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Spiritual and physical health are integral parts of individual human health. Individual health, its physical, spiritual and social essence. Spiritual and physical health

No one has any doubts about the fact that for a full existence and performance of its functions, any organism, including humans, needs health. But what is health?
As a rule, this term means physical or mental health, and spiritual health is often ignored. Bypassing this fact, we forget that spirituality underlies it.

Usually a person has a question, the whole essence of which is this: “What is more necessary? Intellectual baggage acquired through life, practical skills or moral state? As a rule, the first and second are simply necessary and do not even exclude each other in and of themselves.

So what is it anyway? Hieromonk Job (Gumerov) answered this frequently asked question approximately as follows: Spiritual health is freedom from spiritual ailments (sinful passions). All ascetic works and literature are aimed at fighting sin, so we can say that all this will be useful and necessary on the path to finding it.”

Throughout the 19th century in our patristic ascetic traditions, hearths leading to high spiritual asceticism and holiness have been preserved. In addition, relatively recently, very revered righteous people lived in Russia, such as John of Kronstadt and Seraphim of Sarov, Theophan the Recluse and Ignatius Brianchaninov, Macarius, Ambrose and Leonid, who were the elders of the Optina Hermitage. Many people came to them, philosophers and writers who were looking for support and spiritual advice.

Kireevsky I.V., a well-known Russian philosopher, wrote: “The focus of thinking on gaining the spiritual health of a believing Christian lies in the fact that it is necessary to collect all the individual particles of the soul into one single and great force, finding in itself something similar to a kind of concentration of being. When our will and mind, feelings and conscience, true, amazing and beautiful, all the resources of our mind form a unity and thereby restore a large part of a person’s personality to primordial indivisibility ... "

Therefore, thinking, which is inspired by faith, has the ability to unite the multiple particles of the human soul into one whole and discover in itself that which thereby recreates the truth of the essence of man in its original form.

From this we can conclude that this is nothing more than personal self-affirmation, based in its basis on the correct understanding and contemplation of one's personality and in presenting its merits in the face of God.

The whole essence of spiritual health lies in the ability to see your true nature and committed sins. The greater the presence of sin in a person, the less he is able to adequately perceive reality and sees less and less his sinfulness, the disease that affects us. After all, a patient who does not know that he is sick does not make an appointment with a doctor.

If the disease is able to sober up and make us wake up from spiritual sleep, allows us to reveal all our sinfulness, then it encourages us to gain this health and find salvation in God, in a way it makes us go to the doctor.

This is the very beginning on the path of correctness, which leads us to spiritual health.


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People who want to overcome sinfulness in themselves choose the spiritual path. On many, when performing this feat, the Divine energy, called grace, descends. What is this energy, how does it interact with a person? Let's try to learn about it from our article.

Spiritual health is the ability to cognize the world around and oneself, analyze ongoing events and phenomena, predict the development of situations that affect life, form a model (program) of behavior aimed at solving emerging problems, protecting one’s interests, life and health in a real environment . The higher the intellect, the more reliable the forecast of events, the more accurate the model of behavior, the more stable the psyche, the higher the level of spiritual health.

Physical health is the ability of the body to implement the developed program of action and reserves in case of unforeseen extreme and emergency situations.

Here is how the unity of spiritual and physical health is said in the book “Building a Powerful Nerve Force” by the American nutritionist Paul Bragg: “The story tells of two knights who killed each other because of the color of the royal shield, which was hung in the center of the huge hall of the castle. One knight said that the shield is red, the other - green. After the tragic battle, someone looked at both sides of the shield: one side was red, the other green. There are also two sides to a health shield - physical and spiritual - and both are important. Both of these sides - physical and spiritual - are so closely intertwined that it is impossible to separate them. Physical health affects the spiritual life, and spiritual control provides the necessary discipline to maintain physical health.

Spiritual health is determined by the system of thinking, knowledge of the surrounding world and orientation in it; how we relate to the environment or to any particular person, thing, field of knowledge, principle. This health is achieved by the ability to live in harmony with oneself, with relatives, friends and society, to predict and model events, to draw up a program of one's actions on this basis.

