Issue #221 DECEMBER/JANUARY, 2015
Transcription
Issue #221 DECEMBER/JANUARY, 2015
EARTH STAR DEC / JAN 2015 CONSCIOUS LIVING IN THE 21ST CENTURY EVERYTHING IS A MIRACLE BERNIE S. SIEGEL WALKING HOME SONIA CHOQUETTE SONIA CHOQUETTE THE COLORS OF LOVE NEW SLOW CITY YOGA FOR CANCER Contact Christopher for a remote Divine Healing session by phone or Skype. http://www.christophermacklinministries.com 2 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com www.earthstarmag.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 3 EARTH STAR CONTENTS DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 ON THE COVER 27 Walking Home Day 25: Rabanal to Ponferrada (32 km) by Sonia Choquette 38 Everything Is A Miracle Excerpts from A Book of Miracles by Dr. Bernie Siegel 51 The Colors of Love Excerpts from The Light by Keidi Keating by Don Miguel Ruiz 56 Yoga for Cancer Creating Your Yoga Practice and Learning the Poses by Tari Prinster Page 38 59 New Slow City Living Simply…No Matter Where You Are by William Powers FEATURES 12 Down To Earth Astrology by Tim Gunns 16 Rhythm Alchemy \ by Martin Ivanov 22 Discover the Benefits of K-Laser Cover Art Flight of Music by Jean-Paul Avisse For further information, contact Prestige Art Galleries, 3909 W. Howard, Skokie, IL 60076. (874) 679-2555, www.prestigeartskokie.com Class 4 Laser Therapy Treatments by Dr. Joseph Mercola 31 Strange Electromagnetic Energies Page 27 by Louis Proud 43 The Real Brass Ring Change Your Life Course Now by Dianne Bischoff James 45 Natural Extracts Lower Blood Pressure by Brandon Dewitte 64 4 Myths That Keep You From Living Fully and Fearlessly by Anita Moorjani Jean-Paul Avisse . For a free color brochure, please send a S.A.S.E. DEPARTMENTS 5 Up Front 18 Book Reviews Page 51 4 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com Earth Star Up Front PHILAE Touches Down on the Surface of a Comet ouchdown! The Philae probe has landed on the surface of a comet, scientists from the European Space Agency (ESA) announced November 12th. It is the first time a soft landing has been achieved on a comet. However, project scientists believe anchors that hold the probe to the surface failed to work properly and are now trying to find out why, according to ESA tweets. T ESA lander system engineer Laurence O'Rourke told CNN that engineers are still checking the data to see “how we landed and where we landed.” Shortly after landing was confirmed, the probe tweeted: “Touchdown! My new address: 67P!” Later, it tweeted again: “I’m on the surface but my harpoons did not fire.” ESA director Jean-Jacques Dordain told colleagues who had waited anxiously for confirmation of the landing. “This is a big step for human civilization. The biggest problem with success is it looks easy.” And William Shatner, who played Captain Kirk in the science fiction series Star Trek retweeted: “touchdown con- firmed for away team @Philae2014, captain!” Led by ESA with a consortium of partners including NASA, scientists on the Rosetta mission hope to learn more about the composition of comets and how they interact with the solar wind— high energy particles blasted into space by the Sun. —CNN Being Neighbor l y Promotes a Health y Hear t here may be something more to heart health for everyone beyond genes, diet and exercise. This heart-health booster is something we don’t think about, and yet there it is, right in front of our noses. And this newly proven secret to heart health and longevity is free and not hard to do—all you have to do is be neighborly. That's right—just be neighborly to live longer! Here’s why. We know that negative aspects of physical environments—noise, traffic and pollution—can harm our health. It’s a no-brainer. But recently, a study by researchers from the University of Michigan looked at the impact of posi- T www.earthstarmag.com tive rather than the negative aspects of neighborhood living. The research team wanted to find out whether feeling part of a community, trusting neighbors and feeling safe had an impact on heart health. They called these feelings about community connections perceived neighborhood social cohesion. Drawing data from the University of Michigan’s ongoing Health and Retirement Study, the researchers identified 5,276 heart-healthy people and followed them for four years. The average age of these folks was 70. The Health and Retirement Study is a large, national program that collects information on health, health-care economics, aging and quality of life in adults older than 50 through questionnaires that are sent every two years to the more than 22,000 participants in the program. Researchers asked the participants how they felt about the area within a 20-minute walk or one-mile radius of their homes, and how much they agreed with these four statements: • I really feel part of this area. • If you were in trouble, there are lots of people in this area who would help you. • Most people in this area can be trusted. • Most people in this area are friendly. Depending on how strongly a participant agreed with each statement, he or she was put into one of four groups. During the four-year study period, 148 of the participants had heart attacks. The researchers took this information and sliced and diced it with the data they had collected about neighborhood social cohesion and demographic factors (for example, age, sex, race, marital status, education level and income) of their study population. When the researchers adjusted data to compensate for the impact of demographic factors on heart attack risk, they found that, compared with people with low neighborhood social cohesion, people with low-to-moderate social cohesion were 34% less likely to have heart attacks and people with the moderate-to-high or high social cohesion were about 45% less likely to have heart attacks. Those are stunning numbers—you can potentially reduce your risk of heart attack by half by just being neighborly and liking and being involved with where you live. —Daily Health News DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 5 Looking for Customers? EARTH STAR The Leading Magazine for Holistic Living in New England EDITOR/PUBLISHER Cody Bideaux [email protected] Advertise with Earth staR - [email protected] ASSOCIATE EDITOR Tim Gunns [email protected] ADVERTISING OFFICES 828-452-9378 email: [email protected] EDITORIAL OFFICE 828-452-9378 email: [email protected] ADVERTISING MANAGERS Tim Gunns Janessa Howard DESIGN & PRODUCTION Earthstar Productions Jay Scott Hackleman CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Sonia Choquette • Brandon Dewitte Tim Gunns • Martin Ivanov Dianne Bischoff James • Keidi Keating Joseph Mercola • William Powers Tari Prinster • Louis Proud Don Miguel Ruiz • Bernie S. Siegel SUBMISSIONS Manuscripts, artwork, and photographs must be accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope. Earth Star Magazine cannot be responsible for loss or damage of unsolicited materials. Earth Star Magazine is not responsible for advertising claims. Earth Star Magazine, Copyright © 2014 by Earth Star Magazine Incorporated, All Rights Reserved. No articles may be used without written permission of the publisher Volume XXXVIl No. 221 — December / January 2015 http://www.earthstarmag.com 6 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com Earth Star Up Front Aer otoxic Syndr ome Threatens Airline Passengers here are many air travel victims whose mysterious health issues are not publicized or understood by medical authorities, and apparently the international airline and aircraft industries would like to keep it that way. Toxins from bleed air bleeding into the cockpits and cabins of commercial airplanes have the potential to create Aerotoxic Syndrome, an illness that can lead to a long term debilitation that makes it quite difficult to ever regain health. All jet liners and turboprop planes use the bleed air technique for cabin air with the exception of the Boeing Dream Liner. Bleed air is air that is forced into an airplane for breathing via engine turbine compression sections. The air is cooled and forced into the aircraft interior from inside the engine cowling or cover. Most cabin air is 60% bleed air and 40% recycled air. Pilots are subject to 100% bleed air, so they get hit the hardest from bleed air contaminants. The contaminants are in engine and hydraulic oils that sometimes leak and burn off vapors into the bleed air. Some of those oils contain large amounts of an organophosphatecalled tricresyl phosphate (TCP). Organophosphates are nerve gas agents used in insecticides and pesticides, and many nations have banned them. Organophosphates are deadly! A group of Swiss/German TV investigative journalists swabbed interior cabin samples from 31 different commercial aircraft and handed them over to Professor Christian van Netten, a leading toxicologist at the University of British Columbia. Professor van Netten found 28 of those swabs contained TCP! The long term effects of TCP are mostly neurological, but sometimes pulmonary. These effects create various symptoms identical to MS (multiple sclerosis) or Guillain-Barre, a paralysis that sometimes occurs after vaccinations. The symptoms vary in intensity, and they’re crippling in different ways. Bleed air incidents from the 1960s were rarely connected to neurological damage from cabin air contamination. The airline industry has covered them up since the connection was first made T www.earthstarmag.com and the dangers became known in 1977. But now the veil of censorship has been ripped away by some key victim activists who have done the research and provided proof to use in lawsuits against airlines and aircraft manufacturers. Victims involved with the lawsuits have been mostly airline crews and flight attendants whose repeated exposure to bleed air contaminants made them most vulnerable to aerotoxic syndrome. These activist victims are not disgruntled employees looking to get something out of their employers. Many pilots and flight attendants who had previously loved their jobs have been forced into medical retirement with debilitating health issues as the result of bleed air. The UK Independent reported that 27 pilots suffering from cognitive dysfunction were tested at University College London in 2006, and high amounts of jet-engine oil chemicals including TCP were discovered in their blood and fat. There have been incidents where pilots couldn’t function and were losing vision, or were desperately ill until moments after donning their oxygen masks. Sometimes one of the pilots would pass out, leaving the other stricken pilot with the task of handling the aircraft. Incapacitated pilots are invitations to disaster! Flight crews and attendants have been aware of this toxic situation without speaking out for some time. But almost all passengers are clueless regarding these dangerous toxins. Cabin air filters are useless for protecting against heated oil TCP contaminants. There are reported cases of passengers who have had problems, some very serious and long lasting, from even one flight where the burnt oil smell was noticeable. A pilot who had protected himself with oxygen reported passengers looked ill and “zombie-like” from a surge of burnt oil bleed air that had been sent throughout the plane. How many of those passengers had lingering negative health effects that would never be connected to bleed air contamination on that flight? Some passengers were aware of a noxious odor and then dizziness, which turned into long term neurological problems with debilitating MS symptoms. That’s the problem with long term health issues for the unsuspecting. They often kick in strongly days or even weeks after the toxic flight. And since passengers know virtually nothing of aerotoxic syndrome, they don’t connect what’s wrong with them with the flight that released TCP fumes. For prevention, there are compact masks lined with highly effective activated charcoal to adsorb TCP molecules. Adsorbing differs from absorbing because it involves a more effective toxin elimination by electronic or ionic bonding of molecules, rather than sponge-like soaking. Masks are available from http://www.aerotoxic.org —AlignLife DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 7 Earth Star Up Front Volkswagen’s New 300 MPG Car Not Allowed In America ou won’t find the 300 MPG Volkswagen XL1 in an American showroom, in fact it has even been denied a tour of America because it is too efficient for the American public to be made widely aware of, and oil profits are too high in America with the status quo in place. No tour has been allowed for this car because the myth that 50 mpg is virtually impossible to obtain from even a stripped down econobox is too profitable to let go of, and when it comes to corporate oil profits, ignorance is bliss. Years ago we had calculated that it should be possible to get a small car to exceed 100 mpg by putting parallel direct to cylinder water injectors side by side with the fuel injectors, and using the exhaust manifold to preheat the water so it would enter the cylinders as dry steam, thus providing added expansion (which drives the engine) while allowing the combustion process to proceed without reducing it’s efficiency. But we were obviously wrong with our calculations, because they were in fact over 2x conservative. The 100 mpg carburetor was indeed a reality, and the Volkswagen XL1 proves it with only straightforward nothing special technology we have had since the 1970?s.Though the XL1 can be plugged in to deliver a 40 mile all electric drive, it does not need to be plugged in EVER to achieve 300 mpg. And it does not cheat in any way to achieve the rating, it weighs over 1,700 pounds, has normal tires, and delivers a Y 8 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 very good driving experience with a governed top speed of 99 mph. The XL1 could reach a top speed in excess of 110 mph absent governor and turns in a 0-60 time of 11.5 seconds which is by no means leisurely for a car designed for efficiency. The XL1 in no way cheats on performance to hit it’s rating. It is simply the car we should have always had, and have had taken from us in the name of oil profits. Though the XL1 can hit 300 mpg under ideal driving conditions, it’s combined mileage is usually a little over 200 mpg, and if you do city driving only that will drop to a minimum of 180 mpg under the worst driving conditions. But we’d be happy with that no doubt. If the XL1 was equipped with an 18 gallon fuel tank, and you did all highway driving, you could fill it up with an oil change and when the next change was due you could change the oil and keep driving without filling up for and additional 2,400 miles. But it comes with a much smaller fuel tank, because if it could go that long on a single tank chances are the fuel would foul before it got used. The tank is only 2.6 gallons to prevent fuel age related problems from happening. So fill ups are cheap. Many of the publications which speak about the XL1 did so when it was a concept car predicted to get right around 250 MPG. But in 2014, after extensive testing of cars now produced, test drivers report economy above 300 mpg under the correct driving conditions, which would be close to sea level, a flat straight road with no stops, and reasonable speeds. To get rid of miles/imperial/U.S. gallon confusion, in the metric system the XL1 is rated to deliver 100 kilometers per litre. Translated for the U.S., that means approximately 65 miles per quart. We remember how we laughed at the Smart Fortwo, because even a full size 4 doorChevy Impala significantly beat the “Smart’s” fuel economy, and with the Impala you would get a whole car. The Volkswagen XL1 is clearly the two seater the Smart should have been if it really was what the name implies, and the XL1 is in contrast, a car we’d be proud to be seen in. You will NOT see the Xl1 in America, however, Even it’s far less efficient 85 mpg non hybrid full size station wagon counterpart, the Jetta TDI blue motion wagon (Carscoops.com), which is made in America, is banned from American roads. —Peak Oil www.earthstarmag.com Earth Star Up Front SMART METERS Are Poor Value, Find 10 EU Countries early half of European United countries have decided against a large scale rollout of smart meters, calculating that the new technology can be poor value for money. Digital smart meters are a big innovation over present analogue versions, allowing grid operators and utilities to view power consumption at the household level, but they also involve a significant upfront cost. EU member states were supposed to replace at least 80% of all electricity meter with “smart” versions by 2020, provided that they found smart meters saved money in the long run, under the Energy Efficiency Directive. Only 16 out of 28 countries in the bloc found a conclusive net benefit, however, according to a new report from the European Commission. The European Commission painted an upbeat view of the rollout proceeding in those countries, but acknowledged the set back. “The business case for rolling out smart metering is not yet overwhelming throughout Europe,” the Commission said, in its report, “Benchmarking smart metering deployment in the EU-27”. “Sixteen Member States will proceed with large-scale roll-out of smart meters by 2020 or earlier, or have already done so.” “In seven Member States, the costbenefit analysis for large-scale roll-out by 2020 were negative or inconclusive. In Germany, Latvia and Slovakia smart metering was found to be economically justified for particular groups of customers. For four Member States, the cost benefit analysis or rollout plans were not available at the time of writing.” The Commission report found a huge range of values for costs and benefits per smart meter across the different member states. Costs ranged from 77 to 766 euros per meter, and benefits from 18 to 654 euros. Some of the differences in cost were down to technical accounting issues, such as the assumed lifetime of the meter, rather than actual differences such as in installation or labour costs. N www.earthstarmag.com The smart meter rollout is part of the EU’s 2009 “third energy package” meant to achieve an internal energy market targeting secure and affordable energy. Other measures under the package include linking cross-border markets, so that electricity flows from cheaper to more expensive countries. Smart meters allow two-way communication between a house and utility, whether by cable or wireless, replacing present meters which simply measure household electricity consumption. Utilities benefit by reading meters remotely, rather than manually at present. And they would allow grid operators to balance power demand and supply better, by having real-time data on electricity consumption at the household instead of electricity sub-station level. Where the meters can communicate with individual plugs or appliances in the home, they would also allow utilities to shut down power supply for households in return for cheaper tariffs. Such “demand response” could revolutionise grid management, giving operators an alternative tool for managing surges in electricity demand, as well as variable wind and solar power supply. Instead of investing in new power generation, they could pay consumers not to use electricity during demand surges. Such so-called “peak load shift- ing” could save billions of euros by allowing countries to avoid investing in new power generation, much of which is presently kept idle. But not all smart meters have such demand response functionality yet. Smart meters could also help consumers to monitor their energy use and even control appliances remotely by smart phone. But the European Commission report found that smart meters in seven of the 16 countries proceeding with a large scale rollout did not have the functionality to report consumption data back to consumers. Some consumer groups are concerned at the amount of detailed household data which smart meters give to utilities, including how many people are in the house in real time. The EU’s efficiency law protects such consumer data, the Commission report said. “A high level of personal data protection must remain a central concern in the development of smart standards.” “An intensive communication effort is required to help consumers understand their rights, the benefits of installing smart meters and participating in demand response programmes. Consumers should be informed about the functionalities, what data will be collected, and what these data will be used for.” —rtcc.org DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 9 Earth Star Up Front SEABUCKTHORN: “Holy Fruit of the Himalayas” or “Wonder Berry” eabuckthorn is known as nature’s most balanced fruit. This “Holy Fruit of the Himalayas” has been cherished by native Tibetans for centuries for its incredible nutritive qualities. The Seabuckthorn fruit is also known throughtout the world as Sandthorn, Sandorn, and the “Wonder Berry”. Consider seabuckthorn’s nutritional profile: Seabuckthorn contains more than 190 biologically active compounds and with its full range of omega fatty acids in perfect balance. Seabuckthorn contains more than 60 antioxidants and high ORAC value. The fruit of Seabuckthorn is very rich in vitamin C (300-1600 mg/100 g), which is 4 - l00 times higher than any vegetable and fruit. Seabuckthorn is a small, yelloworange to orange-red berry with a sourish taste that are native to China, Russia, and Mongolia. Seabuckthorn was used in China for over twelve centuries where it was first used for traditional Chinese medicine strengthening stomach, blood circulation and respiration. Seabuckthorn is currently used in juice, sports drinks, jellies, ice cream, cosmetics and medicines. S Seabuckthon is rich in macronutrients and micronutrients. Seabuckthorn contains vitamins B1, B2, folic acid, C, E, beta-carotene (provitamin A), and K. It contains carotenoids, flavonoids, phenols, terpenes and at least 20 mineral cofactors. Seabuckthorn also naturally contains 5-HT (serotonin), a neurotransmitter that helps regulate emotions. Seabuckthorn numerous health benefits include cardiovascular, immunity, anticancer, memory, growth, anti-inflammatory, and skin health. Seabuckthorn is known as nature’s most balanced fruit. In addition to omega-7’s, seabuckthorn also provides a rich source of powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory constituents including carotenoids (pro-vitamin A), mixed tocopherols and tocotrienols (vitamin E), phytosterols and beneficial omega 3, 6, and 9 fatty acids. Together with omega-7 fatty acids, these compounds deliver proven benefits to gut mucosa while providing a wide range of benefits to the cardiovascular, immune, and integumentary system. In numerous animal models, sea buckthorn has been shown to prevent and repair ulceration of the digestive tract caused by common stressors like noise, radiation, vibration, and acidic environments. These impressive findings have prompted further research examining this effect in humans. In one clinical study involving 30 subjects diagnosed with peptic ulcer disease, sea buckthorn supplementation for one month was deemed an effective treatment for 96.7 percent of cases and had a 76.6 percent cure rate. Its restorative effects on oral and vaginal mucosa have also been studied in humans and are equally impressive. —NaturalHealthyChoices.weebly.com Simple S OLAR OVEN Makes Salt Water Drinkable purred on by his own extensive travel and friends’ involvement in NGOs, designer Gabriele Diamanti developed a fascination with global water scarcity as a graduate student at Milan Polytechnic in 2005; he recently decided to pursue his interest again and the result is Eliodomestico, an open-source variation on a solar still. Cooking with a solar oven is probably the greenest method of preparing your food or water. It is also one of the most easily accessible forms of solar power. A solar oven is a device that harnesses sunlight to create heat energy. It doesn’t use any fuel, and it doesn’t cost a thing to operate it. It can help slow down the deforestation and desertification caused by harvesting natural resources which are used in conventional fuel production. There are many solar oven designs, S 10 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 but each of them uses the same basic principles. They concentrate sunlight, using mirrors or other types of reflective metal, into their designated cooking areas. The more concentrated the light, the more potent the concentration will be. Diamanti’s design functions by filling the black boiler with salty sea water in the morning, then tightening the cap. As the temperature and pressure grows, steam is forced downwards through a connection pipe and collects in the lid, which acts as a condenser, turning the steam into fresh water. Once Diamanti established the fundamentals were sound, he experimented with a series of concepts for the aesthetic of the object. “My goal was to design something friendly and recognizable for the users,” he explains. “The process developed quite naturally to determine the current shape; every detail is there for a reason, so the form, as well as production techniques, represent a compromise between technical and traditional.” While solar stills aren’t a totally new concept, Diamanti says it’s rare to find them in a domestic context rather than in missions or hospitals, or as large plants overseen by qualified personnel that serve entire communities. “I tried to make something for a real household that could be operated directly by the families,” he says. —PreventDisease.com www.earthstarmag.com Earth Star Up Front CoQ10 Improves Symptoms in War Veterans new study found that a moderate dose of CoQ10 improved symptoms of Gulf War illness (such as word recall, fatigue, and irritability) in veterans. A larger dose did not show this effect. CoQ10 and its activated form, ubiquinol, are now among the most popular supplements in the U.S. They may A be useful in treating or preventing a range of conditions including congestive heart failure, migraine headache, high blood pressure, and Parkinson’s disease. CoQ10 and ubiquinol may also reverse side-effects of “statin” drugs and improve “vitality” —although the evidence is not conclusive. —ConsumerLab.com Buried Treasures Pulled from ‘Titanic of Ancient World’ ncient tableware, lead anchors and a giant bronze spear have been recovered during an expedition to the 2,000-year-old Antikythera shipwreck in Greece. The treasure-filled sunken ship was first discovered more than a century ago. Now, undersea excavators who are revisiting the wreck say it actually covers a A much bigger area than expected. “The evidence shows this is the largest ancient shipwreck ever discovered,” Brendan Foley, a marine archaeologist from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Massachusetts, said in a statement. “It’s the Titanic of the ancient world.” [In Photo: Mission to 2,000-Year-Old Antikythera Shipwreck] —LiveScience.com The “Black Knight” Satellite is Transmitting Signals uthors claim that there is a connection between long delayed echos and reports that Nikola Tesla picked up a repeating radio signal in 1899 which he believed was coming from space. The satellite explanation originated in 1954 when newspapers including the St. Louis Post Dispatch and the San Francisco Examiner ran stories attributed to UFO researcher Donald Keyhoe saying that the US Air Force had reported that two satellites orbiting the Earth had been A www.earthstarmag.com detected. At this time no man-made satellites had been launched. In February 1960 there was a further report that the