 people
right out of high school. Fear of78 / Your Erroneous Zonesfailure and doubt about his intellectual capacities scare Horace. He
looks at catalogs regularly, and with the help he receives in counsel-
ing he has taken the appropriate entrance examinations and arranged
an interview with an admissions official at a local community college. But he still uses his I’ms to skirt the actual doing process. He justifies
his inaction with, “I’m too old, I’m not smart enough, and I’m not
really interested.”
Horace uses his I’ms to avoid something he genuinely wants. A
colleague of mine employs them to get out of tasks he doesn’t enjoy. He avoids having to fix the doorbell, or the radio, or any unpleasant
handyman activity by simply reminding his wife, “Now you know,
dear, I’m just not mechanical.” These kinds of I’ms are adaptive be-
haviors, but they are nevertheless delusional excuses. Instead of
saying, “I find this kind of activity dull or uninteresting, and I choose
not to work at it in my present moments (which is perfectly logical
and healthy)” it becomes easier to simply haul out an I’m. In these cases, the individuals are saying something about them-
selves. They are stating, “I am a finished product in this area, and I
am never going to be any different.” If you are a finished product,
all tied up and put away, you have stopped growing, and while you
may very well want to hang onto some I’ms you may find that others
are simply limiting and self-destructive. Below is a listing of some labels that are relics of the past. If any
of them belong to you, you might like to change them. To stay exactly
the way you are in any area is to make one of those deathlike de-
cisions described in Chapter I. Keep in mind that this is not a discus-
sion of the things that you just plain don’t enjoy, but rather a look
at behavior that keeps you from activities from which you might
choose a great deal of pleasure and excitement.BREAKING FREE FROM THE PAST  / 79Ten Typical “I’m” Categories and Their Neurotic Dividends
1. I’m poor at math, spelling, reading, languages, etc. This I’m guarantees that you won’t put in the effort required
to change. The academic I’m is designed to keep you from
ever having to do the hard work involved in mastering sub-
ject matter that you have traditionally found difficult or
boring. As long as you label yourself inept, you have a built-
in reason to avoid tackling it. 2. 2. I’m lousy at some skill areas such as cooking, sports, crocheting,
drawing, acting, etc. This I’m assures that you won’t have to do any of these things
in the future and justifies any poor performance in the past. “I’ve always been that way; it’s just my nature.” This attitude
reinforces your inertia and, more important, it helps you to
hang onto the absurd notion that you shouldn’t do anything
if you don’t do it really well. Thus, unless you’re the world
champion, avoidance is better than doing. 3. I’m shy, reserved, temperamental, nervous, afraid, etc. The call is to genetics for these I’ms. Rather than challenging
them and the self-destructive thinking which supports them,
you simply accept them as a confirmation of the way you’ve
always been. Also, you can blame your parents, and use them
as the reason for your current I’m. You make them the cause
and don’t have to work at being different. You choose this
behavior as a way to avoid being assertive in situations which
have always been troublesome for you. This is a leftover I’m
from a childhood in which others had an inherent interest in
having you believe that you were incapable of thinking for
yourself. These are the personality I’ms. These self-definitions
help you to avoid the tough business of being different from
what you’ve always been. You simply define your personality
with a convenient I’m and you can now excuse all kinds of
self-forfeiting behav-80 / Your Erroneous Zonesiors as out of your control. You negate the notion that you
can choose your own personality, and rely instead on your
genetic misfortune to explain away all of those personality
traits that you would like to disown. 4. I’m clumsy, uncoordinated, etc. These I’ms that you learned as a child enable you to avoid
potential ridicule that might come your way because you
aren’t as physically skilled as others. Of course, your lack of
skill comes from a history of believing those I’ms and hence
avoiding physical activity, rather than from some inherent
defect. You get good at what you practice, not what you shun. Keep your I’m and stay on the sidelines watching and wish-
ing, but pretending that you really don’t like that sort of
thing. 5. I’m unattractive, ugly, big-boned, plain, too tall, etc. These physiological I’ms are helpful in keeping you from
taking risks with the opposite sex, and in justifying the poor
self-image and lack of love you’ve chosen for yourself. As
long as you describe yourself in this fashion, you have a
ready-made excuse for not putting yourself on the line in a
love relationship. And you don’t have to work at looking
attractive to yourself, as well. You use your mirror as justific-
ation for not taking a chance. There’s only one problem: we
see exactly what we choose to—even in mirrors. 6. I’m unorganized, meticulous, sloppy, etc. These behavioral I’ms are convenient for manipulating others
and in justifying why things have to be done a certain way. I’ve always done it that way. As if tradition were a reason to
do anything. And I’ll always do it that way is the unstated
message. By relying upon the way you’ve always done it,
you don’t ever have to entertain the risky notion of doing it
differently, and you can simultaneously ensure that everyone
around you will do it your way as well. This is the I’m that
calls upon “policy” as a substitute for thinking.BREAKING FREE FROM THE PAST  / 817. I’m forgetful, careless, irresponsible, apathetic, etc. These kinds of I’ms are especially useful to you when you
want to vindicate yourself for some ineffective behavior. The
I’m keeps you from ever going to work on your memory, or
your carelessness, and you simply excuse yourself with your
neat little, “That’s me.” As long as you can haul out this I’m
when you behave in any of the ways described above, you
will never have to work at changing. Just go on forgetting
and reminding yourself that you can’t really help it, and
you’ll always be forgetful. 8. I’m Italian, German, Jewish, Irish, Black, Chinese, etc. These are your ethnic I’ms, and they work very well when
you run out of other reasons to explain some behaviors that
you have, which don’t work for you, but are just too damned
difficult to tackle. Whenever you find yourself behaving in
stereotypical ways associated with your subculture, you
simply trot out your ethnic I’m as a justification. I once asked
a maître d’ why he seemed so excitable and reacted to the
slightest problem with outrageous outbursts. He responded,
“What do you expect from me? I’m Italian. I can’t help it.”
9. I’m bossy, pushy, authoritarian, etc. Here your I’m can allow you to continue hostile acts, rather
than work at developing self-discipline. You varnish the be-
havior with “I can’t help it, I’ve always been that way.”
10. I’m old, middle-aged, tired, etc. With this I’m you can use your age as a reason for not parti-
cipating in what might be risky or threatening activities. Whenever you find yourself faced with an activity such as a
sports event, dating after a divorce or the death of a spouse,
traveling, or the like you can just say “I’m too old” and you
will have eliminated any attendant risks that go with trying
something new and growth-producing. The implication of
an “age-I’m” is that you are absolutely finished in82 / Your Erroneous Zonesthis area, and since you will always get older, you are finished
growing and experiencing anything new. The “I’m” Circle
The rewards for hanging onto your past by trotting out your I’ms
can be neatly summed up in the one word: avoidance. Whenever
you want to dodge a certain kind of activity or to gloss over a per-
sonality defect, you can always justify yourself with an I’m. In fact,
after you use these labels enough, you begin to believe them yourself,
and at that present moment you are a finished product destined to
remain as you are for the rest of your days. Labels enable you to
avoid the hard work and the risk of trying to change. They perpetu-
ate the behavior which has given rise to them. Thus, if a young man
goes to a party with the belief that he is shy, he will behave as if he
is shy and his behavior will further support his self-image. It


 a tooth. The infection still may linger hidden, but to
effect a complete resolution of the infection would require herbs, diet, homeopathy and/or manual
therapies. Tooth Infection Topical Treatments
The odds of curing tooth infections greatly increase when using supplemental herbal treatments. 1
. Plantain
 – Place fresh, bruised plantain leaf directly on the infected and swollen area. Wild
plantain is the best choice. To use plantain, chew it up and then place it on the inflamed area. Plantain has the action of pulling out dead and diseased material. 2
. Echinacea Tincture
 – Place tincture of echinacea on the inflamed area. Echinacea has the
ability to help heal infections. Also, it can be taken internally as described on the bottle. 3
. Potato for Abscess –
Place a slice of plain, white raw potato against the abscess, and leave in
place for several hours.Focal Infections
The focal infection theory maintains that an infection in one place in the body can travel to and infect
a distant place in the body. It is the spread of toxins from one part of the body through the bloodstream
or by other means to another part. Focal infections have been proven to be connected with a large
variety of health problems including blood problems, digestive problems, back pain, infertility,
arthritis, abscess and infections throughout the body or on the skin, heart disease, allergies, kidney
damage, brain tumors, cancer, trigeminal neuralgia and even death. 23
Focal infections often times begin in the mouth. They are caused from inflamed gums, dead teeth
particularly under root canals, and decaying jaw bone known as a NICO lesion. Hidden mouth
infections can also reside in cavitations, which are holes in the bone often where a tooth—especially
a wisdom tooth—has been extracted. This is a hidden area of pus, toxins or rotting bone. What
happens is a part of the mouth is putrefying, or there are putrefied substances in places that the body
cannot clean up at the tooth extraction site. I mention this condition because even if you eat well, you
want to be sure that there is no rotting infectious material in your mouth causing disease in other parts
of your body. I do not want people to live with untreated infections. You can treat many infections
with nutrition. But some cases of infections will not heal properly just with nutrition particularly in
the cases were the tooth is already damaged by dentistry with a large filling, crown or root canal. In
these cases you will want good nutrition in combination with homeopathic injections or surgery to
clean up and protect the area against infection. Tooth Extractions Because of Infections
Extracting teeth destabilizes the bite, weakens the jaw, and can lead to scar tissue formation. 24
 Teeth
are often extracted because of tooth infections, but the bone under the infected tooth is many times not
cleaned up after the extraction. This can then become a source of a focal infection and lead to chronic
pain such as hip and back pain along with migraine headaches. 25
 In my opinion, because of the
importance of having a functional bite, teeth should only be extracted as an absolute last resort when
medically necessary and it should not be a standard treatment for any sort of tooth infection.Dental Implants
The post of a dental implant allows a space for toxins to enter into the gum because the periodontal
ligament and gum tissue do not attach to the implant sufficiently to seal off that space. There is hardly
any evidence available regarding the long-term effects of titanium implants.<|eot_id|><|begin_of_text|>Summarize the following text section accurately and concisely. Maintain specific details and numerical information, and use anti-repetition mechanisms:

