Page 13 - All India Magazine May-2020

Fear and Illness
Can one get ill through fear?

Yes. I knew someone who was so full of fear that he got
cholera! There was cholera in the next house and he got so
frightened that he caught the illness and without any other
reason, there was no other reason for his catching it: it was
through sheer fright. And it is a very common thing; in an
epidemic, it is so in the majority of cases. It is through fear
that the door is opened and you catch the illness. Those
who have no fear can go about freely and generally they
catch nothing. But still as I have said there, you may have
1
no fear in the mind, you may have no fear even in the vital,
but who has no fear in the body?... Very few.
A strict discipline is needed to cure the body of fear. The
cells themselves tremble. It is only by discipline, by yoga
that one can overcome this fear. But it is a fact that one can
catch anything through fear, even invite an accident. And,
you see, from a certain point of view everything is conta-
gious. I knew a person who got a wound through the kind
of fear that he felt seeing someone else’s wound. He really
got it.

What is the difference between mental, vital and physi-
cal fear?

If you are conscious of the movement of your mind, the
movement of your vital and the movement of your physical,
you know it.
As for the mental, it is very simple: thoughts come. You
begin thinking, for example, there is this illness and this ill-
ness is very contagious, perhaps you are going to catch it,
and if you catch it, it is going to be a terrible affair and what

All India Magazine, May 2020 13