US Navy had detected a dark, tumbling object in an orbit inclined at 79° from the equator with an orbital period of 104.5 minutes. Its orbit was also highly eccentric with an apogee of 1,728 km (1,074 mi) and a perigee of only 216 km (134 mi) At the time the Navy was tracking a fragment of casing from the Discoverer VIII satellite launch which had a very similar orbit. In 1973 the Scottish writer Duncan Lunan analyzed the data from the Norwegian radio researchers, coming to the conclusion that they produced a star chart pointing the way to Epsilon Boötis, a double star in the constellation of Boötes. Lunan’s hypothesis was that these signals were being transmitted from a 12,600 year old object located at one of Earth’s Lagrangian points. An object photographed in 1998 during the STS-88 mission has been widely claimed to be this “alien artefact”. People analyzing these pictures have claimed that it could be the Pakal Spacecraft, a supposed Mayan spacecraft written about by Erich von Daniken Black Knight, also known as the Black Knight satellite, is an alleged object orbiting Earth in near-polar orbit that ufologists and fringe authors believe is approximately 13,000 years old and of extraterrestrial origin. —Before It’s News DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 11 decemBER - january 2015 ard work and purposeful action win the day on December 1st when action planet, Mars, sextiles Saturn. Ambition is stimulated now, so act on business or career options. Do work requiring physical stamina. H When Venus trines expansive Jupiter on the 4th, make time to consider the future, and to review your hopes and wishes. Financial enterprise, foreign investments, and travel are particularly favored now. Seek innovative ways of raising investment capital or of financing a project when the sun trines Uranus also on the 4th. A flash of pure genius could facilitate progress towards a goal or ambition now. Mars enters Aquarius later on the 4th, for the next six weeks, encouraging us to be more organized and to clarify our goals. Pursuits requiring teamwork are supported now. December’s full moon culminates on the 6th, in 15° Gemini. Some may be contemplating a change of surroundings, while it could even be forced upon others. Release whatever or whoever no longer serves you now, particularly in regard to associations that may no longer have relevance. When the sun and Mercury align in conjunction in 17° Sagittarius on the 8th, you’ll be more inclined to express your thoughts and views. This is often a planetary transit that coincides with important announcements. Be on the lookout for business or educational opportunities. Jupiter stations Retrograde later on the 8th, at 22°38' Leo (till April 8th, 2015), a celestial reminder that we will need to exercise greater 12 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 tolerance of others' philosophies and methodologies during the next four months. Consolidate recent gains or business progress. While the truth “out there” may be harder to get at, we would be best served now by seeking our own truths within. Venus enters the serious, business-like realm of Capricorn on the 10th, when business interests may actually have greater appeal than pleasure pursuits. A new source of investment or working capital could appear during this transit, or a present source could dry up. Emotional insecurities could manifest as a desire to go out and shop! Steady progress can be made in business, commerce, and legal affairs when Mercury trines Jupiter on the 12th. However, be aware of the future consequences of your actions now. Get some physical and mental exercise The sun and Jupiter align in a free flowing trine on the 14th, an aspect that favors expanding one's outlook on life, and the pursuit of educational goals. Plan a long-distance business trip, or vacation in search of spiritual knowledge—a pilgrimage or quest, perhaps. Spend time with friends, or participate in uplifting group activities. Reflect on life. Uranus squares Pluto precisely later on the 14th, presaging a period of radical change, extreme behavior, political upheaval, and an acceleration of geophysical turbulence around the planet. Wild and exciting times indeed lay ahead, with disruptions in daily life and routines becoming more commonplace. Mercury enters Capricorn on the 16th (till Jan 4, 2015), when thoughts become more serious and turn toward business, career and practical considerations. Ambition is further fueled, while patience and discipline are easier to come by. Be alert to compulsive behavior when Venus and Pluto align in conjunction on the 20th, in 13° Capricorn. For some, a new love interest or fascination could develop, for others a financial windfall is possible. This aspect is favorable for corporate business interests and joint financial concerns. Powerful energies also exist for healing. The red planet, Mars, sextiles Uranus later on the 20th, a favorable planetary auspices under which to initiate new activities or ventures. Progressive career opportunities may present themselves, perhaps at a party or social gathering. However, be discerning. A good physical workout will help to reduce any stress that may develop. After five months in retrograde, Uranus, planet of innovation, stations Direct on the 21st, in 13° Aries. Ambition is powerfully kindled at this time, and goal setting is favored, while the spirit of innovation abounds. There is also heightened potential for geophysical activity and unstable weather for several days around this potent planetary station. The winter solstice arrives on the 21st. just minutes after the Uranus station, as the sun leaves outgoing Sagittarius and enters the cool, calculating domain of Capricorn, where the creative energies of the sun are constrained, disciplined and focused on achievement in this Saturn-ruled sign. Over the next four weeks, try to get a handle on where you’re going, career-wise, and focus on your professional aspirations. December’s new moon occurs later on the 21st, in 01° Capricorn. With this lunation occurring at the winter solstice, much creative impetus exists for planning practical, /www.earthstarmag.com Down To Earth Astrology ambitious new business ventures now, and in the weeks ahead. A significant shift in the force occurs on December 23rd, when we will have our first taste of Saturn in tropical Sagittarius since its last visit, from 1985 - 1988. It will, however, retrograde back into Scorpio from June 14 to Sept 17, 2015, when it will finally leave Scorpio for the sign of the Archer, where it will remain till 2017. During the ringed planet’s transit here we will be presented with new challenges to overcome, principally in Sagittarius-ruled areas such as truth; freedom; spirituality; higher education; long-distance travel; and communication matters, including control of the press, free speech, and Internet neutrality. People will become more committed to their beliefs, and therefor more willing to fight for what they feel is right. Indeed, the truth shall set you free. Mercury squares Uranus on the 24th, when mechanical or systems failures are possible. Therefore, be sure to back-up data files, or get your vehicle checked out beforehand. Postpone important decisions or signings for a few days, as mental processes may tend to be somewhat erratic. This is a great time to brainstorm, though. Mercury is also conjunct Pluto today, so be aware of all you say and do...thoughts and words have much power! Imagination can be truly inspired when the sun sextiles Neptune on the 26th. Experiment with telepathy or lucid dreaming; try going to bed with the firm knowledge that you will receive an answer to a particular question in your dreams. Mars opposes Jupiter on New Year’s Day, signaling a time for caution, and to examine material motives. Beware of biting off more than you can chew, taking too much for granted, or rushing into new ventures without fully assessing all the ramifications. The wise will exercise moderation in all activities. The Sun squares Uranus on the 3rd, which, potentially, can be a real earth shaker! Flow with any changes in circumstances beyond your control, but this is not the time to rebel, or initiate change based solely upon a desire for greater personal freedom or independence. Nonetheless, creative inspiration abounds now, so tap into it. Venus enters Aquarius on the 3rd (till Jan www.earthstarmag.com 27), a time to be more sociable, and to connect with friends and colleagues. Relationships can take an unconventional twist. Seek financing for an innovative project. Pursue business, educational or creative goals with renewed fervor. When the sun conjuncts distant Pluto precisely later on the 3rd, in 14°Capricorn, willpower and assertiveness are greatly intensified. Watch out for ego clashes, or attempts at coercion now. A glimpse of the darker side of life, or of oneself, could be revealed. Mercury moves on from Capricorn’s realm of rules and tradition into revolutionary Aquarius on the 4th (till Jan 27), a transit especially favorable for creative writing, conceiving progressive ideas, and for the study of metaphysics, science, and astrology. January’s full moon culminates later on the 4th, in 15° Cancer, suggesting that domestic responsibilities may be pressing, while the need to take care of business will also be strong. Strike a healthy balance between home and business or career needs. Mars heads into dreamy Pisces for a sixweek sojourn on the 12th, when unconscious desires are powerfully stimulated. Maintain contact with reality now as strong emotional turbulence and sensitivity could temporarily undermine one’s self-confidence. Mars squares Saturn on the 14th, when the customary vim and vigor conferred by Mars is inhibited by the constraining influence of Saturn. Don’t push too hard now. Be sure to get plenty of rest. Self-discipline may be lacking when Venus opposes Jupiter on the 19th. Beware of pursuing pleasures while duties go unfulfilled. Safeguard your resources, as financial extravagance will be rampant now. In addition, Mars is conjunct Neptune today, so subconscious self-destructive impulses could emerge, giving vent to suppressed anger or repressed escapist tendencies. This is certainly not a good time to make financial decisions! The sun enters forward-looking Aquarius on January 20th, a time to assess whether you’re “up to speed” with the techniques or technologies that can keep you at or get you to the head of the pack in your chosen field. Consider your goals and ambitions over the next four weeks. Are you on target? Align with organizations, groups or friends who share your objectives. January’s new moon on the 20th, in 01° of progressive Aquarius, will inspire bold new objectives in some, while others may find that they require a greater sense of freedom. As all new moons are imbued with the energy and attributes of Aries, new beginnings of one form or another will likely be in the wind. Mercury stations Retrograde on the 21st, in 18° Aquarius (till Feb 11) so plans or arrangements of any importance should be implemented prior to this period. However, while Mercury is retrograde, you may safely make revisions or otherwise go over previously covered territory for inconsistencies or errors. Even with Mercury virtually motionless at present, constructive progress can still be made towards career goals, as the sun and Saturn align in sextile on the 22nd. By being both practical and creative you can achieve tangible results now. If necessary, seek advice from an elder or authority figure. Venus enters Pisces on the 27th, when judgment in business or partnership matters may be below par.. However, aesthetic sensitivity is heightened and intuition is enhanced, while creative inspiration abounds. A momentous sextile (60° aspect) between Mars and Pluto perfects on the 30th. When the god of war and the lord of the underworld get together, highly unstable and volatile conditions can typically exist for a few days, and explosive events are possible. However, as this is a generally harmonious alignment, much potential exists to implement positive changes in one’s life around this juncture. Nonetheless, issues concerning power or willpower are likely to arise, so avoid locking horns with anyone who will surely defend their beliefs as fiercely as you would your own. Constructive activities are strongly favored under this potent planetary influence. Improve efficiency wherever possible. Following is a general overview of how the planetary trends for December/January 2015 apply to each sun sign. If you know your rising sign (Ascendant), read that, too, for additional insights. DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 13 Down To Earth Astrology Aries (March 20—April 19) You’ll be in the mood to broaden your horizons and, more particularly, boost your career potential throughout this forecast period. Indeed, given free rein, there’ll be no holding you back once you get the bit between your teeth. An element of good fortune, too, can help keep the cosmic wind at your back, while doors to new opportunities might now open to you. Connect with groups and individuals who share your goals and interests, and be receptive to tips and advice from those in a position to help you. Make adequate quiet time for yourself during the early weeks of the new year, to recharge your energies, and to review your plans and objectives, to ensure that you’re still on course. Taurus (April 19—May 20) Your ambition is growing by leaps and bounds, and there could be some big changes taking place during this forecast period. Renewal, in preparation for new growth, is a prominent theme in December, when at times you might feel like you’re on an emotional roller coaster. Such can be the intensity and implication of events that transpire now that you sense there’ll be no turning back to the way things were. And that will be just fine with you, as you’re strongly motivated to expand your horizons, and to enhance your prospects for the future. Accept all opportunities to socialize over the Holiday season and in the early weeks of 2015, as there are new friends to be made now, with the potential to connect with like-minded people. For some there could even be a soul mate connection just waiting to happen. Gemini (May 20—June 21) You’ve been giving some serious thought towards ways to enhance your career or business prospects and to that end, a new partnership or alliance might be the most direct way forward. How convenient, then, that fate may likely connect you with someone who can fast track you towards a particular objective; your mission will be to recognize them, and the opportunities they bear, when they show up. This can be a time of great transformation and metamorphosis, especially in your preconceived notions about where your highest potential might lay, and how it could be best expressed. While your interests are varied, there may be one or two that you feel a special affinity for, and it’s one of these that you’re now keen to investigate further, one which could lead you in a very satisfying, and gratifying, professional direction. toward an objective. Cancer (June 21—July22) It may be possible to breathe new life into a once successful career path that has 14 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 remained somewhat dormant of late, but which might once again shortly bear fruit. You become more keenly aware of your health and nutritional needs, especially after the likely excesses of the Holiday season, recognizing that your physical energy levels might be higher, and general fitness improved, as you look to the future with renewed hope, and at the prospect of becoming busier. The potential looks good for financial gain, particularly during January, when a little good fortune could go a long way towards helping you to meet certain financial obligations. Leo (July 22—August 23) You’re in your playful and fun loving element during the Holiday season, which is just as well, as friends and family will be vying for your attention and participation in various activities; and you’re only to happy to oblige. Your creative energies are flowing rather well now, so be sure to channel them into some form of self-expression; writing, music, or singing might feel particularly satisfying, for those inclined. For others, energetic physical activities would be an ideal outlet. A more disciplined health and fitness regime could be on your New Year’s resolution list, which may please a partner or significant other even more than you. Virgo (August 23—September 23) Libra (September 23—October 23) Changes or improvements are afoot on the home front as the Holidays approach, when a spot of nest feathering might be on your agenda. Some may be considering putting down firmer roots, while others could be contemplating a move. There’s a part of you that would secretly love to be having more fun these days, and yet your obligations and sense of duty keep you focused on what you really need to be doing. Indeed, there certainly seems to be enough work to keep you gainfully occupied for a while, with the prospect of even more throughout winter. A need for more security may become evident on different levels, from the desire for a more stable home environment, to a new and improved sense of self worth. You’re keen to leave your own indelible imprint on the world, and on your chosen field of endeavor, be it in the form of a novel, notion, or new philosophy for getting more joy out of life that you feel would benefit humanity. There is so much that you want to express to the world at large, and yet must devise the best method of delivery. Ever fleet of thought, you decide to teach from experience, that is, www.earthstarmag.com Down To Earth Astrology convey what you know, and in an entertaining and efficient way. Be sure, however, to pace yourself in your endeavors, to avoid undue physical or, indeed, mental strain. You may have a long row to hoe, so plan your activities wisely. Scorpio (October 23—November 22) You’re beginning to get more serious about stabilizing your finances, and find ever more creative ways to add to your income. Some notions may be truly inspired, while others a product of your deepest thoughts. Indeed, you’ll have a bountiful supply of bright ideas, some of which could help to bring about new professional possibilities. Your domestic environment could be a hive of activity, from home improvements to worldly endeavors. Therefore, greater effort may be required to maintain emotional equilibrium to avoid conflict with family members. With Saturn leaving your sign and moving into Sagittarius around Christmas, you begin to feel a lightening of the personal load you feel you’ve been carrying these past few years. Sagittarius (November 21—December 21) You feel more focused, more vibrant, and ready to meet life’s challenges head on in December, when new personal objectives may cross your mind. You’re not short of creative ideas, that’s for sure, and one or two of them you might eventually be able to take to the bank. Speaking of bank, consider opening a new savings account; it might help you to be more conscientious about putting a portion of your income to one side for that proverbial rainy day. With Saturn entering your sign over Christmas, entering your solar first house, you will become a lot more conscientious about a good many things over the next couple of years, and as a result will have become a much more substantial individual. Capricorn (December 21—January 19) You’re strongly motivated to move forward with a personal project, one that may, however, require the acquisition of additional funds or resources to make it possible, and timing might also be an issue. You may be looking to create your own “fortress of solitude”, in which you can retreat from the world whenever you want, to feel safe, secure and protected. The fulfillment of a long held professional goal might also be on your agenda. If so, your ruling planet, Saturn’s, entrance into Sagittarius and your solar twelfth house over Christmas will provide you with an able ally in your quest, conferring the mental, emotional and spiritual discipline you will need to remain focused on your objective. www.earthstarmag.com Aquarius (January 19—February 18) You may have several bold, ambitious plans or creative projects on the back burner and are now keen to see them come to the boil, and yet there are elements connected to them that are beyond your immediate control. Meanwhile, review your journey, the chain of events and circumstances that have brought you to this point in time; assimilate what you’ve learned from those experiences into your awareness of where you are, who you are, and what you hope to accomplish moving forward. The benefits of this process will shortly become apparent, when you get the green light to proceed with a professional venture, and feel all the better equipped to handle the new set of challenges and responsibilities that will likely come your way. Pisces (February 18—March 20) You may feel like you’re approaching the end of a steep learning curve in life, during which you’ve been challenged to grow and develop in ways you would have scarcely imagined years ago. As a result, you feel more confident about tackling a new and ambitious professional opportunity that suddenly appears on your radar, perhaps inspiring a bold new objective. Your hopes and dreams for the future are still very much alive; you’d also like to leave your enduring mark on the world, but are not exactly sure what that might look like. As you change, your values and priorities also change, which can directly influence your goals. A little soul searching might be called for now. Tim Gunns is an astrological consultant, conference coordinator and producer, and formerly program director of the Los Angeles Conscious Life Expo, and the national Whole Life Expos. Tim prepares personalized no-nonsense interpretations of Natal Horoscopes ($40), Future Forecast Transit Reports ($75 for 1 full year), and Relationship Compatibility Reports ($45). Shipping is free. Send: Name (as you'd like it to appear on the chart), Date of Birth, Time (as close as possible), Place of Birth (city/country, etc.) for each person, and your return address, phone# and check to: Tim Gunns, c/o 110 Hilltop Drive, Waynesville NC 28786. 828-452-7885. Consultations by phone may also be scheduled. Payment can be made via Paypal to [email protected] http://www.earthstarmag.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 15 R h y t h m Alchemy By Martin Ivanov Motion is the significance of life, and the law of motion is rhythm. Rhythm is life disguised in motion, and in every guise it seems to attract the attention of man: from a child, who is pleased with the moving of a rattle and is soothed by the swing of its cradle, to a grown person whose every game, sport and enjoyment has rhythm disguised in it in some way or another —H A Z R A T I N A Y A T K H A N 13 hat is rhythm? According to the Encyclopaedia Columbia, rhythm is the basic element in music. It is connected with time, linked to the duration of sounds and their arrangement and emphasis, whether chaotic or organized, in straight and symmetric models. The western European tact system and its notation began with the formulation of rhythmic models at the end of the 17th century. The explanation of the word continues in the same style. It is explained from a purely musical point of view, ie., that rhythm is linked primarily with music. There is no doubt that most of us accept rhythm with its musical nuance, in the way in which it affects our mood or in the way in which we react to it with our bodies. This fact may sound strange and contradictory, since in the history W 16 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 of the universe and humanity, rhythm has existed in all forms long before the conscious creation and understanding of music. What word did they use before the advent of music to refer to and designate the cyclical nature and frequency of events in ancient times? The etymology of the word “rhythm” is rooted in some of the most ancient languages: ancient Greek (ritmos) and Latin (ritmus). It is clear that in the distant past people did not have the same understanding of rhythm, which we have created over time. The word rhythm was equivalent to motion and time, while for us today the words rhythm and time have somewhat different meanings. While time is a phenomenon, which allows mankind to register the changes in the environment and the universe, rhythm is more closely connected to music and the changes and frequencies contained therein. Is it indeed possible to merge the meaning of these two words? Most contemporary scientific, esoteric and psychological literature views time not as a fact but rather a concept or an idea. Even quantum physicists do not use the word time. They refer to the space-time continuum. Dr. Deepak Chopra in his book, Power, Freedom and Grace writes: Time is an illusion; it is an internal dialogue, which we use to explain our sense or perception of change and connection. At the same time, in the same book and in many other works, rhythm is treated as an absolute fact. However, since it is also connected with time it should also be unreal. Thus if we as human beings are structured in such a way as to accept the space time continuum in a certain way, then is the sequence of the seasons a real phenomenon, are days and nights, high and low tides, bird and fish migration real phenomena? What is used to measure them? Who measures them? Only us as humans? Both the cosmic and the individual reason possess conscious knowledge: ie., not only we, but the Sun, Moon, Stars, Earth, Animals, Fish, Insects and Plants think and possess awareness. If we as people have such an illusory notion of time, how do the Sun, Moon and stars influence with such great accuracy the world’s oceans and create the rhythms of the high and low tides? How does the Earth rotate at a specific speed to create a twenty-four-hour cycleof day and night we refer to as the circadian rhythm? How does the mutually interdependent rhythm of the Sun, Moon and Earth create the Lunar Rhythm, which represents a cycle of 28 days? How does the grunion fish make its way to a specific place (Newport Beach, California), exactly at midnight on a precise day of the year, creating the rhythm of their migration? Is time really a fruit of our illusory notions? Clearly since all the events in the lives of planets, animals and plants happen with such precision, they must measure the rhythm of their lives using the expressive resources of time. The clock—the main spokesperson of time—measures every second with perfect precision and gives form to time with equally spaced ticking. If time did not exist, rhythm would not exist or vice versa. Excerpted with permission from Rhythm Alchemy, by Martin Ivanov, published by Findhorn Press, http://www.findhornpress.