’s intake,
the immune system becomes reactivated and healing can begin. The patient’s metabolic rate has
to be established for a correct dosage, but most cancer patients start with 5 grains of thyroid and
18 drops of Lugol’s solution (3 drops in each of 1 orange and 5 carrot/apple juices) a day, for
the first 3-4 weeks only. Then the amounts are reduced to 2 or 2 1⁄2 grains of thyroid and 12
drops of Lugol’s, and subsequently adjusted according to the Gerson doctor’s instruction.
Patients suffering from non-malignant diseases use the less intensive therapy (see Chapter 19 ),
with much less thyroid and Lugol’s solution.
Niacin : (common name for nicotinic acid, or Vitamin B-3) Niacin assists in the digestion
of protein and helps to open capillary circulation, thus bringing freshly oxygenated blood (from
the constant intake of fresh juices) to all body tissues. By improving circulation it also works to
reduce ascites (abdominal edema) and pain. The dosage is a 50 mg tablet 6 times daily, taken
during meals. This medication often causes the well-known “niacin flush,” a temporary reddening
of the face and upper chest area, with some itching. This is totally harmless and passes quickly.
(Do NOT switch to non-flushing niacin: it is ineffective.) Niacin should be discontinued during
women’s periods or in case of bleeding of any kind.
Liver Capsules : The severely toxic and damaged liver of the cancer patient needs maximum
assistance to improve its vital functions. The therapy provides this help in the form of liver
capsules containing dried, defatted powdered liver from healthy animals. Two capsules of liver
powder are given three times a day, with carrot-only juice. According to Dr. Virginia Livingston,
the combination of dry liver powder with carrot juice produces abcissic acid,  a precursor of
Vitamin A, which is essential in attacking tumor tissue.
Crude Liver Injections : An additional substance given to aid in the restoration of the liver.
It normally contains a small amount of Vitamin B 12. However, since virtually all cancer patients
Copyright © Charlotte Gerson, 2007.  All rights reserved.
This material may not be reproduced in any medium, print or electronic without prior written permission from the author.Page 120Healing the Gerson Way—Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases
www.thegersonway.comare anemic, additional Vitamin B 12 is needed to help restore the hemoglobin content of the blood,
promoting the formation and maturation of red blood cells. It works against different types of
anemia and even against degenerative changes in the spinal cord. As seen in animal experiments,
this vitamin is able to restore a wide range of tissues damaged by age, chronic illness, surgery,
degenerative diseases, or various kinds of poisoning. Intra-muscular Liver Extract (3 cc) with
added 50 mcg of B 12—a tiny amount, a 20th of one cc) is given daily for four or more months.
Later the frequency is reduced to every other day, and still later—sometimes after as much as a
year—to twice a week.
Pancreatin : This is an extract of various pancreatic digestive enzymes, normally needed
to digest fats, proteins and sugar.  Gerson patients don’t consume those substances; however,
these enzymes are vitally important in the digestion and elimination of tumor tissue. The dosage
is 3 tablets of.325mg each four times a day—one after each meal, plus an additional dose in
mid-afternoon. For exceptionally large tumors 2-3 tablets a day of a more concentrated 1200mg
pancreatin may be added to the patient’s medication. Some patients cannot tolerate pancreatin and
have to do without it. Dr. Gerson also omitted pancreatin for sarcoma cases.
Acidol Pepsin : These tablets supply digestive stomach juices, badly needed by patients
suffering from chronic diseases, who tend to have insufficient stomach acid and digestive pepsin.
As a result they have poor appetite and poor digestion. Since the Gerson treatment is based on the
patient’s optimum intake of food and juices, the stomach needs help for the intake and digestion
of food. Acidol Pepsin aids protein digestion and the absorption of iron, while helping to eliminate
gas and bloating. The dosage is six tablets a day, two to be taken before  each meal. No Acidol is
given in cases of acid reflux, stomach ulcers or other inflammatory or irritated conditions of the
stomach.
Ox Bile Powder : This helps to emulsify the castor oil, which is used in the castor oil/coffee
enemas. The powder is mixed into the castor oil and stirred, before the slightly soapy coffee is
added.
Flax Seed Oil : Also known as food grade linseed oil, this contains both essential fatty
acids (EFA’s): linoleic acid and linolenic acid, and is particularly rich in the Omega 3 series, as
discovered by Dr. Johanna Budwig. The therapeutic effects of flax seed oil are many:
• It attracts oxygen at the cell membrane and transports oxygen into the cell;
•  It is able to detoxify fat-soluble toxins, and helps to dissolve and remove plaque;
• It is a carrier of Vitamin A, which is important for the immune system; and
•  It removes excess cholesterol, an important function, since patients’ cholesterol levels
sometimes rise during the initial stages of the Therapy.
Dose: two tablespoons daily for the first month, then one tablespoon daily for the rest of the
treatment.
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This material may not be reproduced in any medium, print or electronic without prior written permission from the author.Page 121Healing the Gerson Way—Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases
www.thegersonway.comCo-Enzyme Q10 : Recently added to the protocol, this co-enzyme is valuable in replacing
some of the nutrients that were available in the discontinued raw liver juice. It must be administered
cautiously at first, since some patients are hypersensitive to this substance. To start with, the dose
is 50mg daily for 5-7 days, then it is increased to 100mg per day, to reach 500-600mg daily.
Copyright © Charlotte Gerson, 2007.  All rights reserved.
This material may not be reproduced in any medium, print or electronic without prior written permission from the author.Page 122Healing the Gerson Way—Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases
www.thegersonway.comCHAPTER 15
Pain Control Without Drugs
A large percentage of patients arrive at the Gerson Therapy hospital in pain, on heavy pain
 control medication including morphine, codeine, or the two combined, e.g. in the drug
Oxi-Contin. These drugs are highly toxic, and since detoxifying the body is the basic aim of the
Gerson Therapy, every effort has to be made to control the patients’ pain without the use of toxic
drugs.
 The first tool to achieve this is the coffee enema (see Chapter 13.) Removing the accumulated
toxins from the liver enables that vital organ to absorb and release more poisons stored in the body;
this immediately brings relief to the patient. It does not, however, get rid of the pain altogether:
mild pain relief drugs, such as aspirin, Ibuprofen or Tylenol might be needed. But these may not
work if the patient had been used to morphine. In such cases the Gerson doctor will use one or
more of the following:
Clay packs
Castor oil packs
The “Triad”: 1 aspirin, 1 Vitamin C (500 mg), 1 niacin (50 mg)
Hyperthermia (artificial fever)
Laetrile
Oxygen treatments
Rebounding
This is how to apply them :
Clay (mud) packs
Clay packs help to relieve ‘hot’ inflammations around arthritic joints and tumors, and in
other areas of fluid retention. The best clay is Montmorillonite (not of marine origin), which
also absorbs toxins through the skin. Taken internally in peppermint tea (1/4 to 1⁄2 teaspoonful
to a cup), clay even helps to clear diarrheas and general food poisoning. Clay packs have long
been used in many parts of the world. Applied around the head, they are even able to alleviate
headaches and seizures.
The clay pack is prepared by mixing the dry clay powderwith enough hot distilled  water to
make a spreadable paste, neither too runny nor too dry. A layer about 2-3 mm thick is spread on
a piece of clean white  cloth, placed on the affected area and covered with a piece of plastic and a
wool cloth. Secured in position, it can be left in place for 2-3 hours and removed and discarded
Copyright © Charlotte Gerson, 2007.  All rights reserved.
This material may not be reproduced in any medium, print or electronic without prior written permission from the author.Page 123Healing the Gerson Way—Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases
www.thegersonway.comwhen it has become dry. Clay packs may be used two or three times a day, as required, but must
NOT be placed on an open lesion.
Castor Oil packs
Warm castor oil packs help to alleviate muscle and bone pain


ystic breast disease, she also had cysts on her
ovaries. Leslie commented, “I kept thinking that there must be something wrong with me. Why would I be getting all of
these cysts in my body?” On examination, Leslie had an enlarged thyroid gland and many signs of an underactive thyroid
condition, including being very fatigued. Laboratory testing showed severe iodine deficiency with a 12% excretion on an
iodine-challenge test (normal levels should be above 90%). Upon taking iodine (in the form of an iodine/iodide
mixture—
Iodoral
®
), Leslie noticed a dramatic improvement in her condition. “Within two weeks of taking iodine, I had more
energy and within one month, my breast cysts began to fade. After taking the iodine for two months, my breasts were soft
and the lumpiness was gone. It no longer hurts to wear clothing. It feels like a miracle,” she said. The ovarian cysts
Leslie had struggled with also resolved. Repeat testing of iodine levels showed a normal excretion rate on a challenge
test (94% excretion). Leslie’s holistic treatment plan includes the use of vitamins, minerals, herbs, and natural hormones.
Update on Leslie’s condition: Leslie has been on iodine for over three years now. “I am 100% better. There is no sign
of fibrocystic breast disease. I would like to tell everyone who suffers with this disease that there is a simple treatment—
iodine. No one should suffer from this illness,” she said.
New 5
th

Edition Update on Leslie’s condition: At Leslie’s last visit, I told her I was writing an update to the iodine
book. She became excited and said, “You must let your readers know how much it has changed my life. I was miserable
before taking iodine. Every woman with fibrocystic breast disease should know about this.”
Leslie’s case is not unique. The treatment of breast cysts with iodine has been reported for over 50 years. Most patients with
breast cysts will significantly improve their condition with
iodine supplementation.
Chapter 8
 contains more information on the
relationship between breast disease and iodine deficiency.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I have used various iodide preparations for years, with mixed success. Although they are effective for certain conditions such
as sinusitis, there is clearly an advantage to using a combination of iodide and iodine together. The results that I have seen in my
patients have convinced me that using a combination of iodide and iodine is a much more effective and appropriate treatment than
using iodide alone.
1
 Thrall, K. Distribution of iodine into blood components of the Sprague-Dawley rat differs with the chemical form
administered. Fundamental and applied Toxicology. 15:75-81. 1990
2
 Eskin, B. Different tissue responses for iodine and iodide in rat thyroid and mammary glands. Biological Trace Element
Research. Vol. 49, 1995
3
 Eskin, B. IBID. 1995
4
 Aceves, C. Is Iodine a gatekeeper of the integrity of the mammary gland? J. of Mammary Gland Biol. and Neoplasia. Vol.
10, No. 2. April 2005.Chapter 4
Iodine and the Thyroid Gland
CHAPTER 4: IODINE AND THE THYROID GLAND
Iodine is an essential ingredient in all of the thyroid hormones. T4 (thyroxine) contains four iodine atoms. T3 (triiodothyronine)
contains three iodine atoms. Without sufficient iodine supply, the thyroid gland is unable to make thyroid hormones in adequate
amounts.
The thyroid gland cannot optimally function in an iodine-deficient state. One of the consequences of an iodine-deficient state
is goiter (swelling of the thyroid gland). Over a hundred years ago, it was shown that goiter could be avoided and often reversed
with iodine. In addition to goiter formation, iodine deficiency may also lead to other thyroid conditions including hypothyroidism,
autoimmune thyroid diseases such as Graves’ and Hashimoto’s disease, as well as thyroid cancer. Studies have shown that
iodine-deficient individuals have an increased incidence of anti-thyroid antibodies.
1

