By Rachel Mascord BDS (Hons), Dentist, Five Dock, Sydney.
For most of my life health was something that I pursued, thinking that I did not have it, and that if I did have it, my life would be nothing short of amazing and I would be able to sit back and cruise through anything, free from all worry and care.
From the time of being a very little child I was sick, almost all of the time. I had bad croup as a baby that developed into very bad asthma as a 4 year old. This caused a lot of alarm in my family. My mother wanted so much for me to be healthy, that health started to feel like that elusive pot of gold at the end of the rainbow – a prize somehow beyond reach.
What did I think health was? What did I imagine it would bring me? Somewhere along the way I had developed a sense that it meant I would be very robust and tough, able to withstand anything that life threw at me – a sort of Superwoman-like capacity to handle life and its physical challenges.
As I got older and able to fund my own pursuit of that elusive health notion, I entered a rambling journey that had me engaging with many and various doctors, and when that failed, through the strange world of alternative therapists. I ate bizarre foods, juiced undrinkable concoctions, grew my own wheat grass and supplemented myself, took on eccentric practices…yet health eluded me and I became sicker and sicker. In my version of what health was, my body became my enemy, a dysfunctional mass of tissues, deeply flawed and wrong at its most fundamental level. In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.
In 2007 I came across the work of Serge Benhayon, and the school Universal Medicine. Battle weary and with the body carrying the scars of a hundred alternative pursuits and the deep wounds of self loathing, I listened to the words of Serge Benhayon, and it was as though a light, long forgotten, ignited inside of me.
Over the years the teachings of this man started to break down the ideal of health that I had constructed – the mass of lies that had kept me running anxiously in an endless round of pursuits; a mouse, exhausted on a wheel that takes it nowhere, no matter how hard it runs. And more than the teachings that he delivered in word, were the teachings he delivered through the way he lived, the way he moved, the relationships he had with other people, the way he put on gloves and warm scarf in cool weather with such tenderness and such a deep level of care for himself…and the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that.
The other aspect of Serge that inspired and continues to inspire me is his capacity for service to humanity, the like of which is beyond anything I have ever seen in another human being. What I started to feel was the quality of a life lived from the innermost essence – its beauty, grace and absolute commitment.
Is that the meaning of health, I started to wonder? Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?
This is something I have started to explore for myself, and gosh has it been a slow process to scrub away the notion of physical perfection that I believed health to be. But how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is? To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living. This new understanding of health has called for a far greater level of awareness and care and far greater acceptance of how I am feeling, free from judgment and the aspiration to a “greater” state. My sicknesses have become a blessing, not to be judged, eliminated so that I can just get on with it, or indulged for attention. I go to the doctor, get the tests that are needed and take the necessary medications or have the procedures carried out as needed. But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.
So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?
My life is the exploration of this possibility, no more a mouse on a wheel, but a human being willing to look within, to the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon – the day I came home.
Medicine and Serge Benhayon 
“But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” To me this highlights how the behaviours and roles we take on are linked to ill health, as in this we override what we know is true for ourselves, and separate from the essence of who we are.
Rachel I hear you, ‘what is true health?’ Many of us have this construct of what it looks like often influenced by other people, TV or the media. And if anything, it takes us the other way. We push our bodies to the extreme, make it do things, or eat and drink things that we wouldn’t consider giving to our babies or young children – so why are we different then?
What is beautiful to read is that you have found another way, another way to be, live and that is through a man (it could have been someone else too), who merely presented that there is another way. Much more loving and nurturing and when we apply this, our bodies love it, I love the simplicity of this.
‘…how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is?’ Yes Rachel and listening to the messages of our body as they come, makes our communication with it easy, which sensibly increases the possibility of healing.
That notion of chasing after health is so relatable, trying to be ailment/pain free and while I am at it hating myself for not being good enough. It feels like before health can physically manifest itself, it needs to be in our relationship with ourselves first. When we can accept and start enjoying being who we are, we get a step closer to being healthy.
Fumiyo, there is another part to our true health and wellbeing and the aspect that disease and illnesses are part of our vitality that leads us to our true health. It is the mere cleaning of stuff that we have shoved away, not wanting to face or deal with it, that needs closure too. It is part of the decluttering of the body, so we can create space for what is essential when serving from our bodies.
“I listened to the words of Serge Benhayon, and it was as though a light, long forgotten, ignited inside of me.” So true, and listening to the words of Serge Benhayon today more sparks are ignited.
There is a prevailing and false belief that the way to stay healthy is to build a body of iron. People get high pumping their bodies hard with weights and participating in arduous fitness feats, rather than simply nurturing it with loving tender care.
Most people believe being healthy means an absence of illness. Few understand true health to be a quality we live and experience in our bodies connected to our inner-most. When we accept low levels of energy and absence of any joy in their lives as normal, we have given up and settled for less. And yet we all have the potential to be so much by turning our attention inwards, start to love and care for ourselves, rather than outwards trying to be all things to all men.
“In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.” It is interesting because we can’t really pursue health it is something that comes from within. I used to pursue what I perceived health to be but I can remember all the time I was doing it, spending a fortune on vitamins and minerals and looking for practitioners to make me feel healthier and better in myself, I seemed to be less vital and healthy than my friends that were just getting on with their life.
Health is incomplete if we just look at the physical body. We have a being that is love and that love is there to care for ourselves, others, and our communities. When we don’t express that love and live without our love as our primary intelligence it has a big impact on our health. Living with love, true love and not emotional or idealistic love, is to me true health.
I love this Melinda ” When we don’t express that love and live without our love as our primary intelligence it has a big impact on our health. Living with love, true love and not emotional or idealistic love, is to me true health.” Without love in our life we are indeed unhealthy and mostly distressed. Thank you
While I have learned so much from the presentations from Serge Benhayon, I learned equally as much from simply observing him move through life. The way he moves speaks volumes as to the quality of the life he lives, and it doesn’t change from the time he walks onto the stage until he steps off it. It is his consistency and commitment to the health and well-being of humanity that for me, is beyond inspirational.
Serge Benhayon is a master of true movement that honours the body in full with every stride, lift of a finger or movement of an arm. His deep level of care offers us all the opportunity to live from this quality as he constantly reflects..
“And more than the teachings that he delivered in word, were the teachings he delivered through the way he lived, the way he moved, the relationships he had with other people, the way he put on gloves and warm scarf in cool weather with such tenderness and such a deep level of care for himself…and the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that”.
There is vastly better health available than ‘normal’ health and our body may be quite different if we don’t give it the food and emotions that are not harmonious for us.
I have come to view true health as committing to supporting my body to heal past ills and accepting them as reflections of how I have lived in the past always knowing that from now on I am free to make different choices.
Great question Rachel what is true health? It has become a multi million dollar business as we all pursue ultimate health and we think including myself for much of my life thought that it was obtained through fitness pushing my body to the limit and telling myself I was enjoying it too. And now I find that health and vitality come from the connection to my innermost the stillness from within and knowing my true self first, and living in the harmony and natural flow my body offers.
A question which is so far from our perception, our health is constantly deteriorating, and we are accepting less and less as “good health”. So many of us, as young as 20 are suffering from multiple symptoms in our every day, but as long as we don’t have cancer or something big like that, it seems okay and we can continue going the way we are.
How many of us are seeing physical perfection as health, I know I still can fall for that from time to time although I know it is not true and it doesn’t help in discarding what is truly going on in the body when there are aches and pains or illnesses, what you call the signposts, the choices made that led to what ever is going on inside.
“and the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that.” I think that a large part of our health is our ability to be present with ourselves. I tend to absorb everything that goes on around me and get very tired from that. Just knowing we are worth feeling ourselves all the time makes a big difference.
Thank you Rachel for removing the notion of physical perfection from the definition of health. I could feel how strong that ideal was for myself, which would constantly keep me in anxiousness – not a healthy state of being.
For me it was the opposite – I was mostly healthy except for a persistent cold and over time things got very slowly worse until the last 14 years where things have been much better.
What an amazing blog, thank you Rachel. “But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” This line to me explains what’s going on with humanity and the rising rates of illness and disease. Living from our essence, our soul, brings a beauty back to life, and love and tenderness, joy and harmony – no activity or product can fill the gap of living from our soul.
It is very interesting how we try to force our bodies to fit into an ideal or picture of health or what it is to be healthy whilst negating the quality of being and the wellness of that being. Clearly it is a way that is not working for us. The body is an intelligence of its own with access to worlds more than what our minds could ever imagine, and what we have not generally been taught or fostered to learn is that our bodies know precisely what is needed for it to return to a state of homeostasis or harmony with the being, when we are open to listening and honouring what is being communicated. We then are able to live in greater connection to our body and being, our bodies being impulse by our Soulful light, and this exploration of the wonder that we are and are connected to is awe-inspiring to say the least.
It is quite a remarkable experience to go from ‘normal’ levels of health and vitality – the odd thing being wrong and needing coffee and sugar to get through the day – to being healthy and having lots and lots of vitality, which is not a peak feeling but a steady, ongoing experience.
Great blog Rachel, I was pondering on the question what is true health, the simplicity of surrendering to our inner wisdom and living from the inside out.
I was laughing reading your description of seeking health and thinking that was the answer to everything because when I was younger I felt like that about losing weight. I thought if only I was slim I would be loveable and everything would be ok. It turns out it is true because these days I am slim, loved and everything is awesome – but it sort of happened the other way around. I met Serge Benhayon, connected to love, started to love myself, connected to my awesomeness, grew in my love and the excess weight and bloating I was carrying fell away.
That can be hard as there is then a constant tension to be more of who you are and expand while staying within our natural limit, which can also increase.
Vitality may be a good proxy for health – you don’t need perfect physical health for vitality and you could be depleted while in perfect physical health but vitality allows you to live life in full.
A great distinction to make Christopher. Vitality is an inner quality and marker of true health.
‘But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.’ True Rachel, it is the way the body supports us to heal what was lived and not of truth.
‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ Beautifully said Rachel, as a society we have accepted far less than true health, the bar is dropping lower as the quality of our lives and health reduce, humanity needs role models of people living true health to remind us of this, and Serge Benhayon is a perfect example of someone who lives true health in every way, shape and form.
Who would have thought that illness and disease can teach us anything and that it is not necessary to avoid it like the plague – pun intended. My illnesses have and are teaching me all the time about how I am living, what foods I should eat or if I am pushing and doing too much. The body has a way of communicating to us to know how we are doing and today I am off to the dentist, so something to look at there.
It is quite life-changing when you begin to understand that “illness and disease” can teach us so much about ourselves. We have all sorts of lessons as we are growing up but as far as I can remember not one was about how to listen to the messages from my body; how life and our health would change, if we were. To begin to listen to those messages and then act on them, is such an essential ingredient of the recipe for “true health”
And when we do break down those ideals, those beliefs that we have we can actually start to tune in feel what is there to be felt… And this is when we can start to actually heal
How we move certainly has an impact on our health, and the more we allow ourselves to be aware of our movements and the quality we bring to them the more we can change our former disregard, which we might not even have noticed before.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” – this is so profound, and would totally change the meaning of life for many, and we actually do know living contracted and holding back the truth of who we truly are is a dis-ease in itself.
So often when it comes to health we can look to just what’s around us, that tells us what is or isn’t good for us; the latest diet, exercise regime, yoga or meditation technique, but what if the greatest indicator we have for what is and isn’t healthy for us is our own body and so instead of only seeking outside of ourself there is a wisdom within us we can re-connect with that helps us to discern what really feels supportive…
“The other aspect of Serge that inspired and continues to inspire me is his capacity for service to humanity, the like of which is beyond anything I have ever seen in another human being. What I started to feel was the quality of a life lived from the innermost essence – its beauty, grace and absolute commitment.” If the lived example and inspiration of Serge Benhayon were to be emulated by humanity how different this world would be.
I agree as I find nothing more enriching, nourishing and vitalising than true purpose and service.
Rachel – our health care systems need to read this so that we can begin to make the changes to truly support people in regaining their true health rather than keeping them disempowered.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” – Love this Rachel, and I too find I am exploring and allowing Health to unfold more fully into my life!
” My life is the exploration of this possibility, no more a mouse on a wheel, but a human being willing to look within, to the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon – the day I came home.” How lovely thank you for sharing.
When we make health the dangling carrot we are consumed by ideals and beliefs. When we recognise health is listening to our own body regardless of what another says, we are free to live health for all to see and feel.
Yes, which means there are products and services that can be sold to us with a promise – however far-fetched – of improved health or well-being.
So many people are looking for true health… But as you say… So many people have no idea what it actually means. If the foundational truth was known about what health really was then the healthcare systems of the world would be in a very different state than what they are now.
I considered health to be ‘okay’. I now experience a level of health and vitality which I didn’t know was possible, especially at an age that is close to 60.
I agree health is not about being free from illness and disease, it’s living life full of vitality and joy in our heart.
I’d agree Rachel, health doesn’t mean being free of illness because if anything my illnesses have supported me to look at and address my unhealthy ways of living. My understanding of health has developed in that now anything that stops my body expressing love is unhealthy.
Our perception of health changes sharply when we consider illnesses as something to work with rather than something to get behind us as quickly as possible.
‘But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.’ This revelation in itself, turns what health and getting sick means on its head.
True health is vitality and joy.
I have had a constant pursuit most of my life to become healthy realising I was not living in a way that would truly support me and continually searching for what would, knowing all along that the answers were very simple as I dipped into all sorts of offerings that were out there, selling themselves as just that: the answer. In this sampling of ways to be healthy I became so distracted that the search itself and all the so called treasures it gave me became the main focus. It was not until I stopped to consider very deeply, more deeply than ever before what the soul and the spirit were about and how life really worked that I came across Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine. Everything started to make sense. The practice of gently breathing and connecting with my body from the inside had a new significance and a simplicity that I had been longing for began to return. Because of my former way of living and especially the disregard I had allowed, the process of my return is not necessarily fast but it is a solid and deepening process and for that I hold great appreciation. I feel that I am becoming healthier as the years go by despite the ageing process.
Yes, it is very easy to consider getting healthy as an act of engaging in a series of fixes.
I will admit I never really looked at health consistently. I just thought health was eating a salad or exercise and so long as I was doing some of these some of the time then I was healthy. The version of healthy would also change and so sometimes only a couple of beers was a healthy choice and so I really never considered truly what it meant to be healthy. The article gives us,”So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” From everything that is said here my version of health has grown and I am seeing more and more how every part of everything I do impacts on my health.There is no saving up health credits to then do the opposite for a while but there is a true way to live in each moment that supports you and your body to see and feel all that is needed. Just like nature follows cycles and deeply surrenders to all that it brings more and more it’s about my surrender to what is already there and no chasing or trying to find something or be something. So health to me is allowing something that is already there out and no longer an endless pursuit of so many things.
This was a delight to read, thank you.
I love what you share here about the meaning of health – “but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?”
I keep committing to a deeper level of care for myself, and in that have developed a much more honest relationship with my body and feel much more solid.
And it is in the detail that can be done.Yesterday I was sitting in bed and the temperature changed and I got cool, and I could feel that old pattern of ‘sticking it out’ whilst I finished the activity and then would get changed. But through a commitment to caring for myself, I got out of bed, and put a warmer top on, and then sat back down. My body went, thank you, that feels better. And I went, you’re welcome 🙂 A true partnership.
‘I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.’ Absolutely Rachel I love how you express this and it would completely turn our current health debate in its head if others were willing to take the same level of responsibility with the state of their health as you have and use it as a roadmap back to living in connection with their bodies and the constant communication that they give us.
Absolutely Rachel, rather than endless trial of the current ideal and beliefs to improve our function health can be a deepening process of living the fullness of who we are.
What a great topic, what is “health”? I was convinced that we were a very “healthy” family when I grew up, we ate health foods, knew about great food, organic, whole foods, we knew how to cook, we were vegetarians but we cooked like chefs and everything looked and tasted amazing. My brothers and sisters were all sporty and we looked fit and healthy. We had affirmation book by Louse L Hay that was like the family bible and I swore by it. I thought I could talk myself out of any illness. The truth was though, I did not have a relationship with my essence, I was lost and in the empty space, I was drawn to drugs, alcohol, weed and caffeine and sugar. I was drawn to these things at a young age and they dominated my life until I came across the teachings of Serge Benhayon and I was reminded of how beautiful it is to be me. I am so grateful that I now
know true health and every day I discover more of what it truly means.
Love this Rachel. How gorgeous to go through what you have to come to the realization that sicknesses are signposts to the choices you have made that have taken you away from who you truly are… allowing you to no longer seek disempowered but live with a deeper awareness of the movements you are making and then addressing them from both a conventional and complementary perspective to encompass the all and not just the parts.
I agree Rachel that health is hard to define, it means different things to different people. There is no perfection in this world but with love we can do so much to ease the way in this life!
The word ‘healthy’ carries many connotations and hidden meanings in today’s world. There are so many things that are said to be healthy that if one was relying on the information available one would be in utter confusion as many things contradict each other. Stepping off the ideal of what is healthy and back into the body I live in and gracefully allowing it to guide what it requires, when, has completely redefined what is healthy and has truly revealed just how much we have bastardised this word’s meaning.
The closing sentence here ending with “the day I came home” is what inspired me to become a student of Universal Medicine, as I too felt the sense of coming home on meeting Serge Benhayon.
I think the pursuit of anything where we have the belief we will reach a destination is a dangerously false ideal to have. There is always tension in life, always challenges, but it is how we respond to this without drama and with true care that defines the health and wellbeing we enjoy.
And of course Doug, the challenge is in embracing something that feels tense and uncomfortable, and I guess that is where we need to understand our lives and take a step back sometimes and appreciate where we are and what we have. It is easy to be glass half full, but what about the part of the glass we have filled, it is so often worth cherishing and from there life grows more abundant.
I have had a warped sense of what health means growing up as well. Healthy to me meant being able to do whatever I wanted or needed to do and be able to do it, like being able to skip, jump, run, go to a friends house, play outside etc. When I would get sick I thought it was incredibly unfair and I really disliked being sick and couldn’t wait to get better. After meeting Serge Benhayon I felt like I woke up out of a slumber and started seeing what was there for the first time in my life. For years now how I see sickness or aches and pains is extremely different to what I used to, and instead I see them as powerful messages from my body and little sign posts to what I could pay more attention to.
Thank you Rachel, for this powerful presentation in which you have highlighted that we will never know what true health is unless will we embrace a loving connection to our bodies and being first. For our true health is not something that we attain from only focusing on what we put into our bodies, or the exercise regime we partake in, or lifestyles we submit ourselves to. Our true health emanates from a quality that already resides within us, our essence, and through developing a loving relationship with our bodies and being we discover that there is a great intelligence that already exists within waiting to guide us, knowing what will serve us best, where and how we need to heal, in order to freely live the vitality and well-being that is our natural way.
Spot on Rachel and so eloquently expressed… our true health is a vitality long forgotten as adults and remembered only as something belonging to small children and babies. Equally forgotten is the connection and intimate relationship with our own inner being, the essential part of ourselves you refer to as the Divine spark. Re-kindle that, and we have vitality and a level of wellness most of us only dream about.
Yes agree Jenny, true health is not just ticking a box, or about eating well and exercise, it is about a vitality and joy that is discovered when we connect and live the divinity we are.
‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ I would say yes it is for without trying to be healthy or get to feeling really good in my body, this has happened just because I too have been living this way. With deepening connection and growing awareness, being open and expressing as much as we can, telling the truth and observing life, letting it show us what is really going on, this all makes up for a life that is becoming clearer and more joyful all the time.
A beautiful reminder that when we feel we are resisting the next level of love and the body is presenting signs of this resistance maybe in the way of depletion or exhaustion to not be judgemental or emotional with oneself but to accept and not fight where one is at… there is immense grace in choosing the latter for oneself.
‘But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.’ The war against yourself has definitely ended Rachel and true health is there to embrace, being all of you, living from your essence.
I have noticed recently how much indulgence there is in our illnesses. As a society we talk about them and make them the focus of our lives and our conversations. This can, and usually does, get more intense as we get older. What if we were to bring that much energy and focus to holding our connection and living from our essence ‘, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”
We do indulge in illness and disease because it has become normalised to live in a society that sympathises and pities the victim. If we were to understand and accept that every illness and disease is created by our own doing because we simply do not want to live the love that we are we wouldn’t be able to get away with indulging feeling sorry for ourselves like we do today. Instead we would be supported to take responsibility for the way in which we choose to live our lives.
You know when you’ve seen something that another does so clearly that you question what do you do that others can see so clearly but you haven’t. Well that’s how I see illness, disease, aches and pains, emotional issues etc., it can be so obvious why something is coming out of a body i.e. sneezing, mucus, coughing etc. but what I see and what I have done is in that moment we go into ‘I don’t know why I have this’ or ‘it is so unfair, why do these things happen to me all of the time?’ and we continue on the same merry-go-round until we stop and pay attention. Our body is like a loving parent that never judges or condemns our choices but through reflection shows us the truth.
Yes, illnesses can provide us with an identity and that can be an identity that is quite satisfying.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” Beautiful Rachel. When we live all of who we are – and stay true to ourselves, then we can say we are truly healthy. The old adage that health is not merely the absence of disease doesn’t cut it any more.
It ‘doesn’t cut it anymore’, very true Sue, because running our body with a belief that health is only if you don’t have any illness or disease or aches and pains really limits us and the awareness that is being offered to us by our bodies. This is illness in itself.
‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ I love this definition of what health is and although it is simple we have lived so far from this way of being for so long that it can take a while to let go of the resistances and the things that we allow to get in the way. There’s no doubt that Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine are a great support in this regard.
It is beautiful to feel our own connection to our body, and to understand fully what it is asking for, in order for us to support it with loving choices, because our body is a reflection of the choices we make.
I know sometimes I have been unwell physically but have felt amazing on the inside and ‘more myself’, so it does seem to me that being healthy is a much deeper subject than just the absence of physical illness or disease.
It is revealing to think how we can have an ideal or picture of what health should look like that actually results in us fighting our body rather than developing a deeper relationship with and awareness of it and appreciating what it communicates or we could say reflects back to us. Through Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon I’ve come to connect with and appreciate much more what my body shows me about the quality of energy behind my choices and how this impacts my wellbeing in every way and equally all around me.
How you describe your pursuit of health Rachel is so familiar and one many of us pursue, out there searching for the solution / cure, wanting to fit into a particular view of how health should be, but it ignores a very crucial part which you talk of here, that our choices have lead us to the scenarios that we have and see (and we need to physically address and deal with these, but we also need to take responsibility and begin to see and feel that our choices have an impact on us and to begin to approach our lives and our health in a very different way, one which addresses both sides of the coin, our physical symptoms and the underlying causes and choices we make, and in that we play our part and do not leave it up to others to merely fix our symptoms while we do not deal with their cause.
That true health starts with commitment is a revelation that seems to be missed by most of society consequently there is a eternal search outside oneself for a solution, rather than the internal awareness of this foundation
For me true health is about an inner vitality that shone out, it is living our potential, with no rules, but with commitment to expressing who we are. I have noticed the more I am willing to express from the inside out, the more healthy I feel and live. We ave many ideas about what health means and it is great to expose these and open up a discussion concerning true health and what that is from a lived perspective.
This is the most simple and comprehensive definition of health that I have come across – thank you Rachel! “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”
Interesting Rachel, how we can see the body being sick as something going wrong, or that there is something ‘wrong with me’ – I have had a similar experience of this when growing up – I seemed to be the one who always got sick in the family whilst everyone else was mostly untouched by the same things. It was hard not to think there was something wrong with me…I now realise that it was my body’s way of handling what was happening around me, and yes I may have had a more sensitive system to things, but it was also for me to take more responsibility in how I was with myself and my surroundings. As a child and as an adult, our body communicates to us all of the time, and really if we tune in and listen then the communication is actually not difficult to comprehend. The challenge can be to listen to it and then actually heed what we are feeling – such as go to bed early when tired rather than stay up late to watch TV, or to not eat a certain food because we know it makes us feel bloated or sore in the belly. For example, I used to dislike cheese as a child and teenager, but living in Switzerland at the time, it was one of the most common foods to be consumed and we would often go out for dinner and be served Fondue (melted cheese with sides of potatoes and pickles). I would eat what was served (to be polite) but would always be sick for a few days afterwards. Doing this several times in a row when my body was telling me this food does not suit me, was not great – after all, you can end up with digestive disorders, allergies, reduced immune capacity etc. And then to think that I thought there was something wrong with me? Wow – we don’t give ourselves a break do we? But the beauty of this is that we are always offered an opportunity to learn, no matter how many times we might make the choice that leads to the body suffering. In the end there is nothing ‘wrong’ with the body, there is only what is natural to us and what is in line with our essence or not.
That little image at the end of this great article, no longer a ‘mouse on a wheel’ is a window into humanity’s predicament that, until that deep, true and healing connection with the inner heart is re-kindled, will always be there, turning and turning and literally going nowhere.
“The quality of a life lived from the innermost essence – its beauty, grace and absolute commitment” this example reflected by Serge Benhayon of how we can engage with and live life is a true inspiration. It shows up my previous idea of health which was a cliché of “a well functioning body with no symptoms” to be the caricature that it truly was.
Health. The meaning of the word is so lost on us now. We have pictures of health. Tanned face smiling – make up on skin glowing. Health to us is what it looks like on the ad. But, as you’ve myth busted here – it’s not true. Health is not a picture, but a way of life, one that I dare say is not about eating lettuce only and running 10k. Being all of ourselves without apology is paramount to a healthy life. This however is still a notion while I put it in to practice, but I feel the truth in it 100%.
This certainly beats ‘fasting’ for 2 weeks on carrot juice ( true) whilst riding 30 k a day on a bike AND having deep enemas everyday for weeks…. The things we did … in the name of health !!!
Health is an ever evolving word for me, what might be healthy one year will no longer be enough the next. And that I guess is how health ties in with evolution, for we can only get healthier if we are evolving in the choice we make.
“In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.” This is a crucial point. Health-wise, people are not truly wise. There are infinite ways to trick oneself regarding actions, practices, choices that are supposedly healthy and good for us which in truth are not. Our health is a great thermometer of the extent to whether we are in war or in harmony with ourselves.
We tend to think health is simply not being sick, but as you share Rachel, there is so much more to our whole health and not being sick is just part of it.
It is true there is so much more to our whole health, in fact being sick can also be appreciated as part of our overall healthy expression, because it is showing us what needs attention. Rachel says it well: “I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.”
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” A great question to ask Rachel, and one to make us stop and deeply consider. Do we measure our health on our physical symptoms and the limitations those symptoms put on our daily lives, or do we measure it against how much we live from all that we truly are? For many this may seem an odd concept, but for those who are rediscovering this to be true for themselves, there is no doubt that deepening the commitment to how we live and accepting who we are is the only way to true health.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” Living who we truly are – yet how many of us feel we have to strive to improve, do better or be perfect in all we do? Accepting who we truly are deep down – and addressing our hurts and the cause of our illnesses (not just treating symptoms) along the way is the way to living a healthy life.
Bring a broader understanding to illness than simply the organisation of organic material causing fatal effects on the human body. A great insight.
True health is not the absence of illness, but the presence of you in all you do, and completely in line with the physical body.
The part that stood out for me was about the connection to our bodies and then likewise to others. When I am presently feeling and aware of my body I feel much healthier, steadier, content and vital. When I connect with others from this place it’s like that feeling magnifies and when I am not connected or present, if I avoid people or entertain stories or judgements about them or myself I feel dull, drained, lifeless and sick. What if our true health relies on connection to ourselves and others and not in our lifestyle choices that separate us from our bodies and others?
Great sharing of your experiences with seeking and understanding what is health, ‘Is that the meaning of health, I started to wonder? Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?’ I would say yes, it has to start with a deep level of commitment to ourselves and our bodies.
I love your definition of health – living who we truly are and moving as such without ideals, beliefs and images.
plus the expression that comes from these two.
I agree Rachel, the real illness is not our symptoms we experience on the surface but the fact that we have separated from ourselves – this hurts the most.
Great expose on what health is and the two ways we might approach it and well summed up by Caroline.
What Serge has been presenting about what is going on in the human frame has turned my perspective around so I am able to learn from my symptoms what it is I am doing or how I am being with myself, in the world that is hurting my body.
This wisdom has supported me to feel my own truth and by doing so every area of my life has become more healthy.
Your blog helped me to stop and appreciate where I am in my life, in the last 24 hours I have felt as if I have been running in an old energy, momentum and pattern that in truth has long gone. A ‘trying to keep up with life’ momentum. There is nothing to keep up to or with, this is an illusion, all we need lies within it is just a matter or reconnecting to this and living from this consistently so. The stop was reading this ‘In my version of what health was, my body became my enemy, a dysfunctional mass of tissues, deeply flawed and wrong at its most fundamental level. In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.’ I can relate to this in that I would see my body as the enemy, the thing that needed to be changed, was letting me down, needed to be ‘better’ which meant that energetically I was attacking myself from within. In truth our body, as Serge Benhayon has shared, is the marker of truth. It shows us how we have been living, have we been loving or in disregard? The mind or spirit likes to think it runs the show and in some or many cases if we let it it does. But as you and many others have shared on this thread Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine reflect, live and present what true health is and first and foremost is is our way of living and everyday choices that need to be addressed not strong juices and concoctions to be drank! But yes from experience it is possible to live a life of vitality, joy and well-being have a clear, strong and present body. We just need to listen to and honour what the body is showing not wage a war against it.
Well said Rachel. Certainly for me meeting and observing Serge Benhayon has totally redefined my definition and understanding of what true health is. I now see it as a way of living that includes love and true expression. That is Love in the true meaning of the word which does not contain one ounce of emotion and a Truth that unifies all.
What feels unhealthy for me now may have felt OK for me some years before… what I have realised hearing Serge Benhayon present on the teaching that ‘Life is Medicine’, is that the way we choose to live is in effect the state of health we choose for our body and mind.
I love that I find myself rereading your words tonight Rachel. I sense within a strength, a grace, a steadiness, that simmers constantly beneath the hustle and bustle of life. When I choose to live in honour of my grace, I cannot but care for my body with the deepest care, respect and love. This care magnifies and I begin to feel my body slow, surrender and allow into it the steadiness, honesty and integrity that inspires health from the inside. Nothing before has in any way brought to me the simple truth that health is not something to gain, but something to live.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” Sounds perfectly true to me!
“To allow it (the body) to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.” “But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” When we diagnose the underlying cause of our real illness then we can start to make changes in the way we are living.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” This is surely the true definition of health and sicknesses are signposts to guide us on that path.
Surely now the many many hundreds of people who have started to tune their lifestyle and life style choices and who are feeling the enormous benefits of this are testimony enough to the truth and efficacy of what Universal Medicine is presenting.
The body is like a two way street and the quality of drivers coming out is determined by how the entry drivers are driving. In other words, what we put in has got to come out and illness and disease is that communication, whether we listen or not.
I love what you have outlined here as some of the false beliefs we have around health, Susan. Many people do believe that being healthy is only about following a certain diet or taking a tablet or exercising in a prescribed way – and yet because this may not be suitable for their body, it is not the answer they are looking for and falls very short of what truly living healthily is all about. And so, what you have said about living freely to express yourself, feeling joy and vitality and being fully a part of life whilst valuing and appreciating yourself and all those around you are the most important ingredients a a healthy life, and from there we will know how best to exercise in order to support our vitality and how best to eat to support our connection with the love that we live. And so it becomes a much more complete approach rather than one that limits our health to the food we eat and the tablet we swallow. Health then becomes a limitless growth from within.
“In my version of what health was, my body became my enemy, a dysfunctional mass of tissues, deeply flawed and wrong at its most fundamental level. In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.” – Rachel, this is so true for many people and I too have been in this boat of believing that I have to fight my body. People are known to ‘fight cancer’ or this and that disease. Yet this is part of what is happening to our body and so we end up fighting ourselves. Also, from a young age, I found it rather frustrating to be ‘stuck’ in a small body and so this limited me with the things I had envisaged for myself to do and get done, and so I felt I was constantly battling myself and challenging and pushing myself to do things that were not totally beyond my capacity but where still putting my body at risk (I did intense sports competition training, learned martial arts so I could “protect” my petite body, pushed myself to do intense yoga practices etc etc), and ‘despite’ all this was often very unwell. And all this was because I was fighting myself on some level, not stopping to feel and accept the immense beauty and strength that lay within me all the time, but constantly feeling a need to find it from the outside to show to everyone else that I could ‘do it’ like everyone else. Thank fully I came across Serge Benhayon’s work, which resonated very deeply with me and this turned my life around and allowed me to arrest the constant battle, and begin the true unfolding of the beauty and strength that lies within me .
‘But how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is?’ True health isn’t about a diet, vitamin, perfection or trying to be a certain way, body shape etc it is connecting to our innermost and allowing ourselves to be all that we are continuously. About listening and responding to our body and being honest accepting where we are at at each moment. I have so much to learn, heal and change with regards to this. Since knowing Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine my health, vitality and relationship with myself including the relationship I have with my body has changed so much however this is still an ongoing and unfolding process.
It seems we can associate being healthy with what we do i.e. going to the gym, taking supplements, following a supposed healthy diet as directed by a new book, etc. What I did not do until recently was connect it to how I actually felt. Health is so much more than what I used think it was. I love the way your blog, including the title, is sprinkled with questions that invite us to consider these important issues for ourselves.
True health is so much more than physical perfection – in fact the drive for physical perfection can lead us way off track what is needed for true health and vitality.
There are so many things to appreciate about this blog, firstly the fact that achieving health is not an end goal, it is a constant evolution. The other point is “The other aspect of Serge that inspired and continues to inspire me is his capacity for service to humanity, the like of which is beyond anything I have ever seen in another human being.” That should be our normal so great inspiration.
When I became ill my body became my enemy too Rachel, a dysfunctional mass that had failed me. ‘My body had failed me’, I can smile at myself now in remembering this strong and desperate feeling as I see clearly the lack of responsibility or desire to look at why my body had ‘failed me’ – what choices had I made to get myself to this point of breakdown! It has been a joy in fact to discover that I had a hand in every aspect of my physical, emotional and mental state and this has been hugely liberating to come to understand. So the understanding offered by Serge Benhayon and his presentations on esoteric medicine and anatomy & physiology completed the picture – I was able to take back responsibility for bringing myself to health and vitality.
The picture of Health is so in our faces constantly, that it’s no wonder it takes us some time to remember that health does not actually come in the form of a picture. It is lived, and it is about honouring our body by listening to it. It’s been said several times, yet we tend to prefer following a picture instead, possibly because there is too much responsibility in paying attention to the very thing we are trying to better.
The pictures of health that we are bombarded with are more of a psychological manipulation than anything else, in fact it’s just marketing…it’s got nothing to do with health.
In a nut shell: “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” – and this is the learning for us all, and a beautiful one at that.
It is the clarity, the precise simplicity, the deep and innate wisdom, that Universal Medicine continually presents which empowers everyone to reconnect so deeply that self care becomes both obvious and paramount.
I would like to see this definition of true health up in every hospital and medical clinic – “Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” Now that would be inspiring.
Great expose Rachel to which I am elucidated in feeling how true health is something we naturally all have and it is not something we need to pursue or develop necessarily. In fact, it feels to me as though taking true loving responsibility for how we are in all aspects of life is closely linked to the livingness of true health. The two are inseparable.
I can relate to so much of what you have written here Rachel, especially trying all kinds of weird and wonderful potions, out there health practices which promised vitality and abundance of energy, but like you I got sicker and sicker, and my energy levels felt as though they would never come back. Paying attention to the messages of the body have become invaluable to my health and well being, and continues on a daily basis to communicate it’s endless wisdom.
I can relate to this very deeply Rachel. Like you I have opened up to the awareness that my body is reflecting back to me with extraordinary accuracy, how my life is out of kilter with who I truly am. I was once proud of the fact that I so rarely needed to see the Doctor or took days off sick. Today, a visit to the GP is one where I get support to understand what my body is revealing to me in a truly loving fashion. It is a source of great wisdom when once I regarded it as an inconvenience.
This makes so much sense to me to be guided by our bodies as to how our livingness is supporting our health and wellbeing “To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.”
What a stunning piece of writing… a bed-time lullaby for me having been bathed in all the wisdom that puts from this article. True health being from living who we are, honouring our tender bodies whether in scenes or in health. Being tender, loving, Letting go of the relentless pursuit of perfection that makes us sick in the first place. Thank you Rachel.
It is gorgeous to feel health is a quality instead of being free of illness and disease. This brings the focus to how we are living every moment of our lives instead of trying to reach that state of health and not considering how we are in the space around it.
Knowing the body as a vehicle of expression, is to accept it is doing all the work in exposing all the what’s not us, clearing all our ill beliefs, which supports us to connect to a deeper level within.
Living our lives as ourselves, being all of who we are is not common, but it can be. Thank you Serge Benhayon for making this a reality in today’s world.
For years I was in the pursuit of being healthy by exercising, meditating, vegetarian cooking but I just got sicker and sicker, but everything I was reading was telling me this was how you got to experience good health. Then like many who have commented on this blog I attended courses run by Universal Medicine and started to consider that maybe the way I was living was making me sicker. So after what must be at least ten years now I am healthier than I was in my thirties.
Imagine if the below statement about the true meaning of health was at the front door of every medical clinic and hospital, health is “not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?”. That would be a truly wonderful thing.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” This is now my understanding and listening to the body and it’s messages and appreciating that illness and disease are the body’s way of communicating that we are or have not been living who we truly are and that it’s simply a call to stop and reassess how we are with ourselves in what we do.
‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ This sounds so simple and of course it is but it seems we have all gathered so many habits and ill ways of living that it takes a while to not only accept this but to allow a true change to occur. It requires deeper levels of honesty than those we might have gotten used to and a commitment and dedication to ourselves that we might also have never really had. Once embarked upon the changes in our lives can be none other than miraculous and it brings such joy to see and feel that in others as well as in oneself.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”
My own health has changed beyond measure since the inward turn to re-connect to my innermost essence and as acceptance and appreciation deepen my health continues to change and rarely do I experience any sickness these days.