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 17 Winter Reading A Book of Miracles Inspiring True Stories of Healing, Gratitude, and Love By Dr. Bernie S. Siegel Bernie Siegel first wrote about miracles when he was a practicing surgeon and founded Exceptional Cancer Patients, a groundbreaking synthesis of group, individual, dream, and art therapy that provided patients with a “carefrontation.” Compiled during his more than thirty years of practice, speaking, and teaching, the stories in these pages are riveting, warm, and belief expanding. Their subjects include a girl whose baby brother helped her overcome anorexia, a woman whose cancer helped her heal by teaching her to stand up for herself, and a family that was saved from a burning house by bats. Without diminishing the reality of pain and hardship, the stories show real people turning crisis into blessing by responding to adversity in ways that empower and heal. They demonstrate what we are capable of and show us that we can achieve miracles as we confront life’s difficulties. New World Library. Paperback, $14.95. Healing Crystals (2nd edition) The A - Z Guide to 555 Gemstones By Michael Gienger This 2nd updated edition is based on new findings in mineralogy and new experiences and research results in the field of gem therapy, including information for an additional 125 crystals not present in the 1st edition, some of which that have been discovered in recent years. With Healing Crystals, Michael Gienger presents a comprehensive directory of all the gemstones currently in use in crystal healing. Clear, concise and precise in style, with photographs of each of the crystals accompanying the text, he describes the characteristics and healing functions of each crystal. All the important information about 555 healing gemstones in a neat pocket-book! Though it may appear small, it encompasses the contents of a whole encyclopedia. Findhorn Press. Paperback, $9.95. The Real Brass Ring Change Your Life Course Now By Dianne Bischoff James The Real Brass Ring takes The Secret on a high-speed road test in a tale of midlife transformation in the real, flesh-and-blood world of contemporary Chicago. It is the story of a “midlife reboot,” a raw, unfiltered journey of enlightenment that illustrates a woman’s daunting personal reinvention and the rewards of fearlessly pursuing a life’s true calling. After a jolting encounter with internationally known psychic and author Sonia Choquette, Dianne Bischoff James is forced to face the truth about her life. Turning Stone Press. Paperback, $19.95. 18 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 Akashic Alphabet By Trenace Rose Within the akasha, the space between matter, lies a treasure trove of memories known as the akashic records, containing a history of the infinite, stored from the origins of time. The wisdom from this resonating, energetic heart, whose fabric connects all humanity, life-forms and elements, is accessible to all with pure intention, through meditation. Akashic Alphabet is received from the akashic records, housed within the space of the collective mind, the cosmic container of all that is and ever has been. This thought-provoking series of vision narratives coupled with acutely sensitive Illustrations painted by a Master Artist, conveys diverse cultural and spiritual philosophies from around the world, revealing a graceful connection of Oneness in all. Dementi Milestone Publishing. Hardcover, $38.95. The Psychic & Spiritual Awareness Manual A guide to DIY enlightenment By Kevin West Aimed at people who wish to develop their psychic and spiritual awareness in a very practical way, each chapter deals with a separate aspect of development and also acts as a diagnostic empowering tool. It is based around the Spiritualist and New Age approach to full realisation, and filled with helpful exercises and hands-on techniques designed to empower the reader. Chapters include healing, meditation, psychic awareness, clairvoyance, psychometry, scrying, colours, auras and their energies, and much more. 6th Books. Paperback, $14.95. The DNA Field and the Law of Resonance Creating Reality through Conscious Thought By Pierre Franckh Taking the law of attraction to an entirely new level, Pierre Franckh reveals how human DNA has a direct effect on the physical world around us--an effect we can consciously focus to manifest our desires. Sharing groundbreaking experiments on the influence of DNA on photons and on the interactions between emotions and DNA, Franckh explains how our thoughts, emotions, and beliefs, whether positive or negative, build a field of resonance around us. Through this quantum field, our DNA is continuously communicating our unique vibration to those around us, and receiving their unique oscillations in return. By focusing our intentions and removing negativity from our beliefs about ourselves, our past, and our future, we can use our DNA to communicate our thoughts and desires to the universe. Through focused thoughts and intentions we draw the same resonant energy to us, thus bringing our intentions and desires into manifestation. Destiny Books. Paperback, $16.95. www.earthstarmag.com Winter Reading Strange Electromagnetic Dimensions The Science of the Unexplainable By Louis Proud We live in an environment permeated by both natural and artificial sources of electromagnetic energy, while we ourselves are electromagnetic beings. As we continue to pollute and thereby alter our electromagnetic environment, we are also altering ourselves. In particular, these changes infringe on the psychic side of our being. This exciting and controversial new title shows how all things, from the mundane to the mysterious, are tied together by a vast—and largely invisible—electromagnetic web. It examines ESP, poltergeist disturbances, psychokinesis, electric people, UFOs, and other paranormal phenomena from an electromagnetic perspective. It also reveals how the artificial, alien energies we’ve been introducing into our environment shape the way we experience the paranormal. New Page Books. Paperback, $16.99. New Slow City Living Simply in the World’s Fastest City By William Powers Burned-out after years of doing development work around the world, William Powers spent a season in a 12-foot-by-12-foot cabin off the grid in North Carolina, as recounted in his award-winning memoir Twelve by Twelve. Could he live a similarly minimalist life in the heart of New York City? To find out, Powers and his wife jettisoned 80 percent of their stuff, left their 2,000-square-foot Queens townhouse, and moved into a 350-square-foot “micro-apartment” in Greenwich Village. Powers explores the viability of Slow Food and Slow Money, technology fasts and urban sanctuaries. Discovering a colorful cast of New Yorkers attempting to resist the culture of Total Work, Powers offers an inspiring exploration for anyone trying to make urban life more people- and planet-friendly. New World Library. Paperback, $15.95. Your Hidden Riches Unleashing the Power of Ritual to Create a Life of Meaning and Purpose By Janet Bray Attwood, Chris Attwood and Sylva Dvorak, Ph.D Passion Test comes a book that will teach readers to harness the power of ritual to unlock their unique gifts and create a life of love, wealth, and happiness. Rituals are the common feature of every ancient culture on Earth. Yet, modern society has lost touch with the power and value of ritual to create a rhythm for daily life, balance, and a connection with others. In the process, many of us have lost touch with ourselves. Your Hidden Riches is a call to reignite the power of personal and community rituals--to sustain us in the midst of an ever-increasing onslaught of information and expectations, and to sustain our world by reawakening the awareness of our interconnection with all life. Harmony Books. Hardcover, $25.00. www.earthstarmag.com Of Course! How Many Light Bulbs Does It Take to Change? By Ian Patrick In Of Course!, Ian Patrick discusses some of the toughest challenges known to students of A Course in Miracles: facing the deaths of loved ones; letting go of long-held grievances; trying to comprehend Nelson Mandela meeting the Spice Girls; and much more. In this new edition, O-Books presents the best of Ian’s insights and personal reflections in one volume, selected from over 100 editions of the UK’s highly respected Course periodical, Miracle Worker. From the lighthearted to the profound, these short essays reveal the down-to-earth illumination of a dedicated Course student who "remembers to laugh" at the ego - and who understands the everyday joys and difficulties of working miracles. O-Books. Paperback, $18.95. The Immortal Mind Science and the Continuity of Consciousness beyond the Brain By Ervin Laszlo with Anthony Peake Based on a new scientific paradigm in sync with experience-based spirituality, Ervin Laszlo and Anthony Peake explore how consciousness is continually present in the cosmos and can exist without connection to a living organism. They examine the rapidly growing body of scientific evidence supporting the continuity of consciousness, including neardeath experiences, after-death communication, reincarnation, and neurosensory information received in altered states. They explain how the persistence of consciousness beyond the demise of the body means that, in essence, we are not mortal—....we continue to exist even when our physical existence has come to an end. This correlates precisely with cutting-edge physics, which posits that things in our plane of time and space are not intrinsically real but are manifestations of a hidden dimension where they exist in the form of superstrings, information fields, and energy matrices. Inner Traditions. Paperback, $16.95. The Case of the Disappearing Cancer And other stories of illness and healing, life and death By Louis Heyse-Moore Everyone has experienced some suffering in their life, often through illness, and, of course, everyone wants to heal. This is a book about healing based on Louis Heyse-Moore’s forty years of experience as a doctor, counsellor and a Somatic Experiencing trauma therapist. The author believes healing is much more than just physical cure. Over the many years that he has worked with ill people, it has become obvious to him that their body, mind and spirit are all affected when they are sick. Many doctors are excellent at treating and curing physical illnesses but may miss the other aspects of healing. The Case of the Disappearing Cancer attempts to redress the balance. AYNI Books. Paperback, $24.95. DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 19 Walking Home Pilgrimage from Humbled to Healed By Sonia Choquette Life was falling apart. Within the space of three years, Sonia Choquette had suffered the unexpected death of two close family members, seen her marriage implode, and been let down by trusted colleagues. And sympathy was not forthcoming. “You’re a worldrenowned spiritual teacher and intuitive guide,” people jeered. “How could you not have seen this coming?” Having intuitive abilities didn’t make her superhuman, however. Nor did it exempt her from being wounded or suffering the pain of loss and the consequences of our all-toohuman traits such as anger, resentment, and pride-traits that can lead even the best of us to stray from our spiritual path. In order to regain her spiritual footing, Sonia turned to the age-old practice of pilgrimage and set out to walk the legendary Camino de Santiago, an 820-kilometer trek over the Pyrenees and across northern Spain. Day after day she pushed through hunger, exhaustion, and pain to reach her destination. Eventually, mortification of the flesh gave way to spiritual renewal, and she rediscovered the gifts of humility and forgiveness that she needed to repair her world. Hay House. Hardcover, $26.95. Death, the Last God A Modern Book of the Dead By Anne Geraghty Anne Geraghty was a clinical psychologist and psychotherapist when her son, Tim Guest, author of My Life in Orange died suddenly. Her old life ended. She went on a search for her lost son. Where was he? Did he live on in some other realm? Or had he fallen into the darkness of oblivion? Her search for Tim became an exploration into the nature of death itself. We die as we have lived. Our lives are not like those of a C12th Tibetan, a C15th Cardinal or a Zen monk; we cannot, therefore, simply turn to old maps and myths of what happens when we die. We need a new narrative of death that embraces our modern understandings of our humanity and the workings of the universe. This book is an investigation into death in our modern world, and an exploration of our struggles to live well in the ever-present shadow of death, which offers fresh and original ideas about death and dying. O-Books. Paperback, $22.95. The Alchemy of Self Healing A Revolutionary 30-Day Plan to Change How You Relate to Your Body and Health By Jeannine Wiest We have more power to heal ourselves than we have been led to believe. Your body is “Instant Messaging” you all the time. These messages contain a unique cellular treasure waiting to be accessed. The discovery that your body (not your mind) is listening to you will transform your life. Your mind runs old programs, “defaults” to all that is familiar in your life, even when what’s familiar is pain. The Alchemy of Self Healing will show you how to tap into your body wisdom that craves health and joy. Take the Alchemy Quiz, follow the exercises, read the essays. At the end of 30 days, when you retake the quiz, you’ll discover you have new resources and tools at your fingertips. New Page Books. Paperback, $15.99. 20 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 Rebel Angels in Exile Pleiadians, Watchers, and the Spiritual Quickening of Humanity By Timothy Wyllie After the angelic rebellion 203,000 years ago, Earth and 36 other planets were quarantined from the larger Multiverse. Despite aligning with Lucifer and the rebel angels, Georgia—an angel of Seraphic status—was permitted to remain on Earth and continue her role as a Watcher. In this book, Georgia, writing together with Timothy Wyllie, shares her personal account of half a million years on this planet. Focusing this volume 38,000 years after the angelic rebellion, Georgia shares her experiences being present for key decisions taken by the rebel angel leadership, witnessing firsthand Earth’s steady descent into darkness, ignorance, and confusion. She explores the supreme significance of the Earth as a world on which the rebel angels have been accorded the privilege of mortal incarnation and as an arena for accelerating spiritual growth. Bear & Company. Paperback, $20.00. Rewilding Our Hearts Building Pathways of Compassion and Coexistence By Marc Bekoff In wildlife conservation, rewilding refers to restoring habitats and creating corridors between preserved lands to allow declining populations to rebound. Marc Bekoff, one of the world’s leading animal experts and activists, here applies rewilding to human attitudes. Rewilding Our Hearts invites readers to do the essential work of becoming reenchanted with the world, acting from the inside out, and dissolving false boundaries to truly connect with both nature and themselves. New World Library. Paperback, $14.95. Voices of the Sacred Feminine Conversations to Re-Shape Our World Edited by Rev. Dr. Karen Tate Most of us have come to realize patriarchy—rule by a male-dominated society revering solely a male God—is not working for Mother Earth or most of the people on the planet. How do we counter beliefs that there is no option but the authoritarian father? How does society go about making a course correction? How do ideas that permeate every level of society from womb to tomb, boardroom to bedroom, voting booth to the workplace shift into a more fair, equal, and just world of partnership, sharing, caring and peace? Those are exactly the questions discussed on the long-running radio show, Voices of the Sacred Feminine, hosted by Rev. Dr. Karen Tate, dedicated to the Sacred Feminine as deity, archetype and ideal. If we can imagine it, vision it, and restore ancient truths then we can manifest it! Here are solutions from these visionaries, scholars, wayshowers, foremothers and activists— women and men— dedicated to reshaping our world. Changemakers Books. Paperback, $24.95 www.earthstarmag.com The Science and Practice of Humility The Path to Ultimate Freedom By Jason Gregory Foreword by Daniel Reid From Krishna and Lao-tzu to Buddha and Jesus, each enlightened master discovered how being receptive to all experience was the key to becoming one with the universe and its spontaneous patterns of order and chaos. Revealing humility as the purest expression of this receptivity, Jason Gregory integrates classic teachings of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Hermeticism with principles from quantum physics to explain the science of humility as practiced by the ancient masters. Inner Traditions. Paperback, $16.95. Depression Understanding the Black Dog By Stephanie Sorrell Having suffered from major depression for much of her life, Stephanie Sorrell has learned to work with the disease rather than against it. Where so many mental-health books feature ‘fighting and overcoming‘ depression, her experience and understanding have enabled her to see the value of the condition rather than what it can take away. In this easy-to-read introduction to depression, Stephanie shows the various ways in which it manifests, what is available on a natural as well as chemical level and how the diversity of psychological therapies serve and hold depression. There is also a spiritual thread running throughout which invites the reader to go further. Psyche Books. Paperback, $11.95. DMT and the Soul of Prophecy A New Science of Spiritual Revelation in the Hebrew Bible By Rick Strassman, M.D. After completing his groundbreaking research chronicled in DMT: The Spirit Molecule, Rick Strassman was left with one fundamental question: What does it mean that DMT, a simple chemical naturally found in all of our bodies, instantaneously opens us to an interactive spirit world that feels more real than our own world? Examining medieval commentaries on the Hebrew Bible, Strassman reveals how Jewish metaphysics provides a top-down model for both the prophetic and DMT states, a model he calls “theoneurology.” Theoneurology bridges biology and spirituality by proposing that the Divine communicates with us using the brain, and DMT--whether naturally produced or ingested--is a critical factor in such visionary experience. This model provides a counterpoint to “neurotheology,” which proposes that altered brain function simply generates the impression of a Divine-human encounter. The Light: A Book of Wisdom How to Lead an Enlightened Life Filled with Love, Joy, Truth, and Beauty By Keidi Keating This powerful book contains chapters by 22 of the world’s leading luminaries in the field of personal development and spiritual transformation, including bestselling authors Neale Donald Walsch (Conversations With God) and Don Miguel Ruiz (The Four Agreements). Covering topics from co-creating a peaceful world, forgiveness, healing, and finding purpose and happiness, to chapters about health, well-being, destiny, and the mysteries of kundalini, The Light also includes practical exercises and guidance, empowering readers to achieve their greatest potential. New Page Books. Paperback, $16.99. Metrophage A Novel By Richard Kadrey The cult-classic dystopian cyberpunk tale from New York Times bestselling author Richard Kadrey, after twenty years, now back in print in a special signed, collectible edition. Welcome to our future: L.A. in the late twentyfirst century—a segregated city of haves and have-nots, where morality is dead and technology rules. Here, a small wealthy group secludes themselves in gilded cages. Beyond their high-security compounds, far from their pretty comforts, lies a lawless wasteland where the angry masses battle hunger, rampant disease, and their own despair in order to survive. Jonny was born into this Hobbesian paradise. A streetwise hustler who deals drugs on the black market—narcotics that heal the body and cool the mind—he looks out for nobody but himself. Until a terrifying plague sweeps through L.A., wreaking death and panic, and no one, not even a clever operator like Jonny, is safe. Harper Voyager. Paperback, $14.99. Vibrant Emeritus The Elder in the Twenty-First Century By Richard Stuecker Enter the second half of your life journey with vibrancy, generativity, creativity and blessing! One’s second half of life can be an amazing adventure of abundance, generativity, and deepening spirituality. Vibrant Emeritus: The Elder in the Twenty-First Century offers a path. that embraces a view of life that counters the belief that one’s "second journey" is one of dissipation and disappointment, focusing on the transitions men and women make in the “Second Journey” they make in their lives after 50. O-Books. Paperback, $19.95. Park Street Press. Paperback, $19.95. www.earthstarmag.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 21 Discover the Benefits of K - L a s e r Class 4 L a s e r T h e r a p y Treatments By Dr. Joseph Mercola aser therapy is still a fairly unknown 21st century treatment modality that can have profound benefits for pain management and tissue healing. Dr. Phil Harrington was a high school physics teacher and was trained at Palmer College of Chiropractic as a chiropractic physician. He ran a chiropractic office in a small town in Iowa for 10 years prior to becoming the first employee of KLaser USA1 —a company that manufactures high-grade medical laser equipment. There are a number of companies that manufacture lasers for tissue healing but K-Laser is currently the leading manufacturer of these types of lasers. L 22 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 What You Need to Know About Lasers Lasers are classified according to their power output: • Class 3a—maximum of 5 milliwatts of power (standard laser pointer) • Class 3b—maximum of 500 milliwatts/0.5 watts • Class 4—anything over 500 milliwatts/0.5 watts The most significant issue with the clinical use of lasers is the depth of penetration. Some practitioners make the mistake of using low-power Class 3 lasers, which basically amounts to a standard laser pointer. Most class 3a lasers only use a red wavelength – 635 www.earthstarmag.com nanometers in the visible red. When you look at the depth of penetration with laser, red laser light only penetrates about one to two millimeters (far less than 1/8 inch) into the human body. Granted, red laser is highly useful for treating superficial wounds, cuts, abrasions, and perhaps even for the treatment of vitiligo, but they will not penetrate far enough for deep seated pain reduction. However, infrared lasers (around 800 nanometers) penetrate far deeper and able to go several centimeters, into your body which will reach most tissue injuries. Power is also another crucial factor when it comes to laser therapy. Power is measured in watts, and you can think of it as the brightness of the light. A higher-powered laser is a brighter light, and it can produce more energy per unit of time. When it comes to doing laser therapy treatment, a higher-powered laser (Class 4) provides two benefits: • A therapeutic dose of laser light can be applied to a much larger volume of tissue • By shining that brighter light at the surface, photons of light are able to penetrate deeper into the tissues, which allows you to treat deep-seated pain conditions Health Benefits of K-Laser Class 4 Laser Therapy Basically, three things happen during K-Laser treatment. First, infrared laser therapy treatment helps reduce pain, reduce inflammation, and enhance tissue healing—both www.earthstarmag.com in hard and soft tissues, including muscles, ligaments, or even bones. “When we look at the basic mechanism of how it works, we are enhancing the microcirculation. We are getting more red blood cells flowing to the area,” Dr. Harrington explains. “But it’s not just the arterial blood supply to the area; we are enhancing the venous and the lymphatic return from the area. We’re also increasing oxygenation of those tissues. We are stimulating the hemoglobin molecule to dump off oxygen at the treatment site, so we are increasing the oxygenation of those tissues.” Finally, the treatment stimulates the cytochrome oxidase enzyme in the cells’ mitochondria. This is really one of the key discoveries in the whole science of laser therapy. Specifically, injured cells are targeted because damaged cells are more readily accepting of photons of light, whereas healthy cells don’t need this extra energy. “By stimulating the cytochrome oxidase enzyme, we are utilizing that oxygen in the respiratory chain inside of the mitochondria, producing more ATP for that cell. So regardless of what kind of cell it is, it’s going to function at a higher level. Now, we are not turbocharging. We’re not making your body do anything that it could not normally do. We’re just facilitating the process. We are helping those cells produce the energy that they normally would, so they can function as they normally should,” he explains. Now, lasers are also used in other areas of medicine, specifically in surgical interventions where they’re used for cutting, removing tattoos, and a lot of other dermatological applications. But the class 4 K-Laser does not do that. The K-Laser can produce up to 15 watts, and the laser light is allowed to diffuse to a spot size about that of a quarter, whereas ablative lasers, the ones used for DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 23 surgical cutting, are closer to 100 watts, and the laser light is focused to a tiny spot size. “The interaction that we’re getting in the body with the K-Laser is called a photochemical reaction,” Dr. Harrington explains. “By shining that light on a tissue, we are getting that ATP energy produced, whereas your surgical lasers, hair removal lasers, or tattoo removal lasers, are designed to cut or ablate the tissues. They have a very, very high-powered density, a very high concentration on that laser.” The infrared wavelengths used in the K-Laser allow for targeting specific areas of the body. The K-Laser is unique in that it is the only Class 4 therapy laser that utilizes these three infrared wavelengths, allowing for deep penetration into the body to reach areas such as your spine and hip (the K-Laser also has a 100-milliwatt, 660-nanometer visible red which, again, is excellent for superficial wounds): • 800 nanometers penetrates the deepest, and is at a peak of absorption for the cytochrome oxidase enzyme • 905 nanometers most efficiently targets the hemoglobin molecule • 970 nanometers most efficiently stimulates microcirculation in the tissues surgery and virtually has no side effects, unlike surgery. Class 4 laser therapy can be effectively combined with a number of other treatment modalities, including various soft tissue mobilization techniques. Ideally, your doctor would do the K-Laser treatment before they do those soft tissue techniques. “Another technique or modality that it’s used together with [laser therapy] is spinal decompression. When a person has a bulging or a herniated disc, by running the laser on the lower back, we are reducing the inflammation internally; we are reducing the cytokines (the tissue irritants in the body), and we are helping to stimulate the blood flow in the area to help that decompression treatment help to heal up that damaged disc,” Dr. Harrington says. “Another interesting area—this is one that we’re just at the forefront of—is both human and animal practitioners are using the laser together with either the platelet-rich plasma injections or with stem cell therapy. We’re just at the beginning of discovering the benefits of those things together.” Examples of the types of injuries that this kind of laser therapy can be helpful for include: • Acute injuries, such as strains, sprains, and shoulder injuries • Repetitive-use injuries such as carpal tunnel syndrome • Traumatic injuries, such as post-motor vehicle accident with cervical strain/sprain • Chronic issues such as frozen shoulder and arthritis To me, at this point in time, it would almost be med- Try Infrared Laser Therapy BEFORE You Consider Surgery For Many Acute Injuries You can