Politics and the Parallels with Personal Health

Nationally, we’ve become too blasé’, too accepting that someone else is the authority and that they’ll watch over our best interests. The majority of us have decided that we’ll take someone else’s word for what’s best, who we should vote for and what we should know and believe.

I talk to lots of people about various subjects and recently the subject of both the national dilemma and personal health have kept coming up. We all have different opinions about the cause and what can be done.

Most people are adamant that something needs to be changed on the national scene, but seem complacent about their own personal health and how they deal with the parts of their personal lives that aren’t working. They think they’re too busy to be involved with politics and personal health, yet strongly feel that others should be more responsible and take the time, no matter what else is in their lives, to be more informed and active in politics. Very often, they have multiple health problems and turn everything over to a health care provider, rather than make any lifestyle or dietary changes on their own.

Personally, I feel these two subjects are parallels. If we allow, want or prefer someone else to be the expert, without question, then we deserve what we get and have no grounds for complaints. If we follow the tribe, meaning we don’t step outside the accepted areas of beliefs, food, what seems the easy path and that we’re more interested in being entertained than in seeking the truth and possible remedies, the end result will always be the same. The end result will be a health crisis and a nation divided on where we should go and how we should get there. We’re in the middle of both crises at this time.

When we want others to take care of us, we should expect to be treated like children. Once we become accustomed to being treated like children, it’s difficult to do otherwise. At the opposite pole, once most people have unchallenged authority, they refuse to give it up.

We all need information that we can’t provide for ourselves. For most of us, it’s virtually impossible to do a blood work up. We don’t have the equipment to do an EKG or many other tests that health care providers can do.

If we give our health care provider knowledgeable and accurate information, they can better determine what tests need to be done. If we have a problem and expect our health care provider to be a mind reader, then the burden and blame is on us. The same is true with politics.

Selecting health care providers, or political representatives because they belong to the same organization we do, and without checking their track record, is a very poor way to select people who will have a direct and lasting impact on our lives.

Generally, those who are having difficulties financially have cars, houses and addictions they can’t afford. If the problem’s from health care bills, it’s likely they didn’t want to take the time to be informed. If the problem is financial due to out of control government spending, we didn’t do our homework concerning who we voted for.

Looking at voting records, we see many of our elected officials are nothing more than a rubber stamp representative. Whatever comes down from above, they put their stamp of approval on. Many are also well schooled in scare tactics. You can tell that by looking at their voting record. The rubber stamp problem crosses all party lines.

We need to do our research, then vote the candidate and not the party. We also need to get second opinions and do some of our own research where our health is concerned.