author: Dr. Jeff Styba
I remembered back in 2001, It was after a hockey game, I came out of the locker room to meet my parents, and out of seemingly nowhere, my mom says, “you should become a chiropractor!” I simply said, “ok, what did you think of the game.” We never spoke of it again for months.
The following Monday, as I was walking out of the science building at Concordia College in Moorhead MN, I noticed a sign that read, “Pre-Chiropractic Students Wanted.”
At the time I was studying pre-med. However, something inside urged my conscious brain to call the number and inquire. I wrote the number down and called the next day. It was the chiropractic office of Dr. Jason and Stacy Roth. He told me to come to his office and have a talk.
Now at this point in my life, I had never been to a chiropractor and had zero context into what chiropractic was. We had a short conversation, and as I left, he handed me a set of 12 tapes. (If you were born in the ’90s or after, you likely have never seen a cassette tape). Dr. Roth said to come back and visit if I enjoyed what I had heard on these tapes.
I put the tapes in that evening one after another and listened for 12 hours of Dr. James Sigafoose preach about vitalism, innate intelligence, above-down-inside-out, BJ Palmer, and the masses of people who were miraculously saved where medicine had failed.
Even Dr. Mayo, the founder of the famous Mayo Clinic had sent his wife to BJ Palmer to get well when medicine failed her. To say my world view had transformed is an understatement.
From that moment on my belief became vitalistic, meaning that the body is not merely a sum of the parts, our body is one unit, designed to heal itself and all we need to do is give our body the support it requires, remove whatever interference there is, and wall-ah..healed! Of course, after this massive paradigm shift, my destiny was now to become a chiropractor/natural medicine doctor and teach the planet all things vitalistic!
Let me frame this conversation to ensure that you have the proper perspective moving forward deciding your world view. Unless two people share the same world view (vitalistic vs. mechanistic), it will be virtually impossible for them to agree with a concept. Think about the topic of vaccines.
The topic of vaccines is such a polarizing topic because our world view determines our stance. If you are mechanistic, you believe the body requires help, and you will be on the side of pro-vaccine. Someone with a vitalistic worldview will find themselves on the side of anti-vaccine generally speaking. Debating this topic with someone of a different worldview will only lead to emotional tension.
Let’s break it down even further:
Mechanistic:
The body is the sum of the parts.
If an organ is diseased, we can cut it out without much consequence to the rest of the body.
Experiencing symptoms is a reflection of a problem that must be dealt with pharmaceutically.
A fever means you are sick
If an organ is diseased, we look at the organ as the problem and treat the symptoms for life.
The body requires outside-in intervention to restore health.
Vitalistic:
The body functions as one unit; every process effects another.
If an organ is diseased, we look for the cause of the problem and fix that.
Symptoms are the body’s way of expressing health.
A fever is killing bacteria/virus/pathogens and is an incredibly healthy response.
If an organ is diseased, we look to the pathway and signaling of life from the brain, down the spinal cord, and through the nerves for physical interference that requires removal so that the body can heal.
The body is created with an innate intelligence to heal, and we must only support this intelligence.
The more I studied and lived this vitalistic philosophy of life, the more empowered I became. Once graduating chiropractic college and starting my practice, my entire method was based on this vitalistic philosophy, and once my patients understood and began living inside a vitalistic model they became empowered as well!
The cascade effect has been of biblical proportion for my family’s life as well as the lives of hundreds of thousands of people since beginning this journey.
Essential oils and plant-based medicine fit right into vitalism because we are not using any of these oils to treat a symptom. We are using them because essential oil molecules support the natural healing process that has been built into our body the day we were created.
Once we understand this philosophy, the why behind using essential oils changes from a mechanistic philosophy to one of vitalism!
To Vitalism,
Dr. Jeff and Megan Styba