 as inner transform ation is
concerned, there is nothing you can do  a bout it. Y ou c annot transform
yourself, and you certainly can not transform your partner or anybody
else. All  you can  do is create a space for transformation to happen, for
grace and love to enter.
So whenever your relationship i s not working, whenever it bring s out the
“madness” in you and in your p artner, be glad. What was uncon scious is
being brought up to the light. It is an opportunity for salvation. Every
moment, hold the knowing of that moment, particularly of your inner
state. If  there is anger, know  that there is anger. If there is jealousy,
defensiveness, the ur ge to ar gue, the need to be right, an inner child
demanding love and attention, or emotional pain of any kind — whatever
it is, know  the  reality of that moment and hold the knowing. The
relationship then becomes your sadhana, y our spiritual practice. If you
observe unconscious behavior in your partner, hold it in the loving
embrace of your knowing so tha t you won’ t react. Unconsciousness and
knowing cannot coexist for long — even if the knowing is only in the
other pe rson and  not in the one who is acting out the unconsc iousness.
The ener gy form that lies behind hostility and attack finds the presence
of love absolutely intolerable. If you react at all to your partner ’ s
unconsciousness, you become unconscious yourself. But if you then
remember to know  your reaction, nothing is lost.
Humanity is under great pressur e to evolve because it is our onl y chance
of surviv al as a race. This will a f fect every aspect of your life and close
relationships in particular. Never before have relationships been as
problematic and  conflict ridden as they are now. As you may have
noticed, they are not here to make you happy or fulfilled. If you  continue
to pursu e the goal of salvation through a relationship, you  will be
disillusioned ag ain and again. B ut if you accept that the relationship is
here to make you conscious  instead of happy, then the relationship will
of fer you salvation, and you w ill be aligning yourself with the higher
consciousness th at wants to be born into this world. For those w ho hold
on to the old pa tterns, there will be increasing pain, violence, c onfusion,
and madness.

I su ppose that it takes two to  make a r elationship into a spiritual
practice, as you suggest. For example, my partner is still acting out his
old patterns of jealousy and contr ol. I have pointed this out many times,
but he is unable to see it.
 How ma ny people does it take to make your life into a spiritual practice?
Never m ind if your partner will  not cooperate. Sanity — consciousness
— can only come into this world through you. Y ou do not need to wait
for the world to become sane, or for somebody else to become conscious,
before y ou can be enlightened. Y ou may wait forever. Do not accuse
each oth er of being unconscious. The moment you start to ar gue, you
have ide ntified with a mental p osition and are now defending not only
that position but also your sense of self. The ego is in char ge. Y ou have
become unconscious. At times, it may be appropriate to point out certain
aspects of your partner ’ s behavior. If you are very alert, very present,
you can do so without ego involvement — without blaming, accusing, or
making the other wrong.
When y our partner behaves unconsciously, relinquish all j udgment.
Judgment is either to confuse so meone’ s unconscious behavior with who
they are or to project your own u nconsciousness onto another pe rson and
mistake that  for who they are. T o relinquish judgment does not mean that
you do not reco gnize dysfunctio n and unconsciousness when you see it.
It m eans “being the knowing” rather than “being the reaction”  and the
judge. Y ou will then either be totally free of reaction or you m ay react
and still  be the knowing, the space in which the reaction is wat ched and
allowed to be. Instead of fighting the darkness, you bring in the light.
Instead of reacting to delusion, you see the delusion yet at the same time
look through it. Being the kn owing creates a clear space o f loving
presence that allows all things and all people to be as they  are. No
greater catalyst for transformation exists. If you practice th is, your
partner cannot stay with you and  remain unconscious.
If you both agree that the relationship will be your spiritual practice, so
much th e better.  Y ou can then express your thoughts and feeling s to each
other as soon as they occur, or as soon as a reaction comes up, so that
you do not create a time gap in which an unexpressed or
unacknowledged emotion or gr ievance can fester and grow. Learn to
give expression to what you feel without blaming. Learn to listen to your
partner in an o pen, nondefensive way. Give your partner space for
expressing himself or herself. Be present. Accusing, defending, attacking
— all those patterns that are des igned to strengthen or protect the ego or
to ge t its  needs met will then be come redundant. Giving space to others
— and to yourself — is vital. Love  cannot flourish without it. Whe n youhave removed the two factors that are destructive to relationships —
when the pain-body has been  transmuted and you are n o longer
identified with mind and ment al positions — and if your partner has
done th e same, you will experience the bliss of the flowering of
relationship. Instead of mirror ing to each other your pain and your
unconsciousness, instead of satisfying your mutual addictive ego needs,
you will reflect back to each other the love that you feel deep within, the
love that comes with the realization of your oneness with all that is. This
is the love that has no opposite.
If your partner is still identified with the mind and the pain-body while
you are already free, this will re present a major challenge — not to you
but to your part ner. It is not easy to live with an enlightened p erson, or
rather it is so  easy that the ego finds it extrem ely threatening. Remember
that the ego nee ds problems, conflict, and “enemies” to strengthen the
sense of separateness on which its identity depends. The unenlightened
partner ’ s mind will be deeply f rustrated because its fixed positions are
not resisted, which means they will become shaky and weak, and there is
even the “danger” that they may  collapse altogether, resulting in loss of
self. The pain-body is demanding feedback and not getting it. The need
for a r gument, drama, and conflict is not being met. But beware: Some
people w ho are unresponsive, withdrawn, insensitive, or cut of f from
their feelings may think and try to convince others that they are
enlightened, or at least that th ere is “nothing wrong” with them and
everything wrong with their partner. Men tend to do that more than
women. They may see their female partners as irrational or emotional.
But if you can feel your emotions, you are not far from the radiant inner
body just underneath. If you are mainly in your head, the distance is
much greater, and you need to bring consciousness into the emotional
body before you can reach the inner body.
If th ere isn’ t an emanation of  love and joy, complete prese nce and
openness toward all beings, then it is not enlightenment. Another
indicator is how a person behaves in dif ficult or challenging situations or
when things “go wrong.” If your “enlightenment” is egoic self-delusion,
then life will s oon give you a challenge that will bring out your
unconsciousness in whatever form — as fear, anger, defensiveness,
judgment, depre ssion, and so o n. If you are in a relationship, many of
your challenges will come throu gh your partner. For example, a womanmay be challeng ed by an unres ponsive male partner who lives almost
entirely in his head. She will be challenged by his inability to hear  her, to
give her attention and space to be, which is due to his lack of presence.
The abse nce of love in the relati onship, which is usually more ke enly felt
by a woman than a man, will trigger the woman’ s pain-body, and through
it she will attack her partner — blame, criticize, make wrong, a nd so on.
This in turn now becomes his  challenge. T o defend himself against her
pain-body’ s atta ck, which he sees as totally unwarranted, he wil l become
even mo re deeply entrenched in his mental positions as he justifies,
defends himself, or counterattac ks. Eventually, this may activate his own
pain-body. When  both partners h ave thus been taken over, a level of deep
unconsciousness has been reached, of emotional violence, savage attack
and counterattack. It will not subside until both pain-bodies have
re


schr. 43:1461-1466, Nov. 27, 1930.
Volk, R. “Zur Diättherapie von Hautkrankheiten.” Dermat. Wchnschr.
91:1869-1873, Dec. 20, 1931.
Volk, R. “La dieta sin sal según Sauerbruch-Herrmannsdorfer -Gerson en la
tuberculosis extrapulmonar.” Rev. mex. de. tuber c. 2:5-23, Jan.-Feb.1940.
Watson, C. “Gerson diet for tuberculosis.” The Lancet.  218(2):161, Jul. 19,
1930.
Watson, C. “Gerson treatment of tuberculosis.” Brit. Med. J. 2:284-285,
Aug. 23, 1930.
Watson, C. “Diet and nutrition with special reference to the Sauerbruch-
Herrmannsdorfer -Gerson diet.” Med. Pr ess. 130:207-209, Sep. 10, 1930.
Watson, C. “The ‘vital’ factor in diet: a theory of the nature of vitamins.”
Edinbur gh Med. J.  38:91-104, Jan.-Dec. 1931.
Watson, C. “The ‘vital’ factor in diet.” Natur e. 128:154, Jul. 25, 1931.
Watson,, C. “The Gerson regime in pulmonary tuberculosis: with a note on
the radiological findings by Dr. J.S. Fulton.” Trans. Med.-Chir. Soc.
Edinbur gh. pp. 6-20, Nov. 1932.
Weisl, N. von. “Einiges über die praktische Durchführung der Gerson-
Diät.” Fortschr. d. Med.  53:185-188, Mar. 11, 1935.
White, C.J. “Lupus vulgaris (treated by Gerson diet). Lupus
erythematosus?” Archiv. Dermat. Syph.  24:323-324, 1931.
White, C.J. “Tuberculosis of the skin.” Illinois Med. J. 6:1215-1218, Jul.-
Dec. 1931.
Wiehmann, P. “Über die Beeinflussung der Hauttuberkulose durch die Diät
nach Gerson.” Beitr. z. Klin. d. T uberk.  66:464, 1928.
Wichmann, P. “Ergebnisse der Diätbehandlung der Hauttuberkulose.” Klin.
Wchnschr. 8:2366-2368, Dec. 17, 1929.
Wichmann, P. “Reply to Gerson.” Klin. Wchnschr. 9:694, Apr. 12, 1930.
Wichmann, P. “Verschlimmerung von Haut- und Schleimhauttuberkulose
durch Gerson-Diät.” Beitr. a. Klin. d. T uberk.  73:825-828, 1930.
Wichmann, P. “Ergebnisse der Gerson-Sauerbruch-Herrmannsdorfer -Diät-
Behandlung bei Haut- und Schleimhauttuberkulose.” Beitr. a. Klin. d.
Tuberk.  75:100-103, 1930.
Wise, O. “Erfahrungen mit der ‘Diätbehandlung nach Gerson-
Herrmannsdorfer -Sauerbruch’ bei verschiedenen Tuberkulose Formen
des Kindesalters.” Ztschr. f. Kinder h. 51:1 19-126, May 1931.
Wohlfarth. “Erfa hrungen mit HGS-Diät bei Lungentuberkulose.” Ztschr. f.
ärtzl. Fortbild.  29:559-563, Sep. 15, 1932.
Wolff-Eisner, A. “Die Gerson Sauerbruch Tuberkulose Diät im Urteil der
Fachkritik.” Beitr. z. Klin. d. T uberk.  73:829-834, 1930.Zelinka, J. “Gerson-Herrmannsdorfer -Sauerbruch diet in therapy of osseous
tuberculosis.” Casop. lék. cesk.  71:357, Mar. 18, 1932.
Ziegler, O. “Die Gründe der Ablehnung der salzlosen Diät durch die
Tuberkuloseheilanstalten.” Deutsche med. Wchnschr. 57:11-13, Jan. 2,
1931.
OceanofPDF.comThe marks GERSON, GERSON THERAPY and GERSON INSTITUTE
are trademarks and/or service marks owned by and proprietary to the
Gerson Institute, Bonita, California and are covered by appropriate
domestic and/or foreign registrations and/or protective laws. All other
trademarks and/or service marks referred to herein are owned by and/or
proprietary to their respective owners.

Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 W est 40th St
New Y ork, NY 10018

Copyright © 2001, 2006 by Dr. Morton W alker and the Gerson Institute
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or
by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting
brief quotes used in reviews.

Kensington and the K logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Of f.

ISBN-13: 978-1-4967-2932-3
ISBN-10: 1-4967-2932-3

eISBN-13: 978-0-7582-6731-3
eISBN-10: 0-7582-6731-2

OceanofPDF.comN o t e s
a
Basil and oregan o, both favorite Italian seasonings, are not allowed on the
Gerson Therapy owing to the aromatic oils they contain.
b
Please be sure to keep extra tomato liquid for soup or gravy, or better still,
drink as a hot broth immediately. It’s delicious.
c
Cover lentils with distilled water and allow to soak (germinate) overnight.
Drain.
d
This is a potassium-based baking powder. If you are a cancer patient, check
with your health professional first before using it.
e
Never use commercial bread crumbs (see recipe for bread crumbs in the
bread section that follows in this chapter or on p. 100 of the Gerson
Therapy Handbook ).
f
Use only apple juice if patient is not yet allowed dairy.
g
Fruit Source is a sweetener derived from natural fruit sugars.
h
Rice syrup, derived from malted rice, is a thick and creamy syrup that needs
to be thinned by either the maple syrup or Fruit Source.
iDr. Gerson allowed. patients to use
  wheat to
  rye flour. The bread is
delicious with or without wheat.
OceanofPDF.com<|eot_id|><|begin_of_text|>essential ayurveda
OceanofPDF.comessential ayurveda
what it is & what it can do for you
SHUBHRA KRISHAN
NEW WORLD LIBRARY
NOVATO, CALIFORNIA
www.newworldlibrary.com
OceanofPDF.comNew W orld Library
14 Pamaron W ay
Novato, California 94949
Copyright © 2003 by Shubhra Krishan
All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmi tted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, or other without written
permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.
Edited by Geor gia A. Hughes and Katharine Farnam Conolly
Front cover design by Mary Beth Salmon
Text design and typography by T ona Pearce Myers
The material in this book is intended for education. It is not meant to take the place of diagnosis and
treatment by a qualified medical practitione r or therapist. No expressed or implied guarantee as to the
effects of the use of the recommendations can be given nor liability taken.
Grateful acknowledg ment is given to Gopi Eberle and Mari Gayatri Stein for use of the yoga
illustrations in chapter 12. Illustrations by Gopi Eberle from Yoga Transformations  audiocassette by
Mari Gayatri Stein. Copyright © 1984 by Mari Gayatri Stein. www.marigayatri.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Krishan, Shubhra, 1966–
Essential ayurveda : what it is & what it can do for you / by Shubhra Krishan.
     p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 978-1-57731-234-5 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Medicine, A yurvedic. I. T itle.
R605.K725 2003
615.5’3—dc21
2002014135
First Printing, February 2003
ISBN


men fame; virtuous men resolution; and the Sage the soul.’A street fortune-teller
The association between the fate of the soul in this
world and the stars unde r which it was born, and hence
the importance of the horoscope in later Chinese alchemy,
is seen in the story of the alchemist Cheng Wei who
devoted his whole life to alchemy and obtained a servant
from a magician to help him in his work. His eﬀorts at
making gold from recipes contained in an ancient treatise,
‘The Great Treasure,’ were always unsuccessful. His wife
watched his futile attempts as he heated the retort which
contained the quicksilver and oﬀered to ‘show him
something,’ upon which she threw some of a drug into the
retort, with the result that when the drug was absorbed
the contents became silver. The amazed Cheng wanted to
know why she should have the secret and why she had not
told him sooner, to which she replied that ‘In order to getit it is necessary to have the proper fate;’ that is to say, a
favourable horoscope and a favourable time.
This belief in the necessity for right times and seasons
was not conﬁned to Chinese alchemy but was tied to the
universal association between alchemy and astrology.
Zosimus believed that experiments do not necessarily
produce results in themselves but must be undertaken at
the right astrological moment; the alchemist requires a
knowledge of the constellations. He also said: ‘It is
necessary that we determine what are the opportune times
... I have heard it said by certain ones that an operation
can be carried out under any circumstances, and I hesitate
to believe it.’ Albertus Magnus wrote that the alchemist
‘should observe the time in which the operation is
performed and the proper hours for sublimations,
solutions and distillations.’ Geber wrote of the inﬂuence of
the seven planets as the key to alchemy and maintained
that the adept can ﬁnd the mixture of the four elements in
animals, plants and minerals by astrology. Arabic astrology
says that the stars are ‘in accord with all mundane
creatures in all things... by secret institution of divinity
and by natural law.’ This obtained not only in alchemy
proper but also in its oﬀ-shoots, in such things as
talismans and magic. Roger Bacon maintained that charms
and images,  when made under the proper astrological
inﬂuences, became endowed with power and stored the
energies of the stars and the human spirit. Ko Hung wrote:
‘In divining the myste rious actions of heav en and
measuring the various motions of the sun, moon and ﬁve
planets, we discuss their trespasses in the realms of the
constellations in order to determine prosperity or decline
for the future. We look upwards for signs in the skies;’
‘Our kings established the oﬀice of Grand Astrologer. For
appointments, establishi ngs, worship in the ancestral
temples and sacriﬁces to heaven and earth they alwayschose the right times.’ And for the aspirant to hsien -hood:
‘To enter mountains one must secure a conjunctio n of the
best season and day, on a day and at an hour that heaven
holds in its grasp;’ ‘Wait carefully for the advent of the
proper days and hours and also observe the wax and wane
of nature. A slight departure from the right path will cause
immense regret;’ ‘Movement and rest should take place at
the proper time as prescribed. Act according to the four
seasons so as to suit the ch'i properly;’ in concocting the
elixir ‘the sun, moon and stars must seven times complete
their circuits and four seasons must nine times return.’
Astrology was linked with alchemy in the lives of the
hsien. One Taoist, T'ao Hung Ching, had a planetarium
constructed and a globe round which the heavens revolved
by a mechanical device. He also made an elixir from
ingredients given him by the Emperor, which both he and
the Emperor took to their mutual beneﬁt. When the
Emperor wanted him to live at court, Huang Ching drew a
picture of two oxen, one freely disporting itself in a
meadow and the other with a golden head-stall being
whipped to make it go. The Emperor got the message and
laughed.
As to the Sage, Yang Hsiung was asked if the Sage  could
make divinations; he replied that he could and was asked
then what was the diﬀerence between the Sage and the
astrologer? He answered : ‘The astrologer forete lls what
the eﬀects of the heavenl y phenomena will be on man; the
Sage foretells what the eﬀects of man's actions will be on
the heavens.’ Or, as Tung Chung-shu puts it: ‘The actions
of a man, when he reaches the highest level of goodness or
evil will ﬂow into the universal course of heaven and earth,
and cause  responsive reverberations in their
manifestations.’
Astrology's chief message for humanity is that it is not
isolated, but a part of the whole cosmos. As RaymondHarrison says, it is as well to divest the mind of the idea
that it is ‘a separate entity functioning apart from  the rest
of the cosmos’ and to regard the heavenly bodies more as
elemental forces lying at the roots of its own character,
‘since each atom of life is the universe in miniature.’
The chief manual of Chinese astrology is the Hung Fan,
the Grand Plan, a section of the great Shu Ching, the
Classical History. It expands the principle of the yin-yang
balance as active in the universe; the Sun is the Great
Yang and the Moon is the Great Yin; the planets are the
Lesser Yin and the ﬁxed  stars the Lesser Yang; these, in
turn, are associated with the Five Elements, the puriﬁed
essence of each rises upwards to the heavens to become
the ﬁve planets: Mercury, water; Venus, metal; Mars, ﬁre;
Jupiter, wood; Saturn, earth, while the ﬁxed stars contain
their various essences. Methods of fate calculation were
not entirely astrological since they also depended on the
Five Elements principle, the Twelve Terrestrial Branches
and the cyclic sixty-year periods; systems which were as
much numerical-mathematical as astrological-
astronomical.
OceanofPDF.com– 10 –
THE FIVE ELEMENTS
In an early treatise, written about 135 B C, we read:
Earth has its place in the centre and is the rich soil of
Heaven. Earth is Heaven's thighs and arms, its virtue
so proliﬁc, so lovely to view, that it cannot be told at
one time of telling. In fact Earth is what brings these
Five Elements and Four Seasons all together. Metal,
wood, water  and ﬁre each have their oﬀices, yet if
they did not rely on Earth in the centre, they would
all collapse. In similar fashion there is a reliance of
sourness, saltiness, bitterness and sweetness.
Without that basic tastiness the others could not
achieve ‘ﬂavour.’ The sweet [the edible] is the root of
the Five Elements, and its ch'i is their unifying
principle, just as the existence of sweetness among
the ﬁve tastes cannot but make them what they are.
This shows clearly the diﬀerence between the doctrine
of the Elements in the East and West. The Earth, which is
only one of the four elem ents in western traditio n, is, in
China, the central and most important on which  all the
others depend and from which they derive their vital
energy (ch'i). The western teaching, following Aristotle
and Empedocles, has four elements: earth, air, ﬁre and
water. For Aristotle, they proceed from the prima materia,
a basic matter on which all forms can be imposed or
imprinted, though itself remaining changeless. Matter and
form interact to produce the four elements, which give rise
to all things by simply changing the proportions of theelements, so that any one substance can be changed into
another by varying the contents of the diﬀerent parts,
provided the right proportions are discovered. All things
are, therefor e, interchang eable: they are diﬀerent forms of
the same matter. This is the very essence of alchemical
belief and work: that transmutation from one state to
another is possible, that the principle of transmutation is
inherent in Nature, so that the lead of base metal can be
transformed into the purity of gold and the lead of the
human situation transmuted into the gold of divine
perfection. Or, as Marco Pallis phrases it: ‘It implies the
possibility of converting whatever is base and polluted into
something pure and noble.’ So, then, the Five Elements
were not only concerned with material and seasonal
changes but with the understanding of inner changes and
alchemical transmutation in the individual.
There is, however, a suggestion of the ﬁ