I can totally relate to this Rachel, when first attending a presentation by Serge Benhayon, every word he spoke was resonating deeply within me – a long forgotten truth being remembered.
“Battle weary and with the body carrying the scars of a hundred alternative pursuits and the deep wounds of self loathing, I listened to the words of Serge Benhayon, and it was as though a light, long forgotten, ignited inside of me”.
I was so out of touch with my body, and indeed myself, that I had no concept at all of what and how I should be relating to and nurturing my body. My feeling is that there are so many millions and millions of people who desperately need to be reconnected basically to themselves so that they can start to, with this connection, make the words true health become real and relevant.
Our health is often seen as something we are not part of, as if we are at the end of a line of “bad luck” and that somehow we are lost in a game of roulette. Nothing could be further than the truth, and our health is up to us.
A great expose Rachel of the interpretation of health as something we search for outside ourselves in many practices and ideologies which never match the true embodiment of healing that occurs when we make the connection back to our essence.
This picture of health many of us have in our head is where we have a body that we can do almost anything to it and it will never break. An ironman who will never be stopped in his tracks, from what it is he is to do. Yet gosh as you show Rachel, how unwell is this? What kind of person would this be who lives and acts without regard for the consequences of our choices? What kind of world would we see if we could just harm and hurt and carry on regardless? Put this way we can see that sickness and disease are great blessings for us all, pointing us back to the true path, stopping us from straying too much from our natural way and making sure kindness, gentleness and warm-heartedness are at the centre of our day. Thank god for illness then, it is truly healthy for us to be this way.
Being healthy used to be a certain look i.e being thin, tanned, healthy looking hair, toned body, but trying to live up to an image of what good health means can never be sustained and disappointment quickly sets in as the reality of how we are living slowly starts to show on our faces and changes occur regardless of how much effort we put into looking the part.
Sometimes it is worth having a look at your thought processes with a massive microscope that shows every little detail of the consciousness you have bought in to which tell you what to think about yourself, your body, and how you should be in the world. Having this kind of experience can be like opening the windows in your house and letting in a cool spring breeze that clears out all the old cobwebs from a long cold and dark winter.
Rachel, great article, I observe how in society health can be considered something that is out of our control, something that we have, don’t have or that deteriorates with age, you ask some important questions, ‘what then is health, is it as simple as living all of who Iam?’
To accept our bodies as the expression of us that they are and to care for them with deep love, appreciating all that they are showing us is really lovely. Thank you Rachel for this blog. It is such a refreshing approach contradicting the communally accepted war on our bodies. Bringing love into health is really important.
I appreciate more and more that true health is not just found by altering my diet and making what is seen as healthy food choices, or getting enough exercise, as much as it is a commitment to living gently without emotional reactions with a deep commitment to work and to pursuits that I would call purposeful, i.e. they serve the benefit of more than just myself. Of course diet and exercise and sleep are all important, but they are just a part of the whole which is about my choice in every moment, to engage in life and be a part of the antidote to the loveless, angry, disharmonious choices that we see all around us, online and in the political and social unrest of our times.
“. . the quality of a life lived from the innermost essence – its beauty, grace and absolute commitment ” and the unwavering commitment to serve all with all that he is – this I too have observed and been inspired by in Serge Benhayon.
Dear Rachel I felt blessed to read your awesome blog. It opens up a new way to look at our bodies: “To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.” Instead of condemning what we feel and then running to the doctor to ask him to fix us again. I love to see it the way you have described it, as it gave me my power back so that I can choose to live in a way to be healthier.
What an industry we have made in our society to get ‘healthy’. What health factories we have manufactured with naturopaths, supplements, and a range of supportive snacks. Yet what you remind me of Rachel is how health lies in the very way we understand life to be. Perceiving it as a struggle with the world outside, seeing a separation between you and between me, giving weight to the issues and dramas we see, well this is the true disease. For whether our body is easily flowing or sore and stiff, it is constantly knowing the truth that is: we are divine, we are sublime, and so much more that the limits of our brain would have us realise. So it seems true health lies in living life knowing that we are all sons of God.
I have come to revisit this article, like an old friend, I have come back because it is a great expose on a subject that most people perceive has nothing wrong with it. When it comes to this subject you can basically do anything, eat any weird thing, run ay amount of ridiculous distance, swim the English Channel, all in the in the name of health! But very few are willing to go deeper and look at their body and question the ideal of the ‘health’ they hold, question if it is indeed healthy.
Beautiful Rachel and I agree. True health is living all that we are and not holding back. True health is in the way we eat and drink and move and speak. It is in our commitment to life and our willingness to be full of love.
Awesome blog on true health, health which begins in the inside out and not the outside in.
It has certainly been my experience in life that there is a consciousness amongst us that ‘says’ the body is an inconvenience and somehow second rate – second to the mind based intellect. This is not true. The body is innately wise and through a full connection with the body and the willingness to listen to its wisdom – by feeling and reading its communications – we are blessed with a deeper truth that we can ever achieve in the ‘mental world’.
Beautiful piece of writing Rachel Mascord, thank you. You gracefully describe what is perhaps the greatest awareness I have reconnected to since meeting Serge Benhayon – which is that I was living life in pursuit of something that I already am – and when I choose to do so, it appears that I am not it. That ‘Divine Spark’ is within me and within every one of us, just waiting to be rediscovered and reconnected to. No pursuit required.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that? “I say yes to this, makes perfect sense to me.
Serge Benhayon’s level of self-care stood out to me too Rachel. When I first met Serge I needed to pick something up from his home. It was early morning and a very cold one at that. He greeted me at the door in his super warm woolly dressing gown with ugg boots and a scarf. I remember at the time thinking it was odd as I had never before seen a man taking so much care of himself, he was more warmly dressed then I was. Now I know this is how we need to look after ourselves and Serge B is a true role model.
The real illness… This is something worthy of investigating, as is what true health really is. Thank you for putting forward the possibility of exploring these further.
What I really enjoy about this blog is that it does not deliver an answer but rather offers a choice, it is very rare to stumble across writing like this, it leaves you alone but invites you in at the same time, its one of my favourite articles. I would love to hear a part two at some stage…..
There is so much talk about health and every time the subject comes up I always ask: but what is health and what is it to you? I love what you share that the true illness is that we are not living from who we truly are. So this should be the focus, and not the supplements, pills, yoga sessions, super foods and god knows what they are selling these days under the false umbrella of health.
A true testament Rachel, there are many who felt like they found home on meeting Serge Benhayon. I too am one. The feeling his livingness ignites from with in us, as you share, is us feeling who we really are, this is home. A reminder of our true tender and deeply caring nature, that deserves forever honour as we drop our ways of being and thoughts that have kept us away from ourselves.
I love that you have introduced the notion of true health being our capacity to serve humanity. It is a new point of reference far and away from the usual measurements of body fat or blood pressure.
As soon as I say the word healthy I can feel a ‘pushing’ behind it, not a natural unfoldment. This word has become so laced with pictures, images, ideals that we lose sight of the fact that we are all naturally healthy if we listen to and respond to our bodies for they know exactly what is needed when.
Thank you Rachel for identifying many determinants of health that are not often seen as part of it. For example commitment to life and to people balanced to the same with oneself – it naturally strikes me as essential to health when highlighted in your blog in describing the expansive role model Serge Benhayon has offered.
There is literally billions and billions of dollars spent in the pursuit of what Rachel is talking about… And that is true health. It is like a grail that humanity pursues which is very appropriate, because this pursuit keeps everyone distracted from the essence of true health which is within, which is always presented at Universal Medicine presentations.
Recently I had an aquantainence share with me that they had liver disease and they couldn’t understand why as hardly drank contrary to most of their family members. We had a discussion about the understanding that it can be also be others factors that affect health like stress and emotions, we construct so many pictures to hold and support ideals that we hold onto and defend often at the expense of our health.
I have found that wanting the illness or disease to ‘not be there’ or to ‘just go away’ is actually doing the complete opposite, it keeps the illness and disease hanging around longer. Because in this reaction we avoid going to the root of the issue, which is that we’ve made choices that have resulted in where we are at.
Dealing with the surface issue (the physical symptom) without looking underneath at the choices that led to this situation is only part healing, as opposed to the full healing that can occur when we look at both sides. This Universal Medicine has presented and through application I can certainly say that being responsible for my choices in life is and continues to be a great dose of medicine.
Much of the intensity of life today is caused by the pursuit for physical perfection. A goal that can never be achieved, or satisfied, and is a constant source of tension and a demoralising influence on how we are able to think about ourselves – never quite able to reach the unreachable mark. A huge turnaround will be when self-acceptance becomes taught in schools, homes, in the workplace. When we are given the opportunity to self-love and express that love with everyone. Then the outer pursuit will no longer have its hold, and only the inner relationship with one’s soul is what really matters, because you can love everyone equally and accept yourself completely. This is our future, but we can live it now, simply by choice because it is your free-will to choose love and to ask for it to be in your life.
Well said Shami. Self acceptance should definitely be taught at schools but first we need to support teachers who can walk the talk to show the young people how it is possible to do. There are many programs taught now and very few by people who are living self acceptance as a way of life, no perfection, but an understanding of its importance in mental health.
Thank you Rachel for this sharing and reminder to me to listen to my body more intently and accept my part in the health of my body and to accept that I need to access help from the medical profession as well as esoteric practitioners.
We really can learn to listen to our bodies, and the constant and all-embracing direction and input that we are receiving to keep us aligned and focused in this life.
Health not as the absence of illness and disease but as the lived presence of connection with who we are and God.
What you write here about the conversation we can have with our body “To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.” is such a great gift from and to ourselves. It is not punishment, it is not letting us down, it is communication on a most powerful scale.
It was very timely returning to your wonderful blog Rachel as my body is healing from a period of ill health and whereas in the past it would have been a time to worry endlessly and strive to get better, like you these days I see any “sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.”. I now see any illness/sickness as an opportunity to look back over the preceding period and honestly observe how I had been living, with the answer to the cause of the ill health always very obvious..
Me too Ingrid, it is a gift, I also feel it is worth noting that just because you choose to be more aware of the way you live, it doesn’t mean you don’t get sick, it is simply that you choose more awareness about why you got sick. There is less judgement and more self nurturing!
Universal Medicine presents to humanity what true health is , and if that wasn’t enough presents and teaches modalities that pave the way for all of us to return
Yes Im also appreciative of the blog and also of what Serge Benhayon presents
When someone is truly healthy it is a connection between the heart and the body, mind and the words, it is in the expression of everything that is expressed… Everything is connected, this is recognised and this is true health.
cjames2012 – what a powerful sharing this is. I too agree and have experienced that true health is of the entire body and mind, united. And that connection is key. This is ancient wisdom and yet not lived today. What an opportunity we have to turn around modern day health.
Understanding health as a wholeness, and a way to live this wholeness meaning living a healthy life.
A well detailed article on what the true definition of health is.
I have had similar conversations with people, Gill. Often when I talk about what I do and do not eat, I can tell that it is bringing something up for someone, but there is a huge difference in why I choose to eat the way I do in that it is based only on the way a food makes me feel, and not an ideology. Choosing to eat based on a bodily awareness of what effect foods have on my physiology brings a whole new level of understanding to my life and my choices.
‘In my version of what health was, my body became my enemy, a dysfunctional mass of tissues, deeply flawed and wrong at its most fundamental level. In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.’ Rachel what you write here seems to mirror the image of many when you consider the common language around illness – ‘battling cancer, fight off a cold, fever etc, defeating cancer, lost the fight with …, a losing battle … Seeing dis-ease as idea of the body’s way of communicating that there’s something about how we are living that is harming and needs adjustment turns all this on it’s head. It is empowering, as we have an inbuilt perfect feedback system informing us what is needed.
Such a powerful message Rachel – re-reading this blog I feel that we as a society are more and more desperate to fix our health and prolong our lives at any cost and absolutely regardless of the quality of that life. Until I came across Serge Benhayon’s teachings this was exactly my approach to health as well.
That is a good point Gill. What we eat and don’t eat is important for health as shown by the rising levels of obesity and diabetes, yet the question of control is an interesting one and is often confused with discernment I feel. Thrown in there is also the question of how we choose what we eat/ don’t eat and how we eat the foods we have finally chosen to eat and this is equally pertinent to developing our health.
I am intrigued by what you write here Rachel. Is true health about achieving some form of perfection free from disease or is it the ability to be in connection with your body to such a fine degree that it re-defines disease and sees every symptom as a communication related to our health?
Beautifully said Linda, it is such a great expose on the ideals we accept, along with expectations about health. It is only through listening to our bodies and own inner wisdom, that can truly guide us. It does take commitment, honesty and responsibility, true health doesn’t just appear, it is in the development of our awareness and making loving choices in each and every moment.
I like what you have shared here Brendan our body being the instrument to support rather than one that we are using to fit into an ideal that doesn’t really exist or in this current society is in constant change.
This new understanding of health as presented by Serge and his way of living, is just so simple, simple loving self care and allowing what is there to be felt, and listening to what the body in its wisdom is saying, whether it be through aches and pains or the sickness we are feeling, a very truthful way of being with our bodies.
Great article that begins to expose the weight we place on “health” being the answer that will solve all our problems. Since studying with Universal Medicine I am less likely to judge myself if I get sick and more likely to reflect on how I have been living leading up to the sickness. I have always been big on going to my GP and get regular PAP smears, breast checks and blood work done, but now I have Universal Medicine to support me to look deeper at any physical issue that may arise in the body, I seem to be just naturally healthier.
Our bodies do know true health, as we are made from love. Chasing health we confirm with our bodies that we do not have it to begin with. All our cells of every single person in this world, are magnetically being pulled back towards our true and natural state that we have forsaken whether we are aware of it or not.
Beautifully said Adele. We are in fact ‘healthy’ by nature. We just need to leave ourselves alone!
Living healthy and living ‘magnetically pulled back towards our true and natural state’ being the same – one way to live wholly..
I like how you bring a focus to the quality in which we live and the tenderness in which we treat ourselves as playing a huge part in our overall health. So often health becomes a pursuit and it feels like such an imposition on the body, drinking odd concoctions and pushing the body physically to ‘achieve’ so called health. A loving relationship with us is a great place to start.
By limiting our understanding of health as being limited to pure function, we are shutting ourselves down to the very real possibility of how life can truly be lived.
I agree, as a society we have a very narrow sense of the rue meaning of this word.
Great point Adam and one that I feel reflects how much emphasis and worth we place on our functionality whilst neglecting the qualities we bring to life and the way in which we do things. It’s not that functionality is bad but that we have separated it out as the only thing that matters.
‘ It’s not that functionality is bad but that we have separated it out as the only thing that matters.’ – this is exactly it Fiona. We are missing out big time if we see illness and disease as something that first and foremost needs to be fixed.
“My sicknesses have become a blessing, not to be judged, eliminated so that I can just get on with it, or indulged for attention.”
Having worked in hospitals for the last 22 years, I’ve noticed that it’s rare to see a patient who is feeling positive or proactive about their illness or upcoming procedure … instead it seems that most just want the condition to be “eliminated so that (I) they can just get on with it” … there is impatience, blame and dismissiveness towards their bodies, no real awareness of this understanding and willing approach that you so beautifully describe, Rachel, to be appreciative of healing and adjustments in behaviour that the body is indicating is required and or more importantly, healing in the deeper emotional and psychological issues that we act out and inflict upon our bodies. It’s great that a new approach and understanding to illness is offered in this blog.
Great to see Rachel’s blog backed by your experience as well Marian. All the comments really lead us to see that there is so much more to live with regards the relationship we have with our health beyond its function.
When you see someone like Serge Benhayon living a level of love that I didn’t know was possible, it naturally makes you stop and question everything.
So true nicolesjardin, just by having Serge Benhayon reflecting the absolute love and truth that he lives, makes us stop and question everything in life.
The older I get the more I appreciate that taking care of my body keeps me in good health. I am also learning that what goes on in my mind also affects my health – how I think about life, others even how I think about myself – if it anything other than appreciation, it can be totally draining, because judgement and criticism creates a tension, a hardness in my body. Allowing life to be what it is, without trying to change anything is way more relaxing, as is expressing what I feel in any given situation. Choosing to be me in every moment rather than anxiously trying to be anything, trying to fit a picture of how I think I should be, allows for a freedom that is amazing and feels great. To me that is true health.
Very much feel your last 2 sentences here, Carmel, are truth … recently I’ve become aware of how much anxiety has been in my body caused by “trying to fit a picture” … I agree, it feels spacious and light to drop that trying and to keep coming back to just being me which, I’m starting to see, is more than enough.
This is very true, we do get caught up in the ‘how much can I get away with’, it is like we need to test our bodies as to what and how much it can handle. I know that I have spent most of my life not listening to what my body was telling me, especially around exercise. Trying to fit that picture of what exercising and being healthy meant. I listen now to my body and with that have a much clearer understanding of what ‘true health’ means.
Thank you Rachel, this is a terrific account of changing the whole notion of what health is about and I agree very much needed. I recall using fitness in a way where I would measure how much I could party all weekend or eat and drink fatty or sugary foods as long as I did my exercise sessions. This came back to a common view of health as what we can get away with. Then of course, life becomes about settling for a certain quality and not about exploring our potential. The thing I have come to understand through Universal Medicine is that we are actually here to discover an unlimited potential, even beyond being here! This exposes just how pointless it is to take the attitude in life of just getting by or coping, instead of being grand and reflecting to others the same.
Wow Simon, what a power-packed comment … calling out how we can try to “see what we can get away with” (usually when younger), and then almost a giving-up that can happen as people settle for an ‘ok’ state of being. It’s so true, as it seems most members of our societies don’t bother/give up on exploring or reaching our potentials … the inspiration of Universal Medicine can be the turn-around, as many have already found and continue to find, it’s a path of never-ending exploration and discovery.
That is so true Simon. Just as some of us experimented with what we could get away with as teenagers it seems that we haven’t really grown out of it but who we perceive we are hiding it from has changed. If we give ourselves the opportunity to mature out of that way of thinking the potential for our health is exponential.
This is such a powerful read, unmasking that there is so much more to true health that doesn’t get mentioned.
It has been wonderful to find out what true health really is from listening to Serge Benhayon – and to aim at living our lives on this philosophy. I am definitely enjoying the benefits of the gentle changes I have made in this way.
This whole weekend I have been at home and in and around my bed with the flu and tons of nasal discharge. I embraced it in full. It feels like my body is cleaning up, letting go of old stuff that I don’t need any longer and that it makes space for new things. Complaining that I am sick at home? Not at all. For me it is an invitation to be with myself, to take deeply care of myself and to allow my body to rest and let go.
I love what you have said here Rachel about ‘attaining’ health and then being able to sit back and relax. The truth as we know is that health is about our ongoing choices, every moment of every day. We can never lag as our body is always communicating what it is that is truly supportive or healthy in that moment. Thank you Rachel for writing about this, as true health has a long way to go before it is re-discovered my many.
This is what should be taught in schools, that “health is about our ongoing choices, every moment of every day”, not that it just ‘happens’ to us. That one day we just wake up and we have an ache or pain, or more seriously, cancer. We are living with a level of irresponsibility that people are just not wanting or willing to feel, which is, it is our responsibility to listen to our bodies.
“The truth as we know is that health is about our ongoing choices, every moment of every day. We can never lag as our body is always communicating what it is that is truly supportive or healthy in that moment.”
This says to me that heath can never be pinned down or owned, as it is a living changing concept that is determined by where you are at in your life.
It sounds simple but for most of my life I just wanted health as an insurance so that I wouldn’t be bothered by the inconvenience and responsibility that the body’s messages were trying to communicate.
That has changed now of course since studying with Universal Medicine and I now love slowly learning the language of the body, and how it speaks supports me on many levels.
Your understanding of health, inspired by Serge Benhayon, to reach the understanding that one’s sicknesses are a blessing is transformational, as you share Rachel. With this approach the whole of life is transformed.
What Serge has presented on approaching illness in this way brings such a love and understanding to ourselves. Illness is often seen as a battle or something we are either winning or losing. There are many stories of an illness being transformational to someone, however, these are very few and far between, and are usually held up as an unobtainable ideal of someone who ‘wins’. The truth of illness is that when dealing with critical illnesses most people die. It is a simple truth, but we can change how we approach this event in someone’s (or our own) life. To understand it as more than just something that is happening to us, and to see the the intertwined nature of it with our entire life, allows for something very beautiful to present itself for healing.
Naren, I like what you say here: “To understand [illness] as more than just something that is happening to us, and to see the the intertwined nature of it with our entire life, allows for something very beautiful to present itself for healing. If we can see this broader perspective we will realise that our choices have led to this moment and it is empowering to take responsibility in this way and not blame or want to ‘win’ but accept what is happening and take the necessary action.
Yes, Sandra. Seeing an illness in a broader perspective does allow us to take much more responsibility for ourselves and where we find ourselves. The call to go to battle against a disease is more like burying our responsibility. This of course does not mean just roll over and waste away if we get seriously ill, but acceptance of what is being presented through illness may bring about a potential for healing unlike fighting it with the aim to win.
In that fighting mentality what happens if you lose? I can imagine that it would be crushing.
What you share here Naren is profound – “To understand it (the illness) as more than just something that is happening to us, and to see the intertwined nature of it with our entire life, allows for something very beautiful to present itself for healing.” If humanity began to see health and disease in this way, it would change so much for so many as people would begin to take responsibility for their own health.
Yes, Sandra, disease is so often seen as something that exists outside of us, and it somehow invades us against our will, but the truth is that we create a fertile ground for illness to take hold through our choices in how we live our lives.
As I read this, I realise who locked into the need to be doing something and the hope that through doing that I would ‘get there’. But there is no there, as we are already there, just doing lots to not feel that fact.
It’s a good point Joel, we don’t just play out this behavioural pattern with health, it is in many pockets of the way we think, it’s a false and tricky search…. as it’s impossible to find “out there” what we already “have in here..”
it’s impossible to find “out there” what we already “have in here..”… yes, like walking around the outside of the house looking for the kitchen.
Thats hilarious, I am going to use that line!
I loved that kitchen analogy Joel. The outer searching for our answers and the refusal to stop and go back inside can make itself appear very strong and have such a hold on us. Yet Universal Medicine has said time and time again that it is a choice, making that choice in the face of an energy that wants to appear powerful and gets upset when that choice is made is not pleasant but if Serge Benhayon is anything to go by that choice is worth making and worth repeating!
I have learnt this also from Serge Benhayon, that each and every one of us, excluding not a single person is deserving of the same self-care and love and through this we naturally extend it to others. This makes for a far brighter world.
This is true kevmchardy, we do all deserve this level of self-care and love. Taking the steps towards this in whatever way we feel is our way back to this, and can take a few areas of resistance until we finally accept how much we do deserve this level of self-love.
It is the only way.
Absolutely, kevmchardy. This is huge. Even those who dedicate their lives to caring for others either through medicine or charity rarely feel that they are deserving of the same love they are supposedly giving to another. To realise that not only are we deserving of that same level of love, but that it allows us to truly love others as a level that we had only dreamed of previously, is a complete turn around from what we are often taught, which is the way to care for another is to sacrifice ourselves, including our own well-being.
What Serge Benhayon has been sharing with us all is something that not only allows others to feel what it is like to be cared for by someone who is living the love they are expressing, but it is strengthening the foundations of humanity by these teachings.
Serge Benhayon most certainly is strengthening the foundations of humanity by the teachings of deep Self-Care and Self-Love. This level of love that I never knew was possible is extraordinary to connect to and is a choice that I am committing to more and more. To break down that thoughts that I wasn’t worth looking after deeply and that I do in fact deserve this level of love has given me trust in the world we are in today. Funny though once I started to really take it deeper with myself along the way it has always made sense and feel right to do this. The abuse I used to put myself through was so far from Self-Love that I can now see is not acceptable. I’m lifting the bar on myself and also what is going on around me. Creating a new Normal which is fact the real Normal.
“once I started to really take it deeper with myself along the way it has always made sense and feel right to do this” This is the crux of it, what Serge Benhayon presents, simply and honestly makes sense. It can be challenging at times, simply because I have had to look at the parts of my life that were not working and be honest with myself about why they were not working, but never has he presented something that I have said “well that’s just crazy”. In fact, it has been exactly the opposite.
Beautifully said Naren, what i can feel from what you have shared is the ultimate importance on working on our own stuff, to build that loving and caring relationship with ourselves, this is key to having the ability and capacity to love and care for others. Without that connection with oneself, the love and care for others can be swayed by the external environment and forces that daily life can attract.
Absolutely, raegankcairney, our connection is paramount and where I know I have to bring my own focus.
I keep being drawn back to this blog as it reminds me of the fact that as a society we have forgotten what true health is, our healthcare system is no longer that, rather an illness management system.
Exactly, David. Having worked in a hospital for some years, I can relate to this very well. Conventional Medicine is able to incredibly support us, yet the system in which it is administered is so much about research, success and pressure to make enough profit to survive on the dense health market, that often the patients and their true needs are not really seen. The symptoms are treated, but the root cause is rarely addressed.
(Yes the IMS sounds like an illness itself David!), but what you share is very true, and not to be taken lightly; if there’s not the element of self care and self responsibility with our own health and well-being, then we are handing it over to somewhere or someone else along the line to pick up the pieces and make the best of it that they can. At best this is only going to be a management of it, yet with our own input and responsibility it can become healing.
So well said David. Our healthcare system has become an ‘illness management system’. There is so little time anymore for true care and an individuals needs, because of the enormous pressures put on medical staff due to the high numbers of sick people.
Yes Sandra, we’d be in a sorry state without pain management and similar support but if we keep going at this rate there’ll come a point when we can’t keep up with the demand. So this blog is a great reminder that once we see “sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness” we can start to find our way back to true health by taking full responsibility for these choices. Our taking responsibility for our own health is the only way that we can effectively alleviate the pressure on the health system.
I agree Sandra Newland – to take true responsibility for our own health, by looking at the choices we make in our everyday living, is the only way we can ever get the health care system truly working. A health care system otherwise completely overloaded and continuously facing the seriousness of bankruptcy.
True health presented by Serge Benhayon as simply living from one’s essence with no perfection, just love and acceptance, is so beautiful, honouring, graceful and divine to feel. I love all you share and being with a wellness and commitment not realised before. Thank you.
Incredibly simple and simply incredible, this is what our life ca be if we just choose and dare to live who we really are.
“What I started to feel was the quality of a life lived from the innermost essence – its beauty, grace and absolute commitment.” Rachel this is indeed the amazing gift of wisdom that Serge Benhayon has presented and lived, which defines what true health is – a way of living that is healing and life affirming.
True health being a deep commitment to self lifts my understanding to a greater level Rachel. This changes the view of illness to a completely different way of thinking that brings the body to another depth of healing through what we can learn from illness and true health.
I can relate to having tried many weird and wonderful concoctions in the pursuit of improving my failing health, many alternative treatments and it seemed like it would never end. That is until I found Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine and then I started to look at things with new eyes. Suddenly my body and my illnesses were not seen as a curse but a rather large letter to myself of the disregard I had been living in.
I love all of what you’ve written here Rachel. The idea of health being about some kind of physical perfection is a great one to break down. And I totally agree how much simpler and honest it is to allow our body “to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.” As you say with no indulgence or disregard, but with responsible awareness.
What is true health? A great question to ask Rachel, I feel there are many preconceived ideas around what we think true health is, based on what we have been told by the media and the medical profession. I always thought I was healthy until I came to Universal Medicine and understood how much I had neglected my body and how tired and run down I really was. We have this understanding in our society that if we are not sick then we are well yet this is a long way from the truth.
This is so true Alison, we can often believe we are healthy if not suffering from a particular disease, but are we truly living a vital and full life? The quality of our relationship with our bodies and the quality in which we choose to live is all part of our overall health.
By connecting to who we truly are, feeling and listening to our bodies as they inform us through the symptoms of illness of dis-ease, our bodies offer us the opportunity to take full responsibility for our health and wellbeing and see the reflection of how we are living.
Rachel, I love the way you write!
You’ve posed the question of whether true health is in fact just living from our essence and being who we are in life. I would say that by living this commitment, as you say, without perfection, your own individual ‘true health’ will be revealed. If we are making our daily choices from our essence, we are going to be living in a way that lets the body thrive. Responding to the body’s communications with us to live a life that will end up putting us into our own ultimate state of health. This will look different for every person depending on the choices that we’ve made leading up to this commitment and the specs of each person’s individual body, but through living our truth our own true health will emerge.
This is an mazing blog showing true health and what we are all missing, that it is our livingness through responsibility, and love that is true health and harmony in our bodies.Thank you, brilliant Rachel.
Amazing how health can be seen in this way, and included is the way that we are in society. How each passing day is a marker of our health, not just by how our bodies feel, but also by the relationships that we have.
The other thing is that the way we live, that is think, feel and act, is a very supportive part of any medical treatment plan for any ailment. It may not cure everything but it sure is part of any prevention, maintenance and curative healthcare plan.
I am not sure than many human beings truly know what true health is. Most of us live in a way that is in such disregard to the natural way our bodies wish to function, that we do not give our bodies a chance to show us what true vitality they are capable of.
I know I didn’t know what true health was Adam. Serge Benhayon has modelled to me how to live a truly vital life and for me this has become it an unfolding improvement of health. Every time I think ‘gee I’m feeling great’ there is yet another adjustment in my ‘livingness’ to make that leads to an even deeper and more integrated level of health.
‘In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself. But how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is? ‘ Just had to repost this little gold nugget. It had my head shaking thinking how crazy this truth is. Many of us fight our own bodies, we have locked it in a cage, feed it was what we wanted, moved it how we wanted, never stopping to ask or feel what this dependable incredible ally needs. It’s complication that can steer one away from a simple truth.
Rachel my heart fell into deep love with your closing statement I could read over and over.
‘What did I think health was? What did I imagine it would bring me?’ What great questions I had never bothered to ask myself through out my searching for health. Asking now I know health to be so much more than what food I eat (although it is a major part). I now know expression is my greatest vitamin, love the best smoothies and brotherhood the best aerobics class.
Hi Rachel Mascord.
You describe so well the ‘battle’ for health we have seen as part of our society – everyone fighting so hard to achieve it. From forcing themselves to eat a certain way in a manner of abstinence from what they ‘want’ to eat, to pushing hard in an exercise routine. At the moment I am working in a city and take a walk around the lake each morning. So many people are out running and exercising which sure – is supposed to be good, but so many of them are bright red faced, pushing them selves so hard and look like they are trying to ‘punish themselves’ into health.
The point of difference you offer about what being Healthy might be if you choose it is really ground breaking and breaks the mould of everything we have been taught about it.
I remember the morning ritual, cutting the wheat grass and doing the daily maintenance on my 6 hydroponic growers, to insure I had my constant supply of produce to be run through the cold press juicer everyday. I had approached health as a way to buy toys and experiment with my body. I had run out of ways to abuse my body, so I figured I was the perfect person to see if things worked. They did, but abuse was easier and always won. True health is listening to one’s body. The body knows what it needs… you just have to hear what is telling you.
Thank you Rachel for this, I love your hypothesis – is true health to be ‘but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people? ‘ I too have witnessed the living proof of a lived joyful life and well-being through total service to humanity in Serge Benhayon and in his family. And through testing this for myself, learning the difference of returning to a life lived in love, and living for the all rather than for the individual self. Even just beginning it changes everything.
I second that Annie, everything changes when this approach to life is taken and as you say even just starting to take more responsibility and commitment has massive ripple effects.
“This new understanding of health has called for a far greater level of awareness and care and far greater acceptance of how I am feeling, free from judgment and the aspiration to a “greater” state.” This aspiration to achieve a “greater state” in anything takes us far away from true well-being, for how can we appreciate and value ourselves for who and what we truly are if we are always driving ourselves to a goal of something we are not? This is a big lesson for humanity, and until it is understood and chosen, and full responsibility taken for our choices in life, — of thought, action and reaction, — nothing will change. Each one of us has a responsibility to choose this and show by the way we live it the truth of it.
This is inspirational in so many ways, and the knowing of truth and our true way of being simply who we really are, and that the living of this is true health and true medicine. We all have a very real responsibility to commit to this lovingly.
I can feel that true health comes from responsibility and commitment to our own body, living all that it is. And then it gets truly supported, and in turn shows us where we hold back and not commit in life.
I agree Benkt, as our bodies are honoured and true health becomes our foundation, we are shown many things about how we are living and perhaps even old ingrained patterns start to surface. There is an ever evolving relationship with our bodies when we begin to reclaim true health.
What a beautiful reflection you are Rachel Mascord, a reflection of true health, vitality and service.
I loved reading and pondering on your blog; this sentence particularly resonated;
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that”
Certainly without perfection my life is also about the exploration and possibilities of living true health.
True health has been lost in the world today and come so far from what it can really be. This is a great blog sharing so much and making us look at what has happened, where we have got to, and most importantly offering the changes we can all make to our lives, simply by our livingness and really bring back true health and well being to ourselves and the world. Living the love we innately are and the honouring of this is an amazing start and way forward and something to really appreciate.
Rachel, I love how you described what happened for you the first time you listened to the teachings of Serge Benhayon – “I listened to the words of Serge Benhayon, and it was as though a light, long forgotten, ignited inside of me”. I have to say that the same thing happened for me. I could feel that what he said made sense and was something that I knew within me but had long forgotten.
True Health is Universal Medicine. The way we live that brings an absolute vitality and purpose to life – knowing the depth we are from is far greater than anything we have at this time and that the reason for all our ill health is the separation from the divinity we come from.
“Is that the meaning of health, I started to wonder? Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?” This is a great question Rachel, and one that would be well to ask in any area of medical research. If this level of committment to ourselves was taken seriously by the medical profession, the results would show that health levels would not only improve in general, but would also remain considerably more constant.
I used to think myself as healthy apart from a bout of disease in my youth and consequently never paid attention to it. I thought myself safe since I did not drink or smoke, and had by most standards a healthy diet. However since coming across Universal Medicine various ailments have flared up. I know they were always in the background, it’s just that my body had become too hard to recognise the signs. So I am learning that I am worth taking care of and this include going to the doctor and receiving the necessary treatment.
‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’
True health is being deeply connected to our own bodies and in this connection honouring all the love that we are and always will be.
“Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” This sentence encapsulates beautifully what I feel true health is.
Deborah recognising that there is no perfection is what makes this more real and what true health is all about.
The single biggest and hardest point of my learning was that I am worthy to be treated tenderly – by myself! Not just to accept the tenderness of others but also to be tender to myself.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” Rachel, having attended many workshops presented by Serge Benhayon I would say a resounding yes in answer to your question. I am learning to deepen my committment to accepting who I am and as I do that more and more, and I am healthier today than I have ever been. This would be a great model for the health service to follow.
Imagine health departments coming to an understanding that health is as Rachel so beautifully points out “–”as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that”. That would change the way we run our health services as with this model of health everyone is accountable for the way that they live.
I love the point you have made here Elizabeth…
Imagine how the world would be if we chose accountability? The health services would not even exist like they do. In fact the world would be very different indeed.
I have gone looking for health in various forms, often complicated or expensive, super foods and self help books, yet I now realise true health is much simpler than that. It is about a willingness to engage with the messages from my body and use common sense in regards to eating from what I feel, resting when I am tired and not allowing negative thoughts to control me, definitely a work in progress but a progression towards true health is being made.
Yes it’s a common trap that we can fall into…believing that the answers to health are outside of us, when all along we only need to tune into our body and listen to what it is telling us.
I love your description of health, it broadens our understanding of how our livingness affects all aspects of our lives so that our thoughts, actions, relationships as well as our physical bodies are as clear as can be.
Thank you Rachel – it ignites in me the want to explore what health truly is. It’s not the things that I do necessarily but how willing I am to unleash the natural spark of love that lives within me.
I like your comment Matt, it is us that carry the magic pill to true health, and our willingness the water that washes it down.
That wheel of existence is such a common one that I most definitely been running amuck on. All the while feeling exhausted and empty. Serge Benhayon presented Self-Love as way of living, one that from observing how it can be done by his very own actions, that have been consistently steady, I know now that Self-Love is the way of the exhausting wheel. In fact I’m not even a mouse, I’m a bird that can fly high with no confined space and it feels amazing.
The never ending seeking you illustrate Rachel feels like it infects not just our perception of health but everything to do with our well being and life. As I read your words I started to see it sits in our jobs, our relationships and even in our ‘healing’. It’s like this is deeply interlinked with our view of time as a linear progression. From the presentations and writings of Serge Benhayon comes another possibility, that our view of time is not true, and that we are complete and divine in this very moment. With nothing to do that can possibly make us grander, no box that needs to be ticked, no exam that needs to be passed, just a beauty to be savoured and lived. To live this is our calling. Perhaps it’s this evolutionary pull that we resist, that gets mutated and transfigured into all these ideals we think we need to live up to?
Rachel I love how you describe the true meaning of health, that being a commitment to ourselves and our bodies, and consequently to all other people. That’s beautiful. I shall take these words into my day with renewed intention of not making it all about me, but at the same time honouring me and accepting my delicateness, open myself up more to others and let everyone feel the amazing me!
Knowing ourselves to be deeply worthy of care and presence is a highly valuable gift.
This way of viewing health makes so much sense – thank you for presenting it so practically and simply Rachel. It inspires me to connect more deeply with true health and well-being myself.
“is health….found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?” I love what this sentence suggests Rachel. It speaks of true health, not just of ourselves but also considering all others too. Our choices and our commitment to ourselves is just the start. We have a great deal more of an effect on the world and everyone else than we often care to realise. It’s worth taking the time to consider what kind of contribution we are making.
We are still prisoners of a consciousness letting us believe that what we are, what we do and what we think affects only us, maybe those close around us. We are part of a whole and it’s time to give ourselves permission to feel this and live our lives with the responsibility and joy this knowing brings.