        I am going to share with you the best of the best solutions that have rapidly induced healing in gum
tissues. There is no guarantee that these methods will work for you. And not all of this advice may be
suitable or accurate for someone with severe gum disease and concurrent loss of teeth. Gum disease is a disease of modern humans. Weston Price explains:
Many primitive peoples not only retain all of their teeth, many of them to an old age, but
also have a healthy flesh supporting these teeth. This has occurred in spite of the fact
that the primitives have not had dentists to remove the deposits and no means for doing
so for themselves. 3
Many ancient skulls found around the planet still have most or all of their teeth firmly rooted. So tooth
loss from gum disease was either rare or non-existent in our ancestors. Dental Plaque and Gum Disease
Plaque occurs when your body chemistry is out of balance. The plaque I am referring to is the buildup
of debris that sticks to your teeth in an unhealthy way. Particularly, cooked animal proteins that are
not fully digested seem to cause dental plaque. Calculus deposits are caused by a high level of blood calcium. 4
 The calcium level in your
bloodstream has to do with the type of calcium food sources you eat, as well as your body’s ability to
metabolize the calcium. Calculus appears when there is an excess of calcium in the blood compared
to the amount of phosphorus in the blood. 5
 Increased calculus deposits can be caused when the form
of calcium in your diet is not absorbable. Nonabsorbable calcium creates free calcium in your
bloodstream. What this means is that plaque is not the root cause of gum disease. Rather plaque appears on the teeth
when the body’s internal chemistry is out of synchronization. This is caused by a faulty diet, excess
sugar, incorrectly prepared whole grains and environmental stresses and toxins. Gum Disease, Bleeding, Swollen Gums and Fat-Soluble Vitamins
Pyorrhea is an advanced stage of gum disease in which ligaments and bones that support the teeth
become inflamed and infected. It is partially a result of the process whereby important nutrients are
not deposited into the gums because they are missing from the diet. When our body chemistry is out of
balance through the over consumption of sweet and processed foods, or the under consumption of
minerals, or a build-up of toxic material in the body, gum disease can result. Dr. Price explained:
Much of what we have thought of as so-called pyorrhea in which the bone is
progressively lost from around the teeth, thus allowing them to loosen, constitutes one of
the most common phases of the borrowing process. This tissue with its lowered defense
rapidly becomes infected and we think of the process largely in terms of that infection. A
part of the local process includes the deposit of so-called calculus and tartar about the
teeth. These contain toxic substances which greatly irritate the flesh, starting an
inflammatory reaction. Pyorrhea in the light of our newer knowledge is largely a
nutritional problem. 6
 (Emphasis added. ) According to Dr. Page, a calcium deficiency or excess phosphorus in the blood is the more specific
cause of gum disease. Pyorrhea, an inflamed condition of the gums, generally occurs when the glands are
malfunctioning, causing a high phosphorus level. By reducing the phosphorus to its
proper relation to calcium, inflammation can be eliminated. When the phosphorus level of the blood is too high in proportion to calcium, there will be free
phosphorus in the blood which can cause both the presence of calculus and irritated gums. When the
phosphorus level was reduced to be in balance with the level of calcium in the blood the irritation
(gingivitis) usually cleared up. 7
 Fat-soluble vitamin D has the effect of lowering blood phosphorous
and raising blood calcium. Vitamin D deficiency is responsible for problems with the hard areas
under the gums such as the alveolar bone which comprises the tooth socket. 8
Interestingly enough, Dr. Mellanby in his dog experiments found that fat-soluble vitamin A controlled
the process and development of gum tissues. If young dogs are fed diets deficient in vitamin A, gum
tissues can become swollen and overgrown. Once the gum tissue is swollen, microorganisms can be
found present. 9
 Vitamin A stimulates certain growth factors and perhaps this explains vitamin A’s
effect on gum tissues. A key strategy in your treatment of gum disease is to use both fat-soluble vitamin A for the soft tissues
and fat-soluble vitamin D for the harder tissues and bone. If you are leaning to the idea that fat-
soluble vitamin A is more important, then I would recommend eating liver. Gum disease is also connected with an overactive anterior pituitary gland. One of the roles of the
anterior pituitary gland is to produce growth hormones; this gland is balanced with testosterone or
estrogen. The lack of growth hormone production is therefore intimately connected with gum disease. Testosterone or estrogen can be increased by moderate exercise, making sure your weight is in yourideal range, a variety of herbal remedies, and avoiding alcohol. Gum Disease, Vitamin C, and Scurvy
Guinea pigs kept on a vitamin C-deficient diet which produces scurvy eventually show signs of gum
disease. Their teeth become elongated from the receding gums which become red and spongy. On the
same hand, successful reports of healing gum disease involve vitamin C supplementation such as with
camu camu berry. Other foods highly concentrated in vitamin C are amalaki berry, acerola cherry and
rose hips. Take as much as two teaspoons of powdered vitamin C-rich berries per day. Synthetic
vitamin C in the form of ascorbic acid may still be effective in healing gum disease, but


	we	started	making	white
flour. We	made	it	because	it	does	not	spoil;	it	keeps	practically	forever,	which
makes	white	flour	an	ideal	food	to	feed	people	in	big	cities. However,	the
malnutrition	problem	with	flour	is	serious—our	bellies	are	filled	in	the	form	of
“hearty”	pastas	and	breads,	but	all	those	empty	calories	do	not	even	come	close
to	fulfilling	our	needs	for	nutrients,	thus	contributing	to	deficiency. Worse,	flour	also	contributes	to	the	other	cause	of	disease,	toxicity. White
flour	contains	almost	no	fiber,	which	is	essential	for	proper	bowel	movements
and	toxin	removal. Eating	too	much	flour	(and	not	enough	fiber)	is	associated
with	constipation,	hemorrhoids,	colitis	and	rectal	cancer. Avoiding	white	flour	is	not	easy	because	it	is	in	virtually	all	breads,	pastas,
cakes,	cookies,	crackers,	breakfast	cereals,	pizzas	and	pastries. But	when	you
realize	that	flour	causes	disease,	cutting	down	on	the	refined	flour	products	you
consume	is	worth	the	effort. A	plate	of	pasta	with	vegetables	can	no	longer	be
considered	a	good	meal. The	vegetables	are	good,	but	the	pasta	is	not;	choose
whole	grains	or	beans	instead. The	real	health	threat	from	white	flour	comes	not	from	any	single	meal,	but
because	we	eat	so	much	of	it—one	or	more	meals	a	day,	every	day. We	also
need	to	keep	in	mind	that	many	other	grains	frequently	are	refined	(such	as	those
in	“multi-grain”	breads	and	cereals)	and	are	reduced	to	little	more	than	empty
calories. Any	grain	that	is	finely	ground	and	“stripped”	of	fiber	and	other
nutrients	is	a	poor	nutritional	choice	because	essential	nutrients	have	been	lost,
which	most	people	do	not	realize. I	cannot	tell	you	how	many	times	I	havetalked	to	people	who	proudly	describe	their	“healthy,	whole-grain	diets”—diets
made	of	whole-wheat	bread,	rolled	oats,	granola,	multigrain	cereals. All	of	these
are	processed,	make-believe	foods. Eating	processed	foods	of	any	kind	is
fundamentally	different	from	and	nutritionally	inferior	to	eating	whole,
unprocessed	foods. On	the	subject	of	food	processing,	one	type	of	grain	processing	is	of	special
concern:	puffed	grains. The	high	heat	and	pressure	used	in	the	puffing	process
alters	the	molecular	structure	of	proteins	in	the	grains,	making	them	toxic
enough	to	kill	laboratory	animals. Absolutely	avoid	puffed	wheat,	puffed	millet
and	puffed	rice	(including	rice	cakes),	and	any	other	puffed	grains. This	warning
does	not	include	popcorn,	which	is	not	subjected	to	such	high	temperatures	and
pressures. In	his	book,
Fighting	the	Food	Giants,
Paul	Stitt	reported	an
experiment	in	which	rats	were	fed	either	whole	wheat	or	puffed	wheat. The	rats
eating	the	whole	wheat	lived	over	a	year	while	the	rats	eating	puffed	wheat	died
within	two	weeks. To	avoid	health	problems	created	by	processed	grains,	choose	whole	grains
such	as	millet,	oats,	quinoa,	spelt,	barley,	amaranth,	teff,	kamut	and	brown	rice. Many	people	do	not	realize	that	white	rice	is	also	a	processed	grain	and,
therefore,	a	poor	food	choice. Buckwheat,	not	strictly	a	grain,	can	be	cooked	like
whole	grains. Organic	whole	grains	are	readily	available	at	health	food	stores. Cook	grains	in	a	pot	of	water	as	you	would	cook	rice. A	rice-cooker	will	also
work. In	the	real	world,	often	we	are	forced	to	make	less	than	ideal	choices. At
the	very	least,	choose	minimally	processed	whole	grains	(such	as	whole-wheat
flour	or	oatmeal)	instead	of	highly	refined	and	stripped	grains,	such	as	white
flour,	white	rice	and	pasta	made	from	white	flour. Misleading	Choices
When	I	told	Elizabeth,	the	woman	I	introduced	you	to	at	the	start	of	this
chapter,	that	if	she	wanted	to	get	well	and	stay	well	she	would	have	to	eliminate
sugar	from	her	diet,	she	replied,	“I	don’t	eat	any	sugar,”	going	on	to	explain	that
she	rarely
added
sugar	to	anything. What	she	meant	was,	she	rarely	took	white
sugar	out	of	the	sugar	bowl	and	added	it	to	her	foods	and	beverages. She	was	not
considering	the	massive	amounts	of	sugar	already	present	in	her	diet	from	foods
as	mundane	as	ketchup,	breakfast	cereal,	dinner	rolls,	soup,	salad	dressing,
bottled	fruit	juices	and	soft	drinks,	not	to	mention	chocolates,	ice	cream,	cookies,
pies,	cakes,	snack	foods	and	pancake	syrup. Elizabeth	was	quite	surprised	when
I	added	up	all	the	sugar	she	was	consuming. Elizabeth	and	I	also	talked	about	white	flour. She	did	not	realize	that	most	ofthe	starches	she	was	eating	(including	pastas,	breads	and	breakfast	cereals)	were
made	from	white	flour	and	other	processed	grains. Thinking	about	what	she
should	perhaps	be	eating	instead,	she	made	another	mistake:	Elizabeth	proudly
showed	me	a	package	of	the	“healthy”	multigrain	bread	she	had	purchased. I
shook	my	head	as	I	read	the	ingredient	list	and	explained	to	her	that	such	bread
is	not	healthy. First,	bread	is	a	highly	processed	food,	and	this	bread’s	number-
one	ingredient	was	unbleached	flour,	a	highly	processed	flour	that	is	only
marginally	better	than	white	flour	(it	has	not	undergone	the	final	bleaching
process). This	supposedly	“healthy”	bread	also	contained	a	health-damaging
sugar	(corn	syrup),	hydrogenated	oils	and	toxic	preservatives. Elizabeth	had	been	misled	into	believing	this	bread	was	a	healthy	food—
perhaps	because	of	the	false	advertising	on	the	package,	claiming	it	to	be
“healthy,”	and	the	fact	that	she	had	purchased	it	in	a	health	food	store. Many
people	have	a	difficult	time	learning	how	to	discern	good	foods	from	bad	ones. The	simplest	explanation	is	to	think	of	the	concepts	of
real	foods
and
make-
believe	foods. The	more	a	food	is	changed	from	the	way	nature	would	normally
provide	it,	the	more	make-believe	it	becomes. Some	Truths	about	Processed	Fats	and	Oils
A	widespread	misperception	in	America	today	is	that	to	be	healthy	we	must
eat	a	low-cholesterol,	low-fat	or	nonfat	diet. Rather,	you	need	fats	and	oils,	but
they	must	be	the	right	kinds	of	fats	and	oils,	not	the	processed	fats	and	oils	so
prevalent	in	our	diets	today. Despite	our	society’s	obsession	with	and	fears	about
fats	and	oils,	these	nutrients	are	an	incredibly	important	part	of	a	healthy	diet. Each	of	the	trillions	of	cells	in	your	body	is	surrounded	by	a	permeable	cell


