When hunting, men saw animals eat the rotted flesh of dead animals without ill- effects, in fact, many animals seemed to thrive on such food, yet, when men ate rotten food, he usually became ill. It seemed, they reasoned, that the spirits and forces acting against man did not always affect scavenger birds and animals. People could eat the same flesh when it was fresh, but if rotted, man’s evil spirits attached themselves to the flesh …and then to those who ate the flesh. Man, it seems, was slowly learning to recognize and avoid certain plant and animal foods …and conditions in life as not being good or nourishing, maybe as he thought, “because the food and conditions contained bad spirits or evil forces”, …but “civilized” people today do not seem to make direct associations between personal attitudes and actions and the consequences of those feelings and behaviors, …probably because all people are not affected in the same way, while bad spirits and evil forces seemed to act against everyone equally. Today’s patients and physicians are seeking a fundamental “common cause”, evil spirit, or unwholesome force for each disease and illness …which they mistakenly believe must be common to the ailment …not to the infinite variety of individuals with a single disease, …unless of course there is a common cause in each patient’s DNA or pattern of genes which makes some evil spirits or forces deadly for one person and not for another.
People today still believe that unpleasant•undesirable foods and conditions indicate the presence of bad energies, while agreeable matters indicate the presence of nourishing substances and fine energies, …the problem is that all unpleasant matters are not bad …and all pleasing and enjoyable matters cannot be relied upon to be nourishing and satisfying. It seems that the world today is a very different place for each person than it was for ancient people …and no reliable commonality of threat or goodness can be discovered or relied upon. Demons and forces are different for everyone!
While some ancient medical concoctions, herbal remedies, and physical treatments were somewhat effective, most were completely worthless. It appears that early medications and treatments were effective more because people believed in them than because they offered an effective cure. In the same way today, many useless therapies appear to be beneficial only because the patient believes in them, …this is the “placebo effect”. Or maybe belief is more-effective than treatments and medications, for there are many examples of cures and remissions which can only be attributed to the patient’s change of beliefs, attitudes, and way of life. The commonality of diseases and healings seem to be patients’ beliefs, either in themselves or the treatment, which are strong enough to support their changing from illness-believing•living to believing in and living their enriching wellbeing as they truly desire.
No matter how carefully you look at body ailments, you will never find a commonality of causes …or actions of evil spirits or bad forces; no uniformity of symptoms …or effects of pathogens; no dependably effective treatment for driving out “causative forces or agents”; and certainly no consistency of recovery. Can it be that life is completely arbitrary? …or consistent with, completely supportive of, and a full revelation of each person’s self and life?
Medical science declares that if certain bacteria are always found within the body of an afflicted person …and the bacteria always precede the infection, then it is reasonable to assume that the bacteria causes the sickness, …is this different than the medicine man always discovering evil spirits? Yet many people carry the bacteria~or the evil spirit~without being sick. Why? And though many individuals get well following a particular medication or therapy, it does not follow that they recovered because of the therapeutic measures applied, for it is just as reasonable to assume they would have improved without those treatments …as frequently occurs. What could have destroyed the bacteria, evil forces, or bad spirits ...or driven them away?
If you feel better or get well after a massage, is it at all reasonable to assume that the massage created the change? Think again! …for even though modern medical and physical treatments and medications have been shown by scientific tests to be effective, this does not mean they “caused” the cure, just as a massage frequently does not relieve the pain or trauma.
Just as the medicine man used physical activity and baths, the application of hot coals and dunking in cold streams, and frequently tried to manipulate or pound evil spirits out of the body, physical treatments today~aka physiotherapy~use exercise, baths, the application of hot and cold packs, and body massage as treatments and remedies, …but are these rubbings, handlings, and treatments really different than the ancient actions to drive evil spirits out of the joints, muscles, and fleshy tissues where it seemed they most-desired to reside in a patient’s body? Even the ancient practice of leeching and bloodletting …or getting bad blood and impurities~like evil forces~out of the body is still practiced today, …though this treatment is obviously not as common or extreme as it was.
What do you suppose would happen today if we follow the old custom of requiring healers to keep their patients healthy …and pay them only when they succeed in that task …or suffer the penalty if they fail? It was not a matter of driving demons out …it was one of keeping them out. Following this pattern, the focus of Asava Massage is to strengthen patients and endow them with the awareful empowerment and freedom to live as they truly desire without, as we might say, letting evil spirits/bad forces/judgments into their body and life! Asava Massage is a new and different approach to medical treatment, …yet, at the same time, it is a return to the old practice of keeping patients’ mindfully embodied self~mind-body~and life fully empowered, fault-free to serve as they truly desire.