This is true Katinka. This knowing does indeed bring responsibility and joy. Two words that we are not used to using together. The more I begin to understand what true responsibility is the more I realise that it is actually joyful.
Yes Rebecca, very true, responsibility and joy definitely go hand in hand. Quite beautiful to confirm this for myself, I fully embrace my life being about love, responsibility and joy.
‘But how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is?’ So much more honest and the benefits to our body and our life when we do are immense.
The missing piece of the puzzle, being who we truly are and that without this connection all matter of illness and disease is communicating the urgency of this missing piece. I cannot even fathom how humanity would be or how medical and pharmaceutical institutions would act if this knowledge was lived or if we took responsibility for our own health and stopped blaming our bodies for it’s mortality.
A truly gorgeous and inspiring sharing Rachel and one that should be in a Women’s Health magazine to break the illusion of perfect health.
Rachael I fully agree and it was only the other day that I was speaking to some people in university. None of the students want to do projects unless that project would end them up working for a big pharmaceutical company, as they see that being the way they can earn a comfortable living first and do good. Yet why is the study of personal connection, responsibility not the topic of every PhD?
Yes I agree David. The study of personal connection & responsibility should be in every school and university. We’ve got a lot to learn and un- learn.
I love how you have written that the body is showing the urgency of this missing piece. It blows my mind that in some cases the a big red light is flashing and yet all the signals are ignored. It seems the majority of the medicinal world has blinkers on to even explore the possibility that the solution is right under their noses, literally.
There are so many aspects of health that remain unexplored in our society, and I love the way that you have shared your experience with health and seeking this as a perfect picture that eluded you constantly until your moment when it dawned on you that there was so much more to health than you originally allowed yourself to see. Serge Benhayon is a man that precipitates such processes – he helps break down those barriers that would otherwise limit our perceptions to a narrow view, and he helps us see through to what is true. He is a man who does re-ignite the divine spark within us.
Spot on Jane – the marker for health and well-being and vitality has been on a sliding scale for a while now resulting in a ‘normal’ of health that is well below the actual mark for ‘normal’ compared to say 20 years ago. This so does need to be a topic of conversation…
Great comment Henrietta, I love how you say Serge Benhayon “helps break down those barriers that would otherwise limit our perceptions to a narrow view, and he helps us see through to what is true. He is a man who does re-ignite the divine spark within us”.
So true Linda it is the livingness and the quality of harmony in which we live life that offers true health.
This message you share Rachel is actually so huge if it could reach the whole medical fraternity and the public – and I certainly appreciate reading and being reminded of this again as society all around increases its madness to seek alternative solutions to what is literally right under our noses! I also agree totally with your final comment:”My life is the exploration of this possibility, no more a mouse on a wheel, but a human being willing to look within, to the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon – the day I came home.” Remembering truth.
I love that line too Debra, “my life is the exploration of this possibility…a human being willing to look within, to the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon.” We often need an outside reflection to re-ignite what we have deep within. It is then up to us to develop that light to impulse us in our own health and wellbeing in order to be of service to others in the same way.
Such an inspiring blog, that opens the lid on what true health might be, offering the opportunity to stop fighting and overriding our bodies and listen to what it may be communicating regarding our choices and how we live our lives.
But if we listen, then what will we hear? Something we really don’t want to hear! Like that our illnesses, aches, pains and disharmony can be blamed on no one. That every choice we make affects our body and every time we dishonour ourselves we give the body something else to digest that tastes very bitter. Ultimately, we don’t want the responsibility of our own health because then we would have to look at how we are living. But through Rachel’s amazing sharing, I can feel the Joy in being careful and present with oneself, with no pressure and perfection, just a process of Love that unfolds and allows the body to do what is needed for evolution. That’s way better than indulgence!
I love this pondering on health: ‘Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?’ I have considered Health to be something that I had to achieve and if I did not have it I had failed, a kind of tick-box. In fact that was how I looked at life: a series of boxes had to be ticked to show a successful life, and because I did not have any interest in ticking many of the boxes I felt a constant failure. Serge Benhayon has a been a real inspiration is connecting to a knowing that life and health are not about an end point, but about a constant evolving and unfolding back to the truth of who we are – divine – living and expressing nothing but love, truth, harmony, stillness and joy.
That ticking of boxes has a double edge to it, Golnaz. Not only does it set up a goal which is often never achieved, and therefore we end up beating ourselves up for not meeting it, but should we feel that we have achieved it, often we give ourselves a label of ‘healthy’ (in this case), and that is it. We forever look back to that point when we gave ourselves that label, and either hold onto it as a high point in our lives, or think that we are still healthy when, in truth we are not anymore.
Our relationship with our bodies is one that is ever changing and evolving. What was ‘healthy’ for us one day, might very well not be at another time. True health is understanding that we will change from one point to the next, and to enjoy the journey.
The nature of the universe means we are forever pulled to be evolving and our relationship with every aspect of our life needs to reflect this. You provide a great point here Naren “Our relationship with our bodies is one that is ever changing and evolving. What was ‘healthy’ for us one day, might very well not be at another time.” This shows how our relationship with any aspect of life including health has to be constantly reassessed, and responded to accordingly as nothing is ever static.
One of my favourite concepts in science is that of homeostasis, which means “movement to create harmony”. It is something that we see in nature all the time, most commonly demonstrated by the migration of animals. Nature is forever moving and adapting and evolving, we are not separate from this, and would be well served to remember it.
Naren, you mention homeostasis, and for me that equates to health. When my body is moving in harmony and balanced, I am in good health. When there is little or no harmony and balance, I am in abuse.The body always offers me a choice
I could not agree more, Catherine. Movement, or more accurately, the quality of our movements and bringing our attention and discernment to that quality, is the key to our health and healing.
No longer a mouse on a wheel – I can relate to that one Rachel and also to the way that my life has changed since meeting Serge Benhayon.
Lorraine I would say I was also that mouse on a wheel but one that didn’t realise there was any way off the wheel until I met and re-connected to me, with the love and support of Universal Medicine.
Like yourself David, I too was a mouse on a wheel for many years, searching for truth and love but looked the wrong places. It was not until I met Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine that my life changed and I reconnected to the divine spark that is me.
An inspiring blog that lifts the reader and empowers us to live life joyfully.
Absolutely Heather and to take responsibility for our choices and understand that illnesses and diseases is a way for our body to let us know we have not been loving with our choices and that we need to look at how we have been living.
Rachel, I was moved by your sharing and how when we hear and feel the truth, our body aligns – we are home! I am learning more and more to stop and and be guided by body! NO perfection here but a growing awareness of the power of the body’s communication when we connect to and develop our relationship with it.
What is true health? I feel because we have moved so far away from true health and its true meaning, each of us would have our own version of what true health is and what it looks like, it is easy to compare ourselves to those that are sick and say we must be healthy based on the fact we are not ill.
I agree davidsonsamantha that “to consider that becoming ill reflects the choice to move away from our true essence is something revolutionary in the world of medicine” but I hereby declare that it is absolutely true in my experience. Even a stubbed toe reflects my choice to abandon my connection with my essence in a futile race against time. Cancer, a reflection of self-neglecting and even abusive choices towards myself. A broken foot, presented me with a real stop to my out of control raciness, depression, a choices to give up on life. And so on. And on the flip side, choosing to build and sustain a connection to my essence has led to a state of vitality and wellness that supersedes any healthy diet or exercise regime I ever tried. Connection to self is the ultimate healthy choice, and the ultimate marker of good health.
Our natural way of being, in health is something that we can all develop through observation and being honest about what we feel. Many illnesses do not just appear, they develop with symptoms over a length of time: “But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.”
To consider that becoming ill reflects the choice to move away from our true essence is something revolutionary in the world of medicine. And yet homeostasis, a building block of our physical being, balance and harmony is in everything our bodies are naturally built to do. I agree illness tells us something, it is a clear ‘signpost’ for us to read.
Reading your brilliant article Rachel, I feel that true health is simply honesty. An honesty with our body. For example, is it possible that a seventy-five year old person who has cancer and is openly dealing with the root causes of that cancer is in fact healthier than the super-fit, bells and whistles, gym-going, carrot-juice-drinking twenty-five year old?
Good point, Otto, until we fully understand the energetic reasons for our illnesses, will we ever truly understand what ‘Good health’ truly is?
No. Because unless we deal with the reason why we got ill, we are in fact only burying the illness. This is the gigantic time-bomb that modern society is sitting on – the cushions under our bums being Western Medicine – the stuffing in those cushions being our refusal to look at our illnesses with honesty. But, when the bomb goes off, as it will, no amount of cushion stuffing will protect us from the truths that our bodies will show us.
Great comment Otto! True health definitely comes from being honest with our body. And being honest with our body means being willing to listen to its constant dialogue with us.
Wow now there is s truth Otto! How ill conceived is our notion of health? I can feel the body particles stir and align when we speak about honesty. All the other ‘bells and whistles’ related to health feel like a glossy veneer ready to crack and peel!
Yes. It as if Honesty is the tune that the body can dance to, the music that reawakens it. No judgement, no perfection…that is not what the body is asking for…just plain, simple, glorious and deeply-healing Honesty.
And how well the body can respond when we are honest with it! – it’s a relationship that is healthy in itself – no wonder then it supports true health.
Thanks Rachel, I love what you’ve shared and particularly your early comment about what being ‘healthy’ would mean to you… ‘it meant I would be very robust and tough, able to withstand anything that life threw at me – a sort of Superwoman-like capacity to handle life and its physical challenges.’
This is the version of health I see most subscribe to… and is the reason we hold up athletes, gym-junkies, everest-climbing moutaineers – our strongest and fittest basically, as those to aspire to. So great to read such a clear account of this being broken down, and to gain a sense of what being truly healthy is like.
It is amazing how we pursue healthy options only to find that they actually cause damage to our bodies. So many food manufacturers are using healthy-sounding words whilst producing food and drink full of chemicals and toxins we really don’t need to be consuming. Fizzy drinks manufacturers sponsor sporting events to make themselves look like they support good health and all the while the sugar in their products can lead to diabetes. Knowing that, they have introduced sugar-free drinks – but what are the chemicals we are taking in instead of the sugar? It doesn’t make sense when water is all we need to hydrate ourselves.
Yes Gill I used to subscribe to the ‘everything in moderation’ philosophy as well but then realised with deepening awareness that some things are just simply not good for me, no matter how minute the dosage.
There is a strong belief out there that health is all about achieving a perfect physical body free from any ailments, but as I have experienced as well, it is much more about the quality of that connection with our inner essence and how we live that every day. This is true health, and it is possible to therefore live very healthy and vital, but still have physical conditions affecting the body.
Feeling into our body is like looking into the mirror to truly see what is going on in our lives. Why aren’t we then willing to see the full picture and are trying to stage a masquerade for ourselves wanting to see an ideal version of ourselves instead of the real deal?
Gill thank you, I also can say yes to “viewing illness as a way of healing” because it is just that. Not to be feared but lovingly accepting it all, as our way to return to who we truly are.
It is a wonderful thing to change our relationship with illness from just wanting relief from symptoms, but enquiring deeper as to what choices may have contributed to the manifestation of the ill health.
In trying to achieve this holy grail state of optimal health, we batter ourselves with comparison with others who might be better off in some respect. I feel that there is an acceptance of where we’re at when honesty kicks in and from there we can build true health.
Totally agree with you Jinya. Without honesty, there can be no true health. Because the foundation of true health is a totally open dialogue with and from your body.
Health is living the true me with understanding, acceptance of the moments I don’t yet choose this and playfulness every minute of the day. I love what you write Rachel about being “a human being willing to look within, to the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon – the day I came home”. As you I too came home the first day of meeting Serge, this remarkable, gracious and glorious man I call my brother.
“The other aspect of Serge that inspired and continues to inspire me is his capacity for service to humanity, the like of which is beyond anything I have ever seen in another human being. What I started to feel was the quality of a life lived from the innermost essence – its beauty, grace and absolute commitment.” These words are a true tribute to the absolute commitment, beauty and grace I feel in Serge Benhayon. Thank you Rachel.
“…my body became my enemy, a dysfunctional mass of tissues, deeply flawed and wrong at its most fundamental level. In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.” This is so sad Rachel but all too common that we battle against illness and disease and we end up seeing ourselves as the enemy. Thank you for sharing your experience of rediscovering your inner light and redefining what health means for you. My definition of health is changing, but it does not relate to my weight, strength or body fat percentage – it is now about how I feel.
I felt this quote to be very powerful too Lee. In more sensitive moments I feel my light and that I am suppressing it or fighting it. How strange, simply a light that emanates love… what is there to be afraid of or seek to dull? Yet life has told me as many others that it is wrong, disruptive, naughty or too bold or selfish to express all of who I am. So I learned many ways to suppress it. It became a battle and I’ m with Rachel, I am over waging that war.
Thank you Rachel for posing this great question and all the importance of true health in our lives. Listening to our bodies and living from there is our only true way of living, for it is all knowing and speaks to us constantly with messages for us to listen to. This must come first before anything else, as life and all that is happening around us is all part of our living and how we deal with this is or health. Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine are amazing at bringing true awareness and light on what is going on and that the way we live is our true medicine and healing and that Conventional Medicine is needed also and they work hand in hand.
Many times in my own life I have noticed after a fundamental change or realisation I can feel ‘unwell’. I have noticed this with others too. Symptoms, such as aches and pains, coughs, temperature, streaming eyes and skin eruptions to name a few, often come just after and disappear within days leaving me clearer and more vital than ever before. My body seems to actively kick start a cleansing of the old and prepares for life with my new level of awareness. This cycle alone shows that ‘Health’ is definitely not invincibility to symptoms that we have thought it is – symptoms are by-products of what has gone on before and are part of our healing.
‘But how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is? To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.’ The body is definitely the marker of all truth and it is from our bodies that we can learn all we need to know in life.
Gill, many justify what they do and how they treat the body by saying “everything in moderation” or ‘a little bit will not hurt me” and I have to admit that I have done that in the past. What a trick that is to over ride what the body is telling us! Like you, now that I can feel more in my body, “I understand that true health is about every choice I make every day. It’s an unfolding journey.”
As you say Rachel…the real illness is what takes us away from who we truly are. When we are connected to ourselves, we are connected to our bodies, and then any little dis-ease, disharmony, is immediately felt and attended to in whatever way is needed thus preventing an illness from establishing – unless the body really needs to clear itself of any previous wayward living.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that”
Thank you Rachel for sharing your experiences, as you deepened your understanding of what is true health, and for sharing your wisdom. A very beautiful and inspiring blog to read.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”-
So beautifully claimed Rachel. By listening to our bodies we can connect to our innermost wisdom giving us great awareness into how we are living.
I keep coming back to this line as well. The simplicity of what true health means, if applied, will change the world.
Here here David – no longer will humanity be searching for the cure or chasing the idea of perfection in health as we will understand that true health is about being responsible for our choices and living in connection with all we truly are.
Yes I was completely oblivious to what is truly needed to look after yourself and to have True Health. Serge Benhayon has been a solid rock that has shared his way of living and once I started to bring in the self-responsibility of my own self-care and self-love did I see the importance of it.
Me too. Until I met Serge Benhayon I thought I did look after myself – because I never ended up at the doctors so I must surely have been looking after myself. All of that has changed so dramatically – way, way too much to say for this small comment box – but it can be summed up in the simple understanding that the body is not solely about function; it is the quality of the function that defines the life I have. That is the bit that I was missing out!
Rachel I can really feel the love with asking whether health is ‘found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?’ This is a way of living that isn’t about bettering ourselves or comparing ourselves to others but listening to the wisdom of our bodies and this wisdom being in connection and consideration of everyone and the universe.
True Health is something being shown to the world by Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine with the harmony joy and stillness inside our bodies claiming our natural divinity simply in our loving livingness everyday. Thank you Rachel for this great sharing and the simplicity of how our true well being can be.
‘For most of my life health was something that I pursued, thinking that I did not have it.’ I can really relate to this. In the past searching for health outside of myself instead of the absolute obvious and that it is in fact within and linked with how I lived (cared for myself or not). However Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine not only helped me to see the obvious but gave me the practical tools so I can re-connect to the innate essence within.
What is clear is that the understanding of health varies from person to person around the world. But is there a single meaning that encapsulates the whole truth? I feel that it isn’t about something we do, but how we perceive life. When our minds are cluttered with ill beliefs, they will dictate our actions and thus result in physical ills. True mind = true body = true health.
What I called true health in the past would have been having a body that I could do what I wanted with, that would not stop me when I pushed it and would let me be in as much disregard as I wanted to be. Today however my understanding of true health is very different to this – it means how I feel in my body, do I feel at ease and in harmony or tight and caught up? As others have shared, this then means taking care of the way I live in everything, for the areas of my life I don’t take care of are unhealthy. What a different way of looking at health I have now compared to the past. Yet in the past I would have said I knew what health was.
True health is something we can all work towards as it is a natural harmonious state that our bodies are designed to be in. I’m finding returning towards this harmony means taking into consideration every aspect – not just the usual choices around food, drink, or exercise, but to know that every choice of what I accept and don’t accept, is going to have an affect on my body and thus the health (or not) that I experience.
What a great question Rachel “What is True Health” Many of us consider ourselves healthy if we do not have an illness of any sort. I feel true health is when we are totally present in our bodies, are living with joy, love, harmony and expressing in full. Not so sure I have mastered true health as yet!!!!
And I would add honesty to that list Mary-Louise. I can feel more and more that if I am honest with my body then that is the first step, and perhaps the cornerstone, of true health. And this is definitely something I am yet to master!!!
I agree Mary-Louise, it’s like we deem ourselves healthy by measuring the idea of health against another who is very ill or unwell. If we are not bed ridden and can take ourselves to the toilet then we must be doing good..right? Wrong! Health has a depth to it that I am only just discovering and Rachel’s article is a milestone in this unfoldment.
A huge part of true health is true expression. If we all exist in a big pool of energy, then what we express will return to us like ripples. Therefore by making sure we express love and truth in all we do we can be the recipients of the lovefull path that is laid before us.
Beautiful Rachel to reread and enjoy all you offer, inspired by Serge Benhayon and known deeply inside us all. True health is our rightful way of being if we choose it and live it every day as our way of being. Full presence and love which we innately are. With appreciation as the key.
I feel that many people, in their attempts to be ‘heathy’, allow the body to become the ‘enemy’ without truly appreciating themselves or their body in this process.
Great point Peter it is easy to see the body as the enemy when all it is doing is showing us that the way we are living is not loving supportive or caring. I know i have seen my body as something to conquer, to fight and improve, a functioning body that I would get frustrated with when it broke down. Learning to appreciate my body has been a slow process but I am no longer critical or self deprecating as i know how harming this is to the body.
Yes Peter, it is as if they have nothing to do with their body. Some of the elder people I work with are treating the body as a machine, it should function otherwise please put in a new mechanism for what ever is not functioning. This notion is putting an immense pressure on the healthcare service as well.
Peter that’s a great point and something I’d not really looked at,yet when I see the many people going to the gym or on erratic diets they are certainly fighting against themselves. The competition is inside, so instead of lovingly being healthy they are fighting and pushing to get the body to a state we feel is our definition of how we want to be. No wonder that has not worked.
Indeed when we invest in certain rules and pictures of what health or well-being is, we may be just imposing further and overriding what our bodies really need for harmony and true health.
Such a great observation, the body even becomes the enemy when it gets flabby, or wrinkled!
Your title Rachel is exactly what Serge Benhayon is presenting to the world today.
We all have our ideals and beliefs about what True Health is but how can we truly know if we do not live True Health in every way every single day and remain consistent. This is where Serge Benhayon comes in and takes the lead. He is a master of True Health and it is this reason why so many of us are now using his teachings to LIVE true health without the need for perfection.
What is brilliant about this man is he is pro medicine and does not dismiss this and for me personally that was the game changer. I got the medical help and then applied the wisdom presented by this incredible teacher and bingo here I am mrs true health and feeling the benefits everyday. No longer being a medical statistic for me is my confirmation that things have changed and thats been 7 years now.
I used to think that I was healthy when comparing myself to colleagues or friends because I very rarely had a sick day. But I deluded myself. Until I came across the teachings of Universal Medicine I did not realise how much I had abused my body by overriding its signals to stop, care and attend to it. I had this belief, inherited from my family, that I had to soldier on no matter what. Sickness was for the weak. In my senior years I am learning to listen to this wonderful body that has carried me so far and giving it the attention and love that for so long I denied it.
True health for me is how I am feeling the way I am today and know that this is all down to the choice that I make on a daily basis. It is absolutely a learning game and I have come to realise that it never stays still in one place. Things change and what was feeling great and supportive to my body and health can become not great for me. Bring my consistent awareness to my health and wellbeing along with every choice that I make is the only way forward. This is True Responsibility for ones health and it feels super empowering.
Beautifully said Natalie, taking “True Responsibility for ones own health is super empowering”. We might as a general consensus, think of taking responsibility for our own health as making choices about treatments, physicians etc., but the true empowerment comes with the moment by moment choices we make about what we will and will not accept into our bodies.
We are indeed our own masters of our bodies and with the help of other health professionals we can take responsibility for our own health and choices.
“. . . how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is? To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living”. This is Gold Rachel. If we allow the body to speak to us without judging any feeling or illness to be good or bad but merely accepting what is there to be felt, as a reflection of our choices, then true healing is possible.
I feel that true health is also a part of illness. When we get ill, if we embrace the opportunity in full to look at the way we have been living, it gives us a chance to make choices of another quality. True health is a relationship with ourselves.
The concept of a relationship with yourself as part of a healthy life is something that could have books written about it, how to support yourself in listening to your body, how to be tender with yourself, how to let go of that that does not support you…
I loved reading your sharing Rachel. What a blessing to read this. A lot of things you share resonate in me deeply like “the war against me” or when you talk about Serge and his commitment to serve humanity. Serge is such a wonderful role model for living a life with such a high integrity, harmony and love.
I honestly did not have any idea about what True Health is until I meet Serge Benhayon. Now I fully understand and totally agree that True Health is in my hands and it is every single choice that I make every nano second of every day that will have an impact on my health and well being. I know when I am open, loving, honest, not holding back or compromising in what I need to express in any way shape or form, I feel extremely healthy, vital and full of much joy. This I know, I have felt this and when I am not this I can trace back to what I have done which is taking me away from feeling this incredible.
Rachel just like you, the way Serge Benhayon is treating is body with the utmost care but without perfection has touched me deeply from day one I have met him. You have described it beautifully and I can feel the words more than I read them ‘the way he put on gloves and warm scarf in cool weather with such tenderness and such a deep level of care for himself’
I have felt the same Annelies, and Sara Williams and the way she cares for her body has been an enormously deeply loving reflection that I have come to really appreciate. It is so inspiring to have role models such as these.
What a great question Rachel and one that the entire health profession need question and look into with fresh eyes. “What is True Health?” ….and What are we working towards? What purpose is there in our treatments? And what more is at play if this treatment is not as effective? Inquiry is a healthy activity in itself, and done with an open heart and mind will bring great changes all round.
Well said rosannabianchini and I fully agree that the health profession need to ask that question about what is True Care. The problem is that we cannot come up with a true answer if everyone is in the same boat and not living the essence of true care in his or her own life. Luckily we have true role models in the world like Serge Benhayon to reflect what true care is all about..
very true Elizabeth..and the amazing body of carers we now have, who’ve understood from him what it takes of oneself to be able to truly care for others with love and responsibility.
The search for a perfect body takes many forms (low fat, muscles, tan…), and the term “healthy” has seemingly become simply about a lack of illness. But there is another twist, if someone has an illness, but it doesn’t debilitate them (e.g. low blood pressure) is that still considered healthy? Many would say yes… And so the word healthy has been turned inside out and upside down. Asking what is “true health” is a great starting point to re-establishing a truly joyful life.
That’s lovely Sally, a drop of self love goes a long way so to speak. Our own loving participation is fundamental to our health – and our way of self love contributes to the well-being of others too.
Rachel, you have given us some powerful revelations about true health being us in connection to who we are and not the attainment of physical perfection and also the way that illness and disease is a healing as they give us an opportunity for us to stop and reassess our lifestyle choices in order to bring harmony back into our bodies, thank you.
So true Susan. Health now means a whole lot more than just the physical. It’s mental, emotional, relational, financial, vocational and ultimately about energy. Are we living in an energy that is conducive to being healthy in all these ways?
Great description Susan, I now firmly believe that our emotional health has an impact that should be considered, as much if not more than the health we attain through food and exercise. So my outlook and demeanour have as much impact on how I feel in my body and thus my true health as anything I eat or my exercise programme. But further my demeanour will of course determine to a large extent how well I eat and how much quality I bring to exercise too.
Rachel, the answer to your question “So what then is health?” is Gold and should be taught to all children from young. If we were all raised with the awareness that true health is “as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that”, the rates of illness and disease would dramatically decrease.
Yes Anne that’s true and the day will come when it is taught in school and everyday life.
It sure would decrease indeed Anne and it is a crucial stage of our up bringing that is being missed. For know it is about us all focusing on True Health and playing the catch up game for many generations and to share this with our young. What would be also wise is to allow the children to show us how it is done and let them be who they naturally are without imposing on them. As we all do know how to care for ourselves we have just allowed the ‘way it should be done’ by how others think it should be. Or simply just ignored caring for ourselves and been in complete neglect. Until I met Serge Benhayon I was in this place. Needless to say once I started to make loving choices my health has improved ten fold.
Yes it should be taught to all children, to understand what health is and what detracts from it is a huge insight into living life. I too have been caught up in the ideals and beliefs of what being healthy meant. I was raised in a very intense world with a parent who was determined to provide me with the most vitamins possible and raw food. Although this came from her sense of what was needed, I never felt good from it, I felt very overwhelmed. A certain harshness came with it, and there was never any connection to what the body needed, as neither of us understood it.
Anne indeed it will, as children grow up with that awareness to make loving choices for them selves, then there will be less illness and disease. It is only matter of time when it is taught in schools and lived in everyday life.
I agree Anne and this is the key. The more we realise we have everything within the less we will seek outer influences and strive for perfection whether it be physicality, looks or spirituality. Knowing the abundance and depths of love we have within is a game changer.
Lovely Rachel, thank you. The idea that honest self love is essential for true health is quite foreign to many people. I certainly didn’t have a broad understanding of what health truly meant until I started to attend Universal Medicine and met Serge Benhayon and his family. In all the health books, website and practitioners I consulted no one had talked to me before about my physical body simply being the external symbol of how I was choosing to live my life and that it has its own built in lie detector. I can kid to myself and to others but at the end of the day my body is keeping the scores and will call me to a halt if needs be.
Beautifully written Rachel, indeed it is exactly as you have said it, illness is anything that takes us away from our commitment to ourselves. I love the simplicity and complete dedicated way of living that is behind what you share with us in this blog. This is so gorgeously written, Thank you
This article is so clear, illness is a reminder that we are not committed to our own self care. It can be a gentle reminder, or a real call to stop. I see it as an opportunity to take some ‘time out’ to review how I have been living.
This is ground breaking stuff. The world tends to see illness as something that some are unlucky to get or are predisposed to have genetically, cultural or geographically. Yet here you talk of the level of commitment to ourselves. This is nothing short of a quantum leap in medicine.
True health is all encompassing and not just played out on a physical level as something that just happens to you as so many believe. Living in True health is a magical place to be and accessible by us all. Thank you Rachel for sharing.
Yes, true health goes way beyond the bounds of what we currently deem healthy. There is without doubt a level of awareness and brightness we can live with that is far beyond what is currently considered our normal parameters.
Yes ch1956, I like especially what you say about living true health being a ‘magical place to be and accessible by us all’. You don’t need money or access to first class medical facilities to have this magic. It’s about how we treat ourselves and move through our day which anyone can work on irrespective of circumstance. It is priceless way to live but worth an absolute fortune.
It’s interesting that top athletes still suffer a great deal of illness. True health is not trying to be really healthy to avoid being sick. It’s having a conscious relationship with your body that is constantly aware of how it is feeling.
Good point Jinya, I recently went to a seminar and one of the speakers said up to 75% of top level athletes use pain relievers daily, injuries and strains all a part of how hard they push themselves. Yet they do it for what purpose? I would have thought that pushing themselves too hard would be known to be counterproductive?
I agree Felicity, I heard even stronger numbers – all athletes bar a few swimmers and cyclists are either injured or need medication for an illness.
It sure is counterproductive and having also seen a presentation recently on what can occur behind the scenes with athletes recently I was shocked at the amount of bruises and injuries that occur as part of the course. No wondered these athletes live off painkillers.
It is a great point Jinya as we hold athletes in high esteem as pinnacles of what our bodies can do and assume they must be in great health. We train our bodies in the gyms to look like and emulate them, yet when we take closer look past all the show, we see they do not have it all and their bodies are suffering as a result of the excessive stress and strain they put on them. It is amazing how much we can be fooled when we only look at one area or aspect of somebody’s life.
Great points you share here Jinya Mizuno, our bodies are our living expressing vehicles and deserve our focused time and love.
Jinya a great point you make, true health is about having a relationship with our body on how it is feeling, and to make loving choices that support it, it is not about eliminating illness and just trying to be really healthy to avoid being sick.
Great point Amita. Eliminating illness is the point at which we have lost touch with the feeling of vitality that can be part of our everyday living, if we choose to feed and nurture our bodies in a loving way.
It might seem extreme to say but imagine if taking painkillers was considered drug abuse and that it was banned from all sport, then athletes would only be able to compete within the confines of what their bodies would allow, this would be a great step towards seeing the harm in sport, a harm that for now is brushed under the carpet in the name of glamorous entertainment.
Is it not the craziest thing that sportspeople compete on painkillers, in total and absolute disregard of what their bodies are trying to tell them, and it is considered part and parcel of the sport. I have to say I don’t think it is extreme at all if it was considered drug abuse. Although many of them would probably just compete anyway and bear the pain.
Stephen, this is a great and valid question that you pose here. If this did ever happen it would change the face of sport as we know it in every way, and absolutely would take all the glamour and entertainment out of it. It does seem absurd and so contradictory of what they are supposedly promoting (great health) that athletes need to be dosed up with pain killers in order to do what they are being paid vast amounts of money to do. And then also being ‘role models’ for the younger generations to be like them…fit, healthy and earning lots of money. But maybe not so fit after all. Hmmm, this doesn’t quite add up.
There are so many aspects of sport that are championed as being healthy and good for us, but are anything but. We could look at the childish behaviour of many sports stars as they compete and the many surly and petty interviews they give when they lose and use this as an example of how sport does not actually build character but provokes something quite vile instead. If we were not so accepting of this behaviour but instead called it out as the immature tantrums that they are then we would give everyone a fresh perspective on what sport really is, and what it really creates.
Great point Stephen and this could be extended to everyone not just sports stars. If we took away painkillers and all pharmaceuticals over night we would get a real sense of our overall health as a race of beings. As it is these are propping us up and masking the true state of our health and allowing us to live in denial of this fact.
Brilliant comment, Stephen – and it can apply in other situations too – when people take painkillers for a twinge in their back so they can continue working, there is always a risk of further injury and weeks off work as a result. I agree, that can be abuse, because they are numbing our body’s natural signalling system from telling us that all is not well and something needs attention.
It would be very interesting to see. We would see a lot more injuries because sportsmen would not be able to hide their pain. It would unmask the abuse that they put their bodies under to perform all for the sake of, as you say, ‘glamorous entertainment’.
Wow! You’ve kicked a goal here Stephen, lovingly so of course with no bodies harmed in the process. I had never thought about this before but it makes sense. We make such a fuss about horse racing and other animals in competitive sports being hurt for entertainment or gambling but what about our own brothers! There is even more harm going on as they strive for recognition at all costs making decisions to comprise their bodies constantly and then taking pharmaceutical drugs to cover up the pain of their drive. Humanity has much to re-learn about self-love.
Yes, I was just considering how health and physical ‘fitness’ are intertwined, yet many althelets I see treat their bodies like machines – maintained not through a loving connection, but through what is required of the body to achieve an end result – a gold medal perhaps. I love how Rachel describes health is ‘Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves,’ which is what I see promoted all around us in sport, and sport being synonymous with health.
I love this definition of health. The absence of disease is such a narrow definition. Redefining health as a relationship that changes as we change and grow is refreshing.
Yes, so agree Lee Poole, health is when we realize ourselves as part of the universe and expand with it. When we see that my body particles are your body particles and they are all universal particles. Trying to separate from that is not only ridiculous, it is impossible.
That’s a very elegant way to present what is clearly true Jinya.
Loving ourselves is the best medicine and support that we will ever find.
“Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?” I love this view of what true health is, and this makes it an experience and a journey, not some magical endpoint to achieve. For me personally, I continue to explore what true health is and my definition seems to change and expand almost daily as I look at different aspects of my life.
Sickness is a necessary part of healing. It is the consequence of the separation from soul. As much of a blessing sickness is, it is still difficult to go through and then physically heal from, depending on the type of sickness of course.
When you say that the pursuit of ‘perfect health’ made you enter into a war against yourself with all the strange and bizarre techniques and remedies that are hawked, I couldn’t agree more – none of these notions actually take the body into account but let the mind dictate what the body will have to submit to next.
Isn’t that a terrible truth Gabriele. Our body gets marched from pillar to post, given this and that, submitted to this and that to satisfy what we think it should be. It is war, a war with self and with the honesty that our body brings.
Thank you Rachel for sharing your return to true health. I love this definition ‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’
This blog and discussion has highlighted once again for me the preciousness of the Human Body as a home and holder of the essence of who we are. Everything chosen by us this time round in a world that is offering in very moment the chance to reflect, deepen, hold and heal whatever is there to be known. To be in the absolute stillness when in relationship with who we are and live the tenderness, fragility and Magic is ‘Heaven on earth’ in every moment Yes, our body communicates love to us in every moment – time to listen and follow instruction. Thanks Rachel for providing the avenue for this knowingness to unfold.
What you have shared here is deeply profound Rachel Mascord. Not only have you dismantled false ideals of perfectionism around what ‘true health’ and a truly healthy relationship with one’s own health and wellbeing can be, but you have done so from the true living science of your own body. Your own experience paves the way – and a real and loving way it is – for all to follow. Come ‘wellness’, come ‘illness’… our relationship with our health on all levels comes down to the choices we make, the attitude we take…
And I would say that you’ve nailed on the head completely, the key to having such a real and powerful relationship with oneself – that being our reconnection to the true essence of who we are, as you found reignited in your meeting with Serge Benhayon. As always, brilliant.
Beautifully said Rachel thank you. Indeed the real illness is in the choices that take us away from who we truly are. Committing to deepening the love we can make every choice from is most certainly the best medicine.
“But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness”. We need to be looking at illness in a different way. As you say Rachel, the sicknesses are not the issue but it is what we have allowed the body to take on and why, which is the real issue. It is a whole different way of thinking about health and only when we start looking at health in this way will the level of diseases and illnesses drop- being self responsible for our health!
I agree Gill that; “Seeing sickness as a sign of where we are at is a completely refreshing view of using illness to return to true health.”. It is certainly going against what is considered normal but it something I am now so aware of, and when I do get sick I always ask myself the question “how did I get to this place?” . I have found that the process of answering the question is always very revelatory.
Simple yes for sure, “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” This acceptance could occur over night but often takes years to develop and maintain (personal experience) and that is okay because health is about our whole life, not just when we think we need to consider it in the short term. I have found practising living in this way, supporting my innate essence to be deeply supportive, as you say not in perfection, with commitment true health is developed.
Do we listen, or try to squeeze our bodies into a box, to tick off being ‘healthy’. Thank you Rachel for a true definition of health – one that is to be adopted across the world. Like you say, health is not the final goal, it is the willingness to have an ongoing relationship with our bodies, and to refine how we live, so we may live unimposing upon it, and instead live in harmony, with us and with all.
This is a lovely blog Rachel; you have shown us the immense difference between fighting against one’s ill health, and accepting that your body requires healing with tender loving care. To me health is like life, the thing that makes the most difference is my attitude towards it.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” I seem to have a quiet chuckle when I read the words ‘as simple as’. Because yes I agree health is that, and it is simple, yet the difference for me from what I used to think health was is PROFOUND. It is like changing from mono to colour or from flat to 3D. Once you get a taste, you start to get a sense that what you thought was it was far far far from the real thing.
What is true health is such an important subject so relevant to us all.Beautifully explained and shown to us all Rachel so lovingly, thank you. True health comes from our livingness of who we are in full, in connection to our innermost. If only we were all taught this simplicity and truth – how different the world would be.
So Rachel, how we live our daily life is the medicine for our health. It can be good or bad medicine depending on our choices in regards of lifestyle, food, relationships, work etc. Only we can explore this and be the master of it. And our body reflects it all.
Such a wise definition of true health, Rachel: “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” I love it. Thank you for the clarity and simplicity in this definition.
I was reflecting that today, after all the support of Universal Medicine, I see true health and living me, being me and accepting me. Yet before hand my definition of true health was not being sick. This shows me how much the world could benefit from a one unified understanding of health and with that the answer to living truly healthy. Something we all so desperately want yet is naturally within us all.
That is an awesome consideration, David – count me in: a one unified understanding of health for all of us. As you say, for many there is unity in the belief that health means not being sick or not suffering from a terminal illness; for others it means super sport based fitness, which does not grant any immunity from illness. All of us in connection with our innate and natural selves, and with all others in the same manner….yes…that would be absolutely evolutionary. I was about to ask, “When do we start?” but I realise we already have started by choosing to heal with the support of Universal Medicine 🙂
I so relate to falling for this misconception, that health is a box to be ticked when we get there. so that we can then resume what we were doing that got us there in the first place! Yeuk! Illogical…..”… an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves.” We really do play some mind games with ourselves and have some irrational misconceptions about health and our relationship with our body.
