The Yin & Yang of Lyme Disease and Climate Change

MAY 13

The Yin and Yang of Lyme Disease and Climate Change

Posted by Brendan Kelly – May 13, 2016

---

 Categories: ECOLOGY & SUSTAINABILITY HEALTH & HEALING

---

Our usual Western view of the world teaches us separation. Medically, we’re taught to believe that each organ is separate from the others and that the physical, mental, and emotional aspects of our lives are distinct. We’re also encouraged to see ourselves as separate from the people and the world around us. The long history of Chinese medicine offers us a different view—one of interconnection.

From an Eastern view, all of our organs are connected and the different parts of our lives are woven together into a whole. Likewise, we are part of the human and ecological communities surrounding us. For several thousand years, Chinese medicine has understood that what happens on a large scale is a reflection of what occurs on a smaller scale, and vice versa. Similar to a modern Western understanding of holograms, where each small part of the picture contains the entire image, Eastern medicine recognizes that what happens within us is reflected in what happens in nature.

Though we’re encouraged to see it as two distinct issues, Chinese medicine can help us recognize that what’s happening with the climate is being mirrored in our internal environment. In particular, the rapid heating and destabilizing of the climate is mirrored in the rapid increase of Lyme disease.

The Center for Disease Control reports 300,000 new cases diagnosed annually in the US, a dramatic increase over the past 20 years.1 Due to the inaccuracy of Western diagnostic tests and that many symptoms of Lyme manifest similarly to other conditions, many patient groups and heath organizations maintain that this estimate is very low, possibly by a magnitude of several factors.2

There’s a long list of possible symptoms associated with Lyme disease, including joint and muscle pain; headaches; fatigue; insomnia; a wide range of digestive issues; and neurological conditions including confusion, dizziness, and loss of balance. The usual Western medical approach is the use of antibiotics to attempt to kill the bacteria responsible for the condition. While this can help some people, my clinical experience indicates clearly that it is not always effective and can in fact contribute to the worsening of existing symptoms and the creation of others. 

From an Eastern perspective, the use of antibiotics is an attempt to treat the infection from the initial tick bite. For Chinese medicine, this inflammation corresponds to the diagnosis of heat, which is an excess of Yang. But rather than being a complete diagnosis, what Western medicine calls infection and what Chinese medicine calls heat is only one part of the progression of Lyme disease. 

After the first stage of inflammation, the second is what Chinese medicine calls Yin deficiency, which is a loss of coolant. When things become hot, the ability of the body to keep things cool can be cooked off, indicating a decrease in Yin. At this second stage, the infection that comes from the initial bite is compounded by the decrease of coolant. 

The third stage is a response to the second, where a lack of fluids causes the body to create and retain unhealthy fluids, which Chinese medicine calls dampness. This sticky, heavy fluid is an attempt to replace the healthy, thinner fluid being cooked off from the heat. For Chinese medicine, this dampness can create digestive issues, tiredness, and the fuzzy thinking associated with Lyme disease.

The fourth, final stage is a response to the third, where the body tries to move the dampness by creating wind. As with wind in nature, internal wind blows things around and is associated with symptoms that move around the body. It’s also responsible for all neurological symptoms, including the tremors, twitches, vertigo, and cognitive issues associated with late-stage Lyme disease.3 In looking at this development of Lyme disease internally—heat creating dryness which creates dampness which creates wind—we can see this very same progression in the warming of our planet. 

Many decades of climate data indicate conclusively that the planet is warming. More recently, climate research also shows that the ability of the planet to hold greenhouse gases is decreasing. Trees hold onto the emissions we’ve been creating and deforestation decreases this sequestration. Melting permafrost releases the potent greenhouse gas methane, which is also bubbling to the surface from the floor of northern oceans. Together, these effects indicate a loss of the planet’s ability to maintain coolant, which is a decrease of Yin. 

Along with the increasing heat and decreasing Yin, there is also an increase of floods globally. This excess of water closely matches the idea of dampness, where the fluids of the planet transform from a state of balance to imbalance. The last stage of climate change progression is wind, which corresponds to more storms globally. As has been extensively documented, there is a dramatic increase of storms in general and severe storms in particular, including hurricanes and typhoons.4

The warming of the planet and the increasing number of Lyme diagnoses follows a similar pattern and starts with the same issue: heat. Heat within us makes us susceptible to inflammatory conditions like Lyme. And the heat from emissions that we in the U.S. are creating is warming the planet rapidly. A balance of Yin and Yang—a balance of coolant and heat—is good medicine not only for our health but also for the wellbeing of the planet.