2
 This chapter will focus on the relationship
between low iodine levels and hypothyroidism. More information about iodine and autoimmune thyroid illnesses and thyroid
cancer can be found in the
Chapter 6
.
Iodine is found throughout the body, with approximately 15-20mg stored in the thyroid of the average adult.
3

4
 When body
iodine levels are sufficient, the thyroid gland can hold up to 50mg of iodine. The thyroid gland requires adequate iodine levels to
make thyroid hormone. The thyroid gland has developed a specialized system to concentrate a large amount of iodine as
compared to its size. This system is known as the sodium/iodide symporter (NIS). There are other tissues of the body that utilize
NIS to concentrate iodine including the breasts, kidneys, placenta, stomach, rectum, and salivary glands.
5
The thyroid gland is located in the lower part of the neck and produces thyroid hormone. It is regulated by the pituitary gland
which produces thyroid stimulating hormone—TSH. TSH stimulates the thyroid gland to release thyroxine (T4). Triiodothyronine
(T3) is converted from T4 in the periphery of the body. T3 is believed to be the active form of thyroid hormone that drives the
metabolic functions of the body. The Figure below illustrates how the thyroid gland produces thyroid hormone.
T4 and T3 are the most common thyroid hormones produced. The ‘4’ in T4 and the ‘3’ in T3 refer to the number of iodine
atoms present. As previously stated, T4 has four iodine atoms present, while T3 has three iodine atoms present. The end result of
iodine deficiency is severe. It can include a poorly functioning thyroid gland, goiter, increased autoimmune thyroid problems, and
an increased risk of thyroid cancer.
Thyroid hormone is essential for normal brain development of the newborn. Since iodine is necessary for the production of
thyroid hormone, an iodine-deficient state may predispose the newborn to abnormal brain development. In children, iodine
deficiency can result in mental retardation, goiter, lowered IQ, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and autism.
Furthermore, fetal iodine deficiency is associated with
increased rates of stillbirth, abortion, and congenital anomaly.
6
 The World
Health Organization stated that iodine deficiency is the single greatest cause of preventable mental retardation.
7
 Research has
found almost a 50% increase in perinatal mortality due to iodine deficiency.
8
 When iodine deficiency is rectified, neonatal
mortality has been shown to decline by over 50%.
9

10
Many studies have shown that children who live in iodine-deficient areas have lower IQ’s as compared to children living in
iodine-sufficient areas. A large analysis comparing children in iodine-deficient and iodine-sufficient areas showed a 13.5 point
difference in IQ score.
11
Janet, age 57, had been treated for hypothyroidism for two years. She was found to be deficient in iodine and given a
therapeutic trial of a combination of iodine and iodide (Iodoral
®
). I asked her to write a letter to me about her
experience with iodine. She wrote the following letter:
“After taking Armour
®
 thyroid for over two years, I began to feel somewhat sluggish and felt that perhaps I needed
more thyroid hormone. Dr. Brownstein told me to take two tablets of iodine (Iodoral
®
–25mg) with my thyroid medicine. It
has been over five months since I began the iodine treatment and I still feel the perkiness everyday that I have been
looking for. In fact, I started to feel better the first day that I took the iodine. The
iodine certainly was needed. I am just
thrilled about how much better I feel.”
WHAT ABOUT IODIZED SALT?
As mentioned in
Chapter 2
, iodine was added to iodized salt over 70 years ago to combat goiter and cretinism. The RDA to
combat these illnesses was established (150ug/day) with one goal in mind: prevent goiter and cretinism. The RDA for iodine has
been successful at combating goiter and cretinism; however, the RDA is woefully inadequate in preventing many other thyroid
disorders including hypothyroidism, Graves’ disease, Hashimoto’s disease, and thyroid cancer. Furthermore, the RDA for iodine
fails to provide optimal amounts of iodine for the rest of the body’s iodine needs. Finally, our increasing exposure to toxic
halogens—bromide, fluoride, and chlorine derivatives—have markedly increased our iodine requirements. Other illnesses
associated with iodine deficiency (e.g., breast cancer, fibrocystic breast disease) are covered in other chapters.
HOW COMMON ARE THYROID PROBLEMS?Thyroid illnesses are found at ever increasing numbers. Recent studies have estimated that 10% of the adult population of the
United States (13 million) may have laboratory evidence of thyroid disease.
12
 I have written in my book,
Overcoming Thyroid


	bodies	separated	in	time	and	space.	A	life	span	occupies
a	limited	number	of	years	between	two	absolute	events,	birth	and	death.
The
laws
	obeyed	in	this	dimension	are	strict.	Gravity,	the	speed	of	light,
and	the	conservation	of	matter	and	energy	(which	can	be	neither	created	nor
destroyed)	form	the	foundation	of	every	other	natural	law.
If	this	is	your	primary	world,	you	have	certain
powers
	that	allow	you	to
explore	it.	These	include	physical	strength,	willpower,	reason,	emotional
expression,	sexuality,	and	personal	authority.	To	the	extent	that	you	use	these
powers	fully,	you	will	be	more	and	more	successful.	At	the	same	time,	you
are	more	likely	to	become	attached	to	this	dimension	of	consciousness	as	the
only	reality.
In	this	world	Akasha	feels	like	physical	space	filled	with	an	infinity	of
material	things.
The
soul
	feels	personal	but	is	seen	only	in	short	glimpses.
2.
Consciousness	of	subtle	objects:
	This	is	the	world	of	dreams,	imagination,
and	inspiration	in	all	its	many	forms.	We	verify	this	world	through	intuition,
detecting	qualities	like	love	and	beauty,	feeling	a	subtle	presence	within	and
without	that	is	not	available	to	the	five	senses.	A	life	span	in	this	dimension
lasts	as	long	as	it	can	be	imagined.
The
laws
	of	the	subtle	world	are	fluid.	Events	can	happen	forward	or
backward.	Invisible	structures	may	persist	for	a	long	time	(for	example,	as
myths	and	archetypes),	but	even	then,	time	doesn’t	bind	them	as	strictly	as	in
the	physical	world.	Gravity	and	the	speed	of	light	are	no	longer	absolutes.
If	this	is	your	primary	world,	you	will	have	certain
powers
	that	allow	you
to	explore	it.	These	include	imagination,	memory,	artistic	ability,	spiritual
sensitivity,	healing	abilities,	and	intuition.	The	more	you	exercise	these
powers,	the	more	successful	you	will	be.	However,	you	may	also	find
yourself	detached	from	the	physical	world	and	unable	to	navigate	it	as	well	as
someone	without	intuition	and
spiritual
	sensitivity.	This	will	worry	you	until
you	discover	that	the	subtle	world	is	capable	of	supporting	you.
Akasha	feels	dreamlike,	filled	with	memories	and	images,	archetypes	and
gods,	spirits	and	etheric	beings.
The
soul
	feels	like	a	guiding	force	leading	back	to	the	source.	It	is	sensedconstantly.
3.
Pure	consciousness:
	This	is	the	world	of	awareness	being	aware	of
itself.	There	are	no	objects,	gross	or	subtle.	We	verify	this	world	through	“I
am.”	Existence	becomes	its	own	end,	its	own	reward.	As	an	experience,	pure
consciousness	begins	with	a	silent	mind;	this	grows	in	richness	and	meaning
the	longer	a	person	has	the	experience.
The
laws
	of	this	world	apply	to	creation	itself.	The	seeds	of	every	object
and	event	gestate	here.	Here	is	the	possibility	of	time,	space,	and	physical
things.	There	is	also	the	possibility	of	mind,	as	yet	without	thought	or	images.
Although	totally	free	of	anything	visible,	pure	consciousness	is	eager	to	give
birth;	mystics	tell	us	it	is	pregnant	with	All	That	Is.
If	this	is	your	primary	world,	you	need	no	powers	to	navigate	it.	The	flow
of	time	and	the	expansion	of	space	are	neutral	events	to	you;	they	come	and
go	within	your	being.	You	witness	them	without	attachment,	although	if	you
wish,	you	can	call	upon	any	quality—love,	compassion,	strength,	truth—and
experience	it	in	fullness.
In	this	world	Akasha	feels	uncreated.	Concepts	like	birth	and	death,	life
and	death,	have	no	relevance.	There	is	only	existence.	To	be	is	an	all-
enveloping	experience.
It	must	always	be	kept	in	mind	that	the	afterlife	is	not	as	“after”	as	we
assume.	All	three	dimensions	of	consciousness	are	ever-present	space.
Akasha	enclosing	the	world	of	physical	objects	is	three-dimensional.	Our
eyes	can	survey	the	landscape	to	tell	us	where	we	are.	Up	and
down
	are	fixed
directions	to	orient	us	physically.	Before	and	after	are	fixed	points	in	time	to
orient	us	as	to	where	we	are	in	our	lifetimes.
Akasha	enclosing	the	world	of	subtle	objects	has	much	vaguer	boundaries.
These	can	change	in	an	instant	to	freefloating	dream-space.	In	the	absence	of
fixed	dimensions,	experience	is	measured	in	terms	of	intensity.	Emotions	are
heightened,	dreams	become	more	vivid,	and	the	presence	of	angels	and	other
etheric	entities	is	felt	directly.	With	experience	this	becomes	a	comfortable
space	on	its	own	terms,	as	it	already	is	for	artists,	intuitives,	and	deeply
spiritual	people.
Akasha	enclosing	itself	is	pure	existence.	It	feels	incredibly	secure
because	there	is	unity	with	everything.	Any	experience	comes	from	within,	a
single	point	from	which	creation	emanates	like	an	energy	beam	or	a	flower
opening	infinitely.
The
soul
	is	impersonal.	It	is	Being,	with	no	added	qualities.
Shifting	Your	Allegiance
So	far,	we’ve	used	the	metaphor	of	a	journey	to	describe	what	happens	in	theafterlife.	Most	people	expect	to	give	up	the	physical	world	for	a	“higher”
world.	The	Vedic	rishis	would	point	out	that	the	real	shift	is	one	of	allegiance.
When	we	die	we	give	up	our	allegiance	to	“consciousness	filled	with	physical
objects”	and	move	on	to	“consciousness	filled	with	subtle	objects.”	In
Vedanta	this	is	what	going	to	heaven	actually	means.
A	shift	of	allegiance	looks	easy	from	the	perspective	of	the	rishis.
However,	it	proves	terribly	difficult	for	most	people,	East	and	West,	because
the	physical	world	is	so	convincing.	Doubt	arises	when	we	think	about	the
other	world,	despite	the	fact	that	we	inhabit	it	in	our	dreams	all	the	time.	A
perfect	example	of	such	doubt	and	the	anxiety	it	brings	is	Shakespeare’s
Hamlet.
In	Hamlet’s	most	famous	soliloquy,	“To	be	or	not	to	be,”	he	wonders
whether	he	should	commit	suicide	in	the	face	of	overwhelming	misery.	He
cannot	bring	himself	to	obey	his	father’s	ghost	and	kill	the	usurper	to	the
throne,	his	uncle	Claudius.	He	is	trapped	by	agony,	and	undone	by	many
things—his	conscience,	his	sense	of	cowardice	and	failure,	his	disgust	with
his	mother’s	sexual	betrayal,	and	a	depth	of	depression	bordering	on	madness.
Even	though	committing	suicide	would	end	his	suffering,	Hamlet	pauses	to
reason	out	things	logically,	breaking	down	the	problem	as	the	rational	mind	is
used	to	doing.
…	To	die,	to	sleep;
To	sleep;	perchance	to	dream:	ay,	there’s	the	rub;
For	in	that	sleep	of	death	what	dreams	may	come
,
When	we	have	shuffled	off	this	mortal	coil
,
Must	give	us	pause
.
Leaving	aside	the	greatness	of	the	poetry,


