 or things you put on a potato, we wouldn't even eat it. We did use potato buds in our home occasionally for thickening of gravy, it was used very sparingly.
We most often used eggplant to thicken the gravy. We put egg-
plant in small containers in the freezer, and when we needed to thick-en the soup we would use the eggplant.
We ate our high carbohydrates for breakfast. We had the biggest
meal in the middle of the day. Even when the children were in school they took their big meal in the middle of the day.
We gave them breadless lunches. Only one day in the week were
they given bread in their lunches. At night we would have soups, and maybe a slice of tomato, a piece of toast, a cup of herb tea, or yogurt. Mostly plain, homemade yogurt.   60 CHAPTER 7
CAUSE OF DISEASES

The first day that anyone, after the age of 18 to 20 fails to take in
as much reserve energy as they burn up in regular energy.
this is the first day of illness. This first day of illness is caused by
mineral deficiency.
Parents should pay very dose attention to children's complaints. One little boy was sent to me by a medical doctor, crying because
of a stomachache. The boy was in the first grade in school. He had cried and cried for months about his stomachache.
The doctors couldn't find a thing wrong with his stomach. When the child was brought to me he was in the zone for a fatal
heart attack. It was his heart hurting him and not his stomach.
He was having chest pains and he thought it was his stomach. When given a diet to correct this condition there was no more
problem.
One of the sad things about America is that over 16,000 children
drop dead on the school grounds every year because the proteins and the foods they are eating are too rich for their bodies.
It builds up to the point that it puts the body chemistry in a zone
for a heart attack.
A heart attack just doesn't jump upon anyone. An electrocardio-
gram (EKG) does not tell you if you are going to have a heart attack. It only tells if you have had one. A pectoris heart attack is caused by
the diet being too rich for the child, and a child cannot digest the pro-teins. The undigested proteins turn  to urea and it causes the child's
cells to be exchanged too rapidly.
The child is not drinking a suffici ent amount of water to wash out
the excess urea solids and it causes the heart to beat too hard.
In a stethoscope it sounds like a drum, it is beating so hard. Because the heart beats so hard so long until it gets so tired it takes
a rest. More children die with cardiac arrest than a heart attack. It is very difficult for the doctors to find out why the child died. We don't 61 know how many children get to a hospital and die, and how many get
home and die later because of cardiac arrest. All of this can be pre-
vented by the RBTI tests that I have developed.
Ninety-five percent of the crib deaths could be prevented because
many times the proteins in the mother's breast milk are too high for the child and his little heart beats too hard- and the heart just stops, and the mother finds the baby dead in the crib.
I have tested many babies under the supervision of doctors and
found that they were all in the zone for a fatal heart attack. This can all be prevented. But it has to be handled through the dietary. process of ionization. At the present the doctors do not have any of these tests available to them, unless they have taken the seminars that we teach for those in the healing arts.
On adults tests have been made that indicated that they were in the
zone for a fatal heart attack. We had one case in which we told the man he was in the zone for a fatal heart attack and asked him to drink four ounces of water every half hour for eight hours while lying down and doing absolutely nothing and then return for another test. He made all manner of fun of us and said he wasn't even sick. This test was made between nine and ten o'cloc k in the morning by a medical doc-
tor. At five o'clock that afternoon his wife called saying he was pro-nounced dead on arrival at the hospital.
We have made tests and predicted heart attacks anywhere from 30
days to six months and missed it by just a matter of hours. We pre-
dicted one three years away and missed it by less than three weeks. That was when the man would do nothing about it. Energy can be measured and we can know when it is going to drop below what we call the PNR line-the point of no return-and once it drops below that
line it is just a matter of hours, or even minutes, until death will take over.
There is only one cause of death, and that is old age. It doesn't
matter if a baby is born dead, or if it lives to be 150.
Old age is nothing more than that the body does not have enough
energy to maintain life. In mathematical terms this is all death is. You can bring it on early, or you can delay it. 62 There are also some factors that are very important in diet.
At age 20 it takes x amount of reserve energy divided by time to
make a cell in the body if there is reserve energy behind it. At age 40, if the reserve energy is still 100 it takes two times the amount of re-serve energy divided by time to make the same cello At age 60 if it is still at 100 it takes three times the amount of reserve energy divided by time to make the same cello At age 80 it takes four times the amount of reserve energy divided by time to make the same cello So aging is how long it takes nature to make a cell, and how much re-serve energy it takes.
I find people who are 60 years old and only use 1½ amount of re-
serve energy, or 2, or maybe only three times the amount of reserve energy. I found one 80-year-old who used two times the amount of re-serve energy. He was like a 40-year-old man.
The process of aging can be delayed by an intelligent diet, proper
exercise, and proper thinking. Diet has more to do with thoughts than thoughts do with dieting because the weaker one is, the more difficult it is to think intelligently, the more incapable one is of deciding what is good and what is bad for them.
The weaker one becomes the less thoughts they have about facts. This is in agreement with the Bible because in it we read: "Faith
without works is dead." People who are sick have less faith than those who are well, because they can't work. The healthier you are the greater the possibility for faith or self-confidence, and the greater your works. It is very important to relate the Scriptures throughout the en-tire Bible to diet.
Can you imagine Jesus getting up in the morning with a bad cold
and sneezing all over heaven, or have the lumbago, or arthritis in the joints? We are created in His image. He is in perfect health and He wants us to be in perfect health also. And we must be if we are to be like Him someday, as Adam was in the Garden of Eden before the fall.
It is very easy to stay healthy. But if you get sick you really have
to work at it. You have to break all the rules. You have to use your stomach for a garbage can. You have to work like a machine, never 63 stop and never rest. You have to have hate in your heart. You have to
break the Golden Rule. You have to really make a jackass out of your-
self.
Three years ago I bought a very good set of medical books. I paid
$800 for my daughter to use them in helping me teach the seminars in the RBTI. This would help her to know something about the names of diseases and problems of people. After reading the first book she said, "Daddy, all it tells you in here is how to name the disease. They don't tell you what to do for it."
"Honey, I know that," I said, "then you have to look in the PDR
(Physician's Desk Reference) in order to find out what to do for the disease."
Today the drug manufacturers tell the medical doctors what to do
for the disease. All the doctor has to do is to name it, and it is his hide if he doesn't do what the PDR says to do.
Naming the disease doesn't cure anything. Diseases are caused by
mineral deficiencies, and no drug will cure anything. For example, the swine flu epidemic was predicted three years ago by the drug manu-facturers. Consequently, the swine flu vaccine was completed, never tried or tested by HEW, or the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and it was given to many, many people. It killed some, crippled oth-ers. Yet laetrile has been invented now for I 5 years or more, and it is being condemned by the FDA because they didn't think of it, and any-thing they don't think of isn't any good. They never tested it, neither
has the American Cancer Society done anything about it. I have had two definite cases wherein laetrile was recommended by medical doc-tors and given under their supervision, wherein I had the privilege of doing the tests


