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Appendix: Investigation of experience reveals Reality

Here is a straightforward procedure to investigate the nature of reality starting from one’s day to day experience. Each step should be considered until one experiences, or ‘sees’, its validity until moving on to the following step. If you reach a step where you do not find this possible continue on regardless, in the same way, and hopefully the ‘flow’ of the investigation will make the unclear step clear. By all means examine each step critically, but with an open mind, for if you only look for ‘holes’ that’s all you will find!
1/ Consider the following statement: ‘life, for each of us, is just a series of moment-to-moment experiences’. These experiences start when we are born and continue until we die, rushing headlong after each other, so that they seem to merge into a whole that we call ‘my life’. However, if we stop to look we can readily see that, for each of us, every moment is just an experience…
2/ Any moment of experience has only three elements: Thoughts (including all mind activity), sensations (everything sensed by the body and its sense organs), and awareness of these thoughts and sensations. Emotions and ‘feelings’ are a combination of thought and sensation.
3/ Thoughts and sensations are ephemeral objects, that is they come and go, and are objects, i.e. ‘things’ that are perceived.
4/ Awareness is the constant subject, in that it is the ‘perceiver’ (of thoughts and sensations) and is always present. Even during sleep there is awareness of dreams and of the quality of that sleep; and there is also awareness of sensations in that if a sensation becomes strong enough (such as a sound or uncomfortable sensation) one will wake up. So this awareness is the constant, conscious, subjective presence.
5/ All thoughts and sensations appear in awareness, exist in (and are known by) awareness, and subsist back into awareness. Before any particular thought or sensation there is effortless awareness of ‘what is’ (the sum of all thoughts and sensations occurring at any given instant), during the thought or sensation in question there is effortless awareness of it within ‘what is’, and then when it has gone there is still effortless awareness of ‘what is’.
6/ So the body/mind is experienced as a ‘flow’ of ephemeral objects appearing in this awareness, the ever present subject. For each of us any external object (or thing) is experienced as a combination of thought and sensation, i.e. you ‘see’ it, touch (feel) ‘it’, ‘know’ what it is called etc…
7/ Therefore this awareness is the constant sub-stratum in which all things appear to arise, exist, and subside. Thus deeper than this body/mind one is this awareness, the constant, conscious, subjective presence.
8/ This does not mean that at a surface level we are not the mind and body for they arise in, are perceived by, and subside back into awareness, which is the deepest and most fundamental level of our being. However if we choose to identify with this deepest level, awareness (the perceiver) rather than the surface level, mind/body (the perceived), then thoughts and sensations are seen for what they truly are, just ephemeral objects which come and go, leaving awareness itself totally unaffected.
9/ Next investigate this awareness itself to see whether its properties can be determined…The first thing that is apparent is that this awareness is effortlessly present and effortlessly aware… It requires no effort by the mind/body and they cannot make it vanish however much effort they apply.
10/The next thing is that this awareness is choicelessly present and choicelessly aware. Once again it requires no choice of the body/mind and they cannot block it however they try. i.e. If you have a toothache there is effortless awareness of it and the mind/body cannot choose for this not to be the case. You may think that this is bad news but that is not the case, can you imagine if you had to make a choice whether you would like to be aware for every sensation that the body experiences! In fact be grateful that there is no effort or choice involved for awareness just to be…such ease and simplicity…which is not surprising for you are this awareness!
11/Next it can be seen that, for each of us, this awareness is omnipresent, in that one never experiences a time or place when it was not present. Even during sleep there is awareness of dreams, the quality of the sleep, and bodily sensations, in that if a noise is loud enough or a feeling (of pain or discomfort for instance) is strong enough it will bring the mind back to the conscious state, i.e. One will wake up… Once again be grateful that the mind/body is never required to search for this awareness, it is just always there, which of course is not surprising for one is this awareness.
12/ Next notice that this awareness is absolutely still for it is aware of the slightest movement of body or mind. For example we all know that to be completely ‘aware’ of what is going on around us in a busy environment we have to be completely still, just witnessing the activity.
13/ In the same vein this awareness is totally silent as it is aware of the slightest sound, the smallest thought..
14/ In fact this awareness is totally without attributes for all attributes occur in, and are noticed by, their lack. i.e. Sounds occur in silence, exist in silence, are noticed by their contrast to silence, and disappear back into silence; forms occur in space, exist in space, are noticed by their contrast to space, and disappear back into space, etc. etc.,
15/ Next it can be easily seen that this awareness is totally pure in that it is absolutely unaffected by whatever occurs in it, in the same way that a cinema screen is totally unaffected by any movie shown on it, however gross or violent. In fact no ‘thing’ can taint awareness; for by definition awareness cannot be affected by any ‘thing’, as all ‘things’ are just ephemeral objects which appear in, exist in and finally disappear back into awareness, the constant subject.
16/ This awareness is omniscient, in that everything appears in it, exists in it, is known by it, and disappears back into it.
17/ Finally it seems that this awareness is forever radiant in that it illuminates whatever occurs in it, thus the mind can see it i.e. become conscious of it.
18/ When one identifies with this awareness there is nothing (in terms of enlightenment, or awakening) to achieve, or struggle towards, for how can one achieve what one already is?
All that is required is for the mind to recognize that one is this awareness…
19/ When one identifies with this awareness there is nothing to find, for how can one find what cannot be lost?
All that is required is for the mind to stop overlooking what is always present, that which perceives the mind (and body)…
20/ When one identifies with this awareness there is nothing to desire, long for, or get, for how can one get what already is?
All that is required is for the mind to realize that which one already is, pure awareness…
So now we have reached the ‘Pure, radiant, still, silent, omnipresent, omniscient, ocean of effortless, choiceless, attributeless awareness’ (the Absolute without form or attributes) which, at the deepest level, we all are! Give up all striving, seeking and desiring, and just identify with This which you already are… Identification with This, rather than with body/mind (thought/sensations), gives instant peace for awareness is always ‘still and silent’ totally unaffected by whatever appears in it.
Although we, in essence, are ‘The Pure, radiant, still, silent, omnipresent, omniscient, ocean of effortless, choiceless, attributeless awareness’ it is impossible to experience this, we can know it, or realize it but it is beyond the realm of experience. This is because all experience appears in This, exists in This and dissolves back into This. In much the same way that you do not see the cinema screen whilst the movie is playing on it, but you cannot see the movie without the screen, this ‘pure screen of awareness’ cannot be seen by the mind (i.e. experienced) whilst the movie of mind/body is playing on it, but the mind could not see the movie without the screen… The only way it is possible to see the screen is when no movie is playing, but as experience is the movie this ‘pure screen of awareness’ is always outside of the realm of experience. However recognition of oneself as this ‘Pure, radiant, still, silent, omnipresent, omniscient, ocean of effortless, choiceless, attributeless, awareness’ may evoke many experiences such as bliss, joy, relief (my God what a relief that there’s no individual ‘me me me’), a lifting of a great burden i.e. enlightenment in the literal sense of the word, universal love etc etc. These experiences vary greatly from person to person and are ultimately irrelevant as the recognition and realization, of one’s own essential nature, is the crucial factor for attaining freedom.

