The Iraq war is believed to be over. But another war, another affliction has arisen, strange and enigmatic, – the SARS epidemic. The eyes of the world were focussed on the biological WMDs concealed in Iraq. The media eagerly waited for news. And the news did come. But from quite another quarter. A new biological weapon forged in the vast laboratory of Nature had suddenly sprung up, pushing humanity into their homes with masks and air filters on. The fear and terror meant for the heart of the Iraqi warriors, through display of ‘shock and awe’, had suddenly been deflected to other hearts and in other parts of the globe. While the soldiers were dying in the Middle East, a so-called killer disease was being born in the Far East. Could there is a correlation and if so, how? It is for a future science to examine.
The soldiers fell as disembodied beings, releasing their fear and anguish in the desert storms. The bombs threw their lives suddenly out of their bodies, shattering every pore. But what happened to their fragments of life released and shattered by the strong winds across the plains and the hills? We may never quite know. But we do have an interesting observation made nearly a century back by the seer-vision of a Yogi probing the occult mysteries of life, disease and death. The Mother recalled “…there are in the physical atmosphere, the earth -atmosphere, numerous small entities which you do not see, for your sight is too limited, but which move about in your atmosphere. Some of them are quite nice, others very wicked. Generally these little beings – they pullulate – and these form quite an unpleasant mass…
…And then if there is a group of such small entities, they may clash with one another, because among themselves they do not have a very peaceful life: clashing with one another, fighting, destroying demolishing each other. And that is the origin of microbes. They are forces of disintegration. But they continue to be alive even in their divided forms and this is the origin of germs and microbes. Therefore most microbes have behind them a bad will and that is what makes them so dangerous…”
The Mother goes on to recount her experience of the flu epidemic in Japan soon after the first Great war in Jan 1919. She recounts her encounter with such disembodied beings who fed upon the vital forces (life energy) of human beings to continue their disembodied existence as long as they could. The disintegration of vital forces consequent to the bombardment and the illness created an atmosphere where people fell ill. Could a similar process be happening now?
A few decades back, when science was preoccupied with simple linear cause-effects correlations, limiting itself to the physical dimension alone and within narrow sections of Time and Space, we could laugh at the proposition as mere superstition. But have we not grown wiser? Do we not speak of non-linearity, of many Time-Space dimensions inter-penetrating and interacting upon each other, of chaos theory and a quantum linkage of each element to the whole, of morphogenetic resonance? The improbables of yesterday are today’s probables! And the probables of today are the basis for a possible future science! The origin of microbes is one among the many secrets whose mystery baffles us until today. And in unravelling this knot lies an understanding of how the force of life precipitates itself into concrete and sensible (sensible to the limited human sight, but through microscopes of course) forms of living beings.
The Solution lies Within
If the origin of microbes lies beyond the physical then the remedy, the true remedy must also be found in the domains beyond the physical dimension too. The solution must be found where the problem lies, at its very roots. Only then can we uproot the tree of illness. So far we are merely playing at cutting the shoots and branches. And have we not played enough? We contain one microbe and another springs up. We eliminate one infection with painstaking effort and another comes up to replace it even before we have rejoiced at our victory! We have to see what nurtures the germ, study the soil and climate of our nature, that makes one succumb and the other immune to the attack. We have to unmask the physical sheath of man and microbe and see what force and will supports each. In other words, we have to discover ways and means of strengthening the vital force in us and thereby learn to thwart and resist every attack, whether SARS or some other.
Here again, we find a meeting point between the ancient science of yoga and the modern science of psychosomatics. Both have discovered that the elements that support and nurture an illness, including infection, lie within our own psychology. These are fear, anxiety and depression. Have we not noticed that negative thoughts, under anxiety, depressive feelings often accompany the attack of those microbes that delay our recovery! Post-viral depression is not an unknown entity. If so, then aren’t we assisting the microbe by creating fear and panic in the people’s minds when we only highlight the deaths and only passingly mention the recoveries? If one man can recover from SARS, why can’t everyone else? This is the question we have to ask rather than the question that if few men have died of SARS others may too?
This does not mean lack of vigilance or preventive measures. It also does not mean selective information. It simply means true and full information. It also means to look at the positive side, the side of hope and show it to those who blinded by fear are unable to see it. It also means applying a true preventive and holistic cure. What we are doing now is cancelling our own efforts in finding a physical cure by a self-defeating will, gloom and fear in our psychological being. We have become our own enemies.
For a True Prevention and Cure
On the other hand, both yogic science and psychosomatic sciences believe in their own way that the vital force can be strengthened. Our protective psychological envelope can be reinforced. The will in our mind and the power of faith in our hearts can substitute a weakened life force and subjugated physical will thereby repelling the illness away from us. A steady physical culture and certain yogic exercises, when combined with faith in the Divine Grace, can even awaken the body’s own healing power to such an extent as to make us immune even in the midst of an epidemic. A state of peace, trust and cheerfulness is a far better inoculation and antidote than several milligrams of injections fighting the germ at the pure physical level. Here too, the yogic vision can assist us.
“…One may try ordinary means and sometimes that succeeds. It is usually when the body is convinced that it has been given the conditions under which it must be all right, it takes the resolution that it must be all right and it is cured. But if your body has not the will, the resolution to get cured, you may try whatever you like, it won’t be cured….
…So there are two things you have to do when you have discovered the disorder, big or small the disharmony… So the first thing to do is to quieten oneself, bring peace, calm, relaxation, with a total confidence, in this little corner… Then you have to add something; you must add the force of spiritual purification which is such an absolutely perfectly constructive force that nothing that’s in the least destructive can survive there… For no force of disintegration can survive within this Force; therefore disintegration disappears and with it that also disappears…. And with that not only is the illness cured, but all possibility of its return is also eliminated.”
The Mother goes on to teach us the science of subtle prevention: “To whatever cause an illness may be due, material or mental, external or internal, it must, before it can affect the physical body, touch another layer of the being that surrounds and protects it…. All communications with the exterior world are made through this medium, and it is this that must be invaded and penetrated first before the body can be affected. If this envelope is absolutely strong and intact, you can go into places infested with the worst of diseases, even plague and cholera, and remain quite immune…. This body is built up, on the one side, of a material basis, but rather of material conditions than of physical matter, on the other, of the vibrations of our psychological states. Peace and equanimity and confidence, faith in health, undisturbed repose and cheerfulness and bright gladness constitute this element in it and give it strength and substance…. A bad suggestion acts very strongly upon it; a good suggestion operates in the contrary sense with the same force. Depression and discouragement have a very adverse effect; they cut out holes in it, as it were, in its very stuff, render it weak and unceasing and open to hostile attacks an easy passage.”
We must fight SARS. But the fight against the paramyxovirus must be conducted as much within as without; as much through inner means as outer ones. For the SARS virus is neither the first nor the last in the chain of human maladies. We may conquer it today by outer means, as indeed we will, but sooner or later another one will spring a new surprise on us. To fight fear and depression is the real and permanent remedy. And the tools to fight these are also given within us. They are faith, peace, cheerfulness and that unvarying trust in the Divine Grace which is the final solution to every problem of human existence.