 the half of it.
That would be hell.
Exactly. Yet you are not condemned to it.
You are not relegated to it forevermore. All
that it takes to get out of hell —to get out of
not knowing —is to know again.
There are many ways a nd many places
(dimensions) in which you can do this.
You are in one of those dimensions now. It
is called, in your understanding, the third
dimension.
And there are many more?  Have I not told you that in My Kingdom
there are many mansions? I would not
have told it to you were it not so.
Then there is no hell —not really. I mean,
there is no place or dimension to which we
are everlastingly condemned!
What would be the purpose of that?
Yet you are always limited by your
knowingness —for you —we—are a self-
created  being.
You cannot be what you do not know your
Self to be.
That is why you have been given this life —
so that you might know yourself in your  own
experience. Then you can conceive of
yourself as Who You Really Are, and  create
yourself as that i n your experience —and
the circle is again complete...only  bigger.  And so, you are in the process of growing —
or, as I have put it throughout this book,  of
becoming.
There is no limit to what you can become.
You mean, I can even become —dare I say
it?—a God...just like You?
What do you think?
I don’t know.
Until you do, you cannot. Remember the
triangle —the Holy Trinity: spirit - mind -body.
Conceive -create -experience. Remember,
using your symbology:
HOLY SPIRIT = INSPIRATION =
CONCEIVE
FATHER = PARENTING = CREA TE SON =
OFFSPRING = EXPERIENCE  The Son experiences the creation of the
fathering thought, which is conceived of by
the Holy Ghost.
Can you conceive of yourself as one day
being a God?
In my wildest moments.
Good, for I tell you this: You are already a
God. You simply do not know it.
Have I not said, “Ye are Gods”?
  Chapter 14
There now. I have explained it all for you.
Life. How it works. Its very reason and
purpose. How else can I serve you?
There’s nothing more I could ask. I am filled
with thanks for this incredible dialogue. It’s
been so far -reaching, so encompassing.
And, as I look at my original questions, I
see we’ve covered the first five —having to
do with life and relationships, money and
careers, and health. I had more questions
on that orig inal list, as you know, but
somehow these discussions make those
questions seem irrelevant.
Yes. Still, you’ve asked them. Let’s just
quickly answer the remainder of them, one
by one. Now that we’re moving this rapidly
through the material — —What material? —
The material I brought you here to expose
you to —now that we’re moving this  rapidly
though the material, let’s just take those
remaining questions and deal with  them
quickly.
6. What is the karmic lesson I’m supposed
to be learning here? What am  I trying to
master?
You are learning nothing here. You have
nothing to learn. You have only to
remember. That is, re -member Me.
What are you trying to master? You are
trying to master mastering itself.
7. Is there such a thing as reincarnation?
How many p ast lives have I had? What was
I in them? Is “karmic debt” a reality?  It is difficult to believe there is still a
question about this. I find it hard to imagine.
There have been so many reports from
thoroughly reliable sources of past life
experiences. Som e of these people have
brought back strikingly detailed
descriptions of events, and such
completely verifiable data as to eliminate
any possibility that they were making it up
or had contrived to somehow deceive
researchers and loved ones.
You have had 647  past lives, since you
insist on being exact. This is your 648th.
You were everything in them. A king, a
queen, a serf. A teacher, a student, a
master. A male, a female. A warrior, a
pacifist. A hero, a coward. A killer, a savior.
A sage, a fool. You have been all of it!  No, there is no such thing as karmic debt —
not in the sense that you mean in this
question. A debt is something that must or
should be repaid.
You are not obligated to do anything.
Still, there are certain things that you want
to do; choose to experience. And some of
these choices hinge on —the desire for
them has been created by —what you have
experienced before.
That is as close as words can come to this
thing you call karma.
If karma is the innate desire to be better, to
be bigger, to evolve  and to grow, and to
look at past events and experiences as a
measure of that, then, yes, karma does
exist.  But it does not require anything. Nothing is
ever required. You are, as always you  have
ever been, a being of free choice.
8. I sometimes feel very psychic. Is there
such a thing as being psychic? Am I that?
Are people who claim to be psychic
“trafficking with the devil”?
Yes, there is such a thing as being psychic.
You are that. Everyone is that. There is  not
a person who does not have what you call
psychic ability, there are only people  who
do not use it.
Using psychic ability is nothing more than
using your sixth sense.
Obviously, this is not “trafficking with the
devil,” or I would not have given this sense
to you. And, of course, there is no devil  with
whom to traffic. Someday —perhaps in  Book Two —I’ll explain to you exactly how
psychic energy and psychic ability works.
There is going to be a Book Two?
Yes. But let’s finish this one first.
9. Is it okay to take money for doing good?
If I choose to d o healing work in the world —
God’s work —can I do that and become
financially abundant, too? Or are the two
mutually exclusive?
I’ve already covered this.
10. Is sex okay? C’mon —what is the real
story behind this human experience? Is sex
purely for procreati on, as some religions
say? Is true holiness and enlightenment
achieved through denial —or
transmutation —of the sexual energy? Is it
okay to have sex without love? Is just the physical sensation of it okay enough as a
reason?
Of course sex is “okay.” Again, if I didn’t
want you to play certain games, I wouldn’t
have given you the toys. Do you give your
children things you don’t want them to  play
with?
Play with sex. Play with it! It’s wonderful
fun. Why, it’s just about the most fun you
can have with your body, if you’re talking of
strictly physical experiences alone.
But for goodness sake, don’t destroy
sexual innocence and pleasure and the
purity  of the fun, the joy, by misusing sex.
Don’t use it for power, or hidden purpose;
for ego gratification or domi nation; for any
purpose other than the purest joy and the
highest ecstasy, given and shared —which is love, and love recreated —which is new
life! Have I not chosen a delicious way to
make more of you?
With regard to denial, I have dealt with that
before. No thing holy has ever been
achieved through denial. Yet desires
change as even larger realities are
glimpsed. It  is not unusual, therefore, for
people to simply desire less, or even no,
sexual activity —or, for that matter, any of a
number of activities of th e body. For some,
the activities of the soul become
foremost —and by far the more
pleasurable.
Each to his own, without judgment —that is
the motto.  The end of your question is answered this
way: You don’t need to have a reason for
anything. Just be cause.
Be the cause of your experience.
Remember, experience produces concept
of Self, conception produces creation,
creation produces experience.
You want to experience yourself as a
person who has sex without love?
Go ahead! You’ll do that until you don’ t
want to anymore. And the only thing that
will—that could ever —cause you to stop
this, or any, behavior, is your newly
emerging  thought about Who You Are.
It’s as simple —and as complex —as that.
11. Why did You make sex so good, so
spectacular, so powerful  a human


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5DMSO in Basic
Microbiology
DMSO IN BACTERIAL INFECTIONS
Era of antimicrobials
Microbiology is the study of bacteria, fungi, parasites, and viruses; these are
 microorganisms that are too small to be seen with the naked eye. Microorganisms
that are harmful to human health are referred to as pathogens, that is, organisms that
are capable of causing disease. Most bacteria, however, are not pathogens, and it has been estimated that nonpathogenic or harmless bacteria make up over 70% of all bacteria. It is also estimated that about 100 trillion mostly benign bacteria—called normal flora—are found symbiotically in the human body, primarily in the oral mucosa, intestines, and surface of the skin. Bacterial cells consequently outnumber human cells by a factor of 10 to 1. Normal flora in the body has created the recently discovered human microbiome, an ecosystem that has been linked not only to the digestion of food but also to obesity, depression, asthma, Crohn’s disease, and even cancer.
1
Pathogenic bacteria are the cause of minor and deadly illnesses. Pathogens can
be broken down into three groups consisting of cocci, bacilli, and spirilla. Cocci are subdivided into three groups, streptococci, diplococci, and staphylococci and are responsible for producing pus and causing boils and


2167
CT,GP,NT,PM
Wauchula
Alfred S. Massam, M.D.
(P)
528 West Main Street
Wauchula, FL 33873
(813) 773-6668
CT,FP,PM
Winter Park
James M. Parsons, M.D.
(D/C)
Great Western Bank Building
#303 2699 Lee Road
Winter Park, FL 32789
(407) 628-3399
A,CT,MM,NT,PO,RHU
Robert Rogers, M.D.
(P)
Suite 204
1865 North Semoran Boulevard
Winter Park, FL 32792
(407) 679-2811
A,CD,CT,NT,PM
GEORGIA
Atlanta
Stephen B. Edelson, M.D.
(P)
3833 Roswell Road
Atlanta, GA 30342
(404) 841-0088
A,CT,FP,NT,OME,PM,YS
David Epstein, D.O.
(P)
Suite 100
427 Moreland AvenueAtlanta, GA 30307
(404) 525-7333
BA,CT,GP,NT,OSM,PM
Milton Fried, M.D.
(DIPL)
4426 Tilly Mill Road
Atlanta, GA 30360
(404) 451-4857
A,CT,IM,NT,PM,PO
Bernard Mlaver, M.D.
(DIPL)
4480 North Shallowford Road
Atlanta, GA 30338
(404) 395-1600
CT,NT,PM
Camilla
Oliver L. Gunter, M.D.
(DIPL)
24 North Ellis Street
Camilla, GA 31730
(912) 336-7343
CT,DD,DIA,GP,NT,PU
Decatur
Naima ABD Elghany, M.D.
(P)
3455H North Druid Hill Road
Decatur, GA 30033
(404) 639-3385
A,CD,IM,PH,PM,PUD
Warner Robins
Terril J. Schneider, M.D.
(P)
Suite 19
205 Dental Drive
Warner Robins, GA 31088
(912) 929-1027
A,CT,FP,NT,PM,PMRHAWAII
Kailua-Kona
Clifton Arrington, M.D.
(P)
PO Box 649
Kealakekua, HI 96750
(808) 322-9400
BA,CT,FP,NT,PM
IDAHO
Coeur d’Alene
Charles T. McGee, M.D.
(P)
Suite 108
1717 Lincolnway
Coeur d’Alene, ID 83814
(208) 664-1478
A,CT,NT,OME,PM
Nampa
John O. Boxall, M.D.
(P)
824 - 17th Avenue South
Nampa, ID 83651
(208) 466-3517
AC,CT,GP,HYP
Stephen Thornburgh, D.O.
(P)
824 - 17th Avenue South
Nampa, ID 83651
(208) 466-3517
AC,CT,HOM,OS
Sandpoint
K. Peter McCallum, M.D.
(DIPL)
2500 Selle Road
Sandpoint, ID 83864
(208) 263-5456CT,NT,MM,OME,PM
ILLINOIS
Arlington Heights
Terrill K. Haws, D.O.
(D/C)
Suite 111
121 South Wilke Road
Arlington Heights, IL 60005
(708) 577-9451
CT,DD,FP,GP,OSM
William J. Mauer, D.O., F.A.C.A.M.
(DIPL)
3401 North Kennicott Avenue
Arlington Heights, IL 60004
(800) 255-7030
FAX (708) 255-7700
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Aurora
Thomas Hesselink, M.D.
(D/C)
Suite 1735
888 South Edgelawn Drive
Aurora, IL 60506
(708) 844-0011
FAX (708) 844-0500
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Belvidere
M. Paul Dommers, M.D.
(P)
554 South Main Street
Belvidere, IL 61008
(815) 544-3112
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Chicago
Razvan Rentea, M.D.
(P)3354 North Paulina
Chicago, IL 60657
(312) 549-0101
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Downers Grove
Guillermo Justiniano, M.D.
(P)
1430 Parrish Court
Downers Grove, IL 60515
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(No Referrals)
Geneva
Richard E. Hrdlicka, M.D.
(D/C)
Suite 206
302 Randall Road
Geneva, IL 60134
(708) 232-1900
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Glen Ellyn
Robert S. Waters, M.D.
(DIPL)
739 Roosevelt Road
Glen Ellyn, IL 60137
(708) 790-8100
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Homewood
Frederick Weiss, M.D.
3207 West 184th Street
Homewood, IL 60430
(No Referrals)
Metamora
Stephen K. Elsasser, D.O., F.A.C.A.M.
(DIPL)
205 South Engelwood
Metamora, IL 61548(309) 367-2321
FAX (309) 367-2324
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Moline
Terry W. Love, D.O.
(DIPL)
2610 - 41st Street
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Oak Park
Paul J. Dunn, M.D.
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715 Lake Street
Oak Park, IL 60301
(708) 383-3800
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Ottawa
Terry W. Love, D.O.
(DIPL)
645 West Main
Ottawa, IL 61350
(815) 434-1977
AR,CT,GP,OSM,PM,RHU
Woodstock
John R. Tambone, M.D.
(P)
102 East South Street
Woodstock, IL 60098
(815) 338-2345
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Zion
Peter Senatore, D.O.
(P)
1911 - 27th Street
Zion, IL 60099
(708) 872-8722CT,FP,GP
INDIANA
Clarksville
George Wolverton, M.D.
(DIPL)
647 Eastern Boulevard
Clarksville, IN 47130
(812) 282-4309
CD,CT,FP,GYN,PD,PM
Evansville
Harold T. Sparks, D.O.
(D/C)
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Evansville, IN 47714
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Highland
Cal Streeter, D.O.
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FAX (219) 924-9079
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Indianapolis
David A. Darbro, M.D.
(DIPL)
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Indianapolis, IN 46227
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Mooresville
Norman E. Whitney, D.O.
(P)
PO Box 173
Mooresville, IN 46158(317) 831-3352
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South Bend
David E. Turfler, D.O.
(P)
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South Bend, IN 46616
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Myrna D. Trowbridge, D.O.
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IOWA
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Beverly Rosenfeld, D.O.
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Des Moines, IA 50322
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Sioux City, IA 51105
(712) 252-4386
Neurology,S
KANSAS


y you, at least not for long.

