Juicy

Because it has been a habit of mine for a long time now, I no longer think that it is strange.  But when I stop and think about it, or when I put it this particular way, I can’t help but find just how odd my habit is.  You see, I have a habit of not eating for one month out of every year.

Or to put it better, I have a habit of not chewing for one month out of every year.  I eat plenty, in fact I pack my system with nutrients, but I do not chew them.

 

Every August, I go on a juice fast.  I started it some years back when I was feeling what I can only say was “extremely middle-aged.”  I felt fat, tired, rather listless and, worst of all, trapped.  Trapped in my own body and trapped in a cycle of thoughts and actions that I knew were not the healthiest, the best they could be.

So I sought out a reset button.  I went to my naturopath before beginning my juice fast, and she mentored me through it.  Not only did she stand by and add rice protein powder when it was needed, but she encouraged me through it and educated me as to what I could expect from the juice fast.

And, if you are ever to undertake one, you need to know what to expect.

You need to know that the first stage of the fast, the detox stage, is a doozy.  Your tongue is coated white, your breath smells.  You feel achy and tired and irritated.  You may break out in rashes, and some of the stuff that will come out of your body will appall you.  Still you have to go through it.  It is an important part of the fast.

You see, the whole reason to go on a juice fast it to allow your body to heal.  And detoxing the system of all the junk that you regularly carry around inside, packed down in your bowels is an essential part of that healing process.

When you go on a juice fast, you are literally flooding your body with nutrients that are given to it in liquid form.  These nutrients are absorbed directly into your body.  They do not need to be digested.  And because the body does not have to use the amount of energy that it usually dedicates to digestion (especially of things like fried foods and red meats), it is able instead to dedicate that energy to healing, to rebuilding tissue that needs attention.  Kind of like when a community dedicates itself to rebuilding infrastructure.

And more, the juice helps cleans the bowels, sweeping away built up waste.  Therefore, the first few days of the fast can be remarkable in terms of what is lost.  Bloat goes away.  Toxins are flushed.  By the end of the first ten days or so of the fast, your system is beautifully cleansed, your eyes are brighter and your skin looks better.

For one thing, the juice fully hydrates.  For another, is fully nurtures the system.

I learned long ago that, for me, the best time of year for the fast is the high heat of summer.  Others swear by the first days of Spring as the best time.  But whenever the fast takes place, it renews, reinvigorates and it heals.

Most years, I only fast for three days.  To get to those days, I do three days of prep, in which I eliminate foods each day until, on the fourth day, I begin my fast.  While fasting, I take at least four large juices a day—two vegetable and two fruit.  In addition, I drink plenty of water.  At the end of the three days, I take three more to slowly add foods back into my diet, always breaking my fast simply with vegetable broth.  Then I add cooked vegetables.  Then I add brown rice as well.  Then I begin the fourth day with yogurt and begin to build back up to eating as usual.

Sometimes, however, I go for a full four weeks.  These are special fasts, and special times when I can take the time to rest and pay attention to myself and my needs, when I can meditate and be still.  In years when I am working hard in August, I can only do the short fast.

But this year, I will do the full twenty-eight days.  I am eighteen days in already.  My detox has passed and been replaced, as it has been in the past, with a sense of energy and concentration. In the first part of the fast, I was too tired to write about it.  Now, with time on my hands (it would amaze you how much time you have when you don’t have to cook, eat or clean the kitchen every night), I will finish up the fast here, with you, letting you know more about juicing (something I have become passionate about over the years) and the occasional juice fast.

 

Toxins Upon Toxins: How Can You Know Your Medicine Is Safe?

It’s in the news virtually every day now.  Allopathic medicines, which, by their very nature are poison toxic now have become even more dangerous.  Why?  Because the giant pharmaceutical companies are not content with the huge profits they are making.  Now they seek to make a higher profit by releasing sub-standard drugs to unsuspecting patients on a global level.
When is enough enough?  We are already seeing consumers turning to homeopathic medicines by the millions, in spite of the ongoing shitfest against them that is being waged by the British and Australian groups known jointly as the “Skeptics”  (a group so ill-read that they can’t even get their own name right–there has never been a group so staunchly behind allopathic medicine and against everything else, no matter how valuable it may be, the term “Skeptic” implies a searching and open, if critical mind–these folks are have done no research, make no attempt a real discovery, and will do nothing to risk their staunchly held values.  Might one suggest renaming them “Luddites?”  It seems a better fit.)

 

Well, today’s news is that Glaxo, that outstanding example of global greed and allopathic incompetence, is now having to make its settlements with the individual states for the toxic and/or ineffective drugs (Toxic and ineffective?  Something of an allopathic home run!) that were sold earlier this decade.  For a full report, click here.