 If they don’t get what they want, they suffer to a greater or
lesser extent. Fortunately, you do not have to live this way. There is a much
higher way to live life. But it requires that you change how you interact with
your mind and with the life unfolding before you.
To understand this transformation, let’s first take a look at how you
even decided what you want and don’t want. If you pay attenti on, you will
see that your past experiences determine your preferences. You didn’ t just
make it all up from scratch—your views, opinions, and preferences are
formulated based on data from your past. For example, let’s say you are
totally secure in your love relati onship until you hear that your friends had a
breakup, and they are miserable. All of a sudden you start worrying about
your own relatio nship. You were fine before you heard about your friends,
but now you’re not. You stored the concept of a breakup inside  your mind,
even though it really had nothing to do with you. Y ou took it personally.Is it possible to process the information without it getting stuck in your
mind? Of course it is. Your friends had a problem, and they shared it with
you. It came into your mind, passed through your consciousness, and you
experienced the feeling of compassion. The interaction actually made you a
greater being. You were able to fully absorb the reality of life without it
getting stuck in your mind. If you want to recall it later, you can willfully
restore it from memory in all its glory. But it will not keep coming back up
by itself. Since it did not get stuck in the conscious mind, or shoved into the
subconscious, it will not advers ely affect your life. It actually made you a
better person because you were able to handle the experience.
On the other hand, if you were not able to process the experience
without resistin g it, it will stay stuck in the conscious mind and create
havoc. If you really resist it, it will get shoved down into the subconscious
where it will fester and spread its disturbance throughout the mind. In either
case, you are storing what you are afraid of in your mind. If you do this, you
will be afraid of your own thoughts. How could you not be? You made a
collection of unpleasant thoughts in your mind, and they are going to keep
coming back up. Now, in order to live in there, the analytical aspect of mind
must be utilized  to figure out what needs to happen outside for you to be
okay. This is where preferences come from. They are simply attempts to use
outside events to solve the fact that you are not doing well inside. This
results in the constant practice of judging everything that’s unfolding based
on your preferences.
It’s easy to see why people don’t agree with each other. Nobo dy else
has had the experiences that came in through your eyes. What you have
inside your mind is completely different from what others have  inside their
minds. It can’t be otherwise because the data in your mind came from the
experiences you had. Nobody else had those experiences, not even close—
not your spouse, your children, or your friends. Not only were your past
experiences different, but you processed them differently. We can certainly
force ourselves to conform to other ways of thinking in order to gain
acceptance, but that just makes living inside all the more complicated. You
not only have your default way of thinking resulting from your stored past
impressions, but now you must suppress parts of that in order to conform to
the “group” mindset. No wonder it gets messy in there!
You are holding  all that persona l stuff inside your mind—the good, the
bad, and the ugly. The inevitable result is that if the moment in front of youhappens to align well with your stored patterns, you feel great. You feel
open, excited, and enthused. If it doesn’ t align well with your stored
patterns, you get upset. You immediately close, get defensive,  and maybe
even get depressed. Now we’re back to the question we asked earlier,
“What’ s it like living in there? ” Sometimes it’s nice; sometimes it’s not.
Sometimes it’s heaven; sometimes it’s hell. This is why. It is not because
God made it that way. You did this. You were given free will, and what you
did with your free will was make a mess out of your mind. Instead of being
in awe that the moment in front of you even exists, you fight with it to make
it match what you want.Chapter 17.
Serve Mind or Fix It
All your prefere nces exist  because you stored experiences from the past
inside your personal mind. This makes it dif ficult to live in there, but instead
of fixing it, you double down and try to satisfy your preferences. “I want to
feel good, and the way to feel good is by getting the house I want.” “The
way to feel good is by owning the car I’ve always wanted.” “The way to
feel good is by finding a better relationship—this one’s not doing it for me.”
These attempts to compensate for your blockages are, at best, short lived
because you are not actually getting rid of the blockages.
The foundationa l choice we have in life is either constantly contr ol life
to compensate for our blockages or devote our lives to getting rid of our
blockages.  The fact is we stored these samskaras inside. We shouldn’ t have,
but we did. Now instead of getting rid of them, we expect the world to adapt
to them. We know it’s not going  to happen by itself, so we use the personal-
thoughts layer of mind to analyze how the world needs to be to match what
we want. We’re brilliant at figuring out how to make someone become
attracted to us, or to change things so they better fit our limitati ons. Almost
everything we do is governed by this personal-thoughts layer of mind. It is
the same analytical power of mind that Einstein used to see E = mc2, but
you’re using it to figure out what to do if someone’ s talking badly about
you. This entire layer of mind  intellectualizes and analyzes your stored
patterns to try to figure out how the world needs to be so that when it comes
in, it will feel good and never feel bad.
That is why you tend to have so much trouble making decisions.
You’re trying to figure out how each choice will make you feel later.
“Where do I want to live? Should I change jobs? I need to figure this out.”
You’re trying to mentally conce ptualize how the proposed action will match
the patterns you’ve stored inside. You don’t even think twice about it. “Ofcourse that’s what I’m doing. What else would I do?” How about live in
reality and enjoy the moments that are unfolding in front of you? That’ s
what else you can do. Use your mind to be creative, inspiring, and do great
things. Don’ t let the mind always be thinking about itself and what it wants.
Learn to enjoy life as it is—instead of limiting the ways you can enjoy it to
serve your past impressions.
The self-centered, analyzing layer of mind is the worst. It is the model
you build about how everything and everybody needs to be for you to feel
okay, including the weather tomorrow. “It better not rain tomorrow, I’m
going camping.” Now you’re getting upset about the weather! You have no
control over the weather, yet it’s bothering you. It’s not just the weather. The
driver in front of you is going ten miles per hour below the speed limit.
Let’s watch your mind: “This is ridiculous. I don’t have time for this.
What’ s wrong with them? They’re supposed to be in the slow lane.” Turns
out the problem is not how the person in front of you is driving. The
problem is what your mind is doing about how the person in front of you is
driving. Eventua lly you catch on that you’ve developed an entire  intellectual
model of how every single thing needs to be: how people should behave,
how your spouse  should be dressed when you’re going out, even how much
traffic there should be. How many things do you do this about? Pretty much
every single thing. You honestly believe that what you made up is how it
should be. The truth of the matter is, that’s absurd. There is no way what
you made up in your head, based upon your very limited past experiences,
has anything to do with what’ s supposed to be happening in the real world.
Think about it for a moment. What you want the weather to be has
nothing to do with what it’s going to be. The weather has to do with
meteorology, not your preference system. If you really want to know why it
had to rain on your day off, go study science. A wise person realizes that the
world is not going to unfold the way they want it to because it’s not
supposed to. No two of us agree how it’s supposed to unfold, yet there’ s
only one world out there. We best leave reality to either science or God, not
to every one’s individual prefer ences. The world in front of you has the
power of reality  behind it. It is unfolding in accordance to the influences
that made it be the way


knows w hy our  bodies evolved to have receptors for psych edelics,
given how rarely they must h ave been encountered by our remote
ancestors.) But the main research on psychedelics seems to
indicate that these substances reduce DMN activity, shutting it
down temporarily. In tandem with this shutting down, the person
taking the drug feels his ego dissolve, together with the normal
experience of mind, body, an d world. This underscores the point
that mi nd, body, brain, and w orld are highly malleable in human
perception. We  are entangled in the process of holding the m intact
every w aking moment, and psychedelics abruptly and r adically
loosen our grip.
For Pollan, the experience was a revelation. He cam e to
recognize “the tenuousness and relativity of my own default
consciousness.” His thorough, objective investigation, which
involved taking a gamut of mind-altering drugs but also delving
into eve ry nook and cranny of medical research, led him  to hope
that their use w ould extend to normal healthy people (although he
retained a sensible fear of bad trips). He wanted the psychedelic
journey to be considered more than a “drug experience.” In his
view, th e first step should be  obtaining the guidance of someonewho could explain the meaning of a trip after it was over, if it had
a meaning (not everyone agrees that it does).

Where does that leave us? N o one really knows, and resp ected
scientific journals routinely turn down research papers on
psychedelics. Pollan’s book should be read to get the c omplete
story about the future promise of these substances. Particularly
intriguing is the use of “micro-dosing,” in which tiny amounts of a
psychedelic are taken on an everyday basis, enough to loosen the
grip of the DMN but not alt ering normal thinking. The hope is
that, instead of altering the mind in a drastic, trippy way, micro-
dosing will permit self-aware ness to observe and reflect upon new
possibilities that a person cannot access under normal conditions.
There’s no doubt, from a meta viewpoint, that psychedelics
weaken or dissolve the mental constructs that keep virtual reality
intact. Some people feel that tripping has tapped into Mind at
Large. T his sounded highly desirable to Huxley, who was an early
champion of  guided psychedelic trips into expanded
consciousness; this was his ultimate goal. To become respectable,
psychedelics h ad to get pas t their hippie image, however, and
brain scans proved to be the key. But the respectability  lent by
brain scans also contains a flaw.
To a neuroscientist, the DMN is like the adult in the room, a
brain region that keeps our  wilder, more primitive impulses at
bay. Thus a sp ecialized group of cells has taken over th e exact
function that Freud assigned to the ego. It is typical of our age that
psychiatry is highly dependent on pharmaceuticals to combat
anxiety and depression, re placing years of expensive, time-
consuming talk therapy. As psychiatry has become a matter of
shifting aroun d molecules in the brain, so has everyth ing else
about th e mind. But the notio n that “brain creates mind” i s just as
fallacious here as elsewhere.
The fallacy crops up glaringly  in the DMN, because if it in deed
controls the balancing act tha t is the adult mind, who gave it such
ability? How did it learn ab out the benefits of adulthood in the
first pla ce? Th e first answer that comes to mind is that th e DMNarose a s a survival mechanism, but there’s no proof of this—it’s
just a blanket generalization from the stock-in-trade of
Darwinians. C ountless peop le function well in society without
bothering to grow into mature adults.
Researchers treat the DMN as if it were a conscious agent with
flexible intentions and good judgment. Attributing such q ualities
to b rain cells i s a form of magical thinking. Clumps of ch emicals
don’t understand how life works; only consciousness does.
After trying a number of different drugs, Michael Pollan had his
most profound experience without them. He was shown how to go
into a trance state simply through breathing rapidly and l istening
to rh ythmic drumming. His r eaction: “Where in the world has that
been all my life?” It was in Mind at Large.
All drug s have side effects, so me of them unpredictable, but the
pitfalls of psychedelics are unique. If you go inside and mess
around with a piano’s strings, music starts to come out sounding
distorted. To go into the mo st sensitive areas of the higher brain
incurs a similar risk, but my point isn’t to sound alarms g rounded
in fe ar and suspicion—quite the opposite. Mind at Large contains
the full range o f human potential, and it can be accessed n aturally
through yoga, meditation, and various contemplative p ractices.
These p ractices also bring beneficial brain changes, accom plishing
this thr ough th e most natural of mechanisms: the mind learning
to know itself.
The tim e for psychedelics to come out of the shadows is now,
giving u s a balanced picture  of what is at stake and also at risk.
The sud den feeling that we c an fly turns out to be a fatal delusion
if we test it by jumping off a high building, as has happened more
than on ce. The  insights that dawn during a trip often turn out to
be unin telligible on returning  to a normal waking state. The bigger
picture goes beyond psychedelics. Pollan encourages “neural
diversity” in the epilogue to his book. But, for me, the mind-
altering effect of LSD bears fruit only if it leads to self-aw areness.
A dr ug can sho w you what lie s beyond the limited mind; o nly self-
awareness allows you to inhabit Mind at Large permanently.
The opposite of self-awareness is the mechanistic view that a
human being is a brain pupp et, a subordinate of neural activity.Insofar as psychedelics have medical uses, we should cheer them
on. But  Huxley ’s insight that Mind at Large is the real is sue still
holds true.
What separates us from Mind at Large—or metareality—is the
thinnest of veils. It takes only the merest thought. I found this out
recently when I was doing t he tree pose with a yoga instructor.
The tree pose requires delicate balance on one foot, and I’ve gotten
better at it, but suddenly that morning I began to wobble.
Immediately the instructor said, “What were you thinking about?”
It was the right question to a sk, because I had lost my clear, open
state o f mind as a result of a distracting thought (ab out the
medical benefits of psychede lics, as it happens). It takes a clear,
open state of mind, uncluttered by random thoughts, to do a lot
more in life tha n holding a yo ga pose. Such clarity is what Mind at
Large feels like. It is what freedom feels like. It is the door to
metahuman.
In Part Two, we’ll make everything personal by showing how
each person can experience the shift to Mind at Large. A c ollective
awakening is made possible only when individuals wake up—and
nothing is more urgent. As  a bridge, let me undersco re how
extraordinary waking up is, and how unpredictable.
Waking up makes us more h uman and more real at the same
time, because we are the species of consciousness destined—and
designed—to know our sour ce completely. If a single vision can
unite the human race, this is it.T7