When you give more attention to the doing than to t he future result that you want to
achieve through it, you break the old egoic conditi oning. Your doing then becomes
not only a great deal more effective, but infinitel y more fulfilling and joyful.

***

Almost every ego contains at least an element of wh at we might call “victim
identity.” Some people have such a strong victim im age of themselves that it
becomes the central core of their ego. Resentment a nd grievances form an essential
part of their sense of self.

Even if your grievances are completely “justified,”  you have constructed an
identity for yourself that is much like a prison wh ose bars are made of thought
forms. See what you are doing to yourself, or rathe r what your mind is doing to
you. Feel the emotional attachment you have to your  victim story and become aware of the compulsion to think or talk about it. Be there as the witnessing
presence of your inner state. You don’t have to do anything. With the awareness
comes transformation and freedom.

***

Complaining and reactivity are favorite mind patter ns through which the ego
strengthens itself. For many people, a large part o f their mental-emotional activity
consists of complaining and reacting against this o r that. By doing this, you make
others or a situation “wrong” and yourself “right.”  Through being “right,” you feel
superior, and through feeling superior, you strengt hen your sense of self. In reality,
of course, you are only strengthening the illusion of ego.

Can you observe those patterns within yourself and recognize the complaining
voice in your head for what it is?

***

The egoic sense of self needs conflict because its sense of a separate identity gets
strengthened in fighting against this or that, and in demonstrating that this is “me”
and that is not “me."

Not infrequently, tribes, nations, and religions de rive a strengthened sense of
collective identity from having enemies. Who would the “believer” be without the
“unbeliever?"

***

In your dealings with people, can you detect subtle  feelings of either superiority or
inferiority toward them? You are looking at the ego, which lives through
comparison.

Envy is a by-product of the ego, which feels dimini shed if something good happens
to someone else, or someone has more, knows more, o r can do more than you. The
ego’s identity depends on comparison and feeds on m ore. It will grasp at anything.
If all else fails, you can strengthen your fictitio us sense of self through seeing
yourself as more unfairly treated by life or more i ll than someone else. What are the
stories, the fictions from which you derive your se nse of self?

***
 Built into the very structure of the egoic self is a need to oppose, resist, and exclude
to maintain the sense of separateness on which its continued survival depends. So
there is “me” against the “other,” “us” against “th em."

The ego needs to be in conflict with something or s omeone. That explains why you
are looking for peace and joy and love but cannot t olerate them for very long. You
say you want happiness but are addicted to your unh appiness.

Your unhappiness ultimately arises not from the cir cumstances of your life but
from the conditioning of your mind.

***

Do you carry feelings of guilt about something you did–or failed to do–in the past?
This much is certain: you acted according to your l evel of consciousness or rather
unconsciousness at that time. If you had been more aware, more conscious, you
would have acted differently.

Guilt is another attempt by the ego to create an id entity, a sense of self. To the ego,
it doesn’t matter whether that self is positive or negative. What you did or failed to
do was a manifestation of unconsciousness–human unc onsciousness. The ego,
however, personalizes it and says, “I did that,” an d so you carry a mental image of
yourself as “bad."

Throughout history humans have inflicted countless violent, cruel, and hurtful acts
on each other, and continue to do so. Are they all to be condemned; are they all
guilty? Or are those acts simply expressions of unc onsciousness, an evolutionary
stage that we are now growing out of?

Jesus’ words, “Forgive them for they know not what they do,” also apply to
yourself.

***

If you set egoic goals for the purpose of freeing y ourself, enhancing yourself or
your sense of importance, even if you achieve them,  they will not satisfy you.

Set goals, but know that the arriving is not all th at important. When anything arises
out of presence, it means this moment is not a mean s to an end: the doing is
fulfilling in itself every moment. You are no longe r reducing the Now to a means to
an end, which is the egoic consciousness.
***

"No self, no problem,” said the Buddhist master whe n asked to explain the deeper
meaning of Buddhism.

Chapter 4
The Now

On the surface it seems that the present moment is only one of many, many
moments. Each day of your life appears to consist o f thousands of moments where
different things happen. Yet if you look more deepl y, is there not only one moment,
ever?  Is life ever not this moment? This one momen t, now, is the only thing you
can never escape from. The one constant factor in y our life. No matter what
happens. No matter how much your life changes. One thing is certain. Its always
now. Since there is no escape from the now, why not  welcome it, become friendly
with it.

***

When you make friends with the present moment, you feel at home no matter
where you are. When you don't feel at home in the n ow, no matter where you go,
you will carry unease with you.

***

The present moment is as it is, always. Can you let  it be?

***

The division of life into past, present and future is mind made, and, ultimately,
illusory.

The past and future are thought forms, mental abstr actions. The past can only be
remembered Now. What you remember is an event that took place in the Now and
you remember it Now. The future, when it comes, is the Now. So the only thing
that is real, the only thing that ever is, is the N ow.
***

To have your attention in the Now is not a denial o f what is needed in your life. It
is recognizing what is primary. Then you can deal w ith what is secondary with
great ease. It is not saying, “I’m not dealing with  things anymore because there is
only the Now.” No. Find what is primary first, and make the Now into your friend,
not your enemy. Acknowledge it, honor it. When the Now is the foundation and
primary focus of your life, then your life unfolds with ease.

***

Putting away the dishes, drawing up a business stra tegy, planning a trip–what is
more important: the doing or the result that you wa nt to achieve through the doing?
This moment or some future moment?

Do you treat this moment as if it were an obstacle to be overcome? Do you feel you
have a future moment to get to that is more importa nt?

Almost everyone lives like this most of the time. S ince the future never arrives,
except as the present, it is a dysfunctional way to  live. It generates a constant
undercurrent of unease, tension, and discontent. It  does not honor life, which is
Now and never not Now.

***

Feel the aliveness within your body. That anchors y ou in the Now.

***

Ultimately you are not taking responsibility for li fe until you take responsibility for
this moment–Now. This is because Now is the only pl ace where life can be found.

Taking responsibility for this moment means not to oppose internally the
“suchness” of Now, not to argue with what is. It me ans to be in alignment with life.

The Now is as it is because it cannot be otherwise.  What Buddhists have always
known, physicists now confirm: there are no isolate d things or events. Underneath
the surface appearance, all things are interconnect ed, are part of the totality of the
cosmos that has brought about the form that this mo ment takes.
 When you say “yes” to what is, you become aligned w ith the power and
intelligence of Life itself. Only then can you beco me an agent for positive change
in the world.

***

A simple but radical spiritual practice is to accep t whatever arises in the Now–
within and without.

***

When your attention moves into the Now, there is an  alertness. It is as if you were
waking up from a dream, the dream of thought, the d ream of past and future. Such
clarity, such simplicity. No room for problem makin g. Just this moment as it is.

***

The moment you enter the Now with your attention, y ou realize that life is sacred