 rest
while a power much greater than  my own takes over, and it doe s a much
better job than I could have done.
I c an learn to tr ust that the pow er that holds galaxies together can
handle the circumstances of my relatively little life. I choose to
remember in any moment that a surrendered life is a more s uccessful
life, because it is under the control of a power much greater than my
own.
Dear God,
I surr ender to Y ou
All I am and all I have.
Every thought, every feeling, every yearning,
I surr ender to Y ou.
I take my hands off the steering wheel.
Dear God, please drive.
Amen.DA Y 284
L o v e  i s  t h e  o n l y  u n a l t e r a b l e  t r u t h.
T he morta l realm can be a place f ull of wonder and excitement, b ut it is
not—even in its most intense manifestations—the world of ultimate
truth. Only the reality of a radi cal, fundamental love is unalterable and
eternal.
In th e en d, there  is only love. This is the truth I will remember at the
end of my life, or perhaps at the end of the life of a loved one. It’ s the
truth I see whe n the superficial preoccupations that compete for my
attention and rob me of my life force begin, at last, to melt awa y. T oday,
I accept the fundamental truth of my existence: that only love is real.
Love is the only ultimate; all els e is a hallucination of the mortal
mind. As I see this, I penetrate the veil of illusion that blinds m e
to my power and my good.DA Y 285
FOR REFLECTION
O n  L o v e  a s  S t r e n g t h  a n d  N o t  W e a k n e s s
M aking love the bottom line doe sn’ t make you a doormat. It do esn’ t
mean you’re compelled to do a nything anyone ever asks of y ou. Love
always gives the loving response—but sometimes the loving response is
“no.”
Love is not wea kness, but strength. It gives us clarity, wisdom, and
astuteness about people. It gives us intuitive gifts that help us discern
situations we might not otherwise understand. W e never need fe ar that in
seeking God’ s guidance in something, we will be led to sacrifice our own
good. Sa crifice is the life we live befor e  we dedicate ourselves to God.
God is not the way to sacrifice; He is the end to sacrifice. That is how
loved we are.DA Y 286
I  s u r r e n d e r  m y  c r i t i c a l  n a t u r e.
E verything we do is infused with the ener gy with which we do it.
Even if I think I’m giving constructive criticism, if I say some thing
in an ef fort to change someone, then they will feel repelled. What I
might th ink is a sharing will co me across as an attack. I pray today for
the ability to communicate ef fectively, but with love.
Behavioral change is not enough to transform our communication
skills. I cannot cover an attack w ith sugary icing, a sweet tone of voice,
or th erapeutic jar gon and expec t a miracle. For that, I need an authentic
switch f rom fear  to love. I pray today for the ability to honor the  spiritual
perfection in everyone, that the y might feel my love no matter what I
say.
Dear God,
Please r edeem my personality,
That any sharp edges within me
Shall turn tender.
W ith every wor d I say,
May I heal and not harm.
And so it is.
Amen.DA Y 287
T o d a y  I  a m  c o m m i t t e d  t o  f o r g i v i n g  s o m e o n e  I  f i n d
h a r d  t o  f o r g i v e.
W herever I withhold love, I block my own good. Wherever I stay stuck
in the past, I ke ep the present f rom unfolding miraculously. Wherever I
see mys elf as having been victimized, I tie myself to the expe rience of
victimization.
The part of me that can be of fen ded, or victimized in any way, is not
the real me. The real me lives in triumph and spiritual victory regardless
of w hat I have been through or what has been done to me. Only my
holding on to grievances can ke ep the universe from providing me with
the miracle of a new beginning.
Dear God,
I surr ender to Y ou my grievances,
The people I cannot for give,
The place wher e I hold on and cannot let go,
The darkness in my own heart.
Please r emove the sickness
Of unfor giveness
Fr om my soul.
And so it is.
Amen.DA Y 288
M y  b o d y  a g e s  b u t  m y  s p i r i t  d o e s  n o t.
M y body is merely a suit of clothes, a temporary container for my
eternal s pirit. As  I identify more  with my spirit, realizing that my essence
is ageless, my th oughts about age will change. Accordingly, so  will my
body.
I am  not burdened today by false beliefs about the vulnerabili ty of
my body to age or disease. I see the white light of spirit that races
through every cell of my being, filling my body as well as my mind with
the revitalizing power of love.
My b ody is a vessel thr ough which my spirit can operate while in
this world, and I am grateful for it. I wish to tr eat it with
pr ofound r espect, yet not be tempted to see it as who I am. I am
not m y b ody, and my body is no t me. My body is temporary and I
am not.DA Y 289
E n d l e s s  c r e a t i v i t y  i s  t h e  n a t u r a l  s t a t e  o f  m y  b e i n g.
G od i s in a continuous state of creativity, flowing within and th rough
me every moment. W ith each thought I think, I open to rec eive the
imprint of divinity upon my con sciousness. I bask in the light that is Him
within me.
All dark ness of thought or feelin g, all neurotic or fear -based patterns,
and all despair or limitation dissolve as I drink in the powerful vibrations
of lo ve. They ar e replaced by th e artistry of the divine, forming  patterns
of th ought and behavior moving through me to create the beautiful, holy,
and true.
God is the artist of the universe,  the Cr eator of all things, and the
designer of all life. I open my he art and mind, that I might be th e
paintbrush with which He paints and the vessel thr ough which He
pours forth His endless cr eativity and love.DA Y 290
FOR REFLECTION
O n  W h a t ’ s  P o s s i b l e  f o r  Y o u  N o w
O n the mortal pla ne, none of us  are perfect all the time. But on the
spiritual plane, all of us are pe rfect all the time. Who we r eally are—
perfect creations  of God, unchangeable and unlimited, none of us more
or l ess brilliant than anyone else—is the most positive self -concept
possible. T o identify yourself according to your spiritual rather than
material reality is enlightenment. From this perspective, you see  that you
ar e the l ight. No thought or conditi on of darkness—that is, lack of  love
in your own mi nd or in anyone else’ s—has any bearing whatsoever on
the truth of who you are or what the universe has planned for you. Y our
past, your mistakes, other people’ s opinions about you, even your
failures do not in any way limit who you are or what is possible for you
now.DA Y 291
T o d a y  I  e x t e n d  c o m p a s s i o n  t o  m y s e l f.
T he roughness of the world is hard on the heart; mine has been tested,
as h as everyone’ s. T oday I ack nowledge any bruises on my soul and
deliver them to God. I know that in His hands they will be healed.
I o wn my pain, t hat I might heal whatever darkness it has spawn ed in
me. I pray that neither others nor I will be af fected by my mistakes. May
my own compassion for what I have suf fered help heal me where I hurt.
Dear God,
I surr ender to Y ou
The scars upon my heart,
The memories that sear,
And the s


 lowest organisms consist of
identical cells, and most of them are single-celled, like the
amoeba. Yet, the distinction between an amoeba and a
human being  breaks down at the level of DNA, in this
sense: all of the amoeba is contained in its little packet of
DNA, and all of you is contained in yours. So it should not
be so surprising that a neuron actually can (under
circumstances we do not quite understand) decide to drop
its rule about not repairi ng itself and suddenly begin to do
just that. Its DNA is not crippled.
The truth of the matter is that the brain is too complex to
be turned into a model, and science by deﬁnition workswith models. Models are useful, but without exception they
have blind spots built into them. To see brain function, or
any function  in the body, without a model, you would have
to see it as a very abstract and seemingly contradictory
thing, as non-change being preserved in the midst of
dynamic change.
As non-change, the body is solid and stable, like a frozen
sculpture. As change, it is mobile and ﬂowing, like a river.
In the scientiﬁc worldview inherited from Newton, it has
been almost impossible to hold both these aspects together
in one’s mind at the same time. I remember a physicist
remarking that for Newton, nature was like a billiard game.
What he meant was that classical physics studies a
collection of solid objects—the billiard balls—moving along
straight lines propelled by ﬁxed laws of motion. The game
is to predict their paths, speed, momentum, and so on, like
an English gentleman at his evening game of snooker. To
make these calculations, however, you have to stop the
game and draw a model of it, complete with formulas for
the proper angles, trajectories, and so on.
Science has accepted essentially a frozen, geometric way
of mapping out everything that happens in the material
world, so quite naturally the idea of the sculpture took
precedence over the idea of the river. But the river has not
stopped just to please science—the beauty of the human
body is that it is new every moment. Yet, how do you make
a map of the body for every moment? That is the next
dilemma we have to confront. If we can solve it, we will
come much closer to what we want, not more knowledge to
put into libraries, but new abilities to program  into our
cosmic computer.
EXPANDING THE TOPICThe theme of this chapte r is that the body should  be freed
from any ﬁxed model of how it works. In a word, you should
think of your own body as a verb, not a noun. If change
were the only constant, obviously we’d all desire positive
change. I’ve already simpliﬁed this into positive inputs
versus negative inputs. But I was trained in medical school
to treat ﬁxed processes, with the primary focus on those
processes that have become so impaired that disease has
begun to appear. Not just a model of the human body is
involved in such training  but an entire worldview, which is
why Quantum Healing  had to be so ambitious in its aims.
Fortunately, steady progress has been made in the area of
wellness, and now a totally disease-oriented approach isn’t
as dominant. Self-directed change, conducted outside the
doctor’s oﬀice, has caug ht on. Pioneering studies by Dr.
Dean Ornish, ﬁrst published in the British medical journal
The Lancet  in 1990, tested the proposition that lifestyle
changes could create radical improvements in the body.
Starting with a one-year study, Ornish took patients already
suﬀering from coronary artery disease, the primary cause
of heart attacks.
One group of subjects was followed with normal medical
care while the others were enlisted in a lifestyle program
that consisted of whole foods, stress management,
moderate exercise, and social support. The speciﬁc form of
stress mana gement was yoga and meditati on. The
program’s diet included a drastic reduction in the amount
of fat consumed per day. These measu res sound rather
routine today, but Ornish produced a result that astounded
the medical community at the time. The patients  in the
control group showed no improvement in their heart
disease, and quite often the stenosis in their coronary
arteries (narrowing due to the buildup of fatty plaques) had
worsened after a year. In the group  following the lifestyle
protocols, however, the coronary vessels had slightlyopened, which was the ﬁrst time that coronary artery
disease had ever been reversed by any means, including
drugs.
The door had opened to a new world of self-care, as other
studies replicated Ornish’s results. Recent progress has
been even more dramatic. In 2008, Ornish, working in
collaboration with Nobel laureate Elizabeth Blackburn,
showed that lifestyle changes improve gene expression.
That is, the genes responsible for disease prevention were
turned on while the gene s responsible for cancer and heart
disease were turned oﬀ. This simple statement hardly
conveys the magnitude of the ﬁnding. It would have
seemed utterly impossible when Quantum Healing  was
written that the way a person thinks and acts has a direct
inﬂuence on their genes.
Nor are we talking about minor changes. Within three
months of undertaking Ornish’s program, hundreds of
genetic changes were observed. One of the most exciting
has to do with the production of an enzyme known as
telomerase, which seems  to be crucial in the aging process.
Each strand of DNA is capped at the end, like a period
ending a sentence, by a structure known as a telomere.
With age, it appears that telomeres weaken, causing the
genetic sequence to fray at the ends.
It is thought,  with considerable supporting research, that
increased telomerase, the enzyme that builds telomeres,
might signiﬁcantly retard aging. The Ornish-Blackburn
study discovered that telomerase did in fact increase in
subjects following the positive lifestyle program. I was
excited by these ﬁndings and wondered how far they might
extend. In collaborat ion with a number of universities, the
Chopra Center for Wellbeing is conducting an ongoing
study, the largest of its kind to date, that focuses primarily
on consciousness.Subjects are divided into two groups, with one group
spending a week at the center learning to meditate and
engaging in a multidime nsional program that deals with
mind, body, and spirit. The control group spend s the week
engaging in an unstructu red spa program that is a pleasant
change from their ordinary routine. Dozens of biomarkers
are carefully analyzed, and the results are a magniﬁcation
of the original Ornish- Blackburn ﬁndings. Even more
genetic markers were found to improve, and the changes
occurred within mere days of beginning to meditate.
The beneﬁcial eﬀects of meditating were well enough
known that I had conﬁdence in them when writing
Quantum Healing. These new ﬁndings, however, go far
beyond the accepted understanding that meditation can
lower blood pressure, decrease heart rate, increase
immunity to disease, and reduce the eﬀects of stress. Those
key ﬁndings haven’t changed, but now we know that
meditation leads to far more holistic beneﬁts, and that they
occur very quickly—it’s not a matter of dedicating years at
a time to master an esoteric Eastern discipline.
The chart below summa rizes what happens when any
kind of positive input enters the mind-body feedback loop.
What P ositive Input Does
Promotes overall balance, or homeostasis.
Moves easily  through the system, without obstruc tion or
blockages.
Generates new neural pathways.
Promotes the production of new brain cells.
Improves gene expression.
Allows every cell to function normally, without anomalies
or aberrant behavior.Supports the immune system, increasing resistance to
disease.
Counteracts the eﬀects over time of entropy and aging.
Increases a sense of wellbeing: The person feels healthy,
vibrant, and alive.
The shape of the future is becoming clear. Two new
concepts are emerging. The ﬁrst is radical wellbeing, the
notion that through lifestyle modiﬁcation a person can
attain a state of wellness that reaches far beyond disease
prevention. The second is self-directed biological
transformation (SDBT), the notion that the genetic switches
that create and govern every cell can be consciously
directed. In a word, you can consciously guide your own
personal evolution. Unlike conventional wellbeing, in
radical wellbeing making the right choices isn’t optional.
Every thought you have is already encoding a biological
choice right this minute, pointing to a positive outcome
(wellbeing) or a negative one (imbalance, physical decline,
disease, or death).
That our cells change by the instant holds the key to a
higher state of health and the possibility of conscious
evolution. If you want to see what your thoughts were like
yesterday, look at your body today. If you want to see what
your body will be like tomorrow


