The Sanity of Beauty

While I'm neither an environmental engineer nor a whiz at quick mathematical calculations, I can readily comprehend when something is beautiful.

Science and statistical projections can easily elude those of us who aren't inclined to interpret the world through those lenses.  Beauty, however, is within the reach of us all.

When something beautiful is endangered, we can feel the shame of the impending loss somewhere down deep in our spirits; yet, we don't always react to the endangerment of beautiful things.  Beauty can be equated, at times, with mere sentimental value.  When it is seen only in this light, beauty can be easily dispensed with, sacrificed -- for a perceived higher good.

People in Dublin need more water -- while I'm sitting here envisioning the picturesqueness of the River Shannon and writing about beauty.  Why would I do this?

The Irish in me flinched upon learning that the integrity of this great and legendary River Shannon was endangered -- specifically by what appeared to be only partially considered, strictly utilitarian plans for large-scale water abstraction from its lovely bounty.

I consider, here, ends and means.  The desired end, in this case, is good:  more water for human beings.  The means proposed in order to achieve this end, however, fail to give adequate consideration to alternative solutions and to potential flaws in the plans, themselves.  Are such means, then, truly justified?

I go back to consideration of "the beautiful."  What makes something beautiful?

Something truly beautiful, I believe, carries the imprint of order within itself and radiates the purity of that order.  Something ordered is something which is in balance with itself and its surroundings.

Balance.  An artistic portrait, to give one example, is said to be beautiful when the features of the face are well-proportioned.

A musical work can build a stunning structure of sound around the simplicity of ordered rhythms and compatible harmonies.  Again:  order, balance, proportion.

If the highlights of true beauty are order, balance, and proportion -- these things, in turn, bespeak some kind of an intelligence.  A portrait of great beauty is intelligently made.  A musical work of great beauty is intelligently made.

A river of great beauty, also, is intelligently made.

When we consider the intricate intelligence at play within a river ecosystem, we can marvel at its vastness.  Because of this complex biological interconnectedness, what happens at one end of a river can profoundly affect the creatures at the other end of the river.  The repercussions of the smallest change in a river ecosystem can be staggering.

This is no random occurrence.  If, on a strictly scientific level, we accept the reality of a river ecosystem, then we also implicitly admit that man's interventions can pose a fearsome risk to such a well-oiled machine.  This very awareness of "ecosystem" now holds us responsible to respect the totality of intelligence which choreographs the movement of every last eel and salmon. How big are we, really, in the face of this?  What might be the consequences of exaggerating our own size by thoughtlessly dismissing nature's repeated cautions of disturbed and damaged ecosystems?

Many people attend schools of higher learning in order to begin to probe, in a serious manner, nature's secrets of biological interconnectedness.  We humans often require higher learning merely in order to pose intelligent questions about the inner functioning of the natural world.  The profound intelligence of order in the natural world can only dimly be sensed by even the most brilliant scientist.  Should we not, then, give the greatest of pause before the shining majesty of a river which, for century upon century, has sustained a country with the bounty of its beauty?

This would seem the most sane thing to do.



"Dublin to get water from River Shannon by 2020" - Fionnan Sheahan Group Political Editor – Published 12 May 2014, Independent.ie 

"Fixing pipes could pull plug on Shannon plan" - by Conor Feehan, Herald.ie, February 17, 2014

What Worked

Hello, Friends,

I've been reflecting . . .

When I felt my physical best in adulthood, what had I done to recapture such wellness?

First, I had my "you need a biopsy" scare, which I've written about previously.  Feeling desperate to avoid cancer at that time,  I looked up a complementary medicine physician.  I then attended a lecture of his at a local bookstore.  His expertise was evident.

I became his patient in the summer of 1998.  The goal, for me, was a simple one:  Avoid cancer.  Since the good doctor could not guarantee that I did not already have cancer, he advised me to go through with the biopsy which was hanging ominously over my head.  I did this within a few months.  Thankfully, all turned out well.  No cancer. 

