	which	make	functioning	in	the
ordinary	world	quite	difficult. In	that	state,	the	option	to	leave	the	world	at	any	time	persists	and	is	a
permanent,	open	option	as	though	it	was	part	of	a	silent	agreement	or
knowingness. There	is	no	obligation	to	persist	or	continue. Q:	How	then	does	earthly	life	resume? A:	After	a	period	of	years,	adjustment	is	made	with	the	relearning	of
communication	styles	and	a	reacquaintance	with	human	affairs	sufficient
to	function. Recent	history	had	to	be	caught	up	on. This	can	be
accomplished	by	getting	a	television,	watching	the	news	reports,	and
reading	newspaper	headlines. There	is	an	ongoing	dialog	within	the
overall	field	of	human	consciousness	that	is	as	though	transparent	by	its
essence;	and	by	recognition,	it	offers	aspects	with	which	one	has	an	option
to	respond. Q:	What	persists? A:	The	Presence	and	the	awareness	of	the	Self	are	ever	present. The	residual
personality	interacts	with	the	expectations	of	the	world	in	order	to	remain
appropriate	and	not	elicit	comment	or	notice	of	anything	other	than	the
ordinary. Although	this	ordinariness	is	learned	and	voluntary,	it	requires
the	expenditure	of	energy	and	attention	to	form. Interaction	with	the	form
of	human	life	can	only	be	done	for	periods	of	time	and	can	seem	quite
exhausting	as	it	is	not	one’s	natural	state. Not	all	the	world’s	requests	or
wishes	can	be	complied	with,	so	there	is	a	tendency	to	conserve	energy	in
order	to	meet	‘needs’	rather	than	wants. The	sage	persists	only	as	a	vehicle	whose	purpose	is	delineated	by
Divine	Will	as	expressed	through	the	Self. One	is	merely	a	witness	to	the
action,	which	is	spontaneous. The	body	continues	to	perform	like	a	live
puppet	and	behave	in	human	fashion. Its	needs	are	fulfilled	automatically
by	its	interaction	with	the	universe. Q:	Is	there	any	‘regret’? A:	Not	regret,	but	there	is	an	awareness	that	the	expectations	and	wishes	of
the	world	often	cannot	be	met. Q:	What	would	you	specify	as	‘your’	function? A:	To	be	that	which	I	am	to	the	world	and	explain	it	as	clearly	as	possible	in
order	to	facilitate	spiritual	awareness	and	thus	contribute	to	the	relief	of
the	suffering	of	mankind. The	energy	field	with	which	that	function	isaccompanied	does	by	itself	silently	contribute	to	the	well-being	of	human
life	and	diminish	human	suffering,	which	itself	is	a	satisfaction	and	a
completion. Q:	What	prayers	are	useful? A:	Ask	to	be	the	servant	of	the	Lord,	a	vehicle	of	Divine	Love,	a	channel	of
God’s	Will. Ask	for	direction	and	divine	assistance	and	surrender	all
personal	will	through	devotion. Dedicate	one’s	life	to	the	service	of	God. Choose	love	and	peace	above	all	other	options. Commit	to	the	goal	of
unconditional	love	and	compassion	for	all	life	in	all	its	expressions	and
surrender	all	judgment	to	God. Q:	How	can	we	forgive	those	who	do	not	seem	to	deserve	it? It	seems	like
an	impossibility. A:	By	understanding	others’	frames	of	reference,	human	limitations	and
conditioning,	and	genetic	and	social	programming,	much	rancor	as	well	as
harm	can	be	avoided	by	acknowledging	and	accepting	the	human
limitation. Unrealistic	expectations	of	human	nature	prevail	and	are
propagated	by	denial	and	the	use	of	hypothetical	arguments. Political/sociological	hypotheses	are	usually	proven	over	time	to	be
incorrect	and	based	on	false	assumptions	about	human	desires,	conditions,
and	limitations. They	are	also	naïve	in	that	such	formulas	almost	always
ignore	context	altogether	and	naïvely	make	false	presumptions	about
human	behaviors	without	attention	to	circumstance. For	instance,	honesty	is	possible,	but	only	if	certain	conditions	are
present. If	needs,	desires,	or	hunger	reach	a	certain	intensity,	then	the
‘luxury’	of	honesty	has	to	be	sacrificed. Poverty	has	its	own	rules	of
survival. Unsatisfied	biological	drives	may	overrule	hypothetical	ideals	of
behavior,	e.g.,	the	rationality	of	the	prefrontal	cortex	may	be	overwhelmed
by	the	arousal	of	the	old,	deep-seated	animal	brain. It	is	an	artificial
situation	that	defies	millions	of	years	of	biology	and	the	rules	of	racial
survival,	including	the	effects	of	pheromones. Another	factor	overlooked	in	human	expectation	is	individual
variability	and	aberrant	individual	defects	of	control	as	well	as	deviant
training,	conditions,	and	defects	in	brain	chemistry. These	individuals	are
often	pushed	beyond	their	limits	by	circumstances	or	even	by	intoxication. All	these	realizations	tend	to	temper	our	expectations	of	perfection	in	a
world	of	limitation. People	in	our	society	are	not	educated	as	to	human	limitation	and
variability. Our	puritanical	society	tends	to	pontificate	and	putconsiderable	emphasis	on	such	imaginary,	nonexistent	faculties	as	‘will
power’,	which	is	used	as	an	excuse	by	moralists	primarily	to	justify
vindictiveness. That	there	is	no	such	faculty	as	will	power	which	can	be
relied	upon	becomes	obvious	to	any	student	of	human	activity	who	would
observe	that	it	is	entirely	lacking	in	most	people	most	of	the	time	and	only
marginally	operative	in	a	few	under	favorable	circumstances. The	fallacy
of	will	power	underlies	many	of	mankind’s	unsolvable	social	problems. If	we	view	average	people	as	flawed,	limited,	and	unable	to	be	other
than	what	they	are	at	any	given	moment	or	in	any	given	circumstance,	then
most	negative	feelings	and	judgments	can	be	avoided. People	are	then	seen
more	as	being	limited	rather	than	as	‘bad’,	‘selfish’,	or	‘wrong’. Life	is
then	considerably	easier	and	more	peaceful. Individual	experiences	of	life	are	tempered,	tailored,	and	considerably
determined	by	one’s	personal	level	of	consciousness	as	well	as	that	of
prevailing	society. As	science	advances,	it	is	discovering	that	more	and
more	of	human	behavior,	especially	deviant	or	abnormal	behavior,	as	well
as	character	traits,	is	inherited. Many	predominant	characteristics	are
already	set	and	in	operation	during	early	infancy. There	is,	for	instance,	a
depressive	disorder	called	“dysthymia,”	which	begins	in	childhood	and
persists	for	a	lifetime. It	is	accompanied	by	the	deficiency	of	an	essential
brain	neurotransmitter. Many	mood	and	behavioral	improvements	cannot
be	made	by	the	individual	unaided,	and	often	the	situation	cannot	be
resolved	even	with	expert	help. Q:	Resolution	of	most	conflict,	then,	is	possible	by	education? A:	That	is	true. Compassion	and	wisdom	go	hand	in	hand. To	complain	about
the	limitations	and	defects	of	others	is	futile	and	unrealistic. Q:	What	about	ideals? A:	They	can	be	hoped	for	but	not	expected. Goals	are	hypothetical	intellectual
constructs	and	can	be	sources	of	inspiration,	but	idealizations	often	refer	to
prideful	conceits. Conventionally,	ideals	are


 wher e we ar e behaving in a
way we fear will be unacceptable to those we love. Maybe
it’s an ar ea of our life that’s out of contr ol, a habit or
addiction we ar e struggling with, or a fantasy that we’r e
afraid to speak out loud. When our behaviors ar e
incongruent with the masks we wear, we will work har d tohide them. W e might be r eally sweet and caring to everyone
we come in contact with during the day and then go home
at night and yell at our kids. Maybe we position ourselves as
a brilliant intellectual while we’r e with our colleagues, only
to go home and spend hours watching mindless TV and
playing video games. P erhaps we’r e in a committed
relationship but ar e secr etly cheating, or we act lik e a self -
made success when the fact is we ar e secr etly living oﬀ our
parents. Our unr esolved shame causes us to act out; it eventually
gets e xpressed as an outer behavior that blows the cover oﬀ
the parts of our life we’ve been trying to conceal. W e can
work day and night trying to contr ol our hidden impulses
from ever coming to the surface, but we ar e only a moment
away fr om acting in ways that under mine our self -respect. If
we’ve been hiding a part of our life in which we act without
integrity, it will eventually be e xposed as we write bad
checks or cheat on our tax r eturns. Section summary:

(Please summarize approximately 150 words)