Note that although we cannot experience our essence we can absolutely know it* just as we know, without a doubt, that the screen is there (when we watch a movie). Then however terrifying, gripping or moving the movie is we are not shaken because we know it is a movie. We still enjoy it, in fact we enjoy it even more, because it is just pure entertainment and we are not identified with it. In the same way, once we know our essential nature, life can be seen as a movie and enjoyed as such without identifying ourselves as being trapped in it. Thus, although we cannot experience our essence, once we recognise it all of our experiences are transformed by no longer identifying with them but just enjoying them. Our mind/bodies are just instruments with which awareness interacts, senses and experiences its manifestation, the world.
This awareness is ‘consciousness at rest’, absolutely still; and is the ‘stillness’ in which all motion arises, exists, is known (by its comparison to the stillness), and finally subsides. For example if you walk across a room, before you start there is stillness, as you walk the room is still and you know you are moving by comparison with this stillness, and when you stop once again there is stillness. Every ‘thing’ that is occurring in consciousness is a manifestation of cosmic energy (the ‘string theory’, and the earlier ‘theory of relativity’, show that matter is in fact energy), which is consciousness in motion; and therefore arises in this awareness, exists in this awareness and subsides back into this awareness.

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*Just as you could not see a movie without the screen, you could not experience anything without awareness, for without that what would there be to experience? For without That we would see nothing (in that there would be no awareness of what was seen), hear nothing, feel nothing, taste nothing, smell nothing and not know our own thoughts! In fact experience, on any level, would not be possible…

Colin Drake

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[1] https://www.msu.edu/~puhek/miem/Upanishads.html

[2] http://bhagavan-ramana.org/guru.html

[3] http://www.messagefrommasters.com/Masters/need_of_guru_and_faith_in_guru.htm

[4] Ranganathananda Sw., The Message of the Upanisads, 1985, Bombay, p.177

… that an inexpensive and readily available mineral called selenium offers exceptional protection against cancer?

Over the last few decades, several randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trials have shown that a daily dose of just 200 mcg of selenium (at a cost of just pennies) can … slash breast cancer risk by 82% … reduce colon and rectal cancer risk by 69% … cut prostate cancer risk by 54% … and cut lung cancer risk by 39%—even if you are a smoker!

The research on breast cancer was published in 1982 by Gerhard Schrauser, M.D.

The research on prostate, colorectal, and lung cancer was conducted by Larry Clark, M.D. and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. This study used the gold standard of research methodology and took place over 7 years. It compared the effects of patients given 200 mcg of selenomethionine (a type of selenium) with placebo.

Earth Shattering Results

Dr. Peter Glidden, N.D., has speculated publicly about why these astonishing findings about selenium and cancer protection are not being brought to the public, despite the supposed “War on Cancer.”

“The results were earth shattering,” says Dr. Glidden, “but because they involved the use of a mineral supplement, and not a prescription drug, they were overlooked. Imagine the media frenzy that a cancer drug that reduced the occurrence of breast cancer by 82% would receive! Your doctor should have called you up immediately and passed on this news to you, but this is probably the first time that you have heard it.”

With this kind of data backing it up, selenium—at an average cost of about $5 a bottle for 100 capsules of 200 mcg each—merits a close look as a potential supplement to add to your regimen.

What Is Selenium?

Selenium is a trace mineral that is essential to good health. Selenium is important to the production of antioxidants that protect the body from damage caused by free radicals. It is needed to produce glutathione peroxidase, an antioxidant enzyme that protects the body from free radical damage. For this reason it is also useful in the treatment of such conditions as Alzheimers disease and dementia, autism, endometriosis, heart disease,Lyme disease, osteoporosis and many others. It is also important in preventing cardiomegaly, an enlargement of the heart that causes premature aging and early death.

For most people around the world, plant foods are the most common dietary sources of selenium. Good sources include wheat germ, oats, sunflower seeds, and mushrooms.

The amount of selenium in certain plants varies depending on the region it is grown due to differences in soil quality and mineral content. Unfortunately, poor farming practices have left much of our topsoil mineral deficient, a fact widely recognized since the 1930s. This is one of the reasons organically produced produce should contain more nutrients, including selenium, than produce from agribusiness.

Eggs and poultry also provide selenium, as does seafood including tuna, salmon, shrimp, and halibut. However, due to contamination from polluted waters, plant sources are a safer option.

One of the best food sources of selenium is found in Brazil nuts. A single Brazil nut provides more than 50 mcg of selenium—more than the recommended daily allowance.

Remember, though, that the patients in the studies were taking 200 mcg daily in addition to whatever selenium they obtained from foods. Therefore, some experts suggest that a combined total of 300 mcg daily is the minimum amount to ingest for cancer preventive benefits.

How Selenium Fights Cancer

Selenium is believed to protect against cancer by disrupting the carcinogenic process before it makes headway … by preventing tumors from forming. Selenium’s antioxidant properties are also cancer protective, as is its ability to inhibit DNA mutations.

Selenium also promotes thyroid health. It does so by converting stored thyroid T4 hormones into active T3 hormones. Your endocrine system requires this conversion in order to function properly.

Interestingly, endocrine balance is crucial for preventing breast and prostate cancers—two of the cancers selenium is proven to fight.

Tips for Supplementing with Selenium

In addition to selenium from organic Brazil nuts, selenium supplements are readily available wherever vitamins are sold. Experts advise that if you choose to take a selenium supplement, you should pay close attention to your zinc levels, as well.

The two minerals combined work synergistically, and may offer stronger cancer protection.

As a result of her own research into autism, she ended up developing what might be one of the most profoundly important treatment strategies not just for autism, but for a wide range of neurological-, psychological-, and autoimmune disorders as well.

