Cancer has plagued humanity for millennia. Some reports of cancer date back to the seventh century BC, and ancient scrolls in Egypt talk about cancer of the chest. Over the eons, countless cures have been concocted, yet cancer is only spreading. Some scientists believe that we should tackle cancer on a case by case basis since each case and each person is unique. In my view, there is only one cause to all forms of cancer; eliminate the cause and you have eliminated cancer.
Cancer is a disruption in the intercellular relationships, where some cells begin to behave selfishly, destroy their environment, and eventually the entire organism, causing its demise. But the cells in our body aren’t inherently selfish; they are programmed to cooperate and even sacrifice themselves for the sake of the body if need be. They begin to behave contrary to their innate program when something mars their structure, as though a malware has been installed in them, making them abusive toward their neighbors. That malware is we, humans, whose bodies the cancer afflicts. When we turn against each other, we spread malice through all other levels of nature including our own cells. As a result, they, too, turn against each other until they die, and we die along with them. In other words, if our spirit is stricken with abusiveness, so it will be with our cells.
When we are abusive toward each other, it is not necessarily the bullies who suffer. In fact, it is usually not the bullies who suffer, though in the end, everyone suffers. No one wins from abusive conduct even if the punishment to the offenders isn’t always evident. The same goes for cancer: It is not always the selfish cells that become sick; often, another organ is struck first. However, in the end, everyone suffers equally as the entire body perishes.
If justice were poetic, cancer would afflict only the selfish. But things don’t work this way. Just as all cells are connected and a weakness somewhere may set off a sickness elsewhere, a selfish person may set off sickness in another person. That other person may not be selfish whatsoever, but because we are all connected, the entire system suffers and somewhere along the human chain, a link will break. In the end, the entire chain suffers, as with the body, but if we wait for the end, there will be no one to see that justice was done.
Therefore, the solution to cancer is not a case by case remedy, but the same remedy for all: the correction of our relations to those that naturally exist among the cells in our body. Instead of sickening our own cells through our ill-will toward each other, we should learn from them how to function like a healthy body. When we fend for each other instead of offend one another, we will be healthy in body, mind, and spirit.