Note: Please make sure to maintain accurate detail retention and include relevant numbers/figures whenever necessary, avoiding repetition where applicable. ).<|eot_id|><|begin_of_text|>
Q: What is the author's stance on idealized self-image?,
A: The author believes that an idealized self-image is not a viable solution, as it can lead to feelings of rejection and emotional wounds.
Q: What are some common attitudes that indicate an idealized self-image?,
A: The text lists several examples, including "I'm not like those people, I'm better", "I've never strayed", "God is proud of me", "Criminals and wrongdoers aren't even human", "Everyone sees how good I am", and "I already know who I am and what I need to do, I'm not conflicted".
Q: What is the author's advice for dealing with the shadow?,
A: The author suggests acknowledging, embracing, and befriending one's shadow, and working to uncover and understand its role in their life.
Q: What is the author's view on the concept of the shadow?,
A: The author believes that the shadow is a powerful and essential part of the human psyche, and that it is crucial to understand and integrate it in order to become a whole and authentic person.
Q: What is the author's message about the importance of self-acceptance?,
A: The author emphasizes that true self-acceptance is the only way to achieve wholeness and authenticity, and that trying to hide or deny one's shadow will only lead to further suffering.<|eot_id|><|begin_of_text|>If we r outinely cover
over feelings of loneliness, they may surface in the quiet of
the night as an insatiable hunger for sugar, alcohol, or
sedatives to ﬁll the emptiness we feel. If the rage we wer e
subjected to decades ago is not addr essed and r eleased, it
may seek e xpression by tur ning us in to a nagging par ent or
a bick ering spouse. Maybe our distaste for our cheating
parent causes us to k eep attracting partners who can’t be
trusted and ar e emotionally abusive. It could be that our
normal se xual curiosity was shut down at a young age,
giving rise to an insatiable fascination with illegal
pornography or danger ous se x. However, to fr ee ourselves
from the unmanageable compulsions that cause us to live a
secret life, we must ﬁnd healthy ways to e xpress our
repressed aspects so that we can be safe fr om behaviors
that can sabotage our life. Matthew was the chief of staﬀ at a pr estigious medical
university. He was admir ed by his colleagues and had a
loving wife and thr ee healthy childr en. Although to the outerworld he look ed lik e a pillar of society, he found himself
bored with his intellect and all the accolades that came with
success. One night Matthew r eturned home af ter making
rounds and started watching late-night TV. He became
fascinated by a young actr ess who was star ring in a movie
and decided to go online and check her out. One thing led to
another and, while visiting a por n site, he click ed on an ad
for a local strip club. The images he saw ﬁlled him with
excitement. His mind began to wander, and he fantasized
about stopping by the club on his ne xt day oﬀ. F eeling a bit
of excitement and fear, he rationalized his decision,
reasoning that since the club was located on the other side
of town, he could just put on a baseball cap and avoid being
recognized by anyone he knew. Soon visits to this strip club became Matthew’s r egular
patter n. He found himself gr owing overly attracted to one of
the women and eventually made a date to get together. The
stories he told his wife became mor e and mor e complicated,
with deeper and deeper layers of deception. He began
looking for medical confer ences to attend in obscur e parts
of the country, so he could enjoy a week end of de bauchery
without wor rying about being caught. As se x with his wife
became less fr equent and less e xciting, he became mor e
adventur ous and started taking bigger risks. He even got
into the habit of buying se xy lingerie and outﬁts he could
take with him on his outings to ensur e that his women could
turn him on. One week end, Matthew’s wife, Maria, took his car to dr op
their kids oﬀ at a tennis lesson, and when she opened the
trunk to tak e out their equipment, she noticed a medical
bag she had never seen befor e. After getting her kids to
their lesson, she r eturned to the parking lot and—on an
instinct—opened the bag. She was shock ed to ﬁnd sheer
lingerie, condoms, and an assortment of other se xual
parapher nalia stuﬀed in this small bag. W anting to
understand the e xtent of her husband’s inﬁdelity, she beganlooking thr ough the cr edit-car d bills, the Inter net history on
their computers, and his cell-phone bills. A fter studying his
behavior for a number of weeks, she discover ed just how big
a secr et life Matthew had been leading, which r evolved
around strip clubs, escorts, and countless one-night stands. After several weeks of silent suﬀering, Maria decided to
confr ont Matthew with all the evidence she had uncover ed. With nothing to say and his hidden behaviors now out in the
open, Matthew was faced with the task of unveiling the
unfulﬁlled ur ges that had led him to cr eate such a gap
between his public persona and his private life. As the shock
of the consequences of his secr et life came into clear view,
he was disgusted that his shadow had lur ed him into
behaviors he never dr eamed he would have been capable
of. Like most se x addicts, Matthew needed help and soon
discover ed that it wasn’t just se x he was seeking, but
attention, admiration, and e xcitement. If he had been able
to see and acknowledge these secr et desir es, he could have
sought the support he needed befor e his behavior escalated
out of contr ol. Instead, his shadow caused him to lose his
marriage and his dignity. I have hear d countless people in my seminars over the
years shar e similar stories. W ithout thinking, they became
somebody they never wanted to be. The bottom line is if we
don’t deal with our shadow aspects, our impulses and our
repressed feelings, they will deal with us. As my friend Dr. Charles Richar ds tells us in The Shadow Eﬀect  movie,
“Ignoring our r epressed shadow is lik e locking somebody in
the basement until they have to do something dramatic to
get our attention.” If we r efuse to uncover them willingly,
we put ourselves at risk of being in the line of ﬁr e of what I
call the Shadow Eﬀect. W ith no r elief in sight for these
repressed parts of ourselves, they tak e on a life of their
own. By r eleasing the guilt and shame we car ry when a part
of our life is housed in the dark, we can instead open thecellar doors and e xchange our secr et life for an authentic
life. When we deny ourselves a safe outlet to e xpress our dark
side—or r efuse to even acknowledge its e xistence—it builds
up and becomes a powerful for ce capable of destr oying our
life as well as the lives


andheal
ing,andsowehaveremainedlargelyignorantofthehealingsystemandhowourbodiescontinuallystrivetocorrectimbalancesand
keepushealthy. Whenthingsbegintochangeinourbodies,weautomatically
assumewearesick,andthatsomethingisdreadfullywrong. Ifourbodiesbegintoreflectimbalanceandfunctionabnormally,ifthere
issomediscomfortorpain,ourfirstassumptionismostlikelythat
wearebecomingsickorthatwehaveanallergy. Thisisbecausewe
aretryingtoaccountforoursymptoms. Thisisanaturalandnor
malinterpretationofwhatishappeningwithourbodies. Ratherthanjumpingtotheconclusionthatsomethingiswrongwithyourbody,firsttrytounderstandhowyourhealingsystemmay
berespondingappropriatelytocorrectanimbalancethathasoccurred. LetmeexplainwhatImean. Considersneezing,forexample. Weusuallythinkofsneezingas
asymptomofthecommoncold,orthebeginningofanallergy~Inrea1ity~sneezingisanormalhealing-systemresponsetoexpelforeigndebris,flushoutirritants,removepotentialpathogens,ridthebody
ofdisease,andhelpthebodymaintainitsintegrity. Sneezingalsois
aprotectivemechanismthathelpstopreventthefurtheradvanceofunwantedforeigninvadersintothedeeper,moredelicatestructures
oftherespiratorysystem,suchasourlungsandsinuses,andisanothercommonwaythatourhealingsystemssafeguardourhealth. Inadditiontosneezing,mostpeople,includingdoctors,confuse
manyothercommonhealingresponseswithsymptomsofadisease. Theseresponsesincludethefollowing:
oCoughing. Alsoconsideredasymptomofarespiratoryillnessorcondition,coughingisadefinitiveresponsefromyourhealingsystemtoexpelunwanteddebrisandinvadingmicroorganisms
thathavepenetrateddeeperintotherespiratorysystemandarethreateningtocausedamagetoyourlungs. Inmedicalcircles,a
goodcoughisknownasaproductivecoughinthatitsuccess
fullybringsupphlegm,mucous,microorganisms,andinfectious
YourHealingSysteminAction 33
debris,whicheffectivelyclearstheairwaysandmakesforeasierbreathing. Coughingcanbepowerful;thespeedatwhichfor
eignparticlesanddebrisexitthelungswithacoughhasbeenclockedatapproximately660mph,aboutthespeedofanF4Phantomfighteraircraft. •Diarrhea. Usuallyconsideredasymptomofanintestinaldisease,diarrheaisahealingresponsethatyourbodyusestoeliminatetoxinsandcontaminatedmaterialfromyourcolonandlargeintestines. Diarrheaisfastandefficient,andithelpstoflushoutwhatisirritatingoroffendingyourintestinaltract. Anumberofpotentiallyseriousintestinaldiseasesorproblemscanbeeliminatedthisway. Suppressingdiarrheathroughartificialmedica
tionscanbedangerous,anddoingsooftenbackfires. Whenyouclogupyourbody’snaturaleliminativeprocessesthroughthesuppressionofdiarrhea,harmfulmicroorganismshavenowhere
togobutfurtherinsideyourbody,wheretheycaninvadeyourliverorbloodstreamandcausemoreseriousillness. Ofcourse,therearetimeswhentoomuchfluidandelectrolytelossfromdiarrheamayrequiremedicalintervention. However,byseeingdiarrheaasaresponseofyourhealingsystem,andseekingout
waystocooperatewiththatsystem,youcanoftenmakesimple,naturaladjustmentstorestorebalanceandhealthtoyourbody. Thesemayincludedrinkingmorefluids,avoidingirritatingfoodsandsubstances,andmanagingstress,whichcanbeharm
fultoyourintestinesanddigestivesystem. (Wewilllookmorecloselyatthesefactorsinthechaptersthatfollow. ) aFainting. Faintingoccurswhenapersontemporarilylosesconsciousnessandfallsdown. Thecausesoffaintingcanrangefromserioustobenign,butthelossofconsciousnessisusuallydueto
ofalackofbloodflowtotheheadandbrain. Fallingdownwhilefaintingrepresentsacompensatoryresponsefromyourbody’shealingsystem. Whenthebodyhasfallenandliesflaton
thegroundinahorizontalposition,bloodflowandoxygento
thebrainincrease,whichcanoftenrestoreconsciousness. Mostinstancesoffaintingaretotallybenign,especiallyifnoseriousunderlyingdiseasesorconditionsexist. However,thereareocca
sionswhenseriousunderlyingdiseaseispresent,andyouwill
34 YourExtraordinaryHealingSystem
needtobebroughttothehospitalandtreated. However,the
correcttreatmentistodealwiththeunderlyingcausesthatprecipitatedthefainting,notjustwiththefaintingitself. UFever. Commonlyassociatedwithaninfection,feverisyourhealingsystem’swayofheatingyourbodyuptokilloffendingorganisms,mostofwhichareextremelytemperaturesensitive
andcannottolerateexcessiveheat. Additionally,feverinducessweating,whichhelpsthebodyeliminatetoxinsmorerapidly. Learningtoworkwithafeverthroughcontinuousrehydration(drinkingplentyofwater),ratherthansuppressing afeverwithartificialmedications,willsupportyourhealingsystemandresultinafaster,morethoroughhealingresponse. Evenattimeswhenmedicalsuppressionofafevermaybenecessary,fluidintakeshouldbeencouraged. Withanyfever,itisprudentto
lookfortheunderlyingcausesofthefeverandtotreatthese,not
justsuppressthefever. Doingthisworkswithyourhealingsys
temtohelprestorehealthandbalancetoyourbody. UNausea. Nauseaoccursinthesmallintestinesandstomach,and
itisaspecificresponsefromyourhealingsystemthatprotects
yourbodyfrommorefoodenteringintoit. Whenyoufeelnau
seous,youhavelostyourappetiteforfood. Yourhealingsystemdoesthiswhenyourbodyneedstolimitsolidfoodintake. Nauseaoccurswhenyouhaveahighfeverandareinneedof
lotsoffluids,orwhenyouhaveastomachvirusoranulcer,and
solidfoodswouldmaketheseconditionsworse. Nauseaalso
helpstoconserveenergyandfreesbloodflowfromthedigestive
tractsoitcanbereroutedtootherareasofthebodythathavea
greaterimmediateneedforhealingenergy. 0Pus. Yourbody’shealingsystem,workingwithyourimmune
system,producespus,anunpleasant,smelly,yellowishsub
stance,tohelpeliminateforeignmaterial,bothlargeandsmall. Puscommonlyoccurswithinfection. Inthecaseofasplinterorforeignbodyintheskin,yourhealingsystemwillformapuspockettowalloffthesplinter,separatingitfromtherestofyourbody. Yourhealingsystemwillattempttodigestanddissolvethesplinterorforeignobject;ifthisprovesdifficult,itwilltryto
pushthesplinteroutoftheskin. Inadditiontofluidssecreted
YourHealingSysteminAction 35
toflushoutmicroorganismsandforeigndebris,puscontainswhitebloodcellsanddigestiveenzymesthatbreakdownanddigestforeignmaterial. Inthecaseofabacterialinfectioninany
partofthebody,thepusproducedwillattempttokilloffanddigestthebacteriawhileitflushesouttheinfection. sRunnynoseandnasalcongestion. Usuallyconsideredsymptoms
ofthecommoncoldorallergies,arunnynoseandnasalcongestionareactuallyspecificresponsesfromyourbody’shealingsys
tem. Theincreasedsecretions,mucous,phlegm,andcongestion
areyourhealingsystem’swayofattemptingtoflushoutanyoffendingorganismsorforeignparticlesthatmayhaveinvaded
theentrancetoyourrespiratorysystem. Althoughattemptingtosuppressthesehealingresponseswithnasaldecongestantsandotherdrugsgivestemporaryrelief,doingsooftenbackfires;it
canprolonganillnessandevenmakethingsworse. Becausethepharmaceuticalagentstendtodryupthesecretionstoeliminatesymptoms,theyworkagainstthenaturalprocessesofyourbody’shealingsystemtoeliminateharmfulsubstances. *Swellingandredness. Thefirstvisiblesignsatthesiteofanyinjury,trauma,orinfectioninthebody,swellingandredness,
too,arespecificresponsesofyourhealingsystem. ‘Whethercausedbyabruise,acontusion, asprain,afracture,oraninfec


