 and various forms of rheumatism.
High levels of uric acid are formed by a diet high in meat, sugar, coffee and tea. Because uric acid is only slightly soluble, it needs
plenty of water and well functioning kidneys to ﬂush it out of muscles and joints and remove it from the body.
Other organs that are usually weak in arthritis are the stomach, the liver, gall bladder and generally the whole of the digestive system.
The prominent involvement of the big toes with gout is especially signiﬁcant as these are the starting points of the acupuncture
meridians of the liver. While the sugar metabolism is especially weak with other forms of arthritis, with gout it is mainly the protein and
fat metabolism.10/30/24, 3:31 PM Health-Science-Spirit - Arthritis & Rheumatism
https://health-science-spirit.com/Diseases/Arthritis-and-Rheumatism.html 6/11Besides the kidneys, other organs of elimination are the bowels, the liver, the skin and the lungs; all of these need to be greatly
stimulated to remove toxic and obstructive waste residues from arthritic joints and rheumatic muscles.
DIET
The basic arthritis diet consists of plenty of raw food such as sprouted seeds, fresh vegetable juices with plenty of wheat or barley
grass and beetroot, also vegetable salads in increasing amounts accord ing to the strength of the digestion. You may cook lentils and
brown rice, usually eaten together at the same meal, and also steamed vegetables, especially onions, green beans, okras, sweet
potato leaves and beetroot. Generally, sweet vegetables, such as carrots, pumpkin turnips and sweet potatoes are best eaten raw
and ﬁnely grated as part of a salad. Frequently have raw food days.
Instead of using commercial yeast-baked bread, experiment with sourdough baking. Use free-range raw egg yolk (e.g. as part of a
salad dressing), otherwise soft-boiled egg. Fish and seafood are good and especially the broth of simmered ﬁsh heads and bones.
Liver may be used occasionally except with gout. Other helpful foods  are avocado, almonds, pecans, celery, coleslaw, peanuts,
peanut oil and extra-virgin olive oil.
The more sensitive the skin is against cold, insect bites and irritants, the less fruit should be used or, alternatively, any fruit acids may
be neutralized with sodium bicarbonate. With insensitive skin use a fair amount of fruit, including bananas, before or instead of meals.
Mix 1 tbsp. of ground linseed (grind in blender or cof fee grinder and refrigerate) and 1 tsp. of lecithin with most meals.
Some arthritis sufferers improve when avoiding foods of the nightshade family: tomatoes, potatoes, capsicum and peppers, eggplant
or aubergine. These may contain the toxic alkaloid solanine, especially high in green parts of potatoes and tomatoes.
Best avoid these until sufﬁcient improvement, then introduce gradually with careful self-observation. Use only red capsicum, not
green ones. However, raw potato juice and broth of potato peels are helpful to some suf ferers and you may experiment with these.
Avoid cows' milk products, wheat products (except wheat grass juice), and other gluten foods such as rye, barley and oats;
sweeteners and sweetened food, salt, red meat, yeast fat, fried products, commercial polyunsaturated oils, margarine or other highly
processed food or food containing preservative, coloring or other  unbiological  chemicals. If sensitive avoid also  unneutralized  food
acids, such as lemon juice and vinegar, fruit juice or dried fruit. Avoid alcohol and smoking; be careful with coffee and tea. Try to avoid
chlorinated and ﬂuoridated water for cooking and drinking. Minimize cooked legumes with gout.
Because of the usually weak digesti ve powers, it is important to have only small meals, chew very well. Have breakfast as the main
meal or possibly lunch, but only a light, early evening meal. Ingest any water in which vegetables or brown rice has been cooked. If
meat, ﬁsh or nuts are used, eat these as the ﬁrst part of any meal. If possible, lie down after lunch.
While it is important to have plenty of ﬂuid-intake, this should not be taken with or after meals so that digestive juices are not diluted.
Drink about one liter of preferably warm water, weak herb tea (peppermint is good) or, most recommended, fresh diluted vegetable
juice about 30 minutes before break fast. Use mainly wheat grass, barley  grass, celery, parsley, edible weeds and other green leaves
as well as beetroot for a vegetable juice and only a smaller amount of ﬂavoring sweet vegetables (e.g. carrots, pumpkin) and apple. A
further glass of water, herb tea or fresh juice may be taken before other meals. Drink juices slowly and spaced out to minimize any
rise in the blood sugar level. For further information on allergy testing, juices, food selection and preparation as well as metabolic
types and blood groups see  Healing Foods.
Cleansing Periods
Fasting or cleansing periods are of greatest importance, the more so, the more the disease has progressed. Frequency, duration and
food restrictions are to be selected according to the severity of the disease and the sensitivity of the body.
On the average, fast about one week each month until much improved, then gradually less. However, you may start with one-day
fasts and then three days before proceeding to a full week. Insensitive individuals and those with gout may often fast on fresh fruits,
especially (unsprayed) apples. Sensitive individuals should use mainly fresh green vegetable juices, sprouted seeds and vegetable
salads, ﬂavored only with herbs and a small amount of olive or peanut oil.
On the ﬁrst morning of each fasting period take a tablespoon of Epsom salts in water to clean the bowels. If your digestion is rather
weak, use mainly freshly pressed raw vegetable juices; wheat grass or barley grass juice is excellent. The ﬁrst cleansing period may
have added cooked brown rice. After fasting reintroduce new foods gradually and watch for signs of allergy or worsening of
symptoms, exclude any reacting food.
Sanitize your intestinal ﬂora by taking a course of cultures of acidophilus and  biﬁdo  bacteria. Preferably eradicate most harmful
bacteria and fungi by drinking one liter of water with the addition of 1 tbsp. of Epsom salts or if this is not tolerated with 1-heaped
teaspoon of table salt and also one large crushed clove of garlic.
Drink this ﬁrst thing in the morning of each fasting day. Then take a suita ble acidophilus - biﬁdo  culture as yoghurt or as high potency
capsules or powders in a large glass of diluted vegetable juice one hour after the last garlic drink. After starting with the cultures use
only small amounts of fresh raw garlic to ﬂavor meals, large intakes would kill the beneﬁcial bacteria. For further information see The
Basic Cleanse  and also  Intestinal Sanitation  or The Ultimate Cleanse.
Supplements
As a basic supplement take a B-complex tablet with each meal. Addition s of speciﬁc vitamins may be of vitamin B6 used for certain
problems, such as 500 mg or more for hand, arm and shoulder problems, up to several grams of pantothenic  acid with rheumatoid
arthritis and up to 3 g of nicotinamide  with osteoarthritis, especially effective with knee problems, all to be taken in divided doses
during meals and snacks. Mix half a teaspoon of sodium ascorbate with each meal and a natural form of vitamin E.10/30/24, 3:31 PM Health-Science-Spirit - Arthritis & Rheumatism
https://health-science-spirit.com/Diseases/Arthritis-and-Rheumatism.html 7/11Minerals that have been found to help are 30 - 50 mg of zinc, 10 - 20 mg of manganese, 600 mg of magnesium, 100 - 200 mcg of
selenium and also chromium and molybdenum. The therapeutic dose of boron commonly is 9 to 12 mg, and the maintenance dose 6
mg. 50-60 mg of borax contains about 6 mg of boron. To measure this amount, dissolve one level teaspoon of borax in one liter of
water. One teaspoonful provides 3 mg of boron. Take this amount initially 3 to 4 times and later twice daily with meals.
In addition use plenty of magnesium  chloride as recommended in the article on Magnesium Chloride. For daily use it will be more
convenient to dissolve the magnesium chloride in water. You may ﬁll a jar half full with magnesium chloride ﬂakes and then to the top
with water. One teaspoon of this solution three times daily with food or drink provides a daily intake of about 600 mg of magnesium. If
you have magnesium oil then use 1 teaspoon of this per day, suitably diluted, to provide 600 mg of magnesium.
Individuals with sensitive taste buds may start using it in tiny amounts mixed with strongly ﬂavoured food and increase doses very
gradually. You may start adding one drop to a glass of water or mixed with a meal. If that is alright, then next time add two drops, and
then three until it starts tasting unpleasant. Cut back


100 grams of fried ground nuts are taken
together and powdered well. Daily morning if this is taken in the dose
of 10–15 gram along with milk signicant weight gain is found within
15–20 days.
Cashew Powder and Ghee in Memory Enhancing in Children
Children who are slow in studies are benetted considerably by this
simple recipe. 2–3 cashew nuts are taken and fried with ghee.
is is powdered well and taken by mixing with little honey or
jaggery.
Later milk can be taken.
Cashew with Pomegranate Juice in Osteoporosis
5–6 cashew nuts are taken along with pomegranate juice daily during
evening hours. If the individual is Pitta constitution, little Gulkand can
also be added. is helps to relieve anaemia, fatigue and osteoporotic
problems, especially found during old age.1.98. 5 Dates Fruit Remedies:
Milkshake, Laddu for
Energy, Stamina
By Dr. M.S. Krishnamurthy M.D (Ayu), Ph.D.
Y
Dates (Phoenix dactylifera) fruit is the well known dry fruit. Date fruits are rich
in iron. ey are also a good sources of potassium, protein, dietary bre,
calcium, vitamins B, A and C. Other than these dates possess trace elements
such as copper, magnesium, manganese, selenium and zinc.
It is called Kharjura in Sanskrit; it means that which is making the body
strong and healthy being a good energizer.
Dates promote immunity, blood cell count, provides energy to the body,
useful in treating alcoholic intoxication and bleeding disorders.
Dates Milkshake
e dates fruit milkshake is a good energy drink.
Take 10 dates. Remove the seed, remove the hard pit. Chop it into
small pieces.
Add a cup of milk. Blend it in a blender or in a mixer.
Drink when it is fresh.
It is useful in anemia, fatigue, work exhaustion, peripheral neuritis,
burning of the body etc are relieved soon by this.2.
3.
4.Kharjura Laddu –
Remove the seeds.
Add equal amounts of powdered cashew nut, dry fried ground nut
pieces and raisin – all one part each.
Add 8 parts of jaggery and pound this mix well. You can also add a
little honey or ghee for taste. It is pounded well and then rolled into
the form of laddus, kept under the fan for drying.
is is administered to the growing children daily morning and
evening. Most of the energy requirements are fullled by this and helps
to make the children healthy, energetic and cheerful.