to 3 ft (1 m), hoodia has multiple spiny, grey-green stems and light purple flowers.
Habitat & Cultivation Native to the Kalahari
desert, hoodia is now extensively cultivated in Namibia and South Africa. The plant is grown from seed or cuttings. Trade in the hoodia plant is legally restricted due to its threatened survival in the wild.Barley has been
eaten since  Neolithic times.Hippophae rhamnoides
(Elaeagnaceae)
Sea Buckthorn
Description Thorny deciduous shrub growing to
16 ft (5 m). Has narrow silvery leaves, male or female
flowers, and clusters of brownish-orange berries.
Habitat & Cultivation Native to Europe and
Asia, sea buckthorn grows mainly in sandy coastal areas and in dry riverbeds in mountainous regions. The berries are harvested in the autumn.
US_202-223_Digitalis_lutea_Iris_versicolor.indd   220 26/02/16   12:47 pm221 other medicinal plantsHyoscyamus niger
History & Folklore The Cherokee used
hydrangea as a remedy for kidney and bladder
stones. The 19th-century Physiomedicalist
herbal movement used a formula comprising
hydrangea, couch grass ( Agropyron repens, p. 162),
and hollyhock ( Althaea rosea ) to treat serious
kidney disorders, including nephritis.
Medicinal Actions & Uses Western
herbal medicine considers the diuretic
hydrangea as being particularly helpful in
the treatment of kidney and bladder stones.
It is thought both to encourage the expulsion
of stones and to help dissolve those that
remain. The herb is given for many other
troubles affecting the genitourinary system,
including cystitis, urethritis, enlarged prostate,
and prostatitis.
Cautions Do not take during pregnancy or
while breastfeeding. Wild hydrangea is best taken
on professional advice.
Hygrophila spinosa
(Acanthaceae)
Gokulakanta
Description Thorny, red-stemmed annual
growing to 2 ft (60 cm). Has bright blue flowers
and small, flat, dark red seeds.
Habitat & Cultivation Native to India,
gokulakanta is now widely distributed throughout
tropical regions. It is gathered when in flower.
Parts Used Aerial parts, root.
Constituents Gokulakanta contains mucilage,
fixed and volatile oils, and an alkaloid.
Medicinal Actions & Uses Commonly used
as a remedy in India, gokulakanta is taken chiefly
for its reputed aphrodisiac properties. Both the
aerial parts and ash of the burned plant are strongly
diuretic, and are used to flush water from the body
in cases of excess fluid retention.
Related Species The South American
H. guayensis  is bactericidal and has been used as a
local treatment for the tropical disease, leishmaniasis. History & Folklore Barley has been
consumed for many thousands of years.
Dioscorides (1st century ce) recommended
it “to weaken and restrain all sharp and subtle
humours, and sore and ulcerated throats.”
Medicinal Actions & Uses An excellent
food for convalescence in the form of porridge
or barley water, barley is soothing to the throat
and provides easily assimilated nutrients. It can
also be taken to clear mucus. Its demulcent quality
soothes inflammation of the gut and urinary tract.
Barley aids in the digestion of milk and is given to
babies to prevent the development of curds within
the stomach. It is commonly given to children
suffering from minor infections or diarrhea, and it
is particularly recommended as a treatment for
feverish states. Made into a poultice, barley is an
effective remedy for soothing and reducing
inflammation in sores and swellings.
Research The fiber in barley, like that in oats,
has an established action in reducing fat absorption
from the gut, aiding lower cholesterol levels. In
common with other fiber foods, it may also help
to stabilize blood sugar levels and to prevent
bowel cancer.therapeutic use in parts of Europe, including
England, and in North America. The leaves and
flowers are picked just after the plant has
flowered, in the first year for the annual variety
and in the second year for the biennial.
Parts Used Leaves, flowering tops.
Constituents Henbane contains 0.045–0.14%
tropane alkaloids, especially hyoscyamine and
hyoscine, and flavonoids. Hyoscyamine and hyoscine
are common to other members of the Solanaceae
family, but henbane’s relatively high hyoscine content
gives it a more specifically sedative action than its
relatives thornapple ( Datura stramonium, p. 200)
and deadly nightshade ( Atropa belladonna, p. 69).
History & Folklore Henbane has been used
as a medicinal herb for thousands of years.
Babylonian accounts and the Egyptian Ebers papyrus
(c. 1500 bce) record that henbane was smoked to
relieve toothache. In Greek myth, the dead were
adorned with henbane when they arrived in Hades.
Writing in the 1st century ce, Dioscorides
recommended henbane for insomnia, coughs,
congestion, heavy menstrual bleeding, eye pain,
gout, and as a general pain reliever, and advised
that the herb should be used within a year as it
deteriorates quickly. In the Middle Ages, henbane
had the Latin name dentaria, denoting its use as a
remedy against toothache. Henbane reputedly
produces a sensation of lightness, as though one
were flying, and it was one of the chief
components of witches’ “flying ointments.”Hydrangea arborescens
(Hydrangeaceae)
Wild Hydrangea
Description Woody-stemmed deciduous shrub
growing to a height of about 10 ft (3 m). Has oval
leaves and clusters of small, creamy-white flowers.
Habitat & Cultivation Native to the eastern
U.S. from New Y ork to Florida, wild hydrangea
grows in woodlands and on riverbanks. The root
is dug up in autumn.
Part Used Root.
Constituents Hydrangea is thought to contain
flavonoids, a cyanogenic glycoside (hydrangein),
saponins, and a volatile oil.
Wild hydrangea  is used to treat kidney and bladder stones.Hyoscyamus niger (Solanaceae)
Henbane
Description Annual or biennial herb growing
to 3 ft (1 m). Has delicate, slightly lobed leaves
and bell-shaped flowers, pale yellow in color
with fine purple veining.
Habitat & Cultivation Native to western
Asia and southern Europe, henbane is now
found across much of western and
central Europe, and North and
South America. It is cultivated for Henbane has distinctive
yellow flowers veined with
purple. The plant was
used in classical times
as a general painkiller.
US_202-223_Digitalis_lutea_Iris_versicolor.indd   221 17/03/16   4:01 pm
222Hyssopus officinalisother medicinal plantsMedicinal Actions & Uses Henbane is
used extensively in herbal medicine as a sedative
and painkiller. Its specific use is for pain affecting  the urinary tract, especially pain due to kidney stones, though it is also given for abdominal cramping. Its sedative and antispasmodic effect makes it a valuable treatment for the symptoms  of Parkinson’s disease, relieving tremor and rigidity during the early stages of the illness. Henbane  has also been used to treat asthma and bronchitis, usually as a “burning powder” or in the form  of a cigarette. Applied externally as an oil, it can relieve painful conditions such as neuralgia, sciatica, and rheumatism. Henbane reduces mucus secretions, as well as saliva and other digestive juices. Like its cousin deadly nightshade, it dilates  the pupils. Hyoscine is commonly employed as  a pre-operative anesthetic and in motion  sickness formulations.
Related Species Other Hyoscyamus species
are used in a similar way. The North African  H. muticus is traditionally smoked by Bedouins  to relieve toothache. See also deadly nightshade (Atropa belladonna, p. 69).
 RQ Cautions Use only under professional
supervision. Potentially toxic in overdose,
henbane is subject to legal restrictions in
some countries.
Hyssopus officinalis (Lamiaceae)
Hyssop
Description Semi-evergreen shrub growing
to 2 ft (60 cm). Has narrow leaves and clusters  of blue double-lipped flowers.
Habitat & Cultivation Native to southern
Europe, hyssop grows freely in Mediterranean countries, especially in the Balkans and Turkey.  wood fire, ground, and then stored in sacks for  a year before being sold.
Parts Used Leaves.
Constituents Maté contains xanthine
derivatives, including about 1.5% caffeine, about 0.2% theobrom


 believed, by some, that emotional stresses may be the cause of this
chemistry change. Once the
 membrane collapses, so the theory runs, the stomach juice certainly
acts on the tissues and extends the ulcer, often eating through the wall of the stomach or duodenum
(perforation) with fatal results.
It is significant in this connection that this digestion that is assumed to be certain is an
exceedingly slow process, often requiring years for its climax.
Yet this self-digestion does not occur in the healthy stomach, no matter how much acid may be
secreted. Hydrochloric acid is a normal secretion of the glands of the stomach, a necessity in the
digestion of protein foods. To believe that it is disease-building is not rational. An excess of acid
secretion due to some evanescent cause may give rise to discomfort and distress, but there will be
no digestion of the lining membrane of the stomach. There may be a flow of the contents of the
stomach back into the gullet, resulting in the symptom commonly called “heart burn,” but this will
not result in any damage to the membrane.
Long-continued suffering with heart burn (most often seen in those who overeat on sugars and
syrups and those who wrongly combine their foods, and who drink liquids with meals) may result
in sufficient irritation of the lining of the esophagus and stomach to cause inflammation, but up to
this point, at least, there will be no digestion of the walls of the gullet and stomach. The acids of
decomposition, resulting from overeating and imprudent eating, are the acids that complicate
gastric and duodenal ulcer.
Experimentally, fresh tissue from other parts of the body, when sutured to the gastric wall, is not
digested and this suggests that the walls of the digestive tube are not digested by the gastric juice.
But I think that an even stronger reason to doubt the role of the digestive juice in producing peptic
ulcer is the fact that ulcers develop in many other part of the body—the nose, sinuses, mouth,
tongue, throat, colon, bladder, womb, cervix, vagina, gall bladder and upon the surface of the
body, as in varicose ulcer— without the digestive action of the gastric secretion.
There is in ulcers, in each of these other locations, a preliminary and persistent inflammation
with hardening and a subsequent breakdown of tissue. The evaluation of ulcer of the esophagus,
stomach and duodenum out of chronic irritation and inflammation and hardening seems to be as
certain as its evolution out of these pre-ulcer states in other locations.
The history of cases of gastric and duodenal ulcer reveals that very early in life, the patient had
developed gastro-intestinal irritation and inflammation. The mode of living and eating that resulted
in the irritation continued, added to, intensified, and the recurring discomforts were palliated with
drugs, until the patient passes through the already indicated stages of pathological evolution—
irritation, inflammation, a gradual thickening of the mucous and sub-mucous tissues (hardening),
and, then, ulceration.
The increasing hardening chokes arterial circulation, cutting off oxygen and the food supply, so
that the tissues break down, giving rise to an open sore or ulcer.
Cancer may be the final ending in this evolution. It is one of the endings of a chain of symptoms
starting with irritation, and passing through inflammation, thickening and swelling (hardening or
induration), ulceration (ulcer formation), and fungation (cancer).
98The same chain of causes and effects may precede both endings or cancer may evolve out of the
ulcer. It should be understood that both of these diseases—ulcer and cancer—represent end-points
in a process of pathological evolution that had simple beginnings and became more complex as it
developed. This is the reason why the search for a specific cause for cancer has been so
disappointing.
All of the cancer-producing (carcinogenic) agents so far discovered are causative in only a
certain percentage of cases—in those in whom the ground has already been prepared for cancer
development.
Ulcer, like cancer, is an ending in a chain of symptoms that begins far back of the evolution of
the ulcer itself. Repeated stomach crises (gastritis) end in ulcer. The ulcer develops after scores of
gastric crises that have occurred frequently in infancy, childhood, youth, and maturity. Ulcer is
classed as an organic disease, which means that abnormal changes have taken place in the structure
of the wall of the organ affected.
Organic changes follow in the wake of vascular (artery and vein) degeneration and hardening.
Indurations (hardenings) wait upon circulatory changes, particularly asphyxiation of the tissues.
Ulceration may be said to be an active degeneration from cell apoplexy; cancer is passive
degeneration from cell asphyxiation. The beginning of both these forms of disease is irritation. All
chronic forms of inflammation begin as irritation and are followed by ulceration and, if the
location favors stasis (stoppage of the blood flow), induration and cancer will follow.
The major links in this chain of pathological evolution are enervation, intoxication, irritation,
inflammation, induration, ulceration and fungation. That last is cancer. Should cancer be the only
unknown element in this pathological composite?
Concomitant with the gastric ulcer is a chronic state of excessive acidity of the stomach, a
condition known as
gastric hyperacidity.
 The common belief is that the excess stomach acid is a
purely local condition.
It is not recognized that this hyperacidity is symptomatic of the systemic condition of the
sufferer. This is the reason that treatment is only local; whereas, if it were recognized that the local
state is but a phase of a constitutional state, a more rational and more successful plan of care could
be instituted.
If the gastric irritation and inflammation continue, and they will if toxemia is not eliminated and
its causes removed, the inflammation will extend to the gall duct and gall bladder and even into the
liver itself. Or it may extend up the pancreatic duct into the pancreas. As the patient’s mode of
living is not corrected and the systemic condition back of the irritation
and inflammation is
increased and intensified, the disease spreads from membrane to membrane and new diseases
develop.
Feeding the ulcer patient is a difficult problem. Not only is there a greatly impaired ability to
digest food, but there is the irritation of the ulcerated surface that is occasioned by so many
different foods.
What a life one leads when reduced to the necessity of conforming to the requirements of a
capricious stomach! In peptic ulcer, due to the secretion of too much acid, it is customary to feed
small, frequent meals of bland foods. These are intended to use up the acid and to reduce, as much
as possible, the mechanical irritation of the ulcer.
But feeding the patient every three to four hours, sometimes oftener, and even at night, means
that the patient is continually overeating. The very feeding program causes the excess secretion to
be continued and helps to perpetuate the same condition it is intended to palliate. Using food as a
99palliative is certainly not a correct dietary procedure.
There are many different diets that are prescribed for ulcer patients and there are various plans
of treatment. Each has its own advocates, but the results of each plan of care and feeding are far
from satisfactory, for the reason that they ignore cause. Milk diets, cream diets, sippy diets, bland
diets, frequent small meals, and similar feeding programs are all intended to palliate symptoms.
These diets cause less immediate irritation of the ulcerated surface, but they remove no cause,
hence health is not restored. This is not a valid plan of feeding and it defeats its own purpose by
adding to the systematic impairment that is back to the ulcer.
Drugs are also used to palliate symptoms—drugs to relieve pain, tranquilizers for depression,
drugs to “coat the stomach.” antacids to counteract the acidity. Other drugs employed in ulcer
cases are intended only to provide short periods of relief from symptoms. They remove no cause,
hence they restore no health. Even the latest method of freezing the glands of the stomach is but a
palliative measure. It makes a digestive cripple out of the patient, but removes none of the causes
of peptic ulcer.
Operations for peptic ulcer continue to be performed. And they are still very unsatisfactory. The
wall of the stomach in gastric ulcer is pretty generally irritated and inflamed. In this broad field of
inflammation the ulcer develops at the most inflamed point. This means that the part in which the
greatest pathological change has occurred must ulcerate. Removing the ulcer does not remove the
field of inflammation. Another point of the inflamed surface breaks down and another ulcer results.
This simply means that removal of an ulcer leaves the field open for the evolution of another
ulcer and recurrence is the rule. Recurrence is due to the fact that the cause of the ulcer is
untouched by the operation. Indeed, if the stomach is removed, and the cause untouched, trouble
will evolve elsewhere out of the same causes. Surgery does not and cannot restore
health. It is a
means of palliating symptoms and rarely anything more. Anemia is a frequent aftermath of removal
of large sections of the stomach.
Gastroenterostomy (formation of a connection or communication between the stomach and the
small intestine, thus by-passing the pylorus) is