P U T T I N G  E X P E R I E N C E  F I R S T
he punch line to an old jo ke has gotten embedded in
popular cultur e. As I first heard it, the joke involves a lost city
slicker stopping his car on a country lane to ask a farmer how to
get to a certa in town. The farmer scratches his head with a
bewildered loo k and says, “Sorry, mister, but you can’t g et there
from here.”
Why does the joke make us laugh? The humor is rooted in the
fact that you can get anywhere on the map from anywhere else.
But if the city slicker had asked the farmer how to get to
metareality, he ’d have gotten the same answer, only this time it
wouldn’t be funny—at least not to me.
You cannot get to metareality by clinging to virtual reality. The
reason for this has been ex pressed in various ways ever since
Homo sapiens  rea lized that th ere is a dimension of life beyond the
everyday. Being stuck in virtual reality is like being under a
hypnotic spell,  and we can’t break the spell as long as it has us in
its grip—there  is no hypnotist standing by who can s nap his
fingers and break the spell  for us. Or we are like dreamers
captivated by the dream’s illusions, and we cannot wake up


),	and	in	fact,	nutrition	begins	to
decline.	Some	foods	deteriorate	more	quickly	than	others,	but	the	point	is
that	you	want	to	eat	your	food	as	soon	after	harvesting	as	possible.	The
more	the	food	sits	around	(during	harvesting,	storage,	transportation	and
distribution),	the	more	nutrition	it	will	lose.
•
Unprocessed	foods,
minimally	altered	from	the	way	that	nature	provides.
Avoid	foods	that	are	cooked,	peeled,	cut,	ground,	dehydrated,	frozen,
canned,	etc.	Unprocessed	foods	are	whole,	complete	foods,	rather	than	justpart	of	a	food	(whole	grains	instead	of	flour	made	from	grains,	for	example,
or	potatoes	with	the	peel	still	on).
Because	we	cannot	all	revert	to	hunting,	gathering,	growing	our	own	food	and
eating	it	fresh	and	raw,	we	must	learn	to	evaluate	the	foods	that	are	available	to
us	and	make	choices	that	are	both	healthy	and	realistic.	We	must	take	the	“black
and	white”	nutritional	knowledge	outlined	above	and	apply	it	to	our	lives	in	the
best	shade	of	gray	that	we	can.
Poisoned	in	the	Nursery
Much	of	the	nutrition	trouble	we	face	begins	before	food	leaves	commercial
farms.	Modern	agricultural	practices	and	chemicals	(such	as	chemical	fertilizers,
insecticides,	herbicides	and	fungicides)	produce	ever-increasing	quantities	of
food,	but	the	chemicals	reduce	the	nutritional	quality	of	the	food	and	deplete	the
soil	of	nutrients	needed	to	produce	future	quality	crops.
Chemical	fertilizers,	which	are	supposed	to	put	nutrients	into	the	soil,	actually
end	up	causing	nutrients	to	be	removed	from	the	soil.	The	most	common
chemical	fertilizers,	which	support	high	food	production,	add	three	major
nutrients	to	the	soil:	nitrogen,	phosphorous	and	potassium.	But	the	plants	require
many	other	nutrients	absorbed	from	the	soil,	such	as	zinc,	calcium,	magnesium,
selenium,	germanium,	chromium,	manganese,	nickel	and	molybdenum.
Chemical	fertilizers	do	not	supply	these	nutrients.	By	not	replacing	these
nutrients	and	by	growing	more	food	on	the	same	land	year	after	year	after	year,
critical	nutrients	continually	are	lost	from	the	soil,	leading	to	nutrient-deficient
soil,	nutrient-deficient	crops,	nutrient-deficient	farm	animals	and	nutrient-
deficient	human	beings.
In	her	1976	book
The	Living	Soil,
Lady	Eve	Balfour	describes	an	eighteen-
year	experiment	on	three	farms	with	similar	soil	profiles.	One	of	the	farms	was
managed	organically,	one	chemically,	and	the	third,	a	mixture	of	the	two.	During
this	eighteen-year	study,	the	soil	on	the	organic	farm	was	found	to	have	the
highest	mineral	content.	Not	coincidentally,	the	dairy	herd	on	that	farm	was
healthier,	produced	more	milk	and	had	higher	reproductive	capacity.
The	use	of	chemical	fertilizers	triggers	a	series	of	problems	as	plants	struggle
to	cope	with	deficient	soils	and	toxic	attacks.	Plants	grown	in	nutrient-deficient
soils	are	less	healthy	and	more	vulnerable	to	insects,	molds,	fungi,	viruses,
bacteria	and	weeds.	The	susceptibility	leads	to	the	use	of	other	agricultural
chemicals,	such	as	pesticides,	herbicides	and	fungicides,	to	protect	sick	plants.
These	toxic	chemicals	create	“dead	soils,”	killing	not	only	the	undesirableorganisms	but	also	the	helpful	organisms	(earthworms,	insects,	bacteria	and
fungi)	that	are	responsible	for	taking	minerals	out	of	the	soil	and	converting
them	into	forms	that	plants	can	use.	When	these	bacteria	and	fungi	are	killed,	the
plants	no	longer	receive	adequate	nutrition.
Insecticides,	fungicides	and	herbicides	accumulate	in	the	soil	to	a	level	where
they	inhibit	plant	growth.	These	poor	growing	conditions	have	spurred	the
development	of	new	kinds	of	plants,	such	as	hybrid	and	genetically	modified
crops.
In	creating	genetically	modified	plants,	which	humankind	has	never	eaten
before,	we	may	have	(unknowingly)	altered	the	nutritional	value	of	the	plants,	as
well	as	made	them	more	toxic	or	allergenic.	More	and	more	genetically	modified
foods	are	contaminating	the	food	supply	with	novel	and	unnatural	varieties	of
organisms.	(See	chapter	9	for	more	information.)
Shelves	Stocked	with	Old	Food
I	can	remember,	as	a	child	on	my	uncle’s	farm,	picking	ripe	apples	from	the
trees	and	eating	them	then	and	there.	I	can	remember	harvesting	fresh	peas,
strawberries	and	sweet	corn	from	our	own	garden	and	eating	them	raw	within
minutes	of	harvesting.	Not	only	do	fresh	foods	taste	better;	they	are	substantially
better	for	health.	Much	of	the	food	purchased	in	a	standard	supermarket	today	is
old.	Presumably	fresh	produce	such	as	apples,	oranges	and	cucumbers	are	put	in
cold	storage	and	can	be	anywhere	from	months	to	years	old.	Supermarket	eggs
are	commonly	anywhere	from	six	weeks	to	six	months	old,	and	they	still	can	be
labeled	as	“fresh.”
Food	is	reasonably	hardy,	but	nutrients	are	not.	Nutrients	are	quite	fragile	and
are	destroyed	by	heat,	light,	oxygen	and	overly	long	storage.	The	most	fragile
vitamins	are	C,	B
1
and	B5.	Unless	you	grow	food	yourself	or	obtain	it	freshly
harvested	from	a	local	farmer,	it’s	likely	the	food	does	not	have	the	nutrition	you
think	it	has.
Irradiated	foods	may	be	years	old	before	you	eat	them	and	thus	completely
devoid	of	vitamins.	Fruits	and	vegetables	undergo	substantial	destruction	of
nutrients	in	modern	cold	storage.	In
The	Kellogg	Report,
Dr.	Joseph	Beasley
offered	examples	of	the	nutritional	loss	that	occurs	after	harvesting:
•	Spinach	and	asparagus	lose	50	to	70	percent	of	their	folic	acid	when	kept
at	room	temperature	for	three	days.
•	Vegetables	such	as	asparagus,	broccoli	and	green	beans	typically	lose	50percent	of	their	vitamin	C	before	they	reach	the	produce	counter.
•	Potatoes	lose	as	much	as	78	percent	of	their	vitamin	C	during	long-term
storage	at	36°F.
•	Blanching	of	vegetables	prior	to	freezing	can	destroy	up	to	half	of	the
vitamins.
•	Freezing	meat	can	destroy	up	to	70	percent	of	its	vitamins.
Commercial,	make-believe	foods	lack	nutrients	not	only	because	of	losses
after	harvest,	but	also	because	food	is	frequently	harvested	before	it	is	ripe.	This
practice	may	be	necessary	for	our	modern	distribution	system	(to	bring	food	to
the	consumer	before	it	rots),	but	early	harvesting	also	reduces	nutrition.	The
ripening	process	is	critical	to	develop	the	full	vitamin	and	mineral	content	of	a
food;	vitamin	and	mineral	content	rise	near	the	peak	of	ripeness.	Also,	flavor