. And the intoxication that results from putrefaction is the reason so many of these dieters become diseased with some dying. Are we protein eaters? Emphatically, no!Are We Starch Eaters?To test this question I will not ask you to do the impossible, i.e., take a handful of grass
seeds (presuming you could gather them in nature) and start chewing. Or, try a spoonful of flour of any grain. You’d choke up on the first spoon of it as your starch enzyme sup -
ply (salivary amylase) would be speedily exhausted. This would amply prove to you that we were not starch ea
ters in nature when we had not mastered fire. Instead of being a
palate-tingling delight, starches are a torturesome affair. When humans can freely eat starchy roots, grains and tubers such as cassava, taro, po -
tatoes and wheat in their raw state to satiation and proclaim the experience a gourmet
treat, then both y ou and I migh
t accede that we’re starch eaters. Are We Omnivores, That is, All of the Foregoing? Of course, humans are
omnivores in practice with the aid of condi -
ments, taste excitants, dena turalization b y

cooking, camouflag -
ing seasonings, spices and so on. But, in Natur e
, we could not
66
Fruiticulturedo more than eat foods in season, and we’d have to eat them in the raw state on their
own merits with our tastebuds. In nature we were frugivores only. Humans & Fruit: Symbiotic Partners in LifeWhile few biology books proclaim symbiosis and none that I’ve encountered pro -
claim our own symbiotic role in nature, we are symbionts as are thousands of species. Symbiosis is coopera tion bet
ween dissimilar organisms for mutual benefit. Symbionts
are cooperators in symbiotic living. While the word symbi -
ont is supposed to apply only to the lesser of two c ooper
at-
ing organisms, I prefer to call both of the c omplementary
c
ooperators symbionts for
that is the only nomencla -
ture that makes sense. Let’s obser ve this phenomenon in
natur
e.
We see flowers bloom and put forth tons upon tons of pollen for fertilizing the ovaries of female flowers. Both male and female flowers secrete nectar at their inner base to at -
tract consumption by bees and other insects. In taking such a large reward the bees and insec ts become con tamina
ted with pollen in the male flowers only to have it removed
when they take the nectar of female flowers. The ovaries of female flowers secrete a sticky substance which the bee or insect must come in contact with in taking their nec -
tars. Instances of symbiosis abound in nature. The above is cit ed t
o demonstrate natural cooperativeness or symbiosis. In this case we
see that the flowers of plants, both woody and nonwoody, attracted bees and insects to
take the free meals provided. This is the way that plants uncannily solved the problem of fertilization, attesting to a high order of intelligence in plant life (which is perceived by few). Humans do not collect nectar. Even if they did, it would be a very poor food though it
sustains bees and insects well. Fertilization in this manner is necessary to certain forms
67
Fruiticultureof plant life to insure that seeds be created with which to propagate the species. As we
know, plant life is stationary. Once it has created its seed progeny, a new problem arises, that of scattering the seeds so they will flourish. How did this uncanny wisdom in nature accomplish this? Among the many solutions was that of creating yet another food around the seed or
seeds. In attracting consumption of this food by mobile creature, there was the inci -
dental distribution of its seeds to areas where they would not compete for space and raw mat er
ials with the parent plant. Of course, that same immense wisdom dictated
the creation of seeds that were unappetizing so they would be discarded rather than consumed. But the greatest wisdom of all, perhaps, was that which created the food package to pro -
portionately meet the precise needs of its eaters:  Those creatures which, in taking and
bec oming dependent on these foods, became the fruit plan
t’s biological symbiont. That
this method of seed distribution was successful is evidenced by the thousands of kinds
of fruits created around seeds in nature. Fruits attract human senses in nature and are gourmet delights in their natural ripened state, which ensures their sur -
vival. Also, fruits contain no poisons in the fresh ripened state wher
eas almost
all plants and seeds contain components which we cannot metabolize, hence are toxic directly or indirectly. Fruits in nature are in a predigested form when they ripen. Fruits ripen when their seeds are at a mature stage ready for reproduction. When fruits ripen, they change to brilliant colors and emit seductive fragrances to attract consumption from a biological symbiont. The tree, stalk or vine is rewarded in that its seeds are distributed, thus perpetuating its kind. They are beautiful to behold and emit captivating aromas and fragrances. This makes them irresistibly attractive to their biological symbionts. If all the water and fiber are removed from most of these fruits, the predigested carbohydrates are almost all the same, about 350 calories per 100 grams on average, more than enough to meet the en -
ergy needs of biological symbionts. This is about 88% of solids. 68
FruiticultureIn like manner, fruits supply from 4 to 8 grams of amino acids per 100 grams, almost ev -
ery one of them with all the essential amino acids in about the proportions that humans
require, plus, of c
ourse, other amino acids. The average amino acid content is about the
same as mother’s milk for a growing baby. The average is about 6% of solids. When suf -
ficient calories have been consumed to meet caloric needs, intake is almost double our actual daily amino acid shortfall from r ec
ycling. Furthermore, the fatty acids from almost all fruits other than avocados and olives consti -
tute about 1% to 5% of solids other than fiber. These fatty acids are liberal in their supply of the essential fatty acids. The average fatty acid content of fruits is about 2%. But, importantly, fruits are rich in mineral matter in the most utilizable form in all Nature! Of its solids, about 3% are minerals including, of course, ample calcium to meet our needs if we do not eat more than 20% acid-forming foods and if we do not cook and derange fruit nutrients. Of the labeled macronutrients, there are vitamins
which are really micronutrients; so little as not to be ordinarily measurable. A year of the RDIs for vita -
mins would not fill a sewing thimble! Yet fruits sup -
ply many multiples of the RDIs of vitamins in almost every instance. F
or instance, vitamin C in fruits suffi-
cient to meet our caloric needs is about ten times as much, on a verage, as the RDI f
or it. Those on the fruit diet have 60% to 70% less need for water than those on the conven -
tional diet, primarily because pathogens require inordinate amounts of water to hold them in suspension and carry them out of the body. Fruits supply ample w
ater in its pur -
est form to meet our needs. Fruitarians do not normally drink water but make as many trips to the urinal as an y
one. As a last consideration, fruits are alkaline in their metabolic end-products. The body readily excretes excess alkalis whereas it must neutralize objectionable acids and excrete them if able. (Arthritis, bursitis, rheumatism, gout and yet other problems are caused by
69
Fruiticulturethe body’s inability to excrete base salts from acid neutralization, usually calcium salts. For instance the uric acid of meats are neutralized into calcium urate crystals because we do not secrete the enzyme, uricase, as carnivores do. These salts have an affinity for cartilage in joints. Also having this affinity are the acid end-products of grains, oxalic ac -
ids in vegetables like spinach, chard, beets and lamb’s quarter, most cooked foods, and mea ts.) Are w
e a species of fruit eaters? I’m sure that you will agree through your own senses
that fruits would be your primary food in a state of nature. Would you, in nature, rel -
ish ripe grapes, peaches, melons, bananas, apples, plums, oranges, mangoes, avocados, tomatoes, figs
, berries and the thousands of other fruits? Would fruits attract your eye,
tantalize your sense of smell, and be a gustatory delight in their raw natural ripe state? Would you prefer anything that occurs in nature to a juicy sweet watermelon? Man has always had a love affair going with fruits. Even through all his perversions, he has con -
tinued to relish fruits. Fruits are the natur al f
ood of humans and the
only food category ideally suited to all their faculties. This does not mean we should eat fruits totally and exclusively in our present circumstances, but it does mean that, in na -
ture, that’s all we ate as