Ghee and Honey Soaked Date Fruits
50 date fruits are taken and seeds are removed.
100 ml of ghee and 80 ml of honey are taken and stirred with little
saﬀron (powdered, 8–10 stamens).
Dates are added and soaked in it.
Daily, just before consuming, this mix is stirred well with a bi spoon
and then 1–2 dates are consumed. is improves energy, very useful
even for pregnant women and for women nearing menopause.
Date Fruits Baked in Between the Wheat Dough
is is the unique home remedy of traditional healers of Jaipur and
Udaipur (Rajasthan).
5–6 date fruits are taken, seeds are removed. Wheat our is taken
and dough is made (consistency suﬃcient to make bolus for
Chapati).ese de – seeded dates are kept in between this dough and
covered. is is kept on direct re and baked for 3–5 m inutes.5.en the dough is gently removed and inner dates are collected.
Daily 5–6 such dates are consumed in case of joint pain caused
especially during old age.
is has signicant benet in degenerative problems such as osteo
arthritis.
Goat’s Milk Soaked Date Fruits
is unique preparation is highly benecial in promoting the sex
power in men.
4–5 de – seeded date fruits are soaked with boiled and cooled goat’s
milk and kept for overnight.
Next day morning this is macerated well.
A teaspoon of honey is added to and consumed before food
(morning or evening).1.99. 5 Radish Home
Remedies for Vitiligo,
Obesity, Bad Cholesterol
By Dr. M.S. Krishnamurthy MD (Ayu), Ph.D.
Y
Radish possesses sweet mixed pungent taste with a lot of juice followed with
bre content it is appreciated in the treatment of constipation and
haemorrhoids quite eﬀectively.
Botanical name – Raphanus sativus
Family – Brassicaceae
It can be eaten in raw form itself, it is usually taken in the form of salad,
curries, soup, sambhar, pickle etc. Even its owers, seeds and leaves possess
many health benets.
Ayurvedic classical literatures as well as the modern dietetics recommend
radish in jaundice, haemorrhoids, indigestion, constipation, urinary disorders,
asthmatic conditions, diabetes, skin diseases, fatty liver conditions etc.
Mulakarishtha, Kanjika, Mulaka kshara etc are the unique Ayurvedic
medicines containing Radish as main ingredient.
Radish Home Remedies
Radish Water in Obesity2.
3.
4.
5.1–2 big radish roots are chopped well. is is added to 3–4 cups of
water and kept for 1–2 hours. Later it is ltered and throughout the
day this water is used for drinking. is helps to reduce the body
weight.
Radish Fresh Juice with Lemon for Bad Cholesterol
Half cup of radish juice is mixed with equal quantity of water and a
spoon of lemon juice. is is taken in empty stomach daily for 30–40
days. is reduces the bad cholesterol signicantly.
Radish Leaf Juice in Eye Care and Night Blindness
Fresh and green leaves of radish are taken and on crushing, juice is
obtained. is juice is taken in fresh form in the dose of 40–50 ml
twice daily, before food. is is considered good for eyes, relieves
burning, itching and excess lacrimation. It is also told to be useful in
night blindness.
Radish Seed Oil in Leucoderma
1–2 teaspoon of radish fruit pieces, 50 ml of radish juice is cooked
with 100 ml of sesame oil. Cooking is continued till all the moisture is
emptied from the oil. en it is ltered and stored.
Regular application of this oil over the lesions of leucoderma has
good benets followed with suitable internal medication.
Radish Fine Paste as Skin Detox
1–2 roots of radish is taken and made into ne paste. is is applied
over the skin/face. is is retained for 15–20 minutes and washed
thoroughly (avoid this if the skin is sensitive to radish and if you
develop allergic rashes)
It rehydrates and detoxies skin.1.100. 5 Walnut (Akhrot)
Remedies: Skin Glow,
Fatigue, Dry Cough,
Bodyache
By Dr. M.S. Krishnamurthy MD (Ayu), Ph.D.
Y
Akhrot are well known antioxidant rich drupaceous nut. It has immuno-
modulatory actions, memory enhancing benets and nervine tonic eﬀects. e
classical texts like Bhavaprakasha and Nighantu Ratnakara referred it by the
name Akshotaka or Akshoda.
Botanical name – Juglans regia
Seed marrow is the most usable fruit part. e leaves and stem are also used
for medicinal purpose by the folk healers.
e trees are found abundantly in Himalayan ranges and Kashmir is the
main habitat of this plant. e seed pulp contains oxalic acid and barium.
e marrow is sweet in taste and hot in potency. It increases Kapha and Pitta
Dosha and balances Vata.
Few simple remedies of walnut are mentioned here below –
Fine Paste of Walnut for Enhancing the Complexion of the Skin2.
3.
4.
5.1 or 2 walnuts are taken and ne paste is made by rubbing with cow’s
milk. is is applied over the face. is acts as a good complexion
enhancer.
Medicated Milk of Akhrot for Fatigue, Neuritis, Diabetic
Neuropathy, Debility etc
3–4 walnuts are taken and ne powder/paste is made. is is cooked
with cow’s milk and taken. As per one’s liking sugar may be added.
is helps to overcome for fatigue, neuritis, diabetic neuropathy, sexual
debility etc.  is is good for improving sleep.
Fried Seeds with Sugar Candy in Dry Cough
3–4


 tablets.
Raw carrot juice is a natural solvent for ulcerous and cancerous
conditions. It is a resistant to infections, doing most efficient work in
conjunction with the adrenal glands. It helps prevent infections of
the eyes and throat as well as the tonsils and sinuses and the respiratory
organs generally. It also protects the nervous system and is unequalled
for increasing vigor and vitality.
Intestinal and liver diseases are sometimes due to a lack of certain
of the elements contained in properly prepared raw carrot juice. When
this is the case, then a noticeable cleaning up of the liver may take
place, and the material which was clogging it may be found to dissolve.
Frequently this is released so abundantly that the intestinal and urinary
channels are inadequate to care for this overflow, and in a perfectly
natural manner it is passed into the lymph for elimination from the
body by means of the pores of the skin. This material has a distinctly
orange or yellow pigment and while it is being so eliminated from the
body will sometimes discolor the skin. Whenever such a discoloration
takes place after drinking carrot or other juices, it is an indication
that the liver is getting a well-needed cleansing.
It is NOT the carrot juice itself nor the carotene that comes through
the skin, as this discoloration will take place even if the juice is filtered
to the point of clearing it of all color pigment. It is just as practical an
impossibility for the carrot pigment itself to come through the skin as
it would be for the red pigment of the beet to turn the body red or the
chlorophyll of the green vegetables to paint the skin green from within.
In any case, is it not better to have a healthy satin-like skin, even
though it may be slightly on the carrot shade, than to have the pasty
complexion which, together with its pimples and other blemishes,
publicizes the unhealthy condition of the body?
Instead of becoming distressed over the appearance of skin
discoloration, which will in any case eventually disappear, we should
be gratified that the disintegration of the liver has been stopped or
prevented by the use of these juices.
27 This discoloration, however, can be somewhat retarded by slowing
up the process of cleansing by changing or adding other juices to the
particular one that causes such a rapid cleansing activity.
The lack of sufficient rest, sleep and overwork may also result in
a certain amount of skin discoloration.
The endocrine glands, especially the adrenals and the gonads,
require food elements found in raw carrot juice. Sterility is sometimes
overcome by its use. The cause of sterility has been traced to the
continuous use of foods in which atoms and enzymes were destroyed
by cooking or pasteurizing.
Dry skin, dermatitis, and other skin blemishes are due to a
deficiency in the body of some of these food elements contained in
carrot juice. This is also a factor in eye trouble, as in ophthalmia,
conjunctivitis, etc.
If properly extracted from fresh, clean, good quality raw carrots,
carrot juice is very rich in the vital organic alkaline elements sodium
and potassium. It also contains a good supply of calcium, magnesium,
and iron while the vital organic elements phosphorus, sulphur, silicon,
and chlorine balance perfectly with the former in their action and
reaction on the human system.
As an aid to dissolve ulcers and cancer, raw carrot juice has proved
itself the miracle of the age. It was found essential, however, that it be
properly prepared and every vestige of concentrated sugar, starch and
flour of every kind be completely eliminated from the diet.
One of the most insidious causes of ulcers and cancer has been
discovered in the victims nursing resentments for a long time, all too
often ever since childhood. Unless resentments are completely
dissolved, they can frustrate otherwise most effective attempts to help
the patient.
It sometimes happens after drinking large quantities of carrot juice
that a reaction is experienced or perhaps some distress. This is a
perfectly natural sequence as it is an indication that Nature has started
house cleaning in the body and that this juice is the most needed
implement for this purpose.
To jump to the conclusion that the juice does not agree with one
shows lack of understanding, as carrot juice is nothing more nor less
than the very finest quality of organic water and the kind of
nourishment that the body needs. If the juice is fresh and has been
properly made there is nothing whatever, even by the wildest stretch
of the imagination, that can do other than furnish the enzymes, vital
2K atoms, and the vital organic water which the starved body cells and
tissues crave and call for.
The addition of some raw goat's milk or a little pure raw cream to
the carrot juice gives it a somewhat exotic flavor and often serves to
relieve the monotony when a reaction or distress may have a tendency
to turn us against the plain juice.
It is pertinent to remark that cream is a fat, pure and simple, while
milk is definitely a concentrated protein food. Cream goes through
an entirely different digestive process in our system than does milk;
and while it is of course mucus-forming to some degree, it is not in
the same class of pernicious foods as milk.
One very good thing to remember when we are overtaken by
fatigue, distress, or reaction in our body is the fact that our colon is
perhaps responsible for more trouble and mischief within our anatomy
than all other causes and conditions put together. In our experience,
we have found that it is utterly impossible for a colon to develop
normally and to function successfully when one lives mostly or entirely
on cooked and processed foods. It is safe to assume therefore, that it
would be almost impossible to find many colons which are perfect.