 m onounsaturated, such as olive oil, or polyunsaturate d, such as
canola, saf flower, or sunflower.  A small amount of clarified butter (under
one tablespoon per day) adds fla vor with an acceptable dose of cholesterol.
In addit ion to reducing your intake of saturated fats, this plan naturally
increases your consumption o f fiber -rich foods, which are helpful in
normalizing elimination, lowering cholesterol levels, and reducing the risk
of digestive tract cancers.
Ther e ar e foods that accelerate aging and entr opy,
and others that r enew and r evitalize the body.

Eating to Grow Y ounger
Use a calculator to compute your tar gets.
Calculate your daily calories by multiplying your weight in pounds by
16.Example: If you weigh 150 pounds, your numbers would look as follows:
This plan r esults in the following calorie br eakdown:SOUR
The sou r taste results from the chemical action of or ganic acids on the taste
buds. All acids are perceived a s sour including citric acid, as corbic acid
(vitamin C), and acetic acid (vinegar). A regular dose of sour awakens your
appetite and enhances your dig estion. It also slows the emptying of your
stomach, reducing the insulin-st imulating ef fect of carbohydrate s. Although
foods ranging from cheddar cheese to vinegar carry the sour taste, the best
sources are fresh fruits including apples, apricots, berries, cherries,
grapefruit, grapes, lemons, oranges, pineapples, and tomatoes. Low- and
nonfat yogurt is also a good source of the sour taste. Fresh yogurt provides
acidophilus bacteria, which are helpful in balancing your digestive tract.
Sour foods are usually excellen t sources of vitamin C and flavonoids,
which protect against heart dise ase and cancer. They also prov ide soluble
fiber, which may reduce the ch ances of both coronary heart disease and
diabetes. Many fermented cond iments, such as pickles, green olives, and
chutneys also carry the sour taste. Although they are helpful in stimulating
digestion, they are best taken in small amounts. Get the bulk of your
servings of sour through abundant helpings of tart fruits with less from
salad dressings and pickled and fermented foods.
SAL TY
Mineral salts are an essential c omponent of health, but a typical W estern
diet is much more likely to have too much rather than too little salt. Thesalty tas te promotes digestion, is mildly laxative, and has a mildly relaxing
ef fect. T oo muc h salt is associa ted with an increased risk for  high blood
pressure and may play a minor role in the development of osteoporosis.
In addit ion to common table sa lt, the salty taste is carried in fish, soy
sauce, ta mari, seaweed products, and most sauces. Be aware of your salt
intake, r ecognizing that it is an essential taste but one that must  be taken in
moderation.
PUNGENT
The pun gent or  spicy taste is usually referred to as “hot.” Most cultures
recognize the value of the spicy taste, although Americans tend to be shy
about it. The pungent spices have always been sought and valued. One of
the major motivations for the journey of Christopher Colum bus was to
discover a shortcut to the exotic spices of India, which were prized by
western Europeans.
The spicy flavor usually results from essential oils that are rich in
antioxidant properties. Their ability to neutralize decay-c ausing free
radicals may explain why pungent spices were commonly used to preserve
food. The natural chemicals in hot spices are also antibacterial.
Modern scientific research has shown that natural compounds contained
within spicy food sources such as onions, leeks, chives, and garlic may help
lower your cholesterol level and blood pressure. Other studies have found
that thes e pungent foods can protect you from cancer -causing a gents in the
environment. Chilis, ginger, horseradish, mustard, black and red pepper,
radishes, and many culinary spices including basil, cinnamon, cloves,
cumin, oregano, peppermint, rosemary, and thyme all carry the pungent
taste. U se them liberally in yo ur diet for both their flavor and the age-
reversing benefits they bring to your health.BITTER
Green and yellow vegetables are the primary source of the bitter taste.
Common examples include bell peppers, broccoli, celery, chard, eggplant,
endive, spinach, and zucchini. Most green leafy vegetables range from
mildly to very bitter. Bitterness reflects the many natural chemicals
contained in vegetables that hav e a wide range of age-reversing  and health-
enhancing ef fects. These phyto chemicals ( phyto is Greek for plant) help
detoxify carcinogens, lower serum cholesterol levels, and enhance your
immunity.
All vegetables carry essential vitamins and minerals. Green vegetables
are g ood sources of B vitamins and folate, now known to play an important
role in protectin g against heart d isease. V egetables are an important source
of both soluble a nd insoluble fiber. The soluble fiber is good for your heart
and the insoluble fiber improves the movement of food through your
digestive tract. High-fiber diets are associated with a lower ris k for breast
and digestive tract cancers.
The American Cancer Society recommends a minimum of five helpings
of fruits and vegetable each day,  but some studies have shown that less than
10 percent of Americans regularly follow this advice. W e echo what
mothers have been saying since the dawn of humanity: eat your vegetables.
Many he rbs also  carry the bitter  taste and are important compon ents of a
healthy, balanc ed diet. Chamomile, cilantro, coriander, cumin, dill,
fenugreek, licorice, rhubarb, rosemary, saf fron, sage, tarragon, and turmeric
are exam ples of culinary herbs and spices that contain the bitter flavor.
Most medicinal herbs such as echinacea, aloe, black cohosh, gentian,
goldenseal, lico rice, passion-flo wer, skullcap, and Saint-John ’ s-wort are
predominantly bitter due to their high concentrations of phytochemicals.
Most pe ople are not naturally attracted to the bitter taste,  but small
quantities enhance the taste of food and contribute to your well-being.Below is a char t that highlights a few of the amazing health-en hancing,
age-reversing chemicals that fruits and vegetables provide.
ASTRINGENT
Astringent foods produce a puckering ef fect on our mucous membranes.
Although modern science does not classify the astringent property as an
actual taste, the natural chemi cals that produce astringency have many
health-enhancing ef fects. Examples of foods that carry the astringent taste
include apples, artichokes, as paragus, beans, bell peppers, buttermilk,
celery, cherries, cranberries, cucumbers, figs, lemons, lentils, mung beans,
mushrooms, pomegranates, potatoes, soybeans, spinach, green and blacktea, tofu, whole wheat and rye grain products. Foods with the astringent
taste have a compacting ef fect on your physiology and are important in the
regulation of digestive function and wound healing.
Recent studies have found that the phytochemicals contained in both
green an d black  tea, good sourc es of the astringent taste, may help protect
you against a v ariety of illnesses, from cancer to heart dise ase. Beans,
legumes, and peas are excellen t sources of complex carbohydrates. They
provide good-quality vegetable protein along with both soluble and
insoluble fiber. Beans and legum es also supply us with folic acid, calcium,
and magnesium.
One of the major shifts in diet between the beginning of the twentieth and
twenty-first centuries was a reduction in vegetable sources of protein and
replacement by animal ones. W ith this change has come an increased risk
for b oth heart d isease and cancer. Add one or two servings of beans, peas,
or lentils to your diet each day and you will grow younger and live longer.
Summary of the Six T astes
The body is satisfied when it has access to the
six tastes of life.