	inhalation. By	contrast,	a	smooth,	healthy	liver	permits	the
lungs	to	easily	extend	into	the	abdominal	region,	which	puts	pressure	on	the	abdomen	and
squeezes	the	lymph	and	blood	vessels	to	force	lymph	and	blood	toward	the	heart. This
breathing	mechanism	is	often	called	“belly	breathing,”	and	it	can	be	seen	in	healthy
babies,	especially. An	enlarged	liver	prevents	the	full	extension	of	the	diaphragm	and
lungs,	which	causes	reduced	exchange	of	gases	in	the	lungs,	lymphatic	congestion,	and	theretention	of	excessive	amounts	of	carbon	dioxide	in	the	lungs. The	restricted	uptake	of
oxygen	negatively	affects	cellular	functions	throughout	the	body. Most	people	in	the	industrialized	world	have	an	enlarged	liver,	especially	those	who	are
overweight	or	obese. What	doctors	generally	consider	a	“normal-sized”	liver	is	actually
oversize. Once	all	gallstones	are	removed	through	a	series	of	liver	cleanses,	the	liver	can
gradually	return	to	its	original	size. Almost	all	diseases	of	the	lungs,	bronchi,	and	upper	respiratory	passages	are	either
caused	or	worsened	by	gallstones	in	the	liver	and	can	be	improved	or	eliminated	by
removing	these	stones	through	liver	cleansing. Disorders	of	the	Urinary	System

The
urinary	system
	is	an	extremely	important	excretory	system	of	the	body. It	consists	of
the	following:	two
kidneys,
	which	form	and	excrete	urine;	two
ureters,
	which	convey	the
urine	from	the	kidneys	to	the	urinary	bladder;	a
urinary	bladder,
	where	urine	collects	and
is	temporarily	stored;	and	a
urethra,
	through	which	urine	passes	from	the	urinary	bladder
to	the	exterior	of	the	body	(see
Figure	11
). Smooth	functioning	of	the	urinary	system	is	essential	for	maintaining	an	appropriate
fluid	volume	by	regulating	the	amount	of	water	that	is	excreted	in	the	urine. Other	aspects
of	its	function	include	regulating	the	concentrations	of	various	electrolytes	in	the	body
fluids	and	maintaining	normal	pH	(acids-alkalis	balance)	of	the	blood. This	system	is	also
involved	in	the	disposal	of	waste	products	resulting	from	the	breakdown	(catabolism)	of
cell	protein	in	the	liver,	for	example. Figure	11
:	The	urinary	system

Most	diseases	of	the	kidneys	and	other	parts	of	the	urinary	system	are	related	to	an
imbalance	of	the
simple	filtration
	system	in	the	kidneys. About	26	to	40	gallons	of	dilute
filtrate	are	formed	each	day	by	the	two	kidneys. Of	these,	only	34	to	52	ounces	are
excreted	as	urine	(the	rest	is	absorbed	and	recirculated). With	the	exception	of	blood	cells,
platelets,	and	blood	proteins,	all	other	blood	constituents	must	pass	through	the	kidneys. The	process	of	filtration	is	disrupted	and	weakened	when	the	digestive	system—and,	in
particular,	the	liver—performs	poorly. Gallstones	in	the	liver	and	gallbladder	reduce	the	amount	of	bile	that	the	liver	is	able	to
produce. Thus,	it	becomes	impossible	to	digest	food	properly. Much	of	the	undigested
food	begins	to	ferment	and	putrefy,	leaving	toxic	waste	matter	in	the	blood	and	lymph. The	body’s	normal	excretions,	such	as	urine,	sweat,	gases,	and	feces,	do	not	usually
contain	disease-generating	waste	products;	that	is,	of	course,	for	as	long	as	the	passages	of
elimination	remain	clear	and	unobstructed. Disease-causing	agents	consist	of	tiny	molecules	that	appear	in	the	blood	and	lymph. They	are	visible	only	through	powerful	electron	microscopes. These	molecules	have	a
strong	acidifying	effect	on	the	blood. To	avoid	a	life-threatening	disease	or	coma,	the
blood	must	rid	itself	of	these	minute	toxins. Accordingly,	it	dumps	these	unwanted
intruders	into	the	connective	tissue	of	the	organs. The	connective	tissue	consists	of	a	gel-
like	fluid	(lymph)	that	surrounds	all	cells. The	cells	are	“bathed”	in	this	connective	tissue. Under	normal	circumstances,	the	body	knows	how	to	deal	with	acidic	waste	material	that
has	been	dumped	into	the	connective	tissue. It	releases	an	alkaline	product,
sodium
bicarbonate
	(NaHCO
3
),	into	the	blood	that	is	able	to	retrieve	the	acidic	toxins,	neutralize
them,	and	then	eliminate	them	through	the	excretory	organs. This	emergency	system,
though,	begins	to	fail	when	toxins	are	deposited	faster	than	they	can	be	retrieved	and
eliminated. As	a	result,	the	connective	tissue	may	become	as	thick	as	jelly. Nutrients,
water,	and	oxygen	can	no	longer	pass	freely,	and	the	cells	of	the	organs	begin	to	suffer
malnutrition,	dehydration,	and	oxygen	deficiency. Some	of	the	most	acidic	compounds	are	proteins	from	animal	foods. Gallstones	inhibit
the	liver’s	ability	to	break	down	these	proteins. Excessive	proteins	are	“temporarily”
stored	in	the	connective	tissues	and	then	converted	into	collagen	fiber. The	collagen	fiber
is	built	into	the	basal	membranes	of	the	capillary	walls. The	basal	membranes	may
become	up	to	ten	times	as	thick	as	normal. A	similar	situation	occurs	in	the	arteries. As	the
blood	vessel	walls	become	increasingly	congested,	fewer	proteins	are	able	to	escape	the
bloodstream. This	leads	to	blood	thickening,	making	it	more	and	more	difficult	for	the
kidneys	to	filter. At	the	same	time,	the	basal	membranes	of	the	blood	vessels	supplying	the
kidneys	also	become	congested,	making	them	harder	and	more	rigid. As	the	process	of
hardening	of	the	blood	vessels	progresses	further,
blood	pressure
	starts	to	rise	and	overall
kidney	performance	drops. More	and	more	of	the	metabolic	waste	products	excreted	by
the	kidney	cells,	which	would	normally	be	eliminated	via	venous	blood	vessels	and
lymphatic	ducts,	are	now	retained	and	adversely	affect	the	performance	of	the	kidneys
even	further. Figure	12a
:	Kidney	stones	embedded	in	kidney

Through	all	this,	the	kidneys	become	overburdened	and	can	no	longer	maintain	normalfluid	and	electrolyte	balances	in	the	body. In	addition,	urinary	components	may	precipitate
and	form	into	crystals	and	stones	of	various	types	and	sizes	(see
Figure	12a
). Uric	acid
stones,
	for	example,	are	formed	when	uric	acid	concentration	in	the	urine	exceeds	2	to	4
mg	percent. This	amount	was	considered	within	the	range	of	tolerance	until	the	mid-
1960s,	when	it	was	adjusted	upward. Uric	acid	is	a	by-product	of	the	breakdown	of	protein
in	the	liver. Since	meat	consumption	rose	sharply	in	that	decade,	the	“within	the	norm”
level	was	adjusted	to	7.5	mg	percent	This	adjustment,	however,	does	not	make	uric	acid
any	less	harmful	to	the	body. Stones	formed	from	excessive	uric	acid	concentrations	of	4
mg	percent	and	higher	(also	see