This being the case, our very first step, if we are suffering from
distress or reaction, would be to take a series of colonic irrigations, if
possible, or at least, a number of enemas until the cause of the trouble
has come under control. The fresh-raw vegetable juices would then
have better opportunity to carry on their end of the regeneration
processes. The best food for the colon is the combination of carrot
and spinach juice, the formula is given on a later page in this book.
Many people do not have the vaguest idea of what the Colon is,
what it looks like or where it is located in the body. I have reproduced
a picture of it because I consider it of such great importance. This
picture of the COLON THERAPY CHART which I drew up, and
which measures about 17"x 22" and is intended to be framed and
hung on the wall of the office or home. (At the end of this book you
will find details about it).
Bear in mind that the quantity of juices needed by the body is
predicated on their quality. Usually it will take a greater amount of
juices which have been extracted by centrifugal action to get the results
obtained by juices made with a Triturator (Pulverizer) and Hydraulic
Press.
At all times bear this fact distinctly in mind that juices are the
very finest nourishment we can get, and if we continue to take them
29 COLON THERAPY CHART
as long as we live the chances are that we will live a healthier life
much longer than we would without them.
Carrot juice is composed of a combination of elements which
nourish the entire system, helping to normalize its weight as well as
its chemical balance.
It nourishes the optic system particularly, as evidenced by the
many young men who applied for admission as pilots to the schools
of the army and navy but were rejected at their first physical
examination because of defective eyesight. A few weeks later, after
drinking an abundance of fresh raw carrot juice daily, they were
examined again. They were accepted with the requisite of perfection
of eyesight.
If this were to happen just once, it would no doubt be considered
a phenomenon. If it were to happen only twice, it would go down into
the annals of healing history as a coincidence. When it happens
repeatedly, however, there is certainly sufficient reason to place doubt
in the background and realize that there are more things in heaven
and earth than even the most educated mind can conceive.
No less effective is the fresh raw juice of the lowly carrot in helping
the treatment of ulcers and cancers. Tissues emaciated by those
insidious ravages of cell starvation classified as ulcers and cancers,
have been nourished back to a healthier condition by the abundant
30 use of carrot juice as the principle item of nourishment, and
supplemented only by a carefully selected and prepared raw diet.
The laymen is generally awed, frightened, and puzzled at the very
thought of these particular afflictions, and yet their cause and
progression is really simple to understand.
After the European war, millions of youngsters in the desecrated
regions—orphans without a home, a roof, a destination—roamed the
country in a state of starvation, we had the picture of a national or
international ulcer developing into a worldwide cancer. Allowed to
spread uncontrolled, their activities would result in crimes and
devastation beyond the wildest stretch of the imagination. Properly
nourished and trained, they would


, but no authentic
cases.167
Gajdusek later had to admit that neither he himself, nor others he met had seen
the cannibalistic rites.168 Roland Scholz, Munich-based professor of biochemistry
and cellular biology in Munich, responded to this revelation by saying that, "the
scientific world seems to have been taken in by a myth. "169
After World War II:
Visible Proof of Viru ses? We Don' t Need That!
Modern viral research is like Bigfoot hunting. Trackers of this legendary ape-like
beast (also called Sasquatch and the Abominable Snowman) trot out the occasional
questionable blurry photograph and footprint marks to claim proof of Bigfoot's
existence. Based on this suspect data, they say the beast is up to ten feet tall and 440
pounds with 17-inch footprints that have even been made into plaster casts to prove
its existence. 170 Virus hunters also collect dubious data, claiming to have images of
the virus, even though electron micrographs of viruses accompanied by an analysis
of their complete genetic material and virus shell are the only method of proving a
virus's existence.
Bigfoot hunt, like viruses, are splendid moneymakers. Along a strip of California's
Highway 101, numerous shops hawk Bigfoot-souv enirs171 and they are popular with
tourists eve n though it is generally accepted that Bigfoot is an invention.172 Of course,
Bigfoot is nowhere near as lucrative as the international virus industry's multi-billion
dollar business.
We must stress here that electron microsco py is fundamental to virus identification.
For a long time, establishing unequivocal proof of a virus meant seeing is believing,
83 Chapter 2
as is the case with bacteria and fungi. The one difference is that bacteria and fungi
can be seen with a light microscope, whereas viruses are so tiny that only an electron
microscope (first patented in 1931) enables detailed imaging to make them visible.
But, first you have to identify exactly what you're looking at, so these particles
(possible viruses) must exist in a pure or purified form, in order to be able to
differentiate virus particles from virus-lik e ones. At the beginning of the 1950s,
virologists agreed that this was necessa ry, since, under certain conditions, even
healthy cells produce a whole range of particles that could look like so-called tumor
viruses (oncovirus es).173 174
The importance of this process was confirmed at an international meeting of the
Pasteur Institute in 1972,175 176 and "endured in the early 1980s," according to Val
Turner, a physician and member of the Perth Group, an Australian research team.177
"Viruses are not naked bits of RNA (or DNA). They are particles with particular sizes
and shapes and other identifying features, which are obliged to replicate at the
behest of living cells. They won't multiply in dead meat like bacteria. So there you
have it. This predicates experiments to prove particles are a virus and that hasn't
changed in a thousand years and certainly not since the 90s."
Turner uses easy-to-grasp language to describe the science: "Think of it like a
paternity suit in which DNA evidence will be used and the accused is HIV and the
child is a human. The crux of the case is proof that the DNA you found in the human
is the same DNA you found in the accused. For the latter, you have to have rock solid
proof the DNA carne from the accused. Given that in cell cultures all sorts of particles
appear, only some of which are viruses, you have to prove that (a) a particular
particle is a virus; and (b) your DNA comes from that particle. How can you prove
(a) without using electron microsco py (for many reasons) and without purification?
You tell me.
Frankly we from the Perth Group do not und erstand this obsession with 'old
data' or'science moves on.' Has Archimedes' principle *'moved on'? Do solid objects
no longer displace their own volume of liquids? If everything has to be 'up to date'
then in ten years nothing that is up to date now will be up to date then. Which
means as long as time keeps going nothing will be right. "178 This goes for orthodox
theories as well!
By soundly characterizing virus structure (virus purificatio n), it is theoreticatly
possible to irrefutably differentiate viruses themsel ves from virus-like particles. If
this has taken place, the next step would be to get an electron micrograph of the
* Archimedes' principle states that a body immersed in a fluid is buoyed up by a force equal to the
weight of the displaced fluid. The principle applies to both floating and submerged bodies and to
all fluids, i.e., liquids and gases.
84 The Microbe Hunters Seize Power
purified virus (of course, proof that a virus exists does not automatically mean that
this virus is also infectious, as had already been established in 1960, at a conference
sponsored by the New York Academy of Science s).179 But this procedure is rarely
carried out in modern viral research. Viruses that purportedly threaten to wipe out
humanity (H5N1, SARS virus, etc.) have evidently never been seen by anyone.180
"Around 1960, before contemporary molecular biology arose, electron microscopy
was held to be the best way of identifying viruses in cell cultures," writes patholog y
professor Etienne de Harven, a pioneer in electron microscopy and virology. De
Harven's research career includes 25 years at the Sloan-K ettering Institute in New
York, a private cancer research center founded in 1945, which quickly advanced to
become the largest of its kind in the USA. 181 "For this reason, laboratories all over
the world directed their efforts at this time towards observing particles in cancer
cells with ever-improved methods of electron microscopy." In 1962, the central role
of electron microscopy was also recognized at the well-known Cold Spring Harbor
Conference. Andre Lwoff, who would receiye the Nobel Prize for medicine three
years later, was among those who designated electron microscopy as likely the most
efficient method of proving viruses' existence; he suggested investigating viruses
with this procedure and dividing them into class es.182
A focus of medical science then (as now) was cancer. And because cancer
researchers had the fixed idea that viruses were definitely cancer triggers, 183 they
spent a lot of time proving the presence of viruses in human cancer cells, with the
help of electron microscopy. But, these efforts were unsuccessful. "One only found
virus-lik e particles from time to time-while viruses of a certain types could never
convincingly be seen," reports de Harven.1B4
Virus hunters were, once again, crushed by this scientific news.. But the scientific
world tends not to publicize negative results whenever possible-in scientific
language, this is called, "publication bias."185 Yet, whether the research claims
promoted as evidence involve new patented drugs said to be superior to existing
(cheaper) ones, or genetic markers of disease (interpreted as "risk" factors), or
statistical relationships, discerning whether the claims are spurious or confirmed by
clinical trials can only be ascertained by making the full body of controlled studies
publicly available.
In medicine, failure to do so casts doubt on the safety and efficacy of treatments
as well as undermining the integrity of the scientific literature. Scientific journals
are supposed to protect the integrity of science-but they don't. As is the case with
most deficient practices in medical research and practice, there is an unacknowledged
financial motive. And why are scientists coy about publishing negative data? "In
some cases," says Scott Kern of Johns Hopkins University and editor of the recently
founded online Journal of Negative Observation s in Genetic Oncology, "withho lding
85 Chapter 2
them keeps rivals doing studies that rest on an erroneous premise, thus clearing the
field for the team that knows that, say, gene A doesn't really cause disease B. Which
goes to show that in scientific journals, no less than in supermarket tabloids, you
can't believe everything you read-or shouldn't."186 l87
As long ago as the 1960s the established science community was coy about
publishing negative data, but the cancer virus hunters' failures were so universal
that it was simply inevitable that one article or another should leak out into medical
publications. In 1959, the researcher Hagenaus reported in the journal Etude du
Cancer about the difficulties identifying any typical virus particles in a wide range of
breast cancer samples.188 And in 1964, the scientists Bernhard and Leplus were
unsuccessful, even with electron microscopy's assistance, in finding virus particles
presumed to play a role in the development of Hodgkin's lymphoma (lymphatic
cancer), lymphoid leukemia or metastases (tumors in various parts of the body). 189
But these scientific studies didn't stop the virus hunters for a second. Instead of
disengaging themselves from their virus tunnel vision, they grumbled about the
methodology of virus determination: for example, over what are known as thin
slices or thin-sections (tissue samples which are extremely precisely dissected and
trimmed to


 teaspoons of
sugar per serving. Would you really sprinkle that much sugar on a bowl of
plain flakes? I doubt it.
Added Fats
The first added fats to look for on a label are saturated animal fats.