Physical health is ensured by high physical activity, rational nutrition, hardening and cleansing of the body, the optimal combination of mental and physical labor, the ability to relax, and the exclusion from the use of alcohol, tobacco and drugs. Here is how A. Schopenhauer said about it: “Consequently, first of all, we must try to maintain good health. The means for this are simple: to avoid all excesses, excessive violent and unpleasant unrest, as well as too intense and prolonged mental labor, then increased movement in the fresh air for at least two hours, frequent bathing in cold water, and similar hygienic measures. measures".

public health- these are social, socio-political and economic categories that characterize the viability of the whole society. This health is made up of the health of individual members of society. Public health and individual health of each person are inextricably linked and depend on each other.


REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH IS AN IMPORTANT PART OF HUMAN AND SOCIETY HEALTH

The existence of any kind of living organisms is impossible without the reproduction of their own kind. Man is no exception in this respect. The history of mankind is a continuous change of generations. However, unlike other living beings, a person endowed with reason can manage the reproduction system, ensuring not only the birth, but also the necessary upbringing of offspring, taking into account the social needs of society. Its reproductive function involves not only the birth of a child, but also its upbringing and preparation for the performance of certain duties that ensure the social development of society. This system of population reproduction, which ensures the birth of healthy children, the upbringing and training of a new generation, is the main content of reproductive health.

The state of reproductive health of a person and society is determined by the following criteria:

Sustainable motivation of people to create a prosperous family and the attractiveness for them of the personal model of an exemplary family man;

Responsibility of parents and the state for the state of health; physical, mental, spiritual and moral development of children; for children to receive the necessary education;

Ensuring the reproduction of the population within the limits that guarantee the demographic security of the state.

These criteria fully characterize the ability of society and the state to create and implement the necessary conditions for the birth of healthy children and the preparation of a new generation capable of ensuring social security and the development of civilization.

Historical experience shows that the best social structure that most fully meets the interests of the individual and society and ensures the continuous change of generations is the family.

A family is understood as a small social group based on marriage or consanguinity, whose members are connected by common life, mutual assistance, moral and legal responsibility.

In modern society, the family is a moral and legal union of a man and a woman and consists of spouses and children. The forms of formation of married couples and the nature of the relationship of spouses are subject to certain social and cultural norms that are developed by society in the course of historical development. Norms are largely influenced by the social structure and the characteristics of a particular historical stage in the development of society.

In the Russian Federation, on March 1, 1996, the Family Code of the Russian Federation was enacted. Its content is based on the principles of strengthening the family, building family relations on mutual love and respect, on the responsibility to the family of all its members, on the inadmissibility of arbitrary interference by anyone in family affairs, on the unhindered exercise by family members of their rights.

The family performs functions that largely determine the preservation and strengthening of the health of both the individual and the whole society. Only in the family does a person receive sustainable opportunities to meet daily needs and develop his personality. The family most successfully performs the reproductive function: the birth and upbringing of children. It is in it that parents introduce their children to moral values ​​and norms of behavior in the world around them, in society, interaction with other people, here they pass on work skills to them. In the family, the leisure function is solved, which ensures the harmonious development of a person, and the sexual function, which ensures the satisfaction of the sexual needs of the spouses.

A high level of reproductive health implies that a person has a stable motivation to create a prosperous family and the attractiveness of the personal model of a good family man, as well as the ability to choose a worthy life partner with whom he can create a happy family.

Unfortunately, the analysis of statistical data and the results of surveys of young people in Russia indicates that in recent years the family and family relations have been drastically losing their attractiveness. In our country, there is a growing number of children who live and are brought up in single-parent families or were born to women who are not in a registered marriage. The importance and value of a happy family life is decreasing. Among young people, the proportion of those who do not consider it necessary for themselves to legally formalize their marital relations when creating a future family is noticeably increasing. From this we can conclude that the level of an important component of human health and society - reproductive health has recently decreased significantly, and this process continues.