Intelligence governs the waking state in which clear
perception occurs. It predominates in human beings who
represent the waking state of consciousness, and distin-
guishes the human from the animal and vegetable king-
doms. Intelligence is responsible for wakefulness as a
whole. Our degree of spiritual wakefulness is the measure
of how we have developed our intelligence. Intelligence gives directed awareness, through which
we can concentrate fully on a particular object. Conscious-
ness (Chitta), on the other hand, gives open or choiceless
awareness, through which the whole can be grasped. While memory abides in consciousness, clarity of memory
belongs to intelligence. Intelligence gives us objective
recall of events. The ability to remember what we know,
without which knowledge is of little value, is the ability of
intelligence to access consciousness. Without such memo-
ry, our intelligence cannot develop properly. When the Ayurveda and the Mind
time comes to use our knowledge without such memory,
we will not have access to it. For this reason cultivation of
memory is a key to the development of intelligence. Samadhi
Samadhi is the fourth and highest means of knowledge,
and is the ultimate form of direct perception. It occurs
when intelligence uses our deeper consciousness as its
instrument of perception. This only happens when we
transcend the intellect into true intelligence. 32 It requires
that the senses are silent and we can look within without
distraction. Then, by the light of our own consciousness,
we can discover all the secrets of life. Spiritual practice consists of converting the raw mater-
ial of consciousness into the refined energy of intelligence. Awareness in consciousness is general and rudimentary,
while in intelligence it is fully developed and articulate. Intelligence illumines our deeper consciousness, which in
turn gives it space and depth. Intelligence takes us from
the unconscious to the superconscious, from sleep to
Samadhi. Meditation is the highest function of intelli-
gence. True intelligence creates Samadhi and immerses us
in our deeper consciousness in an attentive way. 33
Samadhis, which involve concentration, one-pointed-
ness of mind and directed mental activity, belong to intel-
ligence. Higher Samadhis, in which there is no thought or
action, and the mind is not one-pointed but calmed, are of
the deeper consciousness. In these, intelligence ceases to
have any separate function and intelligence and conscious-
ness become one. This takes us into the unconditioned in
which all thoughts disappear. Intelligence: The Power of Perception
Proper Development
To develop true intelligence requires placing the intel-
lect in the service of awareness. This occurs when we rec-
ognize the difference between the higher and the lower
knowledge, which is the distinction between self-knowl-
edge and knowledge of externals. Through the lower, we
understand the outer world and how it functions, but this
knowledge remains bound to the realm of form and
change. Through the higher knowledge, we know our-
selves. Our true nature is eternal consciousness that cannot
be determined by the names and forms of outer knowing. Our immortal Self is the knower. It cannot be an object of
the mind but is the origin of the mind. We can only know
it by being it. There is nothing wrong with the intellect as long as we
keep it in its place. We all need a clear intellect to deal
with the practical realities of everyday existence, like dri-
ving a car. But if the outer function of intellect is not bal-
anced by the inner function of intelligence, it leads to dis-
tortion and can become destructive. Ayurvedic
psychological methods bring about the proper develop-
ment of intelligence so that we can perceive our problems
and their causes, and change them in a lasting manner. The language and tools of Ayurveda are not merely man-
made, but reflect Cosmic Intelligence and help us attune
our life and behavior to it. 109 A
8. The Outer Mind:
The Field of the Senses
ur lives revolve around the vast array of senso-
Ory impressions that are ever coming to us from
the external world. At almost every moment
of the day we are engaged in selecting, filtering and orga
nizing this data and seeing what it means for our welfare
and happiness. We are seldom aware of our minds because
we are always using them to deal with the external world
and its demands. Like a car we are always driving, we do
not have the time to stop and see if it is working properly,
unless it breaks down. It is mainly in the outer, sensory
part of the mind that we live, unless we learn to look with-
in. Our ordinary awareness remains immersed in the sea of
impressions that constantly streams in through the senses. Most of what we call the mind is this surface part of con-
sciousness through which we handle impressions. This
outer mind is called Manas in Sanskrit,54 which means the
"instrument of thinking. " Manas is the most complex
aspect of consciousness, consisting of the senses, emotions,
and outer thinking capacity. Such diversity is necessary for
dealing with the manifold influences of the external world. We will refer to Manas as the "outer" or "sense mind,"
or as simply "mind" itself, as opposed to "intelligence"
(Buddhi) and "inner mind" or "consciousness" (Chitta). However, we should not forget their Sanskrit meanings. 110 Ayurveda and the Mind
Including emotion, mind (Manas) is not simply mental or
conceptual. The Five Senses and Motor Organs
We possess five senses and five motor organs through
which we take in the energies of the five elements and act
upon them in the outer world. Sense and Motor Organs
Element Humor Sense
Quality Sense
Organ Motor
Organ
Ether Vata Sound Ears Vocal Organ
Air Vata Touch Skin Hands
Fire Pitta Sight Eyes Feet
Water Kapha Taste Tongue Reproductive
Organs
Earth Kapha Smell Nose Organs of
Elimination
The mind coordinates the five senses and their data. It
functions as the screen on which sensory data is gathered
and scrutinized. Through the mind, for example, what the
eye sees is correlated with what the ear hears. Otherwise,
the data coming in from the different senses would remain
separate and disorganized. The mind itself is the sixth sense organ because
through it we take in ideas and emotions — mental
impressions. When we read a book, for example, the mind
is also functioning as a sense organ, taking in emotional
and mental information. All our sensory inputs involve The Outer Mind: The Field of the Senses
some mental and emotional component. Similarly, the
mind is the sixth motor organ and rules over the other five. As an organ of action, it is our main means of expression
in the outer world. Only what we have first formulated as
a mental intention can we express through our motor
organs. For example, we must first think of what to say
before we actually speak. As an organ of action, the mind
serves to express ideas and emotions — mental conditions. As a sense and a motor organ, the mind can coordinate
the two types of organs, connecting sensory data with
motor actions. For example, if we see food on the table, the
mind connects that sensory data with the hands to allow us
to pick up the food and eat it. The mind is the central cir-
cuit board for both sensory and motor organs. It is like our
mental computer, while the senses are its software. Though the mind relates to both sense and motor
organs, it connects more with the motor organs because its
main concern is action in the outer world. The mind is
ever driving us to do things. It is ever thinking, planning,
reacting emotionally or otherwise seeking to engage us
externally. Through it we are conscious of ourselves as
beings in the world. The Pranas
Both motor and sense organs are closely aligned to
Prana and its functions. The motor organs exist to fulfill
various vital urges, from eating to self-expression. The
sense organs exist to provide knowledge and experience of
the external world. The mind manages the Pranas, operat-
ing through the sense and motor organs. The mind is
influenced by the Pranas and can easily be disturbed by
them. Whatever affects our vital nature, like hunger, fear
or insult, quickly affects the mind. 112 Ayurveda and the Mind
The senses possess their own instincts and energies that
can dorpinate the mind. The eye has the urge to see, the
tongue the urge to taste, the hands the urge to grasp, and
so on. These urges influence the mind to pursue their aims. The eyes can tell the mind what to see, for example, as
when the image of a beautiful woman draws the mind of a
man outward automatically. This happens to all of us with
one sense organ or another. We are always struggling to
control our senses, which otherwise would fragment our
awareness. Animals are dominated by their sensory impulses. For
example, a dog barks automatically when another dog
comes into its sensory field. The sense mind predominates
in children, who have not yet learned to master their sen-
sory capacities. The outer mind is conditioned through the
sense organs and Pranas. In itself it is largely a reaction
mechanism