Saturated fats may include butter, eggs, lard, cheese, chicken fat, and/or
beef fat. All are dangerous because they’re major players in raising blood
cholesterol levels and laying down plaque deposits.
Next, pay attention to added trans fats (trans fats are formed as a by-
product of the hydrogenation process). You won’ t find the term “trans fats”
listed on the ingredient list but they are produced in the manufacture of
hydrogenated oils, so look for and avoid “hydrogenated” and “partially
hydrogenated” vegetable oils in the ingredient list.
Trans fats are man-made gunk. Food companies take real vegetable oils,
which are liquid at room temperature, and saturate them with hydrogen
molecules to make them solid at room temperature—thus the term
“hydrogenated.”
The companies add these hydrogenated, and resulting trans fats to bread,
crackers, cookies, and other packaged goods to increase the product’ s shelf
life (and decrease yours).
Trans fats, which should be avoided like the plague, have been
implicated in raising LDL  cholesterol, lowering HDL  cholesterol, are a
major contributor to plaque formations and heart disease, and promote
cancers and tumors.
Last, snif f out hidden added fats such as monoglycerides and
diglycerides. These substances go by fancy scientific terms, but they’re fatsand contain 9 calories per gram.
Food companies slide these into the ingredient list hoping you’ll have no
idea what they are. Steer clear.
Because fats are so prevalent, I’ll give you some wiggle room by
allowing you to eat products containing some fats, especially if they’re
minimal (appearing near the end of the ingredient list).
But I still draw the line that the total calories from fat in the product
must represent no more than 25 percent of a food’ s total calories. Also make
sure that any fats present are the healthier unsaturated ones rather than
saturated or trans fats.
Back to our can of Amy’ s Black Bean Chili: The second-to-last
ingredient is or ganic high oleic saf flower and/or sunflower oil. I’m not a big
fan of added oils. However, because this ingredient comes second to last in
the ingredient list, and the total fat per serving of the soup is 10 percent,
we’ll approve this product, fat-wise.
When shopping, remember: The best sources of fat are whole foods,
such as nuts, seeds, greens, grains, and vegetables, rather than added oils,
meat, dairy, or man-made trans fats.
Fiber
Fiber is a type of carbohydrate that your body can’ t digest, and therefore
must expel. But that’ s good news!Fiber rocks! It helps fill us up so we eat less. It keeps our gastrointestinal
tract regular and our stools airy and light. It helps us to stabilize our blood
sugar, maintain constant ener gy levels, and prevent disease.
Fiber acts like a little internal janitor, wielding scrub brushes that clean
and then carry of f disease-promoting substances such as cholesterol,
throwing the nasty stuf f in its garbage bag and hauling it to the dump.
Fiber is found exclusively in plant-based foods. One reason why the
Engine 2 Diet recommends that you eat whole fruits and vegetables instead
of drinking fruit and vegetable juices is because they contain fiber.
An eight-ounce glass of orange juice, for example, contains zero fiber,
120 calories, and 23 grams of sugar (giving you a huge glucose spike
immediately followed by a bigger insulin rush). And it does little to satiate
your appetite. Two oranges, on the other hand, give you 7 grams of fiber,
124 calories, don’ t cause the sugar and insulin spikes, and make you feel
full. Ya!
Consuming a vast variety of fruits, vegetables, and legumes, as well as
whole grain breads, cereals, and pastas, is the best way to reach your E2
Diet fiber goals. Most Americans consume between 10 and 15 grams of
fiber per day. On the E2 Diet, we want you to get 40 to 50 grams.
THESE GUIDELINES ARE a lot to take in, I know. But now all that’ s keeping
you from becoming a full-fledged, Cool Hand Luke, E2 label-reading pro is
hands-on experience among the supermarket shelves. However, I have faith
that the dangers lurking inside deceptive foods are now abundantly clear to
you as you walk up and down the aisles looking for labels that pass the
Engine 2 inspection test.
You no longer believe any of the claims on the outside of a package. You
look for the number of servings per container and the amount of fat per
serving. You are on the alert for added junk, such as sodium, sugar, and fats,
and buy only high-fiber and 100 percent whole grain products.
You are a label-reading star.
BREAD
Here is a quick lesson on the dif ference between whole grain breads
and the kind that have been pillaged.
The anatomy of the wonderful whole grain:Bran:  The outer layer containing most of the fiber as well as
healthy amounts of protein and B vitamins.
Germ:  The nutrient-rich embryo containing vitamins E and B and
protein.
Endosperm:  The fluf fy inside, which is 83 percent starch. This is
all that remains after the bran and germ are removed—and this is
what white bread is made of.
What does this mean? It means 100 percent whole grain has 97
percent more vitamin E, 78 percent more fiber, 78 percent more
magnesium, 82 percent more vitamin B6, 80 percent more selenium,
58 percent more copper, and 37 percent more folacin than white
bread!
OceanofPDF.com4
MAKING IT  WORK FOR LIFE!
When I developed the Engine 2 Diet, my mission statement was:
Educate and motivate people to eat a plant-strong diet so they can enhance
their lives and avoid the common killer diseases.
I am now inviting you to become part of this mission. Start just by
putting one foot in front of the other. One meal at a time, one day at a time;
string them together, several days in a row, and soon enough your first week
will be over. Before long you’ll have your sights set on the finish line.
Although the plan outlined in this book is a twenty-eight-day diet, it is
my hope that this is just the beginning of your plant-strong journey. And as
on any journey, you may stumble and fall. That’ s okay. It’s even expected.
No one gets it right the first time—or the second. I’ve been tweaking and
adjusting this plan for more than two decades myself.
The goal is to keep working on it. Continue to expand your knowledge
base, cooking skills, and recipes, and watch your confidence grow until
there’ s no stopping you. Soon enough, the E2 lifestyle will be second
nature, you’ll be firing on all cylinders, and you’ll wonder how you ever
used to eat all that other stuf f you once called food.
In fact, you will be living the dream—feeling great, looking terrific, and
free of the common modern ailments that compromise and debilitate so
many lives. This dream is easily within your reach.
While you’re living it, I want you to learn to love the plants that are
giving you back your life. I want you to see the brilliance of apples,
oranges, blueberries, broccoli, black beans, yams, whole grains, kale, and
all of nature’ s other wonders. When it comes to food, these are the winners,the unsung heroes that deserve all the credit, the foods that have your best
interests at heart. Don’ t let anyone tell you otherwise.
I want to tell you one last thing. You are a champion. Just by reading this
book, you’re moving from second-class to first-class foods, from nutritional
excess to nutritional excellence. You now know more about nutrition than
99 percent of the world. You are on your way to a plant-blessed life.
I am rooting for your success and want the very best for you. I also look
forward to hearing about your progress at www.theengine2diet.com. Write
me! Maybe your story will be featured in my next book.
Now get out there and earn your health!
OceanofPDF.comPart III
RECIPES AND MEAL  PLANS
OceanofPDF.comINTRODUCTION
This part of the book will allow you to bring the E2 way of living and
eating into your home. Get ready to spoil yourself silly with dynamic plant-
based foods, and by the end of the twenty-eight days, the Engine 2 plant-
strong way of life will be second nature to you.
You’ll start with the most basic of tasks, which means going to the
grocery store to buy all the wonderful healthy E2 foods that will soon be
bursting out of every crack, cupboard, and pantry of your home.
Next, I want you to pay close attention to all the E2-recommended
kitchen tools and cooking ware. The degree to which you have the proper
equipment will make your life in the kitchen as streamlined as possible.
Over a weekend, take the time to transform the tools and the foods in your


 it all
taken care of. NAD enzymes (the N stands for niacin ) come into
play too. These are essential for alcohol detoxification. If you
have consumed alcohol, like a can of beer, NAD enzymes must
be shared between the alcohol in the beer and the benzene in the
beer. It takes longer to detoxify both the benzene and al cohol.
The time delay is a time of lowered immunity and facili tates a
growth spurt for parasites and pathogens.
Foods that are raised to very high temperatures, made possi-
ble with a microwave oven, produce benzopyrenes. Ordinary
bread-toasters can do this too! Old fashioned toasters had a  layer
of metal separating the bread from the wires. Toasting bread in a
frying pan or a stove top surface protects it too. But your stove
grill, whether electric or flame, will produce ben zopyrenes in
your food unless there is a separating wall between them.
It does not matter what kind of fuel is used, the benzopy renes
develop due to lack of shielding between the food and heat
source. A metal wall between them absorbs some of the heat.
Do not burn your food in a microwave oven. Since the tem-
perature may go higher than your regular oven, you can produce
benzopyrenes. Your regular oven is thermostated so that it can not
go higher than it states. Baking and browning is never done
above 425°F. This is your safety feature. If anything in your
microwave has turned dark brown or black or has melted plas tic,
throw it out!
Supplements that help your body to detoxify the benzopy renes
are:
1.Niacin or niacinamide. These are NAD-builders. Take 50
mg with each meal.
2.Vitamin B 2 (riboflavin ). Take 50 mg with each meal.BODY WISDOM AND WHY BAD FOOD TASTES GOOD
381For unpolluted vitamins see Sources.
It would be wise to teach children the habits that maximize
their immune strength. Avoiding food toxins that are specifi cally
immune-lowering is most important. Besides the benzopy renes,
certain mold toxins and solvents do this and are found in foods.
Moldy Food
Everything that's animal or vegetable can get moldy. While
living things are alive, the mold attackers can be held at bay. As
soon as they are dead, molding begins. First it molds; then bac-
terial action sets in. This is what makes things biodegradable. It
is a precious phenomenon. It does away with filth—in an exqui-
site manner. Without mold and decay the streets of New York
would still be full of horse manure from the days of the horse and
buggy and our lakes too full of dead fish to swim in.
Every grain has its molds; every fruit has its molds; tea and
coffee  plants have their molds; as do all herbs, and vegetables.
Nuts have their molds; nuts grown in the ground (peanuts) are
especially moldy because the earth is so full of mold spores. But
the wind carries these spores high up into trees, and even up to
the stratosphere. Molds are not very choosy. They have their
preference for certain plants and conditions. But the same molds
can grow on many plants. This is why aflatoxin, for instance, is
found not just in your cereal, bread and pasta  but in nuts, maple
syrup, orange juice, vinegar, wine, etc. Where is it not? It is not
in dairy products or fresh fruit and vegetables, provided you
wash the outside. It is not in meat, eggs, and fish. It is not in
water.