The family, as the most important social cell of society and the state, performing a reproductive function, must ensure the upbringing and development of the child's physical, spiritual and moral qualities of a person and citizen, integrated into contemporary society and aimed at improving this society. The quality of the performance of this function can be estimated with a certain degree of reliability using statistical data. According to the Ministry of Health of Russia and the State Committee for Epidemiological Supervision of Russia, only 14% of school-age children are practically healthy, 50% have functional abnormalities, and 35–40% are chronically ill. Among schoolchildren, during the period of study, the number of children and adolescents with visual impairments increases 5 times, 3 times - with diseases of the digestive system and urogenital tract, 5 times - with impaired posture, 4 times - with neuropsychiatric disorders. Many students have disharmonious physical development (lack of body weight, decrease in muscle strength, lung capacity, etc.), which creates problems with the overall performance of the younger generation. On the other hand, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, juvenile delinquency is growing rapidly. In general, among all identified persons who have committed crimes, the proportion of adolescents aged 14–17 is 11.8%. Statistical materials also testify to the rapid growth of alcoholism and substance abuse among adolescents.

Many states consider the demographic potential as the main guarantee of survival in the face of global and regional rivalry and the struggle for existence. The best minds of Russia also linked the future with the growth of its population. So D. I. Mendeleev, based on the demographic indicators of the beginning of the 20th century, determined the probable population of Russia in 2000 at 594.3 million people. However, the revolution of 1917, the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945, the collapse of the USSR and some other processes made significant adjustments to this forecast.

As of 2001, the population of Russia amounted to 144.8 million people and continues to decline. The main reason for this is the natural population decline, which is the excess of the number of deaths and deaths over the number of births. The main factor determining this process is the low life expectancy of the Russian population. It is 59.8 years for men and 72.2 years for women and, according to long-term forecasts, it will remain close to this level for quite a long time.

FACTORS AFFECTING HEALTH AND WELL-BEING

Among the factors affecting human health, the leading place is occupied by physical, spiritual and social.

From physical factors the most important are heredity and the state of the environment. Studies show a significant influence of heredity on almost all aspects of our physical and mental health (the degree of their influence on health can be up to 20%). The state of the environment has a direct impact on health. Even the healthiest living habits cannot fully compensate for exposure to polluted air or water. The degree of influence of the environment on human health can also be up to 20%. Polluted air can contain harmful substances that enter the human body through the respiratory system. Poor-quality water may contain pathogenic microorganisms and toxic compounds, which, getting into the gastrointestinal tract, cause various diseases and poisoning.

In addition, under the influence of a polluted environment, gene changes (mutations) can occur in living organisms. Changing genes under the influence of the environment - mutagenesis constantly occurs in every organism, but in conditions of increasing environmental pollution, it goes out of control of natural mechanisms. Substances and factors that cause changes in genes are called mutagens. Ionizing and ultraviolet radiation, various natural and artificial chemical compounds have a mutagenic effect. When entering the human body, mutagens can cause the development of malignant tumors, the appearance of deformities, etc. All mutagens are usually divided into chemical, physical, and radiation. Once in the body, the mutagen is affected by many substances: food components, hormones, metabolic products, enzymes. Some of them enhance its effect, while others reduce and even stop.

Recently, substances have been actively studied (antimutagens), that can stop the harmful effects of mutagens. Some of them make mutagens inactive, others change the effect of mutagens so that they become harmless, and others strengthen the system for countering mutagens. The most active antimutagens are vitamins: retinol (vitamin A), tocopherol (vitamin E), ascorbic acid (vitamin C).

Vitamin A is found in animal products (butter, egg yolk, liver). Vitamin A is not found in plant foods. However, many of them (carrots, spinach, lettuce, parsley, apricot, etc.) contain carotene, which is a provitamin A. In the body, carotene turns into vitamin A, ensures normal growth, the formation of visual pigments that regulate the dark adaptation of the eye, normalizes metabolic processes in skin, liver tissues, eyes.

Vitamin E is found in the green parts of plants, especially young cereal sprouts. Vegetable oils are rich in this vitamin: sunflower, cottonseed, corn, peanut, soybean. Vitamin E plays the role of a biological antioxidant, it prevents the development of the processes of formation of free radicals toxic to the body and normalizes the metabolism in muscle tissue.

There is a lot of vitamin C in plant products: rose hips, cabbage, lemons, oranges, black currants, other fruits and berries. Vitamin C is involved in redox processes, blood clotting, carbohydrate metabolism and tissue regeneration.

A healthy lifestyle, rational nutrition, complex consumption of foods containing vitamins A, E and C reduce the impact of mutagens on the body and, therefore, help maintain health in a polluted environment. Vitamins are absorbed most fully if they are consumed in combination. It must be borne in mind that artificially created preparations are not always better than natural multivitamin sets contained in products. The most available plant products containing vitamins A, E and C are presented in table 8.