 

What amazes me once again on reading this is the LACK of outrage.  Why do those who use allopathic drugs never seem to raise a fuss when it turns out that their medications that cost them an arm and a leg may well also cause that arm or leg to fall off, among other “Side Effects” and that those who are literally shoving allopathic shit medications down the throats of sick people never seem to take a stand to make their medicines safer or more effective–only ever more expensive.  And, again, where are the Skeptics on THIS issue.  If they so want to prove that allopathic medicine is better, bigger, stronger and that it can beat up homeopathic medicine any day of the week, why don’t feel the same passion for cleaning their own house as they do in attempting to ransack ours?  Where is their snark?  Why aren’t they protesting Glaxo?  Why are they , as ardent fans of the allopathic way, making sure that allopathic medicines are as safe as they can be and that their production is completely and totally above the sort of breakdown as Glaxo experienced?

 

Is it that it happens just too often?  Or is it that so many people die of allopathic treatments in any given year that we have all simply numbed to that issue.  Or have we, as I suspect, bought the bill of goods, the complete bullshit party line that tells us that killing patients, or making them choose between ailments (as we found out this week, with heart drugs significantly increasing the potential for diabetes), or taking pills with only the hope and no solid proof that they will work and not kill us (sort of a Russian Roulette of medical treatment) is good enough medicine for the average person.

 

I am glad that the states are getting some sort of settlement.  But about the patients who took their diabetes medicine believing that it was safe and effective, only to find out the hard way that it was not?  What about those taking Glaxo’s drugs for depression, who found out that Glaxo was about to give them something to really feel depressed about?  What can ever truly compensate them?  And how can EVER  take any allopathic drug again without experiencing a certain dread, and harboring a certain fear that this might be the drug that kills them…

Short Rant: Statin Drugs, Diabetes or Heart Disease, Your Choice

I haven’t ranted about this sort of crap for a while, but a new article in the New York TImes concerning newly found risks in taking statin drugs to lower cholesterol levels has me back in the same frenzy that I entered every other time the Times has told us all about the risks that allopathic crap drugs carry.

Don’t believe me.  Here’s the article.  Read it for yourself.

What makes me particularly crazy is the fact that doctors see a 9% increase in the chance of developing diabetes as a “side effect.”  And that they find this increase to be completely acceptable.  From the story:

“’I don’t think it’s very clinically important,’’’ said Dr. Steven E. Nissen, chairman of cardiology at the Cleveland Clinic, who consults with drug companies that make statins but requires his fees be donated to charity. ‘What I worry about here is that people will read this story and say, ‘I don’t want to get diabetes so I’m going to stop my statin,’ and then they have a heart attack.’’’
True, nobody wants anyone to have a heart attack. But shouldn’t we all share a desire that the medicine we take be safe AND effective?  What good is  an allopathic piece of shit drug if it, to some degree (let’s not get crazy and think that statins ALWAYS prevent heart attacks), prevents one disease, while it, so some degree, increases the risk of another.  Millions are at risk of diabetes.  Millions and millions of Americans are living at the threshold of the disease, live with insulin resistance or “syndrome X” as it is called.  What would happen to them, to those already living with high risk of diabetes, if they were to take the statin drugs to prevent heart disease.  So many of the causative factors of heart disease are the same for diabetes and vice versa.  Can a drug that causes an increase of possibility of one ever be a wise treatment for the other?

How is it possible that we have a medical system in which a significant increase in risk for a terrible disease is seen as a “side effect?”  It boggles the mind.  And yet, to the millions who have been so dazed and confused by a lifetime of hearing allopathic bullshit propaganda, it all starts to see as if it makes sense.  A few will die from the drug, and a few will be saved by it.  Only fair.  Only fair.

What makes me so sad is that there are other methods and other medicines that can be equally effective in the treatment of high cholesterol that don’t involve the same risk that allopathic medicine does.  Isn’t it high time that you gave that some thought?  That you stopped taking medicines that put you at risk when you take them and, instead, found something that is safe and effective?

May I suggest that you explore homeopathy?

Just Visiting: The Joys of Teaching, Brutally Honest, Ruthlessly Frank

I am always honored when I am asked to be interviewed by a fellow blogger, especially one like Dr. Amit Nagpal, whose passion of healing is obvious to all his readers.  He recently sent me a list of very interesting questions for me to look over and answer.  So I wanted to let you know about the interview and to give you the link to find it.  Just go here.

Dr. Amit

Dr. Amit calls his blog “The Joys of Teaching.”  As he writes, “The blog was initially inspired by my passion for teaching.  Though I have personally moved to consulting and coaching the title remains my first love, ‘The Joy of Teaching.’  In any case, teaching (sharing knowledge) and co-learning are the basic principled behind consulting, coaching and training.”

Amit’s blog also features “Life Mantras for Your Sustainable Success.”  Among his tools for success are prayer and meditation, making his a most unusual spirit-based practice.  I strongly recommend that you spend some time with Amit at his blog.  It is filled with useful information.  I added the link to my recently started Blogroll, that you can find at the bottom of the right column.  (I intend to develop this list of links as time goes on, to bring you direct connection to some of the most exciting holistic sites on the internet.)