Although I find aflatoxin  in commercial bread, I do not find it
in carefully screened wheat that has had its discolored, shriv eled
seeds removed before using it for making bread, cerealsTHE CURE FOR ALL DISEASES
382and noodles. It is not in baked goods bought at bakeries, left open
to air. Evidently the system of wrapping baked goods in plastic
keeps moisture trapped and starts the molding process. In spite of
adding mold inhibitors, American bread-stuff is far infe rior to
Mexican baked goods in which I do not find aflatoxin!
Here is some good news for cooks: if you bake it yourself,
adding a bit of vitamin C  to the dough, your breads will be mold
free for an extended period (and rise higher).
Aflatoxin
What is so important about molds? Some of them produce
very, very toxic chemicals wherever they grow. They produce
some of the most toxic chemicals known to exist. Aflatoxin is one
of these. My tests show it is always present in cancer pa tients; in
other words it has built up due to the  body's  inability  to detoxify
it in a reasonable time. A great deal of research has been done on
aflatoxin. Any library would have more informa tion.
Aflatoxin reaches the liver and simply kills portions of it.
After a hefty dose the liver is weakened for a long time—
possibly years. Hepatitis and cirrhosis  cases always reveal afla-
toxin. The liver fights hard to detoxify aflatoxin  and manage its
own survival. It manages for 2 to 3 weeks; then a portion of it
succumbs. So the toxic effects of a dose of aflatoxin aren't even
noticeable for several weeks! And without a taste or smell to
guide you, how would you know to stop eating the moldy pea nut
butter  or spaghetti? The answer is:
1.make and bake things for yourself
2.test the things you dearly love but can't make
3.treat things that are treatable for molds
4.throw the rest out of your dietBODY WISDOM AND WHY BAD FOOD TASTES GOOD
383Treatments mentioned in the industrial research journals are
hydrogen peroxide, strong alkali such as lime-water, metabisul-
fite (a common reducing agent) and high heat. I have tried heat
and vitamin C, which is also a reducing agent.
Just heating a food to the boiling point does not kill the
molds. Boiling for many minutes at a higher temperature or
baking does kill them (but not ergot, another mold) and also de-
stroys aflatoxin  they produced and left in the food. For foods you
can't heat that high, for example nuts that are already roasted, or
vinegar, vitamin C  comes to the rescue. I suppose it acts a lot
like the bisulfite; chemically destroying the mold toxin
molecules.
Eradicating Aflatoxin
Simply sprinkling vitamin C  over roasted nuts  is not effec-
tive because the molds have penetrated the surface. Rinse the
nuts in water first (a lot of mold is removed in this simple way).
Cover the nuts with water, add about ¼ tsp. vitamin C powder
(for a pint of nuts) and mix. Let stand for 5 minutes. The water
penetrates the nuts, taking the vitamin C with it and detoxifies
them. Pour off the water and dry the nuts in the oven at low heat.
(Don't burn them or you will make benzopyrenes.)
Rice  and pastas  can be demolded partly by cooking and
partly by adding vitamin C  before or after cooking. There is no
need to add so much it affects the flavor. Brown rice  is espe-
cially moldy.
Vinegars  can simply have vitamin C  added and placed in the
refrigerator.
Honey  can be warmed and treated the same way (¼ tsp. per
pint).
Bread  cannot be salvaged. Switch to bakery breads or
homemade. Use it up in a few days, left in its paper bag. Or slice
and place in a plastic bag in the freezer.THE CURE FOR ALL DISEASES
384Since all foods have both their own and others' molds, there
must be thousands of molds. Very many have been studied be-
sides aflatoxin  producers.
Zearalenone
Zearalenone, an anabolic and uterotrophic metabolite, is fre-
quently found in commercial cereal grains and in processed
foods and feeds, and is often reported as causative agent of
naturally oc curring hyperestrogenism and infertility in swine,
poultry and cattle.18
What this means is, in animals, “zear” looks likes extra es-
trogen to the body. Does it affect humans the same way? Are high
estrogen  levels a problem for us? I find nearly every breast
cancer  case shows a too-high estrogen level for years before  the
cancer is found! It starts females maturing too early, too. It could
cause PMS, ovarian cyst s and infertility. Not everybody gets all
of these effects. And what is the effect on men and boys of eating
an estrogen-like mycotoxin  in their daily diet? This female
hormone  could have a drastic effect on the maturing process even
in small amounts.
Zearalenone ("zear") and aflatoxin  both have immune low-
ering effects. Zearalenone can induce thymic atrophy  and
macrophage activation.19 If you have


 many forms. But what does it say spiritually?”
Fear of commitment mirr ors a belief that spirit is unr eachable.
Thus, love becomes hopeless.
Clare’ s situation speaks of underlying isolation and despair. From her I
got the impression of a woman in a double bind, constantly asking for love
but making sure that those she asked were not in a position to respond on
any but the most superficial level. It didn’ t surprise me that Clare’ s father
was extremely unavailable. Born into a working-class family in SanFrancisco, he had risen from being a dockhand on the Embarcadero
wharves to being president of his own shipping company. He had become a
hero to four generations of his family, from his Italian immigrant
grandparents to his own children. But the qualities that made him “great”—
his power, drive, magnetism, and shrewdness—also made him very
forbidding. None of these quali ties is lovable, yet they were all Clare had
when she was growing up. Her solution was to make  them lovable.
The first person she had a crush  on was her father, and in essenc e she has
repeated that romance over and over, finding men to “love” for their success
and statu s when  in fact she has been mortally afraid of approaching anyone
who has real love to of fer.
“When a powerful man takes notice of you,” I asked, “how do you feel?”
“Special. Cared for. Important,” Clare shot back without hesitation.
“But isn’t this importance and specialness coming by proxy?” I asked.
“What you need is to have your ‘ordinariness’ deemed special.” Clare
looked confused. I asked her to write down this sentence: Spirit loves me
for simply being here. “If you can begin to believe this one thing,” I said,
“the man you attract as a lover will hold the same attitude.”
Ironically, Clare is a glutton for love if it comes with the charge of power,
but mom ents of quiet, gentleness, solitude, intimate rapport, and murmured
endearments secretly bore her, leaving her feeling that something is
missing. Spiritually these are the moments when each of us has a chance to
find love in all its splendid simplicity; but for Clare the emptine ss she feels
whenever things quiet down allows the grief of an abandoned child to rise
too near the surface.
Reading Clare’ s story in symbolic spiritual terms is very helpful. In her
father we see a powerful, remote God who demands to be worshiped. This
image has been easily transpose d onto the men in Clare’ s life. It’s not hard
to see that she is in a spiritual  predicament, mirrored on all sides by the
situations she keeps creating.
The fact that Clare seizes on every opportunity to fall in love tells me that
she craves a spiritual opening; only when madly infatuated does she feel
wanted in this world, cared for by a higher power. Everything else is a
disappointment. The problem is that the opening to spirit keeps closing,
since Clare actually resents and fears higher power. How can she replace
her old, unsuccessful pattern?“You’re here this weekend to talk about healing,” I said, “and in your
case, physical and emotional healing would be superficial. Your need is for
a healing at the level of belief.”
“Meaning what?” she asked.
“I suppose we could say you need a better love life with God. First your
concept of ‘higher ’ power has to be reexamined. God or spirit stands beside
us in every aspect of our everyday lives. Second, the belief that God is
masculine must  be exchanged for a genderless alternative, given how
threatening masculine energy is to you. If you can begin to see how your
notion of spirit has been shaped  by your early childhood, you can start to
look at love as a mirror of the present instead of the past.” This last is a key
concept:
When you fall in love, you fall for a mirr or of your own most pr esent needs.
The intense desirability of another person isn’t innate in that person.
Desire is born in the one who desires. In Clare’ s case, since her underlying
self-image is that of a helpless, unloved girl, any show of power arouses
incredible yearning in her.
There is nothing wrong with this—we all project similar needs in our
search for love.  Nor is there anything wrong with the bedazz led state of
infatuation that Clare has so often sought. Each affair, real or imaginary, has
a repeated message to offer her: “You are loved.” It is the simplest of
messages, but often the hardest  to absorb. For spirit isn’t saying, “You are
loved as long as your passion for this man lasts.” It is saying, “You are
loved,” without any qualifications. If Clare does begin to gain insight and
remove the obstacles that block her vision, spirit’ s message will be awaiting
her. There is infinite patience in spirit, infinite willingness to wait upon our
attention. And one day, in her own time, Clare will notice.
“I think that each man you have loved is a tiny reminder of who you are,”
I told Clare. “This isn’t solipsistic but a natural reflection of your needs.
You aren’ t judged by the love life you choose, since no one is outside
yourself to judge—there is only you as the Self, looking at you from a
different angle.”
“I don’ t see how that helps,” Clare said.“The Self looki ng at you is the primary relationship you bring into all
situations,” I said. “Realizing that, you will start to reduce expectations for
other relationships. In your case you expect a lot from fantasy, but you
could transfer those expectation s to yourself. What do you really want from
men? Security, well-being, a sense of belonging? These are all available to
you from  your own Self, and your healing will be to fall in love with that
Self.”
The secret to spiritual healing is that its foundation is already laid. In his
exalted poetry, Walt Whitman speaks of the ever -presentness of love:
There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.
I read this passage to Clare, who sat silently for a moment. “I’ve been
around for a while,” she said, “and I’m not unconscious. I see that I’m
stuck, and for a long time this concept of learning to love yours elf has been
prescribed to me. But I honestly cannot see how it works.”
“The reason for that,” I said, “is that you are bringing the wrong  model to
your notion of what self-love is. In duality, love connects two separate
people. If that is your model of love, you will have no choice but to see
self-love in much the same way. That is, you’ll try to separate off the parts
of yourself that you value and direct appreciation toward them. But
fragmentation is the problem, not the solution. Self-love and self-division
don’t go togethe r. Self-love isn’t on the level of personality; it’s on the level
of being. Being is whole, and when you recognize that, every part of
yourself rejoins its true status as totality. Learning to love and accept the
powerless, lonely little girl inside you, giving her permission to be part of
you, will lessen her role in directing your love life.”