have the best diet and exercise program in the world, but as most of us are painfully aware, it doesn’t take much to develop an injury from an accident that you were not responsible for. Many times surgery will be recommended to repair or replace joints. There are certainly many times when surgery is appropriate and needs to be performed and we should be VERY grateful we have access to this tool, but more often than not it is inappropriately recommended because of lack of awareness of other effective options, including the healing power of lasers. The laser is typically a tiny fraction of the cost of 24 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com ical negligence bordering on medical malpractice not to try laser treatment before prescribing drugs or surgery. We know Vioxx killed 60,000 people, and that was just an anti-inflammatory, which doesn’t in any way, shape, or form treat the cause of the problem. It was just a symptomatic Band Aid that killed 60,000 people. Similarly, the effects of surgery are typically irreversible, for better or worse. “The Class 4 K-Laser treatments are amazing. They are so effective at treating a wide variety of conditions, whether it is soft-tissue injuries, acute injuries, or nerve damage,” Dr. Harrington says. “For example, we have a gentleman from the Twin Cities who was so successful at treating diabetic neuropathy that he has franchised a chain of treatment centers where the only condition they treat is diabetic neuropathy, and the K-Laser is a keystone in their treatment plan. K-Laser treatments virtually have no side effects. When we talk a little bit about how the laser works, one effect that we’re getting is vasodilation of the tissues and also a lot of release of the tissue irritants in the area. If we’re treating a patient that has a lot of myofascial trigger points, a lot of metabolic waste products, and we give them a K-Laser treatment, a couple of hours afterwards they might be a little bit sore. It’s absolutely not any tissue damage going on; it’s because we’re causing the release of all of those metabolic waste products that were locked up in the muscle... Just [drink] a little bit of extra water to help flush that out.” heating for temporary relief of muscle spasms and joint stiffness. Even so, the vast majority of people seeking laser therapy do present pain as a symptom. It’s just that the laser actually has beneficial effects over and beyond what the FDA recognizes. While there are a couple of over-the-counter lasers available, they are very low in power and will not be able to provide deep-seated pain relief. The K-Laser and other higher-powered lasers are prescription medical devices cleared for sale to and use by trained health professionals only. “As far as training someone in using the machine, we give them all of the scientific information in what we call online modules, where they watch laser therapy science, physiology, and safety, after which they take a certification exam. We also supply different training materials whether it’s booklets, DVDs, or webinars,” Dr. Harrington says. The training modules take about three hours to complete. Anyone who buys a K-Laser unit gets onsite training by K-Laser USA, which is typically a four-hour training session, reviewing the proper use of the machine and how to treat different conditions. Before Drugs and Surgery, Consider Giving Laser Therapy a Try... I have successfully treated a large number of friends and professional associates with the K-Laser and have been very impressed. For example, the person who helps me with my organic landscaping. I noticed he was walking with a limp and I thought it was a result of a tree we just had planted. It turns out it was related to chronic crippling pain he had in his ankle for over ten years. He had merely endured this terrible pain for over a decade. I gave him one three minute treatment and it was virtually removed. He had a slight recurrence several weeks later and I gave him another one and he has been pain free for months. A typical treatment session can take anywhere from five to twenty minutes, dependent on your injury or condition. FDA Clearance of K-Laser All therapy lasers are FDA-cleared medical devices, including the K-Laser. Interestingly, the FDA does not recognize the biostimulatory effects of laser therapy. They see it simply as an infrared-heating device. So if you were to look up the FDA clearance for the K-Laser, you’d find it described as an infrared lamp for topical www.earthstarmag.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 25 “Your shortest treatments could be some of the jaw issues, something fairly superficial, or treating a fairly small area. That would be three to three and a half minutes. And then on the other side of the spectrum, if we are doing either a disc herniation or a diabetic neuropathy, where we’re wanting to treat the lower back and all the way down the leg, that could be 12, 15, to 20 minutes of treatment time,” Dr. Harrington says. In terms of how many treatments will be required before the actual condition is resolved or the pain relief is really achieved, this can vary widely, depending on your condition. Typically, pain relief will be achieved long before the condition itself is healed, so it’s important to remember that the absence of pain does not equal the presence of health. According to Dr. Harrington, the vast majority of conditions require six to 12 treatments over a two- to four-week period of time. As for cost, the nationwide range varies from $25 to $150 dollars, but most practitioners will charge around $40-65 per treatment. “When you look at a pain condition that you’ve been suffering from for years, and you can get it resolved with just a few hundred dollars’ worth of KLaser treatments, that’s well worth it,” Dr. Harrington says. 26 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 Humans aren’t the only ones that can benefit from laser therapy. Veterinarians are able to use medical devices as they see fit, and some veterinarians, especially holistic vets like Dr. Karen Becker, swear by laser therapy. “Yes, it’s going to work for any of the arthritic conditions—hip dysplasia, intervertebral disc disease in dachshunds, for example. Looking at the little dachshund (where the pet owner had brought him in, planning to put him down because his back legs were useless) get a few K-Laser treatments, and the little dog is up and running around again. Some of those stories are really heartwarming,” Dr. Harrington says. The K-Laser website2 (K-LaserUSA.com) lists trained K-Laser Providers—both human medical and veterinary medical providers. I was so impressed with the healing potential of the K-Laser that I obtained one for my personal use. I realize how fragile our bodies are and how easily they can become injured, and I simply did not want to not have access to this marvelous healing tool. I also thoroughly enjoy helping my friends and family eliminate pain from injuries they encounter. Dr. Mercola is the founder of the world’s most visited natural health web site, http://www.Mercola.com. You can learn the hazardous side effects of OTC Remedies by getting a FREE copy of his latest special report The Dangers of Over the Counter Remedies by going to his Report Page. www.earthstarmag.com The following is an excerpt from Walking Home, A Pilgrimage from Humbled to Healed by Sonia Choquette. It is published by Hay House (Sept 2014) and is available at all bookstores and online at http://www.hayhouse.com W alking Home Da y 25 R a banal to Ponf er r ada (32 km) By Sonia Choquette woke up early this morning, ready to begin the long ascent up to Cruz Ferro. I knew it was going to be a long, rigorous walk today so I layered up and stuffed two of my last now six remaining power bars into Pilgrim, just to be prepared for what lay ahead. I then packed up Cheater and headed down to the first floor. I managed to get Cheater down to the second floor when an Argentinean biker saw me struggling, so took him from me and carried him down. It was a good start to the day. After a quick breakfast of coffee and toast and a glass of fresh orange juice, I asked for a stamp for my passport and went back up to my room to grab my poles, Gumby, and Pilgrim. I then pulled on my wool cap, my gloves, pulled my headscarf over my ears, and stepped out into a stiff, frigid wind under dark cold skies. I was ready to go. I www.earthstarmag.com Holy Mother God, Please let me release all my burdens at the top. Even the ones I still want to hold on to. Amen and thank you in advance. The steep walk challenged my knee from the first step, but I just kept going. As I climbed, one slow step at a time, I reflected once again on just exactly what was burdening me, as I really wanted to be sure I didn’t forget something. I had come too far on this pilgrimage to miss the opportunity before me. The top notes of my thoughts cited the usual complaints: too much work, responsibility for what is not mine, years of what I felt were unfair experiences, not feeling loved and appreciated as I had wanted to be. It was nothing new. Yet, the more I walked, the more apparent it became DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 27 to me that while those were things that made me unhappy, they were not at the root of what burdened me. What burdened me most has been my own fear and anger, even rage over these things and more. I’ve been burdened by not trusting others to be good to me. I have been burdened by the belief that I could trust only myself to be responsible and then made choices to support that belief. I’d been burdened by the false belief that I had to work and never stop because I was taught that working hard is what love looks like. I was burdened by the belief that I had no right to the full range of my feelings or to healthy boundaries. I was burdened with resentment and bitterness over things past. These were the real burdens in my life and what I wanted to unload from my heart. It wasn’t what had happened, or who made it happen that burdened me. It was my own emotional confusion and lack of forgiveness toward all that pained me that weighed so heavily on my heart and kept me from being happy and peaceful today. The climb was intense and I was shocked at how cold it was outside. But I didn’t mind. After a few hours I came across a small café and decided to stop and warm up. My fingers were freezing and I was getting very hungry, my breakfast longed ago burned off. When I stepped inside I was surprised to see so many familiar pilgrims standing around a roaring fire in the fireplace in the middle of a large room. Clint and 28 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 Dean were there. So were Hans and Peter, and Linda. I also saw Victoria from last night but I didn’t see her son, Eric anywhere. I asked about him and she rolled her eyes. “I left him behind this morning,” she said. “I had to. We have been fighting since we started the Camino. In fact, I think that is what I am here to unburden myself from today. His control and neediness are strangling me. I needed to get away, so I told him I would meet him in Santiago if he makes it.” I applauded her decision and wished her a “Buen Camino” as she stepped past me and out into the cold once again. I looked around before I sat down. It was an old hippie establishment, complete with peace signs, incense, tons of Camino t-shirts and memorabilia for sale, all of which I wanted. But I knew that I couldn’t take this experience with me, so I didn’t buy any of it. Then my eye caught a small deck of cards called The Way, made up of insights from previous pilgrims who had walked to Santiago, offering advice from the Camino for the journey through life. I pulled a card from the deck. It said, “Don’t fear the criticisms of others.” That piece of advice made me think. I have been severely criticized all my life for being intuitive and making it my vocation. I have been criticized for being an outspoken and strong woman, accused of not being feminine enough. I have been criticized for being playful when I taught my workshops, told I was not worth being taken seriously. For most of my life, I was criticized just for being me, and while it hurt me, it didn’t stop me. Rather than collapse under all that criticism, I just fought back. Now, I didn’t even want to do that. I just wanted to ignore the criticisms of those who didn’t like me, or approve of me, or “get” me and carry on in peace. That would be wonderful. That is what I would pray for today. www.earthstarmag.com After drinking a cup of hot chocolate and eating my last power bar of the day, I put my gloves and hat back on, reached for Pilgrim and my poles, pulled my poncho back over my head and headed out. I was being called to the top. Today marked a turning point in my pilgrimage. For over three weeks now, my walking had dredged up the deepest wounds from my past and shaken them free from both my psyche and my bones, along with the long-held pain, sorrow, and grief that they had trapped in my body. Today was my opportunity to release all of it, from my body and from my life. This was the day to leave the past behind and open my heart to living fully and freely in the present. The fog became thicker once I was back on the path, the cold intensifying along with it. I finally reached the summit, and through the fog I could barely make out the huge iron cross that stood at the top of the mountain. But it was there. I had arrived at Cruz Ferro, the place to unburden myself and ask for forgiveness. Approaching the cross, I was taken aback by the massive amount of small stones and talismans, prayers and pleas, piled high all around it. It was surreal to see the world’s prayers and pain all symbolically left behind in these offerings. There were photos, teddy bears, letters, little shrines made of stacked stones, shoes, rosaries, and more, each item representing someone’s heartache. Looking at everything reminded me of how painful the human experience is and how we, as humans, cannot avoid this pain. There is no way around the human condition. We can only experience it as bravely as possible. We cannot feel love unless we open our hearts, and yet, when we do open them they can and do get broken. It just works that way. If we close our hearts off, however, as a means of protecting ourselves, and cover them over with anger and rage, we break our hearts from the inside. If we look to others to give us the love we are not www.earthstarmag.com giving ourselves, we become frustrated and disappointed and often feel rejected, creating even deeper wounds than before. It is only when we love ourselves fully and forgive all the people and experiences that have caused us pain, both inside and out, can we truly heal and find inner peace. There is no other way. We cannot avoid the pain of life, no matter how spiritually awakened we are. Life involves loss. It is impermanent and messy and causes suffering. It is only when we feel our pain, feel our losses, and allow our feelings to move through us, and then onward, are we able to heal and live as a fully empowered beings in the moment. Looking at the mountain of grief left behind by so many others, I realized I had no need to feel ashamed for hurting. I had no need to feel like a failure because I got angry and scared. As spiritually conscious as I was, I was still human, and still had to experience loss and suffering like everyone else. It was not allowing myself to freely feel my losses that caused me to get stuck. It was denying my pain over and over again that made it explode. In walking the Camino I had now felt it all, and because of that, it was moving on. It wasn’t stuck inside me any longer. I could honestly say I was leaving my pain and my karma behind, while at the same time, as I walked, they were also leaving me. We were done. I placed my huge rock on the pile and thanked all the people who had touched my soul, now and in lives past, for the lessons and the love they brought me. I released my rage, my hurt, my emotional pain, and underneath it all, my fear, and asked for and offered forgiveness for everything in my past. The minute I placed my rock at the foot of the cross, I could feel my last bits of pain tumble out of me and onto the ground. All that was left in its place was gratitude. Just before I left, I took Gumby from my pocket and sat him on the rocks. He had been a good touchstone for DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 29 me, helping to keep my spirits up and my humor alive when all I felt was lost. I took a few pictures of the two of us together, so that I could leave everything behind with a smile. I then got on my knees and prayed for everyone in my life, thanking their spirits for their contribution to my human experience. I stayed a few minutes longer, but it was bitter cold and I felt there was no need to linger. I picked up Gumby, put him in my pocket, and got ready to go. It took a moment or two to find the path in the fog, but I did and slowly began the steep descent. As I started down, the icy wind blew in my face with such relentless ferocity that it felt personal. And yet, rather than fight it, I let it scour off the remaining barnacles of hurtful beliefs and behaviors that I still subconsciously clung to. “Go ahead,” I screamed to the spirit of the wind. “Do your work. Blow it all away.” I felt as though I were being bathed in pure love. In spite of the cold, a gentle warm energy was now touching those deep places of hidden sadness and terror in my heart that for so long had held onto the harsh and frightening experiences from my past, both in this life and long before. I was healing. The cold was refreshing. The flowers along the side of the path were magical. My heart was becoming free of some old and very ugly and painful stuck energy. I finally descended below the cold and fog and emerged into a vast mountain valley. It was incredible. The past was behind me. I was now free. Alzheimer’s Test Detects Disease Decade Ahead of Onset A new blood test for Alzheimer’s appears to detect the disease as many as ten years before clinical diagnosis is possible. The test, described publicly for the first time yesterday, could soon be used to identify and treat patients with Alzheimer’s earlier in their disease progression. Those people could participate in clinical trials to help find new treatments. Already, the test distinguishes between patients and healthy elderly with 100 percent accuracy. “We will need replication and validation, but I’m very optimistic this work will hold,” Dimitrios Kapogiannis, the study’s lead author and a neuroscientist at the National Institute on Aging, said. 30 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 The blood test is still in the early stages of development and has only been evaluated in 174 individuals, requiring a larger, long-term study before widespread use, the authors said. NanoSomiX, an Aliso Viejo, California-based biotech company that develops blood assays for neurodegenerative diseases and is sponsoring the study, plans to produce a commercial version of the test. Two other potential Alzheimer’s blood tests were announced earlier this year. One measures ten fats in the bloodstream that appear to predict dementia with 90 percent accuracy within three years of its onset. Another uses ten proteins in the blood to predict onset with 87 percent accuracy within a year. At the National Institute on Aging, Kapogiannis and his team identified a single protein in the brain involved in insulin signaling, called IRS-1, that appears to be defective in Alzheimer’s patients. The researchers gathered blood samples from 70 individuals with Alzheimer’s disease, 20 cognitively normal elderly with diabetes, and 84 healthy adults. Of the participants, 22 of the Alzheimer’s patients provided samples taken one to 10 years before diagnosis. From the samples, the researchers isolated exosomes, little lipid sacs that bud off cell membranes and carry signals to other cells and tissues. From the resulting pool of exosomes, they identified just those originating in the brain, which contain IRS-1, and measured the levels of the protein. They found that patients with Alzheimer’s had higher amounts of the inactive form of the protein and lower amounts of the active form than healthy individuals. The diabetics had intermediate levels. These levels were so consistent that the team could predict whether a blood sample came from an Alzheimer’s patient, healthy individual, or a diabetic —with no errors. This was true even for samples from Alzheimer’s patients taken ten years before they were diagnosed. —Bloomberg.com News www.earthstarmag.com Strange Electromagnetic Energies By Louis Proud Allergic to Electricity he human body is tuned to, and responds to changes within, the electromagnetic environment of the Earth, such that geomagnetic disturbances can reduce melatonin production and thereby disrupt the sleep-wake cycle. Exposure to artificial EM fields can likewise reduce melatonin production. We will now examine a number of other biological effects associated with exposure to artificial EM fields, some of which come under the domain of “mind control.” If, like me, you live in an urban environment, you’re bound to receive a high amount of exposure to EM radiation from sources too numerous to mention. Cities are grossly polluted with EM radiation, or “electrosmog,” and are becoming more polluted every year as our use of technology expands and technology itself becomes ever more sophisticated. If, on the other hand, you live in the country, it’s probable you receive a low to moderate amount of EM exposure. Some people choose to live in T www.earthstarmag.com the country solely because they’re convinced that artificial EM fields make them acutely ill—a condition known as EM hypersensitivity (EHS). EHS is commonly assumed to be psychosomatic in origin; though, as we’ll see in the latter-half of the chapter, much compelling evidence suggests otherwise. Smart meter health problems Although I wouldn’t go so far as to call myself “hypersensitive” to EM fields, I have reason to believe that during one period in my life I suffered ill effects from longterm exposure to radio frequency (RF) radiation. As with any story, it’s necessary to begin at the beginning. In early 2010, my wife (then girlfriend) and I moved into a small brick dwelling located in the northern suburbs of Melbourne. We found our new home reasonably pleasant and settled in quickly. Most of all, we were grateful to have a place of our own and to be paying such afford- DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 31 able rent. One day in mid-2012, a technician paid a visit to our home to replace our analogue electricity meter with a “smart meter” as part of a Victorian Government plan to upgrade the electricity network—a plan that’s currently being implemented in other states of Australia. Smart meters are at present being installed in homes and businesses across the United States, and the same is happening in numerous other countries, including Canada, Italy, the United Kingdom, and New Zealand. Smart meters and analogue meters are similar to the extent that both devices record your electricity usage for billing purposes. But whereas analogue meters are connected to the grid by means of wires, smart meters are digital, wireless, two-way communication devices that operate in the RF range. They record your electricity usage at frequent intervals and send that data directly to your electricity supplier. They enable your electricity supplier to monitor your power usage closely without having to send a technician to your home to do so manually. Not unreasonably, the surveillance capabilities of smart meter technology have sparked concerns among citizens who value their privacy and don’t appreciate being “spied on” by the powers that be. Although at first I was annoyed that a smart meter had been installed in our home without our consent, I soon forgot the device was there and became absorbed in more pressing concerns. At the time I was busy working on a major writing project, which involved spending much time at home in front of the computer. (I’m aware computers emit various forms of EM radiation. To minimize my EM exposure while working in front of a computer, I always make sure the screen is positioned a good 32 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 distance away from my body.) The project was coming along smoothly and I was confident I’d make the deadline on time. As the weeks progressed, however, I noticed a gradual decline in my ability to concentrate on the project. I soon found any activity that required sustained concentration challenging. The problem appeared to stem from an intense feeling of agitation in the very core of my being. There were times when the feeling became so intense that I’d suddenly leap from my chair and dash from my office without completing the sentence I’d been writing. It’s as if my body was constantly on “alert mode.” Thinking that perhaps my health had suffered from an overly homebound lifestyle, I began to make more trips outdoors, either going for walks around the block or visiting the park down the road. I felt much better when out of the house; the feeling of agitation lifted to some extent, only to come back as soon as I returned home. My wife revealed to me that she, too, was plagued by a feeling of deep-seated agitation and was experiencing concentration issues. It didn’t take us long to recognize that the problem coincided with the installation of the smart meter in our home. The penny dropped when, throughout the ensuing months, I came across a series of online articles concerning cases in the United States and Australia of people claiming to have suffered health problems as a consequence of living with a smart meter in their home. Among the health problems frequently cited were “agitation” and “inability to concentrate”—the same problems my wife and I were experiencing. One article that came to my attention concerned a family of six in the Melbourne suburb of Keilor East. After a smart meter was installed in their neighbor’s home, the Florios began to experience “constant headaches and sleep deprivation.” The family became what Ms. Florio described as “smart meter refugees,” opting to abandon their home because their suffering www.earthstarmag.com had reached an unbearable level. A similar article concerned a couple from Mt. Eliza, Melbourne, named Vic and Rosemary Trudeau. Just days after a smart meter was installed in their home, Rosemary began feeling extremely “irritable” and both she and Vic experienced a “high pitched ringing” in their heads. Other shared symptoms included nausea, headaches, difficulties concentrating, heart palpitations, and insomnia. The symptoms would disappear when they left home and reappear as soon as they returned home. Since their power company refused to remove the device, the Trudeaus were left with no other option but to abandon their home and take up residence in their camper van. “I’d never had any [health] problems [like these] before, and I’d lived in the house 22 years,” Rosemary insisted. Unlike the Florios and the Trudeaus, my wife and I didn’t abandon our home, though we did consider the possibility of moving. The opportunity to move arose when, in early-2013, my wife secured a job in Darwin, Northern Territory (where, fortunately, smart meters haven’t yet been introduced). Our health problems vanished for good soon after we relocated to Darwin. A brief internet search will reveal that many people all over the world are experiencing health problems related to smart meters. These include