The Role of Symptoms in Healing

For the most part, symptoms of illness are something most of us would rather live without. In fact, the majority of the North American population supports an allopathic medical system whose primary function is to either alleviate or even better, to completely silence symptoms. In order to get a feeling for how this translates into the real world, one needs to look no further than the name of our drugs: anti-depressants, decongestants and antihistimes- just to name a few. These drugs are allopathic in nature, meaning that the sole purpose of the drug is to “produce effects different from the disease being treated.” So, if we are stuffed up and we take a decongestant to dry up our mucous membranes, we are- in effect -practicing an allopathic approach.
But is this healing? If were to take the logic in this approach and create a metaphor, taking a decongestant to “cure” a common cold is similar in nature to having the check engine light come on in your car and asking your mechanic to simply unplug the light. Would you really feel safe driving the car?