Myth 1 Most of us think that we are taking full responsibility for our lives. We tend to measure responsibility in various ways:- for example, house ownership, employment, voluntary work or creating a family. We say that by nature of the fact that "I am a director of my own company", or "I am a father with three children", or "I am a dedicated nurse working long and unsocial hours" – we are being responsible people and therefore taking responsibility for ourselves. This is not true. Being a responsible person and taking full responsibility for ourselves can be two very different things. Doing anything that causes us dis-ease – whatever the reason and whatever the dis-ease – is entirely due to our own inability to take complete responsibility for ourselves. For example the husband and father who spends three hours a day travelling, works long hours and is unable to spend much time with his young family should not wonder that he is soon seeking help for stress or recurring illness. He believes that he has to keep his stressful life up in order to sustain the happiness of the family. And yet because the demands of his job deprive them of much of his emotional support, his company and his friendship, his family loses much of their happiness. They all accept his moods and his stress as inevitable. So, even whilst he may be enjoying the house, the car and the holidays, he is also suffering from the stress of supporting such a big house, such a nice car and such expensive holidays. Believing these items to be integral to the happiness of his family, he is soon living under the illusion that his personal suffering is unavoidable. This conclusion is aided by the family's constant observation of surrounding families in exactly the same situation. As the stress mounts, however, his health problems become more frequent. Instead of paying attention to the ever louder protests from his body or pausing to ask himself or his family what any of them really want, he continues his lifestyle unchanged, in the firm belief that he is doing the best thing for everyone. It is in this simple misunderstanding of the true meaning of responsibility that his dis-ease lies. He is doing what he thinks he ought to be doing without asking himself what he really wants to do. He is behaving as everyone else behaves and not in a way that is in his, or his family's, long term interests. His health can only continue to fail as long as he continues this apparently 'responsible' and very stressful life. Myth 2 We consider dis-ease to be a natural condition of life. When we suffer dis-ease it is a sign to tell us that something deeper than just our physical body is out of harmony with nature. This sign may come in many different forms; it may be like a big red stop light that something major in our lives needs addressing (eg through the vehicle of heart disease, cancer, or pneumonia); or it may be as a small beacon flashing intermittently in the distance in the form of less serious but recurring illness (such as repeated bouts of depression, allergies, indigestion, migraines, or even a proneness to accidents). Although relatively minor now, if the cause is left undealt with, more serious dis-ease will inevitably follow. Dis-ease is neither random nor inevitable. We are not meant to live any part of our lives in this unnatural state. The reason we do is purely because our internal guidance system is trying to get a message to us about our lives and sometimes the only way it can do this is to resort to physical distress. Dis-ease means that something in our life is, or has been out of harmony with our true needs. Myth 3 We believe that other people cure us. They don't. No doctor, therapist, healer or any other form of helper has ever truly cured anyone – other possibly than themselves. The only person who can fully heal us is ourself. This is not to say that a visit to a doctor or healer can not be beneficial; but it is to say that such outside intervention can only ever be a tool that we use along the way to self-healing. We need to erase the belief that a visit to the doctor means that we are taking responsibility for our health. It is not fair on the medical profession and it is not fair on us. All we do by going for medical help before investigating the possibility that maybe we can do something to correct the imbalance ourselves, is hand the responsibility to the doctor. We say to ourselves "I'm alright now, the doctor's given me a prescription or a referral or an injection." And in that same moment we have handed over our responsibility to get better to someone else. We have not stopped to consider where the imbalance may have come from or what we could do to correct it and consequently our own power to heal from within has been thwarted. It is true that doctors can prescribe drugs to halt infection, or they can cut out parts of the body where dis-ease has run amok. But this is not cure. In terms of dis-ease this is little more than a delaying tactic. Advocates of modern medicine may point to the people who, following medical treatment, have gone on to lead long and happy lives. Some may claim these people as 'medical' successes. We would disagree. We would state that these people brought about their own eventual happiness, their own eventual good health. How? – by consciously (or in some cases subconsciously) making the changes in their lives that have addressed the original causes of the dis-ease. The medical intervention may have 'kick-started' this process but it is the individuals concerned who then accepted the lead and, either knowingly or unknowingly, addressed the very elements in their lives that were causing the problem. Medicine was no more and no less than a tool that they used to their own best advantage. Myth 4 Illness is quite often due to bad luck. Having accepted that maybe we are guilty of shifting responsibility to our doctor rather too readily, it is then our tendency to look for someone or something else to blame for the fact that we have become dis-eased at all. How many times have we all talked about bad luck in relation to illness? How often do we find people consoling us on our run of bad luck with colds or injuries? Somehow blaming our condition on bad luck seems to make it more acceptable and also brings the sympathy that we think will help us to feel better. There is no such thing as bad luck. It is not due to bad luck that the woman who has had every cancerous cell medically removed from her body goes on to develop cancer again; it is not due to bad luck that the young child whose ear infection has been suppressed with antibiotics goes on to suffer repeated bouts of ear trouble. We tend to interpret these events, quite understandably, as bad luck because it absolves us of any responsibility for these unwanted conditions. It is this belief that we need to change if we are to progress further. Whatever our state of dis-ease, whether work- induced stress, medical side effects or any other form of illness or unhappiness, we have to accept that we have acted as the creators of that state. We have chosen our work, we have chosen our relationships, we have chosen every aspect of our lives as they exist at present. We have therefore also chosen whatever mental and physical symptoms that these aspects of life have brought into existence. Bad luck has played no part in this process. Myth 5 We are not responsible for the bad things that happen to us – we are only responsible for the good things. However honest we may think we are with ourselves, accepting that we are entirely responsible for the bad or unwanted things that happen to us is a very difficult notion to come to terms with. As children we have not been taught to accept total responsibility for everything that enters our lives, and nor were our parents or even their parents. There is no blame to attach to anyone for this misguided belief system. All we need to do is to recognise that we have been brought up in a society where blaming someone for something is the norm. We may for instance blame doctors for the side effects of particular treatments or for their failure to stop serious conditions from recurring. But it is not our doctor's fault that he/she will only be dealing with the symptoms, not causes. We must remember that it has been our want of a cure, our need for a quick fix in order to get back to whatever we are doing, our desire for a name for what ails us that has led to the proliferation of unnatural and unnecessary medical treatments that are practised all over the world today. The side effects and lack of long term cures are products of our own desire to shift responsibility onto somebody else's shoulders. This is just one example of how we tend to blame other people for the bad things that enter our lives. The following chapters and case studies will indicate further how these myths play such a central role in our life. It is in the recognition that these beliefs are erroneous that our real strength lies. Many of us may find it hard accepting the truth, but the truth it is and it will lead us to a much more harmonious relationship with everyone and everything in our lives.