlled and predestined. Astro remedies can help in easing out the malefic effects of the “graha” planets. My interest in Energy medicine intensified and as a result, I certified myself in that in order to practice and help the community. Now what I thought of “me or I” got further classified into -Mind-Body-Soul-Senses etc. Mind seems to be over powering rest of the segments of “I”.

To understand the mind, I did master’s certifications in Clinical Hypnosis which taught me innumerable tools to guide and keep the mind-body-soul healthy . Thoughts seem to be keeping mind busy and distracting it from normal functioning of looking after the body. The need to meditate and importance to keep the mind in “vertical shaft” was understood. The mind in the “linear shaft” of though patterns carries burden and generate sickness to the mind as well as the body. ‘Root pattern’ is the most significant one which gets created during our early childhood period of one to three years of life..Root pattern carries along some of the karmic pattern of the past lives and needs to be worked upon to wash it off in order to come out of karmic effects and move towards “Nirvana” . So, we all have to anxiously find and move on our way to attain Nirvana-our eternal Home. At this point, knowledge and awareness of presence of Aura, chakras , Ida, Pingla, Sushmina, Kundalini, Union of Kundalini and Shiva- Ardh purusha nari form -takes one up in higher planes of existence. one gets connected and reaches higher realms of the Inner world through meditation. Regression therapy into Time and Space reveals and is indicative of the Higher Spirit world of Angels, Spiritual Masters, Gods ,Goddesses, the Master Supreme-all manifested depending on one’s faith and belief.

Ayurveda is an exceptionally divine health science, invented and written as part of our ancient scriptures of Vedas. It identifies the matter and energy stored in the matter, in plants and rocks. The herbs and their extracts work in the human body in consonance and harmony with the chakras and meridians to enhance immunity and detoxify the body in the most natural way, restoring the health to the highly rejuvenated state. In Samkhya philosophy, there are three major guṇas, trigunas that serve as the fundamental operating principles or ‘tendencies’ of prakṛti (universal nature) which are called: sattva guṇa, rajas guṇa, and tamas guṇa. The three primary gunas are generally accepted to be associated with creation (sattva), destruction/transformation (rajas), and preservation (tamas). The entire creation and its process of evolution is carried out by these three major gunas. Ayurvedas identifies these three primodial universal strands and with the usage of plants, herbs and rocks or their extracts, brings in an individual balance in the individual, depending upon his planetary configuration.

Ayurveda is holistic science, characterized by the belief that the parts of something are intimately interconnected and explicable only by reference to the whole.

Ayurvedic Medicine is characterized by the treatment of the whole person, taking into account mental and social factors, rather than just the symptoms of a disease.

The following shaloka of completion, from Upanishad should be displayed in all the Ayurvedic Healing centres:

ॐ पूर्णमदः पूर्णमिदं Om Purnamadah Purnamidam – mantra from Upanishad. ॐ पूर्णमदः पूर्णमिदं पूर्णात्पुर्णमुदच्यते | पूर्णश्य पूर्णमादाय पूर्णमेवावशिष्यते ॥ ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः ॥

Om Puurnnam-Adah Puurnnam-Idam Puurnnaat-Purnnam-Udacyate
Puurnnashya Puurnnam-Aadaaya Puurnnam-Eva-Avashissyate ||
Om Shaantih Shaantih Shaantih ||

Meaning:
1: Om, That is Full, This also is Full, From Fullness comes that Fullness,
2: Taking Fullness from Fullness, Fullness Indeed Remains.
3: Om Peace, Peace, Peace.

I was doing my residency in Dentistry in one of the prestigious Post Graduate Institutes of India at Chandigarh, popularly known as PGI. I got the first “white-Canadian” patient who had problem with the bridge: 6-8 units of gold crowns. Because of gingival recession, food debris used to lodge in the gap so generated, leading to discomfort, hyperalgesia and halitosis. He was a devotee of ISCKON (International Society of Krishna Consciousness ) and was in full attire of Sudaama, Lord Krishna’s devoted friend, having shaved head except a bunch of long brown hair on the back head covering the occipital region (choti). He radiated bliss around with calm on the face and red blushing cheeks. I was emotionally carried away by his spiritual charm and went all the way out to help him. He was given all the treatment free of charge, equivalent of which could have been few hundred dollars at that time. He complimented me with some small book of ISCKON which I must have kept in my book shelf to have that covered with layers of dust of time, without making an attempt to read. I do not remember the title . It was about Raj yoga, I recollect. He told me that Krishna Consciousness brought the ultimate bliss in his life. At that time, I did not really understand the word “Krishna consciousness”. Now that I have done enough certifications on Spirituality, Hypnosis, PLR (Past Life regression), Life Between Lives and also having read some commentaries on Bhagwat Gita by eminent philosophers and sages like ParamHansa Swami Nithyananda, Sri Sri Ravi Shankra of Art of Living Organization and likewise, I have begun to understand how Krishna consciousness transforms the soul and burns away the karma.

Krishna consciousness talks about distinction amongst body, mind, senses and soul. The soul is integral part of the Supreme, eternal and unaffected by birth and death. It teaches us how to get detached from the illusion of the senses, have a control on mind and body, bringing one to a blissful state “Sachidananda “.

It is worth mentioning the following collection from great sage Adi Shankara: Atma Shatakam From Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia.

The Atma shatkam – Devanāgarī: आत्मषट्कम् ātmaṣaṭkam – is also known as Nirvana Shatkam (Devanāgarī: निर्वाणषट्कम्, Nirvāṇaṣaṭkam), and by other variations of these names. It is a śloka in six stanzas written by the great Ādi Śaṅkara (first Shankaracharya) summarizing the basic teachings of Advaita Vedanta, or the Hindu teachings of non-dualism. It was written around 788-820 CE. He mastered the Vedas by the age of 6. This shows he is a re-incarnation, as Vedas take a whole lifetime to master.

When a young boy of eight (Adi Sankara), while wandering in the Himalayas, seeking to find his Guru, he encountered a sage who asked him, “Who are you?”. The boy answered with these stanzas, which are known as “Nirvana Shatakam” or Atma Shatakam”.

The sage the boy was talking to was Swami Govindpada Acharya, who was, indeed, the teacher he was looking for. These few verses can be of tremendous value to progress in contemplation practices that lead to Self-Realization.

“Nirvana” is complete equanimity, peace, tranquility, freedom and joy. “Atma” is the True Self.

The speaker of the poem is nominally Śiva, but it is generally seen as a statement by a knowing person of identity with Śiva or Brahmān. The speaker lists in the earlier verses what he (or Brahmān) is not. He is not body or mind, nor the things that attach them to each other and to the world, including the intellect, the senses, the practices of life, the occurrences of life such as birth and death. In the last verse he says that he permeates the universe, and that he is consciousness, bliss and the soul, and by implication, the Atman and Brahmān.

manobuddhyahaṃkāra chittāni nāhaṃ

na cha śrotrajihve na cha ghrāṇanetre

na cha vioma bhūmir na tejo na vāyuḥ

chidānandarūpaḥ śhivo’ham śhivo’ham

(Sanskrit:मनोबुद्धयहंकार चित्तानि नाहं, न च श्रोत्रजिव्हे न च घ्राणनेत्रे । न च व्योम भूमिर्न तेजो न वायुः, चिदानन्दरूपः शिवोऽहम् शिवोऽहम् ।। 1 ।। )

na ca praṇasajño na vai paṃcavāyuḥ

na vā saptadhātur na vā paṃcakośaḥ

na vākpāṇipādaṃ na copasthapāyu