 increased by the art ofarrangement. There is no way of judging whateach sort of relish is : It may be fish, fowl,vegetable, tuber, side-meat, or a combination ofnuts or fruits, as far as the intelligence of theuninitiated goes.
There were several members of the party offoreigners of different degrees of prejudice
against anything strange in appearance. To one,all of the comestibles were " utterly impossible,"and remained so to the end; while to otherscuriosity got the better of suspicion, and finallythe appetites looked forward to dinner-timewith especial cordiality, for the rice-mountainrelish-cordon and the complicated combinationwere digested with ease.
The standard dish, however, of the Javan
dinner is boiled potatoes and beefsteakswimming in a pint of good butter gravy, so thateven the conscientious dietist with vegetarianpreferences may revel in something that smacksof home and mother, with such an abundance ofluscious fruits that nothing but gustatorydelight happens as a usual thing. Still, it is thesame in Java or Japan, in London, Paris,Berlin, Vienna, Rome or New York, thedigestion of food is under the control of the headand therefore may be called head digestion.
PROFESSOR  FISHER 'S EXPERIMENT.
The most important large experiment for the
testing of head digestion under conditions ofHORACE  FLETCHEK  IN HIS MASTER  OF ARTS ROBES.
THE AUTHOR  ON HIS SIXTIETH  BIRTHDAY, PERFORMING  FEATS OF
AGILITY
AND STRENGTH  WHICH  WOULID  BE REMARKABLE, EVEN IN A YOUNG
ATLETE.
strict scientific control was that inaugurated
and conducted by Professor Irving Fisher, ofYale University, in America.
Professor Fisher occupies the Chair of
Political Economy at Yale, has made extensiveresearches into the factors that influence theeconomies or extravagances of living, and isPresident of the Committee of One Hundred ofthe American Association for the Advancementof Science on Health.
Professor Fisher's interest in my revelations
and tests relative to the potency of headdigestion came primarily from a personal testwhich worked wonders for him in establishing afoundation for good health. He was notesatisfied with the later Chittenden experiments,because they substituted academic prescriptionfor natural selection in formulating the rules ofthe inquiry. Like myself, in conducting theoriginal researches, Professor Fisher realizedthat the practical value of my discoveries wasthat no one needed a biological chemist to orderhis meals for him or tell his appetite what hisbody needed in the way of food elements.
The Fisher experiment worked with nine
healthy undergraduates who were ambitious totake high scholastic honours, and who had little
time for athletics or any form of physicalexercise, they being types of the averageUniversity undergraduate.
A generous table was supplied them with
meat and every variety of food that usuallycomposed college fare. The only instructionswere that thorough mastication and especialattention to the enjoyment of the food asrecommended by me in my books should befaithfully performed. This course was pursuedfor half a year, and for the rest of the year, inaddition to the careful head treatment andenjoyment, preference was to be given to foodsknown to be low in nitrogen content; but not tothe extent of suppressing any distinct call ofappetite for them.
In the first half of the experiment the men
held their own on about 40 per cent. less food,computed by cost, and increased their strength-endurance ability by something more than 100per cent., with the added felicity of feelingunusually fit all of the time, entirely escapingthe slack or sick spells they had beenaccustomed to, and improving greatly in theirgeneral studentability, that is: power of
concentration, memory, mental comfort,profundity of sleep, etc.
During the second half of the experiment still
more improvement was secured owing to thereadiness of the body to accommodate itself tothe wish by favouring the economies.
I have not a copy of the report at hand. It is
included in the publications of Yale Universityabout 1905.
While all of the abundance of confirmatory
evidence which has accumulated since 1898 isvaluable and gratifying, the verdict of theunremitting observation since then is that theproblem of nutrition is always a personal one.After fifteen years of devotion to the study ofthe head-end question, with due attention to thetell-tale excreta and the product expressed interms of energy and general comfort, I amunable to predict what my body is going to wantto-morrow in the way of nutrition supply. I cansay with some confidence that if I go on doing asI have been accustomed to doing daily, and noshock of grief or surprise intervenes to upset allcalculations, I am likely to find nutritivesatisfaction as expressed by appetite among the
foods that are commonly agreeable to me.
If I am compelled or impelled to do a great
stunt of walking or other unusual exertion, orreceive crushing news, all my presentpredictions may be useless. The body itself,from the hair on the head to each finger or toe-nail will know what it wants and will havegiven to the caterer Appetite its requisitioncovering the need. In the meantime each braincell and all of the bones have not beenneglectful of their sustenance requirements, norhave they been backward in letting Appetiteknow.
It is fortunate that the common needs of
digestion may be supplied from a limited rangeof food varieties. Milk is all-sufficient always forgeneral supply of the nutritive requisites. In theplebeian potato, which has attained to royalrank as the result of the extensive experimentsof Dr. Hindhede,* of Denmark, in co-operationwith Madsen the Faithful, has been found full
* Dr. Hindhede, Protein and Nutrition: an Investigation.
London, 1913, Ewart, Seymour & Co., Ltd., Burleigh Street,
W.C.nourishment for ten months, at least, when
supplemented by butter or margarine to furnishthe fuel supply. Even in this surprisingrevelation no academic prescription wasinfallible. Potatoes differ in nutritive value asmuch as 50 per cent. Fresh-cooked and well-cooked ones alone fill the bill of sufficiency, andfull head-work in assuring easy digestion wasmade the first rule of the test. For four months Iserved as a check test-subject and speak fromexperience.
Nothing is ever accomplished except by a
division of labour and on the just division ofresponsibility depends the success of effort.
Nature has given to us the head-end of
responsibility.CHAPTER IX
QUESTION PRESCRIPTION AND
PROSCRIPTION
The Protein Enthusiast—Doubting Thomases
THE only completely accurate prescriber of
nutrition for living creatures is Mother Natureherself, and if she does not prescribe anything
by the undoubted approval of appetite sheproscribes it.
One of the rules which have governed my
quest for optimum human nutrition in themidst of the twentieth century food supply andother conditions, has always been to go toNature for final advice in the matter.
When I say " Question Prescription and
Proscription " I mean that the most positiveprescribers of food have something in the foodline or advice to sell, and they proscribe aspositively anything that competes with theircommercial product.
My eyes were opened to this possible snareand delusion by a great doctor of medicine,*
who is also one of the most ardent economists Ihave ever met—not a miser in any sense, but areligiously philosophical economist. He isalmost as righteously indignant against anywho use the trust which is placed in them byclients or patients for the selling of high-pricedfoods as he is at the makers, advertisers,retailers and prescribers of alcohol as abeverage. In his just opinion it is as wicked, oralmost as wicked, to advise unprofitableextravagance of any sort as it is to prescribepoison.
To this discriminating philosopher food is the
basis of health-wealth, and sacred to its divineusefulness.
The great harm that was done to the world by
the academic prescription of excessive proteinrations
 † was that it started a vicious circle of
extravagances which led as surely to untimelydeath as murder. The perpetrators of thispernicious prescription were innocent ofintention to do harm ; in fact, they were full of
* Dr. M. Hindhede: Copenhagen, Denmark.
† Voit, Atwater, etc.the most generous of motives in issuing their
poisonous advice, and one of the mostprominent, at least, paid the penalty by dyingmiserably of his own fatal ignorance.
I may also say that it is " presumption,"
advisably, for almost all prescriptions of foodwhich do not have their basis on the naturalbody calls are presumptuous. Nature knows! Ifgiven a chance to show her knowledge Natureprescribes rightly and delivers her message inthe form of appetite and the other instincts. Shewill do this in the midst of the most complicatedof artificial food mixtures, as I have reason to
know from personal experience, confirmed by
many others over and over again.
Therefore, I may say more surely than ever,
that whatever
NATURE  PROVIDES  and PERMITS  as
NOURISHMENT  I HAVE  NO RIGHT  TO PRO SCRIBE.
THE ONLY PRE SCRIPTION
that Honesty approves is the Optimum
Economic Nutrition; and my