 mountain ranges provided large herds of grazing wild animals of the deer family. Because
of the vastness of the population and the extent to which all available land surfaces were utilized for
agriculture, it does not seem possible that wild animal life could have been an adequate source of
nutrition. The members of the camel family, the llamas, alpacas, and vicunas were utilized for food.
Of these the first two were used to considerable extent as they are today. When it is recognized
that in the Sierra the available water is largely that provided to the streams from the melting snows
and from rains in the rainy season, it will be realized that these sources of fresh water could not
provide the liberal quantity of iodine essential for human growth and development. It was,
accordingly, a matter of great interest to discover that these Indians used regularly dried fish eggs
from the sea. Commerce in these dried foods is carried on today as it no doubt has been for
centuries. When I inquired of them why they used this material they explained that it was necessary
to maintain the fertility of their women. I was informed also that every exchange depot and market
carried these dried fish eggs so that they were always available. Another sea product of very great
importance, and one which was universally available was dried kelp. Upon inquiry I learned that
the Indians used it so that they would not get "big necks" like the whites. The kelp provided a very
rich source of iodine as well as of copper, which is very important to them in the utilization of iron
for building an exceptionally efficient quality of blood for carrying oxygen liberally at those high
altitudes. An important part of their dietary consists today as in the past of potatoes which are
gathered and frozen, dried and powdered, and preserved in the powdered form. This powder is
used in soups with llama meat and other products. Since the vitamin D group of activators is
absent from nearly all plant products but must be synthesized in animal bodies from the plant
foods, where it is largely stored in organs, an adequate source had to be provided. The Indians of
the highlands of Peru maintained colonies of guinea pigs which were used in their stews. The
ancient burials also show that the guinea pig was a common source of food since mummified
bodies of this animal were found. This is significant since of all the animals that are used for
experimental work the guinea pig is probably the most efficient in synthesizing vitamin D from plant
foods. They are very hardy. They live on a great variety of green plant foods and twigs and are
very prolific. They apparently played a very important part in the physical excellence of the ancient
cultures.
    It is unfortunate that as the white man has come into contact with the primitives in various parts
of the world he has failed to appreciate the accumulated wisdom of the primitive racial stocks.
Much valuable wisdom has been lost by this means. I have referred to the skill of the Indians in
preventing scurvy and to the many drugs that we use which the white man has learned of from the
primitives.
    In this connection the Indians of British Columbia, who have been so efficient in preventing
scurvy, have a plant product for the prevention and cure of diabetes. This has recently become7/29/13 Nutrition and Physical Degeneration
gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200251h.html#toc 160/250known to the white man through the experience of a patient who was brought into the hospital at
Prince Rupert, British Columbia, as reported in the Canadian Medical Journal, July 1938. Prince
Rupert is near the boundary between British Columbia and Alaska on the coast. The patient came
to that hospital for an operation and suddenly showed signs of diabetes, which required treatment
with large doses of insulin. Dr. Richard Geddes Large asked him regarding the history of his
affection and what he had been taking. He was told that for several years he had been using an
Indian preparation which was a hot water infusion of a root of devil's-club which is a spiny, prickly
shrub. This medicine was in common use by the British Columbia Indians. The material was
obtained and used in this hospital for the treatment of diabetes and was found to be quite as
efficient as insulin and had the great advantage that it would be taken by mouth whereas the insulin
which is destroyed in the stomach by the process of digestion must be injected. They could see
very little difference in the efficiency of this preparation whether taken internally or used
hypodermically. This promises to be a great boon to a large group of individuals suffering from
diabetes. It is also probable that its use will prevent the development of diabetes and since the
Indians used it for other affections it may also become a very important adjunct in modern
preventive medicine.
    One of the sources that I have found to be helpful in studying primitive races is an investigation
of knapsacks. I have asked for the privilege of seeing what is carried in their knapsacks. I found
dried fish eggs and dried kelp in the knapsacks in the high Andes. It is also of interest that among
this group in the Andes, among those in central Africa, and among the Aborigines of Australia,
each knapsack contained a ball of clay, a little of which was dissolved in water. Into this they
dipped their morsels of food while eating. Their explanation was to prevent "sick stomach." This is
the medicine that is used by the native in these countries for combating dysentery and food
infections. It is the treatment that was given me when I developed dysentery infection in central
Africa while making studies there. The English doctor in Nairobi whom I called in said he would
give me the native treatment of a suspension of clay. It proved very effective. An illustration of the
way in which modern science is siowiy adopting practices that have been long in use among
primitive races, is to be found in the recent extensive use that is made of clay (kaolin) in our
modern medicine. This is illustrated in the following: (3)
   In the course of an expedition to Lake Titicaca, South America, financed by the Percy Slade
Trustees in which one of us (H.P.M.) took part, an interesting observation was made in regard to
the diet of the Quetchus Indians on the Capachica Peninsula near Puno. These people are
almost certainly descendants of the Incas and at the present time live very primitively. They
exist largely on a vegetable diet of which potatoes form an important part. Immediately, before
being eaten, the potatoes are dipped into an aqueous suspension of clay, a procedure which is
said to prevent "souring of the stomach."
   We have examined this clay and found it to consist of kaolin containing a trace of organic
material, possibly coumarin, and presumably a decomposition product of the grass from
underneath which the clay is dug. The local name for the clay is Chacco, and the Indians
distinguish between good and bad qualities. This dietetic procedure is universal among the
Indians of the Puno district, and is probably of very ancient origin.
    Such a practice by a primitive people would appear rather remarkable in view of the
comparatively recent introduction of kaolin into modern medicine as a protective agent for the
gastric and intestinal mucosa and as a remedy for bacterial infections of the gut.
    It is of interest that both the British and American Pharmacopeias have added kaolin to their list
during the last two decades.
    The Indians of the past buried, with their dead, foods to carry them on their journey. From an
examination of these one learns that in many respects the Indians living in the high Sierras are living
today very much as their ancestors did during past centuries. Items of importance now and in the
past are parched corn and parched beans which are nibbled as the people walk along carrying
their heavy burdens. Today these are the only foods eaten on many long journeys. We found the
parched beans pleasant to taste and very satisfying when we were hungry.
    The Indians of the Amazon Basin have had a history very different from either those of the high7/29/13 Nutrition and Physical Degeneration
gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200251h.html#toc 161/250Sierras of the Andes or those of the coastal region. The fact that vast areas of the Amazon Basin
have not only never been surveyed, but never even penetrated, indicates the nature of the isolation
of these groups. Very little progress has been made in the effort to conquer or modernize these
Indians. A few explorers have made expeditions into parts of the interior and have reported the
characteristics of the plant and animal life, as well as of the native races. Our sole contact was with
the tribe which came to the coffee plantation to assist in the gathering and the harvest of the coffee
beans. In Chapter 14 I have described these people in considerable detail. Since the Amazon
Basin has vast quantities of rain as well as abundant streams from the eastern watershed of the
Andes, the tribes live largely in tropical jungles where there is an abundance of water. They are
expert, accordingly, in the use of river crafts and in fishing for the various types of marine life.
Unlike the Indians of the high Andes or of the coast regions they are not agriculturists. They live on
wild native foods almost entirely. They are expert with the blow gun, with the bow and arrow and
in snaring with both nets and loops. They use very large quantities


 to admit that this was true.
“What we want is to pull your awareness back to a healthier level, to a
place where this disease is not so threatening. Ultimately, we would like
you to find the place where it does not even exist.”
Here he balked. “But it does exist; it is real. Are you asking me to be
blind to that fact? If I am panicked, it’s the leukemia that makes me feel that
way,” he protested. He began to become agitated. He had struggled to
remain comple tely in control of himself ever since his devastating
diagnosis. The prospect of changing his rigid, fearful stance was almost
more frightening to him than his illness. We moved quickly to reassure him.
Other kinds of medical treatments, either Ayurvedic or Western, wouldalways be at his disposal. We would stay in consultation with his own
physician and with top specialists in the Boston area. Without any treatment
for his inner self, however, we did not consider that any outside medical
treatment based on drugs or radiation went far enough.
In a serious or life-threatening illness, there can be many layers of
imbalance concealing the depths where healing exists. Each layer is like a
mask hiding the self from itself—one could spend a lifetime never
suspecting that the quantum mechanical body exists. Perfect health is a
reality at this deepest level, and it waits to be brought to the surface of life.
The beginning of perfection, we tell our patients, is to let go of
imperfection. For that, the Ayurvedic tradition has handed down many
techniques, both physical and mental, for the physician to use.
“If you can pierce the mask of disease and contact your inner self, even
for a few minutes a day, you will make tremendous strides toward healing,’ ’
Gerald was told. “No one can guarantee your recovery, but this view of
medicine is valid, and it works.”
Gerald greeted these statemen ts with a mixture of hopeful-ness and
skepticism. I am keenly aware of the vulnerability that patients  feel in this
situation. They are prone to severe attacks of anxiety and guilt. They
secretly wonder if they deserve their disease and therefore have unwittingly
caused it; they blame themselv es for not eating better, not visiting their
doctor often enough, or not living more healthfully in general; they curse
fate and yet beg it to reprieve them.
All of this anguish is unnecessary, and therefore, it does not have to be
attacked head-on. The simple truth is that when a disease occurs, it brings a
diseased reality with it, and the more serious the disease, the more distorted
our view of reality is likely to become. For anyone in the grip of a truly
debilitating illness, fear becomes dominant. That does not make it
inevitable, however. Fear is the scenery you see when you are in a sick
reality. If you change that reality, which is born inside yourself, the scenery
will change, too.“Tomorrow you can start the treatments,’ ’ Gerald was told after his
interview and initial physical. “You don’t have to believe in them—all you
have to do is experience them.”
He sat quietly. “I’ll try anythin g,” he finally said in a low voice. He
immediately checked into our Center. Considering all that he had been
through, it was no surprise that Gerald’ s initial blood test, taken that
afternoon, was dismal. His white count had soared to 52,000, well beyond
what he had been led to think of as the point of no return.
Several things happened next. As soon as he arrived at the Center, Gerald
was immersed in the routines for balancing the doshas that we covered in
chapter 5. He was diagnosed as a Pitta type and placed on a Pitta-pacifying
diet. Gerald’s diet was strong on salads, fruits, rice, bread, and cold dishes,
low on fats and salt, with an emphasis on sweet taste, all of which help
relieve Pitta.
He learned meditation the first morning at the Center and began to
meditate twice a day, just before breakfast and dinner. As a physician,
Gerald was surprised by his surroundings. The Center is set in a very
nourishing and life-supporting atmosphere. There is nothing conventionally
medical about it. There is no somberness in the air, no antiseptic smells, no
stark critical-care units with constantly beeping monitors.
Ayurveda encourages a natural  setting, preferably a beautiful one, for
recuperation. The five senses are constantly feeding signals to your
quantum mechanical body, and each signal gets metaboliz ed by you,
entering your storehouse of sights, sounds, smells, and so on. If what the
senses see, hear, touch, and smell reminds you of sickness, then something
unhealthy is getting absorbed. How can you renew your realit y if you are
always subtly reminding yourself of the old one?
Gerald loved his long morning walks to the shore, but he was puzzled,
too. “I don’t see anything medic al going on here,” he protested from time to
time. We asked him simply to continue his treatment.The most active therapy Gerald underwent is called panchakarma
(Sanskrit for “the five actions” or “the five treatments”), an extensive
routine to purify the body of toxins that disease and improper diet have
deposited. In Western medicine we know that waste products are
continually build ing up in every  cell of the body. These residues, resulting
from oxidation caused by free radical molecules, are thought to play an
active role in causing DNA  to make mistakes (the cause of most cancers);
almost certainly these wastes impair cell function, lead to more rapid aging,
and ultim ately kill our cells. What is not understood is exact ly how this
debris gets into the cells. Ayurveda says that it is the litter that imbalanced
doshas leave behind, visible proof that some invisible process has gone
wrong.
The Ayurvedic sages lumped all such toxic residues under the term ama,
which they perceived as a foul-smelling, sticky, noxious substance that
needs to be evacuated from the body as thoroughly as possible. Some
purifying measures can be administered at home (as we will discuss later),
but full-scale panchakarma is a specialized treatment, involving medical
supervision as well as labor -intensive methods administered by Ayurvedic
technicians.
Panchakarma doesn’t push physical debris out of the cells, but it is said to
push out the excess doshas, along with the ama that “sticks” to them, using
the body’s own channels of evacuation (sweat glands, urinary tract,
intestines, and so on). From the patient’ s point of view, the daily massages
and oil baths are extremely pleasant and very relaxing; from the quantum
perspective, the channels that bring healing signals into our cells are being
cleaned and restored. Panchakarma, I repeat, is not a cancer treatment. It is
given to all patients in order to restore balance.
Within a day or two, Gerald felt the accumulated fatigue pouring out of
his syste m, as if years of exhau stion were being drained away. Usually a
driven and highly motivated person, he found he desperately needed long
hours of rest and sleep. When he mentioned this, we told him that letting go
of fatigu e was the same as letting go of stress. Fatigue is the shadow of old
stresses that build up in the nervous system. Being a doctor, Gerald was nostranger to stress, but his medical training denied that stress had anything to
do with his illness.
I explained to him that his cells were imprinted with the memory  of stress
and over time lose their ability to function perfectly. Loops of intelligence
get broken open, like disrupting an electrical circuit. The cell’s overall
intelligence weakens, and the final result is disease. In his case, the disease
was leukemia; it could have been thousands of other disorders. The point is
that the same intention applies to them all— restoring the body’ s own
intelligence.
A week after he arrived, Gerald was ready to return home, still convinced
that nothing medical had happened to him. In his final interview, he was
presented with the results of a blood test taken that morning. According to
the lab report, his white count had dropped by over 40 percent, from 52,000
to 28,00 0. He was astounded. This was a dramatic improvemen t. If Gerald
had been taking conventional chemotherapy, a reduction of 10,000 in his
counts over a few days would have been considered very encouraging.
Without any side effects, he felt healthier than he had in years, not just
since he had been diagnosed with leukemia. Another serious symptom of
his disease had disappeared entirely, the abnormal abundance of immature
white cells produced by the bone marrow of leukemia patients. The blood
smear taken on his first day had showed numerous abnormal  cells; now
there were none.
“This could be a fluke, couldn’ t it?” he asked. “The blood test can be
wrong.” But he knew that such routine tests are highly likely to be right—
he relies on them every day in his own practice.
THE POWER OF  AWARENESS
I believe the secret to Gerald’ s recovery was a change in his awareness.
He learned that there is more self-control in letting go than in trying to
control one’s body by