If you strip away  the details of Clare’ s story, her search for love in all the
wrong places stands for a much more general condition. Love between
“you” and “me”  is a dualistic conception. People have been falling madly in
love for centuries, but that hasn’t solved the deeper problem of inner
division. If anything, such divisi on has been exacerbated as generation after
generation tries to resolve separation through others. What heals inner
division is a change of perception.You are not just a small piece of divine essence that was create d to exist
separately. At the level of your soul you are the whole of spirit. Your
connection to God is complete and seamless; your loving relatio nship to the
universe is total. The mind cannot conceive of this all-inclusiveness,
however, while being caught in its own dualism. We think of ourselves as
father or mother, son or daughter, man or woman, here or there, this or that.
Separation is built from our own self-image.
Thought cannot restore wholeness because by definition thoug ht is also
fragmented. Yet everyone’ s mind contains the essence of spirit; silence and
intuitive knowle dge come naturally to us. The fact that we have drastically
devalued these aspects of our inner life doesn’ t abolish them. Already you
can touch on valuable parts of your life that you can know only by setting
thoughts aside. How do you know if you are happy, or intelligent, or
awake? These aren’ t issues you reason with; they are self-evident.
You do not have to think in order to see and hear; you do not have to
have an active dialogue inside your head to know that you exist.
Awareness is awar e of itself befor e it gains knowledge of


 the patient’s mind.
Only the most exceptional people manage to rise above the reality
principle; they alone can begin to appreciate how simple the state of
total insight might actually be.
Here I am thinking of one patient whose experience of
transcending his physical boundaries seemed to make the dierencebetween life and death. “For the last year I have been aware of a
battle raging inside my body, but in my heart, I am like the
happiest, most carefree of children. I have found the part of me that
cannot be touched by my cancer. I am so much more than it, so far
beyond it. Sometimes I feel totally in command of my illness, at
other times I simply pay no attention to it. In either case, illness
cannot mar my sense of being alive and whole, though surrounded
by chaos and destruction.”
Craig Reed had been diagnosed with terminal cancer when he
wrote these words in a letter; he showed it to me after he had
recovered. Craig Reed is a meditation teacher in his thirties from
upstate New York. Three years ago he visited his family doctor with
a severe sore throat, only to discover that he had contracted a fast-
spreading form of lymphatic cancer called lymphoma. He had
probably had the disease for six months before noticing any
symptoms, which meant that the cancer had metastasized
throughout his body. Two days later Craig checked into a large
teaching hospi tal in Boston where he was assigned to a leading
specialist in lymphatic cancers.
“Our only choice,” his oncologist told him, “is to try to kill this
thing with everything we’ve got. It will be very rough, I warn you,
but absolutely necessary.”
When Craig asked how rough it would be, the oncologist smiled
grimly and said, “First we run a truck over you, then we back it up
to make sure we didn’t miss.” In private, he wondered if Craig
would live long enough to complete the rst round of treatments.
But from the very outset, Craig was a highly atypical case. His rst
treatment went unusually smoothly. The fever he entered the
hospital with resolved and the balloonlike swelling in his face
subsided. His psychological readiness to face the trials that lay
ahead began to grow.
At this point Craig wrote the letter from which I quoted. It
mentions that he practiced meditation every day and had been
doing so for seventeen years. He had developed a remarkable ability
to stop identifying with his disease. Though centered in his mind,this attitude of nonattachme nt also had a profound eect on his
body.
Two months into his treatment, his temperature began to rise
alarmingly; Craig was rushed to the hospital, where it was
determined his immune system was severely compromised. His
white cell count had been cut to the bone—it stood at 200, whereas
a health y person’s is between 4,000 and 11,000. Chemotherapy is
known to cause these crises, which put patients in grave jeopardy
from any passing infection, no matter how minor. Discouraged,
Craig’s oncolog ist left his bedside wondering how many weeks they
would have to wait before the white count crept back up. Three
days later, a second blood test was taken. It showed that Craig’s
count had bounced back to 4,000, from near-fatal to near-normal.
The doctor associated with the case had rarely if ever observed or
read about such an occurrence.
Despite the odds, Craig was rebounding rapidly, and the cancer
was in retreat. He was releas ed from the hospital after four months,
having chosen not to undergo a bone-marrow transplant, despite his
doctor’s insistence.
In Craig ’s mind, there was no doubt that being able to distance
himself from his disease was crucial. “The emotional ups and downs
are endless, the ordeal has dragged me through every imaginable
emotion, but something in me is not involved. I still laugh and cry,
celebrate and grieve, but I remain apart at the same time. I have
discovered how to free my life from hysteria, and when the hysteria
went, I was healed.” It has been nearly three years since Craig left
the hospital. He leads a completely normal life and rema ins free of
disease.
It is very heartening to see that patients can pick up the thread to
freedom. And what about Lou? He now stands at a halfway stage,
no longer a prisoner of his fear but not quite believing that he has
escaped.
As things turned out, Lou went in for his surgery, which was
supposed to remove the tumor on his pancreas while leaving the
majority of the organ intact. But his surgeons discovered that the
tumor was much larger than they suspected. Lou was judgedinoperable for either a partial or a total removal, and the incision
was immediately closed.
When he came out of the anesthesia, he shocked his oncologist by
taking the news in high spirits. “I never wanted surgery in the rst
place,” he told me in his hospital room, “and by a circuitous route I
got what I wanted.”
We both mused  on this. I didn’t realize at the time that something
critical had happened—Lou’s sense of being under a dark
enchantment was broken. He ew back to Europe and a fate I could
not predict. Six months later I was delighted to see him in my oce
again, looking well and without any discernible weight loss. He had
a normal appetite and no digestive diculties. Lou did not seem as
happy with this situation as I was, however. “Do I look all right?” he
asked nervously.
“You look wonderful,” I enthused.
“That’s what everyone tells me, but inside I don’t know  how I
feel.” It became apparent that Lou’s uncertainty still cast a shadow,
and yet if he only knew it, he had smashed through huge barriers.
I remem ber how we parted that day. We had been talking for
quite a while. I paused and glanced outside. It was April, a rare
spring day in New England when the sky was a perfect, crystalline
blue. The crocuses were up, yellow and violet jewels splashed across
the lawn, and the trees were bursting in their rst glory of golden
green.
I saw that Lou was looking outside, too, but dully. All at once, I
knew the utter loneliness his sickness had brought. “Look,” I said,
“why don’t you go outside for a little while. It’s a beautiful day, isn’t
it?” He nodded sadly, still alone inside his impenetrable gray space.
I had to break through, if only for a moment. “Think of the
beautiful days you used to love,” I said, surprising myself with
emotion. “Where are they now? They must still be here, inside you.
You breathed the air, and it became part of your blood. You looked
at the sky, and the sight became engraved on the neurons of your
brain. You felt the sunshine,  and its warmth was absorbed by your
skin.“It’s all there now, not just in your memory, but turned into you.
So don’t long for the good old days, Lou— you are them. Outside this
window is another day that wants to turn into you. You aren’t
outside life. Like all the rest of us, you’re blended into it, creating it
as you are being created. This day cannot last without you to keep it
alive. Will you give it a chance?”
When I was through, Lou said very little, but he embraced me
warmly when we parted. We had come to an understan ding. As I
stood by the door, I caught one last glimpse of him from the back.
He was just stepping outside, and from the eager way he looked
around, I sensed his happiness at being welcomed by the warm
spring light.
OceanofPDF.com7
The Importance of Feeling
Special
The instant he started to fall, Ray was probably dead. Twelve
thousand volts of electricity had violently hurled him o the roof
where he was working, helping a neighbor to install a new
television antenna. What should have been a harmless ground wire
turned out to be a live high- tension cable. When Ray picked it up,
he had no protection against the massive surge of current, which
almost certainly stopped his heart on the spot.
The horried neighbor round ed the corner and found Ray’s body
in a heap on the ground. His right arm was shattered where the
current had entered; the charred right knee of his work pants
marked where  it had exited. When the neighbor gingerly touched
Ray’s chest, however, he felt a beating heart. We will never really
know why.
Perhaps—given just the right angle and velocity—hitting the
ground restarted his heart. When debrillator paddles are not
available for shocking the heart back to life, thumping the chest is a
standard procedure in emergency resuscitation. Yet, even in the
hands of a doctor, it is a crude, risky method. You can just as easily
damage the heart as save it, and in the process crack a rib or
puncture a lung. Falling from a roof would increase these risks
considerably. But how else could Ray Shepard’s heart have started
again? It was an intriguing circumstance for the doctors on the
trauma team to speculate about later. When he heard about it,however, Ray


 is rigged. I totally screwed up. I
was screwed by so-and-so. I’ll never get these bills paid. I’ll probably lose
my house. I give up. It’s no use. It’s too late. I blew it. Damn the
Democrats. Damn the Republicans. Damn the corporations. Damn the
unions. Damn the rich. Damn the poor.”
Thoughts placed in the service of fear deactivate the Law of Divine
Compensation. Why? Because they are unloving. They are attack thoughts,
and miracles flow only through the auspices of loving thought. It is love
and love alone that gives us the power to transcend the lower thought forms
and appe arances of the mortal world. Only love of our self and others gives
us the divine authority to reset the trajectories by which our life unfolds.
Love’ s miracles are being created in every given moment, unobstructed by
anything carried  over from the past. That is the way the universe operates.
Your faith in love doesn’ t determine love’ s power, but it does determine
whether or not you will experience  that power. You can’t turn off the light,
but you can put your hands in front of your eyes and then complain that theroom is dark. The universe is infinitely and eternally lit with the light of
love and new possibility. You can have faith in that and experience
miracles. Or you can have faith in the illusions of the mortal world,
experiencing lack and scarcity without end.

I DID RECOUP  the ten thousan d dollars that I lost so many years ago in Los
Angeles, and while I certainly  can’t say I never made another financial
error, I never forgot the lesson my father taught me that night: that I could
absorb the loss. Whether throug h cases where I’ve made mistak es, or where
someone else made mistakes that affected me, I’ve learned that the products
of fear do not permanently stand. Each of us chooses how we will think
about what happens in our lives, and to look on a situation with faith in
miracles is to look through the eyes and with the power of God.