Due to space restrictions, Dr. Amit was unable to present the entire interview on his blog, so I present it here.  One question, on the topic of the Bach Flower Remedies, was omitted.  And since the Bach Remedies are among my favorite healing tools, I decided to present the material here:

Dr. Amit:  Tell us what are Bach Flower remedies and what do you mean by homeopathy in thought and action.

Vinton McCabe:  Bach Flower Remedies are a very special little pharmacy of healing tools.  Edward Bach was an allopathic physician who, at the time of the First World War, was transferred to Hahnemann Hospital in London to continue his work as a microbiologist.  That hospital was, of course, named for Samuel Hahnemann, the Father of Homeopathy.

During his time there, Bach became well versed in Hahnemann’s methods and in homeopathic philosophy.  So much so that he himself developed a group of homeopathic remedies that were based in part on the work he was already doing.  These remedies, known as bowel nosodes, are still in use today in the treatment of patients with myriad diseases.

After the war, Bach built a private practice in London and became one of the most successful physicians of his day.  And yet, due in large part to his new-found understanding of Hahnemann’s work, Bach became more and more disenchanted with allopathic methods and medicines.  At this point, one might think that Bach would become a homeopath, and yet he did not.  While he used some homeopathic methods in his practice, he felt that homeopathy, powerful as it is, was simply too difficult a practice for even medical professionals to get right.

And so, in the final years of his life, he closed up shop in London, moved to a small town on the English coast and dedicated his time and energy to attempting to find a new way of working—a method of healing that would be similar in action to homeopathy, but that would be simple enough for even lay people to use to treat themselves and their loved ones.

The result of his work are the Bach Flower Remedies, a group of thirty-eight remedies that are taken from the plants that were native to the countryside in which he lived.  It is said that Bach gathered the plants around him and potentized them, just as homeopathic remedies are potentized, to a zero potency, or what, in homeopathic medicine, is called a Mother Tincture.  Where homeopathic remedies continue to be diluted from the zero potency to many, many different potencies, Bach chose to leave his there, at the point at which the Bach remedies are the perfect balance between homeopathic and herbal remedies.

They are wonderfully safe, simple to use and can be tremendous tools for healing.  I have time and again seen cases in which these simple remedies act when nothing else will.  Because of my love of these remedies, I wrote a book on them—the book that is actually my favorite of all that I have written.  It’s called The Healing Bouquet:  Exploring Bach Flower Remedies and it has all the information that anyone needs to safely and effectively use the remedies.

For those who are interested in learning more about the Bach Flower Remedies, the link to my book is here.

To answer the rest of you question, the concept of Homeopathy in Thought and Action is based upon something that James Tyler Kent said that I read long, long ago, but stayed with me ever since.  Kent—who was perhaps the United States’ finest homeopath, an eclectic physician who practiced roughly in the second half of the 19th century—said that homeopathic remedies are homeopathic in two ways:  by how they are made and by how they are used.

This is very important, because it means that a remedy can be potentized perfectly, by the two-step process set forth by Hahnemann himself, but, if that remedy is used like an allopathic medicine, it will act like an allopathic medicine.  In other words, there is  philosophy behind how homeopathic remedies are chosen and how they are used that must remain in place if the treatment is to be properly homeopathic.  And when we take our remedies and use them in allopathic ways, we bastardize our own treatments, making them semi-homeopathic and semi-allopathic.

An example of this might be blended remedies.  The mixtures that you see all the time in health food stores.  Because people are too afraid or too lazy to use single remedies, instead they buy a combination of ten or twelve different remedies for the treatment of a cold or a backache or some other specific condition.  Now homeopathic students all know that just using the remedies in treatment of a specific condition is wrong—as if the condition itself tells you what medicine to us—but on top of this, they are also using a mixture of many different remedies, all of which produce multiple symptoms.  How can they possibly expect a good result from such and action?

Homeopathy in Thought and Action is a guiding principle for both my classes and my books.  It means that, to be an effective consumer of homeopathics, or, even more important, to be an appropriate and skillful homeopathy, one must have and understanding of the philosophy and history of homeopathy first and then build and understanding of the materia medica and its uses.  You need to think right to use the remedies right—there is no way around it.

I think that the concept of Homeopathy in Thought and Action is so important that I named my entire series of Kindle exclusive books after the principle.  Each of these books looks specifically at an aspect of homeopathic philosophy or at a part of the materia medica, or even an individualized treatment, like the treatment of high blood pressure, so that, putting all the individual books together, one can get a very good overview of the philosophy and practice of homeopathic medicine.

Those interested in knowing more about this series of books can visit my Amazon Authors Page and look for the “Homeopathy in Thought and Action” series of books by clicking here.  Or on my website by clicking here.

My Knee & Me: An Update

I am happy to report that my knee, the achy, swollen joint that I wrote about a couple of days ago, continues to look and act very much like it’s old self.  In fact, just before sitting down at my desk (with my knee bent, thank you very much) to write this, I took the stairs down to the lower level office and then came back up them again, all without pain or incident.  So it seems as if the healing has taken place and the job is done.