Medicine men viewed cuts, wounds, and broken bones differently than internal diseases or illnesses or misfunctions, for physical hurts were quite obvious …and the area and problems needing attention were easily identifiable, while diseases were mysterious, unseen, and generally unknown. It was not until 500 BCE, during the great philosopher/physician-era of Aristotle, Socrates, Plato, and Parmenides that the main focus of most healing treatments turned, somewhat, from spiritual actions and exorcising demons and evil spirits to dealing directly with the physical body.
In ancient yet somewhat enlightened Greece of this period, hospitals or treatment centers were Sanatoria, which were stone temples with beautiful courtyards, cooling shade trees, and great fountains …all of which were intended to provide a pleasant, soothing atmosphere in which healing could take place, …in other words, the Greeks were beginning to focus upon and respond to patients’ mental-emotional/physical/life needs and desires instead of only driving sickness and evil spirits out, …or maybe they were creating a desirable internal and external environment for “good spirits” to happily reside in. In either case, medical treatments were changing to empower patients to deal, somewhat, with their own problems.
During this period, most people wanted their pains and illnesses attended to and relieved directly …and would not accept the philosophizing or sermonizing that their illnesses occurred because of evil causes, ill-winds, improper or unbalanced humors, being in disharmony with good spirits and strong life-forces, not living a righteous or moral life, or that their internal organs and fluids were too wet or dry …or too hot or cold; …though, in this regard, Aristotle speculated that the brain was actually a radiator for maintaining a proper body temperature and internal environment. He also proposed that the heart heated the blood and added “vital spirits” …and the lungs cooled the blood, …while others taught that the vascular system carried life-giving air to every part of the body. While these functions were not exactly correct, these theories helped move the focus of medical care away from demons and outer causes and treatments to directly repairing or relieving individual body malfunctions. Healers were beginning to see a direct relationship between individuals’ lives, their illnesses, and their recovery …or continuation of their problems and ailments.
Disease and healing were beginning to separate from superstition, religion, and spirituality …and move toward individual physical and personal functions and misfunctions. This was also the time of Hippocrates (460-370 ACE), “the father of modern medicine” …who taught his physicians to ask questions of patients about their sleeping habits and conditions, the directions of prevailing winds at night, their previous illnesses and family medical history, their job and working situations, their eating habits, and what diseases they may have been exposed to, …and only then did his physicians fully examine patients …not merely the area of complaint. From this procedure, his physicians were accumulating a rather complete medical and personal history of each patient before proceeding with a treatment …or course of curative medications and therapies. Many healers and therapists, ignoring this vital step today …or not knowing what patient-information to gather …and what it might mean, blindly treat their patients, …and if some minor relief or change is observed, consider their practices effective and well-performed. Don’t you believe it!
Does your massage therapist …or do you as a massage therapist gather a clear understanding of patients before proceeding with a massage or other treatment? If not, no matter how much you may know about anatomy and body functions, you are likely to treat the wrong ailment or exacerbate the problem …even if a muscle is relaxed or a pain is relieved, …if only because patients, believing that pains and tensions can be eased, are likely to return to “life as usual” …and struggle even harder to control life and situations …and gain or possess what they want; …and they are likely to continue in these ways until even more-severe body pains and illnesses occur …and other problems and afflictions take root in their lives. This is not an imaginary example of occurrences, it is the observed path of thinking and actions normally taken by individuals seeking relief without changing their own beliefs and way of life.
Hippocrates correctly knew and taught that the most successful treatment is to build patients’ strength through many means, including diet, hygiene, rest, and lifestyle changes to create the best conditions within which natural healing and restoration can take place. At the time, Hippocrates’ techniques stressing patient history, intervention, and care were in contrast to the, then, popular school of medicine which stressed only detailed study of diseases …which were presumed to act upon the body independent of the patient.
Unfortunately, Hippocrates’ teachings were not continued and built upon, for though, Galen, a physician and writer (c.160), added greatly to the knowledge about the pulse, brain, spinal cord, and nerves, when he demonstrated that arteries carried blood instead of air, many physicians had reasons to continue the practice of drawing off “bad blood” as a supposed beneficial treatment of illness, …and since Galen’s authority was virtually undisputed at the time …and for hundreds of years, this misunderstanding and medical practice formed a primary treatment until the 16th century …and was continued into the 19th century. It seems that old theories and misunderstandings, once accepted by some “authority”, are very difficult to change …simply because individuals following those false beliefs and treatments have a great deal of self-interest and reputation invested in continuing those practices. The idea appears to be that “if the majority of physicians follow these treatments …and believe them to be effective, it cannot be wrong to continue them”, …the only mistake, it seems, is for a physician to apply “an unproven or unaccepted treatment”!
