Overwhelm
by Barbara D. Allan
Author of Conquering Arthritis
Sometimes
I receive letters from readers who are hitting a point
of overwhelm. In addition to the pain of arthritis, they
may be experiencing new and scary symptoms, or other health
challenges. On top of this, they write of the difficulties
that everyone faces: a divorce, a lost job, a death in
their family. These difficulties are ones that we all
face.
Any one of these challenges is difficult enough. What
does it take to handle them simultaneously?
Before I share my response to these questions, I invite
you to pause and consider what advice you have to give
to someone in this situation.
What has allowed you to stay calm when your world was
falling apart? How did you cope? What has worked for
your own arthritis? If you have good advice to offer,
please write me. I’d like to share it with others.
Together we can come up with better and more complete
answers than any one of us alone.
The Importance of Hope
When someone writes to me in desperation, my first attention
is always on hope. It doesn't have to be grand or elaborate.
Sometimes what they most need to hear is that, yes,
it is possible to make it through this. Yes, it is possible
to heal.
Since I know many people who have cured their own arthritis,
this part is easy for me. But hope does not depend on
miracle stories to thrive. Hope can be found just by
taking care of ourselves amidst the realities we are
facing. This is summed up beautifully in the often quoted
serenity prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr:
“God grant me the serenity to accept the things
I cannot change; courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.”
Serenity
One of the turning points in my illness, ironically,
was making peace with the fact that I might never get
well.
I thrashed around for a few years first, learning everything
I could about arthritis and desperately trying anything
I thought might work to heal myself. But it wasn’t
until I came to a place of deep acceptance that I freed
up energy for healing and started to get
better. This energy had previously been trapped in desperation
and negative judgments about myself.
I recommend using whatever spiritual path you are drawn
to help develop this serenity. The Buddhist path and
the yogic branch of the Vedic path helped me tremendously
during my arthritis years, but any of the great spiritual
traditions, including Judaism, Christianity, Islam and
many tribal traditions, can help lead you to this type
of deep spiritual healing.
Deep spiritual healing must sometimes happen before
physical healing can make much headway.
Courage
The most effective arthritis treatments in the world
will have no power to help you if you don’t have
the courage to undertake them. In the case of arthritis,
that may mean lifestyle changes including giving up
smoking, changing what you eat, and how you exercise.
It may also include developing a spiritual practice.
Wisdom
Wisdom is dependent upon knowing your options. Seeking
information specific to your own situation is an excellent
first strategy for figuring out what can be changed.
Wisdom also grows out of courage. Wisdom is not some
aerie fairy kind of disembodied knowledge. Only by courageously
undertaking promising treatments will you actually learn
what you can change.
Website Special
Let me guide you through the meditations that were instrumental
in my own healing from arthritis.
Normally my 6 CD guided meditation set designed especially
for people with arthritis sells for $127.
Using the link below you can get it for $87.
http://tinyurl.com/b762y
The intro CD explains everything you need to get started,
even if you have never meditated before.
The other CDs guide you through meditations that can
help you to resolve certain deep seated issues most
people with arthritis need to address before they can
completely heal.
http://tinyurl.com/b762y
To see a picture of the meditation CD set:
http://www.conqueringarthritis.com/download.htm
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