dhamiltony2k5 wrote: > Yes. Differently about this thread around suggestion and instruction. > In culture of the group we probably did get some less overt value > things growing up with this and doing this for a few decades. Is an > interesting distinction between taking suggestion and instruction > though in some of what goes on here and how people take it > individually. > > For instance, i was out at meetings around Iowa last month and got > introduced to folks as being from Fairfield. Then the often asked > questions come, variations on: "What is going on in Fairfield?" > > A different pointed Question came this time from someone who is a > staff doctor at one of the in-house psych units in the State. That > person's question was, why do meditators so often refuse to take > medication? > > I thot the question was interesting so i asked the doc, do you tend > to see a dis-proportionate number of people from Fairfield > generally. Yes. A disproportionate number who then refuse > pharmaceutical therapies that would clearly help them, from > Fairfield? Yes, notable. > > In thinking about it i told the doc it might be one) that it was an > original requirement for learning meditation to obstain from the use > of rec drugs etc., that drugs may inhibit the 'subtle' experience of > meditating & therefore, a meditator cultural fear of pharmaceuticals > carrying over to abstaining from the allopathic route. Possibly more > so along with seeing compulsive problems otherwise arrive at the > hospital, then from an early 'suggestion' about taking drugs and > meditating successfully. > > Or possibility two), that possibly the drugs do interfere with > meditative experience for some people and they then decline for that > real reason which they feel is important by their experience. > > One in suggestion and the other in experience. Proly lots of other > things too. > > So it is, > > Because they are many non-toxic ayurvedic substitutes for some of these drugs. And yes some of allopathic drugs can make you sick and throw your meditations as well as your day and work off. Several years ago I had a tooth removed and they gave me Vioxx. That drug (though banned now) went immediately on my "allergies" list. It made me VERY vata. Antibiotics mess me up a bit too and it takes about two weeks to get back into balance. I didn't fill the prescription for vicodin the last oral surgery I had because I didn't get any excessive pain. The big pharmaceutical companies are as corrupt as they come. It is "health" for profit for them. And the list of problems for certain drugs advertised on TV take up half the commercial. Who would want to take anything like that? And most of these are for things that CAN be cured using ayurveda.
Allopathic medicine is good if you break a leg or some other traumatic injury. But some of it is misguided and of course not been around that long where as ayurveda has withstood the test of time. The problem with the latter is that many practitioners are not that experienced and there appears a need (which some Indian practitioners I know talk about) to adapt it to western bodies which don't often work like Indian ones. And I would recommend anyone who wants to use ayurveda as an alternative to allopathic medicine to take some of the weekend workshops often offered around the country (not necessarily by MAPI either).
