I came across an ancient Japanese word: YAMI. Oriental languages are built upon pictures. YA meant flame. MI mean cover or basket. YA-MI when joined together into a single word meant a cover over a flame, or a basket over a light. YAMI was a word meaning sickness. Sickness is a covered light. No doubt this archetypal meaning of sickness goes back to the origins of language. Jesus picked up this same theme when he said "Do not cover your light with a bushel basket, but let it shine." Isn’t it interesting that both east and west picked up the same archetypal picture of illness!

Therefore let us define sickness as a hidden or blocked out light. En-lighten-ment occurs when the cover or block is removed. Our story about ourselves and others sickens us. Our lifeflow is blocked, cut off. Our power is diminished. There is very little glow in our eyes. The spirit is quenched. We have become guarded, resistant, negative, fearful, critical, hopeless, full of doubt. Creativity and in-spiration are gone. We re tense, worried, irritable, lifeless, harried and dispirited. We are like a 16 cylinder engine sputtering along on two cylinders. We feel old, sick, tired, flat.

What is sickness?

• Sickness is a covered light
• Sickness is a story of loneliness, lack and entrapment that has taken its toll on the body
• Sickness is blocked flow
• Sickness is distorted health
• Sickness is impaired thinking
• Sickness is twisted form
• Sickness is dis-ease
• Sickness is a shadow
• Sickness is a smoldering fire
• Sickness is a shadow
• Sickness is a misrepresentation
• Sickness is a hidden power
• Sickness is disguised divinity
• Sickness is a blessing in disguise
• Sickness is health trying to break through

Estralia story

We attribute sickness to germs, accidents, poisons, genetics, environmental conditions, injuries, old age, dysfunctional organs, toxic materials, as well as other psychosocial causes. However, sickness, like suffering, is more basically an attitude toward a condition of the body. There are "well" people who entertain some sick attitudes, and "sick" people who entertain some healthy attitudes. Sickness, whether it seem physical, mental, social or environmental, occurs because of a low vibrational energy field which affects the immune system. Low vibes occur due to a covered light. The soul is not singing. The spirit is not soaring. An infinite being has bought into a self-defeating victim story about his lacks and limitations. How humorous, how comical, to even imagine that we are so flawed and weak that a little germ or injury could handicap an infinite being. Like Kafka said, we live in a little shack beside a mansion. Jesus hit the nail on the head when he said "My father’s house is a mansion I have reserved for you."

Crippled stories manifest as crippled bodies. Sick stories manifest as sick bodies. All sickness is of the mind, an out-picturing of the story we tell ourselves daily and hourly. Examine what you are telling yourself all day long. Is it a "Poor Me" tale or an "Ain’t It Awful" scenario about the world? Are you telling yourself that you are a victim of someone or something? Victimization is the central theme in the human story that feeds into sickness, aging and death experiences.

All symptoms of any illness of any kind arise from the belief in victimization. Is your flame is burning brightly, it will burn up any condition. You are the only one who can throw water on your flame, or cover up your light, or give yourself a line of BS. We betray ourselves with sick, divisive, unconscious thinking. Whenever we give up that responsibility (power) and blame someone or something, we have betrayed ourselves, hidden our light again and planted the seeds of illness or malfunction.

Symptoms of that fact, however, is the essence of the enlightenment process. If you mislead yourself, the symptom remains to remind you that you have sold yourself short.

I made myself sick recently telling myself that I had to make a certain trip. I had to make that trip because I told myself that my financial future depends upon making that trip. I was acting on a belief in poverty, and of a belief that I have to control everything myself. I had set myself up to attract more lack and deprivation.

Our illness problems begin with our misconstrued desires. Everything we want in the outside world is symbolic of what we want to experience on the inside. You want a Cadillac so you can experience comfort, prestige, worth, etc. Find out what you want and then find out where it is. The desire for something is a symbolic representation of a desire for an experience. You can experience comfort, prestige, and worth without a Cadillac. Consciousness is the source and content of all experience. The outer symbol is a trigger for the inner experience. Visualizing the beach can be just as rewarding as going to the beach. The body responds as much to a dream as to an outward physical act. All of our experiences arise from our imagination, from our interpretations of what is happening outside. "What is one man’s meat is another’s poison." What is hell for one is heaven for another.

We assign all meaning, consciously or unconsciously. All meaning, and therefore all experience, is self-created through imagination and self-talk. We are the author of all of our own experiences. All. None of our experiences are created and controlled by anyone else. Not one. We are the absolute owner of our inner world. Even if we assign that power to someone or something else, we cannot escape the final responsibility for our own experiences. Symptoms and sickness mark the spot where we have ignored and disowned the infinite power of imagination.

Sickness therefore is a self-created experience through which we can take back the infinite power of imagination. We make ourselves sick, albeit unknowingly, and we can un-do what we have done. That is the purpose of all symptoms and all illness, to make us aware of our self-talk, of our self-defeating story, of our abandoned divine nature.

Awakening to the meaning of sickness therefore is one of the tools of enlighten-ment. Let your light shine.