Rachel, I find it fascinating how we, as you describe, so often accompany our search for health with a huge dosage of self loathing for our physical body, seeing it as imperfect, flawed, corrupted, always having something wrong with it. I find that so strange. Perhaps this stems from our choice not to read and understand accurately the messages that our body offers us constantly and consistently about how our thoughts and actions are affecting it, and all those around us? Perhaps we don’t like, at least initially, the incredibly honest reflection of our life that our body so honestly shares with us?
Wow this is so very cool to read this article and to have a Dr like yourself Rachel share what is True Health. With your vast experience and years of seeing your patients holds strong a view and understanding of what is truly going on and with your lived experience what is possible. This is Gold.
This totally redefines the meaning, and the LIFE of that word. It shifts the paradigm for anyone who wishes to feel the undeniable power of what you have shared Dr. Rachel Mascord.
Amazing.
Such a big subject, health, in relation to exercise many people I hear consider it healthy to have sore muscles from working out, yet that doesn’t seem to fit with true health, where our bodies are in balance and harmony. Is it another example of a false picture of what health involves, pushing our bodies to be something rather than accepting ourselves and exercising more gently.
The teachings of Serge Benhayon have provided us with a different perspective on true health so that instead of comparing ourselves to others who are in worse health than ourselves, we can look to how our own bodies are feeling – are they operating in true harmony? If we were in true health, there would simply be no aches and pains at all, and everything that hurts or is not functioning correctly is simply a reflection of our past choices – an amazing feedback system that helps us to learn and evolve.
Rachel, I re-visited your blog today and just wanted to say thank you. I found there to be much wisdom and love within your expression and value the possibility of another perspective of ‘what is health’.
“And more than the teachings that he delivered in word, were the teachings he delivered through the way he lived, the way he moved, the relationships he had with other people,” This is what I found so inspiring by observing Serge Benhayon, as he lives his life with such integrity and equality for all, reflecting what true health is by living it not just preaching it.
Learning that our bodies have a true and clear voice that just needs to be listened to is , as Rachel says, one of the deepest learning experiences that we can have, and has such a profound effect upon the quality of our everyday life.
“the way he moved’ This is something I have observed and am inspired by. Serge Benhayon moves in a way I have seen no other move, and this is simply by observing him walking. He is completely at one with his own body – completely surrendered – everything flows to a natural divine rhythm there is no unrest, anxiousness or anything else in the way.
Wellness and health both feel like words that now mean a level of function to most of us which is a smaller version of what they truly are. Wellness is a fuller version of health which comes from living a full rich life of vitality and joy, not just a life we can live in but even beyond that. It is a quality too. This is what Serge Benhayon has so beautifully shown once again for many.
I could feel how I have taken my ‘health’ for granted on a physical level as I read this your blog. There is an arrogance in this way of being that runs deep. If I were diagnosed tomorrow with a serious illness, I would be shocked at first. I have still a way to go in deepening my ‘exploration’ of what health means for me. Your sharing Rachel has opened me to the exploration and all I can feel is a beckoning and deepening of my relationship with me. Thank you.
Funny to say Bernadette, but it is the same for me. It is as though the blog came from a truth that is beckoning me to go far deeper within myself and be far more embracing of where I am at and cut any aspiration to be something that I am not.
And at the same time embrace ALL that we are Rachel! I am learning that when connected to my body, my expression holds only truth that I can then be with as I make choices about how I will live my life. No false aspirations possible in this space! Thank you
If health is living the truth of who we are, what we have in our world today as a version of health is actually function. It is more about living what we are expected to be, or need to be in order to get the desired outcome. How will function stop dominating us and true health start being our barometer and compass for life? It would first take a lot of honesty and then tons of responsibility – none of which will happen overnight. As I am finding, it is a work in progress with much patience, understanding and acceptance.
Yes a work in progress. If health is “living the truth of who we are”, then the degree of ill health that passes through the GP surgeries and burdens the National Health Service is reflecting to us that, on the whole, we aren’t living who we are. I know from my own experience what it feels like to be consistently ill, but I also know the health and vitality that came when I began to enquire more deeply – into the truth of me that I’d started to connect to within my own body. Our bodies can be the wisest physicians if we care to pay a visit.
Good point – health has been turned into something that allows us to function and fit in seamlessly into what everybody else things health is, a kind of super functioning state that actually equals a war against the body and the denial of what it continually communicates.
Being healthy often focusses on the foods we eat, yet there is great health in the way we move, how we express and how we relate to other people. If we consider every act we undertake as a marker of our health choices then we have a much fuller picture of what it means to be truly healthy.
Yes Stephen, when we only focus on our food when we consider our health, then we are falling short of what a healthy live in truth comprises. As you say Stephen, everything we do in life, how we move, express ourselves, what and how we eat, how we relate to other people, how we appreciate and go about with ourselves during the day, everything does have an influence on our health and adds to our feeling of being healthy or not.
Rachel, I enjoy how you playfully expose our notion of health and then throw light on what true health is: ‘Is it as simple as living all of who I am…?’ Could it be then that there is already a state of Health within that the body knows and any dis-ease is a signal that we have allowed something in that throws us out of balance? If we let go of whatever is obstructing or restricting that harmonious balance we heal ourselves by returning to the original state where we are just being ourselves. As you say: ‘the real illness’ is ‘the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am.’
The Health industry is vast and wide and full of many conflicting opinions and research. I love your definition “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”
Nicole it’s alarming that the definition of health, let alone true health, is so different from person to person. We seek health yet we haven’t an universal understanding of what this means. No wonder our healthcare system is on the brink of collapse.
Well said David, we see health industries pitted against each other with competition and fighting and sabotage – What would be possible if they all united and worked together – the current statistics show that we are living with chronic health issues, so there is no shortage of work in this area.
Good point David how can all the areas speak a common language when there isn’t even an agreement on what health is? It seems to be subjective or a moveable line.
Good point David, imagine what would be possible if they all agreed and worked together to deal with the Health crisis? Health seems to be so subjective – what is the baseline for function and what is the baseline for living a vital life.
Very little research encompasses what health is Nicole. The dollars are poured into disease, and so health becomes a sort of lucky default position of “not disease”. Wow – are we selling ourselves short.
How crazy has the system become? There are so many things going on in our bodies – So are we basically living in a society that says if you don’t have a disease yet you are healthy?
This blog speaks columns, I can so relate to what is said here. What jumped out was “In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.” I felt like this most of my life. The constant perusal for a ‘perfectly healthy body’ with the impossible out come, and I too have surrendered to my body and all that it teaches me, and stepped away from the wheel. Thank you Rachel, and thank you Serge Benhayon.
“My sicknesses have become a blessing, not to be judged, eliminated so that I can just get on with it, or indulged for attention. …. I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” I am finding it is such a massive shift in my understanding of true health since I have embraced this attitude of sickness.
Thank you Rachel for this inspirational writing on health and what is true. True health comes from our way of living in every aspect and this is something reflected to us all inspiringly by Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine.
Being and living who we really are in connection with our innermost essence brings a harmony and flow with in us and everything else that is not from here is simply not true health. This is an amazing inspiration for us all and is being shown by so many that it is the true way and that this is possible for everyone equally.
Health for me was always associated with the food I ate, exercise and rest, but Rachel you have demonstrated that it is so much more and my original notion of health firstly doesn’t consider my body’s requirements first and my willingness to listen and connect to the all that I am.
I am realising that in the end True Health is the surrendering to the one and only energy that we’re coming from, the energy of Our Soul. And in surrendering to this energy, whatever is needed to heal ourselves or support others to heal themselves is taken care of. In the knowing that we are guided and surrounded by a Love so big that is almost incomprehensible to us as Human Beings.
Beautifully expressed, Floris. True Health is a continual process as we deepen our re-connection with our Soul. As we do so, so that which is not harmonious with our true being is discarded and is often experienced as ‘sickess’, which as Rachel says, we come to perceive as a blessing.
I have observed over the years some very ill people working very very hard to ‘beat’ their cancer, or other health condition, and diligently following many of the extreme alternative therapies sometimes in addition to western treatment regimes, but the energy in which they were pursuing this goal seemed to be equally detrimental. Sometimes there was an immense drive behind beating their illness, often with anger, desperation, frustration, and rage against this perceived unjust situation, or a desire to win, seeing death as losing the battle. It felt exhausting and it took its toll on both the patient and their carers.
Universal Medicine presentations of working to understand our choices that led to the ill-conditions and healing what was underlying those choices, whilst at the same time supporting the body through all the treatment necessary brings are far deeper healing than anything I had previously encountered. And it is not just for extreme illness, but rather something we can apply to our everyday. Western Medicine is great, but to truly benefit from its wisdom and skill we need also to do our part in supporting and nourishing the body and in healing the hurt and protection that we hold that influences all the choices we make.
Yes Annie, people trying to ‘beat cancer’ are often perpetuating the same habits of self disregard that may have contributed to the cancer in the first place.
What you share here Annie; it is all about taking responsibility and developing my relationship with myself and my choices at every level. Simple and profound at the same time; it is not so easy to do consistently, however to understand this is the key to our true freedom.
Annie, on reading your comment it prompts me to recall folk I have met and I have found that very few people in the wider community understand the responsibility that is theirs when dealing with illness and disease, and prefer it seems to choose the route of blaming parental genetics often for their supposed plight, and as you say “…we need also to do our part in supporting and nourishing the body and in healing the hurt and protection that we hold that influences all the choices we make.”
One has to wonder at what point will the majority of the population find and accept they actually have a part to play in their specific ‘predicament’ of illness or disease. I thank God that we have been shown there is another way as presented by Serge Benhayon sharing the Ageless Wisdom Teachings, and with humility and understanding we are able to see honestly our own role in whatever is our illness and disease.
A wonderful definition of health Rachel, ‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that? Because out of that we can grow, and truly live and learn all we need to about how amazing we are.
True Jenny. And what we call ill health (all of the illnesses and diseases) is placed in a context that makes sense to how we have been living. Without this view we are lost in a world of accidents and randomness. When illness is reduced to bad luck or an unhappy genetic combination we miss such rich opportunities to discover who we are.
This is so true Jenny. Our illnesses and diseases are placed within a very different context when we begin to understand who we truly are. They begin to make sense in the light of how we live and how we have lived.
In this era we are held under a spell that our conditions are born from randomness, accident and bad luck. This blinds us to the possibility of deeper understanding of our choices and getting to know who we are in truth, how delicate and how amazing.
Beautifully said Rachel and Jenny. And evidenced by the fact of having known people in what would be described as a horrendous ‘state of health’. People totally in the Grace of their being and an absolute blessing to be with, for their depth of acceptance as to the ‘why’ of what’s going on in their bodies, and their absolute knowing that it is our connection to who we are that is the true foundation that underpins everything. ‘Come what may’ in the body, but we are either with God and our innate divinity, or not – and as you’ve shared, this is the key to true health.
I would say true health is definitely about “living all of who we are , from our essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”. When we commit to self, the loving choices we make, in how we sleep, eat and take care of ourselves, how we appreciate and accept ourself and have no drive for perfection. Then the body is getting the best healing it requires, we are then living from our true essences.
So much of the time we have made health about a struggle and a fight to get to this point, but there is actually no struggle at all and there is no point to get to, as we constantly evolve and grow and at times need to discard what is no longer needed, through our bodies. Our bodies have a natural vitality and harmonious rhythm if, through the way we live, we allow it to find this balance.
Rachel, I love how you have exposed the modern version of health being one of a battle against the body: the need to be perfect and the need to have a body that is a certain way, rough and tough and able to withstand so much onslaught. The body is seen as ‘too sensitive’ if a person has to rug up or put on a few more layers that other people would not need. It is crazy how we have allowed this. But I love how you turn this all around when you talk about true health not being something that seeks perfection, rather it is about us simply living all that we are, and in this, the body has permission to discard that which needs discarding and also gets permission to flourish and bloom.
This notion that health brings a ruggedness that makes us invulnerable to life is a hard one to overcome. Sensitivity, that really is an innate quality of a human body, is portrayed as a weakness. To be able to overcome it is the pinnacle of health – wearing T-shirts and shorts and thongs in cold weather becomes a victory sign. But what have we won?…other than more detachment from our beautiful and often challenging sensitivity and awareness.
I agree, Rachel: the image of the rough and tough, rugged, resilient, can do anything ‘healthy’ person is persistently portrayed through all media as the ideal of health. Outside of Universal Medicine, I don’t know that I have observed anyone advocating for the exquisite sensitivity and tenderness of the human body as qualities to be encouraged and honoured. Quite the opposite – we are encouraged to override our sensitivity in favour of physical, mental and emotional resilience.
There was a time when I prided myself in being able to go running on the bitumen roads barefoot. I thought I was tough and strong and capable – in fact, I thought I was finally ‘growing up’ because I could be more tough! How crazy is this? Thank goodness I have now moved on from this idea of growing up – and now I understand that my detachment from the body does not actually serve any other agenda than self-abuse essentially. And I get to understand that my sensitivity is not a weakness, but rather something to be treasured as it is my connection to my body and hence my true ‘growing up’ each time that I honour that.
I agree Coleen, I have never observed anyone advocating the development of our sensitivity and tenderness beyond Universal Medicine. Everything I read now is about resilience, coping and overcoming what we are feeling. And Henrietta, I was like you (not barefoot running!) but martially arts that made me so harsh and detached. I looked like a victim of domestic violence at that time, covered in bruises and always injured. I thought this was great at the time. Only now can I question what I gained by that hardness, and more importantly what I lost at that time…that I have since, through dedication regained.
I agree – and I too saw sensitive as weak in the past – but I now know what it is to be truly sensitive and in that – the beauty that comes with it. My body talking loudly to me supporting me to make other choices. What a gift.
Beautifully said Rachel and Colleen, being in touch and embracing our sensitivity and delicateness is often seen as a weakness when it comes to being healthy, I see it all the time at my local gym where men and women totally override the sensitivity of their bodies in order to fit into a mental image of what being healthy is.
Yes Henrietta, the ‘need to be perfect’ fuels this ‘battle against the body’ because the mind tends to think that sickness is ‘bad’ and health is ‘good’ and that sets us up in a momentum of trying to find something to ‘fix’ us when in fact deep down, we are not broken. Symptoms are the body’s way of informing us that we are making poor choices that are affecting it and when we start to listen to the signals we come back into our body and then it can, as you say, ‘discard that which needs discarding’ so it can ‘flourish and bloom’.
Love what you have said Sandra – it’s so true that we tend to see illness as a set back, an issue, a problem, rather than the healing and support it is there to offer us, an opportunity to let go and shed some un-needed stuff and move on. Essentially, illness could be seen as a form of detoxing, and what better means than allowing the body to feel where from it needs to shed the unnecessary energies we can carry?
So true Henrietta,
We battle with our health rather than nurture and care for it.
Living in a constant struggle rather than an effortless flow.
Beautifully expressed Simon, and yes I agree, the flow is key. When there is flow, it’s like things take care of themselves and there is very little we need to do, just a small but here and there to keep the flow going. But the story is completely different when we seek to control things and especially when we go against the natural grain of things – this is the constant struggle. Unfortunately we can also be caught up in believing that this is life – that we are not really living unless we are struggling and working hard. I can say that I have lived by that belief for a long time and am only just beginning to turn that around and realise that it is ok to find things simple, that it is ok to do things effortlessly, that it can be an effortless flow!
Spot on Simon, I have found that it is my willingness and commitment to honour my body that creates this flow where I have been able to discard old ideals and beliefs about health and embrace the connection and constant communication within my body.
And how crazy, to battle with our own inbuilt effortless flow that if embraced immediately puts a stop to the struggle.
Yes I agree Henrietta – that “the modern version of health is a battle against the body” when in fact true health comes from living in tune with the body, listening to its every message and taking steps to act upon them.
Spot on Sandra – listening to the body is the first step and then recognising what is needed as action is the next step. But the final step that completes it all is in the action of what was felt and needed. Words and observations are powerful, but only so with the action to back them up.
“I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” I love this revelation Rachel. It reminds us that ‘that body is indeed the marker of all truth’ and does not let us get away with anything – it loves us ‘to the bone’ and constantly reminds us of what is there to be looked at and healed. When we are connected to who we truly are and we live with that connection in every moment, true health becomes a by-product!
An amazingly wise and respondent marker indeed if only we choose to listen and heed what is constantly revealed.
Seconding that Anne. Rachel has named the true cause of all that may make us ‘unwell’ – our separation from who we truly are. From this, everything that goes on in our bodies can not only be understood, it can be held in the deepest love.
I agree Anne, true health is the by-product of that connection within myself and illness and disease is the result of me living in disconnection to who I truly am and the neglect and abuse that comes from that.
You describe this notion of chasing after a state of perfect health so well, exposing not only the elusiveness of such an ideal but also the entrapment this undertaking brings with it.
Yes trying to be healthy is unhealthy in itself – when we do feel truly healthy the trying doesn’t exist, rather it is replaced with a knowing of what works and what does not work, There is no outcome sought after, the honouring of what we feel our body needs naturally takes care of that.
That is so true Gabriele and Dean, I look around and see many health experts that share the right foods to eat, the right exercise to do, but until we really stop and listen to our own bodies and listen to what it is telling us, and the key is to honour what it is telling you, then and only then will true health begin taking place and we start to nurture this quality of being.
A great point Dean: “trying to be healthy is unhealthy in itself”. I just finished a diploma in diet and nutrition, and it was so interesting to hear about how the bodies of athletes (who we consider to be some of the healthiest people around) actually suffer from what they put themselves through both in regards to their training and also restricting their diet – in an unhealthy way. But because they have the ‘ideal/perfect body’, that is idealised.
What a quantum difference, Dean: to chase an externally designed ideal of health in our heads – and only in our heads – or to feel and to honour what our whole body is communicating through feeling also. One is a dictatorship, the second a harmonious totality. Perhaps the choice for our body depends upon one’s personal sense of politics, then?
I’m with you Gabriele, chasing health is futile. And as you say Dean, when it is replaced by a knowing, we naturally feel what the body needs and respond in kind. True health is the intimate relationship we have with ourselves, not just the food we eat or exercising regularly.
I am finding that my definition of true health is evolving as I do. One of the most recent things I would say is true health is our ability to express our inner feelings.
We only have to look at the average man to see how much we struggle with expressing our feelings – and perhaps our lack of being able to express our feelings is very much linked to the high incidence of male suicide.
I know that sometimes my feelings get so banked up that it’s like being trapped inside a glass bottle, desperately trying to get out but unable to push the cork free.
So true Dean. The constant trying to be healthy leads to chasing the newest super-food or get health fad and continually “doing” things to our bodies, rather than being in our bodies and experiencing true health.
What I love about your comments Dean, regarding men’s health, is that you are looking at the whole man. The reasons for suicide will not be found in a blood test, a genetic test, a blood pressure result….any medical test that reduces a man (or a woman) to a part or a system.
We need to look at that silence that strangles men and crushes their willingness to feel, and the sense that they are little more than material providers for a family.
So many constraints stop us from living who we are. Surely that ought to be our marker of our health.
In your words Rachel Mascord I feel your deep concern and regard for the people in our world who are crushed by the corrupt side of medicine and science.
Dean I can really appreciate how the trying to be healthy isn’t healthy from your comment. Trying feels like an imposition from our mind which, without connection to our body, isn’t going to deliver what our body is communicating.
You are so right Gabriele. The amount of time, money and effort that is exerted to find something that is outside of us, when all we need the simple act of honoring what our body needs and not wants. This is the simple way to be healthy.
I so agree. Looking outside the body leaves us always questioning is this is the answer? Choosing to just honour who we are and how the body feels at any time is a great marker.
The day I came home, and the day I stopped searching to find myself ‘out there’, was the day I met Serge Benhayon. 4 years on my health, my vitality and my commitment to life has taken an 180 degrees turn around. All my relationships have significantly improved as a direct result of the deepening relationship with myself and my body, through attending every year for the past 4 courses and presentations by Serge.
As a society we need to have a definition of what true health is. To have a definition of true health we need people who are living a life that produces true health and then we need to be humble enough to study how these people live that actually produces true health.
Well said Elizabeth, people living in a way that produces true health should be studied. I agree with you that the current medics and other medical specialist must humble themselves to acknowledge that what these people live could be one of the answers for the current increase in rates of illness and disease in humanity worldwide.
Rachel this is such a generous and eye-opening account of your awareness of your health. Your words about the body “To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living” feel so true, and allow me to accept whatever I am feeling with more tender understanding.
My understanding of health has radically changed since I began attending events with Universal Medicine. I used to believe that health was the absence of disease, illness or other symptoms, but I now see it as a quality of energy I live in every day and in connection to myself. It’s something happening on the inside of me that may or may not include physical symptoms. Health for me is now living in a relationship that lovingly confirms all that I am, as opposed to dismissing myself and my qualities, living by beliefs I am not enough, or measuring myself by unreachable ideals.
I often cringe at the disregarding way I used to treat the wonderful gift of this amazing body. My health was something I took for granted and would have been heading for a major fall even though my body, bless it used to cope with everything I used to put it through.
Beautiful understanding and sharing of what is true health Rachel thank you. Before meeting Serge Benhayon and having grown up in a medical family I definitely did not understand what true health was. It is not just function and not having an illness but so so much more. The love and divinity we all are and the harmony and honouring of ourselves and others and living from our essence is the real inspiration and reflection from Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine. This is here for all humanity with simplicity, truth and a consistency all the way in how we live forever evolving back to who we really are.
Beautifully simple and profound, thank you Rachel. – ‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’
It was interesting reading this blog because I never really thought about health, it just wasn’t on my radar. What I thought about in this way was being joyful, since my life had a real absence of it. So I chased through all those alternative modalities looking for joy or happiness. I too have come to discover that looking outside of me brings nothing but the giving away of myself to some external want and true joy, or health comes from within. Learning to look at why my life was empty and truly reconnecting came with the wisdom presented at Universal Medicine and I’m heartily joyful I attended and began to reconnect to truth.
“Somewhere along the way I had developed a sense that it meant I would be very robust and tough, able to withstand anything that life threw at me – a sort of Superwoman-like capacity to handle life and its physical challenges.” I can so relate to this Rachel. Toughing it out is exhausting. Instead, to embrace all of me – with all of my imperfections – is something I am learning to appreciate – something I can work with as then I take responsibility for my own health.
Reading your sharing, so many things are resonating in me, especially your sentence: “a mouse, exhausted on a wheel that takes it nowhere”. I was in this hamster wheel for many years and even today I struggle sometimes to get out of this wheel. True health starts with taking responsibility for my own choices, the rest will unfold.
Learning to embrace illness and disease as the opportunity to see where I have lived far from my true self has been a turning point in my health. No longer is my health just defined by how my physical body is. I now know that true health encompasses every choice I make and everything I live and that my choice to deeply care for and nurture myself are pivotal to being truly ‘healthy.
Great blog Rachel, I re-read this part a few times…” the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness..” It is insightful recognising how choices have the capacity to either confirm or separate from that feeling/connection of the essence of who we are. The dis-ease of disconnection, results in so many ailments and ill health, and illness does offer a path of reflection and reclaiming back to what is true and what is not.
Wow. It is a whole other way to see health as something “found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people”. It blows out of the water society’s current picture of health.
We are sold many images of what it is that ‘health’, ‘healthy’ and ‘wellbeing’ look like. If we only look with our eyes, and cannot feel what lies beneath, all we have is an image and not a true lived way. Health and wellbeing are more than just normal blood tests, and following guidelines. There is a way we can live – in which we nurture deeply and care for ourselves, because we value who we are, what it is that we bring, and the amazingness of every cell of our body. This value, or worth, is somewhat lacking in society today. We need to start building this from the ground up, and start to feel ourselves as worthy of the utmost love, care and attention we can provide.
Amelia you touch on a something that is very pertinent which is that we need to “start to feel ourselves as worthy of the utmost love, care and attention we can provide”. Without feeling that we are worth this we will always settle for something less than true health.
Wonderfully expressed – so true, we can not rely only on our eyes. We have to feel what is underneath the image, what is true and what is not true. Especially the TV sells us many pictures and attitudes how a healthy person should be. But at the end, the only thing which counts is, what we feel in our body. The body tells us, what it needs, so we just have to listen.
This is something I am beginning to appreciate more, that our commitment to ourselves and commitment to others are inextricably intertwined. If we are neglecting ourselves then we cannot truly support others, and trying to help others at the expense of ourselves leaves everyone less. But if we fully commit to supporting ourselves in everyway, we include all in that commitment and everyone is held.
“I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” If we could see the true blessing in illness and learn what it has to show us, then we can grow from the wisdom it brings and return once more to what is true for us, and this is the greatest gift we could ever have.
True health for me is in the little choices each day….how am I going to move, what am I going to put in my body, what am I going to get involved in, the quality of my conversations etc. Add all these up and I am constantly determining my experience of health.
It’s very true Vicky that each little choice we make in every moment of the day amounts to the level of health we will experience in our bodies. Most of us fall for the illusion that good health is only achievable through diet and exercise, but it is the quality in everything we do that determines how well we are going to feel.
This blows me away as it exposes the con of the health and well being industry. Millions are being spent on looking for something or a quick fix outside of our own wisdom that will bring us true health and wellbeing, but we are constantly being sold a lie – the next diet, health food, pill etc. Serge Benhayon has offered us truth and the ability to see and live the truth for ourselves with no blinkers on. That true health and well being comes down to the choices we make and how we choose to live in every aspect of our lives, from the movements we make, the food we eat, the way in which we communicate, move, sleep etc. That true health is self responsibility.
It also exposes our health, well being and medicine industry – the idea that to be healthy is to be tough and robust and push. We see someone who climbs a mountain, runs a marathon, is an Olympic champion, someone who trains hard everyday as healthy and fit – but is this truly fit or healthy or it is actually a form of abuse? Are we ignoring our body’s intelligence?
Isn’t it amazing the drive and beliefs we have, and that we are taught to seek anything outside ourselves, rather than stop and feel what is true for us and that the answers to everything we need lie within each and every one of us.
l love what you have discovered as true Health Rachel…very simple really. lf able to be applied consistently and with conviction and l would also add a healthy dose of self appreciation.
Recently I heard a presentation by Beverly Carter, a former ‘Gladiator’ of TV fame. Beverly once epitomised an ideal of physical strength and fitness, the human body at its supposed peak of perfection and a superwoman to boot. She revealed the situation to be far from ideal, describing the reality behind the facade which was far from healthy in any respect. What a powerful, pervasive and harmful ideal this is, that we are supposed to be Olympian or at least strive to be. And funny that we strive to emulate the ancient deities of Mt Olympus when God is simply within.
Yes… An enormous thank you to Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine for re-presenting to humanity the wisdom that is true health.
Gorgeous Rachel, thank you. So health is really all about a VERY healthy acceptance, love and appreciation of ourselves.
It is so true Rachel that our bodies are such an amazing reflection of how we are living. And if we are honest with ourselves and simply listen to our bodies we are offered what is needed next, to support us with where we are at. When we do choose to live in this way we are choosing to live in harmony, in harmony with our essence and in harmony with life. I agree, it is a beautiful journey of discovery and one that I am constantly inspired to explore.
So beautifully expressed – “Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” I love it, so profound and everything is said. Thank you.
Physical perfection and good health are so far apart especially if you look at athletes and sports people who because of their level of physical fitness are deemed by many to be “healthy”. So if this is the case why do they all get injured so much and develop chronic conditions in later life- it feels to me that many are exhausted and just keep pushing- there is no listening to their bodies. Health is so much more than physical and if we live from our innermost and let our bodies do the talking and listen to what they are saying we will know a level of wellbeing that is amazing. I know because this is how I endeavour to live -not perfectly but with a greater awareness than I have ever had. Thank you Rachel for sharing -such an important discussion.
I have always been what I felt was a very healthy person, rarely getting sick, never spent a day in the hospital, etc. But what is interesting to me now after learning a great deal about True health from Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine, is that I had actually been numbing myself with food, alcohol, and occasionally drugs, all of which stopped me from feeling the true level of exhaustion in my body, and internal damage that had I not stopped those behaviours, would have most likely lead to serious illness and disease down the road. I can say now that after focusing more on being gentle with my body, letting go of harsh activities like endurance and contact sports, and eating foods that are dairy, gluten, sugar free, I feel more healthy than I ever have, and at a level that is supportive of my body in truth.
I hear you Michael, and actually not only that, I am one of those people now living the end result of 20+ years lived in complete disregard of my body. As a result I have a compromised endocrine system and a thyroid condition that is likely to be with me for the rest of my life. Ignoring the body, even though we might think we are ‘healthy’ definitely does not pay. The good news is I now live with much more awareness and appreciation of myself than ever before and for the most part feel far more vital than the days prior to the development of my condition.
‘the notion of physical perfection that I believed health to be’. This is what many think health is, the whole fitness industry is built on it. Yet health is so much more than the so called perfect body, the perfect body can be sick on many other levels, emotionally, psychologically and even physiologically. Health is multi-dimensional, as so beautifully and clearly presented by Serge Benhayon.
I agree Lisa. Around our area there has been a influx of gyms and personal training businesses operating, not to mention the promotion of all the various types of protein drinks, pills and clothing and foot wear lines, and all selling the idea of health. Yet, these industries are all based on unilateral or at best, narrow definitions of health. Yet true health can’t be confined by such narrow definitions and has to be understood from a much broader lens.
I love what you say about Serge Benhayon “the quality of a life lived from the innermost essence – its beauty, grace and absolute commitment.” This way of living which my heart recognises as true, as this gorgeously inspiring man lives every day, is what I view as healthy living. Included in this is allowing my body to speak to me: “through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.” It is quite marvelous that we have this facility, a real gift really.
It’s such a limited view to see health as physical perfection. The health Serge Benhayon lives shatters that illusion.
‘…and gosh has it been a slow process to scrub away the notion of physical perfection that I believed health to be.’ I had this picture and berated myself regularly for not measuring up to my impression of health – literally turning away from health in to somewhat very unhealthy living ways. The truth is my self worth and inability to accept the wonderful being I am kept me in this loop – Universal Medicine supported me to see that it was just that – a loop. Thank you Rachel for a brilliant expose.
‘Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ Yes it is Rachel and puts a stop to the endless pursuit of health.
Kehinde the simplicity of this paragraph should be the basic foundation of healthcare, a personal and responsible healthcare that each of us can choose from young. As adults we have a deep responsibility not to inflict on the next generation the same mistakes we have done, the same illusionary pursuit of health when we now have the keys to true health, something that should be treasured and passed to the next generation so they don’t get caught in the same trap we have.
Yes David we have a personal responsibilty to be models of true health where-ever we are and inspire others to be the same.
For many people markers for health are so low, that people literally stumble with exhaustion before realising there’s a problem. For me True health is being in daily connection with myself that allows me to respond to my body’s messages with attention and love. My markers are: how my body feels, energy levels, emotional steadiness, and an ability to be at ease with life and whatever it presents.
Beautifully said kehinde2012. Those markers should be taught in every school in every town around the world.
Thanks Rachel for your amazing sharing. What I realized was in the past, that I accepted a state of being as normal (low energy), which was not normal at all. I had forgotten about, that there is a real normal – equals to vital, joyful, powerful. I ask myself, why could I accept so quickly a lower state of being ? Thanks to the many reflections of esoteric students and Serge Benhayon I realized, what health and “normal” really means.
Thank you Rachel. “But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” Serge Benhayon has turned my understanding of illness inside out. I now can appreciate illness and disease as a way for my body to heal itself of the poor choices in the way I have been treating myself. It is no longer a worry about something ‘being wrong’ with me but my body letting me know that it is struggling to put it right to allow me to be who I truly am.
This is a great revelation, to understand truly what is going on when we have an ill-ness or dis-ease that occurs to bring us to a stop. A stop from a way of being and living that has manifested itself to be such and presents itself as a form of ill-ness or dis-ease. What we have to realise is that this outcome was not the first time we have experienced such warnings, all those times we have had bumps or accidents were all indicators that we were not living in harmony. Such stops are necessary and we have the opportunity to embrace it as a healing and as a blessing – to release and clear the old way and make new choices going forth that are based from Love.
I used to think that being healthy was being fit, slim and free from illness but with this came a toughness. At a time when I was eating organic food, juicing, doing lots of alternative therapies and a lot of exercise, I thought I was healthy until my body said ‘STOP’ with what was labelled as chronic fatigue. This was the start of me realising that there is so much more to health than diet and exercise, and the big factor is how we are on the inside. How are we emotionally? How much do we love ourselves and others? What’s our connection with our inner-most and God?
The war against your body you talk about Rachel is exactly what happens. It is like we want to beat the body at its own game of making us sick. It’s me against my body, who will win. I can almost guarantee that with this game plan, the body will win hands down. If we think we can outsmart the body, then we are up against a wisdom that already knows the game, will let you play it, let you think you have won, then… what do we have here, an illness or an accident that just came out of left field. The actual game is the art of listening and working with the messages that pour out of the body, no need to be against this beautiful dialogue that comes out in all sorts of ways
I agree Matthew, listening to the ways our body communicates with us is a true art and the benefits are far more amazing than what we could ever imagine.
It’s a great question you raise Rachel as it allows us all to assess what we have come to associate with the word health and how this is so often not about wellbeing in the whole meaning of the word but instead about band aiding our health problems. That health is so strongly linked to sickness is a strong indicator that we have strayed far from the level of health that should be our normal. Where health should be associated with positive words such as energised, abundant, fulsome and vital, it instead is often linked to sickness, disease, hospitals and medication. Wherever we set the bar for health will be what will be used as a measure of health and leave a complacency within us, and at the moment that bar is set far too low.
It is only through Universal Medicine that I have heard the word vitality linked with health, and it felt lovely to hear. As you have said we don’t hear the word vitality from doctors or healthcare professionals … or even ourselves. It is just as you say, health now seems to be linked with ill health. How sad is that!
What is True Health? Now there is a question for all the ages. Clearly we have not understood it as a human race. In fact we have drifted further away from true health than ever before in history. And that speaks volumes about how little advances in technology have given us in reality. Yes we have marvellous surgery, medicines and treatments and are living longer, but we far from healthy.
Spot on Dean. With all the new technology and health developments over the past 50 years you’d think we had finally grasped even just an idea of what ‘true health’ was and looked like… With the soaring rates of disease, obesity and illness it is evident this is not the case.
hear hear Dean we are very far from being healthy. There has been a re-interpretation on what healthy is – to not have any major illness or disease you are healthy. But if we stop and look at this for a moment is there true vitality being lived with joy and harmony in every single moment of every single day. With a consistency that does not change but only gets stronger and healthier. This is the True Health that I know this to be true and that it is possible. Thanks to Serge Benhayon I would have still been under the impression I was all ‘ok’ but really very far away from True Health.
This is a great point Natalie: ” to not have any major illness or disease you are healthy” and yet we are fine living with stress, or depression, or bad relationships at work or in our family, or simply not being happy with our lives. These are all signs that there is something wrong, but if we can manage them by going to the gym or to the pub we say that we are ok.
Susie and Natalie you are both absolutely correct. And it’s also true that if it wasn’t for Serge Benhayon I would probably still be very much asleep to what is really going on – not able to see beyond my own patch of grass.
I love this blog Rachel. Isn’t it wonderful to finally feel that our sicknesses are our blessings ! Thank you for sharing.
It’s interesting how by trying to make yourself healthy you became more unhealthy. It just goes to show that when we have an ideal from our minds about how to live it does not work. I love how you accepted yourself as you were, and from there gave yourself what you needed. A much more loving way!
Yes Rebecca, it’s incredible what is possible when we stop fighting ourselves and truly accept where we are at.
Yes, Rebecca, it is a great example of how living by an ideal allows us to override what we innately know that our bodies need. But ideals are essentially what we think someone else thinks life should be like. Holding an ideal is placing a picture into someone else’s head, and worrying about how they might judge us for not meeting that picture. It is no wonder they do not work!
Great point Rebecca. So where does this unhealthy version of health come from and why are so may of us duped by it? It has us chasing our tails so we don’t actually get a look-in at true health.
Thank you Rachel for yet another deep and meaningfull exploration of what is health. There is much to ponder on within your beautiful blog.
Serge Benhayon is truly inspirational in so many ways and I love your description of “the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that”.
I love that line too Gabriele Conrad. Imagine loving yourself so deeply that you never feel to abandon yourself, that you choose instead to always be present with yourself. Serge Benhayon is truly inspirational regarding the power of conscious presence.
That also resonated in me, that he is always present with himself knowing to be deeply worthy of that, it is the self love to its maximum expression, something I am gradually developing with his reflection as a light shining the way.
Thank you Rachel for sharing yourself with us. “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” I love this – it is the Bible to my own development.
Rachel your writing touches me deeply;
‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?
This feels like the truth and that is what the world needs right now. Thank you.
Kathryn for me I am also coming to see that True Health is much deeper than simply not being sick. That it’s living from me and the bit that has always been a struggle (or that I’ve made a struggle) is accepting with love and without perfection all of me. Yet I feel very deeply that this acceptance is the key. Otherwise I am in an internal fight with myself – which is clearly not a healthy place to be. The simplicity of true health is quite special.
David I can relate to your description of True Health ‘That it’s living from me and the bit that has always been a struggle (or that I’ve made a struggle) is accepting with love and without perfection all of me’. How we feel about ourselves contributes considerably to our ability to lead healthy lives and have healthy relationships.
They feel like truth to me too Kathrynfortuna. And if true health is that, then true medicine as Serge Benhayon presents and many including myself can bare testament to, including can be said to be ‘living in a way that supports us to know and honour who we are in essence’.
Thanks Kathryn for sharing this. No perfection but just living me is a great start to true health.
I have been chasing health like a carrot dangling in front of my face my whole life, and actually, for the most part, I thought I was quite healthy purely for the fact that I very very rarely got sick. In fact I’m 34 and think the last time I was in sick in bed may have been in my early teens.
This belief that I have always been healthy comes down to a comparison with others who may often be fighting the common cold, or the flu or some virus.