The regimen advised by my new physician was not easy, but that didn't faze me.  I hadn't yet thought to raise the question of my being tested for gluten/gliadin antibodies, so a gluten-free lifestyle never came up as a topic.  The doctor did, however, give me an "avoid" list.  I was to avoid all wheat products except spelt and a bread made entirely of sprouted ingredients, called "Ezekiel Bread."  I was to avoid all dairy products.  No cow's yogurt, no goat yogurt, no ice cream, no cheese. This left organic, non-GMO soy milk as a protein-based drink for me.  [The physician later advised me to avoid soy milk, having acquired misgivings about its safety and efficacy -- at least in my own case.]

The "avoid" list also encompassed many other things -- e.g., chemically afflicted foods and products -- which I can't remember precisely right now.  The doctor gave me a medium-sized list of supplements to take.  My Vitamin C stores were something like sub-zero despite my having taken exorbitant amounts of many different brands of C, so this time I took Nutricology's "Buffered Vitamin C Powder."  This formulation turned out to be very "bioavailable" to me -- which meant that I could actually absorb it and benefit from it.  (The physician explained that the other brand of Vitamin C I'd been using the most turned out to be "not bioavailable" to many people.  This was a learning moment.  I felt quite different when taking Nutricology's "Buffered C" powder.)

I followed this dietary regimen to the letter.  Pounds just fell off me.  Pretty soon I was back to clothes in teenage sizes.  My body felt "clear."  Free of sludge.  Light, bouncy.  I remember thinking to myself that the last time I'd felt that way was when I was in the seventh grade.

Which was ironic, because my esteemed physician's wisdom and guidance had given me just enough stamina to take on a full-time job teaching a small class of seventh- and eighth-graders for the 1998-99 school year.  While it's true that I was thoroughly wiped out at the end of each school day and crashed on the couch as soon as I got home, I was elated at how sprightly I felt while engaged in my job.  I noticed this especially at recess time on the playground.  I could move around as freely and quickly as any of my students.  I was amazed.  I recall eating canned sardines for lunch most days, sardines being one of the more chemically safe fish available at the time.

This dietary regimen also kept excessive amounts of migraine headaches at bay.  While I was still highly chemically sensitive at the time, I was able to be in a school building amidst all of the clothing fragrances, shampoo fragrances, soap fragrances, and what have you.  My migraines were reduced to a much more manageable frequency.  I was eating only organic fruit and organic fresh vegetables -- organic everything to the greatest extent possible.  The whole routine, including the periodic doctor visits, was a very expensive venture.  Which is why it's extremely hard to do that all over again now.  Fees have only gone up since then.

So, in terms of choreographing food regimens, I'm on my own for a while.  It helps to recall that incredible restoration of my health back in 1998 and 1999, and all that went into it.  I'd stopped thinking about it, stopped learning from it, because it has seemed so far out of my grasp these days.  The extreme swelling in my lower limbs from Lyme disease in the spring/summer, and the residual inflammation which still remains in my lower limbs even as I write this, put a bit of a dent in me.  I'm presently in search of a remedy for this.

Had I not felt free to use soy milk as a protein mainstay back in 1998-99, that dietary regimen would have been much more difficult for me to sustain. When my protein intake falls too low, I get cardiac arrhythmias.  So I have to be sure that I have a protein source readily available.  This is a tough thing for me to do without the easy protein from soy milk.  Coconut milk, for example, has very little protein.  It's a wonderful powerhouse of nutrition and supposedly excellent for the metabolism, but if it's quick protein I need, I've learned that I'd better seek out another source.  Gluten-free protein bars can take you only so far, and who needs all that sugar? 

My present status is "gluten-free" once again, and I'm contemplating -- also "once again" -- attempting to give up all dairy.  For a gluten-free person, giving up dairy requires much more home-cooking and advance preparation of protein-based foods with gluten-free flours.  In short, it requires work.

However, the better I feel as I become more and more distant from my last serving of gluten, the more energy I hope to have with which to expand upon this gluten-free lifestyle.  I must confess, it still boggles my mind that so many people, myself included, benefit from giving up those very foods which are supposed to be so nurturing to human health.  My philosophical difficulty with embracing this contradiction accounts for the numerous times I begin to give up gluten and dairy and then go back to both.  I cannot deny, however, that my health really picks up when I give up both staple foods.