. The pr oblem is, he never came. Not only did
he not come. He never called. I was in a dark zone. Now what would A Course in
Miracles  say about that? I knew I needed a miracle. But all I
could come up with wer e two choices for ways to deal with
this, both of which I had tried befor e in similar situations,
and neither one felt good or got me what I wanted. My ﬁrst choice was to get very angry and let him know it. “Who do you think you ar e to tr eat me lik e that, you son- of-
a-bitch?” The pr oblem with that choice was that it would
completely invalidate my position. “Marianne’s a nice girl,
but her temper just doesn’t cut it. She’s hysterical when she
doesn’t get her way.”
The only other choice I could imagine was to for give him
and let it go. But that didn’t feel good either. “It’s ok ay you
stood me up, Mik e. I don’t car e. It doesn’t matter.”
Unconditional love I could understand, but not unconditional
dating. I didn’t know what to do. I ask ed for a miracle. I
consider ed the possibility of another possibility. I gave the
situation to God and r emember ed that I need do nothing. From a Course perspective, the ﬁrst thing I had to deal
with was my own judgment. As long as I was not at peace,
my behavior would car ry the ener gy of my conﬂict. Conﬂicted behavior cannot bring peace. It can only pr oduce
more conﬂict. F irst I had to deal with my own per ceptions. The r est would follow. So I came up with an e xercise; I would r epeat constantly,
out loud when I could and silently when other people wer e
present: “I for give you Mik e, and I r elease you to the HolySpirit. I for give you Mik e, and I r elease you to the Holy Spirit. I forgive you Mik e, and I r elease you to the Holy Spirit.”
Since Mik e didn’t call the day af ter our early mor ning
phone call or the day af ter, or the day af ter that, I had a lot
of negative feelings to try to dissipate. My for giveness chant
—a kind of mantra, or r epeated aﬃr mation of spiritual
wisdom—work ed lik e a healing balm on my emotional
turmoil. It deter red my temptation to focus on Mik e’s
behavior, and k ept me focused on my own feelings instead. My goal was inner peace, and I knew I couldn’t have that as
long as I per ceived him as guilty. In case you’r e wondering, it took him two weeks to call. The constant r epetition of “I for give you Mik e, and I r elease
you to the Holy Spirit,” this willingness to for give someone,
had work ed on my brain lik e a pleasurable drug. I didn’t
care whether I hear d from him again or not. So one day I’m in my house, the phone rings, and I hear
Mike’s familiar voice. “Marianne?”
Befor e I could even think about it consciously, a r eal
warmth and love ﬁlled up my chest. “Mik e? Hi! It’s so good
to hear fr om you!” And it was. It felt wonderful to hear his
voice. “How ar e you doing? I’ve missed you.” (Can you believe
he said that?!?) I don’t know if I said I’d missed him, too. His line was so
ridiculous, I pr obably didn’t say anything. But I do r emember
this: He said, “W ell, when can I see you?”
I said, “When would you lik e to?”
“How about tonight?”At that moment, wor ds came out of my mouth that
startled me as much as they must have startled him. I said
with a lot of love and kindness, “Mik e, I really car e for you
and that’s not going to change. I’m still your friend no
matter what. But when it comes to dating, we don’t seem to
do the same dance. So if you want to have lunch sometime,
please call. But as far as a date is concer ned, I need to
pass.”
We both mumbled a few mor e pleasantries and then got
oﬀ the phone. I was wor ried that I had r ejected a br other,
but just as that wor ry came into my mind, I saw an inter nal
image of lots of champagne bottles with their corks popping
oﬀ in the middle of Heaven. I hadn’t r ejected a br other. I had
simply accepted myself in a whole new way. He had a win—
a lesson lear ned and a friendship if he wanted it—and I had
a win. F orgiveness hadn’t tur ned me into a door mat. It had
taught me how to own my yes and own my no, without
anger, with dignity and with love. 15. COMMUNICA TING L OVE
“To communicate is to join and to attack is to
separate.”
The Holy Spirit accepts people unconditionally. To the ego,
this is an outrageous thought, because unconditional love is
the death of the ego. How will people gr ow if we all go
around just accepting each other as we ar e all the time? Accepting people as they ar e has the miraculous eﬀect of
helping them impr ove. A cceptance doesn’t pr ohibit gr owth;
rather, it fosters it. People who ar e always telling us what’s wr ong with us
don’t help us so much as they paralyze us with shame andguilt. P eople who accept us help us to feel good about
ourselves, to r elax, to ﬁnd our way. Accepting another
person doesn’t mean we never shar e constructive
suggestions. But lik e everything else, our behavior is not so
much the issue as the ener gy that it car ries. If I’m criticizing
someone in or der to change them, that’s my ego talking. If
I’ve prayed and ask ed God to heal me of my judgment,
however, and then I’m still led to communicate something,
the style of my sharing will be one of love instead of fear. It
won’t car ry the ener gy of attack, but rather of support. Behavioral change is not enough. Covering an attack with
sugary icing, with a sweet tone of voice or therapeutic
jargon, is not a miracle. A miracle is an authentic switch
from fear to love. When we speak fr om the ego, we will call
up the ego in others. When we speak fr om the Holy Spirit,
we will call up their love. A br other who is in er ror, says the
Course, calls for teaching, not attack. The following section in the Course is a powerful guide to
right-minded communication in r elationships. “Errors ar e of the ego, and cor rection of er rors
lies in the r elinquishment of the ego. When you
correct a br other, you ar e telling him that he is
wrong. He may be making no sense at the time,
and it is certain that, if he is speaking fr om the
ego, he will not be making sense. But your task
is still to tell him he is right. Y ou do not tell him
this verbally, if he is speaking foolishly. He needs
correction at another level, because his er ror is
at another level. He is still right, because he is a
Son of God.”
Miracles ar e created in an invisible r ealm. The Holy Spirit
improves our style. He teaches us how to communicate fr om
love instead of attack. Of ten people will say, “W ell, I toldthem. I really communicated!” But communication is a two -
way str eet. It only occurs if one person speaks, and the
other one can hear them. W e’ve all been in conversations
wher e two people spok e and no one hear d a thing. W e’ve
also had conversations wher e no one said anything and
both people understood everything perfectly. In or der to
truly communicate, we must tak e responsibility for the heart
space that e xists between us and another. It is that heart
space, or the absence of it, which will deter mine whether
communication is miraculous or fearful. Sometimes, of
course, that means k eeping our mouths shut. Silence can be
a powerfully loving communication. Ther e have been times
when I was wr ong, and I knew I was wr ong, and I knew they
knew I was wr ong, and I loved them for having the
graciousness not to say anything. It gave me a chance to
recoup with dignity. When we do speak, the k ey to communication is not
what we say, but rather the attitude that lies behind what
we say. Since ther e is only one mind, all of us ar e
telepathically communicating all the time. Every moment,
we ar e choosing to join or to separate, and the person to
whom we’r


 sense of self from this fact and thereby
keep themselves  imprisoned in a  collective victim identity. If a woman is
still holding on to anger, resentment, or condemnation, she is holding on
to her pain-body. This may giv e her a comforting sense of identity, of
solidarity with other women, but it is keeping her in bondage to  the past
and blocking full access to her essence and true power. If women
exclude themselves from men, that fosters a sense of separation and
therefore a strengthening of the ego. And the stronger the ego, the more
distant you are from your true nature. So do not use the pain-body  to give you an identity. Use it for
enlightenment instead. T ransmute it into consciousness. One of  the best
times fo r this is during menses. I  believe that, in the years to com e, many
women will enter the fully conscious state during that time. Usually, it is
a time of unconsciousness for many women, as they are taken over by
the collective female pain-body. Once you have reached a certain level of
consciousness, however, you ca n reverse this, so instead of becoming
unconscious yo u become mor e  conscious. I have described the basic
process already,  but let me take you through it again, this t ime with
special reference to the collective female pain-body. When yo u know that the menstrual flow is approaching, before  you feel
the first signs o f what is commonly called premenstrual tension, the
awakening of the collective female pain-body, become very alert andinhabit y our bod y as fully as possible. When the first sign appears, you
need to be alert enough to “catch” it before it takes you o ver. For
example, the first sign may be a sudden, strong irritation or a  flash of
anger, or it may be a purely physical symptom. Whatever it is, catch it
before it can take over your thinking or behavior. This simpl y means
putting the spotlight of your attention on it. If it is an emotion, feel the
strong e ner gy c har ge behind it. Know that it is the pain-body. At the
same tim e, be the knowing; that is to say, be aware of your c onscious
presence and feel its power. An y emotion that you take your presence
into wil l quickly subside and become transmuted. If it is a purely
physical symptom, the attention that you give it will preven t it from
turning i nto an emotion or a thought. Then continue to be alert and wait
for the next sign of the pain-body. When it appears, catch it again in the
same way as before. Later, w hen the pain-body has fully awakened from its dormant state,
you may experience considerab le turbulence in your inner sp ace for a
while, p erhaps for several days. Whatever form this takes, stay present. Give it your com plete attention. W atch the turbulence inside you. Know
it is there. Hold the knowing, an d be the knowing. Remember: Do not let
the p ain-body use your mind and take over your thinking. W atch it. Feel
its e ner gy directly, inside your b ody. As you know, full attentio n means
full acceptance. Through sustai ned attention and thus acceptance, there comes
transmutation. The pain-body becomes transformed into radiant
consciousness, j ust as a piece of wood, when placed in or ne ar a fire,
itself is transformed into fire. Menstruation will then become n ot only a
joyful and fulfilling expression  of your womanhood but also a sacred
time of transmut ation, when you give birth to a new consciousness. Y our
true nature then shines forth, both in its female aspect as the Goddess and
in its transcendental aspect as the divine Being that you are beyond male
and female duality. If y our male pa rtner is conscious enough, he can help you with the
practice I have just described by holding the frequency of intense
presence particularly at this time. If he stays present whenever you fall
back into unconscious identification with the pain-body, which can and
will hap pen at first, you will be  able to quickly rejoin him in t hat state. This means that whenever the p ain-body temporarily takes over, whetherduring m enses o r at other times, your partner will not mistake it for who
you are. Even if the pain-body attacks him, as it probably will, he will
not react to it as if it were “you,” withdraw, or put up some kind of
defense. He will hold the spac e of intense presence. Nothing else is
needed for t ransformation. At other times, you will be able to do the
same for him o r help him reclaim consciousness from the mind by
drawing his attention into the here and now whenever he becomes
identified with his thinking. In th is way, a permanent ener gy  field of a pure and high frequency will
arise bet ween y ou. No illusion, no pain, no conflict, nothing that is not
you, a nd nothing that is not love c an survive in it. This represents the
fulfillment of the divine, transpersonal purpose of your relationship. It
becomes a vortex of consciousness that will draw in many others. GIVE UP THE RELA TIONSHIP WITH YOURSELF
When one is fully conscious, would one still have a need for a
r elationship? W o uld a man still feel drawn to a woman? W ould a woman
still feel incomplete without a man? Enlightened or not, you are eith er a man or a woman, so on the level of
your for m identi ty you are not complete. Y ou are one-half of the whole. This incomplete ness is felt as male-female attraction, the pull to ward the
opposite ener gy polarity, no matter how conscious you are. But in that
state of inner connectedness, yo u feel this pull somewhere on the surface
or p eriphery of y our life. Anything that happens to you in that state feels
somewhat like that. The whole world seems like waves or ripples on the
surface o f a vast and deep ocean. Y ou are that ocean and, of co urse, you
are also  a ripple, but a ripple that has realized its true identity as the
ocean, a nd comp ared to that vas tness and depth, the world of waves and
ripples is not all that important.This does not mean that you don’ t relate deeply to other people or to
your partner. In fact, you can relate deeply only  i f you a re cons cious of
Being. Coming from Being, you are able to focus beyond the veil of
form. In  Being,  male and fema le are one. Y our form may continue to
have certain needs, but Being has none. It is already complete and whole. If those needs are met, that is b eautiful, but whether or not they  are met
makes no dif ference to your deep inner state. So it is perfectly possible
for a n e nlightened person, if the need for the male or female polarity is
not met, to feel a sense of lack or incompleteness on the outer level of his
or her being, yet at the same ti me be totally complete, fulfilled, and at
peace within. In the quest for enlightenment, is being gay a help or a hindrance, or
does it not make any differ ence? As you approach adulthood, uncertainty about your sexuality followed
by t he r ealization that you are “ dif ferent” from others may force you to
disidentify from socially conditioned patterns of thought and behavior. This will automatically raise yo ur level of consciousness above that of
the unconscious majority, whose members unquestioningly take on board
all i nherited patterns. In that respect, being gay can be a help. Being an
outsider to some extent, someone who does not “fit in” with others or is
rejected by them for whatever reason, makes life dif ficult, bu t it also
places you at an advantage as far as enlightenment is concerned. It takes
you out of unconsciousness almost by force. On the other han d, if you then develop a sense of identity based  on your
gayness, you have escaped one  trap only to fall into another. Y ou will
play roles and g ames dictated by a mental image you have of yourself as
gay. Y ou  will become unconscio us. Y ou will become unreal. Un derneath
your ego  mask, you will become very unhappy. If this happens to you,
being gay will have become a hindrance. But you always get another
chance, of course. Acute unhappiness can be a great awakener. Is it not true tha t you need to have a good r elationship with you rself and
love you rself befor e you can ha ve a fulfilling r elationship with another
person? If you cannot be at ease with yo urself when you are alone, you will seek
a r elationship to cover up your unease. Y ou can be sure that th e unease
will then  reappear in some othe r form within the relationship, and you
will probably hold your partner responsible for it. All you really need to do is ac cept this moment fully. Y ou ar e then at
ease in the here and now and at ease with yourself. But do you