Notes

1. “How many people get Lyme disease?” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
2. “Basic Information about Lyme Disease,” International Lyme and Associated Disease Society
3. This is Chinese medicine’s Sheng Hua progression theory. I don’t know of any written reference available in English. My understanding of Sheng Hua comes from personal notes from studies with Dr. Jeffrey Yuen.
4. See chapter 3, The Yin and Yang of Climate Crisis, Brendan Kelly, North Atlantic Book, 2015.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Brendan Kelly

Brendan Kelly is the author of The Yin and Yang of Climate Crisis, which looks at the bigger and deeper issues of climate change through the lens of Chinese medicine. The co-founder and co-owner of Jade Mountain Wellness, where he currently practices acupuncture and herbalism, he has also been actively involved with environmental issues for 25 years. For more information about Brendan, his book, recent articles, and classes visit personalasecological.com.

Credited Source: https://www.northatlanticbooks.com/blog/yin-yang-lyme-disease-climate-change/

Space Coast Wellness Center
321.610.8935
466 North Harbor City Blvd. Melbourne, FL
spacecoastwellnesscenter@gmail.com

Location: We are conveniently located at 466 North Harbor City Boulevard in Melbourne, Florida.  At the corner of US 1 and Babcock St.

How to Heal Yourself by Talking to your Body

By Therese Wade on Wednesday April 27th, 2016

Your Cells are Listening

Every part of your body has its own consciousness or its own soul.

These transformative words, spoken by indigenous medicine women, began my journey within to discover the extraordinary healing capacity of the human body.

When this perspective was introduced to me, I was suffering from a severe chronic pain disorder. I suddenly imagined incorporating this concept into my meditation routine.

I thought, can my body hear me… can I talk to it to gain its cooperation in healing this condition?

Can my body hear me?

The Path to Freedom

That night, after reaching a state of deep calm through meditation, I inwardly engaged my body in a heartfelt conversation, with hope, but having no idea what to expect. After about one hour of this focused communication, something amazing happened.

My tissues began to respond. Connective tissue pulled and stretched apart layers of scar tissue. Nerves fired and my calf muscles began to perform flexion and extension exercises independently of my conscious control.

As this response continued, one of my calf muscles that had become paralyzed by the neuropathic condition — diagnosed as Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy — came back to life as electric-like jolts shot through the area.

My heart pounded as I realized that the path to my freedom from this condition had finally begun.

Nerves fired and my calf muscles began to perform independently of my conscious control.

Guidelines for Dynamic Healing

With a background in acupuncture and Oriental medicine, I knew too well how prevalent chronic pain is in this country and I wondered what the implications of this phenomenon could mean to so many others who were suffering.

As I continued to make progress with my condition, I organized my approach into a system that I could teach to clients and shifted my professional focus to hypnotherapy.

When instructing my clients, I explain that a regular meditation practice is necessary to train the brain to enter alpha and theta brain wave states. While in these states, communication between the conscious mind and the physical body is dramatically enhanced.

A regular meditation practice is necessary to train the brain.

I have found that when communicating, there are three key steps to gaining the cooperation of the body:

• Approach your body with genuine compassion, understanding that it is made up of conscious cells who experience emotions.
• Build trust by engaging your body in mental conversations about your desire for the two of you to cooperate and overcome the ailment.
• Allow changes in the conversation by using different thoughts and words that elicit spontaneous elevated emotions.

From my experience, the above guidelines are necessary to achieve dynamic healing responses in the body.

The above guidelines are necessary to achieve dynamic healing responses in the body.

The Force of human Intention

I recently came across a very similar set of factors that were discovered by researcher Cleve Backster, who spent 36 years studying biocommunication in plant, animal and human cells. He referred to these factors as real intent, attunement, and spontaneity.[1]

Backster, formerly an interrogation specialist for the CIA, wrote about the defining moment which led him to his real work in this world, in his book Primary Perception.[2]

This moment occurred one February morning in 1966 when he decided to monitor the Dracaena plant in his lab utilizing polygraph equipment.

Cleve Backstair spent 36 years studying biocommunication in plant, animal and human cells.

He attached the electrodes to a leaf and began to think about ways that he might induce a surge in electrical activity in the plant. In humans this surge in electrical activity is associated with intense emotions.

He suddenly imagined burning the electroded leaf. The same instant this idea entered his mind, the polygraph pen shot to the top of the chart showing an extreme reaction on the part of the plant.

Amazed, he walked to his secretary’s desk to retrieve a set of matches while pondering the possibility that this plant was somehow detecting the force of human intention.

The plant reacted to the idea of being burnt.

Can Plants become Attuned to their Primary Care Takers?

When he returned with the matches, the plant was still showing the same high level reaction which would interfere with tracking additional changes on the chart. Backster decided to “remove the threat” by returning the matches to the desk.

At this point, the chart displayed a downward trend as the plant apparently began to calm down.[3] When Backster attempted to repeat the same results by pretending that he was going to burn the plant, there was no reaction. The plant seemed to sense the difference between real and artificial intent.