I’ve been asked several times since my first post what remedy I used to achieve success. And I have responded to those who asked that my point in writing the post was not to discuss individual remedies (indeed, sometimes I worry that when we mention individual remedies by name that newcomers to homeopathy then associate that remedy with that particular condition, a mindset that is allopathic and not homeopathic–so forgive me if I can be a wet blanket at times), but to stress the way in which homeopathic healing takes place when it takes place.
But since my friends on my Facebook writer’s wall wormed it out of me, I thought I would update you and tell you the remedy.

Most of those who guessed guessed that I took Apis.  Which is a very smart, on-target guess, as Apis is very often used to help people who suffer with arthritis and because it also has an affinity for the knees.  But it was not the remedy.  Very close to it, but not it.

The remedy was Formic Acid, which is an acid contained in (I think) all insect venom.  It certainly is in ant venom (and there is a remedy called Formica that is to the ant what Apis is to the bee), as well as in bee venom.  So Formic Acid and Apis and Formica are all very closely allied remedies.  As to the potency, it was indeed a 200 C, single dose.
Thanks to all who sent good wished and encouragement to me at the time of the post.  Isn’t  it great that something like arthritis–which, let’s face it, is no fun at all–doesn’t have to hold us back if we know our materia medica?

Oprah, Isaac Newton, Homeopathy & Me

Like most of the rest of the American public that enjoys the freedom to watch television in the middle of a workday afternoon, I recently watched the last three episodes of “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” the two-part special featuring a twenty-five year assortment of topics and guests and the final, quiet, Johnny-Carson-inspired last show.

In that last show, Oprah told us that she wanted to leave with us a few of the principles that guide her life.  It was one of these principles that made me sit up and take notice.

Because this was the first time in all these years that I was aware that Oprah and I had something—or someone—in common.  And that someone is Isaac Newton and the something his Third Law of Motion.

Now I have to admit that I usually take a break at four in the afternoon in order to watch Judge Judy enact her Senior Rage against those who allow themselves to be foolishly placed in her power by her television production staff, so the switch to Oprah, with my usual cup of tea, was not so unusual in terms of time period, just in terms of content (the lack of yelling “Stand Up!” was amazing).

About a third of the way into the show—just as I was quite honestly considering taking a look to see who Judy was hectoring that afternoon—Oprah suddenly mentioned Newton, in a manner similar to the way that I have brought in up in my classes over the past twenty or so years.  She used Isaac Newton to explain the spiritual concept of Karma.

Before showing a great clip from the film “The Color Purple” in which Celie finally stands up to her abusive husband Mister and tells him, “All that you have done to me you have already done to yourself,” Oprah explained that, as a universal principle, Newton’s Third Law can be applied to everything in our universe—applied to our own lives and how they work as well.

At that moment, I thought of another moment a long time ago, in which I finally understood homeopathy on a fundamental level when I realized that it is the embodiment of Newton’s Third Law—that it is the Third Law applied to medicine.

The great thing about using Newton as a learning tool, is that he comes already loaded in the hard drive of all our brains.  Whether we remember the year in school in which we learned it or not and whether we remember that it is called Newton’s Third Law of Motion or not, we all know it by heart:  “For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.”

Every time I bring it up in class, I start by giving them the first part of the statement.  I say, “For every action there is,” and I’ve yet to meet a student yet who does not fill in the second half of the equation, “an equal and opposite action.”

Then I simply tell them that, if they understand that, they already understand homeopathy.  Because the First Law of Cure states the same thing:  “Like cures like.”

Homeopathy, you see, is the only form of medicine that works by Newton’s principle, that works WITH the laws governing our universe and our bodies.

Allopathic medicine works in direct opposition to Newton’s law.

Think about it.

If you have a patient who is ill and if you can picture that sick patient as swinging on a pendulum from a place marked “Health” to a place marked “Illness,” then that patient is swinging from Health to Illness.  The allopath, because he gives medicines that work in opposition to the symptoms that the patient is experiencing naturally in his illness (he gives, for instance, a medicine that dries up the sinuses to the patient with a cold or allergies and gives a medicine that puts a patient to sleep for the patient with insomnia, etc.) gives the patient a potent (and some would say toxic, but let’s worry about that another day) medicine that sends that patient abruptly swinging the other way.

This is the honeymoon period of the allopathic dose.  For a time, the allopath’s medication allows the patient to pretend that he is not ill, as the medicine, through its direct and primary action suppresses the patient’s symptoms of illness.  It is important to note that, of course, they are still there, the medicine in no way has cured the cold or the insomnia, only allowed the patient to not have to feel them for a brief period of time.

But then something happens, that equal and opposite reaction.  And the honeymoon period ends.  Because the body reacts to the medicine and, again, sends the patients swinging in the opposite direction—this time toward illness.  And the patient is left with a choice:  keep taking the medicine, often in greater and greater doses in order to achieve the same result (because the body will continue to counter the action of the medicine, in keeping with that Third Law of Newton’s) or experience an even more powerful form of the illness that has been created by working AGAINST the equal and opposite action.