I believe her Gut and Psychology Syndrome, and Gut and Physiology Syndrome (GAPS) Nutritional program is vitally important for MOST people, as the majority of people have such poor gut health due to poor diet and toxic exposures. We’ve previously discussed how the GAPS program can help those with autism and other neurological- and psychiatric disorders, such as:

Dyslexia and dyspraxia
Depression
Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Bipolar disorder
Epilepsy

What is Gut and Physiology Syndrome?

In this interview, we discuss how your gut affects your immune system, as there’s profound dynamic interaction between them. Dr. McBride covers the problems related to Gut and Psychology Syndrome in her first book by the same name. Her next book will cover Gut and Physiology Syndrome, which relates to diseases that are not located in the nervous system but rather elsewhere in your body, such as:

Arthritis
Asthma and allergies
Skin problems
Kidney problems
Digestive issues, and
Autoimmune disorders

Abnormalities in your immune system are a common outcome of GAPS, and such immune abnormalities are at the root of virtually all degenerative diseases.

“Why is that? It’s because about 85 percent of our immune system is located in the gut wall,” she says. “This fact has been established by basic physiology research in the 1930s and the 1940s. Your gut, your digestive wall, is the biggest and the most important immune organ in your body. There is a very tight conversation and a relationship going on between the gut flora that lives inside your digestive system, and your immune system…

Your gut flora—the state of the gut flora and the composition of microbes in your gut flora—has a profound effect on what forms of immune cells you will be producing on any given day, what they’re going to be doing, and how balanced your immune system is.”

How Your Gut Flora Directs Your Immune System

There are two primary “arms” in your immune system:

Th1 immunity is responsible for normal reactions to anything in your environment, from pollen to animal dandruff, dust mites, chemicals, food and anything else you come into contact with. Th1 is kept robust and healthy by your gut flora. As long as your gut flora is normal, you will have no adverse symptoms when exposed to these types of environmental influences, but if your gut flora is abnormal, your Th1 become increasingly disabled
Th2 immunity is designed to address immune functions inside your body, and is not equipped to handle environmental influences. However, it will try to compensate if your Th1 becomes disabled. Unfortunately, since it’s not properly equipped for this job, it ends up dealing with environmental influences like pollen and foods in an inappropriate way; the end result of which is allergies and intolerances.

It’s important to realize that food allergies and intolerances are a very different group of allergies from the more acute anaphylactic allergies. Food intolerances caused by disabled Th1 (due to abnormal gut flora) are not mediated by the same immunoglobulin as the true allergies are. Food intolerances can also manifest hours, days, or even weeks later, making identifying food allergies very difficult.

“Different reactions can also overlap on top of each other. For example, on any given day you can be reacting to broccoli that you have just had for lunch, and to lamb that you’ve eaten yesterday, and to egg that you’ve eaten two days ago, and to a piece of bread that you’ve eaten 10 days ago. All of these reactions overlap on top of each other. On any given day, you have no idea what exactly you’re reacting to,” Dr. McBride explains.

Making matters even more difficult, these food allergies and intolerances can result in all sorts of reactions, from headache, to sneezing, to rashes, or abdominal pains or swollen joints. Or they may result in psoriasis, or cause eczema to flare up.

“Or, it can be an episode of depression, anxiety, or a panic attack. Any kind of symptom can be brought up by food allergies and intolerances,” Dr. McBride says.

At the same time, because your gut flora is abnormal, your gut lining begins to deteriorate, since it is actively maintained by our gut flora. (The beneficial bacteria in your gut make sure the cells that line your entire digestive tract are healthy, well-fed, and protected from chemical- or microbial attacks.) As your gut lining deteriorates, the junctions between the cells open up, causing your gut to become porous, or “leaky.”

“It becomes like a sieve, and foods don’t get the chance to be digested properly before they are absorbed,” Dr. McBride explains.

“They’re absorbed in this maldigested or partially broken down form. When the immune system and the bloodstream finds them and looks at them, it doesn’t recognize them as food. It says, “You’re not food. I don’t recognize you,” and it reacts to them. It creates immune complexes, which attack these partially digested proteins. As a result, we’ll get all sorts of symptoms in your body.”

So what’s the answer?

The key to resolving your health issues is NOT to determine which foods you’re reacting to in order to avoid them. Rather you need to focus on healing your gut lining, because this is the most likely root of your problem. This will also be your most cost-effective strategy, as allergy testing can be quite expensive.

“There are many testing methods developed now for food allergies and intolerances,” Dr. McBride says. “… [But] if you had enough money to test twice a day for two weeks in a row, you would discover that you react to everything you eat… The majority of practitioners who are experienced in this area give up on testing… They recommend focusing on healing and sealing your gut lining instead. Then these food allergies and intolerances will disappear, and you will be able to eventually start eating foods that you could not tolerate before.”

GAPS and Autoimmune Disease

Autoimmune disorders are a very common side effect of GAPS. Conventional medicine has identified about 200 different autoimmune conditions so far, and the list is continually growing.

“The testing in autoimmunity is fairly expensive, so not many people get tested,” Dr. McBride says. “But the more we test, the more we realize that pretty much every degenerative condition has got an autoimmune component. Why is that? Because 85 percent of your immune system is located in your digestive wall, in your gut wall, and the state of your gut flora has a direct and very profound effect on the way your immune system functions.

… Your immune system is a very hungry organ. It needs to be continuously fed… People with abnormal gut flora – GAPS people – do not digest and absorb their food properly, so they develop multiple nutritional deficiencies; their immune system is starving… At the same time, a river of toxicity is flowing from the gut into the bloodstream of these people, because all those pathogenic microbes sitting in their gut flora are converting the food that comes along into hundreds and hundreds of very toxic substances.

The immune system gets quite a lot of this toxicity, so… we have a poor immune system—it is malnourished; it is intoxicated; it is unbalanced, and, at the same time, it is challenged with a huge amount of work to do. Of course, it cannot function properly. Of course, it cannot react appropriately to various things. Autoimmunity is the result of that.”

Abnormal flora in your digestive tract can easily lead to overgrowth of:

Pathogenic bacteria
Pathogenic viruses
Fungi
Worms
Protozoa

Once your gut lining begins to deteriorate, these disease-causing agents can be easily absorbed into your bloodstream and circulated throughout your body. Some of them have affinities for certain proteins, and will attach themselves to them. When that happens, it changes the three-dimensional shape of that protein molecule. When your immune system comes across this foreign-looking protein, it will attack it and begin producing antibodies against it.

“This mechanism is particularly at work in multiple sclerosis in patients. We have researched that quite a lot,” Dr. McBride says.

