August 2003

You can decide to be healthy

by Dr. Ted Morter

You are much more than an assortment of parts packed neatly within your visible skin. You developed as a complete unit and you continue to function as a complete unit. Anything and everything that affects one part of you affects the whole you.

When you jog or exert yourself, your heart, lungs, muscles, circulation, blood acid level, digestive processes, and many other internal organs and processes are affected. When you are upset, your heart, lungs, muscles, circulation, blood acid level, digestive processes, and other internal organs and processes are affected. No matter what you do, all functions of your body are directly or indirectly involved.

Pain and disease in any part of the whole are effects of a "whole" problem. Pain and disease, themselves, aren't the problem. You aren't sick because your joints, head, or stomach hurt. You aren't sick because you have chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, or Crohn's disease. These are merely names for particular symptoms.

Symptoms aren't the cause of your problem. You were sick before the symptoms showed up. Health and disease are both side‑effects of the responses your body has made to the conditions it must survive. And for the most part, the conditions it must survive are brought about by decisions or choices you have made over time in six essential areas of life.

Every day of your conscious existence you make decisions. Conscious choices. Some decisions affect your future more than others. Every day you decide how you will respond in six vital areas of life. You decide what you eat and drink, what you think, what you breathe, and how you exercise and rest. Each of the six decision areas is so important to your current health and well‑being that I call the group "the six essentials of life."

Choices in the six essentials are so commonplace that most people don't even recognize them as conscious decisions. Food and drink decisions are often based on ease, speed, and convenience. Exercise and rest choices are usually based on schedule loads. Choices you make in the six essentials usually aren't dramatic -- they're constant.

The fallout from your choices in the six essential areas affects how you feel and how healthy you are. When the decisions you make in all six areas keep your body functioning at its best, you are healthy and you feel good. If you consistently make essential decisions that keep your body in crisis, you are -- or will be -- sick.

Although diet is the most popular area of an "I'm‑going‑to‑improve‑my‑life" campaign, thoughts and feelings are the most important areas. Your body responds constantly and intensely to how you feel about everything that goes on in your life. And these responses can be behind major physical problems.

Survival of this instant is your body's only goal. Not survival later today, or next week, or next year. Survival now. You may not be happy with the by‑products of your body's survival techniques. You may have aches and pains that range from annoying to excruciating. You may be in the throes of a serious disease. Or you may be in the process of developing a disease that you haven't even noticed yet because you are still symptom free.

Those who are constantly anxious, afraid, up‑tight, jealous, judgmental, or self‑critical, keep their bodies ready for a fight. Being ready for a fight is fine if you're in physical danger. But being ready for a fight constantly -- days, nights, and weekends -- is really hard on the body. After a while, it gets exhausted. If exhaustion continues, organs and systems curtail production or shut down.

Usually the first organs or systems to go are those that aren't contributing to immediate survival. For example, you can manage with gallstones a lot better than you can manage with acidic blood. The good news is that you have control over most of the situations your body must survive. The choices you make in the six essentials set up the survival threats your body must respond to. And the biggest survival threat is stress. Mental, emotional, and nutritional stresses exhaust both you and your internal organs and systems.

The decisions you make about everyday activities -- what you eat, drink, think and do -- affect the climate of your cells' home and the way your body works. When you make and carry out decisions that allow a favorable internal climate, health is your reward. On the other hand, when you make and carry out decisions that produce an internal climate in which your body must constantly "fight for its life," pain and disease are your rewards. Therefore, you can decide to be healthy -- or not.

(Dr. M.T. Morter, Jr. is the founder of the revolutionary Morter HealthSystem, based on his Bio Energetic Synchronization Technique -- B.E.S.T. For information on B.E.S.T. seminars offered all over the country in 2003, call 800/874-1478, or visit the Morter HealthSystem website at www.morter.com.)