On the other hand, homeopathy works completely in keeping with Newton’s principle:  when you give a homeopathic remedy, you are COUNTING ON the equal and opposite reaction in order for the healing to take place.  Homeopathic treatments are based in the concept that the body will heal itself—that in all cases of medical treatment, the purpose of the medicine is to assist the body in healing itself and not to take over the self-healing task from the body (another important topic for another day).

So homeopathic treatments work like this:  The first or primary action of the remedy is actually to continue the patient’s arc INTO illness.  This is why so many homeopathic treatments begin with an aggravation.  Because the remedy given will, in a totally well person, create the symptoms that the patient is experiencing naturally (already all on his own), then the remedy will actually enhance the symptoms and, in doing so, will alert the immune system that a more powerful response is needed than had been planned for.  In this way, the homeopathic treatment actually assists and enhances the immune response.

The equal and opposite reaction in this case is for the body’s immune function (Vital Force for all the Vitalists out there) to push back against the symptoms associated both with the illness and with the remedy (that acts in a manner just like the illness—remember:  Like Cures Like) and, in doing so, bring about a healing response.

Unlike the allopathic treatment in which the symptoms are suppressed and hidden for a time, the patient numbed to his own pain and suffering, in the homeopathic treatment the symptoms are removed, not by the action of the remedy, but by the body’s own healing mechanism, which has been assisted by the remedy’s potency.  How good is that?  How elegant and how in keeping with the way in which we heal?

Given that Oprah can make the leap to see karma as the expression of Newton’s Third Law, I live in hope that one day she will see how homeopathy is the embodiment of that law in terms of health and healing.  And then, on that day, homeopathy will gain its greatest advocate.

May that day come soon.

The Miraculous “Non-Event”: A Homeopathic Healing

I am in a really great mood today.  And, frankly, I am in it because of homeopathy, which has spurred me on to post this.

You see, a few years ago, I began to develop arthritis.  Like millions of other people my age—in their middle years—I find that each new decade brings new health challenges.  And, sadly, I also find that the healing process is getting longer the older I get.

I have, over the years, developed issues with arthritis in most of the joints in my body.  Happily, with treatment—I tend to favor homeopathy and acupuncture as the two modes of treatment that work best for me—I am free of pain and restriction most of the time, which is great.  I am neither dependent upon painkillers, nor do I have to ask for steroids in order to function, so, most of the time, I have no complaints.

Recently, however, I have been complaining plenty.  Because the arthritis finally discovered that I have knees.

Up to now, I have bragged that I have no pain whatsoever in my knees, that I am free to bend, reach, stretch as much as I want.  Then one day, that ended.  A few days ago, left knee swelled up to the size and color of a ruby red grapefruit and felt as if someone had, overnight while I slept, attached a car clamp to the joint.  As my knee was immobilized, I was pretty much immobilized and could only get up off my bed with the help of a cane, huffy breathing and a gallon or two of pure willpower.

I began receiving acupuncture treatments for my pain and found some immediate relief and soon found that I could move my knee a little as well.  But the recovery was slow and I found that I was burning time, since, despite their names, laptops do not really work very well when placed upon the lap.  Most days because a blur of video games on my iPad, books that I am reading to review and reruns of Judge Judy, which signal the end of yet another workday and the onset of the evening news…

But, to the point—and the point is homeopathy.  Once again I have been reminded of just how exquisite a thing homeopathic medicine is and of the fact that, when you are healed as a result of homeopathic treatment you are healed indeed.

Last night, having had a rather bad day in which my attitude had been colored the pain, I decided to take a homeopathic remedy in spite of the fact that I had had acupuncture recently.  Now, as a rule, I will never combine the two of them, as I consider them too similar in their impact upon the body to blend.  They are, after all, both forms of energy medicine, and work by breaking through blockages in the Vital Force and bringing about a state of balance in the whole system.

But, when you are in pain and there is no one watching, you tend to give things a try.  So I took a dose of a homeopathic medicine I had on hand and, blessedly, I woke this morning with a totally normal and pain-free knee.

This experience reminds me of every other one like it that I have personally experienced or witnessed over these last three decades.  What to me is so amazing, so profound about the way the homeopathy works is the simplicity of it.  The fact that, in many ways, the process of a homeopathic “cure” is a non-event.

I took the remedy last night before I went to sleep.  I did not feel anything as a result of taking it.  I was not numbed or put to sleep, I was not made nauseous, nor did I have labored breathing or any other side effect of the sort that you hear listed at the end of every television commercial for allopathic medicine.  No, I just felt…nothing.  As I say, it was a non-event.

But the results—they’re something totally different.  Because the remedy works with the symptoms and not against them, it served to help my body in its own healing process, in working with the inflammation and pain and pushing it out of my body.  The remedy did not mask or numb anything.  Instead, it boosted my own healing process and assisted it in putting things right, in removing the inflammation from my body.

