Ultimate Rehabilitation

Life is a beautiful process. For millions of generations, this beautiful process has been going smoothly, without obstacles. From birth until our final moments, we humans have the choice to act. However, our actions over the last few decades have seriously hindered the progress of each other and the process of life itself. This is due to man's inherent limitations - lack of planning, lack of awareness and understanding, ego, greed etc, which have multidimensional ramifications beyond the scope and horizon of the individual. Hence the quality of life is rapidly declining around the world.

An individual has three dimensions - physical, psychological and social. When an individual is physically sound, psychologically fit and socially well adjusted, he can evolve into a complete personality. But when there is a deficiency in any of the dimensions, that dimension needs to be restored to a state of normalcy. Physical problems such as handicaps, disabilities, chronic and acute medical conditions, lack of nutrition and so on inhibit or restrict the individual from attaining his potential. Mental and emotional problems pertaining to the mind or the psychological dimension are potent catalysts or inhibitors of self and society. Social problems such as war, population, discrimination and others affect large sections of people.

Though these dimensions are integrated, the needs of each dimension are fundamentally different from the other and therefore must be addressed specifically. In fact, every disturbance or problem has components in all the three dimensions. A physically handicapped individual may require just a prosthesis to rehabilitate, but the psyche of the individual and his/her family is much more important than the support given by the prosthesis and so are acceptance, mobility, career and other social issues. Likewise, a psychological issue such as depression has physical (need for proper nutrition) and social context (need to interact with others to overcome the issue). Social problems such as reservations or affirmative action, environmental crime and others have significant impact on the physical environment as well as in the psychology of the policy makers, practitioners and the common man.

Human limitations force us to address or rehabilitate the obvious or visible problem, ignoring the 90% hidden issues relating to the other dimensions. Removing carbon dioxide from air using technology may reduce global warming risks temporarily, but unless individuals think that they have to control use of their automobiles prudently, no technology can prevent global warming. Likewise giving a wheelchair to a handicapped person is not the answer to his personal relationships with family or employer. Social problems require much more than monetary or physical support. In all the above cases, the deep-rooted psychological issues and social factors require to be analyzed and only then any attempt at rehabilitation should be made. The problems are not limited to individuals or families but affect society as a whole and are of serious proportions. World Organizations such as the United Nations, World Bank, Red Cross, UNESCO, World Economic Forum and others spend billions of dollars just studying them and trillions of dollars trying to treat them.

No rehabilitation is complete if all three dimensions are not addressed. Spending billions on addressing issues in the physical dimension superficially addresses the issue, leaving scope for its emergence in other ways. Hence, any solution needs to be analyzed in all three dimensions and simultaneous action needs to be taken.

Addressing the physical, psychological and social dimensions of a problem simultaneously is Ultimate Rehabilitation .