“Mercury, lead, aluminum, other toxic metals and organic molecules that contain this toxic metal have a particular propensity for getting stored in high-fat tissues such as your brain and the rest of your nervous system, particularly the myelin sheath on your nerves… These toxic metals target your brain and your nerves. But when they get accumulated in those high-fat tissues, these toxins attach themselves to proteins in your myelin, in the white matter of your brain, and other parts of your nervous system. Once they’ve accumulated, once they’ve attached themselves to those proteins, they change their three-dimensional structure. Then the immune system develops an antibody against your protein and your myelin.

That is the number one antibody, which is at work in multiple sclerosis. It is called a myelin-specific protein antibody. It’s an antibody which attacks proteins in your myelin… What the immune system is trying to do is it’s trying to clear out mercury, lead, and other toxic metals out of the nervous system, which got stored in there. Where do they come from? 99.9 percent of anything toxic in your body comes out in the digestive system.”

GAPS and Multiple Sclerosis

Interestingly, when your body is unable to clear a particular toxin on its own, it will invite and employ microbes from the environment to help clear these toxins.

“The microbes in the environment are not our enemies at all. They’re actually our allies. They’re our helpers. Your body employs them when it needs them,” Dr. McBride explains.

“If you have accumulated certain amount of mercury in your brain and in your nerves… your body might employ a virus… If you got a cold, that virus (many viruses target your nervous system) will go directly to those toxic patches in your brain and your nervous system and attack them. It will start gobbling it up… Of course, your immune system then joins in, trying to attack the virus. It joins in with inflammation, and you [begin to experience] symptoms of multiple sclerosis. You will get tingling. You will get numbness in your face or in your extremities. You might start wetting your bed, or you might get peripheral loss of vision for a while… That’s one of the first symptoms in multiple sclerosis.

in this situation, if you would just feed your immune system properly and leave the work for the immune system to complete, then these symptoms would last for a month or two, and then they would disappear, because… the virus will gobble up the [toxins] and your immune system will clear out the virus. Your nerves will recover naturally.”

Unfortunately, this is not what happens nowadays. Typically, as soon as people get tingling, numbness, and other symptoms, they rush to the doctor, who will immediately put them on some form of medication, which will typically have a dampening effect on the immune system. As a result, the viruses spread and become even more established, and the disease becomes chronic and permanent.

You have Natural Antibodies Against Virtually All Autoimmune Diseases…

“What people have to understand is that we all – 100 percent of humans – have in our bodies antibodies to deal with multiple sclerosis, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, lupus, or any other autoimmune condition,” Dr. McBride says.

It all begins in utero. As soon as the baby’s thymus develops, the proteins floating about in the bloodstream, which is shared between the mother and the baby, begin to educate the baby’s immune system, and allocate a particular responder cell to every protein encountered. Autoimmune conditions develop when your immune system attacks particular tissues or proteins in your body because they’ve been contaminated by toxins or some other environmental influence. And remember, this imbalance, this toxic influence, originates from your digestive system or gut wall.

“Autoimmunity is born in the gut. That’s where it comes from – your gut wall,” Dr. McBride says. “That happens because your gut flora is abnormal. In order to heal any autoimmune condition – whether it’s multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, lupus, alopecia, psoriasis, or anything else that has got an autoimmune component – you have to focus on healing and sealing your gut lining with the GAPS Nutritional Protocol. And you have to focus on… normalizing your gut flora. You have to drive out the pathogens from the gut flora and replace them with the beneficial flora. Then a lot of healing will happen…’

Unfortunately, conventional medicine is largely ignorant about this research, and does not view autoimmune disorders as digestive disorders, which Dr. McBride is convinced is the case.

The Importance of Fermented Foods

Did you know the number of bacteria in your body outnumber your cells by about 10 to 1? These bacteria in turn are comprised of both beneficial ones and harmful ones. The ideal balance is about 85 percent good bacteria and 15 percent bad. Maintaining this ideal ratio is what it’s all about when we’re talking about the importance of probiotics. It’s important to understand though that probiotics are not a new concept. The only thing that’s new is that you can take them in pill form. But historically, mankind has consumed large amounts of probiotics in the form of fermented and cultured foods, which were invented long before the advent of refrigeration and other forms of food preservation.

“Every traditional culture, when you look at their traditional diet, they ferment their foods. They fermented everything. You can ferment dairy, grains, beans, vegetables, fruits, meats, and fish. Everything can be fermented, and there were fermented beverages in every culture. When the cabbages were ripe in September, you made it a fermented cabbage. Perhaps for a month or two, you were eating fresh cabbage, but then for the rest of the year, 10 months of the year, you ate your cabbage in a fermented form. Quite a large percent of all the foods that people consume on a daily basis were fermented. And with every mouthful of these fermented foods you consume trillions of beneficial bacteria…”

Fermented foods not only give you a wider variety of beneficial bacteria, they also give you far more of them, so it’s a much more cost effective alternative. Here’s a case in point: It’s unusual to find a probiotic supplement containing more than 10 billion colony-forming units. But when my team actually tested fermented vegetables produced by probiotic starter cultures, they had 10 trillion colony-forming units of bacteria. Literally, one serving of vegetables was equal to an entire bottle of a high potency probiotic! So clearly, you’re far better off using fermented foods.

How the Fermentation Process Works

“Mother Nature is extremely wise and extremely kind. It populated all organic fruit and vegetables, the dust on our soils, and all plant matter with Lactobacilli. The fresh cabbage leaves, if it’s organically grown (not the one from chemical farming), will be covered in Lactobacilli—lacto-fermenting bacteria. You don’t need to add anything. You just chop it up. Add some salt in the initial stages. (The salt is added in the initial stage in order to stop putrefactive bacteria from multiplying.) Then as the Lactobacillus stop working and start multiplying, they produce lactic acid. That’s why they’re called Lactobacillus. That’s just lactic acid.

If you look at the research in lactic acid, it is one of the most powerful antiseptics. It kills off lots and lots of bacteria…. So as the lactic acid starts producing, it will kill off all those putrefactive and pathogenic microbes and preserve the food. It’s a great preservative… A good batch of sauerkraut can keep for five to six years without spoiling or rotting, as long as it is covered by its own juice.”

For instructions on how to ferment your own vegetables, which is easier than you might think to do at home, please listen to my previous interview with Caroline Barringer:
This anaerobic process (fermentation) does more than just preserve the food, however. It also makes the nutrients inside the food more bioavailable. For example, according to Dr. McBride, the amount of bioavailable vitamin C in sauerkraut is 20 times higher than in the same helping of fresh cabbage!