Do you see the error in all of this? The general practice of bleeding was of no actual value …but these “experienced physicians” seeing and experiencing only what they “wanted to believe”~like many healers and therapists today~saw benefits where none really existed, …and, in most instances, the death of patients who did not benefit was blamed on “other causes” …so the physicians could continue their false beliefs~just as witch doctors and medicine men had been doing for centuries~and patients suffered because physicians, healers, and therapists would not truly reconsider the “assumed rightness” of their beliefs and treatments which had prevailed even for centuries. But there were physicians who saw healing in a different light …or you might say by the light of Hippocrates.
One notable example was Doctor Wood Baker …who practiced medicine in London at the end of the 1700’s. Dr. Baker, a man of short sentences, was pithy, sharply focused, direct, and to the point. He was tall and slim, and capable of playing a role or acting a part ...and making people think that his motives were entirely different than what they really were.
Doctor Baker was a very forceful, independent, and challenging individual, but he had a very light touch when it came to medicine, ...and he was very popular with his patients, because he related so well to their thoughts and feelings ...and to each patient's way of life. But he was also a great bluffer, and if he didn't have the knowledge he needed, he could quickly improvise it.
People, coming to be healed by ordinary medicine, were helped by Dr. Baker in unique and unusual ways, but they felt that was all right because their fears and pains and illnesses were relieved, …but his fellow physicians condemned him as a charlatan ...and a hoaxer. They felt he was providing medicines and treatments and advice which offered only temporary relief ...and which, in the long run, were detrimental to his patients. They accused him of harming his patients and undermining the medical profession through corruptive practices ...and they brought him up on charges before a Board of Governing Physicians.
"Well," he replied …in defense of his ideas and treatments, "if what I do is so wrong ...yet the results are right, can you truly say that what I'm doing is wrong? And if my patients are healed, can we not say then that maybe ...just maybe, what I'm doing is right? And if your patients are not healed of their illnesses, can we not declare then ...with some degree of certainty, that what you are doing is wrong?
"There's nothing your patients will not submit to, ...and there's little you've not done to them in the name of easing their pain and discomfort, restoring their energy and health, and even saving their lives. How well have you succeeded? Well, ...let's see.
"You've examined, poked, and prodded them unmercifully. And when that did not succeed, you invaded their bodies and rummaged around inside. You rubbed, squeezed, kneaded, disturbed, and tormented them, ...but seldom did you ever stroke, massage, soothe, or comfort their suffering minds and bodies.
"You've twisted, rotated, and manipulated their limbs without success ...except to irritate and aggravate their ever-worsening condition. They've even allowed themselves to be half drowned, frozen in ice, almost boiled alive, steamed in hot gases, roasted in stifling ovens, buried in mud, and seared and cauterized with red-hot irons, …and if that wasn't enough, they were singed, roasted, toasted, and scorched. They were wantonly cut with dirty knives and pricked with poisonous needles ...all in the name of healthful medicine.
"They have been stretched, drawn out, hung upside-down, and forcefully struck; after which, they were squeezed and crushed, compressed, flattened, and almost smothered to death.
"They've been sensitized, brutalized, and stupefied. They've been dehydrated, rehydrated, then dried out until they shrank. You made them retch, cough-up, excrete, discharge, and void their insides, so you could make them swallow, inhale, or otherwise ingest all sorts of abominable medications and so-called miraculous cures.
"Then they've been dripped, drained, and made to pass-off their blood, sweat, tears, and other body liquids and vital secretions ...either willingly or by way of cuts, drains, or even leeches. Then, ...well, they're made to exhaust, exhale, or otherwise pass gas, vapors, stench, and odors.
"And finally, if that isn't enough of an insult, you make them pay for all of this as if it were a wondrous privilege and a blessing conferred upon them by God..."
Well, ...no doubt about it, the assembled physicians were outraged at Dr. Baker's words ...as well they might be, …and they would not listen any further, for they, not he, were to determine what was right in medicine ...and the way it was to be performed. And, of course, if a patient died, that was the patient's doing ...or undoing, not theirs, …they were administering things correctly. And if Dr. Baker reversed some of life's processes and helped long-suffering patients, it was only because God in His infinite goodness and wisdom had granted them His grace ...and a severance from Dr. Baker's wicked healing practices. They declared that God had looked upon his victims favorably ...for a while, but, truly so, they would surely succumb.
