BALANCE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 5 September 1934, Page 7

BALANCE

IN BODY AND MIND .. BY A MEDICAL AUTHORITY (Under the Auspices of the Sunlight League) I The Sunlight League stands for a healthier New Zealand and the better- • meat of the race. With these aims wo* must all sympathise, for New Zealand , could bo healthier and the race could ho improved; the percentage of recruits rejected during the Great War is a sign that things cannot bo taken with complacence. It may be worth while to consider what we mean by health ; everyone knows that it literally means soundness, wholeness, but that is not trie meaning we imply when we use the word. Rather we tend to mean freedom from disease; this latter is a negative conception, I prefer something nearer tile meaning of wholeness, where all aspects and functions of life are taken into consideration. It is not hard to agree that health implies the wholesome possession and use of all our faculties bodily and mental; further it implies a harmony, a balance. To go a little further, we must agree on some standard by which we may test the degree of health. Health surely consists in a state of body and mind which enables the individual freely to pursue his appointed .end. Health is not the end but the means to and end. What is that end? Omitting theological or metaphysical arguments we shall, most of ns, agree that man’s true end is to express himself as an individual, and to servo the community; in this expression and this service there is room for all his nobler aspirations. Only a healthy man can adequately do these tilings a man of healthy mind and healthy body; none of us enjoy absolute health, all of us are handicapped by infirmity of some kind or we would be more than mortal men, but it should be our aim,, as it is of the Sunlight League, to assist in securing the greatest measure of health possible for all our people. Now individual expression and sendee of the community may be, or may appear to be, opposed. Actually there is always some considerable conflict, what we must all reach is a state of harmony, a balance. So too when we acknowledge thafc both body and mind are necessary, we must observe a true balance here. The man with enormous muscles and no brains is not of so much use as one more harmoniously developed ; the intellectual genius crippled with bodily disease is thereby a less valuable member of tho community, though many men of genius have made inestimable contributions to mankind in spite of their bodily weakness.

The man who is always -worrying about liis health is not healthy but in a morbid state, even if his body be in perfect order. Many of the good things of tills life we enjoy, as it were unconsiouslv, and health is one of them; we hardly think of our teeth till they ache, and so with health, we should not be preoccupied with it until it troubles us. But we must not misunderstand this point; we all take reasonable care of our teeth, wo clean them, we keep them exercised on a wholesome diet, we go occasionally to the dentist; but we are not always thinking cf our teeth. As regards health, we must obey certain wise rules; we should see that our diet l is reasonably wisely chosen, that we have adequate fresh air and sunlight, physical and mental exercise. etc. But if we concentrate on our health beyond this stage we are apt to miss the point of our life, and fail to achieve our end of individual expression and service tp the community. Our individual expression is liable to be that of self-absorption in the problems of our personal health, which is not far removed from hypochondriasis. We shall have no time for service to the community.

There is an old Greek proverb: “Nothing in excess,” observes a due proportion in all t/hings; so let ns observe a • balance in health as well as in life Our development and training to bo harmonious must include training of the mind as well as the body, and bv training the mind we should not merelv think of the intellect, but of our emotions as well, for the ordered and harmonious expression of our emotions is as necessary to our health, as bodilv well-being. On the physical side we should enjoy the sun, for in a very real sense we are the children. of the sun, fresh air and exercise, bathing, games,, a wise diet, proper sleep; for these are all valuable and some of them essential in promoting health. But we should try to enjoy them spontaneously and for their own value rather than with a conscious striving for health. Let them take their proPer place in our scheme of things, and let us also remember the things of the mind, our intellectual and emotional life. That is, let us observe a nroper balance. This is not the place to begin a discussion concerning psychological health, but it may be appropriate to make some observations concerning children; the health and development of children is the concern and responsibility of adults. We are waking up, slowly'perhaps, to the realisation that children need suneht. fresh air and a-wliolesom# diet; and are beginning to take a wiser view in regard to their physical well-being. But vvp are slow to accept our full responsibility in connection with the growing mind, of the child. I do not mean the child’s intellectual development, though our educational system is by no means without fault in this highlv important direction ; I mean the care and development of his emotional life. The object of .education, apart from information, teaching and such religious and moral instruction as may be decided, should be to turn out each child a happy independent individual, healthy *in body and mind, already learning to express himself and to control his emotions, and to take his place in serving the community. In this training the home is more influential than the school, and we- must all learn to be able to play a wise part in it. Books will tell us something, but little more than a book on painting will tell ns bow to be artistes. No training or. self-control will be anv good if we fail to control ourselves; for children learn far more by example than by precept, and if we mishandle our emotions our children are likely to do the same. Warps or twists of the emotional life of the child means warps and twists of his character and probably an unhappy or ineffective life ; there are far too many tragedies of this kind in our midst. This mav bn criticised as a. dieression as it! certainly is, but its object is to stress a life, too often ignored. If wo observe the balance in education as in life, we shall pay duo regard to. the intellectual and emotional, as well as the physical side. Let us then trv to obtain this harmony and balance : let us observe wise rules of health both of mind and body; let us not forget that health is not an end in itself biit is a condition in which we are ablo to. live our lives as free individuals and to serve our fellows, and, in so doing, we can, within the limits of this mortal life, experience both joy and honpiness.

Readers of Plato’s Republic, will remember that after long search Socrates found justice under his very feet; it was

that each individual should perform his duo function in the state. In this ideal state there were wise governors who decided what was to bo done. So in that psycho-physical complex, which we call man, health mv be compared to a state, where all our mental and physical functions, all our thoughts and emotions smoothly and harmoniously carry on their work, subordinate to the directing force of our pevsonalitv expressed as the will. Like Tyltyl in Maeterlinck’s play, we may find an excessive desire to grasp the blue bird of health, may make it fly away, but like Socrates and his friends wo often fail to see health when it is obvious.