He eventually discovered that plants become attuned to their primary care takers, responding to both their positive and negative emotions and to their return after being away for a time.[4] Chart findings also showed that plants prioritize the emotions of their primary care takers over the emotions of others nearby.

Plants prioritize the emotions of their primary care takers over the emotions of others.

Signs of Consciousness

Backster later expanded his research to include testing human cells for signs of consciousness.

He collected white blood cells from human donors, electroded them in a test tube and then recorded the cells’ reactions as the donors experienced different emotional states. He found that spontaneous emotions were necessary in order to elicit an electrical reaction in the cells.

For instance, if a donor forced herself to feel an emotion, the cells would not respond. However, when she received a distressing phone call from her daughter, the cells reacted significantly.[5]

He noted that distance seemed to be irrelevant in these experiments. For example, a donor left his electroded cells behind in the lab, then kept a detailed log of any stressful emotions experienced on his trip home to another state, such as missing a turn on the freeway, standing in a long line at the airport, and the take-off of his plane.

Later, his logged incidents compared with the chart recording showed strong correlations between the timing of the stressful events and the electrical reactions in his cells. The chart became quiet again when he arrived home and went to sleep.[6]

Spontaneous emotions were necessary in order to elicit an electrical reaction in the cells.

Raw Creative Healing Ability

These experiments were conducted while using equipment that screened out electromagnetic radiation — the usual energies used for information transmission. The cells behaved as if the screens weren’t there, suggesting that this communication is carried by a field still unidentified by conventional science.[7]

Some scientists believe that the further development of quantum physics may help guide us to understand this field that communicates emotional intent between living things.[8] Quantum Entanglement is a process where two particles of matter which have interacted with each other, still behave as if they are connected after being separated by many miles.

When an energetic change is made to the properties (position, momentum and rotational spin) of one of the particles, the properties of the other distant particle will change at the same instant.

Quantum Entanglement – two particles of matter still behave as if they are connected.

This scientific phenomenon and the research of Cleve Backster, point to the Eastern concept of oneness — the view that all of nature is interdependent. Ancient cultures understood this interconnection as a living universal energy field that sustains life while guiding the evolution of consciousness throughout the universe.

The meditation techniques involved in my practice bring the mind into attunement with this field. Energy from this field is then focused into a physical healing event through clear intention — delivered by means of a conversation that evokes spontaneous emotions — and attunes the physical body to the conscious mind.

This method which I call Antara (Sanskrit for within), enables one to experience the raw creative healing ability generated by an alliance of the mind and body with this living universal energy field.

Credited Source: http://upliftconnect.com/heal-yourself-by-talking-to-your-bodyCredited Source

Space Coast Wellness Center
321.610.8935
466 North Harbor City Blvd. Melbourne, FL
spacecoastwellnesscenter@gmail.com

Location: We are conveniently located at 466 North Harbor City Boulevard in Melbourne, Florida.  At the corner of US 1 and Babcock St.

Anti Aging~ Space Coast Wellness Center

Are Senior Moments and creaky joints just a part of aging?

No. Aging is not the same thing as getting old.

If you've lived long enough, you may have noticed the irony of getting older- your wisdom and experience increase while your health and looks decrease. How sad so many people think aging, as we know it, is normal! Wrong! It is abnormal to age as quickly as we do, in pain, slowing down, stiff and unhealthy and, for some, infirm and unable to love on our own, chained to a body that won't do what we want and taking larger and larger numbers of expensive prescription drugs. You can prevent unnatural aging. Right now!

So What's Going On?

With each generation over the last century living longer than the one before, this coming generation is the first predicted to actually have a shorter lifespan. And, believe it or not, many countries have a longer life expectancy than we do in the US.

We are inundated every day with chemicals that age us quickly. We eat toxins, fruit gassed into ripening (many fruits are nutritious only when naturally ripened) or, worse, un-ripened fruit sprayed to look ripe and vegetables with less nutritional value each year. Our meats and diary products continue to increase in hormone and antibiotic levels, so children are entering puberty at younger ages! As young as eight years old! Ever wonder what it does to your hormone levels through your life-span? Then there are pesticides, which are estrogen and mimics female sex hormones, confusing our natural hormonal balance which can cause age related diseases, mental dysfunctions and/or premature aging.

Many women are given pharmaceutical grade hormones to replace the body's natural hormone production but, while the body does not recognize these as natural enough to effectively use, it reacts by decreasing natural production far more than in normal, healthy aging. We need these hormones to keep us healthy and youthful.

Antibiotics used against bacteria in animals continue to be less and less effective as the bacteria mutate and become resistant, so the strength of the antibiotic is increased. These antibiotics weaken our own immune systems too. The weaker it is, the more we become worn down by disease.