We very often hear the words “Orthodoxy”, “spirituality”. And what do they mean? We use many concepts that do not have a clear “image” in our minds. For example, we are talking about God. Who is he? We're talking about religion and sin. What it is? What is the “spiritual health of the nation”? And why are we interested in this question? Shouldn't bodily health be primary? Even in ancient times they said: "A healthy mind in a healthy body." And suddenly now we are putting forward, it seems, something completely different in the first place.

Not so long ago I read a very interesting fairy tale written by a little "little man", four-year-old Danilka from Petrozavodsk.

A magical tree grew in the forest. There was a hollow in the tree, where the ants lived very well: it was warm, the wind did not blow there, no one interfered with them. One day an owl came. She ate some ants, dispersed others and began to live in a hollow. But one day the owl heard a knock. The bird leaned out of the "burrow", looked to the right, to the left: it did not find anyone. She calmed down and dived into the hollow. But the knock came again. The owl jumped out of the "mink". There is not anyone. There was another knock. Little Danilka wrote: “The owl's heart began to beat, it said: “Owl, why did you eat the ants? Why did you disperse them?”.

The boy made a startling conclusion, which, it seems to me, any psychologist and any philosopher can bow to: the owl was evil, but she had a good heart. This thought of little Danilka leads to important reflections.

If we look at our lives, we will be amazed at many things. Now they say that Russia is in a crisis: one, the other, the third. I want to reassure you: do not think that this situation is only in our country. Nothing like this! Let's be calm in this regard. The whole world is in crisis. And it is still unknown at what point on the globe it has greater power.

We pay attention to “external” crises, material ones: psychological, economic, demographic, etc. Sometimes people draw wrong conclusions, arguing that a person’s spiritual health determines his external well-being and the more “spiritual” a person is, the more outwardly he is “prosperous” . We often hear: "God punished man for sins." Therefore, if everything is fine with me, I am healthy and things are flourishing, then I am almost holy. Is it so? Is this the dependence and interrelationship of these two principles? No.

In Russia, difficulties of an external order prevail, while in the West the comfort of life “reigns” – a fact known to all. During a trip to Austria, we Russians were amazed by the beauty of Vienna. Museum city. How calm people are, what wonderful cafes. Cultural life. What else is needed? People often ask me: “Aleksei Ilyich, in the West there are such good relations between people, calmness, but what about such discord in Russia?!” Constantly being in such conditions, in a wonderful warm water, a person does not want to leave it. So he never comes out. “Quietly and gently rocking, let's forget the sea, friends!” The whole meaning of life remains here, in the “warm water”. The person withdraws from reality. But she, whether we like it or not, stands before every person. No matter how we close ourselves from reality, burying our heads in the sand like ostriches in the face of danger, we will not get away from it anywhere. In "warm water" a person does not want to think about the future. And he doesn't think. I want to tell you how one of the prominent religious figures was buried. He was a Calvinist by conviction. When he passed away, many high, high religious leaders came to pay the last tribute to the man. The ceremony was extremely “interesting”. Everyone gathered in the Calvinist cathedral. They put up a portrait of the deceased, in front of which the prescribed speeches were spoken. Meanwhile, the hearse with the body of the deceased drove up and was driven into the farthest corner of the cathedral square, so that no one could see or even pay attention to where it was. So the ceremony passed, a procedural-civil or civil-religious memorial service, after which everyone went in his own direction. Only a small handful of the closest relatives went to the hearse to "see off" the deceased on his last journey.

In this comfort of life, a person completely forgets that he is a creature, not eternal on earth, mortal, that he must think about the meaning of life, about the question “Why am I living?” After all, everything goes on as usual, irreversibly, in one direction. But we do not even hear who died where. The comfort of external life, to which man so strives, has a treacherous quality.

Today we are faced with such questions, facts, events, from which we sometimes shudder.

Look at the challenges we face in the third millennium. It turns out that the one who is stronger can do anything: destroy any state, and defeat any people.

It is no coincidence that V.Ya. Propp once said: "The history of mankind is filled with blood." But after all, humanity and each person individually strives for happiness, comfort, well-being. An interesting question arises: so what happens? Where does this amazing paradox come from? We all together want peace on earth, justice, happiness. So that people respect each other, help, love. I want to be treated well, but I do not understand that I should treat others in this way. But what do we see? What is history filled with?

