Less for health

I wrote this piece sometime about 4-5 years back at a time when I was in US and getting overwhelmed with too much of everything...

Today internet is bringing about a revolution in making us more informed to make healthy choices. Where advertisements by multinational companies ruled the mindset of people till a few years back, now internet has provided the platform for free and fast spread of awareness about the corruption in the profit oriented companies that make and promote everything we use. So man has slowly again started realising the value of natural ways of living, natural remedies and natural products of daily use after the brief phase of fascination by everything man made (read company made) and complex since the industrial revolution. Its just the beginning of the start of the natural revolution.

At this nascent stage internet is ensuring an ongoing flood of information regarding everything natural. Just googling one of these: DIY homemade recipes for personal use products like soaps or deodorants, or kitchen gardening, or homemade remedies to common illnesses, or health benefits of common kitchen ingredients, superfoods or different dieting regimens or different types of alternative treatments, is suffice to overwhelm one so much that he either gives up his ambition to turn more natural or he completely submerges himself, makes huge lifestyle changes and  grapples for more and more detailed information so that he misses nothing in order to be more healthy. Instead of simplifying life it rather makes it more complex and stressful and one wonders what he is missing to ensure even better health.

Today an idea just occurred to me. That health is in simplicity, in lesser than more. We do not need to know about all the superfoods, all the natural remedies, all the diet regimens in details, all the harmful chemical components in commonly bought stuff in order to be more healthy. All we need is less of everything. Less of artificial products, less of time spent earning money, less of stressing over future, less of medicines, less of trying too hard, even less of information. One of the first teachings of Buddha was moderation. Today for health we need more of moderation, yes, more of less, instead of craze for more in everything. Stress is the main cause of most illnesses now. Following moderation in everything would make life simpler and less stressful, thus naturally more healthy. The human body is Gods best creation and like everything else in nature this body too has the natural ability to heal itself when left alone in its natural relaxed state.

So next time when you are trying to research on some ingredient in some box you bought at the store or about the health benefits of another new superfood just ask yourself, ‘Would that time spent be really worth it, would it be worth more than just taking a deep breath with closed eyes?’ Remember, less is more… more health.

The above image is from one of the favorite fb pages "Be more with less"