If you remember that you are a spiritual being, that God alone is the
source of your power, and that the universe is inherently designed to
provide for your needs, then you are thinking in a miracle-minded way. You
are exercising dominion over the mortal plane by remembering that you are
not of it. You will “just happen” to be seated next to someone who is
looking to hire a person with your skill set. You will “just happen” to think
up some  fabulou s new project and effortlessly attain funding. You will “just
happen” to receive a check in the mail from someone who has owed you
money for years and never repaid you until now.
Why? Because there is a realm of infinite creativity that exists beyond  the
mortal mind, yet within  the Mind of God. This is not fantasy, but rather the
spiritual reality of the universe. If you choose not to believe this, that is
your choice; if you choose to believe it, that is your miracle.
The universe is programmed to manifest, through you, the highest
possibilities for your creativity and joy. And that never, ever changes. In
God’ s Mind you are never too old; in God’ s Mind you are never inadequate;
in God’ s Mind you are not your résumé or your failures. In God’ s Mind,
there is no mistake that you are not given the opportunity to correct, nor
anything anyone did to you that cannot be compensated for when you
forgive and move on.
Nothing about your material circumstances has the power to stop the
engine of cosmic intention that you be blessed. And you are blessed“eternally,” which means moment after moment after moment. In any
instant, regardless of what has happened in the past, the universe has
arranged and is continuing to arrange infinite possibilities for you to
prosper. If you cannot see this now—if despair and anxiety hang like a veil
before your eyes, preventing you from mustering any faith in God at all—
then in this moment lean on mine. One mind joined with another, regardless
of their position in time or space, can remove whatever chains would bind
us and deliver us to that sweet, sweet realm where things come full circle
and there is always a chance to begin again.
OceanofPDF.comChapter 3
Making Love the Bottom Line
To want love, or to believe in the power of love—all that is wonderful.
But where the rubber meets the spiritual road is at the place where we
decide whether or not to act on love.
One place where putting love first is not always easy is in the area of
money. This isn’t because the issue is more complicated than any other area
of life— it’s just the entrenched thinking of the world is that profit, not love,
is the bottom line. In a world that is dominated by scarcity, that thought
makes sense. In a world where scarcity doesn’ t even exist, it makes no
sense at all.

Putting love first means knowing that the universe
supports you in cr eating the good, the holy, and the
beautiful. It means knowing that you’r e on the earth for
a purpose, and that the purpose itself will cr eate
opportunities for  its accomplishment.

Making love your bottom line doesn’ t make you “lose”; it’s ultimately the
way you inevitably gain. For what you give, you shall receive; and what
you withhold will be withheld from you. As a friend of mine once said to
me, the universe keeps a perfect set of books.
Making love the bottom line doesn’ t mean that you have to give
everything away or that you’ll never charge for your services. The principle
of fair exchange gives love to both giver and receiver.Making love the bottom line doesn’ t mean that you’re compelled to do
anything anyone ever asks you to do. Love always gives the loving
response—but sometimes the loving response is “no.”
But making love the bottom line does mean that we take seriously the idea
that we are on the earth to do as love would have us do, and to do with our
resources only what we are internally guided to do. I know from personal
experience that when I’ve done  this, I’ve gained financially as well as in
other ways. And when I have not done this, I’ve lost.
The path of love might not lead to an immediate, short-term bundle of
cash. But following the path of love leads to trust, to deeper relationships,
and therefore to a greater probability of further good. Our internal
abundance is ultimately the source of our external  abundance. Who we are,
not just the services we provide, creates money.
People who are positive and energetic when they show up for work—are
they or are they not the people most likely to be promoted? People who are
kind and helpful when you walk into their store—do they or do they not
have a business to which you’re more likely to return? People who inspire
genuine trust and faith in the excellence of their work—are they or are they
not the people you are more likely to hire for your next project? You know
that line about how nice guys finish last? It’ s a lie.
Yet at times we fear that if we give ourselves to love, we will somehow
devolve into a puddle of weakness—that love will make us vulnerable to
hurt or make us less effective in the world. We think it’s okay for God to
have our spiritual lives, but we better not hand over our finances! A woman
once told me, “I don’t mind giving God my money, but if it’s over two
hundred thousand dollars, I think I better handle it myself.” And here is
what makes that such a joke: it is often in the area of our finances where we
need miracles the most!
Love is our sanity. It does not lead us to unwise behavior. It does not lead
us to give our money away frivolously when there is a need to save it and
provide for our family. It does not lead us to disrespect principles of money
management or the appropriate laws of commerce. It does not lead us into
unreasonable or immoderate behavior. Love doesn’ t ruin things; love makes
all things right, by aligning mortal events with the natural patterns of an
intentional and creative universe.Love makes us wake up in the morning with a sense of purpose and a flow
of creat ive ideas. Love floods our nervous system with positive energy,
making us far more attractive to prospective employers, clients, and
creative partners. Love fills us with a powerful charisma, enabling us to
produce new ideas and new projects, even within circumstance s that seem
to be limited. Love leads us to atone for our errors and clean up the mess
when we’ve made mistakes. Love leads us to act with impeccability,
integrity, and excellence. Love leads us to serve, to forgive, and to hope.
Those things are the opposite of a poverty consciousness; they’re the stuff
of spiritual wealth creation.
In 1992, I published a book called A Return to Love.  At the time, I was a
bit naive—I had never spent time thinking about things like book contracts,
bestseller status, or book royalties. I was happy to be able to live off the
suggested donations at my lectures on A Course in Miracles;  while writing
the book I don’t think I even thought about how well it migh t sell. I do


 needs compounds like
piperine (from black pepper) to protect it
from being degraded by the body’s
digestive enzymes.Chapter 4
Healthy Sweeteners
There are a lot of sweeteners
out there on the market, some
good, others not so good. I have
chosen the two listed because of
their health benefits and low
glycemic index (GI).Agave Nectar
Agave nectar is a natural sweetener
similar to honey and can be used to
sweeten food and drink. This sweet syrup
is an ideal alternative to sugar and is a
healthier choice as it has a low glycemic
index (GI) of 27 as opposed to honey’s GI
of 83.
The agave plant has long been cultivated
in the hilly, semi-arid soils of Mexico. Its
fleshy leaves cover the pineapple-shaped
heart of the plant, which contains a sweet
sticky juice. Ancient Mexicans considered
the agave to be sacred. They believed the
liquid from the plant purified body andsoul.
According to Dr Sahelian, author of
several books including
The Stevia
Cookbook
, agave contains saponins and
fructans, which have anti-inflammatory
and immune system-boosting properties,
including antimicrobial capability.
Agave can now be found in many
supermarkets. I use agave nectar syrup
from The Groovy Food Company,
www.groovyfood.co.uk. You can get the
syrup and other products from this
company, from regular grocery and health
food stores like Tesco, Waitrose and
Holland & Barrett. More information on
agave can be found atwww.blueagavenectar.com.
Manuka Honey
Manuka honey is a premium medical-
grade honey, exclusively found in New
Zealand. It has been discovered that this
unique type of honey has extraordinary
healing properties that are capable of
treating a wide spectrum of health
conditions such as ulcers, acid reflux,
acne, wounds, burns, eczema, MRSA
Staph infections, etc. According to
biochemist Peter Molan of the University
of Waikato, manuka honey is rich in
antibacterial properties. He and his
colleagues have also suggested severalbenefits of manuka honey, including
treatment of sore throats if taken orally.
Manuka honey can be found in some
supermarkets and most health food shops.Chapter 5
Acid to Placid
By Samantha Russo
Digestive disorders are on the
increase and they are not alone:
degenerative and chronic
disorders are also on the
incline. Disorders like coeliac
disease, Crohn’s disease,
colitis, gastritis, fibromyalgia
and chronic fatigue syndrome
(CFS) are rapidly increasing innumber, and some of them are
fairly modern diseases that
were not really heard of 100
years ago. All of these, if not
treated, can lead to cancer.
A lot boils down to our diets –
lacking in nutrients, with an
over-reliance on processed and
heavily-refined foods –
environmental pollution and
stress-filled days. All of these
elements are taking their toll on
our overworked systems.
This lifestyle can lead to an
increase in the build-up of
mucous plaque, which coats thecolon, allowing bacteria to
breed and stopping essential
nutrients from being absorbed.
To help avoid such problems
and to re-energise your health
with some gentleness, why not
begin a journey from acid to
placid?
To begin with you may
experience some discomfort, but
that’s totally normal when your
body is readjusting to love and
tenderness. Here are the few
basic principles of ‘pain-free
eating’.Eat as much high water
content produce (fresh fruit
and vegetables) as possible
You know the saying, ‘You are what you
eat’. Well, my new saying is ‘Eat what
you are’. Our bodies are made up of
predominantly water and the following
indicates exactly how this is so:
• Saliva is 95 percent water
• Blood is 90 percent water
• Bone is 22 percent water
• Lean muscle tissue is 75 percent water
• Lymph is 94 percent water
• Lungs and brain are 80 percent waterAs the body is largely made up of water, it
is only obvious that it needs water to help
keep it healthy and functioning properly.
This is not just about drinking the
minimum 8–10 cups of water each day,
it’s about eating foods that are naturally
full of water such as fresh fruit and
vegetables. They give your body the water
it needs to help keep all your tissues
hydrated and moist which is imperative in
creating and maintaining your health. So,
first, all the nutrients and vitamins found
in fresh fruit and vegetables are
transported to the intestines by the water
in those fruit and vegetables, where they
are absorbed and used by the body.
Secondly, that same water that brought the
nutrients in also carries the toxic wastesaway from the body. As well as that, most
fresh fruit and vegetables are alkaline
foods, which help your body achieve and
maintain an alkaline pH (7.35).
A few simple suggestions:
• Instead of potato with your lunch (chips,
etc), have carrot sticks or cucumber
and celery slices.
• If you are still hungry at the end of a
meal, have seconds of tossed green
salad instead of anything else.
• Make sure you serve a tray of raw
veggies at all parties.