 the divine mind and your ener gy will go from slow to
fast, from material to spiritual, from problems to solutions. The next time
you are faced with a problem, look at your hand for a moment and remind
yourself that although it has intelligence, its substance is your mind that
directs it to be a hand. Then face the problem with your mind  and God’ s
mind  as one. Mortal Sense Needs to Y ield to Make Room for Spiritual A wareness
On Beethoven’ s writing table, framed under glass, were the following
words, copied in his handwriting. He had discovered them in an essay on
the spiritual practices of Ancient Egypt. “I am that which is, I am all, what
is, what was, what will be; no mortal man has lifted my veil. He is only and
solely of himself, and to this only one all things owe their existence.”
Imagine this great composer reading these words every day to remind
himself of the source of his creativity. You too can be inspired to decide to let go of your primary identification
with your mental, material self and yield to the one to whom all things owe
their existence. When confronted with a problem stop in the middle of itand remind yourself that God is on the field and that you can surrender to
that realization. When I do this, almost immediately the solution is obvious. I am always surprised that I didn’ t realize that I was attempting to resolve
my dif ficulty with my mortal self, feeling separated and anxious and facing
the issue all by myself. In the moments of yielding the mortal sense, the
energy field increases and you make room for the presence of spiritual
awareness. I received a letter from a woman who was diagnosed with cancer and given
only a few months to live. She decided to keep this information from
everyone she knew, including her husband and children. She rented a cabin
in the northern Minnesota woods and spent each day silently yielding her
mortal sense and opening herself to spiritual guidance. The days turned into
weeks, and the weeks into months, with every day devoted to communing
silently with God and releasing her attachment to her body and the cancer
that had invaded it. She began to feel stronger as she no longer identified
herself with her body. When she returned to her home she never again even
visited a medical facility. Today she thrives, some nine years after her
terminal illness diagnosis. The commitment to yield her mortal sense and
allow the calm, peaceful, serene, loving presence of God to handle the
cancer was what she intuitively felt was her pathway to healing. Any problem, I emphasize any, disassociates from your inner world when
you yield your material mortal self and allow the higher frequencies of
spirit to manifest in your life. Send Love to, and Pray for, Your Enemies
I use the word enemies  advisedly here. The poet Henry W. Longfellow
wrote, “If we could read the secret history of our enemies we shall find in
each man’ s sorrow and suf fering enough to disarm all hostility.”
Harboring anger and hatred toward anyone guarantees that you remain in
low ener gy fields where problems will continue to crop up repeatedly in
your life. I suggest that you examine every relationship in which you feel
judgmental thoughts of anger and hatred. Replace those thoughts with
energies of acceptance, kindness, cheerfulness, and love. Y ou will have to
make a personal commitment to, first of all, notice what you are feeling andthen exercise your ability to choose to send love. When your heart becomes
pure, your enemy becomes your friend, or even more significantly, your
teacher. Your worst enemies are your greatest teachers because they allow
you to examine the emotions of anger and revenge and then to transcend
them. They give you the exact tools you need to elevate yourself to the
spiritual ener gies that provide your solutions. When you send love in response to hate you accomplish one of the most
difficult things for anyone. As I look into my conscience I can now honestly
say, I have no one whom I can call an enemy, no one whom I could say I
hate. Over the course of my life I have been disappointed many times. Some have borrowed and never repaid. Some have for gotten their promises. Some have left me for others. Some have cursed me and spread rumors
about me. Some have stolen from me. I send love to them all, mindful of
the Buddha’ s words: “W e live happily indeed, not hating those who hate us. Among men who hate us we dwell free from hatred.” It has been this
transformation in my own thinking, perhaps more than anything else, that
has allowed me to move out of those low ener gy problem regions of my
life. It is a powerful strategy for raising your spiritual awareness. God Is Not W ithholding
Imagine, for a moment, that you know a person who has stored away
everything you want or need for your happiness, but refuses to let you have
them unless you do his bidding, ask properly, and behave as he wants you
to. Furthermore, this person can heal you of disease but allows you to suf fer
for now, and maybe  will consider healing you at some future date. This
would not be a very nice person, let alone a very nice God. Is this the kind
of withholding God that you imagine the spiritual ener gy to be? In the
scriptures it clearly says, “And everything I have is yours.” These six little
words may be the secret you’ve been looking for to raise your awareness to
a spiritual level. God is often perceived as an invisible being whom you pray to when you
find yourself experiencing some kind of shortage in your life. “Please God,
send me the money I need. Dear God, I want you to heal me of my disease. I beg you God, please bring back my spouse who left me for another man.”On and on, praying for the things that you perceive to be missing. In this
mind-set you believe God decides whether to provide those missing
bounties from your life based upon how you behave and whether you do the
proper penance and ask in the fashion that God demands. Moving your ener gy up to the level of spirit involves knowing that God is
not going to be doing anything dif ferent one hour from now than he is doing
right now. Moreover, God isn’ t doing anything dif ferent now, than he was
doing an hour ago or one hundred years ago. God is only here in the present
moment, in the eternal now. God is inextricably intertwined with your
ability to move your thoughts out of yesterday and tomorrow and to escape
into the now, wherein is located God’ s only residence. The now is a speck in the universe of abundance that has no boundaries. “Everything I have” means the unbounded prosperity of this universe. “Is
yours” means you can have whatever you place your attention on with love,
now, not at some future time, but now. God is not holding back your share
of this unbounded pie waiting for you to conduct yourself properly. Nor is
God gleefully watching you suf fer in scarcity and illness until he decides to
stop withholding. Whatever solution you seek for whatever problem you
may have is available to you in this moment. It is in you, not in some
mythical Santa Claus like being with a long flowing beard floating around in
the heavens, dispensing “goodies” to some and “baddies” to others. Y ou are
always connected to this universal source of present moment ener gy. As Saint Paul put it in his letter to the Corinthians, “Do you not know that
you are the temple of God and the Spirit of God dwells in you” (I
Corinthians 3:16). When you know this truth, you stop asking God to give
you what you think he is withholding. Instead you can bring this spirit of
God that dwells in you to those missing or problem areas. And you will
have unlocked the secret for a spiritual solution to your problems. Once you realize that you cannot influence God, nor can you find God in
some place where he has hidden from you, you know that nothing is being
withheld from you and you can commune with this omnipresent source and
bring that love to bear on your personal problems. You Are Not Being PunishedJust as God does not withhold, God does not punish you by burdening you
with problems. As Joel Goldsmith, the founder of the Infinite W ay put it,
“All you have to do is to awaken from the belief in two powers of good and
evil and begin to honor God by respecting the first commandment... how
can you fear an evil power if there is only one power and that one power is
God?” The idea that God could be punitive is inconsistent with spiritual
awareness. Purely and simply put, God is love and he has made everything
beautiful in its time, including you and everyone else. Actions and thoughts, which you might call evil, are the result of the error
that is made when you believe you are separate from God. It is a mistake of
the ego, or the intellect, to believe there is evil for which God must punish
you. Y ou correct an error by bringing truth to it. Y ou then nullify the error. The idea that God will condemn you is not consistent with a God of
forgiveness. You believe either in one power or two. The power of one is the power of
love. Evil exists first as a thought of non-good or non-God, and then it is


 diet while being free from heart disease, arteriosclerosis and
other health problems, which fats are commonly blamed for. Native people
in Mongolia largely live on lamb and lamb fat and yet they are not known
for being afflicted with any of the diseases of the western world. We forget
that the fatty tissue of animals is not just made of fat, it has got many other
substances in its structure, which our bodies need. We do not know every
thing about these fats yet by a long way. What we do know, however, is that
if we try to separate meat from the fat, we get sick. Nature put fat into meat
for a purpose and that is how meat should be consumed, together with the
fat, collagen and cartilage in it; that is the form our bodies have been
designed to take up dietary meat - as a whole. It has been shown in many
clinical studies that the protein from meats has to come with the fat to be
properly digested and used by the body, when the two are separated vari
ous health problems develop. Animal fats contain mainly saturated fatty
acids which do not change their chemical structure when heated and are
the best fats to cook with. A rich source of saturated fats is coconut. Coconut and products made
out of it (coconut oil and butter, coconut milk, coconut cream, etc.) have been out of favour in the last decades. Based on ill-founded research and
commercial interests coconut and other tropical fats have been blamed for
raising blood cholesterol and the risk of atherosclerosis, which made them
very unpopular. And yet tropical fats have been used by indigenous people
for thousands of years. These people generally are known for very low
incidence of atherosclerosis and heart disease. About 50% of fatty acids in coconut is lauric acid. Recent research shows
that in the body lauric acid gets converted into a highly potent anti-viral,
anti-bacterial and anti-fungal substance, called monolaurin. Such
pathogens as Candida Albicans, Helicobacter Pylori, HIV virus, measles
virus, herpes virus, cytomegalovirus, Epstein-Barr virus, influenza and
many others are susceptible to monolaurin. Lauric acid is also one of
the natural ingredients of human breast milk, protecting the baby from
infections. Other fatty acids, found in coconut, are caprylic and myristic acids,
which also have a pronounced anti-viral, anti-bacterial and anti-fungal
properties. For example, caprylic acid has been in use as an anti-fungal,
anti-candida supplement for decades in the form of capsules and tablets. It is a good idea for GAPS patients to have coconut on a regular basis. Coconut can provide a natural source of anti-fungal, anti-bacterial and
anti-viral substances for these patients as well as many other nutritional
factors. The question is - in what form? People in the tropics use coconut in its natural state. The nut and juice
inside are very rich in saturated fats, fibre, vitamins, minerals, vitamin E,
tocotrienols, carotene and many other micro-nutrients. Fresh virgin
coconut oil, full of flavour, contains most of these useful substances and is
used extensively in the tropical countries for cooking, and because it con
tains saturated fats, it virtually does not change its chemical structure
when heated. Unfortunately, coconut oil available in the West is very differ
ent from its natural virgin tropical counterpart. It has been hydrogenated
to make it harder and to increase its shelf-life. In the process of hydrogena
tion trans-fatty acids are formed, which are well known to cause
atherosclerosis and heart problems. The hydrogenation process requires
the use of aluminium and nickel, traces of which would stay in the hydro
genated coconut oil. At the same time the process of hydrogenation
destroys vitamins, including vitamin E, carotene, tocotrienols and many
other useful nutrients. And as if that is not enough many brands of coconut
oil and coconut butter in the West go through a refining process which uses heat and solvent chemicals; Not surprisingly, studies with this sort of
coconut oil show that it does increase blood cholesterol. As usual, the best thing is to follow nature and have coconut in its natu
ral form. You can get fresh coconuts in most supermarkets. Please, look in
the recipe section for different ways of serving it. In conclusion
The important point is that we should consume natural fats in their
natural state without processing them. It is processed foods, which con
tain masses of unnatural adulterated fats, that should be blamed for our
modern health problems: the crisps and chips, margarines and butter
replacements, breads and pastries, biscuits and cakes, sweets and choco
lates, our TV dinners and other pre-prepared lazy meals, our cooking oils
and spreads, our salad dressings and mayonnaise, our sauces and condi
ments, etc. Eat fats in the form that Nature provided and you will not go
wrong! For example, butter is much healthier than any so-called "healthy"
synthetic substitutes. I would like to emphasise, that GAPS children and
adults need plenty of natural fats. Let them eat the fat on the meat, the skin
on the poultry, pour plenty of cold pressed virgin olive oil on their served
meals, give them good cod liver oil and fish oil on a daily basis. Supplement
their diet with good quality blends of nut/seed oils with 2:1 ratio of omega-
3:omega-6 fatty acids (LNA, LA, GLA). As well as olive oil, you can use these
oils as a dressing on their salads and ready served meals. Contrary to pop
ular belief, fat is the preferred source of energy in the human body and
remember, the brain and the rest of the nervous system are largely made
up of fats. There are some added benefits of supplying your GAPS patient with gen
erous amounts of natural unprocessed fats. The more natural fats the GAPS
person has with his/her meals the less he/she will crave sweet and pro
cessed carbohydrates, which will make it easier to remove these harmful
foods from the diet. And as you get processed foods out of the diet, you will
automatically get the bulk of harmful hydrogenated fats and trans-fats out
as well. A good supply of natural dietary fats has another benefit, important for
GAPS patients, it stimulates bile production. Secreting bile is the natural
way for the liver to rid itself of toxins. GAPS children and adults are very
toxic people. The bulk of detoxification in the body happens in the liver. Allowing the liver to drain itself on a regular basis will help the patient to
detoxify quicker. We live in a world of fat phobia, created by commercial interests and
funded by them research Fats constitute a large part of our bodily struc
ture and functions. That is why every health problem can be linked to
abnormalities in fat consumption: too much unnatural fats and deficien
cies in natural fats. Stick to the natural fats and make sure that your GAPS
patient gets plenty of them. You will see the results for yourself. 3. VITAMIN A
Vitamin A is a fat-soluble vitamin, which means that it comes as a part of
dietary fats. It exists in many biochemical forms. The parent vitamin A is
called retinol. Common dietary sources are organ meats like liver and
kidneys, dairy products, eggs and oily fish, like herring, sardines and tuna. However, the richest sources are liver oils from marine fish, such as cod,
halibut and shark and from some mammals, such as the polar bear. The
most accessible liver oil available to us is cod liver oil. Cod liver oil has been around for a very long time. Our parents remem
ber how their parents gave them a spoon of this oil every day to build up
their immune system. Cod liver oil contains omega-3 essential fatty acids
and vitamin D, but its most important asset is probably the vitamin A in its
natural pre-formed biochemical shape. Unfortunately, due to digestive
problems, GAPS children and adults usually cannot absorb or use other
forms of vitamin A, commonly found in supplements: retinyl palmitate,
retinyl acetate and others, A natural form of vitamin A found in cod liver oil
appears to be the best form for these patients. But why do GAPS patients need supplementation of vitamin A? Vitamin A deficiency is a big problem in the less developed world. Approximately 350,000 pre-school children become blind each year
because of vitamin A deficiency and the majority do not survive (WHO
1996). But in western countries deficiency in this vitamin is considered to
be rare because of the wide consumption of dairy products, eggs and forti
fied foods. Also the body has the ability to store enough vitamin A, mainly
in the liver, to last at least for three months. On top of that vitamin A can be
manufactured in the body from a large group of plant-based substances,
called carotenoids. There are approximately 600 different carotenoids in
nature (in green leafy and brightly coloured vegetables and fruit), 50 of
which can be converted to vitamin A. Based on all this knowledge western
populations generally are not advised to supplement vitamin A. However, all this applies to people with healthy digestive systems