 to stimulate new tumor growth! The lady of the house said that she
thought that avocados were served at the Mexican Gerson hospital, but
she is wrong. They are not! The problem here is that the patient or
caregiver should not rely on memory or rumor alone but should refer to
the published information authorized by the Gerson Institute. All these items are clearly set down in Dr. Gerson’ s A Cancer Therapy
and several other sources; and avocados are the second item on the
“Forbidden Foods” list. 3. As part of the lunch, we had a very nice vegetable soup. It contained
some zucchini, peas, celery, onions, and a few other vegeta bles. The
patient asked me how I enjoye d the “Hippocrates soup.” I had to state
that the soup we were eating was not Hippocrates soup as Dr. Gerson
describes it in his book. The combination of ingredients that are supposed
to be in that soup are clearly described in A Cancer Therapy  as well as
the Gerson Therapy Handbook  (former ly, the Gerson Therapy Primer ),
and the ingredients listed are very specific. Hippocrates (referred to by the medical profession as “the father of
medicine”) understood that this special combination of ingredie nts in the
soup has a beneficial, detoxifyin g effect on the kidneys. For this reason,
Dr. Gerson had made use of them. He concluded that the soup ingredients
were so important he wanted patients to eat the “special soup” twice
daily to benefit the kidneys and help them clear toxins from the body. Occasionally, one can add extra tomatoes to give the soup a different
flavor; or one can cut up and roast some onions on a dry cookie sheet (no
fat, butter, or oil) in the oven. Then these extras can be added to the same
basic soup recipe for a tasty treat. However, the basic recip e should
remain unchanged. 4. Phillip’ s wife also thoughtfully offered me some enema coffee, which I
gladly accepted. When I picked it up for use, however, I seriously
wondered whether it was the proper strength. I have used enemas for
many years and know pretty well what the coffee should look like. The
solution being provided seemed too weak to be considered “concentrate”
for a usual dilution of 4 to 1. The lady “thought” that she used the recipe
in the Handbook  and that it was right, but again she was wrong. My
suggestion is that the caregiver must be sure each enema contains theequivalent of three rounded tablespoons of coffee (see A Cancer
Therapy, p. 247). If a concentrate is prepared, each portion must  contain
the three tablespoonfuls of coffee. The coffee enema, too, is so very
important that it is imperative the mixture or solution be correct. Please
check and recheck the preparation of the coffee concentrate created for
internal cleansing. 5. Somew hat less important than the above four points is another one. Phillip does enjoy eating some bread with his meals—quite acceptable. But it is also important to understand that the main requirem ents for
nutrition are the salads, soup, potato, vegetables, and fruit. If all those
foods have been consumed, it is all right for the patient to also have one
slice of unsalted rye bread. Even  so, be aware that bread should never be
the main part of a meal. I have discussed Phillip’ s type of problem with the most experienced
Gerson Therapy  medical doctors whom I know. They affirmed that subtle
aspects of patient noncomplian ce cause them difficulties. Aside from the
above, there are other problems we have run across. The Gerson doctors as
well as myself (when I talk to patients) meet some serious obstacles to
healing. When we ask various  patients about their compliance with the
Gerson Therapy directives (such as the above patient who made serious
errors), for instance, they will assure us that they’re doing everything
“perfectly.” Such patients don’t seem to realize what is wrong with their
version of the therapy. Phillip, too, thought he was “perfect.”
When Gerson therapists try to help, heal, and direct patient s on the
Gerson Therapy, we are relying on the various tools that we have specially
created to give patients and families every possible help and guidance: the
food preparation  videotape (Tape III); the recipes in the Handbook;  the
other four-hour, two-part workshop tapes (Tape II) discussing in detail as
much of the treatment as we can; and, most important, Dr. Gerso n’s original
book. At this point, I need to stress again that the patient must familiarize
himself very thoroughly with this material and review it over and over
again. As Sandra  Whitwell pointed out in her suggestions, you always learn
something new when restudying the Gerson Therapy information. One problem area that keeps coming up is the food preparation. Just
boiling the vegetables and putting them on a plate is not good enough. The
Gerson Therapy Video: vol. 3: Food Preparation initiates the cook into
various ways to make foods tasty. For example, cooked beets when peeledand sliced can be reheated a little with some freshly made applesauce and
stirred. The vege table then resembles Harvard beets. Or the sliced beets can
be dressed with onions, some green pepper strips, and vinegar with flaxseed
oil dressing for a beet salad. During the summer months, these salads (also
potato salad, string bean or butter bean salad, etc.) are very welcome,
refreshing, and stimulating to the appetite. There are many suggested recipes in the back of the Gerson Therapy
Handbook  that have unfortunately been disregarded by some patients. As a
result, the Gerson Institute occasionally receives reports from caregivers
that the patients are weak, losin g weight, and doing poorly. Almost always,
it turns out that they have “crav ings” for pizza, enchiladas, or some other
greasy, salty, forbidden food. They are simply hungry because they are not
eating well-prepared healing and nutritious Gerson meals. Gerson meals offer a distinct advantage: if the patient (or family  member
for that matter) eats fresh, organic food, it is truly satisfying. Frequently we
hear further reports that patients ’ companions who participate in the Gerson
program lose their personal cravings for sweets or heavy desserts. But the
key to success is eating tasty food that is prepared with imagination and
inspiration from the recipes provided. I must remind patients frequently that when they are on a nutritional
therapy such as this one, they are on nothing if they don’t eat! If patients eat
properly, most will gain weight  if they are emaciated. Those who are too
heavy will lose weight on the same regimen. Fruits that are in season in the summer, such as cherries, apricots,
peaches, nectarines, plums, pears, and grapes, are especially valuable—they
are high in the best nutrients: vitamins, potassium, and enzym es. Not far
behind are apples, which are available virtually all year round. Patients
(unless they are diabetic or suffer from candidiasis) should always eat much
fruit at night, first thing in the morning, and anytime between meals. Yet one summer food presents a problem: corn. It is perfectly fine to eat
fresh corn. The difficulty arisin g with corn is that nearly everyone loves it
and during the season is likely to eat it to the exclusion of other  vegetables. That is a very bad idea. The vegetables should provide variety and a large
selection of special healing plant chemicals (phytochemicals) and trace
minerals. Eating  mostly one vegetable is not acceptable and does not fulfill
the purpose. Let the guiding spirit of the patient be: “I’ll do the bestpossible to help my sick body heal” rather than “I’ll see how little I can do
and still get away with it.”
References for Chapter T wenty-One
1
Batchelder, T. “Qualitative research on patient experien ces and
implications for long-term care facilities.” Townsend Letter  for Doctors
& Patients  196:56-61, November 1999. 2
Diamond, W.J. ; Cowden, W.L. ; Goldber g, B. An Alternative Medicine
Definitive Guide to Cancer. Tiburon, Calif.: Future Medicine Publishing,
1997, p. 212. 3
Kleinman, A.; Eisenber g, L.; Good, B. “Culture, illness and care: clinical
lessons from anthropologic and cross-cultural research.” Annals of
Internal Medicine  88:251–258, 1978. 4
Margolis, L.W; Meyler, T.S. “What happens in radiation therapy.” In
Everyone’ s Guide to Cancer Therapy: How Cancer Is Diagnosed,
Treated, and Managed Day to Day, rev. 3rd ed. by M. Dollinger, E.H.
Rosenbaum, and G. Cable. Kansas City, Mo. : Andrews McMeel
Publishing, 1997, pp. 49-56. 5
Ibid. 6
Ibid. 7
Stern, J.L. “Ovary.” In Everyone’ s Guide to Cancer Therapy: How
Cancer Is Diagnosed, Treated, and Managed Day to Day,