BLUEBERRIES,
STRAWBERRIES,
GRAPES,	AND
CHERRIES:
	All	delicious	bounty	from
nature,	these	tasty	fruits	contain	flavonoids	that	protect	your	blood	vessels	and
heart	from	cell-damaging	free	radicals.
CITRUS	FRUITS:
	Citrus	fruits	are	high	in	vitamin	C,	which	helps	to	prevent
plaque	buildup	in	your	arteries,	are	alkalizing	upon
metabolism	(see
this	page
for	more	discussion	on	this),	and	have	cleansing	properties	to	help	flush	out
your	system.	Lemons	are	forever	and	always	a	top	Radical	Beauty	fruit	with
many	versatile	uses.	Just	squeeze	them	into	water	or	use	them	as	a	base	for	salad
dressings.	Other	great	citrus	fruits	include	grapefruit,	limes,	oranges,	and
pomelos.	(Be	sure	to	seek	these	out	when	traveling	in
Asia	and
India,	where	they
are	natively	grown	and	extra	delicious.)
BEE	POLLEN:
	Besides	being	rich	in	protein,	antioxidants,	and	minerals,	bee
pollen	contains	a	compound	called	rutin,	which	is	an	antioxidant	bioflavonoid
that	has	been	found	to	strengthen	capillaries	and	blood	vessels	and	improve
circulation.	It	has	a	faint	honey	taste,	but	it’s	not	sweet	per	se.	The	best	place	to
source	it	is	from	a	local	beekeeper.	(Check	out	your	local	farmer’s	market.)
Store	extra	amounts	in	your	freezer.	Bee	pollen	is	a	great	addition	to	smoothies,
and	you	can	also	take	just	a	little	spoonful	of	it	plain	and	chew	well.	Note:	As
with	any	new	food,	be	sure	to	start	with	a	tiny	amount	first	to	see	how	your
body	reacts.	If	you	have	a	honey	or	pollen	allergy,	bee	pollen	may	not	be
suitable	for	you.AVOCADOS:
	Avocados	supply	skin-softening,	beautifying,	and	circulation-
supporting	monounsaturated	fats,	as	well	as	lots	of	folic	acid,	B	vitamins,	and
fiber.	All	of	this	will	help	support	healthy	blood	flow.
THE
GLOWING	GREEN	SMOOTHIE	(GGS)
Drinking	the	Glowing	Green	Smoothie	in	the	morning	is	part	of	the	foundation	of
Kimberly’s	Beauty	Detox	philosophy.	Yes,	it’s	green…but	it	is	delicious!	Its	taste	is
balanced	between	greens,	lemon,	and	fruit,	and	it	is	packed	with	fiber,
antioxidants,	minerals,	vitamins,	and	countless	other	nutrients	to	give	you
sustained	high	energy.	The	GGS	is	also	the	ultimate	health	and	beauty	fuel	for
glowing	skin,	immunity,	strong	hair,	bright	eyes,	and	overall	vitality.	By	blending,	you
are	in	essence	“predigesting”	the	foods,	and	your	body	does	not	have	to	work	to
break	down	the	foods	and	waste	unnecessary	energy	in	digestion.
The	Glowing	Green	Smoothie	uses	entire	vegetables	and	fruits,	including	the	juice
and	fiber,	so	you	are	truly	eating	whole	foods.	The	fiber	doesn’t	have	extra	calories
but	is	a	beauty	and	detox	friend	because	it	naturally	controls	appetite,	sweeps	out
wastes,	and	balances	blood	sugar	levels.	If	you	don’t	have	time	to	make	it	daily,	you
can	whip	up	multiple	batches	and	store	them	in	your	fridge	for	two	or	three	days,
or	even	freeze	portion	sizes	to	have	later	in	the	week.	The	most	important	thing	is
that	you	make	the	GGS	a	part	of	your	daily	life!
GLOWING	GREEN	SMOOTHIE
YIELD:
	about	60	ounces	(3	to	4	servings)
NOTE:
	Mix	and	match	your	greens	and	fruits	for	nutritional	variety,	depending	on
what	looks	fresh	and	is	seasonal.	It’s	best	to	avoid	melons,	which	digest	better	on
their	own.	Be	sure	to	always	include	the	lemon.	Use	organic	produce	as	much	as
possible.
2	cups	cool	filtered	water
7	cups	chopped	spinach
6	cups	chopped	romaine	lettuce
1½	cups	chopped	celery	(about	2	stalks)
1	pear,	cored	and	chopped
1	apple,	cored	and	chopped
1	ripe	banana,	peeled
2	tablespoons	fresh	lemon	juice
½	cup	chopped	cilantro	(optional)
½	cup	chopped	parsley	(optional)
Add	water,	spinach,	and	chopped	romaine	to	the	blender.	Start	the	blender	on	a
low	speed	and	mix	until	smooth.	Next	add	the	celery,	pear,	apple,	banana,	and
lemon	juice,	plus	the	cilantro	and	parsley,	if	desired.	Blend	on	high	until	smooth.
CHIA	SEEDS:
	These	are	a	great	source	of
omega-3
fatty	acids,	which	help
contribute	to	healthy	and	increased	blood	circulation.	It	is	very	important	toconsume	chia	seeds	after	they	are	fully	hydrated	(soak	chia	seeds	in	about	a	one
part	seed,	nine	parts	liquid	medium	of	water,	almond	milk,	or	coconut	milk,
for	at	least	half	an	hour)	in	order	to	get	their	full	beauty	benefits.	They	also
include	both	soluble	and	insoluble	fiber.	Chia	pudding	is	always	a	great	bet,	not
only	because	it’s	delicious	but	also	because	it	has	a	perfect	gelatinous	form	that
is	as	cleansing	as	it	is	filling.
DARK	CHOCOLATE:
	Dark	chocolate	contains	flavonols	that	can	improve	your
blood	circulation.	Pick	up	some	organic,	raw	cacao	powder	and	add	it	to	your
afternoon	smoothie.	When	choosing	chocolate	bars,	go	for	a	high	percentage	of
cacao	and	a	low	percentage	of	sugar.	Also	be	sure	to	avoid	milk	chocolate	and
white	chocolate,	which	do	not	contain	flavonols.	Dark	chocolate	is	a	great
source	of	beauty	minerals,	and	a	moderate	amount	will	help	nip	your	sweet
tooth	in	the	bud.
DOCOSAHEXAENOIC	ACID	(
DHA)	SUPPLEMENTS:
	This	algae-based	healthy	fat	helps
lower	triglycerides,	reduce	blood	pressure,	thin	the	blood,	and	ensure	optimal
circulation.	Your	body	can	make	DHA	from	omega-3	fats,	but	you	can	also
supplement	for	extra	insurance.	Fish	obtain	their	DHA	from	algae,	so	rather
than	take	a	fish	oil	pill,	which	may	be	rancid,	you	can	go	right	to	the	primary
source	and	take	an	algae-based	supplement.	(For	more	about	DHA,	see
this
page
.)
WARMING
SPICES:
	Ginger	and	cayenne	pepper	are	great	for	helping	clear
congestion	and	increase	your	blood	circulation.	They	also	boost	your
metabolism	and	help	strengthen	your	arteries	and	blood	vessels.	Be	sure	to	keep
cayenne	handy	to	sprinkle	onto	wraps	or	sandwiches.	Keep	fresh	ginger	in	the
fridge,	perhaps	in	a	small	bowl	near	eye	level	so	you	remember	to	use	it	often.
Grate	it	into	stir-fries	or	slice	it	and	add	it	into	soups	and	teas.
GARLIC:
	Garlic	contains	a	compound	known	as	allicin	that	helps	open	up	your
circulation	and	loosen	congestion


 and afterwards the patient walked several miles on the city pavements with
but little fatigue. There we re no unusual symptoms other than the toxemia mentioned, and from the breaking of the fast,
improvement was constant and permanent.

In another instance the fast was undertaken by a woman forty -one years old for the purpose of correcting heart irregularit y caused
by functional disease and obesity. The patient who was under height weighed 200 pounds, and she gave no medical history
excepting that some years previous she had been operated upon for chronic inflammation of the fallopian tubes. The fast prope r
was somewhat lengthy, covering sixty -three days and again it is to be noted that the patient was at all times during abstinence able
to attend to her home duties and to make on foot the daily trip to the office of her physician. There was but little faster s' chilliness,
and there were no unusual symptoms, excepting that, about the period included between the thirtieth and fortieth days, a gain  in
weight of from one to two pounds daily occurred, but at the end of this interval gradual decrease in weight agai n began and
continued to the end of the fast, when weight was reduced to 140 pounds. In the meanwhile heart irregularity had disappeared,  and
by careful attention to her dietary, the patient has succeeded in having no return of the obese symptoms, while ge neral health has
been consistently excellent.

