Day Twenty-Two: Health

Word of the Day: Health

Image of the Day: spiral drawn in the snow

Token of the Day: paper Calla fuchsia pink lily

Gail writes: snow spiral, cold day, white clarity

Is health the absence of illness? Is it available to me only if i am free from all diseases of the body, mind and spirit?

Health, when optimum, allows me a good quality of life. I not only function, i flourish. Flourishing, for me, might be a quite different reality to flourishing for the next person. I might know, or at least believe, that in order to flourish i need to earn enough money, live in a pleasant neighbourhood, have a trustworthy set of friends, a loving partner, and be in good physical health. And that good physical health might be defined by me as: pain leavel below 4 out of 10, only one surgical intervention per year, medications well-managed...or i might define optimal health as that moment of balance where i am at peace physically, spiritually, mentally, emotionally, financially, and socially.

Looking the "picture of health" is so often used in Western society to imply that one is obviously well. If we cannot see evidence of illness we assume health. Yet we often also do the same in reverse - if someone is using a wheelchair, has a limb missing, is visually impaired we stick the label ILL or DISABLED on them. We might be right but for all the wrong reasons. I am disabled if i cannot learn to look beyond the obvious to the person within.

Health is my business
part of my vision, part of my passion
my own health is troublesome
distracting, disturbing
it takes up too much time and creates too much worry
Embodying faith, body theology
integrating beings, knitting mind and body with spirit.

This is my calling, my mission, and my desire
and i hope that being wounded
enhances rather than negates my work!