Qi Follows Shen: The Importance of Your Mind in Health & Recovery
(excerpted from his Live Long, Live Strong book)
What you think and how you feel, often carried from past experiences matter when it comes to health especially in cancer recovery.
Consider this quote from the Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Medicine, the oldest book of medicine in the world, that revealed one’s mind’s ability to do harm to health, shorten lifespan and recover from disease:
“Over attachment to the five emotions disturbs the Shen (mind/spirit) and damages the qi (energy), which protects and nourishes the five organs systems. The qi takes command from the shen therefore, when the qi is injured, the body is vulnerable to attacks by the vicious pathogens, yin and yang become out of balance, organs malnourished, disease and even death may ensue soon thereafter.”
In 1980, psychologist Claus Bahnson found that patients with cancer were more likely to have suffered severe personal loss at an early age, and be depressed with strong, persistent feelings of helplessness and hopelessness. It has been concluded that people with a particular personality are much more prone to developing cancers. This personality appears in those who experience prolonged stress and tend to deny and repress their own feelings.
Cardiologists Meyer Friedman and RH Rosenman coined the terms Type A, Type B, and Type C personalities. Type A is someone who exhibits intense emotions outwardly, such as anger, frustration, and impatience. In contrast, a Type B personality is more laid back, relaxed, and tolerant. Type C personality is prone to have difficulty expressing their feelings and have a tendency to suppress or repress emotions they consider negative, inappropriate, or uncomfortable. Research shows Type C’s have a higher lifetime risk of developing cancer.
Several millenniums ago, Chinese medicine mapped out five distinct personality types called Five Element Archetype. Each Element exhibiting positive and negative qualities and traits, as well as health strengths and vulnerabilities, which include certain diseases like cancer. Research suggests that certain personalities create stress, which in turn deteriorates health.
Some cancer survivors concur and report that they believe their personality does increase the stress they feel compared to their peers with different personalities. By understanding who you are, your personality tendencies and quirks, you can work on accentuating your strengths and improving your weaknesses. Thus, you become more capable of coping with changes that often cause stress.
Your perception, beliefs, and faith all fall under what is called Shen in Chinese medicine. Shen looms large in how you ultimately cope with life situations that may cause stress. Obviously, what may be traumatic to one person may not have any effect on another. Your emotional reaction is very much based on your vantage point of a given situation, your judgment of the various pieces based on your beliefs, and your outlook on how it may resolve and conspire to create either a negative or positive emotional reaction in you.
We have witnessed firsthand how our patients have used cancer as an opportunity for change. In other words, these cancer survivors often seized on it to shift course in their own lives, for the better.
In conclusion, your Shen is powerful when you are able to direct your mind away from negativity and instead, choose to accentuate positivity. I invite you or your loved ones to take a short quiz here to find out your Five Element Archetype. Once you figure out your Element Personality Type check out my book, Live Your Ultimate Life (download here ) so that you can begin to explore all the ways to overcome your health vulnerabilities, including susceptibility to cancer and other diseases and assist your recovery from cancer.