path to personal maturity, and the universe will move us along whether we
want it to or not. Every relationship, in fact every encounter, gives us the
opportunity as well as the challenge to rise to the perfection we’re capable
of. We can fall into the morass of our ego wounds, but we can also choose
not to. Jesus will help us if we ask him to. How often people abandon one another when the wound is too great and
the forgiveness too weak. And sometimes the consequences are tragic. It’s
often said that love brings up everything unlike itself, the ego never more
activated than when two people’ s hearts are joined. Everything comes up
for review and release, no ground more treacherous at times—or more holy
—than the ground of love. Jesus secures our connection to others because he is our connection to
others. Calling on him is a request for help that rings throughout the
universe and is capable of changing it. Dear Jesus,
Please take into your hands
my relationship with ________. Lift our r elationship to divine right or der. May a wave of for giveness come upon us both, dissolving all walls that would divide us. May
we only see the innocence in ourselves and in each other. Free us of our fears of love, Dear
God. Heal us of our wounds, that we might no longer wound each other. Amen
The only way to feel close to God is if we’re at least willing to grow
closer to people. And obviously  that’s not always easy. Relatin g to another
human being can be like looking in the mirror and starting to attack the
glass. Since on the level of mind there’ s no separation between us, what we
do to others we are doing to ourselves. When we attack anyone, even in ourminds, it is as though we are bringing a sword down on their head, but
actually it is falling on ours. This is from A Course in Miracles :
A jailer is not free, for he is bound together with his prisoner. He must be sure that he does
not escape, and so he spends his time in keeping watch  on him. The bars that limit him become
the world in which his jailer lives, along  with him. And it is on his freedom that the way to
liberty depends for both of them. Therefore, hold no one prisoner. Release instead of bind, for thus are you made free. The
way is simple. Every time you feel a stab of anger, realize you hold a swor d above your head. And it will fall or be averted as you choose to be condemned or free. Thus does each one who
seems to tempt you to be angry represent your savior from the prison house of death. And so you
owe him thanks instead of pain. * (WB-366)
We become willing to see the innocence in others, then, so that we
might no longer  be tempted to attack ourselves. Heaven is an awareness of
our oneness; therefore any thoug ht of lovelessness toward another denies us
the experience of heaven. The peace of heaven is entered two by two. If God created me perfect, then that means He created everyone else
that way as well. God loves you infinitely, yes, but so too He loves
everyone else. It’s difficult for the mortal mind to even grasp the infinitude
of God’s love, and Jesus will help us when we falter. He lifts the mind
above thoughts of separation, transcending fully the thinking of the world,
reminding us how to love another person that we might truly love ourselves. Life’ s relationship lessons are always occurring. There is no
insignificant encounter because  in God’ s eyes there are no insignificant
people. The lesson might be the ethical move we may or may not be
making; the kindness or patien ce we may or may not be showing; the
person who’ s helped us toward  whom we may or may not be showing
gratitude; the person we may be blaming when instead we could forgive. Every relationship is a lesson in learning how to claim, and express, the
love that is who we are. Any time two people join, it will be a holy or an unholy encounter. Either spirit or ego will have its way with us. We’ll either meet soul to soul
or mask to mask. Our spirits are always leaning toward each other, while
our egos are always leaning away. Yet the choice is always ours. If you’re about to meet someone, before
you even walk into the room where they are, the most powerful thing you
can do is to pray for their happiness. Pray to see their innocenc e. Pray that
God use the relationship for purposes of good. Pray that the relationshipblesses both of you, allowing you the opportunity to see each other ’s
innocence. See Jesus with his arms around you both. This directs your mind to the field you wish to inhabit, the realm of love
instead of fear. It sucks the oxygen out of thoughts like “I’m  afraid they
won’ t like me.” For where there is light there cannot be darkness. Where
the mind is attun ed to God, it cannot be attuned to neurotic thought. Jesus is
a method of attunement. He will lift both of you above the illusion of
separation to the field where you are one. Years ago I was invited to a business meeting with some women in New
York. I don’t know what made me such an abject failure at all this that day. I don’t rememb er not meditating that morning, although I do remember I
came to the meeting straight from the airport. The one thing I do know is
that on that day I definitely didn’ t practice what I preach. For whatever reason, I had a negative attitude from the moment I
entered the room. I even said to someone sitting next to me, “God, I hate
meetings like this, don’t you?” And that’s when I started to see what was
happening. I realized that every  woman at the table had a look on her face
somewhere between shock and serious disappointment. Clearly, they had
thought Marianne Williamson wouldn’ t be like this. They thought I would
be... well... nicer. That was severa l years ago, and I still feel a pang of embarr assment
every time I remember it. One thing it did for me, for sure, was to make me
take very seriously how important it is to bless a room before I enter. As we bless others, we are blessing ourselves. The love we’re seeking in
life is love that we ourselves must generate. The love we give will be
returned to us, and the love we withhold will be withheld from us. We
might not see this immediately, but the law is inviolable. Do unto others as
you would have others do unto you because they will. Or someone else will. An idea doesn’ t leave its source and what we put out will be returned to us. Love is always available, but it must be consciously chosen. The ego
very slyly resists this, so obsessed with the love we’re not getting that little
room is left to consider what love we might not be giving. The ego is
outraged at the thought that someone might not be loving us perfectly every
minute of every day. Like a scavenger dog, the ego seeks any scrap of evidence of our
brother ’s guilt. Maybe someone didn’ t fold their laundry correctly! Maybe
they had the audacity to disagree  with us about something! The ego will useanything to separate us from others. If I’m focused on your guilt, then by
definition I’m seeing you as different from me, therefore separa te from me. Thus the separation is fortified. Always vigilant on behalf of its survival,
the ego is the mind of constant judgment. Literally nothing and no one is
ever allowed to be good enough. It’s often only in retrospect that we realize how we blocked love in a
relationship; at the time we were so sure the guilty party was the other
person, then later realized we ourselves were no better. At the time, we just
thought we were setting boundaries! Standing up for ourselves! Refusing to
be codependent! In love we are often blind until it’s too late. For the ego is
our self-hatred often masquerading as self-love. Its insidious dictate in love
is “seek but do not find”* (T -343). All that is why it’s important to pray early, at the beginni ng of a
relationship. And then of course  to pray without ceasing. I’ve noticed that
when I don’t know how to deal with a situation in a loving  way—if it
triggers me or constricts my heart for whatever reason—as long as I pray, as
long as I’m willing to see things differently, Spirit comes rushin g to my aid. “I will come in response to a single unequivocal call”* (T -62). If we’re  willing to embody more love, opportunities as well as
challenges will appear. Whenev er you’re having a difficult moment in a
relationship, stop to ask yourself what you’re thinking about this person
right now that God would not be thinking, and what God would be thinking
about them that you are not. Simply asking the question will summon the
answer. God isn’ t looking at anyone thinking, “Damn, he’ s such a jerk.”
Freud said, “Intelligence will be used in the service of the neuro


Whatever your field of action may be, you should learn the laws of
your subconscious mind. When you know how to apply the powers of
your mind, and when you are expressing yourself fully and giving of
your talents to others, you are on the sure path to true success. If you
are about God’s business, or any part of it, God, by His ve ry nature, is
for you, so who can be against you? With this understanding there is
no power in heaven or on earth to withhold success from you. • How he made his dream come true
A movie actor told me that he had very little education, but he had a
dream as a boy of becoming a successful movie actor. Out in the  field
mowing hay, driving the cows home, or even when milking them he
said, “I would constantly imagine I saw my name in big lights at a
large theatre. I kept this up for years until finally I  ran away from
home. I got extra jobs in the motion-picture field, and the day f inally
came when I saw my name in great, big lights as I did when I was a
boy!” Then he added, “I know the power of sustained imagination to
bring success.”
• His dream pharmacy became a reality
Thirty years ago I knew a young pharmacist who was re-ceiving
forty dollars a week plus commission on sales. “After twenty- five
years,” he said to me, “I will get a pension and re-tire.”
I said to this young man, “Why don’t you own your own store? Get
out of this place. Raise your sights! Have a dream for your children. Maybe your son wants to be a doctor; perhaps your daughter desires to
be a great musician.”
His answer was that he had no money! He began to awaken to t he
fact that whatever he could conceive as true, he could give conception. 121  The first step toward his goal was his awakening to the pow ers of
his subconscious mind, which I briefly elaborated on for his be nefit. His second step was his realization that if he could succeed i n
conveying an idea to his subconscious mind, the latter would
somehow bring it to pass. He began to imagine that he was in his own store. He mentally
arranged the bottles, dispensed prescriptions, and imagined sev eral
clerks in the store waiting on customers. He also visual ized a big bank
balance. Mentally he worked in that imaginary store. Like a good
actor he lived the role. Act as though I am, and I will be. This
pharmacist put himself whole-heartedly into the act, living, mov ing,
and acting on the assump-tion that he owned the store. The sequel was interesting. He was discharged from his position. He
found new employment with a large chain store, became manager, and
later on, district manager. He saved enough money in four years to
provide a down payment on a drugstore of his own. He called it his
“Dream Pharmacy.”
“It was,” he said, “exactly the store I saw in my imagina-ti on.” He
became a recognized success in his chosen field, and was happy doing
what he loved to do. • Using the subconscious mind in business
Some years ago I gave a lecture to a group of businessmen on the
powers of imagination and the subconscious mind. In this lecture I
pointed out how Goethe used his imagination wisely when confronted
with difficulties and predicaments. His biographers point out that he was accustomed to fill ma ny hours
quietly holding imaginary conversations. It is well known that hi s
custom was to imagine one of his friends before him in a chair
answering him in the right way. In other words, if he were concerne d
over any problems, he imagined his friend giving him the right  or
appropriate answer, accompanied with the usual gestures and tonal
qualities of the voice, and he made the entire imaginary scene as real
and as vivid as possible. 122  One of the men present at this lecture was a young stock-broker. He
proceeded to adopt the technique of Goethe. He began to have menta l,
imaginary conversations with a multi-millionaire banker fri end of his
who used to congratulate him on his wise and sound judgment, and
compliment him on his purchase of the right stocks. He used to
dramatize this imaginary conversation until he had psychologica lly
fixed it as a form of belief in his mind. This broker’s inner talking and controlled imagination certain ly
agreed with his aim, which was to make sound invest-ments for hi s
clients. His main purpose in life was to make money for his  clients
and to see them prosper financially by his wise counsel. He i s still
using his subconscious mind in his busi-ness, and he is a brill iant
success in his field of endeavor. • Boy of sixteen years turns failure into success
A young boy who was attending high school said to me, “I am
getting very poor grades. My memory is failing. I do not know what i s
the matter.” I discovered that the only thing wrong with this boy was
his attitude, which was one of indifference (sự lãnh đạm, thờ ơ)  and
resentment (sự oán giận)  toward some of his teachers and fellow
students. I taught him how to use his subconscious mind, and how to
succeed in his studies. He began to affirm certain truths several times a day particularly at
night prior to sleep, and also in the morning after awakening. The se
are the best times to impregnate (làm thấm nhuần)  the subconscious
mind. He affirmed as follows: “I realize that my subconscious mi nd is a
storehouse of memory. It retains (giữ lại)  everything I read and hear
from my teachers. I have a perfect memory, and the infinite (vô tận, vô
hạn) intelligence in my subconscious mind constantly reveals to me
everything I need to know at all my examinations, whether writt en or
oral. I radiate love and good will to all my teachers and fellow
students. I sincerely wish for them success and all good things.”
 123  This young man is now enjoying a greater freedom than he has eve r
known. He is now receiving all “A’s.” He constantly imagines t he
teachers and his mother congratulating him on his success in his
studies. • How to become successful in buying and selling
In buying and selling, remember that your conscious mind is the
starter and your subconscious mind is the motor. You must start the
motor to enable it to perform its work. Your conscious mind is th e
dynamo that awakens the power of your subconscious mind. The first step in conveying your clarified desire, idea, or ima ge to
the deeper mind is to relax, immobilize the attention, get sti ll, and be
quiet. This quiet, relaxed, and peaceful attitude of mind pre vents
extraneous matter and false ideas from inter-fering with your mental
absorption of your ideal. Furthermore, in the quiet, passive, and receptive attitude of mi nd,
effort is reduced to a minimum. The second step is to begin to imagine the reality of that w hich you
desire. For example, you may wish to buy a home, and in your relaxed
state of mind affirm as follows: “The infinite intelligenc e of my
subconscious mind is all-wise. It reveals to me now the ideal  home,
which is central, ideal, is in a lovely environ-ment, meets with all my
requirements, and is commensurate with my income. I am now turning
this request over to my sub-conscious mind, and I know it responds
according to the nature of my request. I release this reques t with
absolute faith and confidence in the same way that a farmer deposits a
seed in the ground, trusting implicitly in the laws of growth.”
The answer to your prayer may come through an advertise-ment in
the paper, through a friend, or you may be guided directly to a
particular home, which is exactly what you are seeking. There are
many ways by which your prayer may be answered. The princip al
knowledge, in which you may place your confidence, is that the
answer always comes, provided you trust the working of your deeper
mind. 124  You may wish to sell a home, land, or any kind of prop-erty. In
private consultation with real estate brokers I have told t hem of the
way I sold my own home on Orlando Avenue in Los Angeles. Many
of them have applied the technique I used with remarkable and sp eedy
results. I placed a sign which read, “For sale by owner” in t he garden
in front of my home. The day after I said to myself as I was going to
sleep, “Supposing you sold your house, what would you do?”
I answered my own question and I said, “I would take that sign
down and throw it into the garage.” In my imagination I took hold of
the sign, pulled it up from the ground, placed it on my shoulder, went
to the garage, threw it on the floor, and said jokingly to the sig n, “I
don’t need you any more!” I felt the inner satisfaction of it a ll,
realizing it was finished. The next day a man gave me a deposit of $1,000