plus other side effects. The proximal cause of all the aforementioned scenarios
is excess adrenaline. Elevated blood pressure is commonly
treated with a beta-blocker, such as atenolol, metoprolol, or ADRENALINE DOMINANCE 42   |
propranalol, which blocks the effects of adrenaline. Wouldn’t
it make more sense to just lower adrenaline and avoid using a
class of drugs that can cause impotence, weight gain (they are
antithyroid drugs), bronchial spasm leading to asthma, plus
other side effects. High adrenaline can be easily controlled
with diet and hormones, and then the patient can gradually
wean himself or herself off the antihypertensive medications. DIABETES
The two most common types of diabetes are type I and type II. Type I diabetes is caused by lack of insulin. Type II (adult
onset) diabetes is commonly thought to be caused by resistance
to insulin—that is, the cells become resistant to the action of
insulin, so sugar has difficulty getting into the cells. However,
I, along with a small but growing number of physicians, feel that type II diabetes is actually caused by the overproduction
of insulin. A growing number of physicians feel that
type II diabetes is actually caused by the
overproduction of insulin. This view of type II diabetes is controversial and contrary to
the traditional approach. However, the traditional approach is
clearly not working. Attempts to lower blood sugar levels with
drugs that increase insulin production or with insulin itself, as
well as to lower cholesterol levels and blood pressure, usually all fail to prevent the complications of diabetes. In fact, those studies that have attempted to reduce sugar levels to normal in diabetics by increasing insulin to a high level have resulted |   43 ExCESS  ADRENALINE: THE  BAD
in an alarming increase in mortality and complications. In
2012, the normal level for hemoglobin A1C, the time-honored
measurement of diabetic control, was raised from 6. 5 to 7. 5, an
indication that diabetes experts may be realizing that lowering
sugar levels by increasing insulin is not the answer. Standard thinking about diabetes is that sugar cannot
get into the cells because all the cells are resistant to insulin;
therefore the sugar stays in the bloodstream. However, I have
suspected for some time that an additional factor might be
involved: that the sugar cannot be transported into fat cells for
storage purposes because the fat cells have become saturated
with fat (i. e., there is no more room at the inn). As a result,
the sugar level in the blood goes up. The importance of dealing with insulin in type II diabetes
cannot be overstated. Insulin is a fat-storing hormone. It creates
fat by pushing sugar into fat cells, where it is converted into fat
for storage; it also sits outside fat cells and blocks the release of fat. Insulin is recognized as the cause of fat accumulating
around the abdomen. People who produce a lot of insulin often
have a paunch around the middle and relatively thin legs and arms. I suspect that when the fat cells in the abdominal area fill up, diabetes can follow. Let’s look at this more closely. The number of fat cells we
have throughout life is generally determined at a very young
age. People who were thin early in life often have fewer fat cells
as adults. Because they have fewer fat cells to absorb sugar, they
may be predisposed to developing adult-onset diabetes. (I have
observed that some women who have undergone significant
liposuction procedures can develop a type of diabetes that is
often incurable—they have run out of fat cells in which to
store sugar. ) The current epidemic of type II diabetes among ADRENALINE DOMINANCE 44   |
teenagers might very well be due to a combination of how
they eat, lack of exercise to burn off sugar, excessive adrenaline
(which raises both sugar and insulin), and, in some cases,
having been thin early in life. If type II diabetes is caused by excess insulin, where does
the excess insulin come from. In my view, adrenaline is the root
cause. Overproduction of adrenaline leads to overproduction
of sugar in order to fuel the brain and muscles. The elevated blood sugar stimulates the release of insulin. At the same time, overproduction of adrenaline also causes
the release of cortisol. Cortisol, like adrenaline, raises the blood
sugar level, which stimulates the release of insulin. As we have seen, elevated insulin lowers blood sugar
(hypoglycemia). And low blood sugar stimulates cravings for
food high in sugar as well as the release of more adrenaline
(and cortisol), and so the cycle continues. This cycle can also include the release of glucagon, another
hormone that can raise the sugar level. So now three hormones
are raising the sugar level, which is further exacerbated if
the person eats foods high in sugar. Is it any wonder that
people wind up with high sugar levels leading to a diagnosis of
diabetes. Along the same lines, could the release of adrenaline
at night be the reason that fasting sugars in the morning are often the highest sugars of the day in a diabetic. My approach to treating type II diabetes is the same as for
other medical conditions: I try to treat the underlying cause. When the insulin level is controlled, fat production is decreased
and the ability to burn fat increases, so the oversaturated fat cells let go of some of their fat. Once the amount of fat inside the fat cells is reduced, there is room in those cells for sugar to get inside so the blood sugar level drops. |   45 ExCESS  ADRENALINE: THE  BAD
Compare this approach to the traditional method of
treating type II diabetes. Patients are placed on medications
that increase insulin production or are placed on insulin itself. In my view, these patients are being treated with the very
hormone that causes not only diabetes but also most of the
complications of diabetes. Not surprisingly, these patients gain
more fat around the middle. They often feel sleepy between
three and four in the afternoon or after eating—a sign that
they are likely producing a significant amount of insulin. When a type II diabetic is taken off insulin medication in
conjunction with adopting an insulin-reducing meal plan and
using progesterone cream, it is not unusual for the numbness
in their feet (diabetic neuropathy) to improve. Patients on medications that increase insulin
production or on insulin itself are being treated with
the very hormone that causes diabetes. To summarize my view of insulin: it contributes to
accumulation of fat around the middle, it causes type II
diabetes and many of the complications of diabetes, and it
raises blood pressure and speeds up the aging process. Yet this
is the hormone that we use to treat type II diabetics. Could this be the reason they rarely get well. The effectiveness of reducing insulin in order to eliminate
diabetes is illustrated in the following letter from a patient: ADRENALINE DOMINANCE 46   |
September 7, 2010
Patient J. K. I am a retired physicist and aerospace scientist, age
82, and a patient of Dr. Platt’s. In 1985, I was diagnosed
with type II diabetes by my internist. The diagnosis was by glucose challenge; I had no symptoms that I recognized
or complained of. I sought the best medical help I could
find during subsequent years. Endocrinologists in Santa
Ana, CA, UCLA  Medical Center, Loma Linda Medical
Center, and UCSD  Medical Center treated me. I was
treated with sulfonylureas, metformin, insulin, Rezulin,
Avandia, and Actos. When first diagnosed, I weighed
approximately 180 lbs. When I first visited Dr. Platt,
January 19, 2010, I weighed 265 lbs. All of the physicians I
visited suggested I lose weight, but none told me that excess
insulin causes fat storage and weight gain, or that excess insulin is a characteristic of type II diabetes and of their
treatment. They all encouraged me to control blood sugar. None mentioned that there is no scientific evidence that
control of blood sugars to near normal levels will control diabetic complications. Since seeing Dr. Platt in January 2010, I have
understood the need to control insulin, and so I stopped all my diabetic medications. I now weigh 210 lbs., a loss
of 55 lbs. I feel good. I have no retinopathy. My blood
sugars are back to normal. As I mentioned in chapter 3, I suspect that progesterone
may help to control insulin by preventing the action of
insulin at insulin receptor sites, which is actually a form
of insulin resistance. Because insulin resistance might be a |   47 ExCESS  ADRENALINE: THE  BAD
factor with certain diabetics, I recommend that they continue
with metformin if they are on it, since it helps with insulin
resistance. Diabetics who have creative ADHD  may need to
take metformin to help prevent progesterone-induced insulin
resistance in brain cells. WEIGHT PROBLEMS
When it comes to weight, the effect of adrenaline can go in
either direction. On the one hand, adrenaline can increase
metabolism and energy levels, which promotes the burning of
fat. We often see this in children diagnosed with typical type
ADHD : they are hyperactive and usually on the thin side, and
in high school and college,