stress, agitation, anxiety, irritability, insomnia, persistent headaches, ringing in the ears, eye problems, severe memory loss, mental confusion, inability to concentrate, heart palpitations, nausea, urinary problems, hyperactivity, fatigue, dizziness, and nose bleeds. Isn’t this all a bit over the top? Surely those reporting such problems are either deluded or mentally ill? To be honest, had I not experienced some of these problems myself—and my wife also—it’s likely I would have adopted the “deluded or mentally ill” explanation and looked no further into the matter. One person I talked to about my smart meter health concerns suggested, as a joke, I wear a tinfoil hat. The term “tinfoil hat” is used in a derogatory fashion to refer to people inclined toward paranoid or conspiratorial beliefs. The term makes those who think cellphones, Wi-Fi—or indeed smart meters— pose a danger to human health silly or crazy. Another health problem I experienced during my period of exposure to smart meter radiation was lowered immune function. It’s a well-known fact that when the immune system is weak it has difficulty doing its job, which is to defend the body against pathogens (diseasecausing microbes). If you find yourself getting infections frequently and if these infections are difficult to eliminate, it’s a good indication your immune system is weak. Immediately after the smart meter was installed, www.earthstarmag.com my immune system suffered a devastating blow. First, a hair on my leg became ingrown and highly infected, necessitating a strong dose of antibiotics. This was followed by a persistent fungal infection in a certain part of my body. My immune system regained its strength as soon as my wife and I moved. Later we’ll look at evidence showing that exposure to artificial EM radiation can compromise immune function in animals and humans. The WHO report Are smart meters really as harmful as many believe? Before we focus specifically on smart meters, it would be valuable to take a look at the World Health Organization’s stance on non-ionizing (or low level) EM fields and human health. The World Health Organization (WHO), a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN), is an authority on matters of international public health. Established in 1948, the WHO is involved in coordinating international health activities and in aiding governments to improve health services. It goes without saying that their opinions are widely respected and taken seriously. Featured on the WHO website is a several page report on EM fields and human health, simply titled Electromagnetic Fields (EMF), of which I will now give a brief summary. The WHO Report explains something we know already: ionizing forms of EM radiation—xrays, gamma rays, and so forth—carry sufficient energy to break molecular bonds and hence damage living tissue, whereas non-ionizing forms of EM radiation— DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 33 radio waves, ELF electric and magnetic fields, and so on—lack sufficient energy to break molecular bonds. Nobody disputes the fact that ionizing EM radiation is harmful to the body; the debate is focused on whether non-ionizing radiation is harmful to the body. The Report gives particular emphasis to radio frequency (RF) radiation, which lies in the frequency range between 3 kilohertz (kHz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz) and is non-ionizing. Microwaves are one form of RF radiation. The Report acknowledges that RF radiation of high intensity can heat tissue and is therefore harmful to the body. (Earlier I explained that a microwave oven uses high intensity RF radiation to cook food.) The Report goes on to state that because RF radiation of low-intensity—such as that emitted by cellphone handsets and base stations, radio and television transmitters, and radar antennas—causes negligible to zero heating of body tissue it is extremely unlikely to harm the body. The Report also addresses the topic of extremely low frequency (ELF) electric and magnetic fields and human health. Whereas RF fields are generally associated with telecommunications (radio, television, radar, cellphones, and so forth), ELF electric and magnetic fields are generally associated with electric power distribution and appliances that use mains electricity. The power lines that run past your home, the electric kettle in your kitchen, the clock radio situated on your bedside table—all are sources of ELF electric and magnetic fields. The Report explains that exposure to both induces currents in the body. For example, if you were to stand under a 60 Hz power line, the electric field produced by the power line would induce an electric current that flows from your head to your feet, while the magnetic field produced by the power line would induce circulating electric currents within your body. “In virtually all ordinary environ- 34 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 ments, the levels of induced currents inside the body are too small to produce obvious effects,” the Report states. Listed under “obvious effects” are “nerve and muscle stimulation and changes in nerve cell excitability in the central nervous system.” The suggestion is that because these “obvious effects” are absent with respect to exposure to common, every day, low strength ELF electric and magnetic fields, such fields pose no harm to our health. The following two statements from the Report give a clear indication of where the WHO stands on the issue of non-ionizing EM fields and human health: “Despite extensive research, to date there is no evidence to conclude that exposure to low level [non-ionizing] electromagnetic fields is harmful to human health.” “With more and more research data available, it has become increasingly unlikely that exposure to electromagnetic fields constitutes a serious health hazard, nevertheless, some uncertainty remains.” To state there is “no evidence to conclude that exposure to low level [non-ionizing] electromagnetic fields is harmful to human health” but that “some uncertainty remains” is somewhat wishy-washy. After reading the Report in its entirety, one gets the impression the WHO is secretly thinking: We’d like to tell the public that exposure to non-ionizing EM fields is completely safe, but since doing so would make us look negligent or biased, instead we’ll tell them we’re 99 percent sure EM fields are safe. That way they’ll stop worrying about the matter. Common sense tells us it would be extremely bad news for the military and the telecommunications and electric utility industries if the WHO came forward and admitted that exposure to non-ionizing EM radiation is linked to cancer and other serious health problems, never mind the impact this would have on each and every one of us, given that electricity is the lifeblood of modern society. Clearly the best approach on the part of the authorities would be to play down the issue as much as possible, without entirely dismissing it. It’s worth noting that in 2002 the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), which is part of the WHO, classified ELF magnetic fields as a possible human carcinogen (“Class 2B”), due to there being a statistical association between “higher level residential ELF magnetic fields and [an] increased risk for childhood leukaemia.” In 2013, IARC classified RF radiation as another Class 2B carcinogen, stating “Positive associations have been observed between exposure to radiofrequency radiation from wireless phones and glioma and acoustic neuroma.” Given that IARC’s list of Class 2B carcinogens includes such substances as cofwww.earthstarmag.com fee, gasoline, bracken fern, and welding fumes, one is led to believe that one is no more likely to develop cancer from excessive cellphone use as one is from feasting daily on bracken fern fiddleheads and gulping large quantities of coffee. Public exposure limits Just about every country has public exposure limits in place for both ELF (50/60 Hz) magnetic and electric fields and RF radiation. In Australia, the exposure limits for ELF electric and magnetic fields were set by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) in 1989 and are similar to limits present in many other countries. (These limits are currently in the process of being updated.) NHMRC states that in areas where members of the general public experience continuous exposure, the electric field strength should not exceed 5 KV/m while the magnetic flux density should not exceed 0.1 mT. To the best of my knowledge, the United States has no federal exposure limits in place for ELF electric and magnetic fields. We now come to RF radiation. In 2002, the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA) released a document titled the Radiation Protection Standard—Maximum Exposure Levels to Radiofrequency Fields—3 kHz to 300 GHz. The exposure limits set out in the Standard are based on guidelines established in 1998 by the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP). The limits take into consideration such adverse biological effects as electrical stimulation, heating of tissues, and nuisance auditory effects. Again, the heating aspect is strongly emphasized, with the assumption being that RF fields pose no threat to one’s health if they are not of high enough intensity to heat bodily tissue and cause tissue damage. www.earthstarmag.com The RF radiation exposure limits listed in the Standard for the general population and with respect to long-term exposure are expressed in power flux density (power per unit area) and range from 0.2 mW/cm2 at 10 MHz to 400 MHz to 1 mW/cm2 at 2 GHz to 300 GHz. The latter limit of 1 mW/cm2 at 2 GHz to 300 GHz applies to cellphones, as 2 GHz is close to the frequency at which most cellphones operate. We find roughly the same limits in place in the United States and numerous other Western countries. For the sake of simplicity, we will say that 1 mW/cm2 is the RF radiation exposure limit for the general population. When you expose yourself to common sources of RF radiation, the molecules of your body vibrate, which in turn causes heating. As I said, the same principle is at work when food is heated inside a microwave oven. In the case of talking on a cellphone, the specific area of your head to which the phone is in contact will absorb the greatest amount of RF radiation, becoming ever so slightly warm. Yet your overall body temperature will not be affected. RF safety standards ensure that the energy emitted by RF sources such as cellphones is low enough not to measurably increase body temperature. The unit of measurement for the amount of RF radiation absorbed by the body is called the specific absorption rate (SAR) and is expressed in watts per kilogram (W/kg) or milliwatts per gram (mW/g). The ARPANSA SAR limit for cellphone handsets is 2 W/kg (using 10 gram averaging mass). This limit is such that talking on a cellphone will produce a maximum rise in temperature in the side of the head no greater than 0.1°C—far less than the increase in temperature required to destroy bodily tissue. Although it’s reassuring to know that cellphones and other devices don’t emit enough RF radiation to “cook” our bodies the same way a microwave oven does, much convincing evidence shows that exposure to low-level RF radiation can produce biological effects that have nothing to do with the heating of tissue. It is these nonthermal or athermal effects, rather than the thermal effects, that are of relevance to our present discussion. There seem to be at least two attitudes within the mainstream scientific community toward non-thermal biological effects related to low-level RF radiation exposure: either we are told there is no evidence for such effects, or we are told there is evidence for such effects but that the evidence is controversial and unproven. My research in this area has taught me that it’s futile to expect to receive from the authorities a truthful, straightforward answer as to whether low level RF radiation (indeed, non-ionizing EM radiation in general) can cause harm to our bodies. To get to the truth of the mat- DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 35 ter, we are left with no other choice but to bypass official sources of information, including ARPANSA and the WHO, and seek out genuine sources of information. Since one of our objectives in this chapter is to find out why smart meters have sparked a flurry of health complaints all over the world, for the time being we will limit our discussion to RF radiation. Radio-wave sickness Indications that RF radiation can produce a range of adverse health effects unrelated to heating of the body first began to emerge in the years following World War II, when it was found that radar operators have a tendency to suffer from internal bleeding, jaundice, leukemia, cataracts, headaches, brain tumors, and heart conditions. Later, in the 1970s, Eastern European and Soviet researchers—who had been at the forefront of research on bioelectromagnetics since before the 1950s—began to use the term “radio-wave sickness” to refer to a clinical syndrome in those occupationally exposed to EM fields, particularly RF fields. (Bioelectromagnetics is the study of the interaction between EM fields and biological entities.) It was accepted as a fact by the researchers that lowintensity EM fields adversely affect the autonomic and central nervous systems of humans and animals. The symptoms they listed for radio-wave sickness include headache, increased fatigue, increased irritability, dizziness, loss of appetite, sleepiness, sweating, difficulties in concentration or memory, depression, emotional instability, rashes, thyroid gland enlargement, and tremor of extended fingers. Also listed, though found to be less common, were hallucinations, insomnia, fainting, and internal organ or intestinal difficulties. As the reader has no doubt recognized already, many of these symptoms are common among “smart meter victims.” The Moscow signal Of relevance to the topic of early research on the harmful effects of RF radiation on humans is an experiment carried out by the Soviets during the Cold War, in which, beginning in 1953 and continuing over a period of many decades, they beamed low-intensity microwave radiation at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. The U.S State Department first detected the “Moscow signal,” as it came to be called, in 1962, prompting an investigation into the matter by various U.S intelligence agencies, including the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The initial theory put forward to explain the purpose of the signal, whose average intensity varied between 36 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 0.002 and 0.018 mW/cm, is that the Soviets were using it to activate electronic listening devices hidden in the walls of the Embassy. Yet because the signal was found to be a composite of several frequencies and hence unsuitable for electronic eavesdropping purposes, a second theory was advanced as to its purpose: to induce physiological and behavioral effects among Embassy staff. A Scarsdale, New York, ophthalmologist named Milton Zaret, who was employed by the CIA in 1965 to help ascertain the purpose of the signal, concluded: “Whatever other reasons the Russians may have had, they believed the beam would modify the behavior of personnel.” The Moscow signal became the focus of a classified research project, called Project Pandora, which was placed under the direction of the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), a secret organization within the Department of Defense. One of the objectives of Project Pandora was to “investigate possible behavioural and bioeffects (primarily the former) on primates [monkeys] when the latter were irradiated with microwave signals simulating the exposure of Embassy employees in Moscow.” According to Robert Becker, a United States orthopedic surgeon and expert in bioelectromagnetics, the monkeys “showed multiple abnormalities of blood composition and chromosomal counts.” It’s also been alleged that the monkeys exhibited a deterioration in their ability to perform certain tasks. Yet, disturbingly, Project Pandora also involved human experimentation: the decision was made not to inform Embassy staff about the signal or to attempt to block the signal, but rather to treat the staff as guinea pigs by observing what effects they might suffer as a result of the prolonged irradiation. It wasn’t until 1976, when the U.S finally decided to install microwave screening in the Embassy building, that embassy staff— and the rest of the world—became aware of the situation. The Soviets denied beaming the building with www.earthstarmag.com microwave radiation, and in January of 1979 it was discovered the radiation had ceased. (The Moscow signal made a brief reappearance in 1983 and was again reported in 1988.) Aftermath After the Moscow signal became public knowledge, a number of epidemiological studies were undertaken to determine in what ways, if at all, Embassy staff had been affected by the radiation. However, the results of these studies are rather sketchy, indicating a desire on the part of the authorities to keep the truth hidden from the public. One such study, undertaken in 1976 by Dr. Abraham Lilienfeld and colleagues at the Department of Epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University, examined the mortality and morbidity of all Moscow staff and dependents from 1953 to 1976. Staff who had served at other eastern European embassies during the same period of time, as well as their dependents, acted as the control group. Although the study supposedly found “No convincing evidence...that would directly implicate the exposure to microwave radiation experienced by the employees at the Moscow embassy in the causation of any adverse health effects,” this view is not shared by all. In the opinion of Simon Best and Cyril Smith, the study “yielded some provocative findings.” These include “a definite significantly raised rate of protozoal intestinal diseases, benign neoplasms, and diseases of the nerves and peripheral ganglia” among Moscow males. They add: “As a group, Moscow personnel suffered significantly more eye problems, psoriasis and other assorted skin conditions (mostly cysts, dermatitis and eczema), as well as depression, irritability, loss of appetite, and difficulty in concentrating.” The latter group of symptoms are all consistent with radio-wave sickness and very much support the theory that the purpose of the Moscow signal was to “modify the behavior of [embassy] personnel.” As an interesting addendum, three of those who served as U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union in the period 1953 to 1976, when the Moscow signal was active, died of cancer. In order of service: Charles Bohlen (1953–1957) died of pancreatic cancer in 1974 at the age of 69; Llewellyn Thompson (1957–1962 and 1966–1969) died of cancer in 1972 at the age of 67; Walter Stoessel (1973–1976) died of leukemia in 1986 at the age of 66, having first developed signs of leukemia in 1976. What makes the three deaths especially noteworthy is that the Moscow signal was beamed directly at the ambassador’s office. Interestingly, the Moscow signal was between 500 www.earthstarmag.com and 55 times weaker than the 1 mW/cm2 exposure limit for the general population. In fact, since the 1950s and at the time of the Moscow signal incident, there existed in the Soviet Union a tremendously stringent RF radiation exposure limit of just 0.001 mW/cm2 for the general population. Today the limit is higher, at 0.1 mW/cm2. Of course, the Russians have long acknowledged that there are non-thermal biological effects associated with exposure to low level RF radiation. These effects are also recognized in China, where the limit is also set at 0.1 mW/cm2. Excerpted from Strange Electromagentic Energies by Louis Proud, © Louis Proud. Excerpt is printed with permission of the publisher New Page Books, http://www.newpagebooks.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 37 Everything Is A Miracle Excerpts from A Book of Miracles By Dr. Bernie Siegel any years ago, I would have defined miracles as something for which there was no explanation. That was my concept of miracles. So when patients would recover unexpectedly from disease, I would rationalize what mechanisms were present within the body that could explain their recovery. Today, I realize that everything is a miracle. When you ask quantum physicists and astronomers to explain creation, they do not have all the answers. Life is a miracle, and it is derived from the intelligent, loving, conscious energy that created it. You can call it God or anything you want to, but the nature of life shows us it is intelligent and loving, or we wouldn’t be able to survive a cut finger or an infection. Most of us do not stop to think about life on earth being a miracle. To me, miracles are about our potential and what has been built into us to help us to survive. A botanist I read M 38 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 about called miracles “spontaneous reversals” because he saw how plants altered their genes to survive climate changes and diseases. Just think about the fact that a plant doesn’t bleed to death every fall when the leaves drop off...it heals and survives. Doctors call unexpected recoveries and cures “spontaneous remissions,” but that wording makes you think it is luck and that the person had nothing to do with it. That is not true. All living things have the potential to create miracles. Studies and scans show that cancers come and go sometimes with no treatment. We need to study the personalities and learn the stories of the people whom we consider to have had a miraculous or self-induced healing. I know people who have left their troubles to God, or who refused treatment to go home and make the world beautiful before they died. They did what made them happy—from getting a dog to building a wildlife habitat—and their letters to me later end with, “I didn’t www.earthstarmag.com die, and now I’m so busy I’m killing myself. Help! Where do I go from here?” I do not limit miracles to only physical events like recovery from disease, because they occur in every aspect of life. Since consciousness is not limited to the body, or by time and space, it can have effects at a distance, too, and I will discuss some of these things when I present specific examples. Someday I hope we will spend as much money exploring inner space and the wonders of the human body as we are currently spending exploring outer space. The secret lies within us, and yet we are afraid to go within because of our nature. It is time to stop fearing what lies within us and to achieve our true potential. A true miracle is often defined as an event that defies the laws of nature. My mother referred to miracles as “God’s redirections” from which something good would come. A television show you never knew existed alerts you to a medical condition you wouldn’t have checked out otherwise; a kind stranger helps you change your tire before a flood; while you are sleeping a dog barks when he smells a fire. There is so much more to these occurrences than chance. These events are more than coincidences. These are miracles. In fact, even so-called “bad breaks” can be classified as miracles because so often they lead us in better directions. Years ago, arthritis threatened to end my career as a surgeon before it had even begun. The military turned me down for active duty, so I returned to Connecticut to attempt to practice surgery with a former associate. Almost immediately, the symptoms of my arthritis subsided, and I went on to practice medicine and become who I am today. Rather than wishing for miracles to change the physical nature of life, my desire is for those miracles that change our experience of it. When we decide to make a difference in the world and create peace, love, and happiness for all living things...that will indeed be a miracle. We are all living a miraculous story. When we are enlightened by it, we elevate ourselves and demonstrate loving, intelligent, conscious energy. To do so we must act, seek wisdom, and have devotion. Those are the qualities demonstrated by those who exceed expectations. I read a wonderful article by Stacey Chiew, who wrote, “I believe each one of us holds the key that unlocks the door for miracles. Before you can do that, you need to know the password: Love. Miracles are the response to love expressed in us and to others. It is the extra ordinary healing power of our body, the amazing protective energy force that helps keep us safe, and the joy when prayers are answered.” www.earthstarmag.com I agree with Stacey that life is a miracle. We cannot, and probably never will, be able to explain creation and how intelligent, loving, conscious energy could create matter. Angels and Guides One evening I arranged my notes on the podium and began my lecture. I noticed that what I was saying was not following my outline. I kept struggling to get back to my outline for the talk, but after a few minutes I realized the talk I had not planned was better than the one I had. So I just let the words flow out of me for the next two hours. At the conclusion of my presentation, a woman walked up to me and said, “I’ve heard you before. That was better than usual.” The next woman came up and said, “Standing in front of you for the entire talk was this man. I drew his picture for you.” When I looked at the picture I knew who it was: George. George is my inner guide, whom I met when doing guided imagery, as a nonbeliever, for the first time. The picture she drew was the same as one I had drawn for Elisabeth Kübler-Ross years before. From that day forward, George does all my talks for me. They come from a place of consciousness shared with the audience. A few years later, after delivering a funeral sermon for a friend one Sunday morning, I was standing alone in the hallway when Olga Worrall, a well-known healer, who had attended the funeral of our mutual friend, came up to me. “Bernie, are you Jewish?” I asked her if she wanted to know because I had delivered a Sunday sermon. She said, “No, it’s because there are two rabbis standing next to you.” Her description of them from their garments to their beards was again exactly like George. I think his presence in my life explains many of DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 39 my miraculous experiences. I have been in four life-threatening accidents, including choking nearly to death, car collisions, and falling off the roof when a ladder broke. Each time I walked away with no serious injuries. I said to an audience one night, “I must have an angel.” I believe we all have angels or guides. I can’t help but think of the story of the lady who hears a voice say, “Jump back.” She does and realizes she would have been hit by a bus if she kept crossing the street. It’s a good thing she listened! We must remember that there is always hope. We are capable of amazing things, and when we do not fear failure, we have nothing to lose by attempting to achieve the miraculous. blind to our faults and flaws. I believe that, while we choose whom we love, we are wired with the desire to love from the time of our birth. Many people believe they have some terrible defect at the center of their being, which they must hide if they are to have any chance for love. Because they believe they are unlovable and condemned to loneliness if their true selves become known, such individuals set up defenses against sharing their innermost feelings with anyone. They fear and avoid relationships. I cared