. This is the disease formerly called palsy or paralysis agitans. It is
characterized by involuntary shaking of the hands, arms, feet, and in advanced cases, of the neck and head. One of the needs of human beings, monkeys, and guinea pigs is vitamin C. This
vitamin has to do with the integrity of blood vessels. It has something to do with the
growth and function of bones. It has a good deal to do with the nutrition of teeth
(dentine). Dr. Hanke formerly of the University of Chicago made experiments (Asylum at Moosehart, Ill.) on several hundred orphans in which he showed that tooth decay and
pyorrhea were caused in part, at least, by a deficiency in vitamin C. The work of the
Mellanbys in England showed that vitamin C has to do with the health of the dentine,
and vitamin D has to do with the health of tooth enamel. Further work by the Mellanbys
in London and Hanke in Chicago showed that the cause of tooth decay in children who were not properly nourished was associated with scurvy. "Mouth scurvy" might as well
be used instead of the term "pyorrhea" or "tooth decay." The commonest sources of vitamin C are the citrus fruits--oranges, grapefruit and
lemons. This element does, however, exist in all the raw fruits and vegetables. Bananas
are a good source of vitamin C as are also apples and melons. Since it has a profound
effect on the health of the mouth and the health of the blood vessels, it must be
considered one of the very important needs of those animals which do not manufacture
it in their own bodies. It is probable that in the past all living animals produced their own supply of vitamin C. We now know that birds, dogs, cats, and many other animals
may exist and have good health with no source of vitamin C in the diet. Guinea pigs,
monkeys, and humans have lost this function. They must receive their vitamin C from an outside source. This source must furnish the vitamins in sufficient quantities, or
scurvy and its many associated disease conditions will result. Vitamin C may now be produced synthetically in the laboratory. The dose may be
measured accurately. We know the amounts needed to prevent any possible
manifestation of scurvy. The need for vitamin C is very definite and well-established. Over 150 years ago, its need was recognized by English physicians, and lemon juice
was issued as part of the dietary of the men in the English Navy. This gave them an enormous advantage over the men of other na vies who all suffered more or less from
scurvy. This advantage gave the English Navy a predominant influence in the affairs of
the world and made England the Mistress of the Seas--a proud distinction which she
still holds, and which was made possible by supplying a dietary element which her
enemies did not have. Thus vitamin C, long years before its discovery, changed the
history of the world in a very definite way. Other vitamins are changing the history of the world at the present time in as equally a
definite and positive way. Vitamin D is contained in certain fats. It is usually found in association with vitamin
A as in cod-liver oil. It exists in butter if the cows have been grazing in the summer
sunshine and eating the summer grass. It does not exist in butter during the fall and
winter months. It exists to a certain degree in eggs when the chickens have been exposed to spring and summer sunshine; but does not exist in eggs laid during the
winter months. Our main source of vitamin D is not food,  but exposure to sunshine. It has to do with
the building of bones and with the moving of calcium in the blood stream. Calcium
must exist in a certain concentration in the blood, or nervous symptoms will follow. The
nerves become hyperirritable. The muscles become weak and shaky. Intelligence is lowered by the absence of a sufficient concentration of calcium in the blood. Calcium has to do with the clotting of blood. A person who does not have sufficient
calcium will more easily bleed to death. Nature makes a very great effort to maintain the normal calcium concentration in the blood. This effort is so pronounced that in order to
keep the concentration up to near what it should be, it will rob bones and teeth for this
purpose. This explains the thin, eggshell-like bones in many middle-aged and old
persons, who have existed on a calcium deficient diet over a period of years. It explains
also the increase in tooth decay during pregnancy, for Nature always robs the mother to feed the child. Not only does the parasitic new individual called the fetus rob the mother
of calcium, but the fetus also robs the mother of iron, and other valuable elements. Undoubtedly Nature's plan is to disregard the older life in an effort to do the best
possible for the new individual coming into the world. Vitamin D must be considered one of the very great needs, but a sufficient recognition
of this need has not been apparent until, very recent times. The newer generation of
babies being born at the present time are being dosed with cod-liver oil and other fish
oils so that their supply of vitamin D will be better from year to year from now on. Experiments with rats have shown that a vitamin D deficiency not only produces crooked bones, but a relative lack of normal intelligence. This seems to be borne out in
human experience, and in the schools the children with rachitic heads, the deformed
chests of rickets and the crooked legs, bowlegs, and knock-knees due to lack of vitamin D, are less intelligent than children of the same age who have good, strong, straight
bones and do not have the rachitic head or chest. The supplying of vitamin D by cod-liver oil and other fish oils is the makeshift way of
solving the problem. All the needs of the individual for vitamin D could be very well
met by exposure to sunshine. Some kind of a regime must be worked out in future years
to allow more exposure, especially of children, to sunshine, as this is the physiological
way to get vitamin D, and undoubtedly gives a better clinical result than our present dependency on fish oils. One of the objections to fish oil is that, along with the vitamin
A and D, there also exists certain toxic subs tances. These substances are not harmful in
the ordinary dose as taken, but when the human dose is given to a rat or other small
animal, the toxic effects become quite apparent. The crooked bones which result from a lack of vitamin D in childhood have the effect
of distorting the pelvis. This becomes a serious matter in the case of females, for it
increases the hazards of childbirth. Most of the need for instruments in obstetrical
deliveries, and most of the necessity for doing Cesarian operations are the result of
deformed pelves produced by lack of vitamin D during the girl's growing years. Rickets has been exceedingly common in al l the northern parts of the United States,
the percentage of school children suffering from this disease running as high as 70 to 80
per cent. As stated, there is hope that in the future this percentage will be materially cut down. But it shows that one of our greatest dietary needs (if a vitamin coming from the
sun may be called a dietary need) is vitamin D. The vitamin exists in fish-liver oil,
because it has been stored up by the fish in the liver for future needs. The same vitamin
D which appears in cod-liver oil may have gone through the livers of hundreds of
smaller fish or smaller forms of life, and originated in the algae floating on the surface
of the water. The sun acting on these algae has produced the vitamin D.
   The need for vitamin E in the human diet has been recognized for only a few years. It
has a specific effect on the voluntary muscles of the body, ordinarily called the red
muscle. The muscular tissue of the human body amounts to at least 50 per cent of all the
body weight. The health of this relatively huge mass of living tissue can not be
disregarded, even though the person is not using his muscles in manual labor. Some of the most important work in connection with vitamin E has been done by Dr.
Sergius Morgulis, of the University of Nebraska. He has shown that vitamin E is
necessary to prevent muscular degeneration. He has been able to produce artificial
muscle dystrophy in experimental animals by lessening the intake of vitamin E in the
diet. Even after the muscles have been almost completely shriveled up and replaced by
scar tissue, a good functioning muscle may be built up again in the same animal by
supplying vitamin E.
   Apparently the lack of a sufficient amount of vitamin E in human nutrition accounts
for a good deal. of muscle weakness as well as muscle atrophy in the human animal. Different degrees of weakness down to actual  paralysis may occur, These results have
been checked and found correct by workers in other universities. However, in the
University of Copenhagen it has been found that voluntary muscles weaken and shrink in the absence of vitamin E, and also that certain nerve centers in the spinal cord are
weakened, and in severe E deficiencies completely killed, by depriving the animal of this vitamin over a sufficient period of time. Healthy nerve centers in the spinal cord are necessary in order for voluntary muscles
to function property. Muscle shrinking in vitamin E deficiencies may be due primarily to the effect of the deficiency on the spinal centers, and the muscle effects may be
secondary in nature. Another need for vitamin E is much