What I didn’t consider was that every month I had a day or 2 on average completely wiped out from period pain which at times rendered me completely useless and in bed. Nor did I consider that my lack of vitality and general exhaustion was anything worth noting, let alone the negative chatter that went on constantly upstairs.
Since attending Universal Medicine presentations and courses, I’ve realised that there is more to health than avoiding the common cold.
The quality of our day, the way we live it, how we look after ourselves/feel about ourselves and how we are with others really dictates where our health is really at.
Today, health to me means more than not needing a box of tissues. It’s very much about how I feel with myself and about myself. I certainly don’t feel ‘healthy’ all of the time, in fact, not as often as I’d like, but it’s a journey that takes time.
This is such a great point Elodie. There is much more to health than not catching a cold, etc. True vitality and wellbeing is where it is at for me. How I feel within and about myself each day is a great marker and reflection for me as to whether I am healthy or not.
What you expressed Elodie is so true, there is more to health than illness and disease.
‘Since attending Universal Medicine presentations and courses, I’ve realised that there is more to health than avoiding the common cold.’ I agree, Elodie, attending the presentations of Serge Benhayon has truly opened my eyes and helped me to feel more of what’s going on in my body, as I look beyond what most people consider as healthy.
Such a great point you make here Elodie, health is the way we live, how we look after ourselves and how we are with others!! That way health is a normal state of being and not something we have to maintain being consistently in the struggle with our abusive behavior. Living abuse as a norm makes health something to achieve and not something we are.
Elodie, you have expressed so clearly the truth of what true health is and encapsulated all the ways we ignore signposts of ill health as not being a part of the equation. Being unwell for me was also about ‘being in bed’ and comparison to others. I realise now that for most of my life I have been ‘unhealthy’. Thanks to Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine I now have a greater awareness of where I am at and how listening to the wisdom of my body communicates this beautifully. Thanks Rachel for sharing your blog.
Serge Benhayon and true health come hand in hand, what he lives is what you get and feel in every moment reflected and an inspiration for us all. Thank you Rachel for this great reflective sharing of true health our livingness, Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine.
The acceptance of what is – that’s really resonating in me as a beautiful definition of health. It puts an end to the endless striving for the better. Awesome.
This is a great article Rachel, it feels as if having care for our bodies and living all of that we are, is a great way to come to a healthy state of being.
Rachel you have touched on an attitude here that is so prevalent in the medical professions – to see the body as the enemy and a dysfunctional collection of tissues that must be fought with and struggled with and forced into a more ‘healthy state’. How does it make sense to blame something for simply reflecting back to us the way we treat it? And what we have come to call a ‘healthy state’ is purely based on our ability to function in our daily lives i.e. get up and go to work, pay the bills and do our hobbies and holidays. But has anyone stopped to ask what is the quality of all these activities of daily living? You have started asking some of these questions Rachel and I thank you deeply and sincerely for it.
Andrew what you had said is key – society is not looking at the energy in the way we live our lives every day. This really needs to be spoken about so much more in our communities, schools, and workplaces.
When it comes to health it is as if we miss the enormity of what health is and try to play it down, and therefore we often struggle to deal with our illnesses and disease. For example if we are sick we look at our physical bodies, what are we eating, what medicine can we take etc – even at push we will look at our lifestyle. However if we saw health as an all encompassing standard that is present in all aspects of our lives then we could start addressing a sickness from all angles, so rather than just looking at the body – what is our physiological make-up like, our emotional well being, what are the quality of our relationships, all of this would also surely affect our health
Health is a tree with many branches. It is rooted in the rich soil of love and self-nurturing. The branches grow outwards to offer gentle shelter to others.
Beautiful Jinya. The tree of health that we grow supports all.
I love the way you write Rachel, so deeply full of insight yet with a palpable lightness and sense of humour. For me, this part sums up the meaning of health in a nutshell “Is that the meaning of health, I started to wonder? Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?”
Yes Rachel it has indeed been a slow process to replace my ideal of what health should be. However I can feel the momentum accelerating as I take more care of myself. The image of Serge putting on gloves and scarf with tenderness does more to encourage me to self-nurture than a thousand words.
I find it interesting that so many of us mistreat our bodies for a varied period of time and then go in the pursuit of health thinking that it is something we must gain – often in a painful way – when we naturally have a level of health within us.
Yes, that is very interesting indeed, how we take health as something we ‘do’ for a while, and then we just leave it, because it is time to enjoy ourselves again and have fun, and then after a while there is this pursuit for health again. Health is not in a pill, a juice or a detox retreat, it is in how we live in every moment of the day and how we take care of ourselves.
Beautifully said Mariette.
I love what you shared of your observations of Serge Benhayon: “the way he put on gloves and warm scarf in cool weather with such tenderness and such a deep level of care for himself…and the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that.” This way of living feels absolutely gorgeous and reading these lines is so inspiring to take the already deep care and love for myself to another level.
Thank you Rachel for presenting the true definition of ‘Health’ once more, and it is completely different to what I thought health was; a fixed point of endless striving, rather than a deeply tender relationship with ourselves, others, our illness and disease; our choices.
Beautiful Rachel such a great presentation of true health and where it has gone and the appreciation for our bodies and the care and love that comes with this. So much to see and a great insight shared for us all.Thank you
I love this blog, “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” – A much broader definition of health than the one we usually are given or think of. Thankyou Rachel.
Thank you, Rachel, for the reminder that living from our essence is the best medicine of all.
I simply love reading this blog Rachel, there is so much in it. Today it is about the fact that so often when we are ill or have a disease the body becomes the enemy, yet this couldn’t be more further from the truth.
Since reading this blog everytime I come across it, it fascinates me. What is True Health. Today I’ve expanded my own version of Love. As I was walking on the streets in the city centre where I live, I felt the Lightness in my feet confirming my beingness with every step I took. As I was walking I could also feel sadness coming up. For a long time I held the belief that these 2 different feelings couldn’t go together. It was either Love or not. This time it was so clearly that both were there at the same time. And I could just both let them be. For me True Health today has become a being together with myself when moving, doing, standing, etc.
I love the refreshing and empowering way you view illness. “My sicknesses have become a blessing…” to be seen as “…signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” It’s about taking responsibility for the choices we make.
To view sickness as being a blessing is poles apart from the commonly adopted stance in society of illness being a curse, a hindrance and inconvenient. It is by our true acceptance and deep surrender to our body’s healing process that the true healing can then occur.
Well said Deborah. It makes so much sense that an illness is just somethng the body is trying to clear, get rid of. As much as I wholeheartedly feel this to be true, I still find myself doing all I can do avoid any illness whatsoever because I still hold on to the ideal that no sickness = good health. Some patterns of behaviour take more time than others to re-configure.
How true this is of many. We see anything that stops us as a hindrance and inconvenience – it is far easier to feel sorry for ourselves then to firstly allow ourselves the space to stop and feel our bodies and to secondly explore the lead up to this illness and disease and the learning on hand. Our body shows us very clearly if we listen – it is us who keep our fingers in our ears or ourselves so busy running our stories that we miss the precious truth on offer 24/7.
When I look at Serge Benhayon I see the greatest reflection of the concept of health that at this moment I am able to grasp. He lives in constant and unwavering connection to and in honour of the divine essence that is within us all. He chooses to live his life so that he is constantly impulsed by his Soul – and since we are all connected at this inner most level, he is the most considerate, loving and honouring person I have ever known. Because he does not make any choices unless they are impulsed by Soul, he can access the most profound yet the most inclusive wisdom I have ever heard. He is a true inspiration showing us all how we can each live and bring greater love, united purpose and wisdom to the world. Through this reflection I know without a shadow of a doubt that anything less than this is not Health. At times when I get caught in the emotional thick of life, I forget this, yet even then at deep level I have a profound knowing that the physical function of my body neither defines me nor my Health. In fact any signs of illness and disease are a ‘healthy’ signal from my body guiding me towards what needs attention on my return to TRUE HEALTH as lived by Serge Benhayon and the many who have been inspired by him to return to a way of life led by their inner most.
Golnaz, you have written such a heartfelt reflection of the concept of health as inspired by Serge Benhayon. I agree with every word and you have summed up my feelings exactly. “Through this reflection I know without a shadow of a doubt that anything less than this is not Health.”
Golnaz I love what you have shared here about Serge Benhayon and this part is so powerful. ‘…any signs of illness and disease are a ‘healthy’ signal from my body guiding me towards what needs attention on my return to TRUE HEALTH …’
Re-reading this blog has helped me see the extent to which we hurt ourselves by trying to be or achieve something we are not. There is great healing and a natural state of wellbeing when we just let ourselves be.
Just hearing the words to ‘let ourselves be’ creates space in my body and takes away the pressure we are daily bombarded with to be something other than who we are.
Ariana I agree that most of the ideas we have around health are not even our own. I drove myself crazy trying to figure out which bits of information about health from various diet fads and approaches to follow – by far the simplest approach (but not the easiest) is to listen to the messages from my body.
True Health is not a constant pushing and striving to run faster, lift more weights, but a gentle honouring of the body, feeling what it needs by way of fuel and feeding it no more, no less, gentle exercise to keep it flexible and in good working order, and letting go of all those thoughts that are criticising and judgmental of ourselves and everybody else. Appreciation of all that we are is one way we can help ourselves to achieve true health.
What you share here Rachel is a new way of looking at health, one that I too have been inspired by Serge Benahyon and re-connecting to my inner most. This deep level of Self-Care and Self-Love just only gets stronger and I feel like I am just scratching at the surface.
‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ Two beautiful questions for us all to consider.
“My sicknesses have become a blessing, not to be judged, eliminated so that I can just get on with it, or indulged for attention.” indeed we always have a choice to see illness and disease as the healing that we need, as we are forced to stop and at that moment we can either be honest about the way we have been living and the choices that we have been making that contributed to where we are, and bring awareness to the situation and take full responsibility for it, or we indulge in it and do whatever we can to fix it so we can get back in life to do it all over again, with no real awareness to the situation that has been presented in our lives, only for it to repeat itself again until we get it that real health is all about the way we live and the level of care and love we bring into our daily life. It’s not about perfection, it’s about just making caring and self loving choices for our bodies.
Beautifully and simply said. ‘It’s not about perfection, it’s about just making caring and self loving choices for our bodies.’
Very wise words Rachel. When we just observe what our bodies kindly tell us in every small movement or feeling, we will see endless reflections to learn from and by approaching life differently because of what we have learned, we will permanently heal our illnesses instead of just covering the symptoms.
Yes Michael the difference between true healing and just band-aiding.
What a gorgeous blog depicting what true health is really about. Health is often sold to us as a visual image. Rachel your blog has opened my eyes to the levels of acceptance that come with health in loving all of me, playing my part in the community and knowing there is no perfection.
True Health… as simple as living our truth… beautiful blog.
Whenever I start to feel sick I know I have been dishonouring me and truth of who I am. Illness is a reminder for me to come back to the presence in my body and live and honour me and my truth in everything I do. Thank you Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine for reminding me of this fact also.
What is true health? “Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”
By consistently listening to our body, what it is trying to say, we build a body of love.
The teachings of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine have supported me to be open to seeking conventional medical support, something I was in the past very reluctant to do. I now see the combination of Esoteric healing sessions and conventional medicines really complement each other in the healing process, with the key to true healing being me taking responsibility for the choices I make in the way we live. Always knowing that every choice I make will result in me either healing or harming my body.
Margaret what you’ve shared rings very true for myself as well as so many other students of Universal Medicine, the fact of where responsibility for our health lies. In society we have a push through mentality – ignore until we can ignore our health problems no longer. I am sure this makes life for the medical community far more difficult than it needs to be. Universal Medicine certainly complements western medicine in many different ways.
Sally, this is so true, our essence is always whole, so could it be because this is so that we feel where our bodies need support so that in time our bodies can be in full equality with our essence?
The present generally accepted definition of health is by the state of one’s function, which has little regard for our overall well being. Athletes are the prime example who are lauded for their physical prowess but are prone to illness and disease. As you pose the question, Rachel, “so what then is health?” You give, I feel the perfect answer with the question, “Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”
I agree Jonathan, Athletes are prime examples, regardless of their physical fitness they still get sick. In some case their drive towards peak performance is about over-riding other areas of their life where ill health may plague them e.g. mental illness. There are some amazing human beings whose physical being is restricted by forms of disease, but who live lives that are vital. So is health as simple as being connected to self and living who we are and nurturing our inner essence? Yes, I feel this is exactly what health is – well said Rachel.
That’s a beautiful description of true health and how it feels compared to our pictures of ‘being healthy’: “It goes way deeper, back to me, the essence of who I am, and allowing that to be lived”. Every medical student should be taught this definition of true health – What healing they could then bring to their communities.
I absolutely agree Rosannabianchini, all medical and nursing students as well as health care professionals ought to read this article. It redefines what true health is. It is time to have a sensible conversation about our responsibility towards ourselves, each other and our bodies.
For sure it is time Elizabeth, as we do tend to walk around kidding ourselves that health is simply about not being sick or living to be many, many years old. Really, I would say the majority of us have not stopped to question the true meaning of health as Rachel has so eloquently done with this blog.
I absolutely agree with you both Rosanna and Elizabeth and it sure is time to redefine what true health is – a simple yet amazingly beautiful way of living.
Loved your blog Rachel – this is a study in itself. It’s all we need to know, and all we should know. I especially love what you write about Serge Benhayon and his service to humanity. One paragraph on this is not suffice – more needs to be written on what true service is and the blessing it brings your health as a consequence.
Hear hear Rik, Serge Benhayon needs to be studied and written about because he is presenting a way of living that is going against the ingrained way we have been living. Showing us it is a choice to live with absolute Joy, Harmony, Stillness, Love and Truth in our lives – that we can have this vital and abundant richness everyday by living all of who we are.
I have recently been unwell. This brought up many past misperceptions surrounding health and illness. Life was about staying well at all costs as a child and it was considered a sign of weakness and lack of strength to be unwell. There was guilt associated with missing work, not being capable of carrying on and stopping to rest. I was nicknamed the carrier of disease by my family for I was frequently sick with one illness or ailment after the other as a child, and had poor eyesight and required glasses which added to my sense of failure, judging myself and my body harshly and not as the loving friend that it is.
Since attending presentations of Serge Benhayon, I have come to understand energy and True Health and what this is. I realise that the wellness I strived for was only ever comparing to those I perceived as well purely because they were not ill, or wellness was the absence of an extreme illness. This was never wellness at all, for even in a most ‘well’ state of high fitness and excellent physical health by accepted measures I was without self-love, without joy and many steps away from living the love that I am. How could I be well if my thoughts were not well as I strove for perfection of my body and myself and was critical for falling short?
It has been the most amazing re-discovery to understand I am responsible for my health and it is not something outside of me that just happens and nor is it something to compare to others. I now appreciate the enormous blessing available through healing rather than seeing illness as inconvenient and a hindrance, I am able to accept and appreciate me, my body and my own knowing of health and to learn the lessons life shows me and the result of choices that mark where I have not honored truth and therefore brought ill to my body.
Thanks for sharing you experiences, Deborah. It is a great question you pose – “How could I be well if my thoughts were not well as I strove for perfection of my body and myself and was critical for falling short?” How amazing will it be when the medical world recognises that our negative thoughts and emotions directly affect our state of health and well being? Universal Medicine is re-defining what the term ‘health’ actually means, and the truth of the matter is there for everyone who is willing to look at the way they live.
What an exquisitely beautiful sharing Rachel, covering many aspects of health from the elusive myth of perfect health, the false steeliness of toughing it out and never getting sick, illness as a sign of weakness and health as strength and the plethora of pictures we adopt in between. There is no set formula that is for certain for our health is a reflection of our choices and how we each live.
You give us a great take on what true health is all about Dr. Rachel Mascord and this is like fresh air for our world right now, as we all know our health systems are going bankrupt as illness and dis-ease in our bodies is off the scale and getting worse.
Like you, I recall being a very sick child – in fact known for never having any good health and I just accepted it and then spent my early adult life on that same pursuit as you with a hundred ‘alternative’ ways to improve my health, from juicing daily and wheatgrass shots that would literally make me vomit instantly – all in the name of health. Maybe it was because the wheatgrass was not liking the jam doughnuts, chocolate and fresh cream cakes that lived inside my stomach every day..
Humour aside, my health only got addressed AFTER I met Serge Benhayon in 2005 and even then I played around ignoring what he was saying as it didn’t quite suit my comfort lifestyle. It took me a few years to receive and feel the depth of what he was presenting and that it was possible for me to live another way without harming my body and the rest is history now.
My health at the age of 53 is something I have never experienced and I don’t feel ill or see life as a struggle. I plan to work until my last breath as long as I take deep care of my body which I now value, appreciate and know is precious.
This is beautiful, Rachel. There is much here to reflect on, and the way you describe your home-coming, the day you started to look within yourself for the truth, is exquisite. Abandoning ourselves is the real illness as you say, and the more we take responsibility for our choices, the less we will create disharmony in our bodies.
Thank you Marika for this very revealing questioning blog on health, I love it. It really does open up the possibility of a true health and living and our openness to explore this from our inner hearts and not our mind. Opening to truly feel, live who we fully are lovingly as part of the whole, takes commitment and love and is worth it.
Wow thank you Rachel, this reminded me of how I used to view illness and disease as the enemy, that it was somehow a failure to get ill. I now realise thanks to Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine that this is not true and in-fact, illness and disease offer us amazing opportunities to heal sometimes very deep rooted unloving patterns and behaviours. I also realised I used to carry a hidden judgement to those who were ill and to myself when I was ill. Thank fully I am now able to see illness and disease as the evolution it truly offering.
When an illness popped up, I use to think that something was wrong with me and also viewed it as the enemy. That was until I got breast cancer and I innately knew that it was my body and my soul giving me a sign that how I was living was not working. I didn’t know what that was at the time, but over the following couple of years and when I came to Universal Medicine I learnt that the choices and the disregard I had been living in and the lack of self-nurturing was a contributor to the diagnosis of the cancer. I am deeply grateful for the full stop moment that the cancer offered me as I was in the illusion that I was living in a healthy way, where in fact I was living very far away from it.
True health is forever unfolding, an everyday learning, re-adjusting and as you said: “living from all of who you are, from your essence”. I like also what Floris mentioned, “it is to be able to receive loving impulses and act on them.” For a long time I could not feel what food was doing to me, I also went on a Macrobiotic diet which was super hard to follow, and thought arrogantly that I had the secret for true health. The very hard thing is that it also gave me a false impression that it was working. I could not feel or see the hardness in my body, and did not want to admit to myself that it was not working on the long run… I am now making more loving choices today in terms of food, and I still need to readjust, but I feel that I have a greater sense of consistency with my weight and my vitality. My body use to ache a lot more and the strange thing is we tend to forget with time, so appreciating is key!
From something elusive that incited a war against myself and my body to a surrendering back into relationship with myself, my attitude towards the concept of health has been through many guises. Working with Universal Medicine and its students I am endlessly blown away by the turn arounds I have witnessed. From someone who wallowed in my ailments as part of my identity, to someone who takes care, listens to what is being shown and has a level of space and vitality in my life that is an everyday miracle, I have much to appreciate about Universal Medicine and my choices.
Yes Jane, I hear so many real life stories that are so inspiring – there is a book’s worth that would be like an ‘always on offer invitation’ for humanity.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” , yes sure it is, it is as simple as that, live all who who we are from our essence, with no perfection, just love and acceptance and deep commitment. That’s all that is required.
Humanity needs to hear this and to know this – it is simple and we can all live this. True health is a choice away.
I wonder if health really is the focus here? Could it be that we are all of what and who we are, unconditionally and then see how that affect our physical, mental and any other health?
This is so well said and beautiful to read, how you described ironically your war with yourself to health. Then through the inspiration of Serge Benhayon, you came to understand that true health is about the choices we makes as to whether we come back to ourselves, or continue to soldier on, in ideals and beliefs about health.
As Rachel stated ‘Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?
When we come back to ourselves, that is the healing in itself, because naturally from there we begin to make ‘healthy’ choices, committing to a deep level of love and self care. I can relate to what you have shared, and also having a very ‘sick’ childhood, I can for the first time say I know true health, and it was nothing that I thought it was in the past. It goes way deeper, back to me, the essence of who I am, and allowing that to be lived.
Could it be that True Health is nothing more than having built a body that is able to receive Loving impulses and act on them. Whatever the impulses are, whether that being rest, eat, write, perform, build, nurture, etc. That would make life very very simple, not necesarily easy.
I like this comment Floris, because sometimes we want things to be easy although the easy way is not always what leads us to true health. Whereas simplicity has a divine quality to it that requires us to put the work in to make it so, and this is what perhaps makes simplicity so divine, because it has us, our living and breathing choices, as part of its very makeup.
If you are interested in true health that I prescribe listening to this priceless and fascinating library of free audio on the subject: : http://www.unimedliving.com/voice/audio-by-category/esoteric-medicine-audio
Wow the simplicity in this Floris. Living from loving impulses. Therefore aligning to God’s plan?
So simple Floris and it redefines what health truly is. We often see images of fit and slim bodies paraded as healthy and yet that same body may also be very hard, exhausted, carry injuries or lack any self-care and self-love.
Fasting myself of dramas has become a part of my program for healthy living. When i indulge in dramas that sneak in, I know I have separated from God and have made life about my self and not about the whole and the universe I live in.
This is such an easy trap to fall into, and yet such a great marker in the body to feel, and then know something is awry. Once we have and know this marker it becomes just another choice to make, to indulge in the self, or to step forward as a whole, equal with everyone else.
Great point Jinya that it is not just what we eat and drink with regards to our health (as Rachel has also shared) but also HOW we live .. including the dramas we create in our lives. En-joy your detox 💕😄
Interesting Jinya. Until relatively recently I would not have considered dramas to be part of the fasting programme but that makes sense. I would add to that anxiousness, emotional behaviour and lack of self worth. Food for thought!
Yes Jinya, dramas can be as addictive as sugar and are symptoms that we are way off … I used to think they made life interesting, which goes to show how unwell I was.
“Fasting myself of dramas…” – wow Jinya, that to me is such a visual expression, bringing one to look into the word ‘fasting’ and see how it feels in the body. We could expand that into ‘fasting’ ourselves of abiding by belief systems or ideals, or a myriad of things that come to mind. But as you say, they are all an indication of ones’ separation from God thus I feel a separation from true health.
What a great detox! I know when I indulge in a drama I am usually avoiding a hurt – old or an assumed hurt I expect will come my way – why else choose something so small when we can choose to connect to the beauty of God and the bigger picture?
Currently I have to remind myself of the times I’ve stayed with my body where I’ve felt the truth that I am bigger than any hurt. The more I choose this the more my body knows this is true.
I really resonate with your experience of the “slow process to scrub away the notion of physical perfection that you believed health to be”. This notion is deeply ingrained in most of us and as you say, our tragic failing world health statistics indicate that there must be an element to ‘good’ health’ that is missing. Universal Medicine could offer the world the powerful, effective truth that the missing link is fundamentally learning how to reconnect to our divine essence. Pondering the possibility brings enormous joy to me.
Thank you Rachel for sharing this blog, these words are gold. The universe we live in, or the unifying rhythm we live in, is held by great order or laws and harmony – some might say it is held in love. The one rhythm we live in impulses all life and holds all matter including our bodies in a divine constellation, where all particles are aware of the whole and the whole is aware of all particles. To live in a way where we who are responsible for our bodies, allowing our body to naturally align with the all would allow our body to breathe with the all. And conversely to live in a fashion that was choosing to not allow our body to align with the one rhythm of life would be in direct conflict with the rest of the universe. The stress of holding back the breath that breaths life to everything causes a life ill at ease with itself and its surroundings, and even when there finally is a choice to align, all the forces that were used to hold back the body from its natural source have to be cleared from the body – which we call disease. Health might then be seen as a marker of the past, present and future of all our choices to live in and be with our body.
Hello paulmoses39, this is a huge paragraph and I have read it a few times to take it all in. What you are speaking of goes far, far beyond the health we currently see and even imagine, “Health might then be seen as a marker of the past, present and future of all our choices to live in and be with our body.” Thank you Paul.
I love this blog and all that is being shared here. It brings the truth lovingly and shows how much we all can relate to it and our true livingness, taking responsibility for our health and well being from the inside out. True love is in connection to our very being inside and this shines out with a radiance and glory we cannot hide and we feel it as a harmony stillness and warmth inside, with a flow and ease of being. Anything that is not this hurts our body and this is what we don’t like to feel and brings on ill health.
Having become a bit sick over the last 3 days, this blog is perfect for understanding that there is definitely something going on under the surface that I am not yet addressing. I noticed when I first got ill I definitely fought the fact my body was telling me I had to take better care of myself, but as I’ve accepted it, I’ve been able to track back to what behaviour or pattern caused the illness, and for me this has been spending NO time with or for me, and being engaged with problems, issues, and people from when I wake up to the moment I’m asleep. I’m now working on creating more space during my day and particularly in the evenings to rest and rejuvenate!
Well said Susie, I too am unwell, not sick but unwell. I’m allowing myself to feel the tiredness, but like you have looked at choices and how I have been living the past few weeks and I realise, I have not being tender in my relationship with me….
Hello Susie Williams and this is a very responsible approach to your health and care. Not looking to find something to blame but more ‘seeing’ your part in what has happened and then bringing awareness to what you need to change in the way you live. What if we all adopted this approach to personal care? It would seem it would take pressure off other parts that may need to care for us. I love the responsibility you show here, a mark for us all, thank you Susie.
That is another take on health as we are brought up with Rachel. My understanding of health also changed after presentations of Serge Benhayon. Where I first saw being ill as being weak, I now see how this is a way of the body to communicate. Being ill for me is a way of the body, healing my unsupportive choices in life. The way I live is what helps my body to feel healthy.
A great analysis of what true health really means, living from the impulse of our inner essence. This should be posted on billboards.
Rachel the definition of health that you have posed as a possibility is ground-breaking. Inspired by the Serge Benhayon’s presentations on the subject I no longer see illness as an aberration that has to be fixed, but rather is a perfect feedback mechanism from the body that it needs to make adjustments to achieve homeostasis again. I agree that health is ‘… as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that’
“robust and tough, able to withstand anything that life threw at me” – I have found that there are two ways to achieve — either get very, very hard and shut out the world around me or embrace my sensitivity and now that that sensitivity is not wrong, in fact it is the confirmation that I am aware of what is wrong with the world and from that knowing comes a untold strength with no need for toughness.
So if our essence is always whole no matter what ill our body carries, then the relationship we have with it must be very important.
Rachel, reading your article was beautiful, your words wrapped themselves around me like a warm cloak. I felt so strongly the loving relationship you already have with your body, and felt the same loving connection with my own. Thank you so much for sharing.
My health has improved enormously since I committed to just being myself and stopped trying to prove myself to everyone. The more I commit to expressing all of me the more vital and joyful I feel.
This is a really lovely, simple comment Elizabeth, ‘My health has improved enormously since I committed to just being myself and stopped trying to prove myself to everyone.’ This is what I am learning at the moment, that all of the trying is exhausting and makes me feel ill, whereas when I really claim what feels true and I express this, I feel so much more well and life feels so much more simple and true.
Such a great blog Rachel. I too was the mouse running around the wheel trying to heal back and leg pain and no matter who I saw or how healthy I was, the pain persisted. It was only through the presentations, healing courses and access to amazing esoteric practitioners that I’ve been not only able to heal the pain, but able to get to the root cause of my choices that led to the pain in the first place. An amazing journey to be on and one I’m grateful for each and every day.
It truly is interesting how our body is the litmus paper of our choices.
I was always looking outside of myself for the answers to being healthy and well, it is since meeting Serge Benhayon that I started to connect to and trust my body’s innate wisdom, about what I eat, how much to exercise etc., etc., my health has improved dramatically.
I have had a similar experience Thomas, that my health has improved dramatically since meeting Serge Benhayon and being inspired to listen to the wisdom of my body, it is such a simple, common sense way of being and yet through all of my years of searching different modalities, diets, ways of living this simple approach was never really mentioned.
I can relate Thomas, looking for the answers from others of how to get fit and healthy without checking in with myself first to see how my body feels about a fitness or diet program, now seems alien to me. I can see now how extreme some of the fitness programs were and how abusive I was to my body, which resulted in me being far from healthy.
Very inspiring blog Rachel, having also spent a lifetime of searching for true health and well-being through every kind of healing modality and strange ways of eating. It was a breath of fresh air to meet Serge Benhayon and through his talks, start to build a connection to my body, and listen to the wisdom it shares constantly as to how I am treating it and what foods work or not for me.
Without a doubt the consensuses with people I have spoken to it no matter age, race and gender, upon meeting Serge Benhayon there is this overwhelming sense of coming home to that spark that’s reignited and waiting for you, to keep that spark alight and burning. An amazing sense of freedom from within and the search stops.
There is such a new understanding of health for me in this blog, I have found a lot of ideals being blown away.
Beautiful and thought provoking Rachel, thank you. There are many factors and determinants of ill health at play, and yet it appears that true health is simply based on connection … Connecting to the body, presence and living the love that’s naturally within.
Hello Rachel Mascord, great topic to speak about and I wonder what this quote would do to the ‘health’ industry, “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” This feels like it takes in everything in one line, no need to focus on just one part like exercise, diet etc, but rather looking at whole picture. Within that ‘whole picture’ everything has a part but no more important or to be championed more than another. Thank you Rachel I was only thinking about this the other day and now here I am reading your blog, very healthy.
Thank you Racheal for sharing your story, I too have tried to control my body, keep it in line with what I thought was health, not being open to what my body was telling me , instead it was me telling it, how it needed to feel. Since choosing to be more honest and really allowing myself to feel what my body is telling me, I am finding the more I just be with what is, and acknowledge it, my body, in it’s wisdom does the rest, how amazing is the body.
It has been a blessing to be gaining a deeper and deeper appreciation that there is a natural wisdom that is inherent in how my body works and responds. And that I do not need to guess or follow copious rules and regimes, but to deeply listen to what is felt from within myself. The understanding that we are all divine beings of Love with the freedom to choose – express as Love or not – and that our bodies are made up of particles that belong to the Universe and therefore regardless of our choices will always pull to align with the Universe, which is made of Love, has brought a great understanding to illness and disease. How am I expressing life? As Liane beautifully says: “Holding back that beauty and that Divine expression is a pain far greater than what can be physically inflicted on the body and that physical pain serves as a marker for the love that we hold back. If this is all so, and our bodies are forever responding to the Universe, then we need to ask ourselves how do we respond to that call – do we fight or do we flow?”
Thank you Rachel – the return of true health is expressed so beautifully in your words. Serge Benhayon has indeed delivered so much for humanity.
“But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” This is a revolutionary way to look at illness and disease – and it is the absolute truth. Thank you Rachel.
I love your new definition of health, Rachel: “a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people.” Wow! That is health of a completely different order – the type of health that has as its basis an interconnectedness with all people and all of life. The doctors and the medicine associated with this type of health would need to be rather extraordinary: there is no raising of the bar here, because there is no bar – only an innate knowing of the true nature of life and ourselves and our part in it.
What a deep true story of healing you share here Rachel, thank you so much to give a complete other perspective on health through your own experience as a way to “come home”!. The last sentence has brought tears to my eyes as I can relate to it deeply. The turnaround you had with your relationship to health is transferable and inspirational to every other “battle” in life against our true being – the “true illness” as you wrote.
Certainly no more mouse on a wheel for me. I love your final sentences Rachel. Exploring the deeper possibilities of living a true life and living from my essence is one that I now embark upon. Giving up control and just allowing – trusting in the universe is something I say yes to, and shall see how it unfolds, with all the mistakes I will inevitably make along the way, and accepting them, not judging. True health is certainly not just the mere absence of disease.
I can relate to what is shared here and also have asked this question. Much has been shared in this blog to consider even more deeply yet the simplicity remains -” So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?”
The biggest change in looking at health in this way is the way I have come to see illness and disease, in that it is not something to fear and fix, but for most an inevitable part of life as I return to who I am, and illness just acts as a marker in how I have been in relation to myself, so how loveless or loving this has been.
Liane this is a blog in itself! To recognise that our bodies belong to the Universe and to a pulse that doesn’t come from us but through us is a big one! The matter then becomes a simple one as you say – do I choose to align to that pulse or do I disregard it, bring in a damaging force to contra it and therefore illness and disease to my body?
This resonate deeply in me, Liane. The abuse I have allowed in the past has made my body very ill. To use the body for functioning instead of truly expressing love is abuse. To stay open and receive the love which is all around us instead of closing down, and singing like an angel all day long is our true nature.
“Is that the meaning of health, I started to wonder? Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?” This is so clear to me Rachel. I too have before been caught up in thinking health, like much else in my life, is a destination, once I’m there I’ll be so and so. How wrong was I. In living with that mentality every choice I made was goal orientated, outcome driven, and took me away from the inner essence residing in me and the ability to be truly present in the moment. Learning to commit to myself and in the moment has changed my life and my outlook.
Rachel this is a fantastic blog and I can really relate and feel what you have shared to be one that most, if not all, that have attended the work of Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon have experienced and come to understand what true health is. The deep level of care and self love that Serge lives is truly inspiring and for me the leading way of what true health is about. Bring honesty in the way we are living and an openness to look deeper at what is presented to us. The blessing is when the body is telling us loud and clear that there is dis-harmony going on and for us to embrace this. Which is the complete opposite to how you were and what you shared – ‘In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.’
“Is that the meaning of health, I started to wonder? Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?
I love this question Rachel, can health be found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves and our bodies? I think it can be as I have felt how fiery and divine my body feels when I live from that commitment, holding nothing back of my amazing being, committing to myself and all others at the same time.
Katinka what you share with Rachel’s quote and your feeling on the matter takes the meaning of health to an even deeper point that society generally talks about. With so many different levels of health being bandied about, we need as a society to have a clear foundation of true health.
Yes David, coming back to this today I feel even more deeply that we need this deeper understanding of what truly brings us good health and wellbeing, it is our commitment to ourselves, others and life.
You have turned the notion of health on its head, for when we look at our bodies and how we are living as well as to the illnesses we may have, we cannot deny there is a bigger picture to see. I also love what you have shared about health not being the end result or the toughness/immunity to illness, perhaps true health includes the clearing that our bodies need to do to allow more of our natural selves to be in and live in this world.
Great points Cherise. The links between the way we live and our health, illnesses or injuries become more and more obvious as we become open to seeing them… When we are aware of this, it is indeed impossible to question that there is a bigger picture going on!
Hello Susie Williams, it’s interesting when we keep the word ‘health’ in a box, you will only be allowed to see the four walls of the box. But as we have shown here if we open health up things become a lot more obvious like “the links between the way we live and our health…” There is a much “bigger picture going on” as you say and indeed nothing starts from within the box we have made health currently to be. This is a great conversation for us all and in that the true picture is being shown, thank you.
Chasing ‘good health’ is a core distraction we use to not feel the truth of our choice to live in a physical body and play out our amazing gift of life purely on a physical level. What Rachel has alluded to is how true health can simply and naturally materialise when we deeply honour so much more about ourselves than solely the physical.
All so very true Rachel Mascord. I can relate to the war against yourself, with your body as the ‘enemy’. I have spent a lifetime fighting mine but more so in the way I simply haven’t wanted to be in it, as it didn’t feel like a safe place to be; bodies get sick and are subject to abuse both from ourselves and from others. In short – they get hurt and the pain goes deep. If I choose to not connect too deeply then I won’t get hurt, right? Wrong.
Our bodies are Heaven made visible if we choose to live our true selves within them and express this truth to the world. Once this is felt, it is extremely hard to continue living recklessly and this includes all the ‘perceived good’ we try to inflict on them in an effort to constantly ‘pull them into line’ and ‘conquer the enemy’ when really, in this state, we are our own worst enemy because we are running scared from what we know is true – that we are love and the fleshy vehicle that we reside in is a great body of love that belongs to the Universe/God, which is an even greater body of love that encases us all. If we listen to this then we let go of the reigns that we are gripping for dear life and allow ourselves to follow the impulses that naturally pulse forth from this/our greater body. We allow our breath to sync to the breath of God, the all of us. A body that is brought back to this harmony is a body that will not ‘let you down’ because all that happens to it from this point is in accordance to the bigger picture, the greater plan, our true home and any illness experienced will simply be a clearing of what has been allowed to accumulate from being in resistance to this pull. Our bodies do this regardless of whether we choose this or not, for their particles belong to the Universe and answer to that call and not to our self imposed one, however, true health comes from accepting this and allowing our bodies to respond to what they so naturally are designed to respond to – love.
Thus, the real pain here that we all feel and that is the root cause of all illness and disease is the pain of being in a body of love and not connecting to and expressing that love. It is a bit like having the ability to sing like an angel but never opening your mouth to sing. Holding back that beauty and that Divine expression is a pain far greater than what can be physically inflicted on the body and that physical pain serves as a marker for the love that we hold back. If this is all so, and our bodies are forever responding to the Universe, then we need to ask ourselves how do we respond to that call – do we fight or do we flow?
Very wise words Liane, our bodies are pure markers of truth and under divine order of the universe are here to be in harmony with all and expressing love, joy and natural flow at all times. Anything less than this is a battle and a fight within oneself and how could it not be that this leads to the body needing to rid itself from an energy or a way of living that does not belong?! Allowing a deep connection and knowing within ourselves and our bodies is where true health begins.
Thank you Liane. The way we fight recklessly against our true nature is an excruciatingly painful act to choose, but we do and continue to do so until the pain, illness and disease brings us to our knees. If we simply and most humbly listened intently to our bodies we can be shown the way and the only true way – the way of our inner heart and begin to live from our divinity once again.
I absolutely Love reading your words. They are all pure Gold, one by one. It is so True what you’re writing. Yet, giving myself permission in full is what I’m only recently am really exploring. It is indeed Beautiful to align to the Wisdom we belong to. Which is a constant. It never stops. Heaven’s always there. It’s up to me to connect and surrender to it.