Medical diagnosis of the next case classified the symptom as cancer of the stomach. The patient, a man forty years old, was r eally
suffering from an ulcerated condition of the upper portion of the intestinal tract, and he underwent a fast of fifty days in which no
marked peculiarities developed. Weight was reduced from 145 pounds to 105 pounds, and the subsequent gain both in weight and
in strength was typical. In two months after breaking the fast the patient  balanced the scales at 175 pounds.

A young man of twenty -three offers a case of the insanity of syphilis of the type known in medicine as meningitis. In this subject
the blood taint was acquired by contact, and, when observed and first under treatment t he case was in what is known as the
secondary stage of infection. The state of the patient was such that he had but little control over his faculties, both menta l and
physical. He would answer questions in a slow, drawling, sleepy manner with but small evi dence of sanity in his replies unless
shocked in some way. He was shameless in response to the calls of nature and showed abnormal erotic tendencies. Weight when
treatment began was 150 pounds. After low diet and an absolute fast of twenty -eight days, the time of dieting and of the fast
occupying three months, weight was reduced to 110 pounds. From the inception of the fast improvement was continuous, and this
applies both to the physical symptoms of the disease and to the mental state of the subject. At th e completion of total abstinence
there was no evidence of insanity, and at present writing, ten full years from the treatment of the case, no signs of blood t aint are in
any manner apparent.

A young man, nineteen years old, who had been led into habits o f body and of thought detrimental to normal development,
became, as a result, a victim of the symptom of disease known as epilepsy. For five years he had suffered from the convulsion s
characteristic of the malady, recurrent at intervals of from one to two weeks. Medicine had exhausted its resources in this case,
which was but another of the "last resort" kind, yet after a short while, the patient and his family were responsive to the r esults of
treatment and thereafter were enthusiastic in carrying out its details. For five months a regimen of restricted diet and of fasting was
pursued. The time of total abstinence from food intermittently included in this period was sixty days. All general unfavorabl e
symptoms gradually subsided, and the recurrence of the e pileptic seizures became reduced in number to such degree that, at the
end of the second short fast, four weeks had intervened between attacks; and, when feeding was permanently resumed, no furthe r
seizures were apprehended, nor did they occur. Before dise ase was fully eradicated the weight of the patient was reduced from 140
pounds to 105 pounds. Increase after the fast took place and at the end of the rebuilding period the young man weighed 148
pounds.

A woman, thirty -six years of age, at the end of the  third month of pregnancy developed severe symptoms of cholemia, a condition
of the liver in which its functions of conversion and elimination are arrested. Vomiting of dark green bilious fluid took pla ce, and
the patient was in a state verging upon coma. Immediate action was demanded, and food was at once omitted, while copious
enemas were administered twice daily for the time being. The latter brought away dark and foul discharges which continued wit h
no apparent improvement until the seventeenth day of a bstinence. On the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth days the patient lay
in a semi -conscious state, but she revived on the morning of the eighteenth day, when there was a decidedly favorable change in
the character of the bowel passages. Rapid return t o consciousness occurred, and increased strength with no unfavorable symptoms
marked all succeeding days until the twenty -second, when the fast was broken with fruit juices, and thereafter convalescence
proceeded without interruption.

The loss in weight in this case was 22 pounds. Temperature and pulse were continually above individual normal until the latter part
of the fast, the former ranging between 99 and 102, and the latter from 80 to 110, although a decided drop in both was always
observed after th e administration of an enema. No return of nausea occurred after breaking the fast, and thereafter the general
health of the patient was excellent. At term an eight -pound child was easily delivered, perfect in development and vigorous in
health.

On the f ifteenth day of this fast, while the patient was lying in partial coma, as described above, a consultation was held with a
former medical associate. The latter advocated, as the only means of saving the life of the mother, the immediate abortion of  the
Page 18 of  72 fetus, and the abandonment of the fast. His opinion was, however, overruled, and the result of the case justified the stand then
taken, for as the attending physician at confinement, five months later, he freely expressed his surprise at the state of hea lth of the
mother, the ease with which delivery was had, and the remarkable vitality of the infant, and he acknowledged his error in jud gment
with a complete reversal of his condemnation of the treatment the patient had undergone.

A case analogous to the one just cited is that of a woman of twenty -seven, wife of a physician.

She was between three and four months pregnant, and was suffering severe pain in the region of the uterus and in that of the
stomach. The uterus was discovered to be displaced, and by ma nipulation and the use of tampons it was put into normal position.
Nausea with vomiting was constantly distressing the patient when the case was presented, and an immediate absolute fast was
decided upon. However, it was thought best that a preparatory per iod be observed, and for twelve days the patient subsisted upon
liquid diet, after which the fast was begun and continued for thirty days. No unusual symptoms arose during this time, and co nstant
general and specific improvement was noted from the beginnin g. Nausea decreased with progress and vanished about the twentieth
day with no recurrence thereafter. Pulse and temperature were slightly below normal until after eating had been resumed.
Preparation for the fast was made upon strained vegetable broths and  it was broken upon the same dietary. Solid food was resumed
twelve days after the completion of abstinence. At term the patient was delivered of a babe weighing seven pounds, as physica lly
perfect and as healthy a specimen as that described in the previou s case. The loss of weight in this instance was an even thirty
pounds.

It is to be remarked that the children of these two mothers are not only physically excellent examples, but are also mentally
intelligent to a marked degree. These gratifying characte ristics are to be attributed in great part to the purification of body
undergone by the pregnant women at a stage of gestation early enough to provide for tissue structure in the forming fetal bod ies
unvitiated by disease in the systems of the mothers.

The statement descriptive of the following case is given in the language of the father of the patient:
"During several weeks prior to his sixth birthday, our oldest boy had complained of sore throat and general lassitude. This
finally developed into an acu te tonsilitis. On the third or fourth day he complained of pain in both knees, and by evening
these joints were swollen and red, and the pain had become so intense that the weight of the bedclothes was unbearable.
The physician whom we called --one of the r egular school --promptly diagnosed the case as one of inflammatory
rheumatism. He advised the use of hot applications to subdue the pain, and insisted on putting the left knee, which was
the worse, in a splint so that it could not be moved. On his second or  third visit he discovered mitral regurgitation, that


 has much higher voltages than the ground
floor, as there is wiring in the floor as well as in the ceiling. To sanitize an
apartment or office in a large building call on expert help.
Alternatively,  or in addition to these measures, you may disconnect the
fuse or switch in the meter -box for the bedroom (commonly including all
power points in the house) overnight. Possibly have a separate fuse
switch install ed for the bedroom, or a demand switch that only supplies
power to the circuit when needed.
To improve your well -being while driving  and avoid road -rage or fatigue
earth the inside of your car by leading the electricity from seats and large
metal areas b ack to the negative pole of the battery: connect an insulated
wire from a panel to the engine block, and also from the metal frame of
your seat to a side panel, all connections need to be to blank metal.
Dental Problems
Our teeth are another major pollution area. Mercury amalgam fillings or
different types of metal in the mouth act like an electric battery. Dead
teeth with filled root canals tend to be chronic infection foci, and
inflammations may remain inside the jawbon e (cavitations) even after
removal of teeth.
All of these may not cause local pain but instead can create problems in
other parts of the body because through acupuncture meridians each
tooth is connected to a specific organ.
Heart disease, for instance, is commonly connected with inflammations
or infections in the number 8 or wisdom tooth positions, while kidney
problems are related to the front teeth.  97
 Root -canal, filled,  or other dead teeth are chronic infection foci and
contribute to many diseases due to anaerobic microbes in the tiny canals
or tubuli of the dentine. Even after removal of bad teeth health problems
can still arise or continue from root or  metal fragments causing chronic
infection and inflammation in the jawbone.
A possibly safe way of keeping root -canalled teeth is to fill them with
Calcium Hydroxide or Iodine instead of the commonly used Gutta Percha
but no long -term studies on health ou tcomes are yet available. For tooth
implants Titanium is commonly used but this is a metal and can
occasionally still cause problems. A safer alternative with good durability
is Zirconia, the dioxide of zirconium.
Replace amalgam fillings with plastic comp osite. With serious conditions
(e.g., MS, cancer) and large fillings, extraction of amalgam -filled teeth
can bring much better results than simple replacement. Try to find a
dentist who is familiar with safe amalgam removal procedures. Remove
mercury as exp lained in Chapter 6.
Clear plastic partial dentures with plastic teeth are preferable to pink
dentures, bridges, metal partials, and porcelain teeth with a metal base.
Nickel in stainless steel can suppress the immune system and is
carcinogenic. Even dent al gold can be a problem because it is commonly
blended with more harmful palladium, and especially if there are any
other metals in the mouth.
Try to keep your mouth free of metals and have only metal -free plastics
as replacement. Any metal in the mouth can lead to allergy, on average
about 30% of individuals are allergic to the metal in their mouth. For more
information see: Dental Problems.
HEALTHY LIVING
In addition to minimizing the harmful aspects of modern life, we also aim to
improve or maximize positive lifestyle factors. Healthy living is the solid basis
for building radiant health. It focuses on the positive aspects of what we eat,
drink, feel and t hink. In addition,  we use the great healers of sunshine,
earthing, living water, and exercise as vital parts of a healthy lifestyle.  98
 Sunlight
Sunlight is our primary source of life and provides a combination of
bioenergy  and electromagnetic energies. Res earch shows that living in
a sunny area is associated with lower rates and better outcomes of many
diseases. Examples are multiple sclerosis, depression, cancers,
especially breast cancer, and even skin cancers, especially melanoma.
In contrast, sunburn an d fluorescent lighting are related to increased
rates of skin cancer and melanoma.
Lack of sunlight in winter, or if bedridden, may cause depression, which
can be cured by looking into sunlight and other suitable bright light,
especially in the morning. Th is also helps us to sleep better; even babies
sleep better after having been exposed to sunlight. Often look into the
blue sky, this releases serotonin and uplifts our mood. Sunlight is also
required to convert cholesterol into vitamin D.
Frequently expos e your whole body to mild or moderate sunlight. Sit
lightly clothed in the half -shade under a tree in the garden, on the
veranda or even inside a room with an open window. Except in winter do
not sunbathe during the hours around midday. Short sunbathing is
invigorating but long exposure is exhausting and ages the skin. Strong
tanning is not desirable.
Acceptable sunscreens are zinc cream and PABA lotion. PABA is related
to B-vitamins. You can dissolve half a teaspoonful of PABA and 1/4
teaspoon of bicarbona te in a small volume of water and rub this on the
skin. It needs to be re -applied after swimming or heavy sweating. To
prevent it from washing off you can mix it with an equal amount of
coconut cream. Prevent skin cancers by adopting a protective diet high
in antioxidants especially astaxanthin, and low in seed oils.
Avoid overacidity, and use protective clothing as required.
In addition to the skin, the eyes are important entrance points for sun -
energy. J. N. OTT ( Health and Light, Pocket Books) demonstrated with
his research how important it is for us to get the full spectrum of sunlight
into our eyes. This is not possible if we sit behind windows or wear 99
 glasses all the time as these filter out essential UV frequencies, and this
has been linked to diseases such as arthritis, cancer and leukaemia, eye
problems, hyperactivity, endocrine and sexual problems. Plastic does not
absorb UV -rays.
Apart from the benefits of sunlight, outdoors activity itself also has other
benefits. Possibly most important is being removed from the harmful
effects of electromagnetic and chemical pollution inside modern houses,
and instead being fully exposed to the natural energies and vibrations of
our planet. Even if you are not strong enough for conventional outdoors
activity such as gardening or walking, spend as much time as possible
sitting or lying in the garden or on a veranda or balcony.
Earthing
We live in  a natural DC field. The surface of the Earth has a negative
electric charge and the ionosphere a positive charge of about 50,000
volts. Near the surface, the voltage differs greatly. It is highest on
mountains and in dry conditions where it can reach 1000  volts per meter,
while in low -lying and moist conditions it falls to below 50 volts.
Populations with exceptionally long lifespans  always seem to live in the
mountains, such as in the Andes, the Himalayas and the Caucasus.
In buildings with metal roofs, steel -reinforced concrete, or aluminium
insulation the field is near zero. In a high -DC field our wellbeing and
mental abilities are increased, while in a low field we easily become
fatigued,  and our concentration suffers. Another effect of the DC field is
a possible imbalance in the ion distribution in our body when habitually
wearing shoes with rubber or plastic soles. Walking barefoot, especially
on fresh or moist grass, on the other hand, allows our inner polarity to
readjust itself.
When earthed we app ear to draw electrons from the ground into our body
while stagnant bioenergy that may be present as tensions, inflammations
or pain can flow into the ground. With this, earthing generates a positive
shift in the electrical potential of our body and restore s natural self -
healing and self -regulating mechanisms. For more detailed explanations 100
 and evidence, including various research and clinical studies see:
www.earthinginstitute.net.
The best way of earthing is by walking barefoot, especially on moist
ground. This may be grass or moist soil or wet beach sand, but any
barefoot walking on natural ground is good. The best time is early in the
morning when the grass is still wet with dew.
For those who do not have the opportunity to walk much barefoot, or in
addition, there is the possibility of earthing by connecting the body with
a wire to a good earth. This may be done during sleep or when working
on the computer or at any other suitabl e time.
A basic setup can be used as explained earlier in this chapter for Electro -
proofing your house. You may, for instance sit at the computer with your
feet on a wire -net that is connected to an earth. This may be a ground
stake or, with suitable caut ion, the earth connection in a wall plug. For a
safe way of doing this see: www.naturesplatform.com/earthing.html.
Alternatively,  you can buy such equipment at: www.earthinginstitute.net.
Earthing should be avoided during a thunderstorm.
Living Water
Water, air and food