As a result, I woke this morning with no pain and with a fully functioning knee.  When I woke, I got out of bed and had to stop and remember that I had been in pain and that I had had issues with the knee over the past few days.

No more walking as if from the Ministry of Funny Walks.  No more cane.  Just a knee that matches the other one, step by step, inch by inch.

Where do I go from here?  Will I need another dose of the remedy?  At this point I can’t say.  I know enough to wait and see and, in the meantime, to do nothing.  If the swelling or pain begin to re-occur, I will take another dose of my remedy.  If not, I will not.  I would be very happy and very willing to have this whole thing dealt with by a single dose, as that is a perfect example of homeopathy in action…

The Secrets of Psora

Since it’s just about a year since I started playing around with the internet, I thought perhaps it is high time to make some changes to my blog, Psora Psora Psora.

Indeed, over the last year, I’ve been asked several times, first, what the name of the blog means and, second, just what kind of blog it is.

The first question is much easier to answer.

Psora is a homeopathic term.  It literally means “itch.”  But it is most often used to refer to any disease that if functional in nature—that relates to an over-reaction or under-reaction on the part of the body.  Allergies, for instance, are a functional disorder that impact the lives of countless millions of disease.  Psoric diseases are those that will not show up on any test, that seem to be rooted in mystery, and yet—there they are.  Things don’t function right, the patient suffers and not reason can be found.

This is the heart of Psora:  a mystery.  Symptoms are its clues.  But, so far, no solution, no answer.  Psoric things are those that we have to learn to “live with.”  That we adapt to, as our lives are shaped by the limitations that Psora brings.

I named the blog Psora Psora Psora for two reasons.  First, as an homage (in other words, stolen from) the old movie, Tora Tora Tora.  As they are homonyms, it seemed apt.  Second, each Psora relates to a different level of being:  body, mind and spirit, as each can get equally fucked up, and, in it’s ultimate meaning, there is no better, simpler definition for Psora than “fucked up.”

Psora, by the way, is pronounced “sora.”  The “p” is psilent.

Now, on to that second question:  just what kind of blog is this, anyway?

Damned if I know.  I started it without a plan in mind and have managed to be very disciplined in that arena since the launch.  Blame it on Psora.  This blog is seemingly an avenue of dysfunction.  Friends of the homeopathic sort complain that I spend too much time writing about other things, about Tina Fey and pickled beets and some-such.  Friends of the literary sort think I spend WAY too much time going on and on about homeopathy.  They think I am seeing Skeptics behind every tree and under every rock and worry that I will soon take to wearing a tinfoil hat to keep the Obama administration out of my head.

All I can say about that is that I care passionately about homeopathy, and yet, if I had to post posts about what remedies to take during allergy season and nothing else, I would go mad.  But perhaps during the second year I can formulate a plan, or spin off another blog on literary matters and leave this to homeopathy. Who can say?

Finally there is the matter of the changes made.  First the look.  I like the new look—very simple.  The legal pad as if I were just jotting down ideas, barely formulating sentences.  That appeals, to me at least.

And the new “motto.”  I never liked “Writing:  Not Rocket Science.  Harder.”  Thought it a bit bitchy and not really true.  I suspect that rocket science is a bit harder than constructing a complex sentence, complete with dependent clause.  Homeopathy on the Hoof is an important concept to me, and one that I will go into in more detail later one.  Suffice it to say that, if we cannot make homeopathy part of our day-to-day life, if we cannot see the symptoms and the characteristics of the different archetypes when we see them, then we can never truly call ourselves homeopaths.

It’s been an intense year, digitally speaking.  I joined Facebook and LinkedIn and learned to Tweet (badly, irregularly) and found out how good it can be to be an Amazon Author.  And I joined the New York Journal of Books as a literary critic.  But no other part of the internet has been as much fun as this.  Here I met the Skeptics and chased those flying monkeys away.  And here I learned not only that narcissism is fun, but that, on the internet, it is expected.

Brass Tacks

First, apologies to those who follow this blog, for my delay in getting a new post up. I can only say that I have been very busy in the last few weeks working with my editor and with the production department of my publishing house getting my new book ready to go to press. But more on that in a few days when I have something concrete to announce. For today, there are other fish to fry.

Second, I want to express my joy and gratitude to the many members of the homeopathic community who are speaking up and acting out as well. I say it is high time for those who believe that homeopathy presents a valid alternative to allopathic or Standard Western medicine to speak up. And especially high time that we began to hold the feet of the media to the fire when they report as poorly as they tend to do when it comes to homeopathy. If, for example, I hear one more report that uses the word “homeopathy” interchangeably with the term “holistic” or, worse, “herbal,” I am going to make damned sure that those who made the mistake will never make it again.