Delicious and Nutritious
It is easy to foll ow a dietary plan that conforms to the six tastes program.
Regardless of the type of food you enjoy eating, you can both  enhance its
sumptuousness and health-promoting qualities by ensuring that your meals
have a wide variety of tastes. Here are examples of meals representing a
wide range of ethnic cuisine  to demonstrate the practicality of this
approach.
SEVEN VEGET ARIAN MEALS REPRESENTING THE
WORLD’S REGIONAL CUISINES

See the full recipes at the end of the book.
THAI CUISINE
Clear Br oth Soup with Coconut, T ofu, and Gr eens
Y ellow Thai Curry with Carr ots and Gr eens
Fr esh Cucumber with Basil and MintBasmati Rice with Mangoes
Banana Coconut Stew

CHINESE
V egetable Hot and Sour Soup
Buddha’ s Feast
Marinated Sesame T ofu Strips


the pretense and the shame  that goes with it, fear of exposure,
secretiveness, tension, strain, guilt, and anxiety. It will take some
progress in this work before you begin to experience the dierence
in feeling between the genuine desire to gradually work toward
growth, and the ungenuine  pretense imposed upon you by the
dictates of your idealized self. You will discover the deeply hidden
fear that says your world will come to an end if you do not live up
to its standards. You will sense and know many other aspects and
dierences between the genuine and the ungenuine self. And you
will also discover what your particular  idealized self demands.
There are also facets of the idealized self, depend ing on
personality, life conditions, and early inuences, which are not and
cannot be considered good, ethical, or moral. Aggressive, hostile,
proud, overam bitious trends are gloried, or idealized. It is true that
these negative tendencies exist behind all idealized self-images. But
they are hidde n, and since they crassly contradict the morally high
standards of the particular idealized self, they cause additional
anxiety, in that the idealized self will be exposed for the fraud it is.
The person who glories such negative tendencies, believing themto prove strength and independence, superiority and aloofness,
would be deeply ashamed of the kind of goodness anoth er person’s
idealized self uses as a front, and would consider it as weakness,
vulnerability, and dependency in an unhealthy sense. Such a person
entirely overlooks the fact that nothing makes a person as
vulnerable as pride; nothing causes so much fear.
In most cases there is a combination of these two tendencies:
overexacting moral standards impossible to live up to and pride in
being invulnerable, aloof, and superior. The coexistence of these
mutually exclusive ways presents a particular hardship for the
psyche. Needless to say, the conscious awareness of this
contradiction is missing until this particular work is well in
progress.
There are many more facets, possibilities, and individual pseudo-
solutions combining all sorts of mutually exclusive behaviors. All
this has to be found individually.
Let us now consider some of the general eects of the existence of
the idealized self and some of the implications. Since the standards
and dictates of the idealized self are impossible to realize, and yet
you never give up the attempt to uphold them, you cultivate within
yourself an inner tyranny of the worst order. You do not realize the
impossibility of being as perfect as your idealized self demands, and
never give up whipping yourself, castigating yourself, and feeling a
complete failur e whenever it is proven that you cannot live up to its
demands. A sense of abject worthlessness comes over you whenever
you fall short of these fantastic demands and engulfs you in misery.
This misery may at times be conscious but most of the time it is not.
Even if it is, you do not realize the entire signi cance, the
impossibility of what you expect from yourself. When you try to
hide your reactions to your own “failure,” you use specia l means to
avoid seeing it. One of the most common devices is to project the
blame for “failure” into the outer world, onto others, onto life.
The more you try to identify with your idealized self-image, the harder
the disillusionment whenever life brings you into a position where this
masquerade can no longer be maintained. Many  a personal crisis is
based on this dilemma, rather than on outer diculties. Thesediculties then become an added menace beyond their objective
hardship. The existence of the diculties is a proof to you that you
are not your idealized self, and this robs you of the false self-
condence you tried to establish with the creation of the idealized
self. There are personality types who know perfectly well that they
cannot identify  with their idealized self. But they do not know this
in a healthy way. They despair. They believe they ought to be able
to live up to it. Their whole life is permeated with a sense  of failure,
while the former type experi ences it only on more consc ious levels
when outer and inner conditions culminate in showi ng up the
phantom of the idealized self for what it really is: an illusion, a
pretense, a dishonesty. It amounts to saying: “I know I am
imperfect, but I make believe I am perfect.” Not to recognize this
dishonesty is comparatively easy when rationalized by
conscientiousness, honorable  standards and goals, and a desire to be
good.
Self-Acceptance
The genuine desire to better oneself leads one to accept one’s
personality as it is now. If this basic premise is the main governing
force of your motivation for perfection, any discovery of where you
fall short of your ideals will not throw you into depressio n, anxiety,
and guilt, but will rather strengthen you. You will not need to
exaggerate the “badness” of the behavior in question, nor will you
defend yourse lf against it with the excuse that it is the fault of
others, of life, of fate. You will gain an objective view of yourself in
this respect, and this view will liberate you. You will fully assume
responsibility for the faulty attitude, being willing to take the
consequences upon yourself. When you act out your idealized self,
you dread nothing more than that, for taking the responsibility of
your shortcom ings upon yourself is tantamount to saying, “I am not
my idealized self.”The Inner Tyrant
Feelings of failure, frustratio n, and compulsion, as well as guilt
and shame, are the most outstanding indications that your idealized
self is at work. These are the consciously felt emotions  out of all
those that lie hidden underneath. Actually, the basis of the tyranny
of the idealized self-image is the sense of false shame  and false guilt
that this image  produces when one cannot live up to it. In addition,
the idealized self also manifests false needs, which are superimposed
and articially created, like the need for glory, the need to triumph,
to satisfy vanity or pride. The pursuit of these needs never results in
true fulllment.
The idealized self has been called into existence in order to attain
self-condence and therefore, nally, happiness, pleasure supreme.
The stronger its presence, the more genuine self-condence fades
away. Since you cannot live up to its standards, you think even less
of yourself than you origin ally did. It is therefore obvious that
genuine self-condence can be established only when you remove
the superstructure, which is this merciless tyrant, your idealized
self.
Yes, you could have self-co ndence if the idealized self were
really you; and if you could live up to these standards. Since this is
impossible and since, deep down, you know perfectly well you are
not anything like what you think you are supposed to be, you build
up additional insecurity with this “super self,” and further vicious
circles come into existence. The original insecurity, which was
supposedly whisked away by the establishment of the idealized self,
steadily increa ses. It snowballs, and becomes worse and worse. The
more insecure you feel, the more stringent the demands of the
superstructure or idealized self, the less you are able to live up to it,
and the more insecure you feel. It is very important to see how this
vicious circle works. But this cannot be done until and unless you
become fully aware of the devious, subtle, unconscious ways in
which this idealized self-ima ge exists in your particular case. Askyourself in what particular areas it manifests. What causes and
eects are connected with it?
Estrangement from the Real Self
A furth er and drastic result of this problem is the constantly
increasing estrangement from the real self. The idealized self is a
falsity. It is a rigid, articiall y constructed imitation of a live human
being. You may invest it with many aspects of your real being;
nevertheless, it remains an articial construct. The more you invest
your energies, your persona lity, your thought processes, concepts,
ideas, and ideals into it, the more strength you take from the center
of your being, which alone is amenable to growth. This center of
your being is the only part of you, the real you, that can live, grow,
and be. It is the only part that can properly guide you. It alone
functions with all your capacities. It is exible and intuitive. Its
feelings alone are true and valid even if, for the moment, they are
not yet fully in truth and reality, in perfection and purity. But the
feelings of the real self function in perfection relative to what you
are now. The more you take out of that live center in order to invest
into the robot you have created, the more estranged you become
from the real self and the more you weaken and impoverish it.
In the course of this work, you have sometimes come upon the
puzz


 Yet I suggest
that the horrible after‐effects of venereal disease are the result of
suppressive  treatment.  What after all is syphilis? It is simply the result
of a poison which is absorbed  into the body, and  hence the rational
treatment  is to get that poison  out of the body.
As the Medical Profession  reserves the right to treat venereal diseases,
and  has its clinics for that purpose, I as a layman, or a naturopath  as I
am sometimes  called, am prohibited  from treating it. All the same there
are men, who having heard  of urine‐therapy  through  the late Mr.
Baxter's pamphlets  (mentioned  in Chapter 11) and  through  other
channels,  have set about treating themselves.
I will here  give the case  of a man  who contracted  venereal disease in
France  during the last war (1918).  He had, by the way,  suffered  for
some time from psoriasis,  which  he had  suppressed  with herbal
ointments.  This man, then still young,  knew something  about Nature‐
cure  methods  and  had  endeavoured  to treat his venereal disease by
subsirtting  for a time entirely on cold water in the hope of "starving it
out." At the end of an 11 days'  fast, however,  his symptoms,  far from
being better, were decidedly  worse. It was then that he came  across
one of the Baxter booklets. The upshot was that he decided to continue
the fast, but be it noted, with the addition of the internal and  external
use of his own urine. The results were gratifying  in the extreme; at the
end of ten days every sign of the venereal disease had  vanished,  and 74
 the psoriasis  had  greatly improved.  Nevertheless,  he decided to
continue the urine‐fast  until all traces of the skin  complaint  had
disappeared.  This eventuated  in one more  week, and he found himself
free of all his troubles. And not only that, but he also found that his
sight, hearing, senses of taste and  smell  had  become more  acute than
they  had been for years.
Most  people are now familiar with the orthodox methods  of dealing
with venereal disease. Sufferers are i nvited  to attend  clinics  where
they  are treated with injections.  The treatment  may last over a period
of either weeks or months. But although members  of the poorer classes
may  attend  these clinics, notabilities;  particularly  in the smaller  towns,
prefer to be treated by their own doctors, as they feel a certain
embarrassment  'at showing themselves  in a place where  they may  be
recognised.  In any event, the grave question  one asks  oneself i s: What
will be the after‐effects of there  injections?  It i s one thing to treat tLe
disease, but that is not the same as permanently  curing the patient.
Wrote  Dr. W. H. White,  M.D., of Orthodoxy:  " Medicine  ignores the i
ndividual `wholeness  and  treats the disease as a separate entity." Thus
there  are remedies  tabulated  for practically  any ailment from
rheumatism  to syphilis: but as the homoeopath  points out, what the
allopath calls  rheumatism  may  come from twenty different  causes
(were he to say from twenty different secondary  causes, this  would
more  approximate  to the truth) hence the name of the disease is of
really no importance.  Regarded  from  my particular ‐ point of view,  I
would even add  "nor how it has been contracted"  for the method of
cure,  as I have shown, is the same.  75
 To revert to the case of venereal disease I have cited.  If the young main
in question  had employed  urine‐therapy  from the first  instead of trying
to treat it with what are termed nature‐ cure methods,  I am convinced
that it would have been cured  far sooner.  From what I have been able
to gather frcm others who have tried  urine‐therapy  on their own, I have
good reason to believe that where venereal disease has been taken in
its initial stage,  or di'ring the Prst week, cures have been effected
anywhere  from between 48 to 96 hours; that is provided it has not
been complicated  by the usual treatment.  But of course as it is illegal
for me to treat this  age‐old affliction I am i n no position to furnish
case‐ histories. Still, to exclude from  these pages mention of such
diseases as the Medical Profession  reserve the right to treat by their
own methods  would be to leave my task only half fulfilled. Considering
that "a proportion  of all the blind, the deaf,  the mentally deficient  and
the crippled owe their disabilities  to venereal diseases"  (see Britain's
Health) it becomes the duty of any one, be he doctor  or layman, who
has found a means of curing it, to make his discovery  known so that
doctors can make use of it if they  wish. What we have to remember  is
that measures  employed  for treating venereal diseases, as most  others
also, have their day, are found perhaps to be unsatisfactory,  and  then
are superceded  by other  methods.  Although it is doubtful whether the
clinics  will be prepared to try urine‐therapy,  there  may  be some private
doctors who may be willing to give it a trial. Time alone can show.  I