“This is because in the fresh cabbage, vitamin C is bound in the cellulose structure and various other molecules, and our digestive system is just not able to cleave it off and absorb it. Lots of it goes undigested and come out right out of you. So despite the fact that cabbage may be very rich in vitamin C, a lot of it you will not be able to absorb. But if you fermented that cabbage and made sauerkraut, all the vitamin C becomes bioavailable,” she explains.

How to Reduce Chances of “Healing Crisis”

There is one precaution that needs to be discussed here, and that is the potential for a so-called healing crisis, or what Dr. McBride refers to as a die-off reaction, provoked by the massive die-off of pathogenic bacteria, viruses, fungi, and other harmful pathogens by the reintroduction of massive quantities of probiotics. It can significantly worsen whatever health problem you’re experiencing, before you get better.

The reason for this is because when the probiotics kill off the pathogens, those pathogenic microbes release toxins. These toxins are what’s causing your problem to begin with; be it depression, panic attacks, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, or any other symptom. When a large amount of toxin is suddenly released, your symptoms will also suddenly increase.

“If you’ve never had fermented foods in your life, you need to start very carefully and very gradually,” Dr. McBride warns.

She recommends starting off with just ONE TEASPOON of fermented vegetable, such as sauerkraut, with ONE of your meals, and then wait for a couple of days to see how you react. If it’s manageable, you can have another helping, and gradually increase your portion.

“But if the die off is too much, then you need to stop. Let the die off subside, and then have a tiny amount of sauerkraut, or even just a teaspoon of juice from it first; not the cabbage itself. Then two teaspoons per day and so on, until enough die off happens in your body, and your gut flora has changed enough for you to be ready for having the cabbage itself.”

It’s important to realize that besides containing massive amounts of beneficial bacteria, fermented foods also contain many active enzymes, which act as extremely potent detoxifiers.

“Healing goes through two steps forward, one step back, two steps forward, and one step back,” Dr. McBride says. “But you will find that the next layer is smaller. The die off and the detox will not last as long as the previous one… We live in a toxic world, and many of us have accumulated layers and layers of toxicity in our bodies. The body will clean them out, but you will find that each layer will last shorter and not be as severe… Eventually, you will come to complete, radiant health. You will feel 100 percent healthy, no matter how ill you were before.”

This is something that we should maybe take seriously. Some doctors are now saying that there is value in trying LEMON.

So, a tablespoon of “real lemon” (the concentrate in a bottle) in a glass of water every morning. What can it hurt?

Institute of Health Sciences, 819 N. L.L.C. Charles Street Baltimore , MD

This is the latest in medicine, effective for cancer! Read carefully & you be the judge.

Lemon (Citrus) is a miraculous product to kill cancer cells.

It is 10,000 times stronger than chemotherapy. Why do we not know about that? Because there are laboratories interested in making a synthetic version that will bring them huge profits. You can now help a friend in need by letting him/her know that lemon juice is beneficial in preventing the disease. Its taste is pleasant and it does not produce the horrific effects of chemotherapy. How many people will die while this closely guarded secret is kept, so as not to jeopardize the beneficial multimillionaires large corporations?

As you know, the lemon tree is known for its varieties of lemons and limes.

You can eat the fruit in different ways: you can eat the pulp, juice press, prepare drinks, sorbets, pastries, etc… It is credited with many virtues, but the most interesting is the effect it produces on cysts and tumors. This plant is a proven remedy against cancers of all types. Some say it is very useful in all variants of cancer. It is considered also as an anti microbial spectrum against bacterial infections and fungi, effective against internal parasites and worms, it regulates blood pressure which is too high and an antidepressant, combats stress and nervous disorders. The source of this information is fascinating: it comes from one of the largest drug manufacturers in the world, says that after more than 20 laboratory tests since 1970, the extracts revealed that: It destroys the malignant cells in 12 cancers, including colon, breast, prostate, lung and pancreas…The compounds of this tree showed 10,000 times better than the product Adriamycin, a drug normally used chemotherapeutic in the world, slowing the growth of cancer cells. And what is even more astonishing: this type of therapy with lemon extract only destroys malignant cancer cells and it does not affect healthy cells.

Institute of Health Sciences, 819 N. L.L.C. Cause Street , Baltimore , MD1201

By Karen Lee Richards*

Herbs have long been known to help the skin in numerous ways. Some herbs improve liver and kidney function, thus helping clear the body of toxins that can trigger such things as acne and psoriasis.

Milk thistle is well known for its long history of use as a natural liver detoxifier and protectant. And now a large body of research provides a scientific understanding of its many benefits for humans (and their pets) in an ever-more-toxic world.

Extract of milk thistle has been used for more than 2,000 years as a staple of traditional medicine for those with liver and gallbladder disorders.

The first known mention of milk thistle in this respect was by Theophrastus, a colleague of and successor to Aristotle, in the 4th century B.C. Then, in the 1st century A.D., Roman naturalist Pliny wrote that milk thistle was excellent for “carrying off bile,” meaning that it supported a restoration of impaired liver function – a claim that has since been justified by many modern researchers.

Today milk thistle is one of the most well-studied and commonly-used beneficial plants in the world. The U.S. National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have catalogued more than 400 scientific studies of milk thistle and its active compounds.

Milk thistle also enjoys the distinction of being one of the very few traditional herbs that has been widely accepted by conventional science to have significant “medicinal” value.

But what do we mean when we talk about milk thistle, and why is liver support so important?

What is Milk Thistle?

Milk thistle (Silybum marianum) is a plant in the aster and daisy family of flowers. It grows to a height of 4 to 10 feet and has reddish-purple flowers and large prickly leaves with white markings. The milk thistle plant gets its name from the milky white fluid that comes from the plant’s leaves when they are crushed. Native to southern Europe, the milk thistle plant has been naturalized throughout North and South America and Australia.

You might call milk thistle a “silly” plant because its active ingredient – used in supplements and found in the seeds – is silymarin (pronounced SILL-ee-MAR-inn). Silymarin is a flavonoid complex that is primarily made up of three “silly” flavonolignans: silybin, silydianin and silychristin. Despite its name, there is nothing silly about silymarin’s many potential health benefits – starting with the liver.

Why the Liver Is So Important

The liver is the body’s largest internal organ and has been described as the third most important organ, following the brain and the heart. It has often been referred to as the body’s toxic waste disposal plant, but the liver actually has multiple jobs, including:
Controlling infections.

