I won’t try to reproduce everything Peter said here in this limited space. Instead, I would recommend, if you’re interested in the details of the Lakota way of healing, that you pick up Peter’s book and peruse it carefully. But I will tell you one fundamental difference between the two traditions, from my limited understanding: in the West, we try to heal the body of the individual person and their specific disease. The Lakota medicine man does exactly the opposite: he tries to heal the spirit of the group. Western medicine focuses on a single body; and the Oglala Lakota tradition focuses on the community.

When the community has health, in other words, so do the individuals in it.After Peter’s talk I realized that the Lakota model of a healthy community, interestingly enough, probably best reflects the Western practices of the discipline of Public Health, which also emphasizes the total well-being of an entire community and the wholesale prevention rather than the singular treatment of disease. Public Health stresses the environmental elements of life that allow large groups of people to stay well: clean water, a thriving ecosystem, the provision of nourishing food and the eradication of major threats to a community’s well-being like violence, endemic poverty, and drugs and alcohol.

After Peter’s talk I realized that the Lakota model of a healthy community, interestingly enough, probably best reflects the Western practices of the discipline of Public Health, which also emphasizes the total well-being of an entire community and the wholesale prevention rather than the singular treatment of disease. Public Health stresses the environmental elements of life that allow large groups of people to stay well: clean water, a thriving ecosystem, the provision of nourishing food and the eradication of major threats to a community’s well-being like violence, endemic poverty, and drugs and alcohol. 

More:  http://bahaiteachings.org/lakota-way-of-health-in-a-healthy-community