Human Touch

As I thought about it more, I started to think. Really? What is my point in this essay that I am writing? What is this great correlation between human touch, plants, and the five senses...all tied to the "plane tree philosophy" of patient centered care. I mean how do plants and integrative activites like yoga which stimulate the 5 elements of nature in the body correlate and supplement a hospital visit and healing.

Well, first of all my thinking of the whole jazz, was that plants like humans have an exterior and interior anatomy and phyisiology (duh!). But what im saying is that is there is more to this. That maybe we are connected to plants somehow, that maybe when a geriatric cancer patient in the ICU sees a plant or catches a glimpse of a green lively plant, with its vein like stems; they would think and look that their own hands, skin, and veins kind of look like the plants, and can feel some type of hollistic being. I mean this is all still quite a blur to me. For instance, when i talk about the "response theory" in plants, and how some plants wont react to something as strong as a wind gust, but will respond to something as suddle as a rain drop, or another leaflet brushing against eachother. That maybe this can be correlated and can mean something when just touching a patients foot when letting them know you are there, you can get a response. Like plants, that feel of other plants or rain drops nurtures the plant and allows it to grow and feel whole. Patients are like plants, they are planted in a spot, they cannot move and they just wait for their enviroment to stimulate them in some way. That "human touch" could infuse a new power within in a patient, like it does within a plant. It will either attack or respond in a positive growing manner.

Another idea I am dabbling around, is this idea of yoga and other integrative activities that can be incorporated in a healing process. I focus on yoga because my past studies on alternative medicine and the five elements (classical) infuse different aspects of natures inside of us, allowing us to heal mentally and physically. Just as plants very well incorporate everyday the classical five elements in which their enviroment is surrounded by.

This is where my thought process is focused around, I want to produce new information in regards to this. The plane tree model does not in any way shape or form say that plants are what heals patients. Plants in the plane tree model serve a purpose aesthetically, and pyschologically. I want to take this a step further and parallel human systems to plant systems, and really show that yes we do function like plants. And that YES, plants in the hospital enviroment DO stimulate our inner classical five senses and nurture us in the healing process. Ranging from cancer patients to respriatory patients in a hospital.