Removing bacteria and toxins from the blood.

Processing nutrients, hormones, and drugs.

Making proteins that regulate blood clotting.

Producing bile to help absorb fats (including cholesterol) and aid digestion.
A healthy liver – essential for survival – is the only internal organ that is able to regenerate most of its own cells when they become damaged.

However, a number of different diseases and conditions can cause chronic liver damage, which leads to cirrhosis – the formation of scar tissue on the liver. As cirrhosis progresses, the liver becomes less and less able to effectively replace damaged cells. In the end, if the progression of cirrhosis cannot be controlled, it will ultimately be fatal.

The most common causes of cirrhosis are chronic alcoholism and hepatitis, but it can also be the result of prolonged exposure to drugs (including acetaminophen), heavy metals and other environmental and bacterial toxins.

The Science Behind Milk Thistle’s Ability to Support the Liver

Although milk thistle was known to be beneficial for liver problems for many centuries, it wasn’t until 1990 that scientists at a liver pathology institute in Clichy, France finally discovered exactly how milk thistle works to protect the liver. They found that:

First, milk thistle helps decrease the conversion into more toxic substances of many air-, water- and food-borne chemicals such as carbon tetrachloride;

Secondly, it acts as a powerful antioxidant that inhibits these toxic compounds from damaging healthy liver cells.(1)
Scientific studies describing milk thistle’s ability to support various aspects of liver health abound. Following is a sampling from the hundreds of published studies:

Hepatitis: Nine studies that focused on chronic hepatitis associated milk thistle supplementation with significant improvement for patients. Outcomes included normalization of liver function (determined by biopsy) and relief of symptoms such as abdominal pressure and bloating, nervousness, weakness and insomnia. It took an average of 30 to 40 days for improvements to be noticeable.(2)

Cirrhosis: Eleven studies looked at using milk thistle with patients who had cirrhosis of the liver. Some of the effects noted included lower mortality rates, improved liver function (determined by liver function tests), reduction of toxic-metabolic lesions, regression of inflammatory changes, and the relief of symptoms such as abdominal pressure and bloating, insomnia and weight gain.(2)

Alcohol, Drugs and Other Toxins: Over the years, scientists have found that milk thistle can be effective in helping the body avoid or counteract liver damage caused by a variety of toxins such as alcohol, acetaminophen and other drugs, and environmental and bacterial toxins.(3)

It’s interesting to note that in parts of Europe, physicians often prescribe milk thistle to patients for medicinal purposes, most often when they are taking pharmaceutical drugs known to potentially cause liver problems. And the German Commission E, which studies the safety and efficacy of herbs for the German government, recommends milk thistle supplementation in cases of liver damage due to toxins and cirrhosis of the liver, and as a supportive therapy for chronic inflammation of the liver.

Poisonous Mushrooms: Some of the most impressive studies related to milk thistle and the liver are those that deal with poisoning from ingesting the lethal Amanita phalloides mushroom, commonly known as the Deathcap mushroom. In two separate case studies, multiple members of a family were poisoned when they ate Deathcap mushrooms. Their conditions continued to worsen until silibinin, one of the components of milk thistle, was added to standard therapy. It was then that each of the family members began to make a rapid recovery.(4,5)

Milk Thistle Shows Promise as an Adjunct to Cancer Therapy

One of the most exciting areas of study involving milk thistle is that of cancer research. For example, a National Cancer Institute report on a randomized clinical trial in children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia found that milk thistle supported a decrease in the harmful effects of chemotherapy on the liver without working against the cancer treatment. The children taking milk thistle needed fewer chemotherapy dose reductions because of side effects than the children who did not take milk thistle.(6)

There is also one case report describing the use of milk thistle in a patient with promyelocytic leukemia who required breaks in chemotherapy due to abnormal liver enzyme levels. During four months of treatment with milk thistle, the patient had normal liver enzyme levels and was able to undergo chemotherapy without breaks.(6)

Don’t Forget Fido and Fluffy

Just as milk thistle promotes liver defense and detoxification in humans, it can provide similar benefits for dogs and cats with hepatitis or other liver disorders. It may also be considered as a possible option for pets with inflammatory bowel disease, diabetes and cancer, or as an aid to healing for dogs and cats undergoing drug therapy.

Before giving milk thistle to your pet, check with your veterinarian to make sure it is an appropriate treatment, to ensure that all of the ingredients are safe for your dog or cat, and to learn the correct dosage based on the animal’s size.

While liquid milk thistle formulas are available for pets, they tend to be more expensive than the capsules intended for humans. It’s fairly easy to open a capsule and mix the appropriate amount of milk thistle powder with your pet’s food. Although milk thistle does come in a liquid extract for humans, it usually contains a fair amount of alcohol and would not be good for your pet.

Need-to-Know Information

In addition to milk thistle (in the form of silymarin) ProHealth’s Milk Thistle Complex™ is a complete liver support formula, which includes choline and inositol to promote fat and cholesterol metabolism and vitamins C and E for improved antioxidant protection.

Dosage: For adults, the recommended dosage of ProHealth’s Milk Thistle Complex is one capsule, one to four times a day with meals, or as recommended by your healthcare professional.

Side Effects: Milk thistle has a very good safety record. No toxicity has been reported following even high doses of milk thistle. Several large, carefully designed studies in patients with liver disorders have found that taking milk thistle may rarely result in a mild, short-lived laxative effect or cause nausea, heartburn, or stomach upset. At high doses (more than 1,500 milligrams a day), mild allergic reactions have occasionally been seen.

Contraindications: (1) Milk thistle can reduce the effectiveness of oral contraceptives. (2) Although milk thistle has been used in pregnant women who have a bile blockage in the liver, with no toxic effects to the patient or fetus, if you are pregnant or nursing, it is always best to consult with your healthcare professional before taking any medication or supplement.

Summary

Milk thistle has a very long history as a safe and beneficial option for promoting liver health. It is best known for its ability to help protect the liver from the onslaught of toxins we face daily in the form of medications, alcohol, bacteria and the environment. Newer research is finding that milk thistle may also have value as a potential adjunct therapy for various types of cancer.

To order Milk Thistle Complex, visit ProHealth.com

Milk Thistle Complex™ (180 medium Capsules) Nature’s liver protector. Milk thistle is a natural liver detoxifier that contains a powerful compound called silymarin, which has been found to defend the liver from many industrial toxins such as carbon tetrachloride, and more common agents like alcohol. Pro Health’s Milk Thistle Complex includes Choline and Inositol to promote fat and cholesterol metabolism, and Vitamin C and E for improved antioxidant protection.