When, after the Renaissance, the era of humanism came, when they proclaimed: man is God to man, of course, they did not doubt that in a hundred years, well, in two hundred, three hundred and there’s nothing to say, paradise will come on Earth. What does history say? My God! The world is dominated by wars: the Thirty Years' War, the Hundred Years' War, beyond the war, and finally, the 20th century, which was viewed as the pinnacle of human well-being, is flooded with blood - history has never known such a number of victims.

The great misunderstanding lies somewhere in the “middle” of man. He thinks: I can do good for myself at the expense of the blood and suffering of other people. Remember, in Dostoevsky, Ivan Karamazov talks about a boy hunted by dogs? The author asks readers: “Is it possible to build well-being even on a drop of innocent children's blood?” - Not.

The spiritual is the most valuable thing in a person, says religion. What does “spiritual”, “spirituality” mean?

It used to be thought that there are many gods, that they are like us, filled with all the passions inherent in people. Our world is Space, it is Beauty. It is he. This is the mind. This is God.

In theology, there are two approaches to describing God. One of them says that God is a being about which, unfortunately, we cannot say anything in essence, because all our words and concepts are borrowed from the three- or four-dimensional world in which we live. Therefore, whatever we say about God, words will be an extreme limitation, almost a distortion of God. God, ultimately, is a concept that defines a certain ideal that really exists - I emphasize - the ideal of human perfection.

The whole history of mankind says that this ideal is God. He is spirit. How to understand "spirit"? Here we can draw the following analogy ... The law of gravity - where is it? Nobody will say? Are we in the law of gravity? Or is it in us? Do we know what it is? We perfectly understand its effect when we fall and get a bump on our forehead. We do not see the law, but we hurt ourselves when we act against it. In the earthly reality of the law of gravity there is a certain nature of our being.

One of the great saints said: "God exists and is called the nature of everything that exists." We call spiritual reality God, a person. But the personal being is at the same time spiritual, not material. God is not in any constellation. He, like the law of gravity, penetrates everything. Everything is in Him. We are in Him.

And here is the greatest discovery that the history of mankind did not know. Christianity discovered something that is still hard to accept. God is love, and only love. God does not take revenge on anyone, does no harm to anyone, does not get angry in order to cause suffering to a person. No. Everything in the world takes place in full accordance with the inner state of man. Man is a god-like being, and he, if you like, can create his destiny by this correspondence or non-correspondence to God. Hence the striking conclusion: the basic law of being, the main engine of human life, must be love. Love is not a physical reality, not a chemical, not a biological one - it is a spiritual reality. This is very important to realize. It turns out that those who act contrary to this law punish themselves.

It’s good to say: “We love each other,” but someone pushed in the side, and love disappeared. It turns out that we love those who love us, we can't stand those who can't stand us.

When a person does evil to another, he commits an act that is equivalent to Newton's third law: action is equal to reaction. The more I bang my head against the wall, the more I hurt myself, not the wall.

When a scientist discovers this or that law, rejoicing begins in the world, he is awarded prestigious awards. He discovered the law. What an achievement. But the fact is that, knowing the law, we can do the right thing, we can not harm ourselves and benefit others.

To some, the love of a person for a person will seem unfair. I will say this: justice is one of the forms of love of a person for a person.

Where the basic law is not respected, suffering begins. Orthodoxy says that man, as a creature created in the image and likeness of God, has a good heart, even when he does evil. In every soul, in every heart, the flame of love burns. It is important to see it in other people.. (Recall the tale of little Danilka.) Orthodoxy calls for this Good not to be extinguished, not to be littered, but, on the contrary, to be developed.

Love is not falling in love that people experience, and after a month they share the last plastic bag. Love is a property, like the property of taste, for example. It can be destroyed, but it can be developed. All the properties that a person possesses are not accidental, they are capable of giving pleasure. The pressure of feelings is an amazing blessing. Imagine what happens to a music lover when he listens to music - step back and do not interfere with him! The person gets pleasure.

So, like all properties, love can be tamed, or it can be revealed in its entirety.