Wow, Liane, this is writing that is heaven sent ‘naturally pulsed forth’ from the body of Love which holds us all. Thank you for sharing.
Liane, this is a deeply inspiring comment filled with wisdom, truly a blog in itself! Thank you.
“A body that is brought back to this harmony is a body that will not ‘let you down’ because all that happens to it from this point is in accordance to the bigger picture, the greater plan, our true home and any illness experienced will simply be a clearing of what has been allowed to accumulate from being in resistance to this pull. Our bodies do this regardless of whether we choose this or not, for their particles belong to the Universe and answer to that call and not to our self imposed one, however, true health comes from accepting this and allowing our bodies to respond to what they so naturally are designed to respond to – love”.
Liane this is so beautiful. I can feel my body reconfiguring and aligning to it’s true purpose. Wow! Thank you so much.
Wonderfully said, Liane. Holding back our divinity is truly our greatest disease, not only for ourselves but for all of us. It is the reason that we are in the mess we are in as humanity. If all of us took just one step towards the truth of who we are and expressed ourselves from there, the world would be a very different place.
Liane, I agree with Stephanie. This is a blog in and of its own. You have taken this to a vastly deeper level. There is a fight we enter that is even greater than the one against our own essence. It is a war in fact against the greater Plan, against God and in pure resistance to the pull of the Universe that is ever expanding. It’s battleground is our body. We are made of matter that naturally responds to the Universal call, for quite simply it cannot but do otherwise. When our minds fight and kick and scream against this we create a tension that can only be released in a burst that we call illness or disease. As humans we focus on the debris where the fight has occurred – the symptoms, the pain and the suffering, but we do not ask why are we fighting in the first place? And what is it that we are fighting?
Very well said Rachel. Our bodies are the battlegrounds for a self-perpetuated war we enter into when we walk away from love. The first step away immediately creates a tension in the body as we feel ourselves walking away, yet at the same time being pulled back – a bit like resisting the pull of a magnet. And every arduous step thereafter takes us deeper into what is not love and deeper into illusion, for the love we ‘leave behind’ is forever and always within and calling us home. We fight the love that we are, with all that we are not. However, love never fights, so the ‘war’ that we feel is simply our resistance to the eternal pull back to love. Try pulling apart two magnets and you will see how strong the force is that we use to take these steps.
Wow Liane – I found your comment to Rachel’s beautiful blog quite entrancing – that is it held me in an embrace by the simplicity of true love/ true health being expressed. Thank you.
Beautifully expressed Liane. I can feel the pockets of tightness in my body where I have yet to give over the reins and allow full expression. Your comment has touched me deeply.
Liane, I agree, this is definitely a blog and more needs to be said, your wisdom has taken this to the root of our relationship with the body. It is very old, and how the body has been treated forever on earth, through mutilations, wars, rapes, abuses, never-ending violations of the human body perpetrated against ourselves and or each other, then we have all the illnesses and diseases. We hold no value to this body, and we do not live what this body can actually bring us, living divine essence. Where our bodies are held with regard as our connection to each other and ourselves, we cannot escape the body, it is with us wherever we are.
How is this happening – where health is a compensation, for not living true health. It is basically the bastardisation of the human body.
You have taken this to the depth of ‘Thus, the real pain here that we all feel and that is the root cause of all illness and disease is the pain of being in a body of love and not connecting to and expressing that love.’
This is our agony! But it can be different as Rachel’s blog is exquisitely showing us and as inspired by the life and teachings of Serge Benhayon.
This is a lovely sharing Liane, I get it how our bodies are always responding and communicating with the Universe and it is us holding back expressing our own divinity that creates that initial disharmony within.
I love how you use the word health together with the word commitment. This is a word that is usually missing when it comes to health. If there is no commitment to ourselves, then how can there be true health? One cannot exist without the other.
Yes, health is very simple. You listen to the signs of the body and act on them. Over time you become more aware so you will get better and better at it. There are consequences of long term neglect and sometimes things break down but there is a huge difference between a body that is well maintained and another that is inappropriately maintained. Everybody understands that all of this applies to machines, yet when I write ‘body’ instead of machines, it suddenly stops being obvious. It is as if we lose intelligence when it comes to our body – or even if we accept the above it seems to be very hard to make it into a livingness.
I love how you felt you had “..entered into a war against myself” in your pursuit of health, when all you needed was to “..start living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and a deepening commitment to that.” Sounds so easy and very loving.
This is a dear and exquisite blog Rachel- thank you. Your question if health is “…..found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?” inspired by your observations of Serge Benhayon leaves much to consider. Just today I noticed how I can avoid so much honesty by keeping my awareness of my body quite superficial, I awoke not feeling the best but had something to get on with and afterwards one activity turned into the next all the while physically I was feeling worse. When I eventually decided to lie down I felt how I had been avoiding feeling my body deeply and simply brought my focus without judgement to my body and stayed with it, not only did it actually feel better to pay attention to the physical discomfort it also resolved within half an hour and I got on with my day.
I relate to this Deanne, very much so. I have just started to be far more willing to really listen to, see and feel my body. It is as though I was afraid of what it would tell me – rather like being in a difficult relationship where you you just try to ignore each other to avoid the “difficult” conversation. It does not work, and just like the difficult conversation is never as bad as we imagine it will be, the deep observation of what is going on inside us is not overwhelming. For not only do we see the challenges, we experience the grace of all that is beautiful too.
Yes, I too understand what is shared here in my own experience…my body has been unwell for a few days, and I am in and out of paying attention to it. It’s almost like, because I’m unwell, ‘I’m wrong’….but what I felt this morning was to really feel my body and be guided by it and what it needs – taking care and bringing loving attention. So my morning rhythm has had to change to support me. (This is where I come back to me, and make it about true health)… I also feel the space, my body is tired because of some choices I’ve made this month, where I was tough on myself, hard. We are not to underestimate the impact we have on our bodies by our choices, not only physical choices, but how we relate with others, and how we are with emotions, stress, anxiety etc.
“But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” This is so true Rachel…these choices are the real dis-ease, the dis-harmony within the body which develops into the disease if we are not open and willing to honour what our body is sharing with us. This brings the responsibility for our dis-ease and or illnesses back to us and to our choices.
There is always something we are pursuing believing that all will be well when we reach that ideal. Once we realize everything outside ourselves is an illusion and that we are and have everything already we can stop trying to become something. Just being present in every single moment alllows us to feel our incredible beauty and allows us to hear what our body is telling us enabling us to take loving care of ourselves.
Yes Ilja, I agree we are always running to reach some ideal in health, but it is never enough. True health is an ongoing way of life, it’s the relationship we build with our self, and how as you have said ‘take loving care of ourselves’. As we connect and build this relationship, true health becomes a natural part of our daily lives, it’s how we are in every part of our lives with ourselves and others.
Rachel the way the media present health and being healthy is very different to the true health you’ve shared. Before Universal Medicine I had not heard about a true quality of being, of living – it was simply about not being sick. No matter how good you look on the outside – it’s really and simply about the quality of feeling on the inside.
This is a great point David, even working in the medical profession good health is presented as the absence of illness and disease or hospital/medical visits but this is a very limited view to have. This way only serves to create a picture or a bench mark for people to strive for or to feel let down when they don’t obtain health perfection. There must be a true way of viewing our health as an all-ancompassing way of life and a willingness to truly value ourselves, the choices we make to support ourselves and the bodies’ natural process of clearing energy, old momentums and patterns that do not belong. Deeply valuing our bodies and all that they share with us consistently, supports us to view health in a whole new way and we can then share this with the media, bringing true education to others too.
So true David it’s about the quality first. Learning to accept the quality that we all are and getting to know and live that quality once again.
Hello David Nicholson and this is the same for me, “Before Universal Medicine I had not heard about a true quality of being, of living – it was simply about not being sick.” I thought ‘health’ was just about exercise, fruit and veg and as long as you did it better than someone you were always ‘healthy’. In other words I had no idea what health was, it was more about comparison and better. Now with Universal Medicine and blogs like these I have a deeper understanding of things like health and it goes far deeper than ever before, thank you.
I was the same Raymond, I thought being healthy was eating fruit and veggies, exercising and being skinny. If I got sick and needed a day off I would feel judged and weak, like I had fallen behind the healthy bunch. Since attending Universal Medicine I am seeing and understanding that health is related to what I eat, what time I go to bed, are the clothes I’m wearing going to keep me warm, connecting with people and connecting with me.
Hello lindellparlour and I agree health is related to many things and true health for me is connecting, listening and honouring what you are feeling within your body. So it doesn’t really matter what the title is, whether it’s lunch, the gym or whatever. As Rachel Mascord says, “Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” I would say yes, thank you Lindell and Rachel.
Very true David, I also had this picture of health in my mind depending on what I saw portrayed to be healthy by the media, the look, the body, the exercise regime – you name it I did it – but it was only I met Serge Benhayon that I realised that that was not it and true health comes from within me and is the result of the choices I make of honouring and listening to my body on a daily basis.
“But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” Put like this Rachel it is all so simple, yet until humanity returns to who we truly are, we will continue to see ourselves as victims of illness.
Our self-victimisation is an illness in and of itself, one which can lead to actual illness, which simply perpetuates the belief that we are victims of illness. The cure? As you said, lucindag, return to who we truly are: which is far more than what we think.
So to not be a victim is to instead take responsibility for all of our choices and how we live. We are not taught this! We are not taught to take responsibility .. but taking responsibility for how we are is empowering and I feel this is something we have yet to truly realise.
Absolutely, Vicky. We are not taught to take responsibility, often we are instead taught how to take blame, which becomes guilt, which means that we hold ourselves so much less than we truly are.
I am glad you have brought up ‘self-victimisation’, Naren. This is an illusion that runs deep in today’s society with regards to illness, and leaves exhausted doctors needing to be the ‘saviours’. Playing the victim simply avoids the responsibility we know we ultimately have for ourselves, our bodies and each other.
Indeed, Janet. We seem to have gotten ourselves to a point where we have given medicine an authority beyond its capability to fulfil, and yet we are completely reliant upon it when we get sick because we as a society have for the most part given up our responsibility to care for our bodies.
I also used to look at my health and my body as something I had to conquer, but all it did was start a war within myself, and one that I was failing miserably, as though trying with as much might as possible to force my body into being healthy – take it from me that very unloving approach doesn’t work and will never work.
Serge Benhayon has presented that there is a totally different relationship to be had with our bodies and he, along with many others, are now showing the world what true health is.
I did this too Julie, I remember going to the gym when I was younger and forcing myself to get fit, I put myself on a hardcore regime but could not keep it up and felt hugely disappointed afterwards. ‘I also used to look at my health and my body as something I had to conquer, but all it did was start a war within myself, and one that I was failing miserably, as though trying with as much might as possible to force my body into being healthy’. I agree this really does not work and for me was very unloving, I have been inspired by Serge Benhayon to be much more gentle with my body and now love walking and find this very supportive.
Hello Julie Matson and I agree. I would run and train myself to ‘be’ healthy but it never seemed to be healthy enough so I would train some more. Only to stop for a while and then a trigger would kick in and away I would go again on a ‘health kick’. We are living models that health is a living way, a relationship with your body in more than just a couple of areas like food or exercise. Health is a relationship with your body as a whole, a deeply connected living relationship, thank you Julie.
It is great to hear you express this Raymond as I have found that so many of us has thought that this is a healthy way to live until the awareness of Universal Medicine and finding that there is much more to it that is not just about action but also what we are choosing to act on.
Hello aminatumi and thank you. It makes sense there is much more to health than we currently see it as. As we have both said Universal Medicine has been the support to see beyond how we look at health. No only has this made sense but has also supported a truer way for us to be ‘healthy’, a much more rounded way that as I said makes more sense. Thanks again Amina.
A consciousness around what it means to be healthy is being broken down here, which is extraordinary. I honestly could never summon up the energy it needed to be on a health kick as it all seemed too much like hard work as it came from a “should” and a drive that felt too forceful. However that said I am not sure I really took care of my body in a gentler way either only going on the occasional walk for enjoyment. There was no commitment to really taking care of my body or nurturing it especially. Now I have started to develop a much more loving relationship with myself I feel that I want to regularly exercise, but it comes from a desire to deeply support my body and my vitality – to lovingly take care of myself – no “shoulds” at all, which makes exercising a joy!
Hello michelle819 and I agree. Whether you choose to be on a ‘health kick’ or choose not to be on one and do nothing, both appear the same because neither have chosen a true way to support yourself or you health. As we are saying here, health goes far beyond exercise and food and becomes a way of living. A ‘healthy’ choice could be a conversation with another person or the time you go to bed. The health of your body is a living thing and can’t be locked into a type of behaviour that ticks a box. In any moment your body will call for a different approach to the way you live, you can listen or you can ignore, that’s our choice. Listening and honouring what you feel within your body is truly healthy for me. Thank you Michelle.
Raymond, I love how you have taken this back to the purpose of this blog. I have often noticed that when I fail to express something I am feeling is needed, or needed to be said – this leaves a residue of pollution in my body, which over time can magnify and become toxic. Each time this builds up feelings of resentment and bitterness; leaving me feeling hard, in protection, in doubt and in self-loathing. What these emotions do to the body over time is disastrous! I am learning the hard way from having allowed myself to feel the negative consequences of not speaking up and not expressing in the moment, which impacts on my health and sense of well being. To change requires a whole new loving approach and level of commitment to life, but one that is well worth the effort. The results of which can be deeply felt in an increasing joy and vitality in the body.
Hello michelle819, thank you and I agree. If we know life is about connection and feeling what to do next from that connection. Where does the connection start, The Gentle Breath Meditation http://www.unimedliving.com/meditation/free/meditation-for-beginners/introductory-gentle-breath-meditation.html. Then from that connection everything comes, the what to do next comes from a feeling and the expression of that feeling, whether that is speaking or from your body movements. Everything else that may come in is from not being connected. So simply if we stay with a connection and build that from moment to moment than there is no “fail to express” because it’s just another moment of connection to feel. If we make something else more important than this we open ourselves up to the everything else that we have clearly seen is not truly who we are. The commitment is to connection. Thank you again Michelle.
Beautifully put Raymond. When we start with the fact that “life is about connection” then all we have to do in each moment is simply connect. Lovely.
Hello again Michelle819, could life really be that simple? Surely not, wouldn’t we need to do some difficult tasks etc and life be super complicated. Connection is what it’s about and building the consistency of that the key. Then no matter if you’re in the street, your home or the care, simply just connect and find your breath. Thank you Michelle.
So lovely to read your blog again Rachel. I too can remember when ‘I listened to the words of Serge Benhayon, and it was as though a light, long forgotten, ignited inside of me’ and this light has kept burning within for me from that point, although at times it flickers when I become distracted from connecting to the Ageless Wisdom that is so freely available constantly.
I am learning on a personal level that when we express honestly and from truth this has a big impact on how the body feels and therefore on its health. I am learning that this creates space in my body as it is freed up from all the stagnation of things left unsaid. It also allows for an inner strength that is more able to observe and not take on the hurts of another – leaving in its turn yet more room for awareness, truthful expression and further expansion. The results can only mean more vitality and joy.
I appreciate what you have written here Michelle819 about expression and how that in itself is a great dose of medicine to truly support our health and nurture our being.
The day I came home… Goosebumps … I love everything you wrote because it reimprints health in a big scale.
Goosebumps 🙂 I love that.. for me it was a total surrender and a deep knowing in my body… amazing on so many levels. And I agree Steffi this is a huge re-imprint for health and what we have deemed health to be and very necessary for the whole world to take and stop and really understand.
Very true Steffi – with so much sickness in our world true health really stands out now. Universal Medicine delivers true health then it’s up to us to live it.
Thank you Rachel I love your question: “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” This has been answered for me too by meeting Serge Benhayon and all he lives and reflects to the world. The real answer that is lived and known and beautiful and who we are, as you say.
I love it Tricia and I am feeling what you are saying. Health is to first be who you are. It is fundamental. How can we be healthy in any way without that?
Amazing Rachel. The question, “What is health?” is huge – it is often defined as the absence of disease, yet this is far too simplistic and limited as a definition. I know many people with disease who seem healthy and many without who do not seem healthy. For me, health, or being healthy, is a total approach to our lives and the way we care for ourselves so that when an illness arises, as it inevitably will, we are well equipped to support ourselves through the illness – even when we end up dying from that illness, as we all eventually will.
Your opening comment has ignited a simple statement from me Rachel – ‘For most of my life health was something that I pursued, thinking that I did not have it, and that if I did have it, my life would be nothing short of amazing and I would be able to sit back and cruise through anything, free from all worry and care’. An opportunity to ask ourselves – what is the perspective I hold that is preventing what is already there in existence to show itself? We create what we experience. There is always choice – how beautiful is that. Thanks Rachel
Rachel you have captured the meaning of health and how we have been duped and led astray by the different notions and ideals of what being healthy constitutes. Your blog opens up the discussion for us to ponder that there is more to health than being well or being sick.
It’s wonderful to read a clear view on what health is for you Rachel. To end the pointless cycle of obtaining a state of perfection and giving way to listening to and caring for your body, is the way to true health.
What I have noticed is that we have many different views on health and they vary widely. WIth this we tend to make decsions based on knowledge only but very little on listening to the body’s true health.
Health has a very different meaning to me now, since I met Serge Benhayon 5 years ago. Previously I would see it as something that can occur/happen to you (something out of your hands). Therefore you get to seek help and move on with life. But wait, stop.. this was not true for me any longer when I got to feel who I was again. I felt that spark, like the example in this blog, and then I got to feel my relationship with health… I was like NO WAY!?! The old way I was looking at health just did not felt right anymore.. there was more..so much more. I came to my senses and actually felt – health is about me because of me and I have everything in me that causes and is possible to heal this dis-ease. This is the moment where I realised I was no victim or had no power – in contrast – I have all the power and I am able to change it – change my health. THis was the moment where I realised: I have the responsibility to look after myself as a human being, and if I do not take my responsibilty for that, I actually dismiss the true power and purpose that I am here to live for.
This is a really powerful and inspiring statement “I came to my senses and actually felt – health is about me because of me and I have everything in me that causes and is possible to heal this dis-ease.” thank you.
I never really considered my health until Serge Benhayon came along. I was on a slippery slope to a serious illness but thought I was bullet proof and thought wrongly that I was getting away with all the self abuse that I was doing. I wasn’t bullet proof but I feel I dodged a bullet thanks to Serge.
Serge Benhayon and the teachings of Universal Medicine have turned what I thought was health upside down on it’s head. Today I realise what is the point of having a so called healthy looking and functioning body if it’s totally depleted and loveless on the inside, this is not healthy in any way what so ever, and is an illusion of health. Thanks you for opening up the topic Rachel.
Danielle, the illusion of health is a real biggy in a world where ‘health’ has become such a huge industry. I can almost find no line now between the portrayed picture of health and the portrayed ideals of beauty. This is very ironic as it is the complete polar opposite to the fact that a truly healthy person is a truly beautiful person by nature of the all encompassing way of health that Rachel describes… ” living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that”
I love what you’ve shared here rosannabianchini about Health being an industry. You are totally correct, health has become a business or a way that people and companies can make money. I particularly see this in aged care where there are so many products and companies out there that aren’t truly about serving the people, but instead making money from them, sometimes in a way where they are taking advantage of their poor cognition and memory, or their need for comfort from any pain or despair associated with aging.
Wow yes, of course, that’s really important to discuss. We talk about the ‘health industry’ but there is still, by and large, the picture of ‘health’ products, performance products, gyms, spas and sports clubs. but of course the industry is equally huge in the other direction, catering for the aging population and all that this entails to combat deteriorating health.
That’s certainly an illusion a lot of people live by – that if your body looks ‘fit’ you’ve achieved the ‘Good Health Award’, when actually there is a whole lot more to address than just physicality. How about how we live on a day to day basis? The state of our relationships? These are equally if not even more important than having a ‘fit’ figure.
Yes we have been sold a lie that a fit physique means a healthy body – because in truth it can be deeply ill in the inside, mentally and physically.
“it been a slow process to scrub away the notion of physical perfection that I believed health to be”. what powerful words these are, Rachel.
Our society is so geared to health being about physical perfection that words such as “disease”, “illness”, “sick days” , “pain” or “tiredness” are associated with an inadequacy or deficit in the body rather than the way our body is expressing its need to us in a very loving way. We have got “health” all wrong and thank you to Serge Benhayon for presenting the truth and starting a very different conversation about our health.
I really enjoyed reading your blog Rachel and it made me stop and consider what in the world we are all doing to our bodies? Some of us exercise like there is no tomorrow (excessively) whilst others never exercise at all, some eat diets from a book without considering if it feels right for their body whilst others eat to excess and everyone complains (most of us do) when the body gets sore or ill yet we rarely look at how we are living and take responsibility and actually thank our body for being honest!
I like what you are presenting here Judykarenyoung about needing to thank our bodies for being honest enough to tell us that the way we choose to live affects us. When we choose to drink alcohol for example the body gets affected, when we are anxious and stressed the body gets affected. The body is sensing every choice we make and it knows that whatever choice we make will either heal or harm it. Makes me realize how important it is to live in a way that supports the body.
This is so true Judy…many reject their body trying to make it into their picture of how it should be, and when it becomes ill they go into battle with it – it becomes a fight to ‘get better’ which is really so they can get back to the way they were living before – to do it all over again!
Our body has lived with the consequences of all our choices and knows down to the finest detail what is true for it or not. Our body never lies – it just presents all our choices and asks us to take responsibility for them! So simple really…
Judy I agree that thanking our bodies for being honest could be a very healthy thing to do. I just came across research that when people fill their hearts with love and appreciation, their whole physiology becomes harmonious and efficient, and their immune systems improve. So if our bodies are miserable and out of whack, perhaps it says straight up that there isn’t enough lived love in us?
Judy it makes me think that the waiting rooms in a Doctor’s Surgery should be lined with mirrors, so we can all take a long honest look at what we have brought to ourselves. The truth is in our reflection.
It is so exhausting chasing anything that we believe we need to be healthy, fulfilled etc. It was thought provoking to read your exploration of what health actually could be and how different it is from the ‘invincible body’ model of health or at least not having symptoms that get in the way of what we normally do. Living from our essence, in harmony with our inner nature sounds like the way to have true health.
Rachael, this is a very healing article. I could feel my body melting, clearing and relaxing as I read it. How wonderful to come to the awareness that we do not have to be perfect, even in our health. We can accept ourselves as we are and simply give ourselves what we need. Thank you for your clarity.
Me too Rebecca. That acceptance is tremendously healthy.
Rachel your blog is a breath of fresh air.
Like you, I was bound to health being all about the physical – but as you say – to let go is to allow the body to speak. And wow does it have a lot to say! The more I allow, the more sensitive my body is to what is and what is not loving.
I am enjoying this relationship i have with myself, and the ever-deepening way my body talks to me.
This makes me see how growing up and over the years I really took my health for granted and when diagnosed with endometriosis years ago thought ‘why’ how come my body is not ‘healthy’ and ‘normal’? Through Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine this is where I learnt about how our everyday choices affect our health and how taking responsibility for our lives and how we live is really important. This is something I still very much need to look at and work with.
“But how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is?” Accepting the body as to where it is, is the greatest gift anyone can do for themselves in any given moment. This isn’t always easy when we have a number of things to do but when we do make time to stop we give our body an opportunity to heal. In the past especially when I was unwell I found it very difficult to accept that I was ill and my body was in the condition it was. In time I gently surrendered and came to accept the situation I was in. It was from this moment that healing began to take place.
Love that point Rachel: The true illness is what takes me away from what I truly am.
A beautiful well-written blog Rachel Mascord. Before I came across Universal Medicine I went on a pursuit to better my health, visiting many alternative practitioners, reading many books and attending many courses but to no avail. I fleeted from one thing to another until I came across Serge Benhayon. It was here with Serge Benhayon that my search was over. Never before had I come across a man or woman that was living their ‘talk’ and the truth of Serge Benhayon’s livingness I could feel in my body.
Serge Benhayon is the ‘real’ deal, a man living from soul without perfection, a man of amazing wisdom dedicating himself to humanity. Never before had I come across anyone who inspired me and inspires today in the way Serge Benhayon does.
Very true Gill, Rachel has given us much to ponder on and it is quite a key point that we continue to nurture and care for ourselves when we are well just as much as when we are sick. So often it takes a serious illness or scare to get us to step up the way we look after ourselves, so why not continue that when we are back on top, so that the body doesn’t have to get ill again to remind us that it really appreciates being loved.
Thank you Gill and Rowena for the reminder that our true commitment is towards our health when we are well, so that our bodies do not need to get sick to remind us of our responsibility to care for them.
I know I have spent a good part of my life trying to compensate the abuse I was doing to my body with things to fix it at the same time in an attempt to neutralize the bad with the good. Healthy living is now feeling my body for what it needs… which is easy because I have done just about everything that is not healthy for it.
Great honest comment; isn’t the attempt, or constance of endeavouring to ‘neutralise the bad with the good’ such a farce!
I agree in full, that what Serge teaches by the way he lives is even greater than the words he speaks
This sentence struck me Rachel ‘… a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people? What I have been touched by is the ‘consequence’ of the commitment to care for myself, cannot but make me aware of this for everyone! It impossible to develop this level of relationship with myself and not know that this is a marker for all. Thank you!
Rachael I love the way you have explored what is health and realising that the pursuit of it is not it but the possibility that living from our essence is what true health is all about. We need to get out of the away the what is not (which makes us ill) to allow the what is (health) to be lived.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” This is such a great qustion Rachel. We have so many variables about what ‘health’ actually is, and it seems that we determine our health by how few or how many physical symptoms we have. However your question poses something very profound, and that if we considered that this was indeed health, then we would be able to clock any changes in the body and potentially prevent them from getting worse, instead of reaching a point when we think we are healthy despite the pain and discomfort that we have just got used to, and then learn to tolerate it. A very different way to look at health and well being and one that is definitely worth looking into.
Gosh you write beautifully Rachel, you moved me to tears this morning, Thank you.
The human body is going to wear out at some point. The way we are living contributes to how and when that will be but being committed to being more of who we are transcends the human body and it’s eventual death. Health as we know it seems to look at the body as the end point, as a separate package in and of itself, with the aim of attaining perfection of some sort according to a held ideal and belief. Being who we are, allows our essence and quality to permeate beyond the physical body and has an effect on health of all living things. Our commitment to our health if lived this way takes health beyond the individual self and expands it to include the all. How glorious!
Only a few days after reading your blog Rachel I became sick and experienced for the last 2 days at times quite a bit of pain. This time around I experience it differently as I did before. I’m actually feeling that it is actually my own choice to be sick. And that being ‘sick’ doesn’t have anything (!!!!) to do with who I am. The who I am is actually not sick, but very alive. The theme for me is support, allowing, asking, accepting, honouring and appreciating support. And from the moment that I called my GP and talked to his assistant, up until now 36 hours later I’ve been flooded with support. From my father who offered to go with me and drive to the GP and doing grocery shopping, from my brother, from my daughter, from my ex-wife, from the people that I cancelled appointments with and also from an unseen world. But a world that is very feelable. They are there to support me in letting go and surrendering to the fact that I also do belong, that I am indeed Love and that I am a Soul. That it is real. And it all started with reading this blog and reflecting on what health actually is for me.
That is such beautiful medicine Floris. So graceful and such a reminder of how loved you are.
This is great Floris. To really feel that it is not you that is sick, that it is your body that is sick, and that your essence is still vibrant and alive. Our bodies need to clear and heal, and it feels great to accept this but not identify with it. This is how we can truly heal, and it is not about being ‘healthy’.
The answers to your question – what is true health? – would vary a lot depending on who you ask. Not only our jobs, but our ethnicity, family background, age and gender all play a part in creating what we see as ‘health’. But is that true health? Similar to other words like love and religion, health is a word that has been used to morph into anyone’s lifestyle to provide the tailor made excuses for not being healthy or bullying our bodies in forever trying to achieve it.
I love how you describe ‘ bullying our bodies” trying forever to achieve it. This is exactly what happens. I was force fed high doses of vitamins every day as a child, so that I would be “healthy “, relatives who have had the hugest quantites of vitamins over their lifetimes have ended up not in the state of health that strict adherence to such a regime should have ensured. I knkw health is far more than medicine, or vitamins. It’s about how I feel every day that I live and how much love I bring to myself and therefore others.
What an amazing sharing Rachel, all these ideals about health are a huge business – we all want to buy this elusive health, no matter what. How beautiful to get off the merry-go-round and getting such a deep understanding what health really is.
Yes Rachel, every illness in the first place is a gift from our body. A gift to make it obvious that there is something we need to look at and attend to in our lives. Something to be healed and cleared – just like the illness.
‘In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.’ how true – I can remember those undrinkable concoctions that were sold to me as a ‘liver cleanse’ when stopping drinking alcohol was probably what I needed to do at the time. We put ourselves through tough exercise regimes in the pursuance of better health, but risk injury in the process. It’s crazy how we strive to get health when all we need is Love. With love there is no battle.
I smiled at that Carmel. I wonder what our livers thought of those concoctions? I tend to feel it was another drubbing on top of the alcohol. Is it not interesting that “health” has become associated with a flagellant-like approach, “whipping it into shape”, when all that is required is respect at the very least, care and if we are willing to go that far…love.
I can relate to the tough regimes we put ourselves through in the name of “good health”. Over the years I tried many cleanses that involved drinking lots of salty water, certain exercises to push the water into my colon and then for it to wash through the colon and come out the other end. It was an intense yogic practise that I did many times over. I felt “better” and “cleaner” for a short time after, but as you say Carmel, in hindsight eating in a loving way and in a way that suits that my body (which I do now), there is no need for these harsh regimes.
We have such a propensity to box life into little compartments that we can isolate and try to understand. Unfortunately it is as a result of this approach that as human beings we are no longer able to see the wood for the trees. And this is the underlying reason why we have lost connection with the true meaning of health and illness and disease, for we have learnt to look at it in isolation to the rest of life. It is no wonder that we fail sometimes to understand the true impact of the way we live and its relationship to our health.
The compartmentalisation in medical studies is so very intense Adam, and inescapable in the current system of training. It sets doctors on a path that is hard to recover from because the very foundation of their thinking is in bits and pieces.
Right now I am studying for a Masters degree in pain management. Chronic pain defies conventional management. It is rather like looking at Humpty Dumpty after he has fallen off a 30 metre wall, trying to put together the tiny pieces. But how do we do that when the way we have been trained to see the body is fractured at the start?
And there is not yet the consideration of how we live. In that at least pain offers people a massive moment to Stop! And reconsider.
Our propensity to want to reduce our understanding of life to the study of its parts – as though they are unrelated and not connected – is a disease in itself, and not one that only affects the medical profession, but one that is spreading to our systems of governance and education as well as our moral compass when it comes to dealing with greater societal issues. It is found in our interpretation of language and our study of history, In short it is a way of looking of life that has become highly fashionable and as such now contaminates most world views on anything. Meanwhile those who wish to stick their heads up above the clouds are ridiculed and called apologists for daring to claim that life is perhaps greater than the sum of its parts.
Very true Adam. Until the fragment remembers that it is part of a greater whole, it will forever wander lost seeking ‘the missing piece’ when all along, the missing piece is the fragment itself and not the whole that it walked away from.
Beautifully said Liane.
This is a great blog to ponder more deeply what health means to us as individuals, as a society or worldwide as humanity. Thank you Rachel.
The meaning of health that you started to ponder from observing Serge Benhayon “Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?” also describes for me Ruth, the way to health – on a personal level but also for society, as a healthy whole. One beautifully healthy organism.
I have spent a good part of my life looking for things about me to fix. Not my health because physically I have been ok but in every other aspect of my life looking for what I need to work on and fix next and tend to forget to appreciate and celebrate myself and how far I have come.
The consistency, wisdom, clarity, philosophical depth, and practical insight of what Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine present on the subjects of health and self-care are really the guidebook that humanity has been longing for, searching for, and it is now right in front of them. The plethora of books, TV shows, blogs, and posts about these subjects are showing us how desperately everyone is looking, and yet there is, the ultimate awareness of how to truly look after and nurture this human body, available right now.
What is health? I always thought I was making really healthy choices because I had a text book good diet, studied naturopathy, had lots of knowledge.. but my body was telling me otherwise. Chronic fatigue otherwise until I met Serge Benhayon and heard his presentations around health. I learned my own body is my very own marker of truth, when I listen to my body and act on the messages it gives me I have found health on a very different, ever changing, day to day, whole new level. This relationship with my own body has changed my health exponentially. No text book really could tell me what my body needed, what was giving me such chronic fatigue and weakness but my body could. And it has. Feeling how foods felt after I ate them, saying more of what I really thought rather than what I should say, going to bed when my body says I’m tired, simple simple things, alcohol makes me really tired, I won’t drink it… all of these put together and many more messages I have listened to and adjusted within myself means my health is now a dynamic thing, with me in every choice I make, every single minute of every day. Presence with myself is absolutely key.
“In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.” Once again i am struck by this line. Has anyone been to a gym lately and seen the punishing drive that has become our version of fitness and health – where is the partnership, the communication with our bodies? For years I cycled around London pushing my way round the streets with zero regard for my body & its messages, overiding the aches and pains with greater hardness and what I deemed as determination.
And the terrible stress of dealing with the aggressive traffic Lucinda. It is so awful to see the risks that cyclists take with themselves – their vulnerable bodies pitched against people lost in their frustration and sealed in the safety of their metal bubbles.
Great point Lucinda, this war against ourselves has become the “normal” lifestyle and it is not even questioned anymore. Look at the corrupt food industry that is in a massive battle against what is truly nurturing for the body and just sells whatever makes their profit. People today don’t even know or refuse to be aware of how poisonous most mainstream foods are and taste is just favored over healthy. Healthy is even considered as not tasty and boring. I just went to a newly opened restaurant who promote themselves as being healthy, but tasty!! How far have we come that tasty poison is more valued than a healthy body?
This is awesome Rachel. What I read from this is that when we stop fighting our health, we can actually appreciate the markers our body flags up for us which reflect the way in which we live. It’s incredible to hear you say this, ‘allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living’; being able to appreciate and understand these messages now considering your past of quite frequent illness is totally inspirational.
I agree Susie – isn’t it strange that we can find ourselves fighting the signals and communication from our bodies to try to be in control of our health when our bodies are delivering the answers we are looking for. Beautifully exposing blog Rachel.
Yes, I also am gaining a deeper understanding reading this blog again and I appreciate your comment Susie, “we can actually appreciate the markers our body flags up for us…”, instead of fighting it, constantly thinking something is wrong with it or us that needs correcting.
Definitely Judith – the amount of time we spend fighting our bodies and dismissing the messages it sends us is uncanny! We could be taking half the time accepting and learning from our little stubbed toes rather than resisting and stubbing all the other 4!
Susie this is very cool! Learning to read the messages that our bodies are telling us instead of ignoring them or blaming external factors for causing illness and disease is so necessary. Our bodies have so much to tell us and taking the time to listen and to understand is deepening the commitment to self.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” A great question to ask with a great answer! Rachel I love your words”…the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon – the day I came home.” I feel I also came home the day met Serge Benhayon too. I met myself back, with my true self, for the first time in a long time with this meeting.
Same here rachelmurtagh1, once I really heard what Serge Benhayon was presenting, I felt very much like I had come home. And it still feels like that. Home to me, more and more.
Rachelmurtagh1 I love the words that you have used ‘I met myself back with my true self’. When I read them I got a sense of how many of us have lived up until now, which is like a kind of faceless front that just keeps pushing forward. Living like that, it’s a never ending moving away from who we are, in search of our true selves which have always been back here.
Rachel, the part where you point out that the real illness is not being the real you is very profound. The topic of health is a huge subject and your blog is a great discussion starter on what true health means.
Even though I have always felt that illness was my body communicating to me something about how I was living, it was always something that I approached from seeking knowledge rather than feeling and trusting my own knowing. In studying and practicing natural medicine, I feel that I took on the belief that the absence of symptoms equals good health; that the aim was to be able to overcome or cure from a disease. Now I welcome symptoms as an opportunity to stop and feel the message my body has for me, knowing that this is a necessary part of being human. When I really do this, even just for little things or even accidents, I find the wisdom that I receive quite amazing.
Emma, I too spent a lot of time seeking knowledge to be healthier, often overriding how my body felt in order to fit in to an accepted theory of what would make me healthier. It all seems a bit silly when our health is in our hands and our body gives us more knowledge in each day than a thousand derived theories of what health is could ever possibly manage.
Yes I agree it is amazing to feel the message and significance of what goes on in the body. Sure, have the surgery, take the medicine, but then look at how the way we have lived contributes to all of this and ponder on changes needed.
True Emma, I too thought “…that the absence of symptoms equals good health…” but the body never stops reflecting to us where we are within our evolution and as the earth never stops circling around the sun, we do not have a reason to stop and become stagnant, so there is always something to evolve from and let go of.
Ah yes, the elusiveness of health that keeps us spinning and spinning on the wheel of fortune expecting it to deliver us an invisibility like Superman or Superwoman. Nothing like an illness or disease to bring one to a grinding to a halt only to discover there is nothing more elusive than the simplicity of being absolutely still and working from your essence and in service to the call.
You have hit the nail right on the head Rachel with your description of true health. Definitely not the robustness of health that we don’t have to take care of or even think about, nor the health we can buy from the doctor or alternative medicine practitioner, but the one “found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, our bodies, and consequently to all other people”. Beautiful.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” This is a perfect summation of what true health is. When we live in this way, there is a deep surrender to the signposts that the body is showing us.
I agree Donna that these words from Rachel sum up what true health is. I am learning that to make the choice to surrender to the messages that our body is continually giving us is the first step on this path .
Beautiful. I can absolutely relate to feeling that spark inside of me re-ignited once I met Serge. Something very, very real and true about him that couldn’t be denied. It’s interesting how you were constantly searching for things that would bring you ‘health’, and all the while you were getting sicker and getting further away from the true health shining inside of you.