es
tive system with healthy microbial flora. It is known that bottle-fed babies
develop completely different gut flora to the breast-fed babies. That flora
later on predisposes bottle-fed babies to asthma, eczema, different other
allergies and other health problems. We all know that breast is the best!
However, most things that are floating in a mother's blood will be in her
breast milk. A mother with abnormal gut flora would have a whole host of toxic substances, which are produced by pathogenic microbes in her gut
andmaldigested foods absorbed into her bloodstream. These toxins will be
excreted in her breast milk and fed to her baby. In particularly severe cases
mothers of GAPS children could not breastfeed their babies because the
baby would refuse the breast or just fall asleep after the first few mouthfuls
of the breast milk. We know that some of the toxins, which are produced by
abnormal gut flora, have the chemical structure of opiates, like morphine
and heroin. If the baby gets these opiates in the breast milk then it is quite
understandable why the baby falls asleep after the first few mouthfuls.
Another reason for the baby to refuse breast is milk allergy. In a woman
with gut dysbiosis the gut lining is damaged and leaky. It allows through
partially digested proteins and antigens. Milk antigens have been detected
in breast milk. I have seen a few cases when the baby took to the breast
after the mother removed dairy foods from her diet. A lot of cases of severe
eczema in babies can also be relieved by this measure.
On the positive side, however, the mother would also develop antibodies
to her pathogenic flora in the gut. These antibodies too will be excreted
through her milk and fed to her baby. So, if the baby has inherited abnor
mal gut flora from the mother, this flora will be controlled by antibodies in
the breast milk while the baby is breastfed. When the breastfeeding stops,
however, this protection stops as well. A lot of parents of GAPS children can
time the start of health problems in their child to the time of stopping
breastfeeding: ear infections, digestive problems, eczema, etc. It is possible
that the baby has developed an abnormal gut flora, which was controlled
by antibodies in breast milk, so its own immune system has not developed
any protection against this abnormal gut flora. On the contrary, there is a
lot of evidence to suggest that the baby's immune system accepts these
pathogenic microbes in the gut as something normal because that is all it
has known from the beginning and it does not recognise these microbes as
foreign and does not attack them As a result after the breast feeding stops
there is an explosion of growth of abnormal bacteria, viruses and fungi in
the baby's digestive system. In different children it takes a different length
of time, depending on the individual composition of the gut flora, severity
of gut dysbiosis and the diet of the child.
Coming back to the health of the parents of GAPS children, when I ask
questions about the health of their child's grandparents, particularly on the
mother's side, it becomes obvious that we have generations of people with
compromised gut flora. This damage becomes deeper in every generation.
The era of antibiotics, contraceptive pill, breast feeding going out of fashion arid drastic changes in diet have all contributed to this phe
nomenon. Doctors have known for centuries that unhealthy parents pro
duce unhealthy children. Mother's body is a home for the growing baby for
nine months and a source of nourishment and care for months after the
birth. So, mother's health is particularly important for the health of the
baby. In our modern society we have generations of women, whose health
has been compromised by our modern life-styles. Should it, therefore
come as a surprise to us that we have epidemics of autism, ADHD, dys
praxia, dyslexia, asthma, eczema, allergies, diabetes and many other health
problems in our children?
There is another important factor, which makes children vulnerable -
the toxic load which the child is born with. What is it? For years we believed
that the placenta in a pregnant woman protects the foetus from any toxins
which the woman might have in her body. Recent studies show that we
were wrong. The foetus accumulates most toxins, which the mother is
exposed to. Mercury from amalgam fillings, toxins coming from food and
environment and toxins produced by abnormal gut flora in the mother
have a good chance of accumulating in the foetus. Depending on how toxic
the mother is during pregnancy different babies are born with a different
toxic load. A baby with a high toxic load will start its life at a disadvantage
being more vulnerable to various environmental influences: vaccinations,
infections, food, drugs, etc. That is why the old wisdom of treating preg
nancy with respect is so important. A pregnant woman has to be extremely
careful what she puts into her mouth and on her skin. A good quality diet,
plenty of rest, plenty of clean, fresh air and gentle physical activity in the
fresh air are all vitally important. Protecting pregnant woman from expo
sure to any man-made chemicals, tobacco smoke, radiation, drugs, etc.,
will help her produce a child with a low toxic load in its little body, which
will give it a good start in life.
What about other children in the family? In my clinical experience the
siblings of autistic, hyperactive and other GAPS children are almost invari
ably affected by abnormal bodily flora and conditions, which are caused by
it. The most common ones are eczema, asthma, digestive problems and
anaemia. Less common are attention deficit with or without hyperactivity,
dyspraxia, dyslexia and autism. Of course, these children have inherited
the same flora as their GAPS sibling. But due to genetic differences, a dif
ferent toxic load at birth and various other factors, their bodily dysbiosis
and toxicity, which it produces, manifests itself differently. Well-function
ing gut flora is the major regulator and housekeeper of our immune system. Allergies, like eczema and asthma are the result of a malfunction
ing immune system and the most common conditions I see in the siblings
of autistic children, for example.
Different digestive problems are usually not as severe in the siblings, as
in their GAPS brother or sister. Nevertheless, they are quite common,
which is not surprising considering that they got their gut flora from the
same mother as their more severely affected sibling.
Anaemia is something that is not readily recognised in connection with
autism, eczema, asthma, ADHD, schizophrenia and other GAPS disorders.
And yet the majority of GAPS children, I have seen, look pale and pasty and
their blood tests show typical for anaemia changes. However, when you
look at mothers and siblings of these children, they almost without excep
tion look just as pale and pasty. The reason for that is that most people with
abnormal gut flora have various stages of anaemia. We have already dis
cussed why it happens in the previous chapters. Here I would just say that
anaemia, even mild, is not something to be taken lightly as it comes with a
constant feeling of tiredness, lack of energy and stamina, difficulties in
concentration, completing daily tasks and learning.
On the whole, having met many families with GAPS children, I usually
find that the whole family needs treatment. The most fundamental pur
pose of treatment has to be normalising the gut flora and addressing nutri
tional deficiencies. As the whole family gets healthier, the parents have
more energy and stamina to deal with their child's problems and to bring
up their other children. Afamily is alivingorganism and has to be seen and
treated as a whole. In our struggle to help our GAPS children it is very easy
for us, parents, to neglect ourselves. But, at the end of the day a strong
healthy family is what we are all about. Isn't it? 8. VACCINATIONS
DOES MMR CAUSE AUTISM?
The human mind is like an umbrella -
it functions best when open.
Walter Gropius, 1965
Talking about autism it is impossible to avoid the issue of the MMR vaccine
and vaccination in general. In my practice I see some parents of autistic
children who would link their child's disorder with the MMR (Measles,
Mumps and Rubella) vaccine where a majority cannot make this connec
tion. An equal number of families connect their child's regression with DPT
(Diphtheria, Pertussis and Tetanus) vaccination. Following research by Dr
Wakefield there has been a lot of publicity on this subject. The British gov
ernment has put a lot of effort and money into convincing the public that
the MMR vaccine is safe. While the MMR vaccine was in the limelight,
other vaccines got questioned as well, due to the fact that many of them
contain a preservative Thimerosal, a Mercury compound, and many other
toxic and questionable substances. DPT vaccine containing Thimerosal
has been banned in many countries. However, in Britain a fair amount of
old stock, containing Thimerosal, may still be injected into babies. Many
vaccines are new and have not been tested long


