Curated Paper 1 - Austin Martinez

Austin Martinez

BIOL 4500

Dr. Jonathan Karpel

9/21/2018

Curated Paper 1

              This course began with an exotic study of the philosophy of “Ayurveda”, an Indian healing art that takes in to account the body, mind, and spirit and studies their interconnections.  These are collectively known as the dosha, and dictate how the body affects the mind, or the spirit affects the body, and so forth.

My entire has been spent as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and I am devout in my observations of that religious belief.  Naturally, the most inquisitive piece of discussion that caught my attention was the discussion of what constitutes the ‘spirit’.  Being religious, I understandably will have a different hardline definition of what ‘spirit’ means than someone who does not believe in a post-mortal existence.  Despite those differences, I think that the term ‘spirit’ supersedes religious aspects and can be consolidated by what we decided it was – the heart, or character of an individual.  Our discussion focused on what the difference was between mind and spirit, with the consensus being that mind was what our cognition dictates, while spirit is what our heart yearns or strives to do.  ‘Spirit’, rather than being a term describing ethereal existentialism, seems to be a definition of one’s character and I think that most people could agree on that general definition – it seemed like the class was in agreement with that idea.

              While I believe in balance, I believe personally that the spirit has the most profound effect on the mind and body.  Surely the mind and body also have an effect on the spirit, but for a person to be truly defeated?  I think it has to be the spirit, the character of that person that must be defeated.  After reflecting on this, I read more on the Ayurvedic Institute’s views of dosha, or the mind, body, and spirit.  They seem to agree that each of these aspects are not of equal strength in every person – each person is going to have a predominant or strongest trait, a middle trait, and a weakest trait.  Despite the layers of these traits, it is important that they can remain in equilibrium to ensure the whole health of the person in question.

             So which part of the dosha is predominant?  That varies from person to person I would say.  I am not a physical masterpiece, but I consider myself physically able and healthy.  My mind is able to memorize and analyze information thoroughly, though I can think of many examples of people who have a ‘harder’ personality.  I feel like my spirit is my strength, and that it can help me to alleviate pressure in physical and mental areas more than physical or mental fortitude can affect my overall well-being.

              This idea of some aspect of the dosha being strongest in some people has made me think about a book I recently read, ‘Lone Survivor’ by Marcus Luttrell.  He describes the Navy Seal dogma that you essentially fight until you die.  He talks about his friends that died next to him, all having been mortally wounded, literally fighting until their last breath.  There was a particular example of Michael Murphy, the commanding officer, who got on a satellite phone to call in backup.  In order to get phone service, he had to wander out into open gunfire.  He sat down on a rock and called headquarters – while on the line with command, he was shot through his upper back and dropped the phone, but calmly reached down and picked up the phone, and continued the phone call.  He finished the call and made his way back to the team without showing he was injured, all to maintain his dignity – that was, after all, his last day alive.  I don’t think the fortitude to do something like that is solely physical in nature – I think it has more to do with the mind and the spirit than the body’s capacity.  I do want to make it exceptionally clear that for other people, the body or the mind might be their strong suit.  The aforementioned example is just to illustrate how I think the dosha are a bit different in everyone.

              I think that in exploring the balance of the human body and its ability to fight off disease, we have to understand that each individual has their own strengths and by focusing on a holistic approach of using that strength to heal their overall self, that gives us opportunities to help other people or even to help ourselves.  This can be done at home, by looking at ways the Ayurvedic institute methods for diet, mindfulness, and other healing techniques.

             The Ayurvedic institute is located in New Mexico.  With my family coming from Northern New Mexico, I have seen firsthand that the land is truly a place of enchantment, as they say, and I think it is appropriate that Ayurveda is pressed here in the United States from a land that is full of tradition.  Native American tribes have practiced holistic medicine (albeit different from the Ayurveda approach) in those lands for a very long time.  I find it interesting that two sources of seemingly mystical healing methods have roots in the same place.  It them makes me wonder if the Native Americans were more receptive to this type of healing and view of life, and if that was something that allows Ayurveda to be taught and brought about more here in the United States, outside of its native India.

              With a background in the knowledge of the dosha we turned our horizons to apply it to the pathophysiology of disease.  Remember, all things in the world are connected.  This isn’t meant to mean to the extent of Chaos Theory, but really things in the world of health especially are all connected.  An individual frequently has high blood glucose?  That isn’t just going to affect insulin production.  It’s going to affect a lot of different physiological processes, and it isn’t going to solely cause diabetes.  Because it affects so many things that are all chained together, it is going to make a person at risk for many different conditions.

              Nutrition labels have almost been regarded as a horoscope, rather than a scientific recommendation.  I think this comes from an ultimately incorrect perspective in the human mind – that is, that our body is indestructible.  Our body is so good at handling problems day-to-day, that I think people simply think, ‘That excess sugar won’t bother me’ or ‘A little extra salt here won’t do me any harm’.  Both salt and sugar are very important to the body’s function, but when we don’t regulate what we take in it builds up over time and eventually can pose a threat to our lives because we chronically overconsume. 

There is a “whole cost” to disease.  I use the term “whole cost”, because often the pathophysiology is looked at and the dollar amount is overlooked, so by “whole cost” I mean a combination of these two aspects.  A thing I now see that is overlooked probably by the world in general is the dollar amount behind a disease.  Sure, there are some diseases that occur in people that they have no control over; however, there are plenty of diseases we can prevent by proper diet in particular.  If people knew more about how much something was going to cost them in the long run, they might be more careful about it. 

              We had a really good discussion on EBT cards following our Beyond Biology discussion.  There were some good points thrown around from all perspectives – the overarching theme being that each person seemed to have the best interest of people in mind, even if those involved different methods.  Someone mentioned the idea that there could be a rewards system based on nutrition, and I think that strikes a good balance between forcing people to eat healthy and not.  People love “free” things, and any incentive is sure to garner attention.  If we really did have a rewards system revolving around nutrition, I think there would be a lot of people who would go for it.  People in general want to be healthy I think, but just don’t know how.  It almost seems a trend to be healthy, especially with portrayal in media of thinness.

This really wouldn’t be hard to track.  We know that a store can track if you’re buying ice cream or spinach.  Since I believe most people want to be healthy, I really don’t think this would be hard to do.  I really think that lots of people would embrace it.  Sure, there are people who will always entirely disregard nutrition and health advice, but there are just as many who would embrace something like that.

To view this through a political lens, I really think that an approach like that would appeal to people in both wings of politics, and society as a whole because it strikes a balance between telling people what to do and encouraging people what to do for a healthier society.  There seems to be some pretty viable tenderness for why it would or would not be a good idea to implement a nutrition aspect.  This would fall right in the middle.

We can streamline all of this in a clear, linear progression – nutrition is lacking, nutrition is pushed by the government, many people eat healthier, due to eating healthier their bodies are healthier, because their bodies have been enriched so also have their minds and spirits been enriched through the idea of Ayurveda.  This extends beyond the sphere of health diagnostics, but also into companies.  More companies spend money on providing healthier food options as a result of government programs, so it becomes easier for society as a whole to purchase healthy food.  This was a really good concept pointed out in class – how are people to afford it?  By swinging the trend towards healthy eating, it also affects how companies might function and make it easier on us as individuals, and prove for a better, healthier society in the future.