New Study Reveals Blindness Will Affect Millions…Permanent Blindness An Epidemic!

Few people realize that macular degeneration is the leading cause of blindness for men and women aged 55 and over. It affects more than 10 million people in the U.S. alone — and millions more all over the world.
Age-Related Macular Degeneration (AMD) is a condition which causes light-sensitive cells in the back of the eye to stop functioning…and this results in severe vision loss. AMD affects the middle part of the visual field, which is needed for driving as well as many other everyday activities.

In January 1997, Dr. Carl Kupfer, then the Director of the National Eye Institute, National Institutes of Health, stated publicly that macular degeneration will soon take on aspects of an epidemic!

This is alarming news because according to a recent poll, Americans dread blindness more than any other disability. [Source: American Macular Degeneration Foundation]



The picture on the left (below) shows what a grid looks like with normal vision.	The picture on the right (below) shows what the same grid might look like in the eyes of someone suffering from Age-Related Macular Degeneration.

Unfortunately, there is currently no cure for Age-Related Macular Degeneration. However, there is a way to drastically slow down the progression of this incurable disease.
The National Eye Institute says there is only one (1) proven way to slow down the progression of Age-Related Macular Degeneration once diagnosed. That 1 way is through vitamin supplementation.

Age-Related Macular Degeneration is a real problem with real consequences when left untreated. A recent study was done at the University of Wisconsin that showed that exercise may reduce the risk of developing AMD.

The study tracked 3,874 men and women (aged 43 to 86) over a 15-year period. The study concluded that those with an active lifestyle were 70% less likely to develop the degenerative eye disease than those with a sedentary lifestyle.

For this reason…

1. It is recommended that you talk to your physician about starting a healthy exercise program — if you are not currently exercising.

2. If you, like many of us, do not exercise regularly — or have not exercised 3-5 times per week over the last 15 years, then it’s even more important that you use a macular degeneration supplement.

The antioxidants that are found in an amazing supplement called Preserve Mac Forte have been proven by the National Eye Institute to slow the progression of Age-Related Macular Degeneration and possibly help prevent blindness.

Although most people don’t believe they’d ever go blind, AMD actually affects so many middle-aged people these days — and it is predicted that an ever-increasing number of individuals will develop the illness every year as more and more “baby boomers” approach, and cross over the threshold to age 55 and beyond.

Dr. Warren Ringold has successfully helped thousands of men and women around the world suffering from AMD. He has recently released a product containing the necessary ingredients, as recommended by the National Eye Institute, to slow the progression of AMD and help reduce the serious risk of permanent blindness. Click the link for the full details on Age-Related Macular Degeneration.

More articles:

by Jeff Carreira

We think we are a “something”—an entity that emerged in the universe on a planet called Earth.

Are we really?

What is a human being? What am I?

Am I my body, my brain, my thoughts?

Superficially it seems that we are simply some combination of these things and more. When you look deeply the simple question, Who am I? reveals mind-boggling complexity.

What if you are not a something that thinks and acts?

What if all of life were one unfolding process that included:

Experiences of thinking

Experiences of acting

And

Experiences of thinking that you are a something that thinks and acts?

What if you don’t exist in the way that

you have always thought you did?

-

Realizing Your True Nature

by Adyashanti
Awakening to the truth is a deep realization of what you are as an experience. What is it that is feeling? What is it that is thinking or sensing? This is not about coming up with the right name for it, so don’t name it for a moment. It’s about just noticing, just experiencing. Feel it. Sense it. Welcome it. Spiritual awakening is realizing what occupies the space called “me.” When you listen innocently, you’ll see that there really is something more here than a me.

Your me is always experiencing this moment in relation to some other moment. Is this moment as good as it was two weeks ago? Will it be the same today as it was yesterday? The me worries about what it knows and whether or not it is good enough to get enlightened. Your me might call itself Hindu, Christian, Buddhist, Advaitan, atheist, agnostic, believer, or nonbeliever, but no matter what your me is identified with, when you become very open and relaxed, you can suddenly be aware that something else is occupying your body-mind. Something else is looking out from your eyes, listening from your ears, and feeling your feelings. That something has no qualities. Realizing your true nature is realizing what is present without qualities. We can call it the emptiness of consciousness, the Self, or the No-Self. To directly experience this emptiness – the aliveness of it – is spiritual awakening. It is to realize yourself as beautiful nothingness, or more accurately, no-thing-ness. If we say it’s just “nothing,” we miss the point.

When your image of the me takes a break, you’ll find all you are doing at that moment is just being open. You feel quite relieved that you are not trying to get to another moment or a better experience. You feel yourself just being in a very relaxed, easy sense of peace. You haven’t gained anything at all—you’re not smarter, you don’t necessarily know more than anyone else, and you haven’t suddenly become holy. If you are resting as your own true nature, then you feel that there is really nowhere else to go.

At that moment, you feel as if your path has ended. It can be hard to end it when so much is invested in your path, but if you really want to be free, you must want to know the truth more than anything else. And when you do, you find that the truth is so damn empty. There is so much nothing to it. There is so much nobody there, just a very vivid awakeness.

But even then you can realize the truth and still not operate from it. You can have a very deep awakening experience and still not function from that awakening because the me is still convinced that a me is necessary. The me always brings you back into relationship with another—it can be the world and me, my job and me, the dog and me, whatever. Have you noticed how the way you relate to your thoughts, feelings, and sensations is often slightly adversarial? How it’s never quite the right moment? How it’s almost perfect, but not quite? The Buddha said, “All suffering originates from craving, from attachment, from desire.” This is the movement of the me who always wants a little more out of the moment.

The me is clumsy. As my mother used to say, “You’re like a bull in a china shop.” Did you ever hear that? If you let your mind imagine a bull getting loose in a china shop, that’s how the me is. It’s knocking things over, things like the most precious china. With a whisk of its tail, there goes . . . grandma’s four-generation-old antique china cups! Boom – they’re gone. When your me is operating, it’s like that bull. It tends to make a lot of noise because it’s always in a slightly adversarial relationship with its moment. It produces noisy thoughts, feelings, beliefs, or opinions. It also likes to search, moving its head around, scanning for the right emotion in the body, scanning through the mind for the right concept. It’s always in movement like a radar, looking for the right thing to happen.