 144Healing the Gerson Way—Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases
www.thegersonway.comthree daily meals and coffee concentrate for enemas, plus securing the constant supply of large
amounts of organic produce needed for the smooth running of the program. The produce needs
to be washed and prepared for juicing and cooking, salads and vegetables have to be made ready
as near mealtimes as possible in order to safeguard their freshness—and of course all this is
accompanied by the constant washing of dishes. Moreover, this daily routine, taking up nearly
eight hours, must continue non-stop seven days a week.
 Obviously seriously ill patients, or even less ill ones, cannot cope with such a demanding
schedule. Irrespective of their condition, patients must rest if they are to heal.  This cannot be
repeated too often, for many people, especially members of the patient’s family are not clear
about this. Healing, the body’s heroic effort to defeat disease requires energy; a sick person’s
already diminished energy must be reserved for that.
In other words, a whole person is needed to fulfill the Therapy’s requirements. In many cases
a spouse or some other family member is willing and able to do the work, but the intensity of the
non-stop tasks will soon exhaust a single person. In this case a kitchen helper has to be hired and
trained. In fact it is best to have two helpers, each one working several days a week.
Choosing the right helper is important. It is unwise to engage a nurse trained in allopathic
medicine, since she might not approve of the nutritional regime and could try to add items of
her choice. Likewise, a ‘gourmet cook’ would probably find the Gerson way of food preparation
difficult to handle. The ideal choice would be a kind and open-minded person, willing to be
trained in the exact requirements of the job. Some patients have found it helpful to approach
their Church to provide volunteers. The best way is to arrange for several volunteers to schedule
continuous assistance, so that they take turns if one or the other is unable to attend.
 Since the hourly preparation of juices with all the other tasks keeps the helper busy, a cleaner
may also be needed once or twice a week. As pointed out earlier (see Chapter 9, The Gerson
Household, pg. 95 ) no toxic cleaning materials are to be used in the patient’s home.
 After 8-12 months on the Therapy the patient is usually in a much better condition and can
take on a number of food preparation tasks, including juicing. However, if this extra effort brings
on new symptoms or excessive fatigue, outside help must be brought in. Some people, particularly
the breadwinner, are able to return at first to part-time work, later to a regular job. There is just
one important condition: the patient must never eat lunch in a restaurant. He/she needs to eat the
usual Gerson lunch at home, together with the freshly made green juice (which cannot be taken
along to work), and also have some rest plus the midday enema. The carrot/apple juices can be
taken to work in the morning, in a glass-lined thermos flask; another thermos full of juice needs
to be ready for the patient to drink during the afternoon. Then on returning home the balance of
the green juices can be taken, along with the missing enemas and followed by  rest.
This arrangement only works if there is a person at home able to prepare all the Therapy
Copyright © Charlotte Gerson, 2007.  All rights reserved.
This material may not be reproduced in any medium, print or electronic without prior written permission from the author.Page 145Healing the Gerson Way—Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases
www.thegersonway.comitems needed by the patient.
The Trouble With Sunshine
Sunshine can be a source of good health; it can also be a killer. The difference lies in the degree
of exposure we choose. The human body needs Vitamin D, which helps to maintain several organ
systems and is essential for forming and maintaining healthy bones. However, very few foods are
naturally rich in Vitamin D (some commercial foods are fortified with synthetic versions of the
substance), so we need the Vitamin D, which is produced in our skin exposed to sunlight.
The trouble is that the ultra-violet (UV) rays contained in sunlight can cause severe damage
to cells. This partly explains why the widespread fashion for deep tanning has been accompanied
by the doubling of skin cancer cases in the last few decades. Even those who don’t lie for hours
practically naked on a sunny beach but have an outdoor job may develop skin cancer, since 30-
50% of UV rays reach us even on a cloudy day.
All this means that Gerson patients must take great care to avoid sunburn, which causes
immediate harm in the form of blisters, reddening and discomfort, but can also produce long-term
damage, with dry, wrinkled skin as its mildest, and melanoma as its worst effect. The first rule
is to keep out of sunshine between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. in the summer and in hot climates all the
year round. It is still possible to enjoy brightness from a shady spot, but not close to water, which
reflects back sunshine powerfully.
Even at other times of day it is important to be well covered when outdoors. Light, white,
long-sleeved cotton shirts, full length pants and wide-brimmed hats or white caps with visors give
necessary protection.
Healthy children need to be able to play outdoors and swim in summer, but they are even more
sensitive to sunburn than adults. Unfortunately 90% of commercial sunscreens and sunblocks
contain a chemical called Octyl methoxycinnamate (OMC), which is toxic and doubles its toxicity
when exposed to sunlight. As the skin absorbs 60% of everything applied to it, obviously such
preparations cannot be used by children. However, effective non-toxic sunscreens containing
natural ingredients, such as Green Tea, are available and can be tracked down with a little effort.
Complementary Therapies
These days there is a bewildering array of complementary treatments on offer and the question
arises whether Gerson patients should use any of these. The simple answer is that anything that
promotes healing and does not clash with the requirements of the Therapy is permissible and
potentially helpful. However, there is no margin for error, so let us see which techniques are safe
to use.
Copyright © Charlotte Gerson, 2007.  All rights reserved.
This material may not be reproduced in any medium, print or electronic without prior written permission from the author.Page 146Healing the Gerson Way—Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases
www.thegersonway.comReflexology or Zone Therapy dates back to Ancient Egypt, China and India. It is based
on the principle that the feet and hands are a mirror image of the body, and that by applying
pressure to certain points, especially on the feet, corresponding parts of the body are affected.  The
purpose of the treatment is to break up congestion, blockages and patterns of stress, and restore
homeostasis, the body’s internal equilibrium. Reflexology does not claim to diagnose or cure, but
it has a good record of improving general well-being. It must be used gently and cautiously with
cancer patients, avoiding reflex points that correspond to affected areas of the body.
Reiki  is a Japanese technique for stress reduction and relaxation that promotes healing. Its
practitioners claim that there is an invisible life force energy that flows through us and keeps us
alive. If this energy becomes low, we fall sick and suffer from stress, so in order to heal the Reiki
master channels the energy through his or her hands into the patient’s body. There is no need for
massage, only for very gentle touch, but although the patient feels very little, the treatment is
truly holistic, affecting body, emotions, mind and spirit. Because of its non-specific nature Reiki
is able to help in any disease and works well with other medical or therapeutic techniques. The
word itself consists of two parts: Rei means higher power, Ki stands for life force energy, so the
implication is that Reiki is a spiritually guided way of restoring universal life force energy in
those who need it.
Acupuncture  originated in China some 2000 years ago, and has been known and increasingly
practiced in the U.S. since 1971. Its essence is the stimulation of certain anatomical points on the
body by penetrating the skin with thin metal needles and manipulating them by hand or electrical
means. This is claimed to regulate the nervous system, activate the body’s own painkilling
biochemicals and strengthen the immune system. Acupuncture has a proven record of good pain
control and of hastening recovery from surgery. It can impart a sense of well-being and boosts
depleted energy. Acupuncture needles, which cause minimal pain, were approved by the FDA
for use by licensed practitioners in 1996. Today this ancient technique is used in the U.S. by
thousands of physicians, dentists and other practitioners for the prevention or relief of pain, and
members of the American Academy of Medical Acupuncture use it on cancer patients in many
hospitals and clinics.
Yoga  first emerged in India some 5000 years ago. It has several varieties, including hatha
yoga,  a physical discipline consisting mainly of stretching and breathing exercises, which has
grown in popularity in the West since the mid-20th century. Being non-competitive, gentle, and


 Eur. J. Endocr. 2000. Oct; 143(4):485-91
7
 Okerland, M. Medical Applications of Fluorescent Excitation Analysis. 1979
8
 Wsrchr Ges Heilk. 1840; 6; 197
9
 Disease of the Heart and Aorta. Hodges and Smith, Bublin. 1854; 278
10
 Trousseau, A. Lectures on Clinical Medicine. Vol. 1. Lecture XI. Exopthalmic Goiter of Graves’ Disease. London. 1868;
587
11
 Med Cl North America, 1925; 8:1145-1151
12
 J Iowa Med Soc, 1924; 14:65
13
 M. Rec. 1921; 99:996-999
14
 Arch. Int. Med. 1924:34:355-364
15
 Arch. Int. Med. 1930; 45; 481-502
16
 Solomon, B. Current trends in the management of Graves’ disease. J. Clin. Endocrn. Metab. 1990:70:1518
17
 Cooper, D. In Werner and Ingbar’s The Thyroid. 2000. Lippincott, Williams and Wilkins.
18
 J. Insur. Med. 2001; 33(2):138-42
19
 Metso, S. The J. of Clin. Endocrin. And Metab. 92(6):2190-2196. 2007
20
 Aceves, C. Is iodine a gatekeeper of the integrity of the mammary gland? J. of mammary gland biol. and neoplasia. Vol.
10, No2. April 2005Chapter 7
The Selenium/Iodine Connection
Chapter 7: The Selenium/Iodine Connection
Selenium is a trace element that is essential for health. It cannot be manufactured in our bodies; therefore, it must be found in
our diets or taken as a supplement. Adequate selenium levels are necessary for regulating thyroid function and iodine metabolism.
Small (microgram) amounts of selenium are necessary for maintaining optimal levels.
What Foods Provide Selenium?
Plant foods are the world’s major dietary source of selenium. The plant-based content of selenium is dependent on the
selenium found in the soil where the plants are grown. Selenium can also be found in meat and seafood. Nuts can also contain
selenium, with Brazil nuts containing the largest amount (544μg/ounce). In the U.S., meats and breads are common sources of
selenium.
1
 The content of selenium found in common foods is listed in
Table 6
.

Table 6: Content of Selenium in Common Food
Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) For Selenium
The RDA for selenium is 55μg/day in adults which is based on the dietary selenium required to maximize the activity of the
antioxidant enzyme glutathione peroxidase.
2

3
Selenium Deficiency
In the U.S., it is estimated that most adults ingest about 100μg/day of selenium, which is above the RDA.
4
 Although the
intake of selenium may appear adequate to maintain glutathione peroxidase activity, the RDA does not take into account the toxic
load that may be affecting the glutathione activity in the body.

The more toxic agents, such as pesticides, mercury, chlorine, and bromine that we come in contact with, the more glutathione
peroxidase will be needed to help to detoxify these agents. Selenium deficiency can be the rate-limiting step in the body’s
production of glutathione.

Studies have found selenium depletion in individuals with gastrointestinal disorders such as Crohn’s disease or those with
surgical removal of part of the intestines or stomach.
5

6

7
 Selenium deficiency has been linked to an increased risk of:
Death from cancer of the lung, colorectal, and prostate
8

9

10

11
Arthritis
12

13
Heart disease and cardiomyopathy
14
HIV disease progression
The exact mechanism of selenium deficiency causing the above illnesses has not been elucidated. One hypothesis is that
selenium acts as an antioxidant (in part, through glutathione peroxidase) and can counter the oxidant damage caused by variousillnesses.
Selenium Toxicity
Selenium has a narrow margin of safety. Unlike vitamin C, where large doses are rarely harmful, larger doses of selenium can
cause adverse effects. Selenosis is a condition of high blood levels of selenium (>100μg/dl). Symptoms of selenosis include: hair
loss, fatigue, irritability, garlic breath odor, and mild nerve damage.
15
 The Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of
Sciences has set the upper intake level of selenium at 400μg/day for adults to prevent the risk of selenosis.
16
 My 21 years of
practicing nutritional medicine has shown 100-400μg/day of selenium to be a safe range. These doses have not caused selenosis
in any patients.
Selenium and Iodine
Selenium is a required component of at least 11 enzymes. Without selenium, these enzymes would be nonfunctional. Life itself
is not possible without selenium and the selenoenzymes. This chapter will focus on two of the selenoenzymes: glutathione
peroxidase and iodothyronine deiodinase.
Glutathione Peroxidase
Four separate glutathione peroxidase enzymes have been identified. Each of these enzymes has antioxidant capabilities and
protects the body from oxidant damage. Recall from
Chapter 5
, the oxidation of iodide (shown below).

The Oxidation of Iodide

The oxidation reaction is catalyzed by the interaction of H
2
O
2
 and thyroperoxidase (TPO). Furthermore, we established that
too much hydrogen peroxide could damage TPO and cause Hashimoto’s disease.

One of the controlling features of this reaction is the
enzyme glutathione peroxidase. Glutathione peroxidase can react with
H
2
O
2
 to reduce hydrogen peroxide to water.
Figure 14
 illustrates this principle.