for a teenage girl with severe burn scars who wore a turtleneck even on hot summer days because she felt she was “ugly.” Weeks after I suggested she spend her summer working as an aide in a nursing home, where they wore uniforms that would reveal her scars, she found the people there didn’t notice them. “This is because when you are giving love,” I said, “you are beautiful.” Love is energy, so it knows no time and no physical limitations. I know from my experience—personally, and through mystics, dreams, and drawings—that we are capable of communicating with animals and the dead and can know the future. I think that when two people are constantly conscious of each other it sustains a connection, which eventually leads to their being reunited. All we can ask of life is to be given the chance to love. Dr. Bernie Siegel’s multimillion-copy bestselling first book, Love, Medicine & Miracles, was published in 1986. He is the author of multiple other books, including A Book of Miracles, 101 Exercises for the Soul, and 365 Prescriptions for the Soul. Visit him online at http://www.berniesiegelmd.com. Excerpted from the book A Book of Miracles © 2011 by Bernie Siegel. Published with permission of New World Library. http://www.newworldlibrary.com The Gift of Love A teenager complained that her grandmother’s house did not have a full-length mirror to see how she looked. Her grandmother responded by saying, “If you want to see how beautiful you are, come here and look in my eyes.” I believe love is the answer to every question you could ever ask. It is the solution to every problem, and it is necessary for our survival. When we choose to love, we can never be wrong. We will always be in the right place at the right time because love brings order, harmony, and peace. By the same token, being loved is the gift of a lifetime. To be accepted by someone means they are transcending all your flaws with a commitment. Love is 40 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com A Book of Miracles Q and A with Dr. Bernie Siegel What is a miracle? Life is a miracle. What cannot be explained by science is a miracle. We cannot explain the origin of our universe and life so it is all a miracle derived from loving, intelligent, conscious energy. It also lets us know we all have the potential to be miracles and demonstrate them because the ability to create lies within us too. The potential is built into us by our loving creator so we heal our wounds and alter our genes and survive threats to our existence and I am talking about people, plants, bacteria and all forms of life. The importance of change—from the inside out. How does that happen and how does that open the door for a miracle to take place? As God said when I gave my first consultant’s report at the Board of Directors of Heaven meeting, “Bernie when you finish say the beginning and not the end.” When I asked why God said, “Because we have to begin to use the information you have given us. Graduations are a commencement not a termination and the Bible ends in a revelation and not a conclusion. My son’s life is about beginnings because it is always changing.” I have learned that when you use change as a labor pain of life you can give birth to a new self which loves life and your body and the direction of your life and health responds to the chemistry created by the love both physically and spiritually. The future is unconsciously prepared long in advance, as Jung stated and therefore we are creating our future and determining the possibility of a miracle every day. When we are a work in progress and rehearse and desire to become the person we wish to be change is inevitable. What is grace and how can we welcome it into our lives? Grace is amazing as the song tells us. It can save you, help you to believe, protect you give you hope and more. When you have faith your life changes and peace comes to you because you know that you are connected to a higher power and the Lord is your shepherd. My mother always let me know that when I had a problem God www.earthstarmag.com was redirecting me and something good would come of this. Norman Vincent Peale’s mom told him that if God slammed one door further down the corridor another would be open. I have seen people cured of cancer when they went home and left their troubles to God. But to believe and find that kind of peace is not an easy task and one must accept the belief and the grace to attain it. Like the still pond allows us to see our true reflection grace brings peace and stillness to our mind and life. What can we learn from children and animals? What we can learn is the truth. Life is about living today and not worrying about the future. When I have a problem I ask myself, WWLD, or What Would Lassie Do? Then I can see how love will resolve my problem. Animals are complete and we need to learn how to become complete in our lives and behavior. When One of our children was seven an X-Ray revealed a bone tumor and I was sure it was a malignant tumor that would end his life in short order. I explained to my wife and his four siblings the problem. The next day he came to me and said, “Dad can I talk to you for a minute? You’re handling this poorly.” He explained they were trying to enjoy the day and I wanted them all to be depressed about the future. He was right. As the song says yesterday is dead and gone and tomorrow’s out of sight it’s so sad to be alone. help me make it through the night.” How do we let go and let God? You stop judging and thinking and let your heart make up your mind. There is a greater wisdom and higher power. Again to turn to the wisdom of a song, just like the seasons there are reasons for the path we take. There are no mistakes just lessons to be learned. When you see the obstacles as teaching you how to climb instead of God punishing you things change. When you lose your car keys you don’t assume God wants you to walk home so when you lose your way or health look for it and God will help you to find it when you let go of living in your head and let your heart and faith take over. DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 41 Emotional darkness. How can there possibly be benefits? Charcoal under pressure becomes a diamond. When you love your fate and ask what you are to learn from the Hell you are going through the benefits appear. I ask people to tell me what they are experiencing when they have a disaster in their life and the words they share are about their lives. Words like failure, draining, confusion and so we deal with those things in their life which fit those words and then they can be healed by their affliction. When that happens and you then ask them to describe what cancer meant to them they say, gift, blessing, new beginning and wake up call. I suggest you don’t wait to become strong at the broken places but learn from the wisdom of the sages and become strong through their teachings. What do you do when you are overcome by fear? I don’t fear anything because I know what I and you are capable of. As a ninety plus year old said at a support group meeting, “The only thing I fear is driving on the parkway at night.” Everyone laughed and stopped being afraid of the future. One cannot be afraid when one is loving or laughing. So when fear enters your life realize others have survived what you fear and then laugh for no reason and find someone who needs your help and serve them. I guarantee your fear will melt away. I will add fear is useful to protect us from dangerous situations or vicious or poisonous animals because it empowers our mind and body to move quickly and protect us but when you live in fear your immune function is suppressed and stress hormone levels are elevated which becomes self destructive. Prescription Drug Vending Machines Installed On College Campuses he total insanity of over-medication in America has reached a new low as Arizona State University has installed a prescription drug vending machine called InstyMeds. American college students—who are already the most over-medicated population on the planet—now have an even easier way to pollute their brains with SSRI drugs, antidepressants, antipsychotics and prescription “speed” amphetamines which are routinely abused by students for final exam cram study sessions. “School officials didn't specify exactly what kind of drugs will be available in the machine, but said it would contain 50 medications that are most commonly prescribed to college students,” reports CBS News. “You know, the things that you'd like to have right now to feel better,” said InstyMeds Vice President Bob T 42 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 Bang, according to CBS News. I don't assign any particular blame to the InstyMeds machine company, by the way. The machine looks like a competent invention to bypass the usual inefficiencies found in most pharmacy operations. Check out the Instymeds website http://www.instymeds.com for information on their invention, which technically could be used to dispense all sorts of things that are far more useful for student health —such as vitamin D! Why don’t universities install nutritional products vending machines to actually support cognitive function and immune function among students? Big Pharma has already infiltrated and dominated medical schools and “science” journals. Drug company interests also completely dominate the mainstream media and government health care decision makers. These pharma drugs are so safe that students can be dosed with three, five or even ten at a time, we’re told. And yet the drugs are so dangerous that “the medication is secure in the 1,500pound, ‘vault-like machines’ that have remote alarms in response to any tampering,” reports ABC. Wouldn’t want any students looting the machine and selling those drugs on their own, you see. That would be “drug dealing.” When a student sells amphetamines to another student, that’s a felony crime, you see. But when a vending machine sells amphetamines to the same exact student by prescription, that's called “evidence-based medicine.” Arizona State University is the second university in America to install the prescription drug vending machine, and many more are in the works. Seriously, is “easier access to more meds” really the answer to student health? “Serving the health-care needs of our students is still our highest priority,” remarked Allan Markus, director of ASU Health Services, when the campus closed its pharmacy. And yet, I’m willing to bet nobody at ASU Health Services ever bothered to tell students why they need to boost their intake of vitamin D. In fact, if a vitamin vending machine were installed on campus, it would no doubt generate outrage and complaints from all the drug company reps and the doctors they routinely bribe to keep pushing their poisons onto students, pregnant women, babies and the elderly. —Natural News www.earthstarmag.com The Real Brass Ring Change Your Life Course Now By Dianne Bischoff James n this excerpt from her book, The Real Brass Ring: Change Your Life Course Now, Dianne Bischoff James reveals some of her secrets for a midlife reboot. As a businessperson Dianne gets excited by executive summaries. So she put together 14 consumable rules based on the metaphysical practices she’d studied over the years. It is her ‘cheat sheet’, which she calls The Shortcuts for Happy Living. I The Shortcuts for Happy Living Rule 1: It’s All Good The Universe is already in order and in a state of wellbeing. We didn’t come here to fix anything, because nothing is broken. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: If the world is complete and abundant, why do I keep running around trying to improve it and worrying about my next dime? Does this mean I can stop working so hard, relax, and just enjoy being here? www.earthstarmag.com Rule 2: What You Think about You Bring About We are always attracting. Everything you think about, talk about, and pay attention to is coming your way, so make it good. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: I’ve been raised by second-generation fear-based survivalists. Positive self-talk is a whole new skill set that will require tremendous practice on my part. Rule 3: Leverage Your Alignment When you’re aligned physically, emotionally, and spiritually, you’ll experience joy. Connect vibrationally with who you are so that your Earthly part, the body, joins with your spirit, the Source part. This connection will allow you to readily attract whatever you want. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: I’m pretty sure I’ve never been aligned because I rarely feel like a “fountain of well-being,” singing Hallelujah and waving my arms back and forth. DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 43 Rule 4: Use Your Emotional Radar Detector What feels good is good because emotions are the message center of the body. The thoughts that make you feel light and breathe easy are the right ones. Move away from anything that feels bad. And pay attention to the warning signs displayed through negative emotions. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: As a strong-minded professional woman, I’ve been too busy “doing” things to ever acknowledge my emotional center. It’s been much easier to ignore exhaustion, sorrow, and frustration than to go into those scary “feeling” places. Rule 5: Manage Your Wave Everything has a vibrational flow and we are all connected through energy waves. Create harmony and synergy by focusing on the positive side of the wave. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: It won’t be easy to grab at the merry side of the “it’s all good” stick. I’ll need to redirect my thoughts and look for the small positive things that happened during the day. Rule 6: Tend to Yourself First The only person you need to please in life is you. Take 100 percent of the responsibility for your words, actions, and experiences and take care of yourself, first and foremost. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: Abraham tells us to act like a cat. Well, my cat is orange, fat, furry, demanding, and only sits on my lap only when he feels like it. He is, however, quite satisfied with life and always takes care of his needs. Rule 7: Focus on Receiving Sit back, remain positive, and let the Universe deliver what you want. Allow yourself to receive. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: I am a professional “earner,” so I don’t know how to receive without effort and exertion. But it sure would be nice if the Universe just dropped things into my lap. everyone else’s business and let them manage themselves. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: Does this mean I’m not responsible for other people and their issues? Can I stop feeling guilty and just let everyone enjoy their day or be miserable, as they have chosen? Rule 10: Feeling Good Is the Mecca Lighten up. Move away from resistance and be able to say, “I love how this feels!” Dianne’s Initial Feedback: I mostly feel push-back and strain, but emotional bliss is a terrific future goal. Rule 11: Learn Your Lessons Process your issues now. Learn your life lessons and work everything out in your interpersonal relationships. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: Although I’ve made some progress in learning lessons, I’m sure I still have a bumpy road ahead. Rule 12: Speak Your Peace Say everything that needs to be said. Always speak your truth in the moment. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: My tongue is a welltrained cover-up artist and I’m much better at saying what people want to hear rather than what’s on my mind. Rule 13: Live Your Authentic Self The highest experience of love is the realization of what you believe in, who you are, and what you love to do. The only thing that’s stopping you is you. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: I am totally committed to discovering my true desires and pursuing what I came here to do. Rule 14: Love Your Life Learn to love your life because you are the “dance.” And in all aspects, pursue the wisdom of the heart. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: Love your life and follow your heart. This statement I completely understand. Rule 8: Choose the Ending to Your Story Reality is yours to create. Use clear intentions, desires, and positive feelings to manifest whatever you want and watch unlimited futures unfold. Dianne’s Initial Feedback: If my life is a movie in the making, perhaps it will end in love, romance, and travel. Now that sounds pretty exciting. Rule 9: Manage Your Circle There are only three “circles” of influence: (1) your circle, (2) other people’s circles, and (3) the Universe’s circle. Your only job is to manage your circle. Get out of 44 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com Natural Extracts Lower Blood Pressure By Brandon Dewitte he World Health Organization has determined that hypertension is the leading cause of cardiovascular mortality. It affects as many as 1.5 billion people worldwide and is a major risk factor for atherosclerosis. Drug therapy for hypertension is often comprised of one or a combination of medications that may include an angiotensin II receptor blocker, calcium channel blocker, beta blocker, angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitor, and/or a diuretic. Some of these drugs and drug combinations have potential side effects, which is troubling since blood pressure medications may be required for the rest of a person’s life. That does not mean a person with hypertension should discontinue their prescribed medications. But if natural approaches can reduce blood pressure readings so that drug doses can be reduced or eliminated, then side effect concerns can be mitigated. In an exciting new discovery, scientists have uncov- T www.earthstarmag.com ered two natural extracts that have similar mechanisms to some of the most effective drug therapies for hypertension. Olive leaf extract has been shown to function as an ACE inhibitor and celery seed extract has potent calcium channel blocking properties. Clinical studies have demonstrated that both extracts are able to safely lower blood pressure. These specialized extracts offer a natural approach to blood pressure management. Current Treatments For Hypertension Numerous recent, large, randomized clinical trials have indicated that treating hypertension in older adults can reduce the risk of kidney disease, stroke, and cardiovascular events. Unfortunately, bringing blood pressure down to healthy levels is easier said than done. Many clinicians start therapy with a mild diuretic DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 45 (“water pill”) at low doses, then gradually increase doses until either blood pressure is controlled or the maximum dose is reached. However, nearly 75% of patients do not get adequate blood pressure control on a single drug, which means a second medication is often necessary. This process may continue until a person finds himself or herself on three, four, or more drugs. A frequently prescribed class of antihypertensives used today are the angiotensin II receptor blockers. These drugs block the angiotensin II receptor and often induce more profound and sustained blood pressure control than older classes of medications. However, there are side effect risks associated with angiotensin II receptor blocker drugs. In some individuals, angiotensin II receptor blockers can cause an increase in potassium and changes in kidney function. Also, do not take angiotensin receptor blockers if you are pregnant or plan on becoming pregnant because this class of medication can cause harm to the fetus. One of the most commonly used approaches to treating hypertension involves the combination of two drugs: an ACE inhibitor and a calcium channel blocker. A large 2013 study demonstrated that for most people, this combination was more effective at reducing cardiovascular consequences of hypertension than using either drug with a diuretic. This combination also demonstrated the greatest probability of reducing death. Here’s how the combination drug therapy works. Angiotensin converting enzyme, or ACE, is a natural enzyme in the body that activates the hormone angiotensin, which causes blood vessels to constrict, thus increasing blood pressure. Inhibiting ACE can return blood pressure to lower levels. ACE inhibitors alone, however, are not always entirely effective, which is why doctors often combine them with a second drug called a calcium channel blocker. Calcium channel blockers lower blood pressure by a different mechanism than ACE inhibitors. They prevent the entry of calcium ions into muscle cells in the arterial wall. Since calcium ions are a major signal telling those cells to contract and raise muscle tone in the artery, blocking calcium influx into the cells 46 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 will prevent contraction and lower blood pressure. Use of the combination of an ACE inhibitor and a calcium channel blocker has become one of the mainstays of modern pharmacological blood pressure control, since the two drugs act in parallel, but different ways. Unfortunately, as is usually the case, both drugs bring with them side effects. Scientists have discovered two natural ingredients that work in ways similar to mainstream drugs, but without the numerous side effects. Olive leaf extract and celery seed extract act as ACE inhibitors and calcium channel blockers, respectively. Each has been shown in clinical studies to lower blood pressure. WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW Natural Extracts Lower Blood Pressure • High blood pressure (hypertension) is the leading cause of cardiovascular disease and is an important contributor to premature death and disability. • Despite widespread awareness of hypertension as a health threat, only a minority of Americans manage to control their blood pressure. • Patients using prescription medications may have to take two or more drugs before their blood pressure is controlled. • One of the most effective drug combinations pairs an angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitor with a calcium channel blocker. • New scientific evidence shows that olive leaf extract provides ACE inhibition, while celery seed extract offers calcium channel blocking effects. • Each of these supplements has independently been shown to lower blood pressure in human trials. • ACE inhibition plus calcium channel blocking effects are available through the use of the natural ingredients olive leaf and celery seed extract. Olive Leaf Extract: A Natural ACE Inhibitor Extracts from leaves of the olive tree (Olea europaea) contain www.earthstarmag.com compounds known as secoiridoid glycosides. When ingested, these substances break down into molecules with the ability to inhibit angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) and its harmful effects on blood vessels. Studies now show that olive leaf extract is effective at lowering blood pressure, just as would be expected from an ACE inhibitor. In preclinical trials, researchers found that when they gave rats an olive leaf extract at the same time as hypertension-inducing chemicals, it prevented them from developing experimentally induced hypertension. Similarly, in rats that had already been hypertensive for six weeks, administration of olive leaf extract normalized blood pressure, even when the rats continued receiving the hypertension-inducing chemical. Animal studies have also shown that olive leaf extract is effective at reducing the signs of metabolic syndrome, a major cardiovascular risk factor. Human studies have been extremely encouraging as well. A cleverly designed human trial using identical twins demonstrated the antihypertensive effects of olive leaf extract, with one twin serving as a control. Treated twins received either 500 or 1,000 mg/day of the extract while the other received advice regarding a “favorable lifestyle.” After eight weeks, compared to their controls, twins taking 500 mg/day saw an average drop in systolic pressure of 6 mm Hg, while the twins taking 1,000 mg/day saw an average drop in systolic pressure of 13 mm Hg. In the group taking the higher dose, blood pressure fell from an average of 137/80 at baseline to 126/76 after eight weeks and LDL cholesterol was also reduced. Olive leaf extract was recently compared directly with the ACE inhibitor captopril in patients with Stage I hypertension and it was found to be almost equally as effective. The extract dose was fixed at 500 mg twice daily for the eight weeks of the study, while captopril dosing started at 12.5 mg twice daily, and increased to 25 mg twice daily if needed for blood pressure control. At the end of the study, both groups experienced significant reductions in systolic and diastolic blood pressure as compared to baseline. The olive leaf extract group www.earthstarmag.com experienced a mean systolic blood pressure reduction of 11.5 mm Hg, while the captopril group reduced systolic blood pressure by 13.7 mm Hg. Diastolic pressures fell 4.8 mm Hg in the olive leaf extract group and 6.4 mm Hg in the captopril group. The differences between groups were not statistically significant. In addition, triglyceride levels fell significantly from baseline in the olive leaf supplemented group but not in the drug group. This important study showed that olive leaf extract was similar in effect to the ACE-inhibiting drug, but with the added benefit of triglyceride reduction. A subsequent human study showed that olive leaf extract could also improve insulin sensitivity by 15% in overweight middle-aged men, an important step in further reducing cardiovascular risk. It also led to a 28% improvement in pancreatic responses to blood sugar. WHY AT-HOME BLOOD PRESSURE TESTING IS SO IMPORTANT To ensure that the drugs, nutrients, and lifestyle changes you are using to combat hypertension are achieving optimal results, have your blood pressure checked regularly. Ideally this should be done every 12 hours initially using an at-home monitoring device. The reason you should check every 12 hours is that some blood pressure drugs wear off after 12-18 hours, leaving you vulnerable to considerable periods of higher-than-desired blood pressure. It’s during periods of high blood pressure that damage to the delicate endothelial linings of our arteries occurs. Once you have established a program of drugs, nutrients, and/or lifestyle that produces reliable optimal blood pressure ranges, then testing several times a week should be adequate for most people. Relying only on your doctor to check your blood pressure exposes you to long periods when your blood pressure could be dangerously elevated without you or your doctor knowing it. We offer an at-home blood pressure testing device to our members. You can also purchase one at your local pharmacy. DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 47 Celery Seed Extract: A Natural Calcium Channel Blocker Celery is a simple food with a complex chemical makeup. Studies show that celery seed components produce a relaxing, dilating effect that lowers blood pressure. This appears to occur, at least in part, by blocking or antagonizing the flow of calcium into muscle cells lining blood vessels—similar to the action performed by calcium channel blocking drugs. One key blood pressure-lowering compound in celery seeds has the technical name of L-3-n-butylphthalide, abbreviated as 3nB. 3nB has been used in a number of studies for the management of vascular diseases in the brain, such as stroke and vascular dementia. And even now, a synthetic form of 3nB is being developed as a drug in China for the