Yes—your body often follows your mind and the way society shapes it; calm the inside and many sicknesses ease, though germs and accidents still happen.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, do you feel that biological or physical diseases are also reactions to sociological or psychological backgrounds?
Sir, one more contradiction I am coming across is about free will and destiny. People say they are suffering because of old karmas, and others go completely opposite to that. It is very confusing whether there is anything like destiny or free will—whether there are past karmas or something else will happen in the future. This contradiction is, I think, a vital one in society today. Both are true, and there is no real contradiction between them. A contradiction appears—on the surface it is there—but inwardly there is none. I remember: a man once went to Caliph Ali and asked the same question—“Is man free in his actions, or is he bound? Is it destiny, or is it freedom? Are we doing what we must, or are we doing what we choose?” Ali looked at him for a while and said, “Do one thing: lift one foot and stand on…
So some physician might have cured the blisters on her face; he might even have done plastic surgery and replaced the facial skin entirely—then the disease would have manifested from some other door. The hands might have developed eczema, or the legs might have become paralyzed, or the eyes gone blind, or the ears deaf—the disease would have found another door. The disease does not end; it looks for a door. In truth, what we call disease is not the disease itself; it is a symptom. The ordinary physician fights the symptom; the great physician fights the root. Modern psychology says that until a person’s mind is changed, there is no real freedom from any illness. Hence you too must have seen: once you get caught in the circle of illness, there seems no way out.
A master was asked by a curious monk: 'what is the way?' 'it is right before your eyes,' said the master.'why do I not see it for myself?' asked the monk.'because you are thinking of yourself,' said the master.'what about you,' said the monk, 'do you see it?' the master said: 'so long as you see double, saying I don't, and you do, and so on, your eyes are clouded.' 'when there is neither I nor you, can one see it?' said the monk.'when there is neither I nor you, who is the one who wants to see it?' replied the master.
The Way is there, and you are thinking about yourself: 'Why can't I see?' Nobody can see who is filled so much with the ego. Put it aside, because the ego means your whole past, all that you have experienced, all that you have been conditioned for, all that you have known, studied, collected, gathered -- information, scripture, knowledge -- all that is your ego, the whole lot, and if you are concerned with it, you cannot see it.'WHAT ABOUT YOU?' SAID THE MONK. Whatsoever a master says, every answer could lead to a satori -- if the person is right. Just the first thing, when he said, 'IT IS RIGHT BEFORE YOUR EYES,' would have become an enlightenment if the right person had been there. But he missed; otherwise the next statement would have been an understanding. 'WHY DO I NOT SEE IT FOR MYSELF?' HE ASKED.'BECAUSE YOU ARE…
Osho, today humanity is sick, and I believe that when man first appeared millions of years ago, he must have been healthy. Then what is that unconscious mind of man that let the germs of disease enter, and what are those germs and seeds that allowed inhumanity to begin in man?
These are all fantasies. In fact, there is no need to get caught in the idea that millions of years ago man was happy. Nor is it true that man must be unhappy. Some people understand, and they are always happy in the sense that they accept suffering too. Those who do not understand are always unhappy, in the sense that in their very rejection of suffering they go on becoming more and more miserable. And it has never been that all of humanity was once happy and then all of humanity became unhappy. Nor that once there was acceptance and now everything has turned into rejection. It has never been so. Every age has its own diseases, its own sorrows—they change. A new age creates new diseases, new sorrows, but sorrow is always there, illness is always there, trouble is always there—and it will remain so. We keep on…
Western societies have developed the costliest health system that ever existed. People spend billions of dollars a year for it and it is really successful in some fields of surgery or in transplantation and preventing infections. But it seems that people are more sick than they ever were before. What is health?
Kirlian has been able to predict diseases that will happen to somebody six months later. Just by taking photographs, X-rays, he can say, "This person is going to have tuberculosis within six months -- because his photographs already show it." And he has always proved right. The doctors refused to believe him in the beginning because the man showed no symptoms of tuberculosis. Their X-ray and their methods had nothing to say about the man: he seemed to be perfectly healthy; there was no sickness present. But one question Kirlian has raised: the man does not feel well-being. He is healthy according to the textbooks of Western medicine, but according to the Eastern way of thinking he is not healthy because he is not feeling an overflowing energy of life. Something in him is developing and destroying his well-being. Anybody who reported to Kirlian that he was not feeling well…