Frame of Reference

Frame of Reference

Your frame of reference is important.  How you view life, the world, your fellow man and the human body will often determine the outcome of your life.  An article in “USA today,” September 22, 1988, demonstrated how doctors diagnose and treat based upon their frame of reference.  Dr. Lawrence Horowitz, former director of the US Senate Subcommittee on Health, states “Women have a 70% chance of having their uterus removed by the age 75 in a certain city in Maine.  Women living in other cities in Maine have a 25% chance.”  Were the first group of medical doctors bad physician?  No, they just had a hysterectomy mindset.  Their frame of reference said, “Do surgery.”  The point of the article was to get a second opinion.  However, that would be of little value if you were to go to a physician in the same town.  It could even get quite confusing.  Suppose you went to a town where the doctor had a “no surgery under any circumstances” mindset and you really needed the surgery!  Perhaps that is why some people prefer the philosophy extolled in the Chinese proverb that says “Man with one watch always knows what time it is.  Man with two watches never knows.”  It seems easy enough, pick out an authority and do whatever he says.  Unfortunately, whatever the authority says will be based on his frame of reference.  Should not your decisions be based on your frame of reference or, at worst, on the advice of someone who has the same frame of reference as you?

Your frame of reference is really your outlook on life.  The chiropractic frame of reference says the human body is designed by an intelligence far greater than the mind of man.  It maintains that the body was meant to run and heal itself from above-down, inside-out.  The chiropractic frame of reference says the body was meant to be healthy and that being ill is not normal.  Medicine,  on the other hand, views the body as greatly limited.  Chiropractic views the body as having great ability.  Medicine sees the signs and symptoms of disease as the body breaking down, chiropractic sees them more often as a means of adaptation.  Medicine views life as an overwhelming obstacle that cannot be overcome without the use of chemicals.  Chiropractic views life as a challenge that can be met with great joy and result in a better, stronger individual.

How you look at life is important.  In fact, many authorities in the health field maintain that a person’s outlook directly affects their health.  People with a positive attitude generally have longer, healthier lives.  It obviously affects your enjoyment of life.  Your frame of reference will affect your outlook, but most important, your frame of reference will affect your decision-making progress.  If you have a health frame of reference, you will address your attention to health.  If your frame of reference is proactive rather than reactive, you will go out and search for health rather than sit back and wait for sickness to occur and then run off to a man who has a sickness frame of reference and a remove-the-organ attitude and do whatever he says.

Chiropractic is a positive, proactive approach to life.  It doesn’t tell you to do this and to not do that.  It tells you that your body is always better off without interference in the nervous system.  It just makes sense to have your spine adjusted regularly.  It is also important to educate ourselves in matters of health, use common sense and listen to your body to determine what you need to relative to matters of health.

Healing Journeys Book Cover