treatment of cerebral ischemic stroke and mild cognitive impairment as well as for the prevention of Alzheimer’s disease—all of which have components of abnormalities in blood flow. Animal and lab studies reveal that 3nB-rich extracts of celery seeds produce blood pressure reductions of up to 38 mm Hg in hypertensive rats (this effect was not seen in those with normal blood pressures). Animal studies also demonstrate that celery seed extract has no significant toxic effects even at very high doses. A human study demonstrating the effectiveness of a celery seed extract standardized to 85% 3nB recently appeared in the Natural Medicine Journal. For the study, thirty middle-aged patients with mild-to-moderate hypertension took 75 mg doses of a celery seed extract twice daily for six weeks. To obtain an equivalent amount of 3nB, one would have to consume approximately 530 stalks (nearly 50 pounds) of celery. Mean blood pressures at baseline were 139.4/85.4 mm Hg. At three weeks, they fell to 134.8/80.9, and at six weeks they fell to 131.2/76.9. This represents total drops of 8.2 mm Hg systolic and 8.5 diastolic from baseline. Of great importance, while pharmacological calcium channel blockers and ACE inhibitors are known to reduce blood flow to the brain—which can leave patients 48 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 feeling tired, depressed, dizzy, or forgetful—celery seed extracts rich in 3nB appear to improve brain blood flow, prevent stroke, and may protect brain cells and enhance their energy consumption. THE DANGERS OF HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE Hypertension is classified as blood pressure greater than 139/89 mm Hg. It is now reported that once you are older than fifty, a systolic (top number) blood pressure higher than 140 mm Hg is a greater cardiovascular risk factor than diastolic (bottom number) pressure. As blood pressure increases, cardiovascular disease risk rises rapidly. Beginning at 115/75, risk doubles for each additional 20/10 mm Hg rise. Even among those with normal pressures at age fifty-five, the lifetime risk for developing hypertension is 90%. Although the consequences of untreated hypertension take time to develop, they are deadly when they arise and can include coronary artery disease, heart failure, and atrial fibrillation, a common arrhythmia. There is now evidence that cardiac disease related to hypertension has its origins early in life. Arterial stiffening, occurring with age and advancing atherosclerosis, is a major underlying cause of adult hypertension, especially so-called “isolated systolic hypertension,” in which only the systolic (top) number in the measurement is elevated. Stiff arteries create “back pressure” on the heart, which not only further raises blood pressure, but also puts extreme stress on the heart muscle, leading eventually to heart failure, coronary artery disease, stroke, vascular dementia, and chronic kidney disease. Olive leaf and celery seed extracts could not have been developed at a better time. Hypertension is quickly becoming a global epidemic.1 It is estimated that nearly 30% of adults around the globe have hypertension—and that percentage climbs to 75% in some European nations. Even in the US, which has one of the highest rates of awareness of the disease, hypertension affects between nearly 30 to 50% of the population. Hypertension has long been known as the “silent killer.” Despite increased awareness and treatment www.earthstarmag.com of hypertension, it is estimated that more than 50% of people worldwide with high blood pressure are unaware of their condition, and only a minority have been able to achieve control of their blood pressure. If you’re unsure of your blood pressure levels, you should have them tested as soon as possible. Life Extension suggests that optimally, blood pressure should be maintained at 115/75 mm Hg. Blood pressure levels greater than 139/89 mm Hg should be treated right away. Talk to your doctor about possible treatments and consider adding the combination of celery seed extract and olive leaf extract to your treatment plan. Rather than blindly assuming anything works, obtain an at-home blood pressure monitor to ensure that the drugs, nutrients, and lifestyle changes you are using to lower blood pressure are achieving optimal results. ARE YOU PREDISPOSED TO HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE? Many conditions cause or predispose a person to having hypertension. Over 25% of US adults have metabolic syndrome, which includes hypertension as one of its definwww.earthstarmag.com ing features. Obesity, another component of metabolic syndrome, is a leading cause of high blood pressure, with 60 to 70% of hypertension in adults related to excess body fat, especially “central” obesity located around the abdomen. Being overweight or obese is associated with a significantly increased risk of hypertension compared with people of normal weight. Obesity imposes unusual stresses on the body’s self-regulatory mechanisms, among which are over-activation of the reninangiotensin-aldosterone hormone system, which promotes fluid retention and boosts blood pressure. High levels of uric acid in the blood is directly related to hypertension. In one study, people with high uric acid levels were 2.6 times more likely to have high blood pressure than those with normal levels. And people with both high uric acid and obesity were more than 4.5 times as likely to be hypertensive, compared with normal-weight people with normal uric acid levels. Another cause of hypertension is obstructive sleep apnea (also called obstructive sleep apnea-hypopnea syndrome), in which a person’s breathing temporarily ceases or becomes very shallow during sleep. In one study, over 50% of people with the syndrome had hyper- DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 49 tension compared with only 30% in controls. Regardless of the cause of hypertension, it is essential to treat it. While most Americans are aware of hypertension’s risks and many are receiving treatment, only a minority have been able to successfully control their blood pressure. The colored bars above represent the percentages of American adults who express awareness of the dangers of hypertension, those who are being treated for hypertension, and those who have their hypertension under control. Each color represents a different National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) study, which began in 1976. Clinical studies show that each of these supplements alone is effective at significantly lowering blood pressure, generally without the adverse effects often associated with prescription medications. Using olive leaf and celery seed extract together is a powerful natural combination modeled on solid science. Reprinted with permission from Life Extension Magazine, http://www.lef.org Summary Despite billions of dollars spent on drugs to lower blood pressure, Americans are still losing the battle to keep their hypertension under control. Even drugs that are effective at bringing down high blood pressure have uncomfortable, sometimes dangerous, side effects. One of the most effective blood pressure drug combinations is an ACE inhibitor paired with a calcium channel blocker. But for those with early or mild-tomoderate hypertension (Stage I), ACE inhibition and calcium channel blocking may be accomplished with extracts from olive leaf and celery seed, respectively. Even those with more advanced cases of hypertension may be able to reduce their dosing of drugs by adding this nutrient combo. 50 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com EXCERPT FROM T HE KL I GK H T BY T HE C O L O R S OF EIDI EATING LOVE By Don Miguel Ruiz Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all of the barriers within yourself that you have built against it. —A Course in Miracles see love as a magnificent spectrum of all the colors of the rainbow. We have hundreds of emotions and each one is an aspect of love, which can be placed somewhere within this beautiful spectrum. By looking at love in this way we can see how we fragment love in order for our mind to understand it. It is easy to see how we divide love in many different directions by looking at the conditions we impose on love. We love our parents, our friends, our children, and our partner. We love songs, places, and animals. All of these different relationships are only a part of the totality, which is love, but they are not the whole thing. We distort everything we perceive and because of this we do not clearly see the different aspects of love. When we merge all the radiant colors of the rainbow I www.earthstarmag.com together the result is white Light. And in the same way, when all the different aspects of love are combined, the result is Truth. It contains everything. So how can we experience the fullness of love? We cannot understand or experience what love is until we reveal what love is not. I see this as knowing the difference between conditional and unconditional love. Conditions begin at an early age. When we are children we want to be like the adults and from them we perceive what they believe about love. This is the beginning of our understanding and experience of love being fragmented because of early influences. We witness all the dramas that our parents, our friends, and our brothers and sisters create about love. But this is not really love in the highest sense. Children play, pretending to be adults, and they can hardly wait to grow older just to be DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 51 like everyone else. I remember pretending to be a medical doctor. Children usually have such a beautiful smile, but as soon as I pretended to be a medical doctor my face changed right away and became very serious. Back then I was only pretending, but when I grew up and became a medical doctor my face really did change that way. It is the same thing with all that romantic love. We see our brothers or sisters falling in love and dating and we wish to become older so we can do the same thing. However, we also see all the dramas, the broken hearts, and the consequences of those broken hearts. They say, “Look at what he did to me.” They tell all their friends and everyone knows how much they are suffering. We learn that romantic love hurts. Then we finally grow up and we start dating and falling in love and because of this limiting belief we become like everyone else, distorting love. We follow the rules we were taught, that love should be this way, a man should be this way, a woman should be that way, and we believe that this is love. But it is not true. We try to control the other person but that is not love either; it is exactly the opposite. We try to make our loved one the way we want them to be, we grow jealous, possessive, and we create a huge drama. If they are not the way we want them to be we say they have broken our heart because love hurts, doesn’t it? Ninety-nine percent of people love conditionally. Everybody believes the way they feel is the way everyone should feel, however this is a great untruth. In the same way, you defend your truth and you think this is right and everybody else is wrong. But there are seven billion people in this world who all believe they are right. It is the same when it comes to love. We believe that what we feel is really love, but it is not. This form 52 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 of love is very selfish. We look for love, but in a very conditional way because it has to be the way we want it to be. We have Gods for everything. We have a God of the thunder, a God of the sun, a God of the rivers, the lakes, and the oceans. We even have the God and Goddess of love and we really believe they exist. However, that God or Goddess represents human sacrifice. Nowadays, we sacrifice in the name of love. You can probably see how many times you have sacrificed yourself in the name of love or how many times you have sacrificed somebody else in the name of love. This is clearly a tainted version of love. When we put labels on the pure energy of love this will distort it and once it is distorted it is no longer true love. We distort love as soon as we use words to describe what we feel. All of these words are labels that come from our conditioning. For example, we feel intense emotion, but instead of observing the extraordinary energy force moving within us, we say, “I feel so sad, I feel so angry,” and then we get caught up in melodramas and our minds spin out of control, wallowing in memories of the past or fears of the future. We have lost the power of the moment and in the process we have lost the essence of the pure energy, which is always present. In every culture and in every language we have invented words and symbols to describe our moods and to give meaning to love. No matter how rich the language, these labels only serve to limit love. They are labels, not love, and they are certainly not the Truth. Love diffuses in many different ways yet it is all from the same source, just as when we put white Light through a prism all the colors of the rainbow are revealed. We can liken our perspectives on love to how we perceive Light. If we see brown or blue, for example, we are only seeing a partial aspect of the whole picture. What we are actually seeing is a reflection of our own www.earthstarmag.com beliefs and limitations and this also colors what we transmit in the name of love. Everything is action and reaction. When Jesus spoke to the public, only the purest of white Light shone into the crowds. When He spoke with His apprentices He was also emanating that same pure white Light, but the way it was received was a little different. When He spent time with women the reflection was received in a different way again. What is important is that the love He was transmitting was white Light, pure love directly from the Source. The way everyone around Him perceived and received the love was different according to their layers of conditioning. If you meet Jesus Christ and He sends you white Light your ability to receive and reflect His Light will be dependent on your filters, or in other words, your limiting beliefs. Your level of radiance will not be as pure and white as His. But with practice and awareness it may become that way. This is the process of enlightenment. The love you receive from your partner may not be the white Light you receive from Christ. When the Light you receive from those in your life is already distorted you have a choice to either make it a little whiter or distort it even more. It is up to you! It is a good idea to interact with people who send a better quality of Light to you and that way you will evolve more and more. Many cultures teach us to choose our company with care. The disciples worked with the white Light that came from Christ. When He worked with a big group of people it was difficult to measure the reaction, but when He worked with a little group it was easier to measure the limitations falling away and the pure love growing stronger. To be with someone like Christ or Buddha will increase our ability to receive that pure love. It is not that we do not have it, as we do, but we distort it in our mind with our limited knowledge. As a consequence what comes out of us is not what we really are, because in truth we are all just like the Christ and Buddha. When love goes through the filters of our minds it will emerge completely different and distorted. When we learn from someone like Jesus Christ they will help us to recognize those filters and to dissolve them, but no one can do it for us. The easiest and best way to know love is to be in the presence of pure love. It is written that when the disciple is ready the master will appear. In love or not? To know pure love we need to understand what desire is. Desire is completely normal, neither good nor bad, right nor wrong, even though there are many religions and philosophies that state it must be avoided! It all depends on what we do with that desire. It can become obsession, which is extremely destructive and will destroy everything we create. On the other hand, desire can become passion. When this happens we really begin to love what we are doing. That passion can take us to inspiration and inspiration can take us to real love. Nevertheless, obsession has the power to destroy everything we create. For example, if we get married and obsession comes into that marriage, sooner or later www.earthstarmag.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 53 the marriage will be destroyed. If we create a business and obsession goes into that business, sooner or later that business will be destroyed. In reality our desire shifts both ways, sometimes to obsession, sometimes to passion. When the desire turns into obsession we fail in our relationships, marriages, friendships, and businesses, but when the desire turns into passion and inspiration we radiate pure love, which is a reflection of who we really are. Expressing love for our world We express love for our world because we have the desire to. If, for example, we try to save the rainforests and that desire turns into obsession, then in our efforts to save the forest we will burn ourselves out and destroy ourselves. The other option is that we get very passionate about saving the forest and then we really will be doing something to help, but at the same time we will have respect for everything else, not just the forest, or the dolphins, or whatever it is we want to support. When we feel passion, this is an expression of unconditional white Light, pure love. Then, if something is not working the way we would like it to, we will not get upset. We will simply express our desire without attachment to outcomes, putting effort into saving the rainforest without expecting anything in return, including that the forest may not be saved. This is unconditional love. idea of love or whatever, but this is not love. We are so insecure that we become jealous about what our partner is doing or not doing. We try to control them; the way they walk, the way they talk, and the relationship becomes a complete nightmare. And with that obsession we destroy what we really want. And all of this is because we do not love our self. We need to love the main character of our story, which is our self, or else we can only pretend to love the secondary characters. The key point is when we become honest and aware that we do not even like our self, we realize we cannot expect anyone else to love us. The turning point happens when we stop looking outside our self for love. If we do not like a person, we can walk away. If we do not like a group of people, we can walk away. But if we do not like our self, wherever we go and whatever we do, we are always going to be trapped with our self. We cannot just walk away. Most of the people who do not like themselves try to bury their feelings of emptiness either by eating too much, drinking too much, or indulging in something in order to forget. They suffer and they hate themselves so much that one way or another many of them end up killing themselves. If we have awareness and we know all the tricks we use to conceal our self-loathing we realize that these addictions are blocking our Light and love from flowing and do not serve us at all. When we have this awareness then we create reconciliation with our own body, with our self. This is a wonderful step. It begins a profound healing. The word yoga means union; Loving our self Loving our self is the first step to real love because we cannot give what we do not have. If we do not love our self, how can we pretend to love someone else? We may feel the need to be loved, we may be obsessed with the 54 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com union of knowledge, body, mind, and spirit. The problem is not the body, it is the mind and its limited knowledge. The body is judged by the mind. Therefore, the mind is where we need to place our focus if we really want to heal ourselves. We blame everything around us, we see everything we do not like, and we try to change the whole world. However, if we want to change the whole world, we need to change ourselves first. If we change ourselves then we can change the world and the only way to do this is by loving ourselves. When we love ourselves everything else then changes as if by magic and we begin to shine. About me what I am not. And, of course, I accept people the way they are. I have been taught many lessons in my life about love, but none of them are important. They are all irrelevant because in truth they were actually lessons in limitation. What is really important is to enjoy life, to love, to be in the moment, and to be happy. No one can make you happy, only you can make yourself happy. In the same way we cannot make anyone else happy either. Now we are beginning to understand what love is not, perhaps we can put our eye on what love is. The only problem is that it is so difficult to use words to describe it. Because in a book we have to use words, the easiest way for me to define love is to say: love is the equilibrium between gratitude and generosity. We are so grateful to receive, and once we do, we become so generous that out of the fullness of our hearts we start giving and do not expect anything in return. We are being ourselves completely with no conditions attached. We become passionate. We react in that way because of the gratitude we feel for what we receive and then the generosity of who we really are shines forth. We do not have to and we do not need to, it just comes out of us and the reason is because we are love. We know we are made by love. This is real love. This is pure love. © Keidi Keating, Don Miguel Ruiz. Excerpt is printed with permission of the publisher New Page Books. http://www.newpagebooks.com I can say I am a medical doctor, an author, and that I used to play a lot of chess and guitar. I can tell you everything that identifies me, but all that is just my creation. It is not me. I never even chose my name. I have no idea what I am, but I am. I know I am alive, I am here, that is the truth, and everything else is just an attempt to describe my identity and I already know that I am not that identity. That identity is the way I wish people would perceive me, yet people distort that too and they will not perceive me in the way I want to be perceived. They will qualify me and according to what they believe they will change it. They may believe they know me but they do not. They know the image that they perceive, the image that they judge, and vice versa. I really cannot say that I know anyone, not even my own parents or my children. I can hardly say that I know myself. To not have to pretend to be what I am not is a relief. I am what I am and people either love me or not. I do not pretend to be www.earthstarmag.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 55 YOGA FOR CANCER Creating Your Yoga Practice and Learning the Poses By Tari Prinster oga poses for cancer patients and survivors are not much different from those for everyone else: we all need to strengthen our immune systems and get our muscles moving and fluids flowing! Yoga for Cancer poses, however, are selected for their specific benefits to target survivors â ™ needs. Survivors can use many, but not all, yoga poses. Some popular poses should be avoided, or used only with great caution. In this chapter fifty-three unique poses are provided that are tailored to the specific needs of cancer patients and survivors. Each pose is detailed with an illustration and description along with any benefits and modifications. My recommendation is that you fully review all these poses to better understand what options you have. In chapters 7 and 8 I have sequenced these poses to provide sample practices of thirty, sixty, and ninety minutes based on where you are in your treatment or recovery and the side effects you are hoping to address (such as lymphedema, bone loss, weight gain, anxiety, etc.). Y 56 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 Getting Warmed Up - Starting to Move with Your Breath - Arm Vinyasas - Seated Hip and Spine Warm-Ups Starting to Move with Your Breath PELVIC TILT Sit upright with hands on your hips. Use your hands to bring awareness to the movement of the hips in this sequence. INHALE: Rock to the front of your sitz bones, moving the front of your hips toward your thighs to arch your spine. Lift your chest and draw your elbows behind you. EXHALE: Rock to the back of your sitz bones, rounding your spine. Let your head fall forward as you pull your belly back. Elbows move out to the sides. www.earthstarmag.com Repeat sequence five times. Benefits: Breath awareness, coordinating movement with breath, spine mobility, hip flexibility, chest opening, releases neck tension, releases tension in upper and lower back. NECK STRETCH Begin in your upright seat with your head balanced on top of your spine, chin parallel with the floor. INHALE: Lengthen your spine, sitting tall. EXHALE: Slowly lean your left ear toward your left shoulder. Relax the muscles on the right side of your neck. INHALE: Reach your right hand actively toward the floor beside your right hip, turning your right hand so the palm faces forward and then away from you. EXHALE: Lean your head a little bit farther to the left to increase the stretch. INHALE: Bring your head back upright EXHALE: Lean your head to the left, into the stretch. Repeat the last two steps for five breaths. Then switch to the second side, leaning right ear toward right shoulder while reaching the left hand toward the floor. Modifications: This sequence can also be done standing. Benefits: Breath awareness; coordinating movement with breath; releases neck, shoulder, and upper back tension. Arm Vinyasas CACTUS CLAP Sit upright with palms on your thighs. front of your face. INHALE: Re-open your arms to cactus. Repeat the last two steps for three breaths. Move slowly, following your breath. Then lower your arms and rest palms on your thighs. Modifications: Forearms and palms may not come all the way together. Bring them as close as is comfortable. Benefits: Range of motion in shoulders and arms, chest and upper back stretch, lymphatic drainage in arms. CACTUS TWIST Sit upright with palms on your thighs. INHALE: Lift arms to cactus. EXHALE: Holding your right cactus arm steady, bring your left cactus arm across to your right, twisting your spine to the right. Your forearms may or may not touch. INHALE: Re-open your arms to cactus. EXHALE: Repeat on second side, holding your left cactus arm steady and twisting left to bring your right forearm toward your left. INHALE: Lift your arms to shoulder height, bend your elbows to make a cactus shape, palms facing forward. INHALE: Re-open to cactus. EXHALE: Bring your palms and forearms together in Repeat the entire sequence three times. Benefits: Range of motion in shoulders and arms, upper www.earthstarmag.