It is time what we began to demand our rights to not only undertake the method of health care that we desire—both in case of illness and preventatively—but it is also time that we made our government aware of the fact that we consider our right to choose when it comes to health care to be a basic human right and not something that we are willing to surrender, now or ever. It is time for our politicians to realize that our vote is linked to the politician’s ability to prove to us (with his or her track record) that they will fight like mad to ensure that this basic right is never removed. And that in all countries in which a national health plan is in place that homeopathy is part of that plan—no and forever. Equally important, as nations like the United States now finally begin to flirt with the idea of universal coverage, it is of vital importance that homeopathy be part of that program and that those who think it is their right to block such coverage be shouted down as the petty martinets that they are.

No matter what arguments those Skeptics who attempt to want to remove homeopathy as a legal and recognized alternative to the toxins of allopathy may want to present, the simple matter is that they are trying to control our right to select the medical treatment that is most in keeping with our world view and our beliefs when it comes to health and healing. And it doing that, they overstep their rights—as their rights end where mine begin. Let me put it into all caps to make it clear: IT NEVER IS AND NEVER WILL BE RIGHT FOR ONE GROUP TO BE ABLE TO DEPRIVE ANOTHER GROUP OF THEIR RIGHT TO CHOOSE WHEN IT COMES TO POLITICAL, RELIGIOUS OR MEDICAL BELIEFS. No matter what ridicule is used, no matter what fear speak, the reality is that no one should ever have to lay down their right to choose because of the tyranny imposed upon them by others.

Suffice it to say, anyone who attempts to interfere with my right choose homeopathy or chiropractic or acupuncture when it comes to medical treatment is in for quite a fight. And I am happy and proud to see that, day by day, the number of other people who are willing to stand up and speak out along side me is growing dramatically.

We are seeing a chipping away at our right to choose. Great Britain, the home of the most of that very vocal minority known as the Skeptics, has already enacted legislation that requires homeopaths to “prove” the validity of their practice in a manner that can only be described as “Orwellian.” The sheer bullshit of the action—a means of placating the Skeptics who attempted to removed homeopathy from the National Health Care—is akin to the McCarthy hearings in the USA in the ‘50s. The results will likely be the same—a blacklist of sorts through which some homeopathic practitioners will be blocked from making statements of homeopathy’s efficacy. Statements that are made daily by food and supplement companies on television commercials and blatantly made daily by pharmaceutical companies—even though our recent history shows that those companies, more than any other, are likely to have to eat their words when their promises are proven false and their drugs proven toxic.

Why then does the British government seeks to “protect” its citizens from homeopathic medicines while allowing pharmaceutical giants like Glaxo to get by with a slap on the wrist when they are caught red handed lying about the efficacy of their products and selling tainted goods? Where is government protection then?

And why does the Canadian government—supposedly working from the same need to “protect” the citizens of is country—now feel the need to remove homeopathic remedies in the potency of 10M from store shelves? What sense does it even make? It is chop logic of the most severe sort. On the one hand, Skeptics insist that homeopathy is crap because the remedies are diluted to the point that no molecules of the original substance remain (in making this claim, they of course ignore the thousands and thousands of remedies are less dilute and have many molecules of the original medicinal substance remaining, but let’s go with it for the moment), but on the other the government feels it necessary to remove 10M potencies, one of our highest levels of potency and therefore dilution. Following the logic of the doubters, the Canadian government should have removed 6X potencies, not 10M, which are so highly diluted that most certainly no original molecules remain.

What gets me mad every time is that, Skepics and government officials alike, none of these idiots ever seem to have even the slightest understanding of what homeopathy works or why or how. None have, in my experience—and I have asked this question of many, many of them, repeatedly–have any direct experience of homeopathy. It is not as if they have visited a homeopath again and again and worked with it to achieve a healing, or studied it seriously enough to question their own values and thought processes. No, they condemn what they don’t even understand.

For instance, they continue to scream that what makes homeopathy homeopathic is the process of dilution. Not true. The basic truth of homeopathy has to do with how your look at symptoms and how you treat them, not with what. The core philosophy of homeopathy is stated “Like cures like,” not “dilute, dilute, dilute.” The core philosophy has to do with the fact that, when treating homeopathically, we always work with a patient’s symptoms, not against them.

If the doubters could start from this point and move forward from there, we might be able to have a dialogue. But as long as they wish to shout down all attempts to discuss our philosophies like adults, and as long as their bully tactics result in a slow chipping away of our rights as humans to determine our own medical care (the loss of the 10M potency in Canada may seem like a small enough thing until it is the potency you happen to need), then I say that the only appropriate response is to kick them in the balls. Once they are bent over and in pain, we could, if we wanted to, offer them a dose or two of Arnica.

Homeopathy, Skeptics & Chinese Food: A Placebo Effect Cul De Sac, Featuring Tina Fey & Her New Book, Bossypants

When I am not busy trying to make the world safe for homeopathy, I am often busy reading books and reviewing them for the New York Journal of Books—and, in doing so, I am busy trying to make the world safe for readers as well.

In the book I am now reading for my next review, Bossypants by Tina Fey, I came upon a short chapter that resonated with me.  Called “I Don’t Care If You Like It,” the chapter had to do with the concept of whether it is right or wrong for women to be comedians.  But there was something in the universality of people having the right to do or think as they like that hit close to home with me.  So I thought I’d share it with you.