 of active a wareness of drawing energ y in
directly  from the  stars,  the sun, the  earth,  and from one’s  sexual
partner  What I feel is that  I have  been  able  to absorb,  be nourish ed
by, and bring  into my  own life some of the real  masculine,  Yang,
qualities  of my partne r. With my partne r’s Yang energ y as a
resource  available  to me, I have  been  able  to be more assertive,
more creative,  and more outspok en. The exchange  with my partn er
of the  whole essence  of his being  has enable d me to amplify  my
own perso nality  and to include  his qualities.
    Question:  How has the male energy  you absorb ed affected  your
daily meditations?
- 292  -Chapter IX
    Answer:  I want to be mo re integrate d, including  integratin g the
male and  female ener gies within myself.  Beco ming mo re integrate d
and more balance d is one  of the benefits  of this practice.  Being
able to exchang e with my partne r has really  enhance d my spiritual
growth.
    The sam e ener gy that could  have  been  lost at times in emotional
confusion  or throu gh miscommunication  has become an  energ y
resource  that is available  for my own growth. There is clarit y that is
illuminating  in ter ms of  my em otional  and spiritual  life. It is also
more refined  energ y.
    My partn er’s energy  is no w available  for my spiritual  growth,
and my ener gy is available  for him.
    Question:  What do you feel is the highest  level of  this
practice?
    Answer:  Refinement of  one’s  own sexual, emotional,  and mental
energies  into subtle  spiritual  energ y and into a  spiritual  body that
lives w ithin the ph ysical body yet is free  to move any where in time
and space  is the  highest  level.  The sexual  practice  conserves  and
refines  the fuel,  but it is wi thin the Kan and Li me ditations  that the
real alche my occurs.  The essence  of the  Kan and Li practice  is
fire and water male and  female energi es uniting  creatively  within
each  Tan Tien or  center  in the body.
    Through  the self- intercou rse of Kan and Li, one  impregnates
oneself,  nourish es the fetus,  and finall y gives birth  to a spiritual
child that  dwells within. Then  the challenge  is to nourish  the spiritual
child w ith strong,  refined  energ y and virtue  through  the ups and
downs of dail y living. And  how  does  my partne r fit into  this?  I enhanc e
his self- generati on as he  helps  me with mine.
    Question:  You can be both  the mother  and father  of this spiritual
child b y having  the additional  help  of outside  masculine ener gy?
    Answer:  Yes. What I like so m uch about  the Taoist  practices  is
that in cultivating  our own nature,  we attain  our fullest  flowering and
give birth  to ourselves.  With a partn er in Dual Cultivation,  there  is
obviously  an added  energy  and mutual support  in addition  to joy
and pleasure.  I also  know  that I can  cultivate  my own sexual  energ y
myself,  and be creative  with it.
    Question:  Do you feel the sexual  cultivation  practice  is essential
to your spiritual  grow th?
    Answer:  Yes, but it is not  essential  to have  a partner.  These
practices  can be done  by a woma n who has a com mitment to
- 293  -Interview
celibacy  as a way of utilizing  her sexual  energ y for her own spiritual
growth and directing  the transformed  energy  toward service  to
others.  For a woma n who does  want a partne r eventuall y Single
Cultivation  allows her to take  her time to choose  her partner  well
without rushing  into a relationship  purely  to satisfy  sexual  needs.
So I w ould say Single  Cultivation  is essential.  Dual Cultivation  is
valuable,  but optional.
    There  is so mething  else  that I feel  is very  important  since w e
are talking  about  the benefits.  From the  beginni ng these  practices
were very  tranfo rmative, enhancing  my sense  of being  in control  of
my o wn energ y and my o wn destiny. I have  grown more responsibl e
and able  to use  my energies  creatively.
    Question:  Is the  Tao all about  controlling  your emotions and
energies? How does  this figure  in being  effortless  and flowing free?
    Answer:  I think  about  life as a  river.  Before  I practice d Fusion
and Ovarian  Kung  Fu, I felt  in my emotional  and sexual life as if I
were a leaf  on a current,  and it was the current  of circumstance
that would sometimes direct  me. Now, know ing these  Taoist
practices,  I feel  that t am  more like a raft,  and I can use  the current
for the purp ose of follo wing the river.  When I look  at my  past and all
the suffering  that I went throug h in some of my  emotional  and sexual
relationships, and I look  at friends  now, I see that the  Taoist practices
allow  us to be  in the  river  in a way that’s  harmonious  and flowing
without being  knocked  against  the rocks.  We are the navigators.
    Question:  Let’s talk a little  about  the psychology of relations hips.
How do you feel this practice  changes  the psyc hology of the battle
of the  sexes?
    Answer:  I think  it is essential  for both  partners  to enter  into a
relationship  with the intention  of mo ving the energy  up and fully
sharing,  because  it is an  exchange  of energy  designe d to be
redirecte d toward grow th. This gro wth will naturally  take  its o wn
direction,  emotionally  and spiritually. As the energy  moves up  during
the practice,  it takes  care  of itself. Every thing else w ill flow naturall y
from that.  The po wer struggl e tends  to dissolve.  When things  occur
that must be clarified,  the tools are  available.  It seem s there  is a
harmony and a flo w that is present  that reall y extends  far be yond
the sexual act.  There  is also the other  tremendous  benefit  of feeling
attuned  to the  other  person,  wherever he might be.
    Question:  Why do  you think  this happens?
    Answer:  My experience  is that  as the  energ y moves up  there
- 294  -Chapter  IX
are bondings,  at the  heart  level, and  the me ntal and spiritual  level,
and those  bondings  are very profoun d.
     Question:  I have  som e specific  questions  about  the actual
technique.  Do y ou reall y feel the energy  flow up the  spine  in ver y
direct  path ways? It see ms wh en you are making love  these  energies
all get  mixed together : This is a little  confusing.
     Answer:  I think  there  is an interesti ng distinction  betw een
practicing  on my own, if I am stim ulating  myself,  my whole being  is
totally  involved  with anothe r person.  More of my w hole body gets
aroused  when I am with my partner.  So wh en the energies  move
up, they  are more likely  to expand  and to fill my w hole body. When
I am alone  I have  a clearer  sense  of the  energ y going  up my spine.
If I’m  with my partn er I have  a sense  of the energy  moving up throu gh
my w hole body. Som etimes I have  the sense  of not onl y my own
energy  but also  of his, as one  column or  wave moving upw ard.
     Question:  Have y ou discovere d any additional  techniques  to aid
this sexual  practice?
     Answer:  My lover  and I have  discovered  certain  things
spontane ously. It requires  a great  deal  more discipline  for men to
cultivate  this practice  than  it does  for wome n.