 a lower vibration frequency and lower power. When we are in
lower ener gy state such as anger, hate, violence, guilt, jealousy or any other
negative feelings, we are psychically vulnerable to the other person. In
contrast, for giveness, gratitude, and loving-kindness have a much higher
ener gy vibration and much greater power. When we shift out of a lower to a
higher ener gy pattern, we create a protective shield on the ener getic level,
as it were, and we can no longer be psychically vulnerable to that other
person. When we are in a state of anger, for instance, we are vulnerable to
the ener gy depletion brought about by the other person’ s counter -anger. Paradoxically, if we really want to af fect other people, then we ought to
really love them. Then, their anger at us will boomerang back upon them
with no ef fect upon us. This was the wisdom of the Buddha’ s statement in
the Dhammapada, “Hate is not conquered by hate. Hate is conquered by
love. This is an eternal law. ”
Guilt
The next “heavy” area of negativity is guilt. Here the underlying purpose is
to placate, to assuage, to escape punishment by self-punishment, and to
elicit for giveness. The most important of these is the wish to elicit
punishment from another person, combined with self-punishment. This is
not a conscious wish; nevertheless, it is the unconscious purpose of guilt. W ith a little investigation, this can easily be verified. The next time we are
feeling guilty about something particular regarding another person, watch
what happens in the next encounter. Almost inevitably, they will bring up
the very thing we are holding in mind. For instance, if we are feeling guilty
because of lateness to an appointment, that guilt will frequently elicit acritical response from the other person. By the holding of guilt, we bring on
to ourselves all the criticalness of others and their belittlement of us; our
low self-esteem is channeled back to us through others in the form of their
invalidation of our life. If we hold in mind that we are small and unworthy, we elicit those
kinds of responses from others, whose remarks tend to indicate that we are
small and unworthy. If we think we are only worth a crust of bread, then
that is what we will get. This is what the scriptures mean by the statement,
“The poor get poorer and the rich get richer. ” Poverty on any level, not just
financial, comes from inner poverty, just as outer wealth comes from inner
wealth. If we want others to stop being critical of us and attacking us, the
answer is to begin letting go of guilt and all the feelings that have brought it
about. T o help clarify the role of emotions in interpersonal relationships, a
very quick way of learning is to presume that the other person is conscious
and aware of our inner thoughts and feelings. By doing this, we will not be
far from wrong, for they are indeed intuitively aware of our thoughts and
feelings, even if they are not consciously aware at a given moment. They
will respond to us as if they knew our inner feelings. The overall
r elationship will behave as though the other person wer e awar e of our inner
feelings. If we are still holding the fantasy that other people do not know
our thoughts and feelings, just notice that dogs quickly do. Do we really
think that the human psyche is inferior to that of a dog. If a dog can quickly
read our total inner attitude, we can be sure that the intuition of people
around us is picking up the same vibration. Apathy and Grief
The feelings of apathy, grief, depression, sorrow, self-pity, the blues,
hopelessness, and helplessness come from the inner program of “I can’ t. ”
Their purpose is to elicit sympathy, to win back, to gain support, to make
others sorry, and to summon help. What is the ef fect of these feelings on
another person. Although there may be an initial attempt to help, eventually
this is replaced by pity and finally avoidance. Why avoidance. The
avoidance is because of the huge ener gy demand that we are making on the
other person. It is an attempt to drain them by throwing ourselves on their
doorstep. This results in the common saying, which sounds hard-hearted butis unfortunately so often true: “When you laugh, the world laughs with you;
but when you cry, you cry alone. ”
Constant grief will drive others away. They begin to resent it unless
they are in a very high place themselves and capable of ef fortless
compassion. Chronic grief brings premature aging, a tiredness and
weariness about the person, and it can only be overcome when we have the
courage to allow it to come up under appropriate conditions and have the
willingness to surrender to it and let it go. Fear
The feelings of fear—whether tension and anxiety, shyness, self-
consciousness, caution, holding back, or distrust—have the purpose of
escape from the imagined threat, and to put psychological distance from the
feared situation or person. Paradoxically, as we have pointed out before,
because the fear is powerful, the very process of holding it in mind can
make that which is feared come into our life. It is like a self-fulfilling
prophecy. The ener gy of fear generates an inner focus on all the negative
things that could happen, and that focus can coalesce the appearance of the
very events that we fear the most. Fear in relationships, therefore, is giving away our power to another
person and enabling them to do the very thing that is feared. The way out is
to look at the worst possible scenario and look at the feelings they arouse
and begin to relinquish them. Like other emotions, fear can be unraveled to
its component parts, and the parts are then easily relinquished. For instance,
let’ s say that there is fear of critical attack. W e ask ourselves, “What is the
worst possible scenario. ” W ith this question, we see that the basis of the
fear is pride. When the pride is recognized and relinquished, the fear
automatically dissolves. Again, in a relationship in which we are
experiencing fear, if we unravel the fear, we may find that it is really a fear
of discovery of our inner anger; the fear is that the other person will
retaliate against the anger. Again, when we relinquish the anger, the fear
will automatically disappear. The insecure person is fearful and prone to jealousy, clinging,
possessiveness, and attachment in relationships, an approach that always
brings frustration. The purpose of these feelings is to bind and tightly
possess the other, to achieve security by preventing loss and, at times, to
punish the other for our own fear of loss. Again, these attitudes tend tobring into manifestation the very thing that we are holding in mind. The
other person, now feeling pressured by our ener gy of dependency and
possessiveness, has an inner impulse to run for freedom, to withdraw, to
detach and do the very thing that we fear the most. These attitudes lead to
constantly wanting to influence others. Because people intuitively pick up
our wish to control them, their response is to resist. So the only way to
bring about relinquishment of their resisting us is to let go of wanting to
influence them in the first place. This means letting go of the inner fears as
they come up. Pride
Feelings of pride are often condoned in our society and take the form of
perfectionism, neatness, punctuality, dependability, “good personhood,”
excessive cleanliness, workaholism, excessive ambition, success, moral
superiority, and politeness. In its exacerbated forms, we see arrogance,
boastfulness, vanity, smugness, and prejudice; on the spiritual level, there is
the righteous killing of “nonbelievers. ” The underlying emotional purpose
of these feelings toward others is to win their admiration, avoid criticism or
rejection, gain acceptance, be important, and thereby overcome our own
inner feelings of worthlessness. Unfortunately, the feelings that are aroused
in the other person are often those of envy, competitiveness, or even hatred
and easy exploitation. If we look at pride, we see that it’ s often a substitute
for genuine self-esteem. It is also of considerable interest to realize that the major relationship to
which many people apply these phenomena is the relationship to God. There is the belief, often unconscious, that we can elicit a certain response
from God: “God will feel sorry for me”; “God will retaliate against me”;
“God will punish me”; “God will be pleased with me”; “God will favor
me. ”
When we have adequate self-esteem, we are motivated by inner
humility and gratitude and, therefore, we have no need for the constant
eliciting of strokes and pats from others (or God). When we stop wanting to
be liked, we find that we are. When we stop catering to others and trying to
manipulate their approval, we find that they do respect us. Self-denigration
in the forms of placating, flattering, deference, self-ef facement, and
passivity are all attempts to influence others by catering to their ego, so as
to get favorable treatment and get our own way. False humility


 supposed to be fun. Play with the law of attraction, in vent games
with your imagination, because the law of attraction doesn't know or care if
you're imaginin g and playing, or if it is real. Wha tever you give in
imagination and feeling, will become real. How to Play

"The law of lo ve could be best understood and learned th r ough little
childr en. " (Gandhi 1869 1948)

How do you play. Y ou do the same thing as you did when you were a child,
and you use your imagination to create make-believe games. Let's imagine you're a cyclist and you want to become the best cyclist in the
world and win th e T our de Franc e. Y our training is going well and you have
your dream in y our sights, but y ou are diagnosed with a disease and given a40 percent chance to survive. W hile having treatment, you imagine you are
riding in the T our de France and it is the race of your life. Y ou imagine the
medical staf f is your training team giving you feedback at every checkpoint. Each day you im agine you're racing in a time trial, and your time is getting
better and better. Y ou win the race with your medical team and you
overcome the disease. One year after y ou win back yo ur health, you win the T our de France, and
you continue to win it seven years in a row, becom ing the only cy clist in
history to achieve that. This is what Lance Armstrong did. He used the
most di f ficult circumstances as  props to create an imaginary game and
realize his dream. Let's say you want to have the best built body in the world, a nd you also
want to become a famous actor in America. Y ou live in a tiny village in
Europe and come from a f amily  that has struggled financially, but still you
imagine your dreams. Y ou use a pic ture of a hero to sculpt you r body, and
you imagine winning the European title for the best built body. Y ou win the
title seven times, and then it is time to become a famous actor. Y ou travel to
America, but no one believes you are actor material, and they give you all
the reaso ns why you will never ac hieve yo ur dream. But y ou have imagined
being a famous a ctor, and you ca n feel the success, you can taste it, and you
know it will happen. This is w hat Arnold Schwarzenegger did when he won
Mr. Oly mpia se ven times and then became one of the biggest names in
Hollywood. Imagine you want to be a grea t inventor. In your childhood your mind is
challenged to the extreme; you  are overwhelmed with hallucinations and
blinding flashes of light. Y ou fai l to finish university and leave your job due
to a nervous breakdown. T o gain relief from the crippling hallucinations,
you take control of your mind by creating your own imaginary world. Inspired by the idea of a brighter future, you direct your imagina tion to new
inventions. Y ou build an invention completely in your imagination; you
change t he construction, make improvements, and even operate  the device,
without ever drawing a sketch. Y ou create a  laborato ry in your min d and
you use  your imagination to check the new invention for wear and tear,
before turning your idea into a physical device. This is what Nikola T esla
did t o be come o ne of the greate st inventors. Whether it was the  alternatingcurrent motor, radio, amplifier, wireless communication, fluorescent light,
laser bea m, rem ote control, or a ny of his other three hundred plus patented
inventions, all of them had been  developed in exactly this way - through the
power of his imagination. "Logic will get you fr om A to B. Imagination will take you everywher e. "
(Albert Einstein 1879-1955)