I too experienced the same, they was no way of denying what I felt and how true it was. Serge Benhayon was the first person to remind me that I am much more then I was choosing to live and so the journey started where I gave myself time to reconnect back to my true connection. And what a JOY this is and has been.
Meeting Serge Benhayan was a life changing experience for me also. I have redefined what I know as health and to live a healthy life. I feel better now than I did 10 years ago and am living a truly healthy and vital life paying much more attention and care to the way I treat my body.
Trying to obtain health rather than living our lives from who we are and commiting to that are two complete opposites. I’ve learnt the latter from Universal Medicine and it’s far healthier.
I love your description of health Rachel that is “found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people”. Our commitment to our health is thus universal, not to do with our individuality at all; as every choice we make about our health – and other things – affects everyone else, because “everything is energy”, Einstein and “everything is because of energy”, Serge Benhayon.
You know what you say here sueq2012 is very interesting, as very often we don’t see the profound effects we have on our environment and others. Every choice/decision we make is like a wave within the sea – it come with an energy and that energy can either be healing or harming to the whole. If we make choices to care for ourselves that are truly sustainable this sends out an energetic ripple effect to those around us, our environment and everyone in the world, whether they know us or not.
I love the point that you make here sueq2012 about our commitment to health being universal. We do not live in a vacuum and every choice we make affects not only ourselves but also everyone else. As a society we have to eventually come to terms with the fact that our choices are a public health matter.
Spot on sueq2012. Also responsibility comes to mind when I read your comment. Being responsible for our health and our beingness is essential in our everyday living as it is a reflection for others to take that step as well.
Ah Elizabeth that’s a great comment ” fact that our choices are a public health matter” means our choices are not just about us but impact everyone, so once again it brings awareness to our responsibility with ourselves first.
It’s big to realise that all our choices affect everyone. Our health is our responsibility. Learning to not shy away from this responsibility and making loving choices leads to a loving life, full of responsibility.
I like how you open up a bigger picture! Indeed, it becomes even more purposeful if we are aware of how much effect every single one of us has towards others. What great responsibility we all carry naturally!
“My mother wanted so much for me to be healthy” – The way you illustrate this ‘health’ as a pot at the end of the rainbow is telling Rachel. We focus relentlessly on the end result of life, but not on the way of life. What if we made this understanding and cherishing of the quality we live, the first thing we taught a child in this world?
This is so much of an ideal isn’t it “my mother wanted me so much to be healthy,” and it feels so elusive and powerless to think of health as seperate from us in this way. I love how Rachel slowly unfolded a new way to understand Health from how she was living her life, not devoid of the responsibility of her choices, I also love the relationship with western medicine, so open to that understanding of what’s needed when the body has illness of some sort, yet uniquely placing herself in full captain of how she then lives forth.
How lovely this would be Joseph. It seems that often we get caught in chasing the ideal of what it means to be healthy, and this is different for everyone, yet it prevents us from appreciating the quality in which we live.
Absolutely Joseph- it is all about how old we get and if we are provided financially to then sit back and “enjoy” life – finally… What if we enjoyed and cared for ourselves our whole life, everyday..what a difference that would make.. And yes, definitely this should be taught in school from a young age!!!
True health has been so influenced by societal ideals. For some it looks like muscles and a 6-pack, for others it looks like a tan! Great expose on what true health is and that it is time to raise the bar on how we care for ourselves.
yes Joseph , we have been focusing on the wrong definition of health have we not. I know I have. Knowing now that my health is the end result not of my efforts but on the quality of my way of life has shifted this focus immensely and the ‘result’ is that I am more healthy than ever before.
I overrode my body and failed to listen to what it was saying to me with its many ailments, to the point as you so beautifully say Rachel, of entering into a war against myself. I developed an auto immune condition – hello! – the classic ‘war against self’ illness. This no longer exists in my body for the same reasons as yours Rachel;
So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?
Since my introduction to Serge Benhayon and the School of Universal Medicine in 2003 I am also undergoing a life long exploration of what true health is, and what better way to measure that than with my own body. I certainly have a much more honouring and lovingly responsible respect for it.
Beautiful Rachel, thank you for such a tender and confirming article. It is clear that you have scrubbed away all those corrupted notions of health and revealed a delicate, tender woman who chooses to pay attention to her body and its messages, rather than wishing them away in favour of being rough and tough. It is quite extraordinary that we assume health means being able to use and abuse our bodies with no consequence. Serge Benhayon is a master at nurturing those tiny flames within us, so that they blaze up again with a warmth so beautiful we cannot ignore them. True health is the continual nurturing of these precious flames within us, achieved by paying attention to and honouring all those messages our bodies give us every day.
This is truly inspiring Rachel, a beautiful way to look at health and our live . It feels so joyful and simple to look at ourselves this way, to take responsibility for ourself and our health, how we live and the care we take with ourselves and others also. It feels true and real and the inspiration from Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine says it all. Thank you for sharing this so clearly and lightly.
This is so beautifully written Rachel, and profound in its depth of clarity around the pursuit of health. I particularly loved your line… ‘In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.’ This is so true, and so often overlooked in our pursuit of so-called health, as we base it purely on our functionality, rather than the presence and expression of an essence, so pure and fundamental to our true function, that vitality and health are natural byproducts.
Exactly Doug, looking everywhere outside except within ourselves is what we all seem to do, but it obviously isn’t working. It’s time for a different approach.
Thank you for sharing Rachel.
I didn’t realise I had the belief of health representing a super person. In the meaning of fit strong, disease free and able to attack anything with their all because they were 100% ‘healthy’.
Your own lifetime of experience, the inspiration from your own observations of a lovingly responsible, committed man, Serge Benhayon, and the continued possibilities you wait to feel in the answers to the wise questions you ask, it seems are all leading you back to you and at last the potential for true health.
What a profound blog. “But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness”. This sentence sums it all up for me, such a truth you bring here. Thank you.
It’s important to call out that health isn’t about physical perfection as you share Rachel, but it is a commitment to looking after ourselves in a forever deepening way and recognising that there is a potential for health in our bodies that may be far beyond what we have allowed ourselves to feel and commit to.
Great expose´of how we can perceive health Rachel and how far from the truth this is. I was very much of the opinion before Universal Medicine that if I wasn’t sick then I was healthy without ever considering that how I lived in-between these two moments contributed to whether I stayed healthy or got sick. Being aware of how I live and listening to my body gives me a better understanding of the times when I do get sick…..it doesn’t just happen, I am sick for a reason and the answers lie in how I have been living up to that moment ..was I living with joy and vitality in my life or was there something that was getting in the way of this? This to me makes more sense than just accepting that sickness is just one of those things…it just happens.
Great question Rachel, I notice that if I get sick or don’t feel so great, I can give myself a hard time about it, and if everyone around me comes down with something and I don’t, I can get arrogant about it, there is a bit of control going on, the goal is to not get sick. I’m realising that what ever my body shows me, if it’s sick or if it feels amazing, then it’s there for me to take note of and either appreciate my choices or take a look at what’s going on in my life. Whether it’s an ache or a smile, the signs are just what I need to bring me back to my self. So if I wake feeling weary, then I don’t get down about it – but I look at how I took myself to bed, was it late, did I eat too much that night, was I distracted by something? It is great to ask questions and take note of all the signs for me to learn from and bring more love to my life.
Dear Rachel, this is so lovely how You share this – it’s like a feather, so divine, and is deepening my understanding of my choices and listening to my body and truly start to surrender to its wisdom and take care. Thank You for sharing.
Further to my previous comment about love being an essential ingredient in health and how true love has zero emotion in it… it struck me how emotions are at the root of our ill-health, so the more love we have in our body and the less emotions, the healthier we are likely to be!
Thanks for bringing the topic of emotions into this discussion Nicola. I can feel just how uncomfortable and tense my body starts to get when I am angry or stressed. It makes such sense that these emotions are the start of things going wrong in the body. How can it function harmoniously if these emotions are running the show?
What a beautiful sharing Rachel. To me the word LOVE would have to be there in any definition of Health. For how healthy can any of us be without love in our bodies and in our life?… and when I say love, I am talking about an energetic quality as defined by Unimedpedia Love – http://www.unimedliving.com/unimedpedia/word-index/unimedpedia-love.html – for true love is a quality of the Soul and it does not have one ounce of emotion in it.
Your expression is deeply beautiful to read and your new understanding of health and responsibility inspiring. The world is built on quick fixes, so few are prepared to look within and see that the way they have been living has contributed to where they find themselves, and even fewer still change their life because of it…. and commit to living all that they are.
We have been lead to believe that there is a picture of health (there’s the aspiration!) that we can attain, and that products, regimes or alternatives will deliver us this picture of health. I know I certainly explored this and I also know that I felt my body had completely failed me when I became quite sick and far, far from that picture. I knew the illness was trying to tell me something but I didn’t have the relationship with my body to understand what was being communicated: that the choices I had made through my life in disregard of my body, but ultimately in disregard of who I am, was the cause of this extreme breakdown.
My way back to health was to nurture that inkling of my true self and now, as you say Rachel, to live “from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that”. A big hearty YES in answer to your question, this is true health.
It is great to open up a conversation about the potential we have to be healthy, even if we start by asking the question is it inevitable that we must suffer bouts of illness, exhaustion, depression and moodiness in modern day life? The concept of Health might be more inspiring if we include in it all our lifestyle choices, relationships, self confidence, and attitude to every day life and how all of this affects our bodies. Perhaps if we embrace all our choices and how each and every one contributes to our health, we may open our world to experiencing a quality of life totally different to what we currently settle for.
Indeed Rachel, meeting Serge Benhayon was the turn around for me amd still is, as I observe his immense love for himself and humanity.
I feel health is as simple as you describe it to be. Simple, however not easy to implement with consistency. Every day, one loving step at a time. A gentle unfolding of us.
True health, a wonderful description of what you feel it to be “Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” Health is a word that is used in so many ways in the world, but keeping it simple and yet revolutionary, I feel it is about ‘living all of who we are’.
A beautiful blog to read and be inspired by Rachel.
An clear exposure of how we identify health with a state of perfection (which is actually impossible) and anything less than this is not considered to be, or accepted as real health!
Since attending presentations by Serge Benhayon I have more awareness and the ability to feel the driving force fuelling perfectionism – the need to be perceived as perfect – always looking for ‘something more’ in order to ‘function better’ and have recognition for doing this. So totally crazy and deeply exhausting in the process!
A perfect set up to debilitate our physical, emotional and mental health even further as the body signals are constantly overridden – until the body itself brings us to ‘a stop’ with illness and disease. All to bring our attention to the fact that there is a requirement to change the way in which we live and express in our daily lives – the beginning of the return to true health.
Our bodies are such wonderful ‘barometers’ of revealing to us exactly how we live our lives. Aches/pains used to frustrate me and very little attention if any was given to how I could make changes to those constant revealing patterns. Choosing now to listen/feel/observe my way of living and put into place more self loving acts. Our bodies never lie to the fact of how we are truly living – at all times. An amazing sharing with us all Rachel thank you.
It is a bit ironic you could say that when we get sick the first thing we do is blame our bodies for it and become upset with our bodies for letting us down, when perhaps the illness was caused by us not being connected to our bodies in the first place!
Great point Andrew. I know in the past when I’ve gotten ill or injured I often blame and get frustrated with my body – ‘why are you doing this to me now?!’… As you say this is pretty ironic considering it was my choices that lead me to that illness or injury, and that it’s actually a way of getting me to look after myself and have a stop moment – a blessing.
Yes Susie I agree this completely turns around how we view illness and disease. From something that needs to be stopped, eradicated, avoided even at all costs, to a necessary and needed messenger to bring us to a stop and to clear the accumulation of unloving choices we have made.
“In my version of what health was, my body became my enemy, a dysfunctional mass of tissues, deeply flawed and wrong at its most fundamental level. In pursuing this notion of health I entered into a war against myself.” This is brilliant description of the relentless battle we choose with our bodies through unrealistic “health” driven pursuits. Before Universal Medicine i had been living from my head, cut off from the glory of my body, indeed it was shocking to feel how little I cared for myself.
When I look back to the way I approached health I can say it was a battle. I should eat this, I shouldn’t eat that, I must go to the gym at least 3 times per week, my workouts should be at least one hour, no pain no gain etc etc. It was such a struggle to keep up with all my shoulds and shouldn’ts. Now my workouts are never much longer than 30 minutes, sometimes only 15. What’s different now is that I listen to my body and only do as much as I feel to.
Rachel you speak out of my heart here -” the day I came home, when meeting Serge Benhayon. ” This also was like coming home for me, feeling completely understood and confirmed in what I was truly feeling about the world, religion and society.
Rachel asks, What is health and replies “Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” this may be a seemingly simple answer to a very complicated question yet it is so stunningly profound. Living all of who I am, is not something that I would have understood before meeting Serge Benhayon and the added benefit of Esoteric Healing and Universal Medicine presentations and workshops. I for a long time thought I knew exactly who I was but over time came to see I was living a version of myself that I had created to protect myself through the world, all of this pushed me to drive myself and make very unloving choices and hence true health was impossible. Over many years I have shed many of these layers and now live a very simple yet extremely joyful life and understand what it is to be truly well and healthy. Thank you Rachel for the reminder.
Rachel once again your sharing clarifies an issue, this one being Health and what it means to be healthy. I have begun to truly understand that what we consider good health is, as you say, not necessarily the case. Without illness and disease, how would we know that the way we are living our lives and how we have lived in the past, have been detrimental to our bodies, therefore bringing us back to self awareness and the need for self care and gentleness and self love. Thank you Rachel.
“… the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that.”
Because we are divine expressions and equal to God, to not feel our own worth is to reject God – he of course doesn’t judge us for that. But it sure helps to understand why we need to value our worth and explain the ills that arise in our health when it is not being fully expressed – illness is the language of the body lovingly pulling us back to being true love.
Overriding what my body was feeling, always seeking the miracle cure and feeling like a failure if I got sick, was the way I used to live with total disregard in how I used my body, although I was under the illusion I was living a healthy lifestyle. Through attending Serge Benhayon’s presentations and also seeing the amazing tender and graceful way he is in his every movement, I realise that my body is like a loving barometer and I now accept and appreciate the ways it gently and sometimes very loudly lets me know when I am disregarding it. This requires a commitment to be aware of how I am being in what I am doing, knowing that, I am worthy of the many ways I can care and be more gentle with myself.
Deidre I love this: “my body is like a loving barometer”. I too, after years of overriding the messages my body was giving me, realised that it was actually trying to get me to stop, listen and acknowledge the disregarding way I was living, a way that was causing it great harm. Today I do listen and care for it for so much more lovingly than I ever have, and as a result my relationship with my body is growing deeper every day.
What a simple and easy way to look at health. It made sense to me that it’s about a true way of living as then everything healthy is associated with that. If we aren’t living in a true way that’s when the health implications start to arise. This is a great summary -‘Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ I feel that’s a healthy way of life for sure.
I agree Emily that certainly sounds like a great way to approach and define health to me too.
Thank you for blowing quite a few myths and ideals out of the water – I can relate to this old notion of what health was supposed to be like before meeting Serge Benhayon: a rugged and hardened exterior that could withstand anything and everything – and how ludicrous, dishonouring and forever unattainable that dangling carrot truly was! And at what cost to my true wellbeing and health it came.
So true Gabriele. The forever unattainable ideal is there so we can bash ourselves for not attaining it. That doesn’t sound very healthy!
Understanding Rachel that true health is a deep commitment to knowing myself, truly from my essence and honouring that by being present is my first commitment in all I do, makes so much simple sense to me now. As you expressed this in Serge Benhayon’s reflection from his livingness: “… the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that.” Health is then going beyond connecting to our essence; it is truly understanding we are worth living like this all of the time.
I really love your whole blog Rachel but especially the part where you explain the tender loving behaviours that Serge does. The tender loving deeply honouring behaviours that give notion to the fact that he is living from his inner-most and from that place lives life. It is beautiful to know of a man that truly honours himself and inspires so many others to do the same.
It is fabulous that you have exposed this ideal around health here Rachel. If we are always chasing this “physical perfection”, we are always going to be feeling less and somewhat empty without it. Similarly, if we just carry-on ignoring our body and it’s ailments, we are not being honest about our health either. What you have described, in listening to what the body is communicating to us and learning the lesson – but without making a judgement on ourselves, being hard on ourselves, or going into being the victim of the illness, but just observing the illness as a sign of our livingness and choices, then we can see our heal-th as an opportunity for heal-ing.
A true celebration Rachel Mascord. What struck me while reading your article is our view on health from an external perspective. As a society we see health as something we get to as if it is something outside of us. Whereas what you are sharing with us is the fact that true health come from within and its focus is inwards. An internal process of developing an intimate relationship with ourselves and our body.
Rachel, I had some tears spring up as I read your words, they touched me deeply.
I often hear people say they are ‘battling’ some disease process in their body, ‘fighting’ a cold or the flu, ‘pushing through’ pain. All of these things seem to involve a huge struggle against the body which as you so beautifully describe is simply there telling us there is something to stop and feel and look at. “But how much simpler and more honest is it to allow the body to be as it is? To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.”
The magic of the body sharing how it feels about the way we use it is a gift to be treasured.
Great exposure Rachel. I used to think I was superman and literally could have the physical might to deal with any health issue and that my body will heal as I treat it well. I now realise how arrogant that was and how ignorant that was to the messages my body was sharing with me through its true quality of health which I now realise exposes the quality of how I was living.
I love how you have broadened the meaning of Health Rachel. It totally opened my eyes to how I was restricted in my thinking that health is only being free from illness and disease and that it means physical perfection. That health is a way of living makes so much sense to me. A way of living that nurtures the body and is very caring.
So true Lieke, we do today have a belief that health is free of illness or disease. Whereas true health and well-being as presented here is living lovingly, joyfully and vitally everyday. We are so far from this marker that when another does live it, we question how is it possible, rather than why is it not possible.
Well said Lieke, I feel the same.. my definition of health was to not have an illness or pain anywhere but we all know that when we feel low, down, emotionally unstable, depressed, angry, sad, contracted or withdrawn etc., we don’t feel ‘healthy’. It goes to show that to be healthy is all encompassing of the way we live our lives.
The truest healing moment of my life also Rachel, “no more a mouse on a wheel, but a human being willing to look within, to the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon – the day I came home.” Oh joyful tears of recognition and appreciation.
Rachel, what a beautiful love filled blog you have written. Health is such a topic in everyone’s life but do we consider what health is in truth. Your expression of what health is is very powerful, we are the ones that are in the lead of ourselves, our own development, how to live from our essence. The health care is full of complexity at the moment, it needs the simplicity Serge Benhayon is offering and is in your blog as well. And oh yes meeting Serge was absolutely a coming home in all aspects.
It is so true the health care has become complicated, and worse still contradictory. Scientific findings lurch from one extreme to another…where do we go with that? And how do we make sense of it all?
Conventional and alternative medicine seemed to have themselves lined up across opposite sides of a battle line, but the real casualties are people.
Serge Benhayon has answered the complexity with the way he lives, and inspires us all to live. Simple and so very caring.
Every single person in the world has a relationship with their body. Fad diets and exercise regimes can make someone think they are being healthy. Not having cancer can be another person’s definition of health. It’s one of those words that we can modulate to suit our level responsibility. It can also be used to judge others or ourselves. All this is happening to various degrees on the spectrum that measures how loving we are with our bodies. Some relationships are based on nothing but beliefs of what is thought to be good for it according to the latest research. Some relationships are based on disregarding it and using it in whatever way to satisfy the deep inner ache of missing our true selves. True health can only be lived if there is an intimate relationship with the body and allowing it to speak as we go through life and the choices we have to make. I’m learning that this relationship is the basis for everything and without it, I am lost.
Jinya, I wonder if people actually understand that we have a relationship with our body, probably, I’ve come to realize, the most important relationship we will ever have. For a long time I didn’t and health was something I was leaving for when my body would break down, believing this would happen when I was old or aged. Fortunately I have a fairly robust level of health, however I’ve come to define health completely differently from how I once felt it was, since coming into a relationship with my body, listening for its subtle messages, through understanding teachings by Serge Benhayon to be in a conscious presence with it.
Great point you make here Elizabeth. I used to be a fitness instructor and yoga teacher. That was my idea of health. Having a relationship with my body or even myself.. what did that mean? I first heard about these relationships at a Universal Medicine workshop, and since then its been something I have been developing. I now strongly believe its something that should be on the curriculum of all schools. Why wait for the body to break down before we start taking care of it?
The form of health I have seen to be possible through Universal Medicine and the way Serge Benhayon and others live their lives is something that resonates deep within me as a ‘yes, this is health’. All the other pictures of health may look great on the surface and show happy, smiley people but I cannot say I have felt happy or smiley when attempting to follow those routes. I have however experienced a sense of contentment, joy and lightness within myself and with others from my applications of what Universal Medicine presents. A form of medicine I would say brings true health.
So very clear and true Doug.
I’m scared that many people’s version of what is good health is the absence of a terminal illness. It is also a measured term, often what is considered good health only being that when compared to something far more terrible. How much lower can we go?
Rachel, thank you for proposing there is actually a different way of approaching health and determining for ourselves if we are indeed healthy. To me, someone who is healthy is someone who knows very deeply they are worthy of caring immensely for; and one of those people is most definitely Serge Benhayon, I agree.
AM for EM scared
There are so many ideas about what health is. For some it is as simple as not being sick. For others they follow the latest and greatest fad diets and exercise regimes. We make our marker of health about numbers, repetitions, calories, weight, portions and so on…all the while we have a true marker in our body that is constantly telling us how far away we are from who we actually are. I love what you say Rachel about true health ~ ‘It is as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that’. Simple. The rest is nothing more than distraction.
The messages from our body become more specific and refined as we begin to listen to it, calling us to live and express the love and grandness that we innately are.
This is something I am finding. As I get older but continue to take more loving care of myself, I feel more vibrant and so much more in tune with my body. My health has definitely improved as my relationship with myself has.
The fact that health is not an end-point, a static point that we reach – but a relationship and unfolding with ourselves is truly revolutionary. It places our well-being squarely in our own hands based on our willingness to connect to our essence and live from that knowing.. so awesome.
I think what you’ve highlighted Sarah Davis is so important – “..that health is not an end-point, a static point that we reach – but a relationship and unfolding with ourselves..” This helps bring our awareness back to the present moment rather than focusing on an ever elusive ‘end point’ of health.
That is so awesome Sarah I have never thought of it like that before, it is absolutely true. Health isn’t defined by one static point, but rather it deepens within oneself and become grander and more healthy as we build our relationship with ourselves.
Yes, great point Sarah, in the past I would have said that when I get to a certain age my health will deteriorate, as a child my health will be at its best and as I age it will decline, yet I am finding that the more I live connected to my essence, my health and vitality are going from strength to strength and I have seen this in others who are doing the same well into their 60’s and beyond. Our health is not defined by our age or an end point, it is evolving and if we appreciate this we will appreciate the responsibility then lies with ourselves.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” I love this Rachel.
Wow – what if that was the dictionary definition!? That may just change the way we all look at health.
What a gorgeous, all encompassing, honouring and accepting exploration of what health is. Rachel you have expanded my understanding of health. I used to feel that illness was a failure (not other people’s, just mine) but I can now see that illness is a way for us to understand what we need to do to look after ourselves deeply.
Reading this blog I realised how the word ‘health’ just as any other tag and ideal can be used as a caricature snapshot that keeps us running like the mouse on the wheel to try to get to that ideal. And my goodness this tendency is so encouraged and preyed upon by the ‘healthcare industry’. Chasing an ideal also keeps us dissatisfied with our bodies and dismissive of the loving signposts it provides that tell us how true or how far we are living from our essence. It has been a blessing to come across Universal Medicine and start to appreciate that I am far more than my body, that my health includes all of me and how I live every day, and that there is no point to reach because I, life and the Universe are all evolving all of the time.
“Chasing an ideal also keeps us dissatisfied with our bodies…” Great point you’ve made here Golnaz, highlighting the fact that there is so much out there offering us reward where health is concerned but also always emphasizing that something is ‘wrong’ with our bodies as they are and so we continue desiring something ‘better’.
Yes Elizabeth, the point made by Golnaz and that you highlight links the health industry to the fact that very few of us like our bodies. The health industry plays directly into this negative way of thinking. It keeps us thinking we are never good enough. The constant stream of new research and new wonder supplements that come out guarantee we will never reach this imagined end point of perfect health. Thank God for Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine that present how powerful self love and listening to our own bodies can be.
Love the term “loving signposts”
And the context.
Health is a multi-billion dollar business where in fact what is sold is not true health. It is a business that keeps its consumers on a treadmill of craving more, as the promises made are not fulfilled, yet manages to keep dangling a golden carrot that many are willing to continue chasing. Thank you Rachel for a clear presentation of true health.
You are so right Jonathan about the amount of money being spent on heath. The irony is, someone in the government in the UK last week justified smoking against health because the government made 10 billion in tax on tobacco products and it only cost 7 billion for healthcare and prisons combined.
That is quite astonishing Steve and just goes to show that we have completely lost sight of the importance of well being and put economics before true welfare. I love how Rachel has seen that true health includes being sick sometimes, that illness and disease are an important part in the body’s process of clearing and healing itself of all that does not belong inside it. Health is not about fighting disease, health is about caring, nurturing, growing throughout all aspects of ourselves and appreciating the messages our bodies are continually giving us what ever they may be.
That is astounding sjmatsonuk! That it is seen as an acceptable trade off shows how far we have come from truly seeing and feeling what is happening for people.
A great call Jonathan – the multi-billion dollar business of health needs exposing in full as it keeps us so far away from the truth of true health and well-being. Through re-connecting to our body and beginning to listen to its wisdom we can live, walk and express in a completely different way and slowly and surely the foundation for true health is re-built.
Yes, great point Jonathan and it’s a multi billion dollar business that is generally not talked about. We accept that pharmaceuticals is a sector driven by profit, but do we view the health business in the same light? True health comes from listening to our bodies and feeling what is needed, the issue here is that this costs nothing and leaves you completely empowered. No wonder it is not talked about.
Yes Jonathan, I saw a BBC documentary on health supplements just recently. It was shocking to hear that many supplement don’t actually have to contain the ingredients they claim to on their labels. As you say, it keeps many of us in the false belief that there is a fixed end goal that we must keep striving for. True health is so much more.
I love the joy and lightness and beauty of your blog and it feels as though this reflects your full and boundless joy and enthusiasm for life – a truly inspiring blog Rachel, that encourages us to take a new look at how we live our lives and to be honest about our level of commitment to our health and the way we live our lives.
I agree Susan, Rachel brings such a joy, commitment and love of life and I can see that when I see her and feel it when I read what she has written here. It’s a beautiful quality in her that is here to stay.
I totally agree here Susan, Rachel has done an amazing job in reflecting just that and this is truly inspiring for us all. It is quite something to live in a way that is truly in consideration of our bodies and how we treat them to such a point that we are able to take self-responsibility to such a degree.
Thank you for opening this amazing conversation about what ‘true health’ is Rachel. I saw health as an absence of illness and consequently forced myself to keep going and ignored any signs from my body that all was not well until my body came to a stop, when I would then feel a failure for getting sick, and my goal was always to get back on my feet in the quickest time possible without looking at why it had happened.
In the years leading up to attending my first Universal Medicine presentation, this was happening on a more regular basis and I was slowly recognising that something needed to change, but it was only when I listened to Serge Benhayon and as you say, saw the evidence of how he lived, that the penny started to drop. I love your definition that true health is ‘found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?’ Committing to myself and listening to the messages my body is constantly giving me has transformed the quality of my life and I have so much more to offer others, thanks to challenging the ideals and beliefs I held about health and wellbeing.
It’s amazing to ponder that even with sickness we can be self critical, how what I now see as a great offering from the body, gets quelled, overridden by hardness and quick fixes.
You are so right there Lucinda. When we get sick there can be a feeling of having failed in some way and we can beat ourselves up. The fact that we get ill in the first place is indeed down to us and the choices we have made which most often we do not wish to look at, hence the quick fixes and hardness.
If we choose to see the sickness for the grace that it is offering, a stop moment to look at how we have been living, lovingly so – then illness can be embraced without judgement and we can allow for healing. When I used to come down with colds there was a part of me however that was totally relieved if I was sick enough to take a day off work. I actually enjoyed being ill so I could have some time out!! NB this is not embracing illness for the healing it offers – I never really looked at the way I was choosing to live or go about my day that induced the illness – I just used it as the excuse I needed to have some me time and the time my body was craving for!
Yes Michelle, the body is offering us an opportunity to stop and take full stock, to allow the reading of how we are living to come through and for us to respond accordingly. I recall saying things like ‘oh I’m just run down’ but then resisting making the changes that my body needed to adjust and get well because I just wanted to keep living how I wanted to.
Now I realise that if I live in a way that is light and supportive to my body, which is actually the remedy for when I am sick (for example, when you have a cold to stop pushing so hard and eat light, warm nourishing foods and avoid dairy,sugar, coffee, alcohol etc.) then I don’t need to get sick so often! Once we start living from this kind of responsibility, the messages from the body can be more gentle, offering us a nudge and giving us time to respond.
Beautifully put Helen. It’s in challenging our ideals and beliefs around health and all other areas that true healing can begin to take place in our bodies and lives.
Health is an crucial element for both life and living with a certain quality. Because of this, what we understand by health is of utmost importance. Our choices follow that understanding. So, if the idea is wrong, the choices will also be wrong and how we assess the process will also be wrong. If we do not understand that illness and disease is a way for the body to communicate that how we are choosing to live is hurting us, it will be very difficult to have a healthy relationship with life.
Beautifully written Rachel. For most, health is either you have it or your’e sick and to be unwell often comes with the notion of somehow being reprimanded for some “unknown reason”. However, in considering the responsibility we all have in choosing to deeply care for ourselves, to have the living example of what true care looks like – as we do in Serge Benhayon – the meaning no longer appears elusive, but a rock solid confirmation of life lived from love.
Absolutely beautiful Rachel and very true for me too…the first day I met Serge Benhayon was also the day that I came home…
Using sickness to ‘indulge in attention’, how often is this little fact overlooked when we consider a person with an illness? Is it a manipulation, controlling another through what we choose, unconsciously or not? Taking responsibility for all the little choices that we make, creating the level of health we enjoy or endure. In appreciation of myself and the presentations of Serge Benhayon, enjoying great health without trying to be healthy.
I’d say Mark, that this little fact you mention using sickness to ‘indulge in attention’ is rooted in our Australian culture and will take some lengthy time to work through.
Well said Rachel – there is much for us all to consider here. In fact imagine if these were the conversations that were happening as part of the health curriculum in schools, medical institutions etc… That it was taught (or at least considered) that true health is about considering and observing our choices and the way we live… The world would be a very different place if we all considered this level of responsibility for our own health.
Thank you Rachel, your blog offers a great angle coming in redefining what ‘health’ means. Showing us that health encompasses having a deeper relationship/interaction or awareness about ourselves, our body, and what it needs at any point, like you say, for example, putting on some gloves on a cold morning if our hands feel cold. Simple things that when attended to, the body loves and ‘rewards’ you back with health.Taking care or ‘self care’ is having the communication between awareness and our body, and caring for it.
As Rachel shares, coming back home may not be an experience you would relate to as being experiencing a ‘healthy’ body and mind at first glimpse. Yet connection and acknowledging how we feel is surely the starting point to an honest understanding of what health means to us personally and what choices support us to commit to life in full.
Wow Rachel – you illustrate so clearly that our relationship to ‘health’ is not at all healthy. The definition will need to be rewritten when people start to consider more deeply the way Serge Benhayon and many students of The Livingness are with life. In contrast to the unattainable goal, the picture we carry, what your words frame here is just how health is a quality of love and care that we can live constantly, if we choose to.
A superb exploration of the true meaning of the word ‘health’, debunking the prevailing notion that it’s all about being physically resilient enough to reach the goal of a ripe old age unscathed by illness and disease. For me, it’s no longer about endurance or resilience. It’s about the true quality of the way in which I’m living in each moment. That requires commitment and dedication to my daily choices, listening to my body’s many and varied forms of feedback and signalling, whilst also operating in all I do with the utmost responsibility and integrity towards myself and others. This takes a different type of commitment and dedication from the one that kept me a slave to the gym for many years. It requires a far greater level of awareness of the consequences of my choices and a fundamental acceptance of who I truly am and what my body truly needs.
I wonder if we swallowed a version of resilience which is not true, in that being able to endure difficult situations and subject ourselves to abuse or self abuse is something to be applauded.
“For me, . . . it’s about the true quality of the way in which I’m living in each moment”. Simple words Cathy, but they capture the essence of what determines true health and wellbeing. Unfortunately many are not yet ready for this level of personal responsibility.
I love how you have exposed how damaging the paradigm of ‘a picture of health’ is and much of an illusion it is. When we follow what a ‘picture of health’ is we are not in any way honoring what we ourselves need to return to and maintain true health and well-being. I thought being a vegan was ’it’, thinking eating cleanly and ‘consciously’ however I have never been so unwell, weak and lacking energy in my life. I was a pale version of myself and I remember saying that to myself. Yet I persisted believing that this was what a ‘picture of health’ was. Eventually, through listening to my body I started eating meat again and my well-being improved immensely. Through the presentations of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine I have also come to realise the absoluteness of how our bodies are designed to support us and guide us in truth. And I have been inspired to develop my connection to this and to explore how to live in the natural harmony we are designed to live, with all, together.
Rachel, your blog brought tears to my eyes as I could feel your appreciation of all that was presented to you by Serge Benhayon and how he lives the care he speaks of and then how you adapted this to your own life. I feel your deep acceptance of illness as a marker for how we lived and a doorway to look at where we may not be supporting ourselves and this is so important, to accept and treat ourselves with tenderness and deep care. Thank you for such a gorgeously delicate blog – yes that’s what comes through in how you live now with your delicacy.
I love your proposal for a definition of Health Rachel – “Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” Definitely one for the dictionary!
I agree Fiona, can you imagine if Doctors and health professionals also wrote out a prescription for this as well as what they were treating.
Oh yum Rachel, I love the personal responsibility in this article. This sentence “To allow it to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases and aches and pains that let us know exactly the way we are treating it and consequently the way we are living.” as you talk about the body and its communication with us I can feel the love that our body has for us. It doesn’t let us get too far away from it. If we do it has to bring in a correction. I had my head on my husbands chest and heard his heart beating, it is truly magical to hear the body and the way it is set up to support us in daily life. We must honour that in our choices and not berate or judge. Medical support and self care are vital partners. I would have only seen part of the picture before Universal Medicine helped me see how much power I have over my own health when approached in this responsible way.
Love what you have shared Rachel and I especially love this line…
‘I listened to the words of Serge Benhayon, and it was as though a light, long forgotten, ignited inside of me.’
This is so true for me too. So much that Serge Benhayon has shared has been a confirmation of what was already known within that I was not yet able to fully claim as truth.
Marika what you share I feel is worth really pondering on, how is it possible that on the one hand we can hear Serge Benhayon speak and present about any topic under the sun yet there is a deep connection and knowing that we already know what is being shared. It is unlike so many other presenters or teachers from school to beyond where I feel I have to scramble to keep up. The equality is absolute and with that we have someone who lives and speaks with true health. It helps greatly to understand the importance of simply feeling our body during our activity as being a key foundation to being healthy.
Ah health as the elusive perfection of the human body, one that never gets sick and can do it all. But what if being healthy meant being in harmony with ourselves, and that to return to harmony there are times where our body has no option other than to get ill so as to rid itself from the way we have chosen to live, express and think. What if being healthy is a quality of lived energy rather than a physical ideal? Then caring for ourselves, eating what supports the body, sleeping, talking, relationships, work – in fact everything that we do would be part of our prescription for true health.
Beautiful wisdom from the two Rachels! You are both saying that sickness and ill health can be so necessary to bring our bodies back to harmony again and as such can be viewed as gifts not burdens. Imagine how different our health system would be if we were were taught and lived this way from a young age. We would be going to the doctor so we could fix ourselves rather than to be fixed! “Everything we do would be part of our prescription for true health”.
Beautifully expressed Rachel. I found attaining a level of health like a battle too, with hard exercises and a strict eating regime. I was convinced that this was the way to stay healthy. I found that what I thought was going to make me healthy does the complete opposite. I would feel drained and more tired, it was only the drive that I was in that kept me going because on so many levels I was not connecing with myself and what my body actually needed.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” Rachel, I too came to this understanding after I was inspired to make more loving choices after hearing Serge Benhayon present. My experience has been that our health is the consequence of the choices we make in very moment. Hence, if we take responsibility for our choices we are taking responsibility for our health.
Rachel, your words are reconfiguring Health in it’s True meaning. Reading through the blog I felt that I hold a perfect Health – no pain in the body – as something I still have to strive for. Almost as if I reach that point that only than I am worth it to be Loving and serve others. Wow, this is insidious but I’ve held this probably all my life as being the Truth. I feel I still have to reclaim what Health is for me. Your blog is very supportive in this process. Thank you.
Awesome comment Doug, this is so true. What an amazing way to view the ill health one might experience as being a healing. It is our bodies’ way of clearing and showing us the way to truly heal.
I agree Jane. I love what Rachel shares here too about ‘what is health’. It really deepens the current thoughts and approaches to health and offers a way forward for everyone. It’s not necessarily always easy, but definitely so worthwhile for everyone.
That is so powerful too Doug. As most of us do not see illness as a blessing, but as you say see it is the enemy. This in itself has a hard impact on the body, which is already very vulnerable from illness. There is always opportunities through ill health to be honest with ourselves in how we are living and make changes in every aspect of our life, that support ourselves.
True Jennifer, illness brings us the opportunity to be honest with ourselves and explore what we may be able to live differently.
This is such a great way at looking at illness Doug and Jennifer – as a friend and a blessing! The two-fold gift of illness – the opportunity to make more loving choices and the clearing of old “stuff” which is usually quite heavy to carry around.
