40 years ago, I ran away from her. ——The origin of 'body dialogue' that even made gallstones disappear.

A moment ago, I tried to write something a bit too polished, but I stopped. It is 9:00 PM. In the silence after watching a movie, a memory I could not possibly gloss over came flooding back.

Forty years ago, on a bed in a geriatric hospital. There was a woman with a paralyzed body who could barely move on her own, desperately trying to pull out the feeding tube inserted through her nose. With her hand bent near her face, she grabbed the tube with all the strength she could muster. We would hold her down with several people and repeatedly reinsert the tube. With almost no visitors, she had no choice but to spend her days in bed, not even allowed to die...

At the time, I could not even look directly at her unless I viewed her situation as 'someone else's problem.' If I hadn't done that, I felt like my heart would have broken, making it impossible to protect my own life or even show up for work the next day.

I am by no means a 'good person.' I was just scared. How could I ever come to terms with myself if I ended up in such a sad situation? Even 40 years later, the sound of us holding her down and her gaze still remain within me, without me having found an answer.

Many long years have passed since then, and many things have happened to me as well. However, I feel that I have become more capable of understanding human suffering than I used to be.

Now, I teach 'how to have a dialogue with the body.' It started when I was told that my own gallstone condition meant there was 'no guarantee for my life.' I hated the idea of surgery, so I desperately tried to 'crush the gallstones' in my imagination. And then, as if responding to me, my body made the gallstones disappear.

Since then, I began to speak to my body. The body is not merely a 'vessel for the soul.' It is a one-of-a-kind existence that has been with me since I was born, letting me know things through its ailments, and supporting me. When I was able to think that way, I felt I could finally accept that female patient, if only a little.

I am still the same 'earthy person' I was back then. Like a mountain hag, I shut myself away in my house, always looking inward and living desperately. But precisely because of that, I have come to understand the 'cries of life' that are not just pretty words.

My course is one answer I have arrived at, having seen those 'depths of despair.' You are suffering because you are 'alive.' Why don't you try talking to your body again, honestly? Your body knows many things. It will surely show them to you.