Greg’s story illustrates why it is so important to understand the
background of one’s patients.
When I first talked with Greg, it was immediately
apparent that he had a classic case of ADHD. Adults with thisproblem frequently become workaholics and type A personal-ities. These people are living on adrenaline. They start out withlow progesterone levels, which causes an over-production ofinsulin. This leads to hypoglycemia and to an outpouring ofadrenaline to bring sugar levels up.
This was Greg’s underlying metabolic state. When he began
working in Las Vegas, the new element of stress was added.
Now his adrenal glands were over-producing not only
adrenaline but also cortisol (this is addressed in chapter 20).The cortisol raised his sugar levels, leading to even moreinsulin production. This led to more hypoglycemia, which ledto more adrenaline. He lost his appetite because of the high129 PSYCHOGENIC MEDICATION AND GREG C.  levels of adrenaline, leading to a body starved for fuel, which
created even more stress.
He did not have bi-polar disorder; he just had a major
hormonal imbalance. One can readily see why sometimespsychological conditions can be treated with hormones in amore effective manner than with drugs.130 THE MIRACLE OF BIO-IDENTICAL HORMONES  ADD AND ADHD—
THE SILENT EPIDEMIC
chapter FIFTEEN
I could not write a book about the influence of hormones
without making special mention of attention deficit disorder(ADD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).In my view, these two conditions are primarily related to ahormonal imbalance involving high insulin and the resultanthypoglycemia, or low blood sugar.
There are many kids with symptoms of ADD who are
struggling in school today because they have difficultiesfocusing. Often the reason they cannot pay attention in classor do homework is that they are hypoglycemic. Any time sugaris taken from the brain, the brain cannot focus. The reason forthe low sugars is that the kids are over-producing insulin.
Because of the hypoglycemia these youngsters experience a
persistent craving for foods that provide sugar, such as fruitjuice, soda, and candy. And very often kids with ADD have aweight problem, since they are continuously eating highglycemic carbohydrates.
ADHD starts out the same way—too much insulin
leading to low sugar levels. However, kids with ADHD have tocontend with another hormone: adrenaline.
131The brain cannot function without sugar, and the body
has an amazing capacity for finding ways to raise the bloodsugar level when it is low. Prominent among these regulatoryreactions is a process called gluconeogenesis, which, simplyput, creates sugar from protein. It is mediated through thesympathetic nervous system, which means the body pours outadrenaline to raise sugar levels. Adrenaline, which is naturalspeed, causes these kids to be hyperactive.
At the same time that the body is creating adrenaline, the
low sugar levels are prompting cravings for food high in sugar.Ingestion of sugar then leads to the over-production of insulin,leading to a drop in sugar, leading to difficulty focusing,leading to the over-production of adrenaline, leading to hyper-active behavior, and on and on.
Kids with ADHD are usually thin. The hyperactivity
burns up the sugar before it’s converted to fat for storage.Oftentimes the hyperactivity is masked by the child’s activeinvolvement in sports.
Kids with ADHD are treated with drugs such as Ritalin,
Adderal, and Strattera. However, approaching this conditionfrom a hormonal standpoint in most cases eliminates ADHDwithout having to resort to medication.
You can probably guess that the missing hormone that can
balance the high insulin and adrenaline levels and alleviateADD and ADHD would be progesterone. We inherit ourhormone levels from either parent. If a mother is estrogendominant, she is also low in progesterone. This can be passedon to her daughter or son. Anyone with a low progesteronelevel will over-produce insulin, thereby causing hypoglycemia,leading to ADD.132 THE MIRACLE OF BIO-IDENTICAL HORMONES  AN AMAZING TRANSFORMATION
I should mention my experience with one nine-year-old child
who had a classic case of ADHD. He had been thrown out ofevery public school in the city of Indio, California, for fightingwith other children, shoving teachers, and similar behaviors.His mother was desperate because the boy sincerely wanted togo back to school. I do not treat young children with ADHDin my practice, but I made an exception in this case.
I talked with the boy and helped him understand that the
sugar-based diet he had been eating and drinking was part ofthe problem. I told him he would be putting a cream on hislower forearm. He agreed to follow the protocol and was givena meal plan.
T wenty-four hours later, his mother told me she could
not stop crying; she had never seen her son behave so well.He did ten pages of homework—quite an accomplishmentfor someone who had never done homework before. HisADHD was gone.
In spite of his recovery, the Indio school board refused to
re-admit him into the system. I had written a two-page letterexplaining that he was better, but the educational system, notsurprisingly, proved to be blind to how simply ADHD can beaddressed.
On the positive side, he is now attending a parochial
school. His sixth-month report card was all A’s—not surpris-ing since most ADHD children are extremely intelligent.
When the boy went for his next therapy appointment, the
psychiatrist, who had been following him for his ADHD, sawright away that the signs of the disorder were gone. But whenhe asked the mother what her son was taking and she told himnatural progesterone cream, he told her to stop the cream133 ADD AND ADH D—THE SILENT EPIDEMIC  immediately, that it was a female hormone, and to put her son
back on the drugs that had been prescribed. She explained thatthe boy wouldn’t take them because they made him feel sick.He told her to do it anyway. Needless to say, the mothercontinued with the cream.
I subsequently spoke with the psychiatrist, who refused to
accept anything I was saying because there were no drug-company studies to verify it. He refused to allow his ownpowers of observation to see that progesterone was beneficial.Psychiatry developed purely as an observational science; now itis almost purely about psychopharmacology. He would ratherplace this nine-year-old boy on potentially lethal drugs, withmultiple side effects, than use a natural bio-identical hormonewith no side effects. His statement that progesterone is afemale hormone is typical of the lack of education doctorsreceive about hormones.
As stated previously, I do not treat young children that are
hyperactive in my practice—but I do treat their parents. If aparent has ADHD, there is a 50 percent chance that the childwill also be hyperactive. If the child is adopted, then he or shehas an even greater likelihood of having ADHD. This isbecause the majority of women who give up their children foradoption seem to be young mothers who have gotten intodrugs and alcohol and gotten pregnant, and, in my opinion,most young people who get involved with drugs and alcoholhave ADHD.
ADHD IN ADULTS
There are many adults with undiagnosed ADD or ADHD.
People who experience sleepiness between 3 and 4 in the after-noon or while driving—this is ADD. I use the word “ADD”interchangeably with “hypoglycemia,” because when the level134 THE MIRACLE OF BIO-IDENTICAL HORMONES  of sugar in the brain is low, the person can’t focus. People who
become workaholics may actually have ADHD and are livingon high levels of adrenaline caused by recurrent hypoglycemia.
/Sswashimply put, I view ADD and ADHD as a matter of
too little progesterone, too much insulin, and,
in the case of ADHD, too much adrenaline.
If you ask a specialist in ADD/ADHD what is causing the
problem, they generally say they don’t know. I am not aware ofany other doctor beside myself who approaches these condi-tions from a hormonal standpoint. Simply put, I view ADDand ADHD as a matter of too little progesterone, too muchinsulin, and, in the case of ADHD, too much adrenaline. Myphilosophy is so far removed from the standard of medicalpractice, which calls for the use of dangerous stimulants totreat the problem, that it can create concerns for traditionalpractitioners. Yet, as they say, the proof is in the pudding.When I treat the symptoms of ADD and ADHD with proges-terone and a diet that encourages the lowering of insulin, thereare positive results.
The immediate response of one patient, a 53-year-old
male, after starting on progesterone was that it made himextremely tired. As soon as he said that, I realized he was anadult with ADHD. He was a trim male, working a 12-to-14-hour day. Placing him on progesterone prevented his insulinlevels from rising. It took away his hypoglycemia, so hisadrenaline levels went down. I adjusted his diet, providingmore carbohydrates to normalize the sugar, and also gave himthyroid. As a result, his fatigue disappeared.
I think part of the reason why ADD/ADHD is under-
diagnosed is that doctors approach it as a “


 the eternal field of awareness that exists at the source of creation.
The intelligence  inside us radiates like light, crossing the border between
the quantum world and the physical world, unifying the two in a constant
subatomic dialogue. Your physical body and your quantum mechanical
body can both be called home —they are like parallel universes that you
travel between without even thinking about it.
PHYSICAL BODY :
A FROZEN ANA TOMICAL SCULPTURE
“I” sees itself as:
—made of cells, tissues, and or gans
—confined in time and space
—driven by biochemical processes (eating, breathing, digestion, etc.)
QUANTUM MECHANICAL BODY :
A RIVER OF INTELLIGENCE CONST ANTL Y RENEWING ITSELF“I” sees itself as:
—made of invisible impulses of intelligence
—unbounded in time and space
—driven by thoughts, feelings, wishes, memories, etc.
To all appearances, the physical  body occupies a few cubic feet of space;
it serves as a fragile life-support  system for seven or eight decades before it
must be discarded. The quant um mechanical body, on the other hand,
occupies no well-defined space and never wears out. How big a container
would you need for the dream you had last night, or for your desire to be
loved? Even though a person’ s total genetic material could easily fit into a
teaspoon, what is most important about genes—their intelligence—occupies
no physical space.
At the level of the quantum mechanical body every aspect of an
experience is wrapped into one point that is beyond the three-dimensional
world. A photograph of a new bride gives us a literal record of how she
looked, and a tape recording can capture her voice, but these are the crudest
fragments of experience; unless she saves them as mementos, the texture of
her bridal gown and the taste of her wedding cake appear to be lost forever.
But in quantum space everything is there at once, and through the simple
act of remembe ring, the bride can recapture a complete world. By some
further miracle, every other experience the bride ever has will be tinged
with this new addition to her memory. Being a married woman becomes a
part of her brain’ s view of her whole life from that moment on.The images imprinted on your quantum mechanical body are as complex
as you are. In short, these images are you. You live out your stored images,
manufacturing your own version of time, and in the process you program
the kind of body required by your version of time. Let me give a concrete
example of how this works.
In his fascinating book of psychiatric case studies, Love’ s Executioner,
Irvin Yalom recounts the story of Betty, a 27-year -old unmarried woman
who came to him for therapy. Betty was a very difficult case from the start.
Hard in manner, aloof and complaining, she kept up a litany of grievances
about the fact that no one liked or accepted her. She worke d in public
relations for a large department store, and every slight she suffered from
customers, co-workers, and bosses was dragged into her diatribe.
As Yalom listened, he was struck by the odd fact that througho ut Betty’ s
tireless description of her miseries, she never mentioned something very
obvious—her weight. Although barely five feet two inches  tall, Betty
weighed 250 pounds. She and everyone else knew that her appearance was
disturbing, yet she had turned her entire existence into an elaborate game to
disguise this fact. Not mentioning her weight was a shield  of silence,
covering up the deeper pain she could not confront.
Yalom realized that it would be too difficult for Betty to tackle her
obesity without first coming to terms with her psychological distress. He
spent months trying to penetrate  her defenses, and eventually they started to
dissolve. One day Betty announced dramatically to Yalom that she was
going to lose weight. She outlined a plan of attack that was remarkably
disciplined and well organized. With great seriousness she launched into a
diet, joining a support group and religiously avoiding any temptation to
binge. She signed up for weekly square-dancing and set up a stationary
bicycle in front of her TV. As the pounds quickly began to come  off, Yalom
noticed a remarkable thing.
As Betty lost weight, she began to have vivid dreams and flash backs of
painful incidents in her past. The underlying traumas that Yalom could
hardly budge in therapy were now melting away with the fat. Betty began
having wild mood swings, which at first seemed random. Then Yalom
noticed that they followed a coherent pattern: She was reliving varioustraumas that had occurred when she was at certain weights. It turned out
that Betty had grown steadily fatter since she was 15.
The last time Betty had weighed 210 pounds, for example, was when she
decided, at age 21, to move to New York. She had grown up on a small,
poor ranch in Texas, an only child trapped with a depresse d, widowed
mother. On the day that her diet took her back down to 210 pounds, Betty
had a vivid flashback of how difficult leaving home had been. Quite
literally, time was locked up inside her, blended into her cells.
“Thus her descent from 250 pounds set her spinning backward in time
through the emotionally charged events of her life: leaving Texas for New
York (210 pounds), her college graduation (190 pounds), her decision to
drop the pre-me d curriculum (and to give up the dream of discovering the
cure for the cancer that had killed her father) (180 pounds), her loneliness at
her high school graduation—he r envy of the other daughters and fathers,
her inability to get a date to the senior prom (170 pounds), her junior high
graduation and how much she had missed her father at that graduation (155
pounds).”
Yalom was quite excited to see how tangible and alive a past memory
could be: “What a wonderful proof of the unconscious realm! Betty’ s body
had remembered what her mind had long forgotten.” I would go even
further and say that her body was a kind of mind in itself, a storehouse of
memories that had taken physic al form in fat cells. Betty’ s experience had
become Betty; instead of just metabolizing hambur gers, pizza s, and milk
shakes, she had metabolized every emotion—sad longings, frustrated hopes,
bitter disappointments—associated with each bite of food.
Shedding weight was her deliverance from the past, and as the old body
went, a new Betty was created. She rapidly gained insight into herself; she
rediscovered deeply buried desires and shed tears over hurts she had
concealed from herself for many years. Her body contours began to emer ge:
first a waist, then breasts, then a chin and cheekbones. With her new shape,
Betty found the courage to venture into a social life. Her weight had made
her an outcast since her early teens; now she went on her first date, and men
in her office were attracted to her, no longer put off by her armor of
defensiveness.In the end, the metamorphosis did not fully succeed. The most traumatic
event in Betty’ s life had occur red just before her adolescence, when her
father suffered a long, protracte d death from cancer; she had weighed 150
pounds then and had never managed to get that thin again. Now, as she got
down to 155 pounds, her diet became a grim struggle—her body refused to
let go of even one more ounce, no matter what, and her flashbacks became
harder to face.
“Soon we spent entire sessions talking about her father. The time had
come to unearth everything. I plunged her into reminiscence and
encouraged her to express everything she could remember about his illness,
his dying, his appearance in the hospital the last time she saw him, the
details of his funeral, the clothes she wore, the minister ’s speech, the people
who attended.…She felt her loss as never before and, over a two-week
period, wept almost continuously.” This time was very difficult for both
doctor and patient. Racked by nightmares of her father ’s death, Betty said
that she died three times a night; Yalom felt intensely guilty for dragging
her back to a time when she had lost not just her father but her dream of
happiness.
Betty balked at uncovering any more buried feelings. It became clear that
her mind could not cross this last, too-threatening threshold. Neither could
her body. Too many griefs and unrealized hopes had turned into Betty. At
about that time she quit both her diet and her therapy. The 150-pound
barrier held, embodying the loss of a father who would never return to her.
Yalom regretted that she was only a partial cure, yet he also had to admit his
relief—the ordeal had deeply shaken both of them.
Like Betty, everyone becomes their past, but we also have the power to
reverse that process, to free up frozen time and release pent-up memories
that no longer serve us and prevent our happiness. You are constantly
making and unmaking your body at the quantum level. The word unmaking
is necessary because life is not all creation; old, outworn exper iences need
revision as new ones come along