Man has several levels of being. The first two are elementary, in which it is similar to animals: physical and biological. The psychological (third) level sharply distinguishes a person from the animal world - this is the ability for aesthetic feeling and experience. Tell me, what's the use if a person is physically healthy, but mentally abnormal? Alas, there is no man. Above the psychological is the moral level. What is the use if a person is physically healthy, but he is a scoundrel. God save him from him. And there is an even higher level that determines the dignity of a person - spiritual, when the soul strives for the sacred, for truth, for goodness. Aspirations, searches of a person determine his spiritual state. Orthodoxy indicates the way by which people can fulfill their aspirations. It is important not to forget that spirituality and morality are two different things.

External behavior, the nature of the relationship to people, to business, to the law - we call all this “morality”. The person behaves impeccably, he is a wonderful family man, he will never answer with a rude word, he is a deeply moral person. However, this wonderful person can at the same time burn with a thirst for fame, a thirst for wealth, can envy and turn green from what is good for other people.

Spirituality is an internal state of the soul that changes, depends on our will, on the mind, on the worldview. Spirituality is hidden from the outside eye. This is what is happening in me or can be happening. Something that, as a result, can turn me into a completely different being.

Spirituality is the ultimate, not an intermediate goal of life, something that a person strives for. The spirit creates its own form. My life, the life of society, the people is determined by the spiritual state, the degree of presence of what we call "true human love." Christianity tells how to cultivate love in oneself.

There is a whole science. It is called loudly, sometimes this word makes people shudder when it sounds, it becomes a little scary and a little uneasy. Indeed, her name is harsh - asceticism. How scary! Everyone thinks that asceticism is not eating, not drinking, not getting married, and generally walking with your eyes down on the ground. And asceticism is simply the science of the correct human life, the center of which is attention to the spiritual side of existence.

"Askeo" means "I exercise." Asceticism is an “exercise”, a “fight” within a person, thanks to which an amazing process of cleansing the soul from “abnormal” emotions, feelings, thoughts takes place, which we don’t even share with each other, because sometimes these are nasty things. Orthodoxy insists on the purity of the soul.

By the way, I must say right away that asceticism is a science proven by more than two thousand years of experience. And before Christianity, there were people who already knew how to bring up a great and holy property - love. It turns out that it is impossible to acquire love for a person who is filled with what religion calls "passions."

One of the great saints of the Orthodox Church said that by the world one must understand not human society in itself, but the totality of passions by which human society and man live.

It is very well written about people living by passions: be careful not to destroy each other. Where did war come from in the history of mankind? Where are the quarrels from? Where are the murders from? Where is the theft from? Is it not from the passions that are at war in our soul? When greed is being promoted on television, you should not hope that there will be a place for love. When I envy, what kind of love can we talk about? When I pretend, I lie, I am filled with the desire for fame, wealth and other things, do not expect love from me. We are destroying that most holy and pure feeling that makes a man a man.

The Church and the Gospel teach: one who does not struggle with "evil" feelings - envy, condemnation - will never be able to acquire a feeling of love that will spread to all people equally. The gospel says: love even your enemies. It is necessary, as far as strength allows, to treat enemies with generosity, and if possible, with love. When I love, I am happy. When I hate, I, it is I, suffer. It turns out that the path to acquiring love as a property lies through the decision to live as it should be for a truly holy person, i.e. without causing harm to anyone, without holding evil in oneself, through a struggle with oneself. A German poet of the 17th century wrote: “The battle with oneself is the most difficult battle, victory from victories is victory over oneself. Spirituality is acquired by inner struggle.” Not only Christianity, but I am sure that all religions pay attention to what our human life comes from, what it can really be filled with, what is its content. Religion is aimed at the existence of man, at the soul, heart.

Christianity asserts that human activity and creativity are ultimately determined by the spiritual state. See how lovers behave. They are “winged”, they see all the beauty of the world. Pay attention to a person in anger, annoyed, a person who is gloomy in spirit.

The health of the nation is, first of all, spiritual health. Without a struggle with passions, abominations, without the purity of the soul, there can be no talk of any health. Christianity offers the "means" of purification of love - this is the Church, prayer, Sacrament.

Today, all the forces of the soul are directed only to the outer side of life. We forgot about the most important thing: the soul. What makes a person happy? Is it just external things? A priest told me about a billionaire who committed suicide. I was shocked. You think: well, external blessings make a person happy. It turns out not. In such cases, one wonders where the root, the center, from which the source of human happiness can clog.