 at a furious pace and with
powerful eﬀects everywhere in your body, is coordinated by
the brain, which uses the pituitary gland to guide many of
the hormonal signals just described, not to mention various
other chemical signals that go racing down your neurons to
focus your eyes, prick up your ears, jerk your back muscles
upright, and swivel your head in alarm. To make this whole react ion happen and then to make it
go away again (for the body, unlike a man-made drug,
knows how to reverse every one of these processes just as
neatly as it began), the same key-in-the-lock mechanism is
employed everywhere. It is all so deceptively simple, yet if
you attempt to duplicate this event with a drug, the results
are nowhere near as precise, orderly, and beautifully
orchestrated. In fact, they are chaotic. Injecting adrenaline,
insulin, or glucose separa tely into the body gives it a crude
jolt. The chemicals immediately ﬂood all the receptor sites
without coordination from the brain. Instead of talking to
the body, they assault it with single-minded insistence. Even though the chem ical make-up of adrenaline is
identical no matter where it is derived, the critical
ingredient of intelligence must be present; other wise, the
drug’s action is a mockery of the real thing. Here is a related example to show the complicated
results of giving a drug that seems simple. Hypertension
patients are generally told to bring down their elevated
blood pressure with diuretics—drugs that take water from
the cells and pass it out of the system through urination. This is exactly what the kidneys do all the time as they
delicately monitor your blood chemistry to make sure that
the balance of water, waste products, and the necessary
salts, or electrolytes, is precisely maintained. A diuretic,
however, has only one idea in mind, and obsessed with that
one idea, it careens through the body, demanding, “Water! Water!” from every cell it meets.The result is that the ﬂuid tension in the blood vessels is
reduced, which is what the doctor wants to happen, but the
water level everywhere else is aﬀected at the same time. The brain may be forced to give up some of its water, which
under normal conditions it does only in the direst
emergency, causing the patient to feel dizzy and drowsy. In
many cases nothing more  serious happens, but sometimes
other brain functions may also then be thrown oﬀ,
especially in older patients: if they happen to drink alcohol,
even in moderation, these people can become so confused
that they forget to drink  enough water or to eat properly. This can lead to malnutrition combined with severe
dehydration. In the view of some endocrinologists, the
dehydration induced by diuretics in the presence of alcohol
or tranquilizers is the leading cause of death among older
Americans. All of these consequences, whether mild or severe, are
usually called the undesirable “side eﬀects” of diuretics,
but that is not an accurate name. They are just its eﬀects—
the good and bad ones necessarily come together in the
same package. A diuretic basically work s by latching onto
sodium atoms, causing the body to discard excess  salt, and
this in turn indirectly brings down the water level in the
tissues, since  water is bound up with salt in our bodies, just
as in sea water. The diuretic cannot help it if too much salt
is taken where water is still needed. Since potassium is
close to sodium in its atomic structure, the diuretic also
causes it to be depleted, leading to weakness, fatigue, and
leg cramps. (Less-adverse eﬀects are generally noticed by
the leaching  of other trace elements, such as zinc and
magnesium.) Besides these common signs of potassium
deﬁciency, there can be other complications—digitalis, the
drug commonly given to heart patients to strengthen their
weak heartbeat, becomes more toxic if the body is low on
potassium. Ironically, a potassium deﬁciency is nowsuspected to be a causal link in high blood pressure, which
means that the diuretic may be promoting the very
condition it was meant to cure. The frustrating reality, as far as medical researchers are
concerned, is that we already know that the living body is
the best pharmacy ever devised. It produces diuretics,
painkillers, tranquilizers, sleeping pills, antibiotics, and
indeed everything manufactured by the drug companies,
but it makes them much, much better. The dosage is always
right and given on time; side eﬀects are minimal or
nonexistent; and the directions for using the drug are
included in the drug itself, as part of its built-in
intelligence. —
Thinking about these well-known facts has led me to three
conclusions. First, that intelligence is present everywhere
in our bodies. Second, that our own inner intelligence is far
superior to any we can try to substitute from the outside. Third, that intelligence is more important than the actual
matter of the body, since without it, that matter would be
undirected, formless, and chaotic. Intelligence makes the
diﬀerence between a house designed by an architect and a
pile of bricks. For the moment, let’s keep our deﬁnition of the word
intelligence  as simple and practica l as possible. Rather
than referring to the intelligence of a genius, which may
seem both exalted and abstract, I deﬁne it simply as “know-
how.” There is no doubt, whatever you think about
intelligence in the abstract, that the body must be credited
with an immense fund of know-how. The body’s inner intelligence is so powerful that when it
goes awry, the physician is faced with a truly formidable
antagonist. Every cell in the body is programmed by itsDNA, for example, to divide at a certain rate, producing
two new cells after the mother cell splits in half. Like
everything else regulated by our inner intelligence, this
process is not purely mechanical. A cell divides in response
to its own internal need combined with signals generated
from the cells around it, the brain, the faraway organs that
are “talking” to it via chemical messages. Cell division is a
carefully considered and well-thought-out decision—except
in the case of cancer. Cancer is wild, anti-social behavior, whereby a single cell
reproduces itself without check, heeding no signals from
anywhere except, apparently, its own demented DNA. Why
this occurs, no one know s. It is a good bet that the body
itself knows how to reverse the process, but for some
reason, equally unknow n to science, it doesn’t always
succeed. It is only a matter of time, once the process
begins, before the cancer cells overwhelm a vital organ,
crowd out its normal cells, and cause death. When the ﬁnal
crisis comes, the cancer  cells perish with the rest of the
body, doomed by their ungoverned appetite for self-
expansion. Medicine has so far not ﬁgured out a way to send a
message to the cancer cells in time to ward oﬀ the tragic
fate they have created. The chemicals a physician might
use against cancer are not at all eﬀective on the level of
intelligence. Cancer is endowed with mad genius, while
drugs are simple-minded. So the oncologist resort s to a
much cruder assault, a form of poisoning. The anti-cancer
drug that is administere d is generally toxic to the entire
body, but because cancer cells are growing at a much
faster rate than normal cells, they ingest more of the
poison and die oﬀ ﬁrst. The whole strategy is a calculated
risk. The patient must be fortunate; his physician must be
extremely knowledgeable about the dosage and timing of
the chemotherapy, both of which are absolutely vital. Thenthe cancer may be defea ted, adding years of useful life to
the patient’s existence. Ironically, the therapy may fail because it strips the body
of the very intelligence that usually guards it from  disease. Many anti-cancer drugs are extremely damaging to the
body’s immune system; they directly suppress the bone
marrow, which manufa ctures our white cells, with
devastating eﬀect on the white-cell count in the blood. As
the course of chemotherapy continues, the patient  becomes
more and more susceptib le to new forms of cancer, and in a
certain numb er of cases—as high as 30 percent for breast
cancer—new cancer appears and the patient dies. Moreover, it is sometimes not statistically possible to kill
every malign ant cell. It has been estimated that a typical
cancer patient may have 10 billion cancer cells. If his
chemotherapy is 99.99 percent eﬀective, there would still
be 1 million survivors, more than enough to start over
again. Cancer cells are not created equal; some are hardier than
others and therefore more diﬀicult to kill. It may be that
destroying the weaker cells acts as a kind of Darwinian
selection, leaving the ﬁttest to survive. In that case,
chem


direct advantage of this. I drew  bliss as a circle to
represent a constant, unbroken signal. However, there can
be breaks in the circle. These occur when the DNA, the
mind, and the body are not perfectly synchronized. Ayurveda would say that many diseases begin where there
is such a break—bliss slips out of its groove, so to speak,
throwing oﬀ the cell’s intelligence. To repair the break, a
speciﬁc signal needs to be inserted back into the circle—a
primordial sound. In this way, a vibration is used to cure a
vibration. —
Treating disease with a mental sound is highly unusual, I
know. To understand it, we need to make a closer
connection between bliss and the quantum ﬁeld. By the1970s, the world’s atom smashers had been busy for forty
years, and now there were hundreds of “hadrons,” a class
of subatomic particles that were proliferating far too
abundantly to be conside red elementary by any standard. Didn’t the universe have simpler building blocks than this. The way out of the dilemma was found by theorizing that
all of these particles were variations not on a smaller
particle but on an underlying wave form. This wave form was dubbed a “superstring,” because it
behaves very much like a violin string. The superstring
theory holds that billions upon billions of unseen strings
pervade the universe, and their diﬀerent frequencies give
rise to all the matter and energy in creation. Certain
vibrations also turn into time and space—the preﬁx super
indicates that these strings actually reside far beyond our
limited four-dimensional reality. No one will ever see them,
no matter how powerful our instruments become. To clarify what a superstring is, physicist Michio Kaku
gives an analogy to music: imagine that a violin is enclosed
out of sight in a box. As its strings vibrate, diﬀerent
pitches, chords, sequences of notes, and timbres are
produced. If you were an alien who did not know what
music is, you would ﬁnd each of these things completely
diﬀerent from one another—the note C might be like a
hydrogen atom, while E-ﬂat was a photon. Only by opening
the box and seeing that indeed every sound came from one
violin would you be convinced that they had a uniﬁed
source. In the same way, nature’s fundamental ﬁeld is constantly
vibrating and producing variations upon the same “notes,”
but our senses are set up so that they turn this sameness
into diﬀerences. We perceive iron as a solid note, hydrogen
as a gaseous note, gravit y as a heavy note, and so on. Only
by exposing the superstrings would the underlying unity be
evident. They are exposed not by opening the box but bymathematical formulas that show that all forms of matter
and energy ﬁt the super-s tring model—as so far they all do. Therefore, quantum physics now has its ﬁrst good
candidate for a uniﬁed ﬁeld theory, justifying Einstein’s
faith in the order of the cosmos. Amazingly enough, the Vedic rishis also perceived that
the cosmos was pervaded by strings. These strings were
called sutras,  from which surgeons get the word suture. In
Sanskrit, sutra can mean  a stitch (or suture), but also a
thread or a verbal phrase. If you think of a sutra as a
thread, then the whole universe is woven like gossamer
from threads of intelligence, billions and billions of them. Like notes played on the unseen violin, the fundamental
level of the whole world, according to the Vedic rishis, is
made of sounds. Because they arise before anything else,
they are primordial—hence the term primordial sound. It takes more than one sound to make the universe. However, the rishis did have just one sound to begin with, a
vibration called Om, which appeared at the time we would
call the Big Bang. Om is a meaningless syllable—it simply
stands for the ﬁrst wave that breaks the cosmic silence. As
it breaks up into many tinier waves, Om subdivides into
diﬀerent subfrequencies  that compose the matter and
energy in our universe. Once you open your mind to the possibility, it is no more
surprising that stars, galaxies, and human beings can be
created from Om than from a superstring. Both are
abstract. Going back to the hidden violin, Kaku wrote, “The
tones create d by the vibrating string, such as C or B-ﬂat,
are not in themselves any more fundamental than any other
notes. What is fundamental, however, is the fact that a
single concept, vibrating strings, can explain the laws of
harmony”—or in the case of the universe, the laws of
nature. Om can be pictured as a straight line whose pitch rises
into inﬁnity, like the most super of superstrings. It is no
accident that the syllable Om sounds like the English
“hum”; when the rishis  tuned in to the sound of the
universe, they actually heard it as a cosmic hum. If you
were enlight ened, you would be able to hear the vibration
that is your own signatu re; for instance, you could “hear”
your DNA as a speciﬁc frequency vibrating in your
awareness. Likewise, each neuropeptide would grow out of
a sound, as would every other chemical. Starting with DNA, the whole body unfolds into many
levels, and at each one the sutra, or sequence of sound,
comes ﬁrst. Therefore, putting a primordial sound back into
the body is like remindin g it of what station it should be
tuned in to. On that basis, Ayurveda does not treat the body
as a lump of matter but as a web of sutras. —
Needless to say, it has taken me some time to explain all of
this to myself. When I ﬁrst began to administer the
Ayurvedic programs at the inpatient facility in Lancaster, I
kept one foot ﬁrmly planted in my private endocrinology
practice—although I felt in tune with Ayurvedic theory, I
was still nervous about its results. Every week I shuttled
back and forth from my oﬀice to the clinic. One October
day I walked into the dining hall and noticed one of the
cancer patients, a middle-aged man who was sitting quietly
in the corner, eating lunch with his wife. He had cancer of
the pancreas, a fatal condition that is also extremely
painful. When he had come in the door ﬁve days earlier, his
face was gray and creased after months of suﬀering. I
walked over now to say a few words. As I approac hed, he
casually looked up at me. It was one of those moments that
stops the heart. His face looked peaceful and relaxed; his
eyes were unmistakably touched with bliss. I asked himhow he felt. He said that he had no pain at all; after four
days of Ayurvedic treatment, he had taken hims elf oﬀ all
his pain medication. A few days later he left, and until the
time he died, he remained largely free of drugs. This is not yet a cure, but it is a huge step towa rd one. Consciousness would be curing people today, I am
convinced, except that we diagnose disease too late, after
years of stress have hardened the physiology and made it
diﬀicult for bliss to penet rate. But the gate is always open,
even if only by a crack. All the Ayurvedic healing
techniques operate on the premise that one treats the
patient ﬁrst, the disease second. The prospect of becoming a well person again, as
opposed to ﬁghting against a disorder known to be
incurable, gives hope to people who otherwise have
nothing to hold on to but grim statistics. One AIDS patient
in Germany has been treated with Ayurveda for two years
as part of a pilot program  conducted in Europe. Diagnosed
in 1984, he is still alive at the time of this writing in August
1988 (80 percent of AIDS  patients die within two years of
diagnosis); he leads a normal life and is without overt
symptoms. A similar program is under way in California, treating
AIDS patients under clinical observation to see if both the
latent and active phases  of the disease can be aﬀected. Both groups are small, and the subjects know that
Ayurveda is not promising a cure, but the supervising
physicians feel that they are seeing improvements,
particularly in the patients’ ability to withstand the
debilitating fatigue that saps the strength and will of AIDS
patients. Just to extend the latency period, giving a patient more
years before the disease produces symptoms, would be a
major breakthrough. However, I met one patient, not
connected with the clinic, who seems to have done betterthan that. A musician from Los Angeles in his early forties
came to be taught the bliss technique two years ago; I did
not see him again until this year,