We are made up of 5 Tattwas or Elements; earth, water, fire, air and ether which correspond with wilfulness/lust, greed, anger, pride and attachment. The elements are responsible for projecting our passions and our attitudes. We cannot escape the primal drives evoked by the passions, they are a big part of what makes us human, but we can channel them for positive ends. This is called turning emotion into devotion. In David Shannoff Khalsa’s book Kundalini Yoga for complex psychiatric disorders (p326) he writes “When any of these five factors (passions) is excessive or inappropriately expressed, there is a consequence in the mind. This consequence is eventually expressed in the body in the form of what we call disease. Therefore, the diseases that we commonly acknowledge today are all actually symptomatic of an imbalance in a previous or current state of consciousness, which can include the karmas of a previous lifetime. On a spiritual plane, there is a purpose and a destiny, or fate for each individual soul. These symptomatic diseases are learning experiences for that host individual.”