I love this question too. It highlights that true health is ultimately our individual responsibility to live connected to our body and who we are.
And it also highlights the effects of this individual responsibility on the wellbeing of others. We wouldn’t place such a high demand on each other and our healthcare system if we all chose to make the wellbeing of our body number one.
Thank you for this enlightening blog Rachel. You mention the pursuit of health was like a war against yourself, bombarding your body from mental ideals, and from self-loathing. I like how you describe that it is simpler and more honest to allow our bodies to speak to us through its illnesses and diseases, aches and pains and tend to our bodies with love and care.
Brilliant blog Rachel, I loved reading every part of it. You’ve raised some awesome questions ‘So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ By living all of who we are is the answer to all our issues, it is that simple.
The meaning of health found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people, was exactly what stood out for me too in this beautiful blog. This would lay a whole different foundation to our health care if we take this as a starting point.
This is really an important issue for health care in general Monika, how are we taking responsibility for the care of our bodies and the quality of our relationships with others?.
“And more than the teachings that he delivered in word, were the teachings he delivered through the way he lived, the way he moved, the relationships he had with other people, the way he put on gloves and warm scarf in cool weather with such tenderness and such a deep level of care for himself…and the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that.”
This is a tremendously beautiful testimonial to how Serge Benhayon delivers far more than words, thank you for that Rachel!
So true Judith, I have been ongoingly inspired by how Serge Benhayon lives, moves and relates to others. He is not just a presenter of true medicine and health but the living proof!
This is such a great sharing Rachel, the deep understanding of what true health is. Health and becoming healthy is a major business with no integrity, selling people under the name of health any product they want to market. Through Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon I came to understand and feel that health is how I live on a daily basis and that health is not something to be achieved, but something lived on a daily basis.
Beautiful blog Rachel and one that touched me very deeply. I too have aspired to having a super fit and super healthy body and have been very attached to physical function, appearance and so called physical and mental health as a sign of success in my life. But what if health actually did not have that much to do with function but was as you say more about our level of commitment to remaining deeply connected and honouring of ourselves? Well that is a game changer! Imagine if when we went to the doctor, as well as all the other instruments for measuring our physical and mental function they pulled out their instrument for measuring our commitment to ourselves?! Bring on the day I say.
Rachel thank you for sharing this. You write with such beauty and grace that even though the body may be a little behind, your inner strength and clarity of purpose is reflected in your words. We are so caught up in the ideal of having the perfect body or perfect health we lose sight of the glory that lies within. You clearly live and express from this divinity which is truly inspiring for all who come in contact with you I’m sure.
What is true health is a great question to ask Rachel, we have the notion that if we are not sick we are healthy but this can be far from the truth. I have learnt through Universal Medicine that true vitality and health comes from how we live in every aspect of our lives and learning to listen to our bodies so that we know when something is not right long before sickness or illness takes hold.
It’s true Alison, how we live in every aspect of our lives can be the greatest medicine of all.
I too have idealized health and very much thought of any body ailments as some mistake or something being wrong with me, rather than the body communicating to me, giving me a sign what I need to look at next and accepting life as a constant development.
All the wisdom we could ever need is found in our bodies and yet I like many have tended to ignored it’s voice in favour of pursuing the seemingly more enticing prospect of gaining more knowledge. It is a great sense of pride that has needed to be dropped to order to embrace the simple truth that you confirm Judith – that our bodies hold the wisdom that constantly reveals to us life’s next development.
Great point Dean, we champion the mind at the expense of the body, not realizing that it is the one that holds the key to all the wisdom.
Rachel, I can relate so much to your blog. As I child and teenager I was often sick and/or injured and the quest for health took up a big time of my life. I remember hitting a point where I was so frustrated with my body as to me it was preventing me from living a full life, meaning doing anything I wanted to do. But in hindsight it was a very big distraction form dealing with the hurts and issues that lay underneath. I have now learned that true health comes from my energetic quality first and foremost and that whatever is going on in my body needs to be addressed but does not define me or my health.
It is interesting you raise the point Carolien of being distracted from our issues and hurts underneath as we can become identified and define ourselves so easily by our ill or good health too. Missing the point as you describe that true health comes from my energetic quality first and foremost.
I agree Elizabeth, and it has been amazing to understand that not only is true health the way we live each day but each and every moment also. Universal Medicine sure do cover every angle possible for what true health really is, and our bodies always high-light to us how we truly are living.
A beautiful account of what true health really is and what illness and sickness truly represent if we are willing to be honest with ourselves and take ownership of the choices we make on a daily basis do in fact impact our health for better or worse. When we become this honest with ourselves, the body can truly support us in communicating what it needs to recover.
I loved reading this great blog and totally agree Rachel that meeting Serge was like coming home for me too. No-one has explained what true health is, in truth, like Serge Benhayon does in his presentations, and that being aware of my body’s communication will lead me to living with vitality and joy, if I choose to listen.
How incredible to have a discussion about what health really is. “I listened to the words of Serge Benhayon, and it was as though a light, long forgotten, ignited inside of me.”
– This is such a terrific way of capturing the experience. I have come to understand that I am precious, I am divine and I am worth it. I am worth connecting to and listen to to my body, for it tells me how precious I am. If i ignore this, it has to yell at me.
And what a way to live nicolesjardin, with respect for one’s body and so in tune with it that you can respond to the slightest whisper, rather than pushing through until the body is forced to yell and scream.
Definitely Hannah how lovely – responding to a whisper.
It is as if we describe ‘health’ as being able to withstand life. That we must build a body which can endure what is thrown at it from any angle with poise and not a flicker of discomfort. The way we exercise often is along the same lines: pushing our bodies to their limits, revelling in the sore muscles as proof that we have toughened ourselves up.
But what you describe here of observing Serge Benhayon, Rachel, and how he has redefined health is paradigm-shifting. No longer is it about seeing life and the body as the adversary to overcome, but as our vehicle to care for and work with gently and with respect for its wisdom.
Rachel your blog reads like a passage out of a book. I find myself wanting to read more and more. Whilst the story is clearly about your life, I feel like it’s also about mine.
I once considered ‘good health’ and physicality to be a sort of pinnacle of success. It must have been a pretty empty pinnacle though because I could never fully devote myself to attaining it. The flip side of this was disappointment in a body that unfailingly displayed the results of my (often wayward and mostly disregarding) choices and a way of wielding my body as both a shield and a weapon. Awful, really awful.
It wasn’t until 2001, at the age of 35, when I had the first of many sessions with Serge Benhayon that I was re-connected to the value of my body as a vehicle for expression of energy, the truth of my worth as a woman and through that the deeper meaning of well-being and all that it entails.
Thanks Rachel for writing these wise words on an important subject.
Beautifully written and expressed, Rachel! I too am inspired by Serge Benhayon’s “capacity for service to humanity, the like of which is beyond anything I have ever seen in another human being”. I feel as you do that the caring, accepting way he lives is indeed the closest thing to the definition of health, which does not exclude bodily repair and correction processes!
I have a completely different view of health and what this is after attending presentations, workshops and courses by Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine; knowing that true health is held within all our hands by the choices we make every moment within our lives. Do we make choices that support and evolve us or sabotage and hold us back?
I’ve never thought of it that way before Rachel, what is the end point with health? Is there one? Your blog says it beautifully, our illnesses, diseases, aches and pains are the signposts to look at your choices. Love it!
Rachel this is one stunning blog! For me the suggestion that health can be found ‘…in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people…’ rings so true – for surely health is not just about the individual, as it is not about just one singular part of our body.
I liked this comment too Hannah. When we focus on our ill health and playing the victim of that, it is so easy to separate from other people by needing their sympathy and recognition. When we accept our ill-health as a consequence of our choices without judgement, and listen to the messages we are receiving from the body as an opportunity to make changes, we can choose to make health about more than just us and our physical bodies. We can see that we make up part of a whole – humanity – and feel the responsibility that we hold in deeply caring, loving and looking after ourselves as part of that whole.
Exactly, beautifully expressed Simone 🙂
Last week in an exercise class, the facilitator said to feel into any areas of our body that we might be avoiding as there may be a deeper reason as to why we would not want to bring attention and focus to this area. This reminded me of your comment here Hannah. If we are only “listening” to some parts of the body and not developing our awareness and understanding of other parts, are we avoiding learning all the lessons our body has to offer us? The body is an amazing vehicle for learning and understanding more about ourselves as the Divine beings we are. The more we clear all that it is not truly us, the more we can feel the love that we are and express ourselves from that. This feels like a truly inspiring reason to deeply care for and honour our bodies, much more so than the pursuit of an ideal about living in a “perfect, healthy body”.
Thank you for sharing Simone, it is a great reminder to be connected to the whole and not be focussed on only the the parts that feel good, or as we often do, that do not feel so good. Also I have found that we can easily focus on pain (and wanting it to go away) and therefore not going any deeper as to why the pain is there.
Absolutely Carolien. Or trying to work out why the pain is there and thinking about it (which often distracts us from feeling it anyway!) and coming up with reasons for it. Rather than, as you have suggested, just feeling the pain with no judgment or self-criticism, but an openness and willingness to understand more about ourselves and the choices we have made which have led to the pain.
I know that one too well Simone, pain can be all consuming and we can ‘sit in it so to speak, without actually surrounding and feeling it. I remember well how the pain would be a distraction and the spin I would go in having to find the answer to why it was there so I could fix it.
Very true Hannah, we are often too easy to overlook the fact that if we do not love ourselves and take deep care of our body, the consequences will not only be on us, but very much so on all those around us too.
Reading your blog Rachel I had a deeper understanding that we choose the relationship we have with our illness and that that relationship has a profound effect on our wellbeing. We may choose to feel a victim or ignore it or fight it. To instead choose to allow the body to be, to listen to it, to nurture it and to look for support when we need it feels so much more loving.
So true Jane that we choose the relationship we have with illness but I was so held in my belief that getting sick was a ‘failure’ that I had no recognition of this prior to attending Universal Medicine presentations. I love how you present ‘To instead choose to allow the body to be, to listen to it, to nurture it and to look for support when we need it feels so much more loving.’
Dear Rachel,
The word health holds so many false realities, for example: it is about how fit our body looks, or how thin we are, or how we are healthy, while living needing stimulants like coffee to get us through the day, etc.
These are a few of the ideals that I used to hold. I thought I was healthy, when I had constant sinus infections and asthma.
Yet like you I had no idea of what true health was until I too became a student of Universal Medicine. The strength of the lies though of healthy living still had me trapped in thinking that it was foods alone that improved my health. It has taken much commitment, but now I can feel a new level of health that comes from deep within, that feels how my body truly feels and offers understanding of what I may be doing that is affecting a greater level of health that my body is capable of living.
The wisdom of your words show us that our health, true health, can only be present in our bodies when we allow our body to be in the driver’s seat, communicating what it is that it needs to live to its divine true healthy potential.
This is very true Leigh, I too got caught up this idea, ‘The strength of the lies though of healthy living still had me trapped in thinking that it was foods alone that improved my health’, I used to consume huge amounts of ghee because I was told it was good for me, but I did not check in with my body how it felt about this, I just took the ‘experts’ word for it. I now have no dairy as I have noticed that it makes me feel congested and now listen to my body rather than the ‘experts’, I have realised that I am in fact ‘the expert’ on my body.
I resonate with what you say Leigh about how health is so much more than what we eat, and that in response to making many loving choices we can come to feel ‘a new level of health that comes from deep within’ our bodies. I can feel the change in my body too and I get the sense that I am only scratching the surface and there is no end to the true health and depth the body can reveal to me, if I am willing to listen to it.
When you say it like this Doug it is no wonder that when we begin to honour our bodies again and give them back their voice, that we feel so battered, bruised and exhausted. It gives me a moment to stop and fully appreciate just how much I put my body through when I was dragging it behind me and allows great understanding and acceptance of what I feel now that it is in the driver’s seat. Thank you.
“So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am” This to me says so strongly what true health is, our ability to live life to fullest without the feeling of any form of restraints or hold backs, simply forever moving forward without attachment to all the ways of living and being that are not natural to ourselves
To live who we truly are to the Fullest, now that is just wonderful Oliver.
Rachel, the love, sincerity and awareness expressed through this blog has captured the essence of what living who we are is about. It warms the heart and with such simplicity allows for a place where everything communicates the divine in action. Thank you.
I agree, meeting Serge was a homecoming for me too. Thanks for sharing this Rachel.
I have also endorsed ‘health and well-being’ to be an image of a figure with a six-pack, standing on a mountain with not a sign of illness. A picture of perfection. May be true health is a state of being where we are in relationship to how we are feeling all the time and having a vision of our lives that is whole and interconnected so that we understand how every choice impacts the state we are in.
I agree Jinya. True health is not just about physical health, it includes how we think, feel and the presence we bring to all we are and do. True health is about knowing the love we are and living that everyday by taking responsibility for the choices we make and allowing Love to be the food on which we feast. Thanks Rachel for bringing increased awareness through this loving blog.
Health is a polluted word as its meaning has been tagged to so many things that are not actually healthy. Healthcare is the management of sickness and health stores sell many unhealthy products. True health can be as simple as putting on an extra layer of clothing when we are cold and this real health is something I am learning is forever deepening, it is in every aspect of how we move, interact and live, a responsibility but also a very enjoyable way to be. Thanks Rachel for sharing your experiences.
I have to agree Stephen, ‘health’ has been bastardised to the nth degree. It struck me just before that there is a ‘health’ food aisle in most supermarkets and that there are actually ‘health’ food stores everywhere. What does this make the rest of the food in the supermarket? And why would we eat it if it is not truly healthy? We have been sold, and accepted, many lies about what being healthy entails – and this shows a lot for how responsible we are willing to be. If we had true health sitting in front of us, would we choose it? We say it’s what we want, but when it comes to the ‘crunch’, are we prepared to do what it takes? As Rachel points out here, we don’t need to run anywhere or ‘do’ anything for health. It is as simple as learning to listen to these bodies of ours, as they are full of a depth of wisdom, we just need to allow ourselves to feel.
Indeed what a turn around to consider health is simply a matter of listening to our bodies and responding to life from those communications. It may mean seeking support from health care services as well as considering the quality we live our lives in.
Spot on Amelia, allowing ourselves to feel is a huge factor in life. And then trusting what we feel and acting on it, whether that be to observe or to make a choice to change something or correct something. Building a relationship with ourselves in this way is huge, as it really brings a level of simplicity back into our lives.
Yes shouldn’t it be the other way around in supermarkets…that the majority of food sold be ‘healthy’ and then we have one aisle that is labelled ‘unhealthy’. Me thinks we have it all backwards…but the supermarket is a great gauge of where we are at as a society. Over the years I have watched the ‘health’ food aisle grow longer as the demand for this expands. However as Stephen says, even things labelled ‘healthy’ need to be discerned. A ‘heart healthy’ tick on a product doesn’t make it healthy, especially when that tick can easily be bought! It’s your body that will have the final say.
So true Stephen, I always thought healthcare was something I needed to go to someone else for but if we take it right back, we very often have a hand in the situations that lead to the lowered immune systems. I can only speak for myself, but the colds, the fractures, the digestive issues, I could really have avoided the majority, if not all of them if I had understood the power of something simple such as putting on an extra layer of clothing or paying attention to what my body was telling me. Rachel’s blog expands what true healthcare is all about and I believe doctors would find themselves under less pressure to ‘fix patient’s if we could make this approach more standard.
Thats great Lucy, very simply put but revelatory, healthcare is not an external outsourced option but something we develop from within our bodies.
I agree Lucy, health care professionals would experience far less stress if they were to consider that the body knows what is going on and that all they really need to do is to support another to listen to the wisdom of the body. That way, no matter what ailment a person presents with the health professionals has a clear place to start the conversation with the person to get them back on the road to true health.
Stephen I love how you share how the healthcare industry is sometimes very far from what it promotes! Many of the products branded as healthy are considered to be so because they contain less fat. However in substitution of the fat are vast quantities of sugar. They may say no refined sugar on the front label, but looking on the list of ingredients on the back of the packaging you will see sugar in lots of different forms.
I agree michelle819, people are being misled by labels just to sell the products, but on the other hand it also exposes the lack of responsibility the consumers of these products take to investigate (read what is truly in a product) what they are choosing to put into their body, or deny how their body really feels after consuming these products.
I smiled to myself as I read your comment Diana as I remember feeling good about myself when I used to go down the so called “healthy” aisle in the supermarket. I’d pat myself on the back for making a good choice but didn’t really discern how my body felt afterwards eating what I had bought. I remember buying a type of cereal that was branded as a healthier option. I only admitted that it was packed full of sugar after I had consumed large quantities of it and had started to put on weight!!
Wow Stephen a great revelation: “True health can be as simple as putting on an extra layer of clothing when we are cold” this takes it to a whole new level, because it makes us consider that true health is a quality of being. Not an ideal, food, store, product etc.
Yes, Stephen the healthcare industry should really be called the managing sickness industry. It’s interesting to consider that many, if not most, of the diseases that keep the healthcare professionals and hospitals in busy business and are putting an enormous strain on our groaning ‘healthcare systems’ are largely avoidable if we as people were more willing to take responsibility for some simple lifestyle changes.
Absolutely Stephen G. this exposes the dysfunctional way of our healthcare system in the world.
Rachel what a great article breaking down the very concept of health. We are constantly told what healthy is by advertising agencies across the world – yet I’ve not heard what true health is apart from the understandings of what Serge Benhayon has presented. You’ve elaborated on these in a way that has the same simplicity. When you share “the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that.” to me sums up the very basic aspect of health yet one that we often avoid.
I agree David, the deep honouring and tender care we crave but do not give to ourselves is the very foundation of self care and good health. Interesting this is not lived by the majority.
I agree David. We are fed the notion of what health is by a myriad of media – young, strong, great skin and teeth, a glowing look with lots of energy. If we fit this then we consider ourselves healthy. I used to fit this bill all the way through to my early 30s, but this was only on the outside. Underneath all of this, after having met Serge Benhayon too, I finally admitted I was in self loathing and had lack of self worth issues. We may look good on the outside but we know on the inside that we are incredibly tired and that we have the odd “minor” complaint – a head ache now and then, blocked sinuses, tight shoulders, constipation and so on. These were all the things I had dismissed as unimportant at a time when I considered myself to be “healthy”. I also didn’t stop to consider that the amount of energy I had might becoming from a drive rather than from a natural vitality. Rachel you have summed up true health beautifully – an openness to deeply nurturing and taking care of myself knowing that I am utterly worthy and deserving of all the love in the world.
Could that be because it requires firstly honesty and then taking responsibility for ourselves to live everyday health in this way?
That is true katechorley and it is not only interesting that it is not lived by the majority, but also that we as a human race have forgotten this true way of living health from honouring and caring for ourselves.
Written by a woman who is deeply honouring of herself – thank you Rachel Mascord. Our world would be a very different place if we all started to look within.
“But I also see those sicknesses as signposts to the choices that have taken me away from who I truly am – the real illness.” To see all sickness and disease as secondary to the real illness, the choice to be less than who we are, is a revelation.
I agree Leonne, a revelation straight from the soul.
What a beautiful blog Rachel. Thank you! So much of what you have said mirrors what my life has been like, and what so many other people go through in this day and age. Always suffering from something, constantly looking and trying out different modalities to get fixed, and never truely feeling in good health along the way, or understanding what was really going on. The fact is that with each ache, pain, and illness, our amazing bodies are trying to communicate to us to change the way we live so that we support and nourish ourselves, and ultimately be the love that we really are.
Rachel, your opening line really struck me because for me it was the opposite and yet the outcome was the same. I can say that ‘for most of my life, great health was something that I did think that I had and I thought that my health was nothing short of amazing and I did feel that I was able to sit back and cruise through anything, free from most worry and care’. And yet my real health was appalling and my body eventually broke down to such a degree that walking became an effort. With the support of Universal Medicine I have very, very slowly built up my health to be something that is actually truly amazing but I have done it by letting go of many deeply held beliefs, especially around health.
The health industry has a way of making you chase one cure after another, always avoiding the true reason you got sick in the first place. Responsibility, or lack of it.
So when you are brought to the fact that you must look and take responsibility for your life the true healing can occur.
Thank you Rachel. I have always been in ‘good health’ so have never really put much attention to the word health, what it means and what it brings or not. But have also seen it as either being in good or bad health or something in-between but not as something that is connected with every moment of my life, how I am with myself, how I live day in day out and how much or how little care I have for myself and others.
I recognise taking on my ill health as though it was something to be conquered and took to eating strange concoctions like clay, foul tasting colon cleanse concoctions (which when it came out the other end, smelt like burnt tyres) and growing wheat grass, to mention but a few things. But nothing improved my health and well-being and in fact my catalogue of illnesses got worse.
Then I found Universal Medicine and started to look at things differently, not only the foods I was eating but the choices I was making in other areas of my life. My health began to improve very quickly when I started to look at the foods I was eating, which included eating meat, cutting out wheat and diary to start with, I felt like I was coming back to life and that my illnesses were no longer my main focus.
I no longer fight my aches and pains, because I know they are giving me a message as to how I have been living.
This is a very beautiful blog. And I absolutely agree with having that pursuit for a robust perfection of health in the body that only seems to wear it down and create feelings of self loathing. When I first observed that way that Serge Benhayon took care of himself, I was like, ‘are we allowed to do that?’ Because for years I had put the care of me and the worth that I believed myself to have in to the hands of others who I saw as more important than myself. Ultimately however, the responsibility starts here with me and this is what I am learning with Universal Medicine.
Thanks Rachel I was the complete opposite to you, before I met Serge Benhayon, I seemed to be in the absolute pursuit of destroying myself and through his superhuman patience, love and way of living I was able over time to drop all the weapons I was using to kill myself and start to feel again. Now my health is not something I take for granted and I do take notice of what aches and pains are trying to tell me.
What you have written here brings tears to my eyes Rachel, ‘a human being willing to look within, to the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon – the day I came home.’ It makes me realise what an absolute blessing it is to meet Serge Benhayon and how amazing and at the same time completely ‘normal’ and practical his presentations are, I too feel that I have come home and am forever grateful for this.
Rachel you have covered so much. The amazing accolade to Serge Benhayon for how he lives and the example to all of what we can all achieve though our choices. I also will always remember – the day I came home.
I love what you have explored here Rachel with what is true health. I also tried ‘anything’ from alternative modalities, supplements (spending thousands and never finishing a bottle), drinking concoctions and doing all kinds of detox’s to make me better and healthy. Health or being healthy has so many connotations, as you have described and if any of them are warped from its true meaning than what are we really pursuing? This is the take home message for me on understanding true health “…found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people?
‘Is that the meaning of health, I started to wonder? Not an endpoint marked with an invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves, but found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people? I love this Rachel. True health is not just about the absence of disease and about the self, but also about being all that we are, our healthy living not just temporally but also energetically and then reflecting this out to everyone we meet.
Beautiful blog Rachel, thank you for sharing your exploration into what health truly is. I find that when I work with my body it is great at letting me know where I am making loving choices and where I am not. It has to go through and at times endure everything I put it through and so knows me better than anybody else!
great Blog Rachel. I really like your style. it feels so much simpler, to accept our body as it is, and accept whatever it is presenting to us and yes not strive for any sort of perfection or ideal of what health is but rather live our essence to the best of our ability and work with our body in full.
Beautifully expressed Rachel. And you too are “that spark” that ignites in others their own Light!
Your definition of true health is gorgeous, Rachel. It really sets the marker in a way that the whole is considered.
Yes, making true health about everyone not just ourselves is a new and I would say challenging concept in the self centralised world we live in but oh so true.
Thank you Rachel for a profound understanding of true health. Serge Benhayon has completely changed how I also perceive illness and disease and instead of it being something wrong with me and something to be fought and ‘why me?’ I am able to look at the choices I have been making and the way I live to understand that I am responsible for all that happens in and with my body. I now ask for support from a doctor and at the same time take responsibility for my own share of the healing by understanding and making choices that restore true health.
A beautiful expose on how we can develop a true relationship with our health. Illness and disease is not the enemy, and whilst we would like to think that it is not necessary, and this would definitely be more desirable, the fact is that sometimes we need a stop, a wake up call, and message that asks us to consider the momentums of our ways. Too often we not only ignore the warning signs of illness, but we ignore the illness itself, and there is no greater example of this than the way so many of us push through when we have a cold or the flu, when all we deeply want for all the world is to stop and rest.
Hi Rachael, this line really hit the mark with me.” . . . and the way he was always present with himself, knowing himself to be so deeply worthy of that.” It just undid something in me. It is so interesting that we think so little of ourselves that health can mean for many of us an “invincibility that makes us rough and careless with ourselves” when it is the lack of value for ourselves that cause the health problems in the first place. Thank you I love your writing.
Rachel, thank you for a thought provoking blog. My understanding of the meaning of health has fluctuated over the years and I have gone off on tangents, seeking clues as to how to be as healthy as possible. I wanted to avoid the various chronic conditions my parents, relatives or friends had at all costs but believed that, to some degree, things were preordained genetically. While I could see how environmental factors also came into play, I still tended to view health as something outside of myself. Since attending Universal Medicine I have come to realise that while all the above may play a part, the real notion of health is something quite different. This is where your definition captures it so well. What if we could all come to understand health in this way first and foremost? My body instantly relaxes and I find myself warming just at the very notion :).
The view of welcoming illnesses and diseases is compelling to me Rachel Mascord, as what you say they are the most honest signals of our bodies about the state of health. Our bodies do have a rhythm that we have to adhere to and by overriding it with the mind and using the body beyond its limits and to dump our issues with life in it does not sound that intelligent. I am prepared to say that our body is more intelligent than our mind, as our body does not stop to tell us about the state of our health , while our mind continues to make new versions of it while never being able to connect to the truth, while the body is naturally connected and cannot else be that.
I too welcome this new approach to illness and disease that Rachel Mascord has presented here. It allows us to take greater responsibility for the choices we have made in a very loving way. Listening to our body and actually doing something about what it is telling us has to be a very intelligent move.
I love, absolutely love your new definition of health Rachel. For so long we as a society have been imprisoned by a definition of health that simply did not work. We have known for a long time that our health is affected by our lifestyle choices but knowing that has not prevented the rise in illness and disease. Clearly something has been missing and you just delivered the missing key to us. True health as you say is ” living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that”.
It’s something to deeply appreciate Rachel, the fact that you now see illnesses and conditions as a blessing and something to observe as the way your body speaks to you. For it provides loads of information in how we are living and the choices we are making…everyday. This is not a common experience for most, wishing what they were feeling would go away and asking to be “fixed”. What you are sharing is all about self responsibility. That is something that is very rare indeed, especially when an unwell body is taken to a health professional, this allows the health professional to simply do their job, while the important work of looking at your choices is done by you. I call that a partnership.
I love your final words Rachel, “the day I came home”, because deep down we all know that our body speaks to us but it just depends as to whether we want to listen or not. ‘Come home” to connecting to yourself first!! And all else will awaken from there!!
I can relate to so much of what you share here Rachel…Serge Benhayon is truly inspirational, and it is through his presentations that my perception of health has also changed – no longer is it about fixing signs and symptoms just to ‘get on with life’ but to accept what my body is showing me as an opportunity to heal on many levels – not just physically…and that health is about the quality in which we life every day. It’s not about ‘doing life’ until our body forces us to stop but being aware of our everyday choices and being willing to take notice of the little signs our bodies reveal to us each day – even just sitting when we feel to sit is a healthy choice in that moment.
Thank you Rachel, health for me is tied to being responsible for myself in every moment. However, I at times gloss over my symptoms as “just something going on with my body” but the more I stop, honour and care for my body and am willing to listen, the more I can bring in loving change to the way I live. It doesn’t have to be complicated, I can just listen and care enough about myself to make changes and new choices, and choose to feel I’m worthy of a body that feels wonderful, pain free and vital to the greatest capacity it can be. Thanks for the inspiration to explore this again.
The definition of health has changed greatly for me ever since being introduced to the Ageless Wisdoms Teachings. I used to think health was a state in which the body had no major disease or illness. I now see one can be healthy even if the body may have disease or an illness. Why you may ask, well for me health is now more about a state of being. The body may be physically clearing through an illness or disease but if when this is happening a person is in relationship with themselves and looking at why the body is going through any particular ailment I see this as health. We all have some unresolved hurts and issues and this is not a picture of health but could appear to be from the outside if no symptoms are present. Health for me is a willingness to deepen my relationship with myself and my body so I can get a good feel for the choices I am making and how they impact on me.
“a human being willing to look within, to the divine spark that was re-ignited that first day of meeting Serge Benhayon – the day I came home” – how completely beautiful Rachel, the day I came back home too.
Rachel, you throw a whole new meaning to the word ‘Health’ and turn it 360. That health has nothing to do with being completely ailment or disease-free, but more, and using your pondering words: ” ….found in a deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people”. This makes sense to me. We may be free of disease or even super fit, and yet remain uncommitted to life or people making life a self-interested life. A life unexamined is without fruit borne or dry soil left infertile, eventually suffering illness or malfunction…moving away from its natural vital state being the greatest illness to suffer.
Rachel, you have asked the question that I also had asked many, many times throughout years of illness, injury and exhaustion, and these words brought me to tears as they totally describe how I felt the day I walked into my first workshop with Serge Benhayon: “Battle weary and with the body carrying the scars of a hundred alternative pursuits and the deep wounds of self loathing”. And also like you I felt a light within me that had struggled to shine suddenly explode into life, and as it did I could feel that I finally come home. My life still has its challenges, but I welcome them knowing that with each one I am discovering so much more about me, my life and the “true health” that I now know is possible.
Rachel you have covered so much so eloquently in your article. When reading the paragraphs about Serge Benhayon I got a really true felt sense of how he lives, which was remarkable, as I felt that I was getting the same from your words as if I was with him. Just one of your examples about how he puts his gloves and scarf on was such a huge reflection of the loving care that he constantly embodies. If he never spoke another word then the world would still receive so much just from being with him.
Thank you, Rachel. Your sharing has exposed my perfectionist view on what true health is. My body is not a static mass of tissue, and aiming to achieve the pain-free, symptom-free status by fixing issues here and there in its forever ongoing metamorphoses feels to be futile. It is about building a relationship with my body where I lovingly listen and respond to what it is communicating.
This is a really beautiful and honest article asking what true health is and acknowledging a man, Serge Benhayon, for all he is doing and teaching in order to help and support others return to a more loving, healthier and harmonious way of living.
Rachel you have eloquently expressed my experience also. Through the inspiration of Serge Benhayon and support of the Esoteric Practitioners and fellow students I too am learning that health is as simple as ‘living all of who I am, from my essence, without perfection …’. I am no longer that rat on a wheel seeking the mythical endpoint. I know my home deep within, and am committed to living from that place.
We are so easily sold the health story by buying a pair of the latest jogging shoes or drinking the new berry drink from the Amazonian jungle. A clever form of advertising that we fall victim to because we think health is found outside of ourselves but really it is already within.
Awesome Rachel, thank you. I could feel many echoes here of my own life and the pursuit of health when I seemed to have so many ailments. It wasn’t until I met Serge Benhayon and began the study of the Way of the Livingness did I start to grasp that my body was clearing my choices and past experiences. Taking true responsibility for my health involved a deep understanding of energy and how it works, and has offered me the ability to discern for myself what is needed, medically and energetically. The framework of my health has changed dramatically, and I am deeply grateful to Serge for what he always has and continues to present.
‘The framework of my health has changed dramatically… ‘. This is key Jo. What Serge Benhayon presents is truly a framework for health and life in general where NOTHING is left out! Fundamental principles of everything being energy and my choosing the quality of energy in everything I do, is a life changer. All our dilemmas in life can be understood and worked with from this foundation. Thank you.
Rachel, I love the all encompassing and expansive way you explore health and what it truly means, that it is so much more than the absence of illness and disease or physical perfection. In times of illness I have also felt the experience of being deeply connected and accepting of myself in essence, and felt the ‘blessing’ that illness can bring. Serge Benhayon and the quality of the life he lives, in absolute commitment to himself and others equally have inspired me. Our overall ‘health’ expressed as the… “quality of a life lived from the innermost essence – its beauty, grace and absolute commitment.”
Love this Rachel, it shows that health is not something to attain as such, but the true relationship with have with ourselves. Building our connection to our essence and living from this place, never in perfection but with a willingness to be open to what our body is expressing and the choices we make to live the way we do.
Rachel what an incredible sharing that really challenges the current held view of about what is health. As a fellow former exhausted mouse wheeler, who has been deeply supported my Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine, I love and feel that true health is ” as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that.”
Rachel this is such a touching piece of writing. So much was revealed here I could write an easy in reply but for now I celebrate this line, “I listened to the words of Serge Benhayon, and it was as though a light, long forgotten, ignited inside of me.” We are not taught from day one to listen to our own bodies and that all the answers are within, instead we are taught to listen to others and what their views and opinions are on things, including health. The problem is we are not all the same, what will work for one body will not work for another and the truth be felt we all know deep down what is truly good for us and what is not.
What I love about what you say about Serge Benhayon is he never tells another what to do, he simply reminds us that we are all our greatest healers and if we listen to our own bodies, the answers are all within. This man truly empowers, wanting nothing in return, other than for all to live the great love that they are. A true philosopher of our time freeing our minds so we can freely choose our own path.
I love what you share here about Serge Benhayon, ‘he never tells another what to do, he simply reminds us that we are all our greatest healers and if we listen to our own bodies, the answers are all within. This man truly empowers, wanting nothing in return, other than for all to live the great love that they are. A true philosopher of our time freeing our minds so we can freely choose our own path.’ So true.
Beautifully expressed Caroline – I very much resonate with all that you have said here. Imagine if we were taught from day 1 to listen to our bodies? The world would change overnight!
Caroline, I love what you write – ” … instead we are taught to listen to others and what their views and opinions are on things …”. You cannot but listen to others – there is so much ‘hearsay’ and the ‘same stuff’ being repeated everywhere you go like “touch wood”. It’s obvious that everyone is acting ‘same same but different’ behaviors how-ever, what if there was another way? Read on!
Rachel, thank you for breaking down the meaning of health – true health as you say: ‘Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?’ What a revolution we could have in the world if we saw health in this light!
Thanks for this article Rachel. I think this sentence is a new definition of health
“A deep level of commitment to ourselves, and our bodies, and consequently to all other people”
Most people I see, put the last part, commitment to others, ahead of the first two, but the reality is that what we do to ourselves, we do to others and NOT vice versa…being loving to ourselves is the only way to guarantee that we are consistently loving to others.
Absolutely Joel, so many times in my life before I met Serge Benhayon, others issues became much more important than what was going on in my life. This is also a general rule for most of society; we all want to nurture others before our self. With deep love and dedication to the Way of the Livingness, the students of the Livingness are now sharing a true way of approaching health; much appreciation to Rachel for her amazing Blog.
Great reminder Joel about ‘what we do to ourselves, we do to others and NOT vice versa…’. I can get caught up in what I think is worthy or something I have to offer and not be truly honest about the quality of living this myself. Thank you.
Rachel, this blog is poetry at its best. You bring a quality to the topic of true health that is masterful and in your writing, I could feel the love and care that I am worthy of. Magnificent.
So true Bernadette – as well as her commitment and dedication to humanity.
Love this Rachel. You start with this unattainable goal that the harder you try to get it the further away it becomes… like some illusionary trick. And then the box gets kicked out from under this illusion, only to find its been there inside you all along… now you are the inspiration for others to show them the way back to harmony, love and a truly fulfilling life.
I agree Simon – Rachel does inspire me.
Typically for most being healthy equates to not being ill, but even then being ill seems to mean not being seriously ill. For example someone at work is having an operation on his back next week, but I am sure if I asked if he was healthy he would reply yes. We seem to have become accustomed to an unhealthy and struggling body as normal.
Enter Universal Medicine with a way of seeing health that breaks the mould, and offers that true health is in an ever present connection with self and a way of living that puts love at its forefront.
Absolutely exquisite Rachel, this is a blog I’ll read again and again. How many of us choose the mouse on a wheel existence, running and running, never feeling truly at home, and what you have shared with us here is how we can choose to stop so simply with pure grace and return to our most natural home — within.
Deep thanks and appreciation Rachael and Katerina, I agree life was like a never ending maze that went on from one health issue to the next with every turn in the maze showing up symptoms which had been hiding or buried. It all seems so obvious now but I was denying that which is now made blatantly evident thanks to the presentations of Universal Medicine by Serge Benhayon. What is being exposed allows us to be open to true healing of the emotional outplays that hold us all in our ills!
This is an awesome blog Rachel. Before I met Serge Benhayon I was also living in irresponsibility when it came to my health. I thought I could eat whatever I liked (copious amounts of dairy, sugar, refined carbohydrates and coffee) and that I would find the right combination of supplements and herbs to counteract this disregard. I thought that someone would have the answer to keeping me healthy without me having to look at the way that I was living. I love that you share that health is not about a robust body but about living from our essence, living all that we are.
Thank you Rachel, for a great sharing of your quest for a healthy body. I had an idea in my mind of a healthy diet being key, so had lots of fresh fruit and vegetables, fruit especially, at times cut out red meat, and included more fish. I worked very hard in the garden (at one time 10 acres, ouch!) and went regularly to Tai Chi classes. I also tried a couple of new age thingeys. But I developed an intermittent back problem that was quite crippling when it occurred, and vertigo and balance problems every so often.
After discovering Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine and lots of treatment with esoteric practitioners, especially including chakra puncture, and connective tissue, (and certainly changing how I did everything), about 9 years later I can say that I have not had that back problem for at least 7 years now, and the other problems seldom appear and are of a very low level.
I love your round up of what health is – “So what then is health? Is it as simple as living all of who I am, from my essence, with no perfection, just love, acceptance and the deepening commitment to that?” How simple is that, I love it, it is so absolutely gorgeous to be living that, not perfect, but at the moment to the best of my ability.