FIGURE 14: Glutathione Peroxidase

If there is not adequate selenium available, there will be insufficient glutathione peroxidase to reduce and neutralize excess
H
2
O
2
. Excess hydrogen peroxide can cause the oxidative damage to TPO and initiate the start of autoimmune thyroiditis. Animal
studies have agreed with this model.
17
IODOTHYRONINE DEIODINASES
Iodothyronine deiodinases are enzymes that are responsible for activating and deactivating thyroid hormone. These agents
work by removing an iodine molecule. For example, the thyroid gland releases a large amount of the inactive form of thyroid
hormone T4 into the circulation. T4 has to be converted to T3 to become the active form of thyroid hormone. Iodothyronine
deiodinase, a selenium-containing enzyme, is responsible for this conversion as shown in
Figure 15
. Selenium
deficiency has been
shown to decrease deiodinase protein and activity.
18

FIGURE 15: Iodothyronine Deiodinase
How Much Selenium Should You Take?Selenium levels can be checked through the hair, serum, or nail clippings. I have found hair selenium levels very reliable. In
order to achieve the best results, I suggest working with a health care practitioner knowledgeable about natural therapies.
Supplementing with selenium in doses of 100-200μg/day has proven safe and effective at correcting selenium deficiencies.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Selenium is a very important trace element. Adequate selenium levels are necessary to maintain optimal thyroid function. If
selenium is deficient, inadequate glutathione peroxidase will be produced. This can set the stage for autoimmune thyroid disorders
to begin as the thyroid gland can be damaged by H
2
O
2
. Adequate selenium levels can ensure
optimal glutathione peroxidase
production and help protect the thyroid gland from oxidative damage.

Selenium is also important for activating thyroid hormone (via iodothyronine deiodinase,
Figure 15
). I have treated many
patients with hypothyroid symptoms that resolve when the underlying nutritional deficiencies, such as selenium deficiency, are
rectified.

If you have side effects with iodine therapy, I suggest looking at selenium deficiency as a possible cause. If your selenium
levels are low, supplementing with selenium may correct the problem.
1
 NIH Office of Dietary Supplements.
www.nih.gov/factsheets/selenium.asp
. Accessed 8.19.07
2
 NIH
3
 Food and Nutrition Board, Institute of Medicine. Dietary Reference Intakes of Vitamin C, Vitamin E, Selenium and
Carotenoids. Washington D.C.: National Academy Press; 2000:284-324
4
 Bialostosky K, Wright JD, Kennedy-Stephenson J, McDowell M, Johnson CL. Dietary intake of macronutrients,
micronutrients and other dietary constituents: United States 1988-94. Vital Heath Stat. 11(245) ed: National Center for Health
Statistics, 2002.
5
 Kuroki, F. Selenium is depleted in Crohn’s disease on enteral nutrition. Dig. Dise. 200


	need	to	speculate	about	“extended
mind,”	the	notion	that	thinking	can	occur	outside	the	brain.	Fortunately	or	not,
we	find	ourselves	with	a	rich	store	of	enigmas	that	provide	room	for	the	Vedic
rishis	and	their	deep	understanding	of	consciousness.	On	the	frontier	of	many
mysteries	lies	the	answer	to	one	mystery.13
I
S
	A
KASHA
	R
EAL
?
THE	USE	OF
	the	word	“Akasha”	has	lingered	around	the	fringes	of	physics	for
at	least	a	century.	The	reason	for	this	is	that	an	ancient	and	supposedly
outmoded	belief	refuses	to	die—the	belief	that	empty	space	is	not	empty	at
all.	Akasha,	the	Sanskrit	word	for	space,	has	an	English	equivalent:	the	ether.
Up	until	a	few	generations	ago,	if	you	had	gone	to	school	and	asked	what
filled	the	infinite	void	between	the	stars,	you	would	have	been	told,	whether
in	ancient	Greece	or	medieval	France	or	Harvard	at	the	time	of	Abraham
Lincoln,	that	pure	emptiness	isn’t	possible.	An	invisible	ether	that	can’t	be
seen	or	measured	allows	light	to	travel	from	the	stars,	as	water	allows	ripples
to	spread	when	a	rock	is	thrown	into	a	pond.	Without	a	medium	to	pass
through,	light	waves	have	no	way	to	move	from	point	A	to	point	B.
The	ether	suffered	a	decisive	setback	in	the	1880s	when	two	American
scientists,	Albert	Michelson	and	Edward	Morley,	proved	that	light	traveled	at
the	same	speed	no	matter	what	direction	it	moved	in.	This	was	important
because	the	so-called	“ether	wind”	that	was	thought	to	sweep	energy	through
the	universe	should	have	made	light	travel	slower	going	upstream	than
downstream.	When	Michelson	and	Morley	proved	that	this	wasn’t	true,	even
Einstein	became	convinced	that	space	was	a	void	without	activity,	a	belief
that	was	also
wrong
,	as	it	turns	out.	Physicists	now	believe	that	space	is	full	of
activity	in	the	form	of	invisible	fluctuations	in	the	quantum	field.	These	so-
called	virtual	fluctuations	account	for	matter	and	energy	and	also	for
distortions	in	time	and	space.	Thus,	in	a	curious	way	the	disproved	notion	of
the	ether	has	been	revived	indirectly.
To	find	out	where	matter	and	energy	come	from,	physics	wound	up
positing	a	universal	field	that	envelops	not	just	what	we	observe	but
everything	that	could	possibly	exist.	Modern	physics	finds	it	easy	to	make	the
material	world	disappear	into	nothingness,	but	that	is	deeply	disturbing,
almost	as	disturbing	as	the	disappearance	of	a	dying	person.	Here	is	how	the
disappearing	act	of	a	rock,	tree,	planet,	or	galaxy	works:
First,	the	rock,	tree,	or	planet	disappeared	from	sight	when	scientists
realized	that	solid	matter	is	made	up	of	atoms	that	cannot	be	detected	by	the
naked	eye.
Second,	atoms	disappeared	when	it	was	discovered	that	they	are	made	upof	energy,	mere	vibrations	in	the	void.
Finally,	energy	disappeared	when	it	was	found	that	vibrations	are
temporary	excitations	in	a	field,	and	that	the	field	itself	doesn’t	vibrate	but
maintains	a	flat,	constant	“zero	point.”
Theoretically,	to	reach	the	zero	point	in	Nature	one	could	cool	empty
space	down	to	absolute	zero,	and	instantly	everything	would	cease	to	vibrate.
Yet	the	zero	point	also	exists	here	and	now—it	provides	the	starting	point
from	which	everything	in	the	universe	springs.	Since	matter	and	energy	are
constantly	emerging	and	then	vanishing	back	into	the	void,	the	zero	point
serves	as	the	switching	station	between	existence	and	nothingness.	Newton
had	established	that	matter	and	energy	cannot	be	destroyed,	but	they	can
oscillate	in	this	shadowy	way	at	the	subatomic	level,	as	long	as	the	sum	total
of	matter	and	energy	isn’t	altered.
The	Zero	Point	Field
It	wouldn’t	be	so	disturbing	if	this	vanishing	act	was	due	to	occur	only	when
the	cosmos	dies	billions	of	years	from	now	by	cooling	down	to	absolute	zero.
Nor	would	it	be	so	disturbing	if	matter	only	collapsed	into	the	void
theoretically.	Such	isn’t	the	case,	however.	Matter	and	energy
have
	to
disappear.	If	they	remained	stable,	which	is	how	rocks,	trees,	and	planets	look
to	the	eye,	chaos	would	break	loose.	Matter	would	exist	only	as	randomly
floating	particles	in	interstellar	space.	Exploded	bits	of	the	Big	Bang	would	be
flying	apart	at	millions	of	miles	an	hour	without	any	relationship	to	one
another.	There	would	be	no	forms,	no	evolution,	no	organization—in	other
words,	no	universe	as	we	know	it.	At	best,	gravity	could	possibly	pull
together	larger	clumps	of	matter,	but	gravity	is	also	a	wave	function	that
fluctuates	around	the	zero	point.
The	fact	that	chaos	doesn’t	totally	dominate	remains	a	huge	mystery,
which	may	only	be	solved	by	Akasha.	Here	the	needs	of	physics	and	the
Vedic	rishis	begin	to	converge	in	startling	ways.	The	rishis	were	focused	on
consciousness	as	a	universal	principle.	But	to	have	a	thinking	universe,	they
needed	to	explain	how	the	cosmic	mind	works,	how	it	holds	itself	together
and	organizes	itself	into	thoughts.	If	the	“mind	field”	was	totally	stable,	it
would	be	a	dead	zone,	or	at	best	filled	with	a	constant,	meaningless	buzz.
Physics	also	needs	to	know	how	the	universe	holds	itself	together	and
organizes	into	coherent	forms.	Otherwise,	the	inconceivable	fireball	that
appeared	at	the	instant	of	the	Big	Bang	would	have	blown	itself	apart,	the	way
dynamite	blows	itself	apart,	without	bothering	to	create	forms	along	the	way.
Physics	was	drawn,	step-by-step,	into	the	void	because	nothing	in	the
visible	world	was	adequate	to	explain	what	had	to	be	explained.	The	zero
point	became	an	all-inclusive	“field	of	fields”	that	encompasses	every	unseen,or	virtual,	particle	in	the	universe.	It	was	calculated	that	the	zero	point
contained	10	to	the	40th	power	more
energy
	than	the	visible	universe—that	is,
a	one	followed	by	forty	zeros.	The	void	turned	out	to	be	a	seething	exchange
of	energy,	not	just	between	photons	and	electrons	but	in	every	conceivable
quantum	event.	Suddenly	the	unseen	has	become	incredibly	more	powerful
than	the	seen.	But	in	what	way	is	the	“field	of	fields”	like	a	mind,	the	thing
the	rishis	were	looking	for?
Thinking,	the	basic	operation	of	the	mind,	organizes	reality	to	make	sense.
The	universe	does	this	physically.	It	forms	complex	systems.	DNA	is	one
example,	but	genes	didn’t	create	life	simply	by	stringing	simple	molecules
along	a	double	helix.	There	are	spaces	between	each	genetic	bit,	and	this
sequencing	is	all-important.	An	amoeba	differs	from	a	human	being	in	the
sequence	of	carbon,	oxygen,	hydrogen,	and	nitrogen	along