orite
Calciumfluorideisfoundworldwide,intheform
ofthemineralfluorspar,whichoccursasbeautiful-
colouredcrystals.Themostcommonofthesecrystals
isvioletcolouredandwhenthisisexposedtoultra-
violetradiation itemitsabeautifulbluelight(itisfrom
thisthatwederivetheterm'fluorescence').
Thelargestsingleuseoffluorsparisinthesteel
industryasaflux-anagenttoincreasethefluidityof
certainmetalsintherefiningprocesses-anditisalso
usedinthesmeltingofgold,silver,copperandlead.
Theword'fluor'comesinfactfromtheLatinmeaning
'aflowing'.
Calciumfluorideispresentintheenamelofthe
teeth,thesurfaceofthebonesandintheelasticfibres
oftheskin,themusclesandthebloodvessels.
Thehomeopathicpreparation ismadefromselected
piecesofcrystalfluorspar,whicharepreparedby
trituration.
GENERALANDEMOTIONAL/
MENTALSYMPTOMS
Therearenostronggeneraloremotional/mental
symptomsforCalcareafluorica,althoughaswiththe
INTERNALMATERIAMEDICA Calcareaphosphorica(Calc-p.) •63
otherCalcareasaltspeopleneedingthisremedyare
generallyworseforcold,dampweather. Itises-
peciallyusefulasatonicforanytissuesthathave
becomewornout,flabbyandlax,inthesamewaythat
Calcareaphosphoricacanbeusedasatonicforworn-out
nervoussystems.Forexample,duringpregnancythis
maybeindicatedforwomenwhoseskinisdryandout
ofcondition;andvaricoseveinsisanotherexampleof
elastictissuethathaslostitstone.Thosewithfirm,
elasticskinandnoworryofstretchmarkswillnot
needthisremedy.ShortcoursesofCalcareafluoncacan
berepeatedifitisfoundtobeofbenefit.
PHYSICALCOMPLAINTS
Backache
SymptomsPainsinlowerback.
Better(01continuedmovement.
Worseonbeginningtomove.
IfRhustoxicodendronwasindicatedandonlypartially
relievesthepain,orifitfails,thenCalcareafluoncawill
usuallyhelp.
Commoncold
SymptomsXasalcatarrhdry.Sneezingwith
difficulty.
Betterforsneezing.
Thisisforstuffycoldsintheheadwithdrycatarrh.
Toothdecay
SymptomsCrumbling;Decaying.
Thisremedyusedasatonicwillhelptobuildstrong
healthyteethinchildren. Itisasaferoptionthan
fluoridetablets,whosepotentialsideeffectscontinue
tocauseconcern.Thehomeopathicpreparation isobtainedbydrop-
pingdilutephosphoricacidintolimewater.The
particleswhichformasaresultofthisprocess
arewashedindistilledwateranddried,andthen
triturated.
GENERALSYMPTOMS
Catchescoldseasily.Complaintsfrom:lossofbody
fluids.Facepale.Slownessofchildrentolearnto
teethe.Thin.
Worseforcold;fordamp;fordraughts;forfreshair;
forwetweather.
Calcareaphosphorica isofvitalimportanceinthegrowth
andmaintenanceofhealthycells.Itnourishesblood
cells,bones,teethandallconnectivetissueanditis
thereforearemedythatmaybeindicatedinyoung
childrenwhodevelopslowly.Youngchildrenareslow
learningtowalkandslowtolearn.Becausetheirfood
isnotwellassimilatedtheytendtobeanaemic,grow
slowlyandtheirteethdecayeasily.Theydevelop
slowly,babies'fontanellescloseslowlyandtheyare
slowtoteethe.Thisisawonderfultonictogiveto
childrenwhohavehadagrowthspurtandhave
becomepaleandexhaustedasaresult.Adultsand
childrenwhoareweakandtiredwhileconvalescing
fromanillnesswilllikewisebenefitfromthisremedy-
itwillhelpthemtoregaintheirstrength.Thetypical
calcareaphosphoricatypeisthinwithlong,dark
eyelashesanddarkhairTheyaresensitivetothecold
andthedamp,andhavecoldextremities.
EMOTIONAL/MENTAL SYMPTOMS
Anxious.Discontented. Restless.Sighing.Sluggish
inchildren.
Worseformentalexertion.
Calcareaphosphorica (Caic-p.)
Othernames:calciumphosphate; calciiphosphas
precipitata;phosphateoflime
Calciumphosphate isamineralsaltandistheprinci-
palmineralconstituentofbonesandteeth.Itaccounts
forabout60percentoftheaveragehumanskeleton.
Commercially, themostimportantofthecalcium
phosphates isprimarycalciumphosphate,or'super-
phosphate'.Thisisusedasafertiliseringredient,asa
leaveningagentinbakingpowders,asastabiliser
forplastics,andinthemanufactureofglass.Other
formsofcalciumphosphatearealsowidelyusedin
commercialproducts.Adultscomplainandgrumbleaboutmanythings.
Thinkingoftheircomplaintsoftenmakesthemfeel
worse.Theysighalotwhiletalkingandaregenerally
restless.Childrenarepeevishandlifelessandhaveno
go'inthem.Theywantsomethingbuttheydon't
knowwhat.
PHYSICALCOMPLAINTS
Anaemia
SymptomsWithexhaustion.
Causesacuteillness.
Thisisfortheconvalescentstageofanillness,
orpost-childbirth,whereregainingstrengthis
provingdifficult.
64•Calcareasulphurica(Calc-s.) INTERNALMATERIAMEDICA
Brokenbones
SymptomsBonesslowtomend.
Thisremedyisindicatedforfracturesthataretaking
longerthanexpectedtoheal.Itcanbegivenroutinely
afterSymphytumhasdealtwiththepainofthefracture,
asitwillspeedupthehealingofthefractureand
ensurethattheboneisgoodandstrong.
Cough
SymptomsYellowmucus.
Worsewhenteething.
Calcareaphosphoricamaybeusefulinclearingobstinate
coughs(orwhoopingcough)inchildren.Theseare
coughsthattendtobeworseinthecold-weather
months.Teethingmayalsomakethiscoughworse.
Cramp
SymptomsCrampincalves.
Worseforwalking.
Headache
SymptomsInschoolchildren.
Causesmentalexertion;overworking;anaemia.
Theheadacheisoftenworseforacoldwind,butcold
bathingcanrelieveit.
Insomnia
SymptomsWaking:difficult;late.
Worsebeforemidnight.
Morningsareanawfultimewhenwakingisdifficult.
Jointpain
Worseforcoldweather.
Thejointsofthefeetinparticularareoftenaffected.
Thefeetarealwayscoldandthereisacrampingand
achingnumbness.
Periodproblems
SymptomsPeriod:painful;heavy.Blood:darkred;
clotted.
Womenbecomeanaemicaftertheseheavypainful
periods.Calcareaphosphoricawillworkasaneffective
tonic.
Stiffneck
SymptomsInadults.
Causesdraughts.
Teething
SymptomsPainfulinchildren.Slow.Difficult.
Stoolsgreen.
Calcareaphosphorica ishelpfulforeitherfirstorsecondteeththatareprovingslowanddifficultincutting
throughthegums.Teethingchildrenmaydevelop
diarrhoea,coldsandcoughs;thesecomplaintsplus
theteethingdifficultieswillbehelpedbythisremedy.
Theteetharealsoinclinedtodecayeasilyand
prematurely.Calcareawillensureabetterassimilation
ofcalciumandsoencouragehealthydentine
formation.
Calcareasulphurica (Caic-s.)
Othernames:calciumsulphate;sulphateoflime;
gypsum;plasterofParis;selenite
Calcareasulphuricaisachemicalcompoundfoundmost
commonlyeitherintheformofcrystals,asselenite,or
inearthymasses,whenitisknownasgypsum.Itis
oneofthefirstmineralstocrystalliseasseawater
evaporates,andbedsofgypsumfrequentlyunderlie
depositsofrocksaltformedbytheevaporationof
ancientseas.
Rawgypsum(minedfrompitsandcliffs)isused
mainlyasaretarderinPortlandcement(itslowsdown
therateofsetting).Itisalsousedasanagricultural
fertiliser,andinthemanufactureofpaints,phar-
maceuticalsandinsecticides.Whenpartiallydehy-
dratedandmixedwithwater,calciumsulphateforms
plasterofParis,