We no longer get the nutrients we need from good health, in body or mind. We also get the wrong advice about diet, even from well-intentioned physicians and dietitians who offer us conflicting information and don't keep up on the latest research. We eat too many carbohydrates (sugars) and processed foods, and not enough proper fats and proteins, which also feed the brain.  It's no wonder we are aging so quickly.

Free Radicals

Many physicians and most scientists studying aging feel free radicals are responsible for the process of aging. Free radicals are chemicals left in the body that the body cant get rid of and that cause cellular damage. Some free radicals are the result of just plain living itself- metabolism and cellular processes- and are natural for all living things. But, between the high toxins and low nutrition, pollution, trauma and stress, our bodies take a beating from the outside as well and all this builds up even more free radicals.

And you have plenty of them by age forty and they just build from there, slowing down the cell's work, causing them to function incorrectly, reproduce faulty copies or not reproduce at all. Free radicals go crashing into DNA, causing genetic damage and leaving the cells without the information they need to do that work that is so vital to our health. The result is age.

In short, the body has to work harder and harder. It loses ground, can no longer repair the normal damage and the free radical damage as well as it could when it was younger. And the worse it gets, the harder it is to fix and the downward spiral of age continues. The effects are visible,  just look in the mirror.

Our genes are set to bring us to maturity but we have no genes that have the job of facing us. Aging is due to damage. Today, we are living longer, but not better. Wouldn't it be great to live longer and be healthy all the way?

Look & Feel Younger

Wouldn't it be great if you could have the benefits of aging and dramatically reduce the parts you don't like? Wouldn't it be wonderful to have great energy and glowing good looks long into your 'golden years'? Sure, we want to live longer, but we also want older age to be vibrant, healthy, active and youthful. That means we want to look good, with beautiful, glowing, youthful skin, the vitality we had in our twenties and thirties and the ability to enjoy life to its fullest.

Fortunately, the study of healthy aging has occupied the best minds in Chinese Medicine for thousands of years as well as some of the best western scientists for the past few decades. And the East and West agree. As a result, there are ways to improve your quality of life as you age. And all of these techniques are completely natural- they work with your body to increase your overall health while also increasing your energy and youthful appearance.  One of the most powerful and comprehensive approaches to help you achieve a long and healthy life is called Anti-Aging Acupuncture. I offer this treatment to my patients who want to insure their quality of life as they age.

Oriental Medicine, Anti-Aging Acupuncture and Cosmetic Acupuncture

Anti aging acupuncture and oriental medicine can help bring the body into balance- the balance necessary to reduce the free radicals, heal cellular damage and reproduction, increase your immunity so you stay healthy, help you keep the hormones you need and reduce the wrinkles you don't. It can help remove stress and reduce the effects of trauma and disease. Even arthritis pain can decrease as you get older and enjoy a more active life.

• Oriental medicine and cosmetic acupuncture or facial rejuvenation can bring postmodern faces the same youthful appearance it has achieved for Asian royalty for centuries without the trauma or expense of surgery.
• Many patients see definite improvements. Lines soften even after just one treatment and lasting results can be found with proper care.
• Cosmetic acupuncture stimulates the circulation of qi (say chee), the body's life or energy force in Oriental medicine, to the face and neck, bringing blood and energy flow to the skin and the connective tissue beneath it, brightening and firming.
• Procedures can smooth out fine lines, reduce the appearance of deeper wrinkles, plump out the texture of skin and help tone underlying muscles to tighten saggy cheeks and droopy necks.
• Anti-aging acupuncture does not just help you look younger, but it also helps you feel better.
• People who have face-lifts look like they've had face-lifts. Anti-aging acupuncture shows nothing to the world but health, youthfulness and longevity.
• Someone with dry, thin skin with fine lines would require a different approach than someone with saggy cheeks and dark circles under the eyes. Anti-aging acupuncture tailors the treatment to the person.

Sometimes working on other conditions has an unexpected benefit of improving appearance. You came in for wrinkles but might find you are losing weight and breathing better.

Vision failing? Hearing decreasing? Accumulated trauma? Creeky joints? Growing older does not mean you have to feel and look old. It doesn't have to be that way.

Want more information?

Call Dr. Christopher Bickford, AP. Dipl. Ac. OMD for a consultation. Make the alternative choice that makes a lasting difference.

Space Coast Wellness Center
321.610.8935
466 North Harbor City Blvd. Melbourne, FL
spacecoastwellnesscenter@gmail.com
www.spacecoastwellnesscenter.com

Location: We are conveniently located at 466 North Harbor City Boulevard in Melbourne, Florida.  At the corner of US 1 and Babcock St.

#antiaging #acupuncture #melbourne, FL #health #wellness