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 57 Sample Practices for Varying Stages of Your Treatment and Recovery 30-, 60-, and 90-Minute Practices This chapter offers sample practices based on various challenge levels and durations of time so that you can have the flexibility to choose different practices based on how you are feeling. They are designed to be effective for both new and experienced yoga practitioners. The individual poses you learned in the previous pages are carefully sequenced into complete practices. If you are a cancer survivor in treatment, in recovery, maintaining your new normal, or gaining new strength, these samplers are a way to structure your home practice. Or if you are a yoga teacher for cancer patients or survivors, you can use these sample sequences as a basic outline to help plan your classes. spine flexibility, chest and upper back stretch/strengthening, lymphatic drainage in upper body. Seated Hip and Spine Warm-Ups SEATED CAT / COW Sit in a chair, cross-legged, or on your knees. Cup your hands around your knees or thighs, extending your arms as much as possible. INHALE: Arch your spine, reaching your chest up through your upper arms, belly moving toward thighs. Pull on your knees with your hands. Excerpted from Yoga for Cancer by Tari Prinster © 2014 Healing Arts Press. Printed with permission from the publisher Inner Traditions International. http://www.InnerTraditions.com Tari Prinster is a certified yoga teacher, founder of yoga4cancer, former director of Women’s Cancer Survivor Program at Om Yoga, New York City, yoga ambassador for the Living Beauty Foundation, and a breast cancer survivor. Her work has been featured in the documentary YogaWoman and in Yoga Journal. She has presented at conferences held by Yoga Journal, Yoga Service Council, and International Alliance of Yoga Therapists and has published articles in many yoga publications. She lives in New York City and Vermont. EXHALE: Round your spine, belly away from thighs, head bowing forward, as if wrapping your torso over a beach ball. Press your hands against your knees. Repeat sequence at least five times. If you are sitting cross-legged, switch which leg is in front and repeat the entire sequence an equal number of times. Benefits: Full spine flexibility, chest and upper back stretch/strengthening, stimulates lymph system in hips and torso. 58 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com New SLOW City L i v i n g S i m p l y. ..No Matter Where You Are By William Powers n 2007, I lived for a season in an off-grid permaculture cabin in North Carolina. No Name Creek gurgled through a lush forest, and I befriended the eclectic neighbors—organic farmers, biofuel brewers, eco-developers. I discovered a sustainable but imperiled way of life, and wrote about in my memoir Twelve by Twelve: A OneRoom Cabin off the Grid and Beyond the American Dream. Alas, the book triggered angry questions. “It’s easy,” one Twelve by Twelve reader wrote, “to find minimalism, joy, connection to nature, and abundant time in a shack in the woods. But how the hell are the rest of us supposed to stay sane in our busy modern lives?” This question was the genisis of my new book: New Slow City: Living Simply in the World’s Fastest City. I received—in fact—a hundred variations of this question after lectures and on radio interviews, and always answered by saying I was living 12 x 12 values... but in Queens, New York, the home to which I returned after my time in the cabin. But as each year passed, the reader’s doubt increasingly became my own as overwork, material clutter, and the lack of contact with nature—“civilization,” in short—brought me to a point of extreme unhappiness in Queens. Eventually, I too doubted it was possible to live 12 x 12 in a city, and I felt I www.earthstarmag.com an urgent need to decamp far from urban life. Not so fast. As I reached this point, my newlywed wife, Melissa, was offered an excellent job that demanded we stay put in New York City, and I suddenly had no choice but to figure out how to take what I’d learned in the 12 x 12—about the Leisure Ethic, connecting to nature, and living simply—and somehow make it work in the real-world context of a marriage and two careers. In an attempt to do this, Melissa and I embarked on an experiment. We sold or gave away 80 percent of our stuff, left our 1,600-square-foot Queens townhouse, crossed the Williamsburg Bridge, and moved into a tiny rental: a 340-square-foot “micro-apartment”—roughly two 12 x 12s—in downtown Manhattan. Melissa and I approached our thimble of an apartment through the ideas of philosopher Thomas Merton, who called his stark monk’s chambers “the four walls of my new freedom.” We stowed a minimal kit of kitchenware, toiletries, clothing, and books as if equipping a houseboat’s trim hull. It was a refreshing purge; the apartment seems to expand with each tweak. We began to feel our well-being rise in proportion to what’s been shed. A slim metal table in the kitchen welcomes the cutting board; jackets laze on his-and-her hooks; sandals snuggle in their micro-shoe-apartment beside the door. DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 59 rises up, I notice nut-brown oak branches and green leaves fluttering with white butterflies. An off-turquoise sky. Stretchy clouds. Ciao stress! Beyond this minimalist freedom, I discovered that being “Slow” is not at all Luddite. Slow means cultivating positive qualities—receptive, intuitive, reflective— instead of the fast qualities so common today: busy, agitated, acquisitive. I began living and working smarter instead of faster. Borrowing from author and entrepreneur Tim Ferris, I spent my Slow Year practicing two principles at the same time: 80/20 and the Hodgkinson’s Principle. The 80/20 principle says that we accomplish 80 percent of work results in just 20 percent of our time. Conversely, we more or less waste the other 80 percent of our time on a paltry 20 percent of the results. Dutifully, I 80/20ed my life and find that the principle holds true. In one particular week, for example, I looked at all the potential work streams—in international consulting, writing, and speaking—that I could pursue, and distilled out that week’s most strategic one in terms of income-to-time-invested and my current level of enthusiasm: a high-end magazine article. Then I overlaid the Hodgkinson’s Principle. Hodgkinson’s says that work expands to fill the amount of time available to accomplish it. Thus, having chosen the one most critical work activity, I corralled it into a tight timeframe, and found it works: I condensed what might have been five days of work into two! This approach spawned “reverse weekends” for me, where I worked smarter for two-days and took five-day weekends. This is not a utopian idea. Even Carlos Slim, the world’s richest person, recently called for a 3-day work week and Google is increasingly experimenting in lowering hours and thus increasing employee creativity and efficiency. Other Slow City tools my wife and I discovered in our year’s experiment are: Technology fasting: We “fasted” from our gadgets for stints, diabling our phones and setting email to vacation mode. This helped quality of our relationship because we had more time focused on each other. Silent meals: Even in Manhattan’s fine restaurants, we’d sometimes eat in total silence, deeply savor the food, scents, soundscape, and visual beauty of the restaurant in a meditative manner. Though not everyone will live twelve-by-twelve, all of us can ask: What’s my twelve by twelve? We can find the elusive contours of enough—and live there. Enough is the sweet spot between too little and too much. It starts with each of us creating space to slow down a little and ask the core questions, like: How do we find balance in a world that is changing more quickly than ever before in history? And how can we incubate a New Slow City that’s saner now and fit for the future? Born and raised on Long Island, William Powers has worked for over a decade in development aid and conservation in Latin America, Africa, Native North America, and Washington, DC. He is a senior fellow at the World Policy Institute and is on the adjunct faculty of New York University. A third generation New Yorker, Powers has also spent two decades exploring the American culture-of-speed and its alternatives in some fifty countries around the world. He has covered the subject in his four books and written about it in the Washington Post and the Atlantic. An expert on sustainable development, he is a freelance writer and speaker. More information at http://www.WilliamPowersBooks.com. Based on the book New Slow City, © Copyright 2014 by William Powers. Reprinted with permission from New World Library. http://www.NewWorldLibrary.com Urban sanctuaries: Melissa and I began spending more and more time in natural and reflective places right in Manhattan, like Central Park’s Ramble and the tip of Pier 45. Living on the third story: I discovered I only need half my attention on the street level. As the rest of my focus 60 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 www.earthstarmag.com New Slow City A Talk with William Powers, Why did you write this book? New Slow City originated with a somewhat angry question. It came from a reader of Twelve by Twelve: A OneRoom Cabin Off the Grid and Beyond the American Dream, my previous book about living in a twelve-footby-twelve-foot off-grid cabin in North Carolina. “It’s easy,” she wrote, “to find minimalism, joy, connection to nature, and abundant time in a shack in the woods. But how the hell are the rest of us supposed to stay sane in our busy modern lives?” I received a hundred variations of this question in emails, after lectures, and during television and radio interviews about Twelve by Twelve. I always answered by saying I was living 12 x 12 values... but in Queens, New York—the home to which I returned after my time in the cabin. But as each year passed, the reader’s doubt increasingly became my own as overwork, material clutter, and the lack of contact with nature—“civilization,” in short —brought me to a point of extreme unhappiness in Queens. Eventually, I too doubted it was possible to live 12 x 12 in a city, and I felt an urgent need to decamp far from urban life. Not so fast. As I reached this point, my newlywed wife, Melissa, was offered an excellent job that demanded we stay put in New York City, and I suddenly had no choice but to figure out how to take what I’d learned in the 12 x 12—about the Leisure Ethic, connecting to nature, and living simply—and somehow make it work in the real-world context of a marriage and two careers. In an attempt to do this, Melissa and I embarked on an experiment. We sold or gave away 80 percent of our stuff, left our 1,600-square-foot Queens townhouse, crossed the Williamsburg Bridge, and moved into a tiny rental: a 340-square-foot “micro-apartment”—roughly two 12 x 12s—on the fifth floor of a nineteenth-century walk-up in downtown Manhattan. Voila, New Slow City was born! It’s a memoir of a year living the Leisure Ethic in a New York minute, an adventure into smart-city trends ranging within the growing global Slow Movement (Slow Food, Slow Money, etc.). As the world accelerates, shouldn’t we also go faster to keep up and stay competitive? Slow feels a little, well… Luddite. www.earthstarmag.com At first blush, Slow evokes an interminable line at the Department of Motor Vehicles. Slow is an old-fashioned rotary phone, the kind that took so long to dial that, as comedian Louis CK jokes, you kind of hated friends who had 0s and 9s in their numbers. Slow is unAmerican—it’s inefficient, dull, and Luddite. Right? Well, how about another perspective. Gallup recently reported that 70 percent of American employees are either unhappy or disengaged at work. Anxiety levels among adolescents and adults are soaring, even compared to just two decades ago. One out of every four adults in America experiences some form of depression in the course of their lives. In Japan, they have a name for people who die from overworking: karoshi. Could we in the United States be tipping toward becoming a nation of karoshis? I, for one, became so stressed by constant work and the pace of city life that— before our Slow Year experiment—I found myself nearly a karoshi myself. I’m convinced that society must find a new equilibrium between the demands of business, the consumptive habits of society, and our own personal happiness. Being “Slow” means being self-paced. Slow is not at all Luddite. It means cultivating positive qualities—being receptive, intuitive, patient, reflectiv—instead of the fast qualities so common today: being busy, controlling, impatient, agitated, acquisitive. By living and working smarter instead of faster, you’re likely be more competitive. How do you work smarter? Borrowing from author and entrepreneur Tim Ferris, I spent my Slow Year practicing two principles at the same time: 80/20 and the Hodgkinson’s Principle. The 80/20 principle says that we accomplish 80 percent of work results in just 20 percent of our time. Conversely, we more or less waste the other 80 percent of our time on a paltry 20 percent of the results. Dutifully, in New Slow City I 80/20 my life and find that the principle holds true. In one particular week, for example, I looked at all the potential work streams—in international consulting, writing, and speaking— that I could pursue, and distilled out that week’s most strategic one in terms of income-to-time-invested and my current level of enthusiasm: a high-end magazine article. Then I overlaid the Hodgkinson’s Principle. Hodgkinson’s says that work expands to fill the amount of time available to accomplish it. DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 61 Thus, having chosen the one most critical work activity, I corralled it into a tight timeframe, and found it works: I condensed what might have been five days of work into two. This approach spawned “reverse weekends” for me, where I worked smarter for two-days and took five-day weekends. This is not a utopian idea. Even Carlos Slim, the world’s richest person, has recently called for a 3day work week and Google is increasingly experimenting in lowering hours and thus increasing employee creativity and efficiency. Granted, using 80/20 and the Hodgkinson’s Principle won’t be ideal for everyone or all the time. This approach is more suited to entrepreneurs and hourly workers able to prioritize their own time and tasks, nailing the most important ones as quickly as possible and thus freeing up time. But almost anyone can create a small sideline work stream and apply these principles; eventually, perhaps, this side income might become one’s main income. How else can I slow down in my busy modern life? Two great Slow City tools my wife and I discovered are urban sanctuaries and third-story living. First, Melissa and I began spending more and more time in natural and reflective places right in Manhattan. She loves Central Park’s Ramble—with its circuitous paths looping down past waterfalls and pine groves— and the Tudor City gardens perched above First Avenue and 40th Street, an oasis to which she flees from her Midtown office to eat brown-bag lunches amid birdsong. My favorite sanctuaries: Pier 45’s tip, where the West Side High- way fades to a hum; a back seat in the cathedral of St. John the Divine in late afternoon; and the High Line, a new park sanctuary created from unused urban infrastructure. Moongazing on our microapartment rooftop one night after dinner, we mused on two other urban sanctuaries: Washington Square and Madison Square Parks on warm days, when we love to kick off sandals and lie back to savor that sensual press 62 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 of our bodies to the Earth. Gravity’s eros. And it’s mutual, since our bodies exert a tiny gravity on the Earth. A second tool is “living at the third story,” which challenges the street-level commandment that thou must ingest sample sale and fast food come-ons wholesale. I only need half my attention on the street, I discovered, to keep from sleepwalking into traffic and other pedestrians. As the rest of my focus rises out of the buy-osphere and into the biosphere, I notice nut-brown oak branches and green leaves fluttering with white butterflies. An off-turquoise sky. Stretchy clouds. A devious gargoyle winking down at me from a portico. As gridlock, taxi-top strip-club ads, and the crush of shoppers gets backgrounded, my body relaxes. My new foreground: the ebony shine of a baby grand piano through an apartment window. And—look!—there’s the bright white Washington Square Arch capped with a red-tailed hawk, the sunlight gleaming on its wings. Besides those two tools, we also experimented in: • Technology fasts. We tuned off our gadgets for weekends (sometimes for 5-day weekends!), utilizing the “vacation auto-response” on our email. This helped quality of our relationship because we had more time focused on other and the “real” world around us. • Silent meals. Even in Manhattan’s fine restaurants, we’d eat in total silence, deeply savor the food, scents, soundscape, and visual beauty of the restaurant in a meditative manner. This made our lives feel deeper, richer, more sensual and enjoyable. Before your Slow Year, you took and your newlywed bride took “uni-moons” instead of a honey moon. What’s that? Yes, as good New Yorkers Melissa and I had gotten caught up in the prevailing turbo-capitalist ethos. Americans work longer hours than the citizens of any other country—fourteen more hours per week than an average European—and on average we leave unused, and so waste, 30 percent of our vacation time. I’d taken on so many work commitments, mostly subconsciously, to fit in and feel valued within the American system. I overworked, eating quick meals at the laptop or between flight connections. So, even as Melissa and I married, in a small ceremony with family and close friends, our overworking led us to join the disquieting “uni-moon” trend. Instead of a honey- moon trip together in the busy weeks after our wedding, we each took separate, individual vacations without each other—uni-moons, or what amounted to a few days of free time at the end of separate work trips. She took hers in the Dominican Republic after a UN capacity-building workshop; I took mine in Paris on a forty-eight-hour stopover after a community forestry www.earthstarmag.com consultancy in Liberia, West Africa. Strolling, alone, in Montmartre that first evening, I found myself on the smartphone, checking work emails. Looking up from my phone, I was jolted aware that the Eiffel Tower and all of Paris were stretched out before me in all their beauty. I thought back to my North Carolina 12 x 12 and wondered what had happened to one of the big lessons I learned there: the need to balance my constant doing with the joy of simply being—a kind of Leisure Ethic. So you decided to change. What’s the biggest thing you learned? It’s hard to reduce what I learned to a soundbyte. It took much effort to try and stretch a New York minute into an hour, and a great way to discover what I learned is through the new trend of Slow Reading. We’re so distracted by quick Tweets and the barrage of email that we rarely sit with a book—New Slow City, for example!— on a non-Internet-connected device or better yet the physical book, and simply enjoy it for hours on end. Slow Reading is a radical act in our workaholic era, where economic growth is put before life itself. The global environmental crisis is in no small part related to our constant doing—consuming, burning fossil fuels, etc—instead of a benign and joyful being. Ninetieth century British essayist Thomas Carlyle wrote that “man was created to work, not to speculate, or feel, or dream. Every idle moment is treason.” This is even more the prevailing ethos today. It’s treasonous to ask for something the American labor movement demanded, a century back, when union members hoisted banners reading BREAD AND ROSES. The bread was good wages. And the roses? American workers were demanding time, in the form of shorter working hours. Time to smell the roses. Well, they didn’t get it. As Executive Director of the non-profit work-life-balance group Take Back Your Time! John de Graaf put it to me, “We’re working more than we were a generation ago. Without leisure, we’re slaves. This is a freedom fight.” (continued) Time is a renewable resource, but we’re sold the idea it’s scarce. It’s been stolen from overworked singlemoms and business executives. And from almost everybody I know. There’s a David-and-Goliath battle underway today all around the globe. People like de Graaf put happiness first. Journalists like Carl Honoré report on how American workers lost the roses. There’s spiking interest in the international Slow Food movement and in decompression activities like Tai Chi, Tantric sex, and Slow Travel. In Austria each year, people gather from all over Europe in the town of Wagrain for the annual conference of the Society for Deceleration of Time, whose members explore pragmatic means of slowing down. In www.earthstarmag.com Japan, the Sloth Club advocates a less-hurried and moreharmonious lifestyle, and it has swollen to seven hundred members, part of a trend called the “Latinization of Japan.” But do these growing movements stand a chance against the Goliath of overwork? I think they do. But it starts with each of us creating space to slow down a little and ask the core questions, like: How do we find balance in a world that is changing more quickly than ever before in history? How do we overcome our culture’s ingrained habits of too much clutter, total work, and permanent distraction? And how can we incubate a new culture that’s slower, saner, and fit for the future? DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 63 4 Myths That Keep You From Living F u l l y and F e a r l e s s l y By Anita Moorjani ne of the biggest lessons I learned from nearly dying of cancer is the importance of loving myself unconditionally. In fact, learning to love and accept myself unconditionally is what healed me and brought me back from the brink of death. During my workshops and speeches, I often tell the audience to “Love yourself like your life depends on it, because it does!” Being at the brink of death taught me that my purpose in life is to be who I am, and express my authentic self fearlessly. But I also learned that I would never fully express myself unless I was able to accept and love myself unconditionally. The extent to which I am fearless about expressing my authentic self is in direct correlation with how much I love and accept myself. If you’re anything like me, you will feel that it’s one thing to know the importance of loving ourselves in theory, but quite another thing to effectively put self-love into practice. Most of us come from cultures and societies that do not promote, or even support, self-love, and O 64 EARTH STAR DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 we often feel judged if we love ourselves, value ourselves, or put ourselves first. It almost feels as though we live in an upside-down world where we are taught the opposite of what would really help us in life, and when we actually stumble upon the truth of how to live our lives joyfully, we are judged for practicing it. Perhaps this is the reason why so many of us are struggling through life—we are brought up to believe in the opposite of what would really help us, and when we inadvertently stumble upon the truth of how to live our lives joyfully, we are judged for practicing it. Below, I’ve listed some common myths which people seem to take as truths, and which I believe hold us back from living our life fully: Myth #1: It’s selfish to love yourself: To dispel this myth, just look at its opposite: what does it look like if we don’t love or value ourselves? We feel unworthy, undeserving, and unlovable, and the person we become is one who is needy with a void that we believe needs to www.earthstarmag.com be filled by others because we believe that it’s selfish to fill it ourselves. This is the person I used to be. I was needy—and a people pleaser—because I needed the validation of others in order to feel worthy. Now, I’ve noticed that when we love ourselves, we don’t need the approval of others in order to be who we are. Instead, we are able to bring our fully-realized, joyful self out into the world—someone who others want to be around—instead of a self that is needy, with a hole that needs to be filled from the outside. Myth #2: Loving myself means needing constant selfcare, which could make me high maintenance: Many have expressed to me that they believe loving and honoring ourselves simply means making the time in our busy schedules to take care of ourselves—for example, taking the time to meditate, smell the flowers, get a manicure, get our hair done, or get a massage—basically, spend money on ourselves and give ourselves a treat. People tell me “I must already really love myself, because I do that type of stuff for myself all the time. But my life still doesn’t work!” Although I do think it’s important to take the time to do those things for ourselves if it brings us pleasure, here’s what self-love means to me: It means loving myself even when I fail. Even when I’m feeling down, and feel as though I have nothing left. Even when I feel that everyone on the planet is against me and doesn’t understand me. I need to be able to look myself in the eyes, and say, “No matter what anyone else thinks, I will not let myself down, or forsake myself. I will stay by my own side!” ity, I started to become fearful of having “negative” thoughts. Whenever I had a fearful or insecure or negative thought, I would deny it, suppress it, and push it away, believing that it would contribute towards manifesting into a negative physical reality. It was only after almost dying of cancer, did I realize that I had been suppressing many of my thoughts and emotions, for fear of being negative, and putting “negative thoughts” out there. And this suppression only contributed to my illness. I then realized that it’s not my thoughts that create my reality; it’s my emotions towards myself. That is, the more I love myself, the better my external world. The more I love and value myself, the more I allow positive things to come into my life. The less I love myself, the less I feel worthy of allowing positive things to come into my life. If I constantly suppress certain emotions and feelings within myself, judging them as being “negative” and forcing myself to have more positive thoughts, the message I am sending to my own self is that “my thoughts are wrong. I should not be having these thoughts!” Basically, I am denying who I am, and what I am feeling. This is not a loving thing to do to myself, and neither is it healthy to have all these feelings and emotions bottled up inside. I have since realized that it’s more important to be myself than it is to be positive. And as a result, when I am positive, it is genuine and authentic. Anita Moorjani is a speaker and bestselling author of Dying to Be Me: My Journey from Cancer, to Near Death, to True Healing. Find her at http://www.AnitaMoorjani.com or on Facebook. Excerpted with permission from the publisher, Hay House, http://www.hayhouse.com Myth #3: Loving ourselves means being in denial of our weaknesses Many believe that loving ourselves means being in denial about our seeming failures, and just talking ourselves with affirmations. However, this isn’t the case. It’s not just about constantly praising ourselves, talking ourselves up and telling ourselves how awesome we are. It’s about loving the REAL us! It’s about loving the human “us.” The “us” who has feet of clay, the “us” who comes undone under criticism, the “us” who sometimes fails and disappoints those around us. It’s about making a commitment to ourselves that we will stick by “us,” even if no one else does! That’s what lo ving ourselves means! Myth #4: It’s important to always stay positive, regardless of external circumstances: Although it’s not a bad thing to have a positive attitude in life, I have found that as someone who reads books that advocate positive thinking, and how our thoughts create our realwww.earthstarmag.com DECEMBER / JANUARY 2015 EARTH STAR 65