The Board of Physicians declared that it was only God's benevolence and mercy and forgiveness, in essence, which healed his patients, and it had nothing whatsoever to do with Dr. Baker or his “wicked treatments” that they even survived. The Board condemned the "wild and insane" things he was doing. They accused him of dispensing “unproven and ineffective potions; following untrue and untried treatments; and improperly speaking to his patients and giving them hope, and falsely telling them to deal with themselves and their lives”. The Board determined that his practices were "evil". Throughout this trial, Dr. Baker got an even clearer and stronger ...and happier picture of himself and his treatments …which he wrote about to pass on.
Several years ago, a short manuscript of Dr. Baker’s writings came to light, …and we’d like to quote the words he spoke to his patients about their lives and their illnesses.
Since the very beginning, every attitude, every thought and word, every action and reaction, every emotion, and every event and relationship you have ever experienced has been carried in consciousness in your soul; and from that, you have proclaimed your life, your body, your health, and your well being: or illnesses, disorders, and disabilities.
In each lifetime, you, through your everlasting soul's continuing attitudes and experiences, establish the pattern of your life and your physical body, and your soul precisely constructs that body through your inner-design [genes]. Your physical body and well being are patterned by, and you are a confirmation of, all you have ever thought or believed about yourself and others; your body and well being are shaped by your attitudes, emotions, convictions, and everything you have ever done; and they are expressions of all you hope to be. What is your self image? What do you appear to be? What is the essence of your body and your life today?
And as you look at yourself with new understandings and insights, do you regret the past? Are you fearful or disheartened? Is your self portrait encouraging? Everything you have today is because you have sincerely chosen that, and it has been lovingly granted to you by God. And everything you do not have is only because you have not chosen that. Are you happy with your choices and your self image? Do you like what you see; or would you immediately like to change things?
You probably have a tendency to say, “This is not the way I want to be. I'm not worthy enough. Forgive me, dear Lord, I'm sorry. Make me well. Make me better. I want more, for I don't like what I see and know about myself. Change my life. Please Lord, heal me, for I do not want to continue as I am.” Then you come to me~your doctor~and again plead for me to heal you; you want me to ease your pains, comfort you, and change your life, because you are afraid.
Well, if you sincerely want to change, if you want to be different, if you truly desire to be healed and forgiven and live a new life, then you must be careful about your attitudes and the way you say and do things, the way you believe, what you put your faith in, and the way you are. For once things are thought or believed, or spoken, or done, it is too late to change them; too late to release them or heal them. They are yours for ever and they are for ever carried in your soul, and in your body. You cannot erase them, undo them, or pass them off; you cannot go back and give those old events a new start; and you cannot change the past. Those things are with you for ever. God protect and forgive you.
But you can, right now, begin creating anew. You can start over and develop different events and consequences; different thoughts; different attitudes and images; and a different picture of yourself, your body, your well being, and your life with God. You can do things that are much better and finer today, and more desirable for yourself and others. You can be more sincere and concerning, more involving and caring this time, and certainly more loving. You can be more complete, understanding, honest, and compassionate with all individuals and things; with your words and actions in every situation; and with your life and well being today. And you can carry all of that with you into your future.
But, all too often, you still want to heal the past, to change and alter it; you want to correct or relieve or release the images, the feelings, the actions, and the events and relationships you have previously experienced. You have a tendency to do this in most situations and relationships in every part of your life. You believe you can release the past, or be released from the past. You expect me to provide a treatment that heals things...and yourself. You want forgiveness, yet you continue creating the same problems in your life~in the body of your life~and then, little by little, you expect me to cure them. You say of your errors and inappropriate behaviors, “They are minor little things. They are not important. And you hope that by ignoring or changing or healing matters one at a time, everything will be well, you will be forgiven, and all will be better.
But your soul carries these old events clearly within itself exactly as they happened, and they cannot be disposed of or changed or healed. And by constantly being concerned with the past, you continually limit yourself, your well being, and your life today; and you unalterably repeat the same mistakes, or make them worse, and carry them into your future. It is time to concern yourself, your life, your body, and your well being with today's new awarenesses and devotion, goodness, inspiration, faith, and blessings. Leave the past to heal its own wounds and bury its own dead.
To heal yourself today, you must leave the past, learn from your present life, and change your attitudes, words, and actions, your judgements and self images, and your life right now. Give your soul and your body new, greater, more righteously wondrous images and things to carry.
Well, that’s all we have of Dr. Baker’s words to his patients.