First a few chapters from Bossypants:

“Amy Poehler was new to SNL and we were all crowded into the seventeenth-floor writers’ room, waiting for the Wednesday read-through to start.  There were always a lot of noisy ‘comedy bits’ going on in that room.  Any was in the middle of some such nonsense with Seth Meyers across the table, and she did something vulgar as a joke.  I can’t remember what it was exactly, except it was dirty and loud and ‘unladylike.’

“Jimmy Fallon, who was arguably the star of the show at the time, turned to her and in a faux-squeamish voice said, ‘Stop that!  It’s not cute!  I don’t like it.’

“Amy dropped what she was doing, went black in the eyes for a second, and wheeled around on him.  ‘I don’t fucking care if you like it.’  Jimmy was visibly startled.  Amy went right back to enjoying her ridiculous bit.  (I should make it clear that Jimmy and Amy are very good friends and there was never any real beef between them.  Insert penis joke here.)

“With that exchange, a cosmic shift took place.  Amy made it clear that she wasn’t there to be cute.  She wasn’t there to play wives and girlfriends in the boys’ scenes.  She was there because she wanted to do what she wanted to do and she did not fucking care if you like it.

“I was so happy.  Weirdly, I remember thinking, ‘My friend is here!  My friend is here!’ Even though things had been going great for me on the show, with Amy there, I felt less alone.

“I  think of this whenever someone says to me, ‘Jerry Lewis says women aren’t funny,’ or ‘Christopher Hitchens says women aren’t funny,’ or ‘Rick Felderman says women aren’t funny…Do you have anything to say to that?’

“Yes.  We don’t fucking care if you like it.

“I don’t say it out loud, of course, because Jerry Lewis is a great philanthropist, Hitchens is very sick, and the third guy I made up.

“Unless one of these men is my boss, which none of them is, it’s irrelevant.  My hat goes off to them.  It is an impressively arrogant move to conclude that just because you don’t like something, it is empirically not good.  I don’t like Chinese food, but I don’t write articles trying to prove it doesn’t exist.”

Which all goes to show that cosmic shifts can happen anywhere, any time.  They can happen while reading the next book that you are to review.

So thanks Tina Fey for setting me straight, for letting me see just how arrogant it is of the Skeptics to not only decide that homeopathy is not for them, but to also take the next step and, like Chinese food, start writing articles and making videos announcing that it does not exist.

If I have had not just one but multiple healings through the use of homeopathy, then, say the Skeptics, either it was all a coincidence and my symptoms were going to go away anyway, or I am just too much of an idiot to know that I have been tricked and fooled, again and again.  Because I am ssssoooooooooo easily lead that I can believe that I have been healing just because someone waves a wand at me and says that I have been healed.  (Funny how that never seems to work with allopathic drugs, no matter how many wands are waved and now matter how much I believe in them as well.  But placebo effect is a wacky old thing, it just comes and goes, comes and goes…)

So let me say this to the Skeptics (and, by the word Skeptic, let me note that I am not addressing those who are generically skeptical, those who are actually asking questions with the intent of getting answers, no I am addressing those who have more formally named themselves Skeptics and who have made it their business to be more or less the medicine police for a world that neither needs not wants such a service), in Tina Fey’s vernacular, when it comes to homeopathy, those of us who have spent our lives studying it, practicing it and/or being treated by it “don’t fucking care if you like it.”

You can take it or leave it.  As can I.  And I choose to keep it.  I choose to continue being treated by it, and writing about it, and studying it and seeing to it that it remains a legal form of medical treatment in my own country and in countries around the world.

Because this is where you really make me mad, Skeptics, when you don’t just satisfy yourself stamping your feet and shouting.  When you take it upon yourself to try and see to it that the laws change and that I no longer have the right to have the medical treatment of my preference.  And that is where you are making your mistake, Skeptics.  You should have stuck with your phony “Oh, look I overdosed by taking homeopathic remedies incorrectly in a way that would never actually cause an overdose for a homeopathic remedy, although, were it an allopathic drug, it likely would have killed me!” videos.  Because when you seek to take away my legal rights, you get me mad.  And millions of others just like me.

You see, people don’t like being told what to do, especially by an arrogant group of loudmouths.  You may get some media attention just for the novelty of it all, but I think that you will find that, in trying to drive homeopathy into the ocean, you actually get many people who have no intention of actually taking homeopathy themselves, upset enough to see to it that your measures don’t work.

Why?

Because just like Tina Fey, millions of people agree that “just because you Skeptics don’t like something, does not mean that it is empirically not good.”

And we don’t have to convince you of anything.  We don’t have to prove a damned thing to you.  And we have the right to choose when it comes to our own medical care–not you, never you.  Honestly, and we mean this from our holistic little hearts, we just don’t fucking care if you don’t like it.

Homeopathy exists.  And homeopathy is loved by millions.  Just like Chinese food.