• If the children are hungry after school,
give them fresh fruit instead of cookies,
crisps or chips.• Add chopped celery, cucumbers, onions
and peppers to tuna or egg salad.
• Take veggie dippers (cut carrots,
cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, broccoli,
cauliflower, celery, radishes, peppers,
courgettes) to work to nibble on
instead of bending to the vending
machine.
Correctly combine your food
Stop looking for that magic pill that will
justify you eating chemical potions
designed to taste unbelievably delicious.
If you exist mainly on
nutritionally-
devoid
, chemical-laden junk and expect to
feel and look good or have more energythan a couch potato, think again. You need
to stop complaining and stop taking pills
for stomach problems, aches and pains
and high cholesterol (among other things).
All this can be eliminated (or immensely
improved) by properly combining your
meals.
If you suffer from a disease such as
cancer, heart disease, arthritis or diabetes,
listen here: your diet plays a major role in
the development and severity of those
diseases. Cancer cannot exist in a clean
environment! It can only survive in a toxic
environment. Waste that has not been
eliminated from the body makes your body
toxic. (Remember that fruit and vegetables
help to eliminate waste.)For example, uric acid is one of the most
potent poisons in existence – and high
protein foods (specifically animal
products) are a major source of it. When
uric acid settles in your joints, it leads to
arthritis. Uric acid does not exist in fruit
and vegetables. Basically, your body
needs to be fed with high water-content
foods. You absolutely cannot be healthy
and free from diseases without them.
The concept of proper food combining has
been around since 1911, believe it or not.
But it’s astounding how few people are
aware of it or the importance of it. The
idea was originated by Dr William
Howard Hay, a New York physician who
graduated from NYU Medical College in1891 and who spent 16 years specializing
in surgery. He then developed what is
often a fatal kidney condition called
Bright’s disease, and after having no
success with traditional medicine, he set
out to find alternative methods to cure
himself of the disease. He came up with
the idea of food combining, which
concerns itself with eating in such a way
as to be in harmony with the physiological
manner in which different foods are
digested by the human body. That is,
certain foods need an acid digestive
enzyme, whereas other foods need an
alkaline environment. So the two should
not be mixed if fast, efficient digestion is
to be achieved. Dr Hay cured his Bright’s
disease with this system of eating (nowcalled the Hay Diet) and went on to
become a famous author and lecturer.
The concept of food combining has since
been adapted by many successful health
practitioners, researchers and advisors.
So basically, our bodies digest different
foods in different ways. Fresh (non-
starchy) vegetables, since they are largely
made up of water, are a more ‘neutral’
type of food and pass through the stomach
quickly with little or no digestive enzymes
necessary. Starchy foods need an
alkaline
digestive enzyme, which starts in the
mouth with the enzyme ptyalin and
continues in the stomach and small
intestine. Protein foods are digested by
acid, specifically, hydrochloric acid andpepsin secreted by the stomach.
When an acid and an alkaline are mixed
together in a lab beaker, they neutralize
each other. The same concept applies in
your stomach: when acid and alkaline
digestive enzymes are mixed together in


  or what the spectators think of you, or what you are going
to do  tom orrow, or what your ha ir looks like. The usual repetiti ve nonsense
generated by the active W estern mind ceases. Concentration—the ability to
focus unhindere d by distracting thoughts—is at its highest. In such a state
of inten se concentration, your complete attention can be devoted to the
game.
Being i n the flow allows for a still, quiet mind, undistracted by
conscious thoug hts. It is a state that involves the use of the entire brain
rather th an just the logical proc esses of the left brain. Being in the flow is
the v ery antithesis of W estern e ducation, whose sole purpose is to develop
and nurture the analytical, reasoning, and logical brain.
Y ou will  no doubt have experienced the feeling of an activity ta king up
all your attention and focus to the point where you for get everything else
around y ou. Wh en you are truly  engaged in creative endeavors like sports,
writing, painting, music, and drama, many hours can pass by unnoticed.
The dan cer and the dance become one. The painter and the paint ing become
one. The runner and the race become one.
During training practice, an athlete will perform the same action over
and over again, making precise adjustments to create the perfect sequence,
whether it is marking an opponent during a game, taking a golf swing,
knowing when to overtake duri ng a race, or taking a penalty kick. In the
same w ay, a martial arts expert develops controlled and flawless
movements through years of constant repetition and refining. Each time a
movement is replicated, the bra in stores information and develops muscle
memory, eventually allowing the task to be performed without conscious
ef fort. In  essenc e, the body kno ws what to do—the mind simp ly needs to
get out of the way. There is no room  for thought in fast-paced activities;
thoughts serve only as distractions. An athlete at peak performan ce does not
think. Instead, instinct kicks in, muscle memory ensures spontaneous
movement, and 100 percent of e ner gy is directed toward the task  at hand. In
the zone, the athlete finds that his or her reactions and move ments flow
without conscio us thought. Intuition takes over and the right ac tion occurs
naturally.
During the 1988 Monaco Grand Prix, A yrton Senna managed to stay
ahead of  his competitors with ease, including a teammate driving a similarcar. Recounting  the race, Senna explained how he achieved t his without
conscious ef fort : Letting his instincts guide him, he felt as if the circuit had
become a tunnel, and no matter how fast he drove, there was always room
for more.
Enter the Zone at W ill
The zon e is nothing more than p erforming in the absence of tho ught. When
the mind is still and thoughts are no longer a distraction, you are able to
give an activity your complete and undivided attention. Being a ble to focus
without distracti ng thoughts defines concentration, a vital attribute for the
proper e xecution of any action a nd the achievement of any goa l. An active
mind re sults in diminished con centration as every little thought interferes
with the  task at hand. For example, an individual who is readin g this book
with an active mind is merely looking at the page. His attention is
elsewhere on a never -ending train of repetitive and useles s thinking.
Although his eyes might be following the sentences, his mind is not. When
he re aches the bottom of the page, it is unlikely that he will remember much
of the content.
Nowadays, as we spend more time communicating via social media,
playing computer games, an d surfing the Internet, our powers of
concentration are diminishing. A ccording to international motiv ational guru
Kevin K elly, we  are now living  in an attention-deficit society. T he dial has
moved from conversation to presentation and from dialogue to monologue.
W e no longer give each other our undivided attention, and neit her do we
take the time to observe our own breathing or allow our minds to still.
T ed Selker of th e Massachusetts Institute of T echnology supp orts this
view, cl aiming t hat because the Internet of fers so much choice  we end up
spending our time flitting from one thing to another, shortening our
attention spans and forming a h abit of poor concentration. Selker suggests
that the nature of web browsing can leave us with an attention span of just 9
seconds—the same as that of a goldfish.
Reading a piece in the  New  Y o rk T imes,  I  was surprised to learn that the
children of the l ate Apple founder Steve Jobs hadn’ t been introduced to the
iPad. W hen journalist Nick Bilton asked Jobs if his children loved thegadget, he replied, “They haven’ t used it. W e limit how much technology
our kids use at home.” This stance has been echoed by a number of
technology chief executives, wh o set very strict criteria on the amount of
screen time their children experience—all too aware of the implications of
extended periods spent looking at a screen. As the modern world becomes
increasingly dep endent on screens and devices, gadget addiction has the
potential to isolate people from  the world around them, subd uing social
interaction and increasing mind activity.
Not only is an overactive mind less conducive to focus and prod uctivity,
it also leads to  increased stress, anxiety, and depression—all of which
contribute to mental health problems and a reduced quality of life.
The importance of being able to control and still the mind cannot be
overestimated. An athlete with a quiet mind will enjoy good  powers of
concentration an d be able to enter the zone at will, but an athlete with an
active mind will have a head full of unnecessary thoughts and will find it
dif ficult to enter the zone. If the mind is overactive during d aily life, it
follows that the mind will be ov eractive during sports. Only when the mind
is relatively still during normal daily life can the athlete enter the zone
during competit ion. A still mind can be attained through having a high
BOL T score, using meditation,  and developing awareness of the mind—
nothing else.
Y ou could, of co urse, go down to your local bar and drink six or seven
lar ge beers. No doubt this appro ach will quiet the mind. As appealing as it
sounds, achieving a state of m ind where thoughts are drowned out with
alcohol is not conducive to alertness and increased performance. Instead,
for thousands of years, human  beings have practiced dif ferent forms of
meditation to quiet and tame the mind. Meditation allows you to pay
attention to your thoughts, emotions, and feelings, while reducing repetitive
and useless thinking.
R yan Giggs made his first appe arance for the Premiership football club
Manchester United during the 1990–91 season. As the most decorated
player in English football history, Giggs has won thirteen Premier League
medals, four F A cup winner ’ s m edals, three League cup winner ’ s medals,
and two  Champions League winner ’ s medals. At the age of forty, when
most of  his peers had long since retired, Giggs continu ed to play
professional Pre mier League football. So what is his secret? A ccording toGiggs, self-awar eness has been a major factor in his extended career: “The
focus on oneself is hugely important, even if it is only for a d aily hour of
stretches and meditation,” he says.
The renowned golfer T iger W oods is also well known fo r using
meditation to improve his game. T iger ’ s father, Earl W oods, was
instrumental in developing his son’ s concentration. Earl W oods explained
he w ould repeatedly attempt to distract his son as he practiced h is swing by
dropping a golf bag or shouting obscenities. Earl W oods believed that T iger
could be the “first black intuitive golfer ever raised in the United States”
and tested his meditative concentration from a very young ag e. And his
prediction came  true: T iger W oods has been the world number one golfer
for m ore consecutive weeks tha n any other player in history. The ability to
play sports intuitively relies on complete immersion in the zone, where the
right act ion occu rs ef fortlessly and the golfer and the game become one. In
the film The Legend of Bagger V ance,  t he  celebrated coach describes  the
perfect swing as being in harmo ny with “all that is, all that was,  and all that
will be.”
T o get to this p lace and access intuitive intelligence, it is nece ssary to
practice quieting the mind. Intuitive intelligence is not learned but
experienced. Th ose who bring about monumental change and success in
this wor ld have access to it. For some it is an automatic process. For others,
including myself, it has to be developed. A clear example of intuitive
intelligence can be found in th e late Steve Jobs. In an interview with his
biographer W alter Isaacson, he described observing how peop le living in
India rel ied a