You can't afford to get sick, and you can't depend on the present

In the voice of Andrew Weil, a healer of both body and spirit, we hear an ancient truth clothed in modern words: “You can’t afford to get sick, and you can’t depend on the present health care system to keep you well. It’s up to you to protect and maintain your body’s innate capacity for health and healing by making the right choices in how you live.” These words are not the warning of despair, but the call of awakening — a reminder that the power of life and vitality does not lie in the hands of others, but within the sacred vessel of our own being. It is a truth as old as the dawn: health begins not in the physician’s hand, but in the discipline of the soul.

In the days of the ancients, men and women did not separate the body, the mind, and the spirit. To them, these were but three strings upon the same lyre, each vibrating in harmony when life was rightly lived. The sages of India spoke of prana, the vital energy that flows through all living things, nourished by balance and moderation. The Greeks spoke of sophrosyne, the virtue of self-restraint that kept both body and desire in check. In these old teachings lies the same wisdom that Andrew Weil revives — that well-being is a practice, not a product; a way of living, not a thing to be bought.

When Weil warns that we “cannot depend on the present health care system,” he speaks not in anger but in truth. The modern world has built great temples of medicine, filled with wondrous machines and learned healers. Yet, even amidst these marvels, the human body grows weaker — not from lack of treatment, but from the neglect of prevention. Too often, we turn to medicine only when we have already fallen, forgetting that the wiser path is to live so that we do not fall at all. The truest physician is the one who teaches you how not to need him — and the truest healing is the harmony you maintain each day through your own choices.

There is an old story of the Yellow Emperor of China, who once asked his healer, “Why do some physicians treat disease only after it arises, while others keep their patients from falling ill at all?” The healer replied, “The superior physician prevents sickness before it begins. The inferior waits until the body is broken.” This wisdom, preserved for thousands of years, is the very heart of Weil’s message. The innate capacity for healing lies within us — in our cells, our breath, our will. To neglect it is to abandon our inheritance. To honor it is to awaken the divine design of life itself.

In this age of haste and indulgence, many have forgotten the simple disciplines that guard vitality: the strength of movement, the calm of rest, the purity of food, the clarity of thought. We poison the body with excess and expect miracles of medicine to save us. But the body, noble and patient as it is, cannot bear endless abuse. It whispers warnings before it screams. It begs for care before it breaks. Weil’s words are the call to listen — to treat the body not as a machine to be repaired, but as a temple to be maintained through reverence and wisdom.

Let the lesson be clear: the power to be well lies not in hospitals, nor in governments, but in you. In the choices you make each dawn — what you eat, how you breathe, how you rest, and how you think. Choose foods that nourish, not merely fill. Seek the sun and the soil as your allies. Move your body as the ancients did — walking, stretching, laboring with purpose. And let your heart be at peace, for a mind at war breeds sickness faster than any plague. The body heals best in the presence of joy.

Remember this: to live well is to heal daily. No medicine is stronger than a life lived in balance, no cure deeper than the harmony between soul and flesh. As Andrew Weil teaches, do not wait for illness to awaken wisdom. Cultivate it now, in the quiet hours, in the humble choices, in the moments when no one watches. For health is not a gift to be given — it is a mastery to be earned.

So, my listener, take these words as a covenant between you and your body: to honor its needs, to heed its warnings, and to guard its strength as a sacred trust. For in caring for your body, you are caring for the spirit that animates it. In nurturing your health, you are honoring life itself. Your well-being is your greatest wealth, and its keeper — now and forever — is you.