As soon as you move your attention away from the radar scan, you start to notice something else. Inside, there is something that is not creating nearly as much noise as the me. This something else, this openness, this awakeness, is not searching for the next moment or scanning for the right emotion or experience. You can get the sense of it now. What does it feel like to simply be awake? Whether you think you are awake or not doesn’t matter – don’t worry about that for now. What does the awakeness itself feel like? What is the experience of that awakeness before you try to be more or less awake? Just with a willingness to open, you can start to feel it. How does this awakeness feel? How does this openness feel? Just by bringing your attention there, just by noticing without any effort, this formless or empty sense of being heightens itself as if to say, “Someone is finally paying attention.”

When this openness is present, you can recognize how it experiences your body. How does openness experience a feeling, emotion, or thought? How does it experience the movement called “me?” Allow yourself to get a real taste of this. This openness is in a completely different relationship with everything that exists, starting with you. It’s in a different relationship with the moment; it’s not going anywhere. Have you noticed? It’s not trying to achieve something else. It hasn’t elevated you or demeaned you. Start to sense the profound innocence of this openness. It’s not perceiving from the past—not from the last moment, much less from the accumulation of a lifetime. It’s perceiving only in this moment.

Openness has not accumulated anything, so it’s free. It has a profoundly innocent but wise relationship to everything. It is something primary, awake, and alive. You can sense how incredibly precious it is. When you look right into it, there is nothing there. Let yourself experience this openness, this nothingness. Let yourself see how it experiences your body and mind right now, in this moment. It’s so different from the experience of the me. This nothingness is the peace that surpasses all understanding, and it’s right here at your fingertips.

Awakeness is inherent in all things and all beings everywhere, all the time. This awakeness relates to every moment from innocence, from absolute honesty, from a state where you feel absolutely authentic. Only from this state do you realize that you never really wanted whatever you thought you wanted. You realize that behind all of your desires was a single desire: to experience each moment from your true nature. You find that simply walking outside and seeing a leaf in the breeze or seeing a street person on the corner is the most exquisite of experiences. You don’t need anything big; each moment has a beauty all its own. Even the very ugly moments have a beauty when experienced from this innocence, this beautifully disarming state of awakeness.

During any moment, you can ask yourself, “What is it like for emptiness to experience this moment? What is it like for awakeness?” Really listen, because openness is quiet and soft. You can’t insist upon it. You can’t grab for it, so don’t reach. Just open. Look for the openness, feel from the openness, and relate from the openness. It can freak you out if you’re not used to it. If you find yourself in a place that you don’t like, just ask how openness is experiencing this moment. A shift happens, and you find yourself saying, “I’ll be damned – it’s actually enjoying this!”

This relationship from your heart, from the truth of your being, from openness – is something that can’t be taught. I remember what it was like when I went as a Buddhist to undertake the precepts. You read through them, study them, and kind of take them inside. You do whatever the little me does with them, like deciding you are going to do a really good job of it – until you find out otherwise. You think you know what the precepts are, then you really awaken to your true nature and realize that this is how your true nature naturally sees things. It’s very simple. That’s it. Now you don’t need any precepts because your true nature sees that way all the time. You don’t need to be reminded of how your true nature sees. You only need to be reminded of what your true nature is.

So if you want to find out how openness relates to each moment, just go inside. Be that openness. Be that emptiness. All you can do is ask yourself, inquire for yourself. How is it relating to this thought in my head? To this person? To this moment? You can see this. Go directly to the source, to the only authority that is finally liberating: your own awakeness, your own emptiness perceiving this moment. It will teach you how to live.

By the end of breakfast, or a bit later in the morning, my habitual thoughts and behaviors would start creeping in again, and those ever-recurring feelings of insecurity and selfishness would let me know I was falling short. Unless I found the time for more yoga and meditation, I would often find myself feeling once again like my familiar small-minded, not-okay self. Then I’d go to bed, wake up and start over again.

While I touched genuine peace and open heartedness, my inner critic continued to assess my level of purity. I mistrusted myself for the ways I would pretend to be positive when underneath I felt lonely or afraid. While I loved the yoga and meditation practices, I was embarrassed by my need to impress others with the strength of my practice. I wanted others to see me as a deep meditator and devoted yogi, a person who served her world with care and generosity. Meanwhile, I judged other people for being slack in their discipline, and judged myself for being so judgmental. Even in the midst of community, I often felt lonely and alone.

I had the idea that if I really applied myself, it would take eight to ten years to release all my self-absorption and be wise and free. Periodically I would consult teach ers I admired from various other spiritual traditions: “So, how am I doing? What else can I do?” Invariably, they would respond, “Just relax.” I wasn’t exactly sure what they meant, but I certainly didn’t think it could be “just relax.” How could they mean that? I wasn’t “there” yet.

Chogyam Trungpa, a contemporary Tibetan Buddhist teacher, writes, “The problem is that ego can convert anything to its own use, even spirituality.” What I brought to my spiritual path included all my needs to be admired, all my insecurities about not being good enough, all my tendencies to judge my inner and outer world. The playing field was larger than my earlier pursuits, but the game was still the same: striving to be a different and better person.

In retrospect, it is no surprise that my self-doubts were transferred intact into my spiritual life. Those who feel plagued by not being good enough are often drawn to idealistic worldviews that offer the possibility of purifying and transcending a flawed nature. This quest for perfection is based in the assumption that we must change ourselves to belong. We may listen longingly to the message that wholeness and goodness have always been our essence, yet still feel like outsiders, uninvited guests at the feast of life.

What has helped me the most since then is to remember that imperfection is not our personal problem – it is a natural part of existing. We all get caught in wants and fears, we all act unconsciously, we all get diseased and deteriorate. Yet, when we relax about imperfection, we no longer lose our life moments in the pursuit of being different and in the fear of what is wrong.

The renowned seventh-century Zen master Seng-tsan taught that true freedom is being “without anxiety about imperfection.” This means accepting our human existence and all of life as it is.

So, while the trance of feeling separate and unworthy is an inherent part of our conditioning as humans, the good news is that so too is our capacity to awaken. We free ourselve s from the prison of trance as we stop the war against ourselves and, instead, learn to relate to our lives with a wise and compassionate heart. When we learn to cultivate and embrace our lives with what I call Radical Acceptance – accepting all the different and varied parts of ourselves – we begin to rediscover the garden: a forgotten but cherished sense of wholeness, wakefulness, and love.

- Tara Brach, from her blog http://blog.tarabrach.com/ , posted to The_Now2

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