Whatever it is you want, use your imagination, create games, and play. Use
every prop you can find to help you. If you want to lose  weight or have a
better body, then create games so you feel as thoug h you have that body
now. Y o u can surround yourself  with pictures of great bodies, but the trick
is this. Y ou must imagine those bodies are yours. Y ou must imagine and
feel that yo u are looking at your body, not somebody else's body. If you are overweight or underweight, and you had the perfect weight right
now, how would you feel. Y ou would fee l dif ferent from how you feel
now. Everythi ng about you would ch ange. Y ou would walk dif ferently, talk
dif ferently, and you would do t hings dif ferently. W alk like that now. T alk
like that  now. Act as if you have it now. It doesn't matter what it is that you
want; imagine how you would feel with it, and act like that now in your
imagination. Whatever you imagine with feeling, you are giving to the law
of attraction, and you must receive it. Lance Armstron g, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Nikola T esla all these people
played with their imaginations and felt their dreams with all their heart. Their imaginings became so real to them, they could feel their dreams and
know th ey woul d happen. It doe sn't matter how far away your dream seems
to you. It is clos er to you than anything in your life, because all the po wer
to bring your dream to you is inside you. "Everything is possible for the person who believes. " ( Jesus - Cir ca 5 BC
AD 30 in Mark 9 :23)
In the future we will see more and more discoveries about the power of our
imagination. Already scientists have discovered special mirror cells thatactivate the same areas p in the b rain when you imagine doing s omething as
when YOlll physically perform the action. In other words, simply by your
playing and imagining what  you want to experience, your brain
immediately responds as if it is real. If yo u're talking about somethin g in the past or the future,you're imagining
those things now, you're feeling  those things now, you're on that frequency
now, and that's what the law of.'attraction is receiving. W hen you're
imagining your dream, the law of attraction  is receiving it now. Remember,
there is no time for the law of attraction. There is only this moment of now. If you experience a time delay in  receiving what you want, it's only because
of the time it takes you to get onto the same feeling frequenc y that your
desire is on. A nd to get onto the same fre quency as your desire, you have to
feel the love of having your desire now. When you get yourself onto the
same feeling frequency and stay there, what you desire appears. "All you  can possibly need or desir e is alr eady yours. Call your  desir es into
being by  imagin ing and feeling your wish fulfilled. " (NevilleGoddar d 1905-
1972)

When you are really excited about anything that has happened, and you feel
amazing, captur e that ener gy and imagine your dream. Quick flashes of
imagining and feeling y our dream are all you need to harness the power of
your excited feelings for w hat you wa nt. This is playing. This is fun. This is
the joy of creating your life. Points of Power

The Key of Love
• T o use love a s the ultimate p ower in your life, Y ou must love like you
have never loved before. Fall in love w ith life. • See only  love, hear only love, sp eak only love, and feel love with all your
heart. • There is no limit, no ceiling, to the amount o f love you can feel, and it is
all inside you. Y ou are made of love. • T ell the law of attrac tion what you love eve ry day by singling out the
things you love and feeling them. • T o c hange the way you feel, or t o lift good feelings higher; m ake a mental
list of everything you love and adore. • Y our job is to love as much as possible every day. • Make a conscientious ef fort to notice as many things around you that you
love, as much as you can each day. The Key of Gratitude

• Every time you feel grateful you are giving love. • Be grateful for everything you have received in your life (past). Be
grateful for everything you are receiving in your life (present). Be grateful
for what you want in your life, as though you have received it (future). • Y our gratitude will multiply everything in your life. • Gratitude is the bridge from negative feelings to harnessing
 • the force of Love. • T o use t he power of  gratitude, practice it. W'hen anything good hap pens to
you in your day, give thanks. It doesn 't matter how small it is, say thank
you. • The mor e you feel gratitude, the more love you give; and the more love
you give, the more you receive. • Every s pare second is an opportunity to be grateful and multiply the


 the nursing mama’ s diet, the baby’ s symptoms improve. Common
foods that cause colic include wheat, dairy, soy, and peanuts—but really any
food that mama is unable to digest properly will af fect the quality of her
breast milk and thus disrupt her little one’ s tummy (hence the importance of
slowly rekindling mama’ s digestive fire with proper foods after giving birth,
as taught in the next chapter). Caf feine, chocolate, cruciferous vegetables,
onions, and raw garlic are among the other foods Ayurveda recommends
removing from mama’ s diet. In general, make sure mama’ s digestion is
balanced and that she is able to digest her food ef ficiently without feeling
gassy or bloated. (See the food guidelines in chapter 8 for supporting mamaand babe.) Once you put these changes in place, your babe may take a few
days to a week to show significant progress, but it will come. Most of the time, colic will disappear on its own as the baby’ s digestive
system matures (around four months old), though watching your little one
in extreme discomfort or pain can be heartbreaking, and trying to care for a
colicky newborn can be exhausting. Below are some other remedies that
may help. If symptoms persist, consult a lactation specialist or pediatrician. REMEDIES FOR COLIC
Empty one breast at a time when breastfeeding. Your baby may
be getting too much lactose in the foremilk and not enough fatty
hindmilk. Make sure the baby is nursing on one side until the breast
is fully empty before switching to the other side. Herbal teas for mama. Make a tea with any combination of
caraway, cumin seeds, chamomile, catnip, fennel, dill, or anise to sip
on while the baby is nursing. The herbal remedy will transfer to your
breast milk and ease your baby’ s digestive system. Herbal tea for babe. Fennel seed or dill seed tea is helpful for
relieving gas and intestinal cramping. This can be given directly to
the baby. Bring 1 teaspoon of seeds to boil in 1 cup of water; steep
and strain. A few drops may be all that is needed, but a small bottle
is fine if your baby wants more. The colic hold. Lay your baby with their belly across your forearm
and your hand supporting their head and chest. Keep the baby’ s
head slightly higher than their feet. This may relieve some of their
discomfort. Burping. Burp the baby with gentle pats on the back after every
feeding to reduce gas buildup in your little one’ s stomach. Take a warm herbal bath together. Make an infusion with
chamomile and lavender and add it to your bath water. Hold yourbaby to your chest for skin-to-skin contact while relaxing in the warm
water. Baby abhyanga. When your newborn is relaxed and calm but not
asleep, gently massage the baby and rub sesame oil in clockwise
circular motions around their belly using your first two fingers with
gentle pressure. Eliminate stimulating substances. When mamas smoke or
consume caf feine, the stimulant can pass through breast milk and
lead to colic. Add probiotics to your diet. Add yogurt, kefir, or lactobacillus
capsules to your diet. Essential oils. Put a few drops of chamomile, fennel, or lavender
essential oils in warm water, soak a washcloth in the water, squeeze
it out, and then wrap it gently around your baby’ s abdomen. Homeopathic treatment. Colic Calm is a homeopathic remedy
found in most pharmacies. I highly recommend having a bottle of this
at home just in case it is ever needed. It eases babies’  discomfort
almost immediately. CONSTIPATION
A breastfed newborn will generally poop daily, if not several times a day. According to Western medicine, it is normal for your baby to start going
several days without any bowel movements after six weeks of age, and as
long as there is no pain or cramping associated with the constipation, baby
will eventually have a soft bowel movement and all will be fine. However,
according to Ayurveda, everyone—including infants!—should have bowel
movements at least once per day and anything less than that is considered
constipation. Again, as long as your baby is not uncomfortable or in pain, mild
constipation is common and nothing to be concerned about, but if you wantto help get your baby’ s bowels moving, Ayurveda recommends changing
your diet to include more warm, oily, watery foods—specifically focusing
on stewed fruits (recipe on this page ) for breakfast each morning until baby
starts pooping daily. You can also drink warmed prune juice so that baby
receives those benefits while nursing or put a little bit of ghee on your
nipple for your baby to ingest while nursing. Another Ayurvedic folk
remedy is soaking a Q-tip in olive oil or ghee and gently inserting it a
quarter -inch into your baby’ s anus. They should have a bowel movement
shortly after! If you are concerned that your baby is in any discomfort or
pain from constipation, always consult with your pediatrician or midwives. SLEEP “SCHEDULES”
A newborn baby’ s sleep pattern does not seem to have much rhyme or
reason. Keep in mind that just about any schedule your baby has for
sleeping is probably normal: They can sleep all night and all day. They can
sleep all day and be awake all night. They can sleep all night and be awake
all day. They are adjusting to the rhythmic patterns of day and night, and
that takes time. Furthermore, they need a lot of sleep to continue growing. Remember that newborns will go through growth spurts every several days
for several weeks and then every several weeks for several months. All the
growing that their brains and bodies are doing is exhausting! As a general rule of thumb, a baby’ s “wake window” (the time that they
can tolerate being awake between naps or before bed) will start small and
gradually increase over time. After the first few months, you will likely start
to see a rhythm regarding what time baby wakes up for the day, when their
first nap is, how much time they can be awake before the next nap, and
what time they generally fall asleep for the night. As their wake windows
naturally increase, the number of naps they take each day will decrease. Rest when the baby sleeps so that you can care for them when they are
awake. If they are tired, let them sleep. If they are awake all night, try not to
get overwhelmed; their schedules are changing from day to day and it is
only temporary. If you are exhausted and need to rest, ask for help! You canonly care for your baby if you are in good health. If you are confused about
their sleep schedules and nap times, talk to other moms in your community;
they will all have advice for you. As you will learn, every baby is dif ferent,
and you will get to learn your own baby’ s patterns and schedules over time. That being said, if you are struggling with sleep deprivation, you do not
have to suf fer through it silently. In the early days, there is not much you
can do about adjusting a baby’ s schedule, but you can ask other adults for
support. Take turns with your support people, whether that would be your
partner, family members, friends, or doula, and ask them to care for your
baby while you rest. After your baby is a few months old, you can adjust
their sleep and feeding schedules to become more regular so that you (and
they!) can sleep for longer stretches of time. And of course, if you feel that
something is wrong, always follow your intuition and consult your care
providers. THINGS THA T SUPPORT RESTFUL  SLEEP
Drink your hot milk tonic each night! Diffuse lavender or roman chamomile essential oil. Use a sound machine in baby’ s room. Use a weighted blanket or weighted onesie that is appropriate to
your baby’ s weight. Swaddle your baby to help calm their dispersed energy if you notice
their hands are flailing and their breath is fast. Swaddling will also
keep them from waking themselves up. Give baby a massage and bath before bedtime. Make the baby’ s sleeping area as dark as possible, and during their
waking time, let it be light. This helps them to adjust to the time of
day.SPITTING UP (IN BREASTFED BABIES)
Spitting up—several times a day—is a common occurrence for a newborn
in the early days. Projectile vomiting, however, can be a cause for concern
and is a reason to call your pediatrician. One common reason for spitting up
is reflux—when the baby’ s stomach acid flows back up into the esophagus. Reflux is something that should be diagnosed by your pediatrician. Supplementing breast milk with formula or feeding your baby cereal mixed
with breast milk is often recommended by Western medical practitioners,
though studies have shown that neither of these treatments improve reflux;
in fact, they may even worsen it. In some cases, making changes to your
diet may help the baby’ s symptoms. Reducing dairy and following the other
Ayurvedic postpartum diet recommendations in chapter 8 is a good place to
start. Another common reason for spitting up is an oversupply of milk or a
fast