Foundation for Advancement in Cancer Therapy
Non-Toxic Biological Approaches to the Theories,
Treatments and Prevention of Cancer

2024
Our 53rd Year

Why Are We Sick?By Paul Bander, M.D., D.HT. and Teresa Bander, M. A.

PAUL & TERESA BAHDER: Paul is a fully licensed M.D., Board Certified in Homeopathy, whose experience includes work, studies and research in East European folk medicine in Poland, in Ayurveda in India, and Homeopathy in Greece. He has given numerous lectures and appeared on TV

Teresa, born in Poland, has a degree in Clinical Psychology and twelve years’ experience in individual psychotherapy. She has done extensive research in the field of Jungian and Transpersonal psychology. She has given seminars in Poland, Denmark, France, and Switzerland.

Together they have established and run Princeton Homeopathy Clinic where they use Classical Homeopathy to treat a wide range of diseases (mostly chronic conditions, both physical and mental). They believe diseases are limitations which, however, can help us to expand consciousness and that only through such expansion true healing process can take place. They are active giving seminars and writing on these topics.

Homeopathy perceives symptoms as an expression of vital force reacting to disease and as a way of regaining the lost harmony (homeostasis) of the organism. Homeopathy does not evaluate the progress of treatment by the disappearance of symptoms nor does it aim to eliminate them, but rather to make the person feel better. Homeopathy recognizes the cause of disease to be something subtle, something much more meaningful than a chance exposure to bacterias, an allergy, or a degenerative change. It allows one to see the meaning of symptoms and their reason for existence, and eventually to change one’s life attitude and orientation. In the process of homeopathic treatment people become more aware of ways in which they are undermining their own health, and of the significance of life choices which present themselves to them. Thus the process of cure is very importantly also an educational process. Understanding the ‘why’ of disease can make not only remedy selection more accurate but the cure itself a meaningful process of discovery. This article presents some thoughts on this subject formulated during the authors’ experiences of accompanying their patients on the road to cure.

If there is one quality that characterizes life, it can be said to be aspiration, or the process of expanding, overcoming limitations, reaching for something higher and vaster. The progression of one specie of life into the next, as well as the thirst within each one of us for meaning, sense and fulfillment in yet deeper and fuller ways, exemplifies this principle.

Life is an evolution of consciousness which endlessly grows and learns through experience, expanding and transcending its present limitations. This progression is visible in higher and higher ideals of self-transcendence, whether in sports, better and better technology, more perfect examples of human integrity or more encompassing understanding of reality. In a way, life is a chain of experiences allowing us to learn, expand and transcend yet further.

Development of consciousness takes place through accepting the challenges presented to us. Developments of consciousness is expansion of consciousness and expansion is possible only by learning through experience. The process is analogous to learning the alphabet in school. Initially, learning the alphabet is something new. It is not a problem but an opportunity. To learn it we have to become interested in it, concentrate on it and experience it. If we accept the challenge, we gain knowledge and access to vaster experiences and wisdom.

There are two conditions of life: 1) everybody has to participate in the process, and 2) there is no escape from it. That is, no matter how much we may strive to avoid life experiences, there is no way to escape them. Nowhere to hide. The world is our school and, like it or not, we can only change the speed of our learning, how fast we graduate from one level to the next. When we don’t pay attention, we don’t learn. We need strong stimuli to beckon us. Challenges help to attract our attention so we will learn.

“There is a time for everything and a season for every change.” Learning the alphabet at a normal age is not a problem but learning it at middle age, or even at high school age when one has many other things to learn is an enormous task. Promotions in school are given at a certain pace and if we fail to learn, we need to repeat the same grade. Staying in the same grade to learn the same material is more painful. The second time around we have to carry the weight of our past failure in addition to the challenge of the lesson itself. Each time we stay back to repeat the same learning experience, it becomes harder and we meet with greater suffering.

Life teaches us the same way. We can learn painlessly, in harmony happiness, free of any disease when we learn quickly, the first time a lesson is presented to us. When we refuse, the voice of the teacher necessarily gets louder to gain our attention. If need be, our body issues a series of warnings so that we may learn.

Normally this call of life is quiet and subtle and if we correctly read the message given to us we find ourselves in the state of health, peace and harmony. When, for any reason, the progression of consciousness gets stuck, life speaks louder to force us to learn. Disease, with its suffering, is a cry of life calling our attention to transcend ourselves.

Disease is one of those situations where life dramatically forces us to expand consciousness. We can ignore this call, but the price of doing so is high: it is the price of life. If we ignore the repeated lessons given to us, the usual result is a chronic disease, which is none other than a slowly progressing death. We die not only in the physical sense of death but we also die slowly in terms of our emotional, mental and spiritual being. Finally, refusing to hear the ultimate call to apply ourselves, we are thrown out of the school of life, we die.

A good case in point is a cancer patient. Usually cancer patients are “very decent, hard-working, responsible” people who achieve prominence and respect in society. Why are they sick? Surely it must be because certain basic requirements to be healthy were not fulfilled by them. These requirements are the aspiration to be transformed into something higher and vaster than one already is.

The usual attitude as to why people are sick is acceptance of the belief that it is normal for people to get sick. This is one of the main difficulties in understanding health. The social norm is to struggle in life and to have a body that ages, deteriorates and needs an occasional tune up like a car. We repair this instrument as long as possible and then discard it like an old object. This is right; the body is an instrument to be used and used in the best way but not an instrument for transport, horizontally. The body is a vehicle, but to be used vertically. The body has an opportunity to become transformed. It stops being a mechanical machine and becomes an instrument of the soul. The body is the voice of the soul that encourages us to learn the present lesson so that we can reach higher heights and deeper depths. It can awaken our aspiration and yearning for yet loftier fulfillment. The people who are transformed are the ones who move from a horizontal to a vertical movement of consciousness.

There are numerous cases of so called spontaneous remission of cancer or miraculous cures with diet, Yoga exercises, etc. The change that takes place in their life is not just diet, exercise, etc., but it is the change of consciousness. Changing diet is then just an outward manifestation of the inner change. These people understand what the meaning of their symptoms is and this is what brings about healing. These are the chosen ones who understand the message ‘this is your last chance to change’, and they change everything. To return to the example of cancer patients, it is not an accident that they refer to, their tumors as ‘growths’. Refusing to grow inwardly they develop pathological ‘growth’ outwardly.