I want to end with a wonderful poem by an English poet:

The night looks with thousands of eyes
And the day looks like one.
But there is no sun, and on the ground
Darkness creeps like smoke.
The mind looks with thousands of eyes,
Love looks at one.
But there is no love, and life goes out,
And the days go by like smoke.








Spiritual health of a person, depending on the degree of satisfaction from the activities carried out in society, forms the emotional health of a person, by imprinting through the prism of experiences, a certain level of anxiety, and as a consequence of the level of self-esteem of the individual and the degree of socialization of this individual in this society. Emotions received by a person, both positive and negative, affect the psychological state of a person. With the predominance of negative aspects, they directly affect human health. Based on this, one should clearly highlight the dependence of physical and spiritual health in the complex. Thus, emotions and human health are an inextricable link between emotion + health.





In the system of spiritual health as the basis for the general health of a person, Orthodoxy assigns a central place peace of mind- a calm, blessed state of mind. Peace and harmony in the soul, peace of mind, peace of mind and peace, the harmony of the soul leads to the harmony of the body, while mental anxiety leads to many diseases. Mental storms and passions, constant evil, hatred, envy, anxiety, destroy the spiritual world, lead to a nervous strain, the inner world of a person - a sinner is full of arbitrariness, disorder and destruction.


All human misfortunes begin when he loses his life force. Luck, health and the state of happiness depend on the amount of spiritual power in a person. The more global and greater meaning his life has, the more spiritual power a person receives. The lowest is aimless vegetative existence. In second place is the service of worldly selfish interests. On the third - life for the sake of something or someone. On the fourth - life for perfection. At the highest level - perfection to help and save people, to lead the Higher Divine Power into the world. Man himself, narrowing himself down to a carnal existence, narrows his possibilities of perceiving the Divine Power. Passive life, going with the flow, acting along the line of least resistance, indulging in laziness weakens the vital force, resulting in diseases. Each action, in which effort and extra effort is invested, directed at the Spiritual goal, develops such a great strength in a person that he can live in unbearable conditions and remain alive and healthy. Passivity and retreat from difficulties on the spiritual path leads a person to retreat from health and vitality. External factors for lowering energy leading to illness can be stress, accompanied by a large release of emotional strength, hypothermia, excessive stress (in pursuit of results), clogging oneself with heavy food, alcohol.



But, recognizing the existence spiritual health, science is not yet ready to give accurate answers to many questions and, in particular, to offer criteria for evaluating this particular, perhaps the most important, component of human health.





It has become fashionable to talk about the problem of health everywhere: in the media, on television, in educational institutions. Many really understand and accept such a value, but what is traditionally invested in this concept - health or, as they say today, individual human health? What is his physical and spiritual essence? It is worth understanding whether we generally define the concept of “individual health” for ourselves correctly.

Public and individual health. What is the difference?

The concept of public health is quite broad and includes the concept of the well-being and well-being of society. The state of the psychological climate of the society depends on what indicator the index of the health of the society has. Among the people, one can sometimes hear the definitions of “sick society”, “infected society”, “unfavorable climate of the team” - these phrases directly reflect the state and problems of the functioning of a certain team or part of it, but not an individual member of this team. The concept of individual health is distinguished by concretization and substantive attribution to a particular person, it has several components, primarily such as spiritual and physical health.

Without taking into account all the components, the concept will be incomplete. In connection with the concept, it is characterized as a positive state of the individual personality, which is in harmony between all the components of the concept of individual health: its physical, spiritual and social essence.

Physical well-being, its place in a comprehensive health system

The emotional comfort of a person directly depends on the physical comfort. The concept of physical health, in a narrow sense, means the absence of diseases and somatic disorders of the body. In a broader sense, physical health is ensured by motor tone, rational nutrition, hardening and cleansing of the body, a combination of mental and physical labor with the ability to relax, and exclusion from the use of various psychoactive substances.

A person may not have a history of diseases, pathologies of systems and organs, but the overall tone of the body is significantly reduced, sleep is disturbed, and mental activity is unproductive. This, first of all, indicates that the physical and spiritual health of a person is in disharmony, which will gradually lead to the emergence of psychosomatic complications and subsequently to diseases already at the physical level.