REPERTORY Commoncold•169
afterdrinkingmilk:Mag-m.
inthemorning:Dios.,Nux-v.
formovement: /;».
tightclothing:Nux-v.
Causes:
anger:Cokx.
excitement:Coloc.
fruit:Coloc.
drinkingmilk:Mag-m.
indignation:Stop.
teething:Mag-ni.
vexation:Coloc.,Stap.
Collapse
Afterdiarrhoea:Ver-a.
CommoncoldAll-c,Ars.,Bar-c,Bell,Bry.,Calc-c,
Calc-f.,Calc-s.,Carb-v.,Euphr.,Heps.,
Kali-b.,Kali-ni.,Kalis.,Lye,Mag-m.,Mercs.,
Nat-c,Nat-m.,Nit-ac,Nux-v.,Pho-ac,Puis.,'
Sep.,Sil.,Sul.
Eyes:
dry:Ars.
burning:Ars.
streaming:Euphr.
Dischargefromeyes:
burning:Euphr.
watery:Nat-m.,Nux-v.
Eyelids:
red:Ars.
puffy:Ars.
Glands:
swollen:Bar-c.
Nasalcatarrh:
bland(notirritating):Euphr.,Puis.
blood-streaked: Calc-s.,Phos.
bloody:Mercs.,Nit-ac.
burning:All-c,Ars.,Mercs.,Nit-ac,Nux-v.
crusty:Kali-b.
dripsdownbackofthroat:Heps.,Kali-b.,
Nat-c,Nat-m.,Sep.
dry(stuffedup/congestedwithout
discharge):Calc-c,Calc-f.,Kali-b.,Phos.,Sil.
dryatnight,profuseduringtheday:Nux-v.
dryalternatingwithprofuse:Puis.
likeeggwhite:Nat-m.
green:Kali-b.,Mercs.,Puis.,Sep.
hardcrusts:Kali-b.,Sil.
one-sided:All-c,Phos.
profuse:All-c,Ars.,Kalis.,Nat-m.,Phos.
smelly:Calc-c,Calc-s.,Heps.,Kali-b.,
Mercs.,Nat-c,Puis.,Sil.,Sul.
sticky/stringy: Kali-b.
thick:Calc-s.,Kali-b.,Kalis.,Nat-c,Puis.,
Sil.
thin:Nit-ac.
watery:All-c,Ars.,Eupr.,Mercs.,Nit-ac,
Nux-v.watery,alternatingwithblockedupnose:
Nat-m.
wateryinthefreshair:Nit-ac,Puis.
white:Kali-m.,Nat-m.
yellow:Calc-c,Calc-s.,Heps.,Kali-b.,Kalis.,
Lye,Mercs.
dirtyyellow:Nit-ac,Puis.,Sep.,Sul.
yellow-green: Kali-b.,Mercs.,Puis.,Sep.
Nose:
blocked:Calc-c,Carb-v.,Lye,Nat-c
dry:Bar-c,Lye,Sul.
itching:Sul.
runsduringday,blockedatnight:num-v.
Sinuses:
blocked/painful: Kali-b.,Lye,Mercs.,Sil.
Sneezing:All-c,Ars.,Bry.,Carb-v.,Eup-p.,
Heps.,Mercs.,Nux-v.,Puis.,Sul.
betterforsneezing:Calc-f.
frequentsneezing:Ars.,Carb-v.,Mercs.,
Nux-v.,Sul.
difficultsneezing:Calc-f.,Carb-v.,Sil.
inastuffyroom:Puis.
slightestuncovering:Heps.
With:
cough:Euphr.
drythroat:Kali-b.
eyeinflammation: Euphr.,Sul.
headache:Aco.,All-c,Bell.,Bry.,Lye,
Mercs.,Nux-v.
fever:Bell.,Mercs.
hoarseness:Calc-c,Carb-v.,Mercs.,Phos.
itchingthroat:Carb-v.
painlesshoarseness:Calc-c.
lossofsmell:Bell.,Calc-c,Calc-s.,Mercs.,
Nat-m.,Phos.,Puis.,Sep.,Sil.
lossoftaste:Bell,Nat-m.,Phos.,Puis.,Sil.
sneezing:All-c
sorethroat:All-c,Mercs.,Nux-v.,Phos.
Better.
freshair:All-c,Kalis.,Nux-v.,Puis.
Worse:
coldandheat:Mercs.
aftereating:Nux-v.
freshair:Nit-ac
aftergettingup:Nux-v.
morning:Calc-c,Nux-v.
evening:Ars.
night:Mercs.,Nit-ac.
ontheright:Ars.,Lye
fordrinkingmilk:Calc-s.
stuffyroom:All-c,Kalis.,Puis.
uncovering:Heps.
Causes:
gettingchilled:Aco.,Bell.
gettingchilledwhenoverheated:Ars.
coldwind:All-c.
. J
170•Complaintsfront/after INTERNALREPERTORY
cold,drywind:Aco.
draughts:Nux-v.
gettingheadwet:Bell.
gettingwetfeet:All-c.
swimminginthesea:Mag-m.
Complaintsfrom/after(seealsoWorse)
Accident/injury:Am.,Bcll-p.,Con.,Hyp.,Nats.
Anger:Cham.,Cocc,Colch.,Coloc.,Ign.,Ip.,
Nux-v.,Op.
suppressedanger:Stop.
angerwithanxiety:Ars.,Ign.,Nux-v.
Badnews:Ccls.
Gettingchilled:Aco.,Bry.,Mcrc-s.,Nux-v.,Phos.
Rhus-t.
whenoverheated: Bcll-p.
Changeofweather:Bry.,Caust.,Dulc,Kalis.,
Phos.,Rhod.,Rhus-t.,Sil.,Sul.
anychange:Phos.
fromcoldtowarm:Bry.,Kalis.,Sul.
tocold:Rhus-t.,Sil.
todamp:Dulc,Rhus-t.
todry(especiallydrycold):Caust.
tostormy:Rhod.
Coffee:Chain.
Coldwind:Aco.,Bell.,Heps.,Nux-v.,Spo.
Disappointed love:Ign.,Nat-in.,Pho-ac,Stop.
Excitement: Coff.,Gels.,Pho-ac.,Puis.,Stap.
Fear:Aco.
Fright:Ign.,Pho-ac,Puis.
Grief:Caust.,Cocc,Ign.,Lach.,Nat-tn.,Pho-ac,
Puis.,Stap.
Humiliation(woundedpride):Coloc,Ign.,Lye,
Nat-m.,Pho-ac,Stap.
Indignation:Colch.,Coloc,Stap.
Injuriestonerves/coccyx:Hyp.
Joy:Coff.
Lossofbodyfluids:Calc-p.,Carb-v.,Chin.,
Pho-ac.
Measles:Carb-v.,Puis.
Mentalstrain:Arg-n.,Kali-p.,Lach.,Lye,Nat-c,
Sil.,Stap.
Over-eating:Ant-c
Overwork:Kali-p.
Reprimands: Ign.,Op.,Stap.
Shock:Aco.,Am.,Ign.,Op.,Pho-ac,Puis.,Sil.
Sprains:Calc-c
Sunstroke:Glon.,Nat-c.
Suppressionofemotions:Ign.,Nat-m.,Stap.
Surgery:Am.,Bell-p.,Hyp.,Stap.
Teething:Cham.
Vexation:Ip.
Gettingwet:Calc-c,Caust.,Puis.,Rhus-t.,Sep.
Gettingfeetwet:Puis.,Sil.
Gettingheadwet:Bell.
Concentration
Poor:Bar-c,Caust.,Lye,Nux-v.,Sil.ConfidenceseeSelf-confidence,Lackof
Confused(seealsoAbsent-minded; Forgetful)
Arg-n.,Bell.,Calc-c,Carb-v.,Cocc,Glon.,
Lach.,Mercs.,Nat-c,Nat-m.,Op.,Petr.,
Rhus-t.,Sep.,Sil.,Sul.
Inthefreshair:Petr.
Conjunctivitis seeEyeinflammation
Conscientious Ign.,Sil.
Constipation Calc-c,Caust.,Heps.,Lye,Mag-m.,
Nat-mitNux-v.,Op.,Sep.,Sil.
Alternateswithdiarrhoea:Nux-v.
Belly/stomach feelsfull:Sep.
Desiretopassstool:
absent:Op.
constant:Nux-v.
ineffectual:Caust.,Lye,Mag-m.,Nat-m.,
Nux-v.,Sep.,Sil.
Pains:
burningafterstool:Sil.
stitching:Caust.
Stools:
blackballs:Op.
crumbling:Mag-m.,Nat-m.
hard:Lye,Mag-m.,Nux-v.,Op.,Sep.,Sil.
hardatfirst:Calc-c.
knotty:Lye,Mag-m.,Sil.
large:Calc-c,Mag-m.,Nux-v.,Sep.,Sil.
pale:Calc-c.
passedwithdifficulty:Mag-m.
rabbits'/sheep'sdroppings:Mag-m.,Nat-m.,
Op.
'shy'(theyrecede):Op.,Sil.
smallballs:Mag-m.,Nat-m.,Op.
soft:Heps.
soursmelling:Calc-c.
With:
ineffectualstraining:Mag-m.,Nat-m.,Sep.,
Sil.
unfinishedfeeling:Nat-m.,Nux-v.,Op.
Better:
being