If I think about this scenario in a long-term light, I don't think I can keep up with avoiding these foods.  If I think about it only in terms of this day, this hour . . .

Maybe I can do this.  :)

Cheers!

~ Carolyn

Don't Starve Your Gallbladder!

If you don't give your gallbladder something real and substantial to chew on, it begins to pine away . . .

Good fats -- not those synthetically greasy, gloppy, indigestible, waxy, "plastic" specimens often called "snacks" -- are those real and substantial things.  

By contrast, if you feed your gallbladder a watery, "lite" diet of low-fat or fatless foods, the gallbladder shrinks and withers from lack of exercise.  Then, it becomes too weak and frail either to feed off the good fats or to throw off the fake fats (those imposter "trans fats").  It becomes a mess in there and the gallbladder starts to shriek in pain.

Friends, we really need to keep our gallbladders, because when the gallbladder goes, all of the breaking down and detoxifying now falls to the liver.  True, the gallbladder pain stops when the gallbladder is removed (!) -- but deep on the inside, it becomes a desperate situation, because the liver can't really do all of that work alone.  And now the poor person is stuck with only a liver.  Maybe two functional kidneys, too -- but even two kidneys can't atone for that missing gallbladder.

If your gallbladder is already gone, I'm very sorry.  Please be careful of what you ingest, on behalf of your exceedingly valuable liver (see the last link, below, for helpful information).

If you still have your gallbladder -- let me tell you my own little story.  When my first gallstone attack struck,  I'd already been forewarned by Dr. Joseph Mercola's writings about the precaution of holding on to one's gallbladder if at all possible.  But there I was, on a cold wintry night, suddenly beset with a boring pain, front and back, up high.  I looked at my face in the mirror and it was green.  I wondered if I'd pass out.  I felt weak all over and completely defenseless against the pain.  It was off to the hospital for me.  I remember sitting up in an emergency room bed for about five hours, barely moving because the pain was so bad.  They mapped out my gallstones on ultrasound, showed the picture to me, told me my gallbladder was inflamed, and said that I'd have to have it removed shortly.  I listened respectfully but decided to keep my gallbladder.  They gave me some ibuprofen, and the attack subsided shortly thereafter.  I focused on the really good fats after that.  My complementary-medicine physician later affirmed that I should treat the gallbladder well by eating good, whole, organic-if-possible fats.

Somewhere within that year or the next, I heard about an herbal practitioner who'd had many successes with curing various ailments through a modern, Oriental-style approach to the body.  I believe I went to him, that first time, for several miscellaneous complaints.  After his first exam and treatment, I asked him how my gallbladder was doing.  He said, "I fixed it.  It's gone [the problem].  Your gallbladder's fine."

I thought, "Whoa."

To the best of my calculations, that was nine or ten years ago.  I still have my gallbladder!  Most times, when I go back for another visit with this practitioner, I ask him, "How's my gallbladder doing?"  He always says, "It's fine."

With the greatest of gratitude, let me say that I don't take my gallbladder lightly.

While I don't claim to agree with every single detail or suggestion mentioned in the following links, I think the overall direction of these pieces represents my own thinking, in general, on this topic.  I'd like to pass on to you what I can regarding the preservation of the irreplaceable gallbladder (and helpful hints for those whose gallbladders have already been removed):

"Taking the Fear Out of Eating Fat" - by Lori Lipinski, April 30, 2003 (The Weston A. Price Foundation)

"Gallstone Treatment" (January 02, 2008) - An informative comment by Dr. Joseph Mercola of Mercola.com

"Problems with Digestion? This Type of Food May Be To Blame..." (January 06, 2011) - by Dr. Joseph Mercola of Mercola.com

"Five Important Tips if You've Had Gallstones or Your Gallbladder Removed" ( April 10, 2004) - by Dr. Joseph Mercola with Rachael Droege

Cheers!

~ Carolyn