Factors affecting the physical health of the individual

It is believed that the state of physical health of a person directly depends on the factor of heredity. Genetic predisposition to certain diseases leads to the constitutional weakening of specific organs, which over time becomes the cause of the development of pathologies. The next, no less important factor is a person's lifestyle, the presence of bad habits, the level of awareness of factors that are harmful to human health. A person provokes many diseases in himself, neglecting the rules of a healthy lifestyle and succumbing to temptations and temptations. In this regard, there is a clear connection between the concepts of spiritual and physical health.

Spiritual health of a person

The concept of the spiritual component of individual health is commonly understood as the ability of a person to cope with difficult circumstances of life, while maintaining an adequate model of behavior and an optimal emotional background. Spiritual health is provided by the process of thinking, knowledge of the surrounding world and the correct orientation in it. A person can achieve perfection of spiritual health:

  • having learned to live in harmony with oneself and with the surrounding world at the same time;
  • having learned to predict and simulate life situations;
  • shaping their own response style.

Spiritual and physical health of a person, being in close relationship, jointly affect the indicator of general well-being: a disorder of spiritual health entails a deterioration in physical indicators and vice versa.

Factors that form the spiritual component of human health

Not everyone is given to understand what it is and follow it: many, knowing the rules, nevertheless prefer to live without rules. Therefore, the first and main factor influencing spiritual health is the attitude towards a healthy lifestyle. A person tends to repeat those types of behavior that bring pleasure, so it can be quite difficult to give up certain eating habits, harmful stereotypes. Naturally, the choice in favor of a healthy lifestyle requires a high level of understanding and interest and directly depends on the individual lifestyle.

An equally important factor in choosing a lifestyle is the environment, which demonstrates different models of existence and forms stable stereotypes of behavior among individual members. The environment, as you know, directly affects individual health, its physical and spiritual essence depends on the level of motivation to follow the rules of a healthy lifestyle.

or the ability to live in society

The term refers to the ability of a person to adapt to natural and social environments. It is achieved by the ability to anticipate the occurrence of threatening and non-standard situations, assess their possible consequences, make an informed decision and act in accordance with one's capabilities. The concept of social adaptation includes the complete adaptation of a person to the conditions of the team. The physical, social and spiritual health of each member of society constitutes the general social well-being of the collective. In a healthy society, non-standard situations occur much less frequently and are, as a rule, of a natural nature.

Factors affecting social health

An important social factor is the state of the environment in which a person lives. Pollution of natural resources leads to an increase in the stress background of the body, physical disorders in the human condition, and a decrease in the emotional background. An equally important factor is the availability of quality medical care, which significantly reduces the risk of occurrence and complications in people. Against this background, the level of physical well-being, emotional stress significantly increases or decreases, the spiritual component of health suffers. Spiritual and physical health, together with social health, constitutes the individual health of the individual. At the same time, all three components are equally significant and complementary.

Health as the main value

Understanding and awareness of health as the main value in the modern world is not given to everyone. Most often, a person brings to the fore career, material wealth, prestige in society, forgetting about health and inner harmony. Only having lost health, people begin to understand its value, but it is not easy, and sometimes impossible, to return the lost.

The modern parable of the rich man tells how a young businessman amassed a huge fortune and lived only for profit and money. One day the Angel of Death came for him and told him to get ready. The businessman asked to give him some time, because he did not have time for the main thing in life, but the Angel was inexorable. Then the young man decided to buy some time and offered a million, then two, then his entire fortune for a few days of life. It was not possible to buy life, since money has no value; a successful businessman went after the Angel without completing the main thing in his life. Individual health, its physical, spiritual and social essence are in harmony when a person correctly sets priorities and follows them.

Is a harmoniously developed personality a guarantee of health?

Given that the three components of individual health interact and complement each other, it can be argued that internal and external harmony will be the key to human health. The individual health of a person, his physical and spiritual essence cannot be perfect without social well-being, in turn, a person with a disturbed physical or spiritual beginning cannot be socially adapted. Healthy nutrition, emotional comfort, positive mental attitude, correct prioritization are the key to a harmoniously developed personality with perfect physical, spiritual, and social health. Such a person is hard to find now. But it is in your hands to become one.