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Each one of us is brimming with creative power. Creativity lies at the core of what it is to be fully alive and free, so each of us can express our unique visions as gifts to all life. I believe it’s time to set free our indestructible passion to create from the core of our being. Each of us is being called to do this; not only for our own sake, but for the sake of all beings and the earth itself. I am excited about answering the call. Are you? HOLISTIC POWER Creativity is a mind-body-soul experience. It demands that we have access not only to our intelligence and to the layers of our psyche of which we are consciously aware, but to the whole of our being including what is commonly called the unconscious mind. Most of us have come to ignore the unconscious parts of us, in no small part as a result of Freud’s insistence that they are a repository of repressed desires which need to be codified, pathologized and treated. It is this belief that has propelled tens of millions of men and women into psychotherapy in the past hundred years. As a result, most of us still live with the lion’s share of our potential for creativity and freedom unavailable to us. Meanwhile, beneath the vast ocean of what it is to be fully human, our creative power slumbers, waiting for us to awaken it. PLUMBING THE DEPTHS Then, when the founder of depth psychology, C. G. Jung, came along. Jung announced what every creative artist discovers for himself, that Freud’s “fearful unconscious” is also a realm replete with visions, archetypes, insight and soul—all of these are fuels which feed our creative fires. Once we embrace the depths of our psyche and learn to work with them, we can access the gifts they hold, and live our lives from a foundation of authentic freedom and power. A person’s interior life, insisted Jung, not only merits attention; it calls for dedicated exploration which is exactly what he, himself, did and then recorded in his posthumously published Red Book. Thanks to more than half a century of exploration, Jung came to see the human psyche—both conscious and unconscious—as an inherently spiritual and fluid medium, a magnificent ocean which we humans can fish for enlightenment, creativity, healing and personal transformation. Jung then went on to discover that the dreams, myths and archetypes which reside in our unconscious are highly personal to each of us. Yet we are also connected with what he called the collective unconsciousness, which connects us with archetypal realities that are not only personal but universal. WAKE UP TO RAGING FREEDOM Now this is revolutionary stuff. It speaks of truths few of us even consider, unless we happen to be one of the visionary artists, thinkers or scientists who discover this for themselves in the course of their work. Such men and women are seldom willing to buy into the general consensus of what is taken to be reality. They prefer to strike out on their own, determined to enter uncharted territories and find out for themselves what treasures can be found there to bring back, fuel their work and transform their own lives and the lives of others. Invariably, when someone is courageous enough to question the stuff that the rest of us take to be true, they discover whole new realities. I have a passion to explore the nature and power of creativity from every angle possible in this blog. I hope you will join me in my journey.

Within each one of us, thin or fat, there lives a joyous creative spirit. It is the spirit of the child - of life itself - a completely individual nature which is constantly seeking freedom simply to be what it is and to do what it wants to do. The world we live in as we grow up seldom leaves space for that unique spirit to develop fully. Our parents, our education, our culture is continually feeding us with rules about what we should and shouldn't do - should and shouldn't be. It is a little like getting up each morning and having to put on your straightjacket before you begin the day. For many people—both men and women—weight control has become part of that straightjacket. They worry constantly about how or what to eat or not to eat. They agonize over one or two pounds - or fifteen - gained or lost and they treat themselves like naughty children who need controlling lest they get out of hand and eat something they shouldn't. A person in any kind of straightjacket is a person disempowered. It is a person who does not trust himself or herself and who to a greater or lesser degree lives in fear - fear of food, fear of what he or she might do, fear of disapproval from a society impassioned by notions of thinness. I have known that struggle. I have lived it myself and I see evidence of it all around me in women caught in the jaws of bulimia, anorexia or compulsive eating, and in men who overindulge in alcohol or fatty foods, struck down by a heart attack in the prime of life. This has always seemed a terrible waste. POWER TO TRANSFORM Thirty years ago I began to ask questions like: Why do so many people struggle with weight in our society when the vast majority in other cultures never even seem to grow fat? What causes the distortions to our bodies not only in body size and fat deposits, but in the degenerative conditions, from heart disease to rheumatoid arthritis that come in their wake? Is it really weakness of character or lack of willpower that makes us all eat too much and gain weight? And - most important of all - is there a way of eating and living that enables someone who is carrying too much fat around to eat and live so that whatever distortions have already appeared will disappear quite naturally as part of the process of regenerating the body through food and exercise? MY SEARCH FOR ANSWERS So I read many books and papers, listened to dozens of lectures from physicians and scientists and interviewed a number of doctors personally who claimed to have found answers. Some of their answers were useful, but not until I was introduced to the work of ATW Simeons did I come to understand that even the most genuinely helpful discoveries about why we get fat—and why every slimming diet we follow—almost invariably lead sooner or later back to our regaining weight we have lost. Why? Because each and every one of them, no matter how sincere or well meaning, ignored the most important truth of all: Simeons’ work stands alone even amongst the findings of many brilliant and sincere scientists and doctors—from Atkins to Sir Robert McCarrison who have contributed so much to sound dietary practice. What makes Simeons unique is that he alone discovered that overweight, obesity and all the anguish that accompanies them is in no way caused by a lack of willpower or simple greed. Neither can it be permanently cleared by putting people on a slimming regime. These conditions represent a significant metabolic disorder. Until this metabolic disorder is dealt with we will simply go on forever taking diet pills, shedding fat and then regaining it, along with all the inner grief, disappointment and shame we suffer each time this happens. Even better, Simeons discovered where the locus of overweight lay in the body, and how to create a protocol that would give a man or woman’s overweight body a kind of permission to restore normal balanced functioning to that area in the brain, thereby clearing not only unwanted fat but enhancing a person’s overall health in life-changing ways. THIN FOR WHAT? In the Western world we have long been possessed by an obsession with changing the shape of our bodies, especially trying to make it thinner, using one diet after another. Yet making a body thinner is not always the best thing to do - either for its health or its good looks. A thin body is a wimpish body. It is a body depleted of energy and of power. When you are lean you are strong, you have sleek muscles, good tone, and you can feast heartily on wholesome, natural foods in keeping with your body’s unique food needs, enabling you to stay that way. You are also highly resistant to illness and early ageing as the years pass and you feel comfortable and at ease in your body. This is a very different experience from the anxiety over thinness which disempowers so many men and women. Leanness, created by restoring healthy balance and functioning to the body’s fat and appetite control center, brings a sense of power with it - a sense of being in control of your own life which is a far cry from the inadequacy many feel as they continue to battle against weight gain with conventional slimming diets. I believe it is time we forgot about thin and choose instead to go lean from inside out. This calls for revolution. COME THE REVOLUTION - Diets That Work To revolutionize means to change completely and fundamentally - your body and your life. It is not a word chosen lightly but because it most accurately describes the powerful positive transformation that takes place in how you look and feel when you transform your appetite and fat control center so it works again, throw out convenience foods loaded with bad carbs, hidden sugar, junk fats and chemicals, and begin to feed heartily on the kind of foods your individual body loves, drink large quantities of pure water and strengthen your muscle mass through simple exercise that your body loves, be it dancing, yoga, swimming or what-have-you. The word lean means `muscular...containing little or no fat.' Being lean is as different from being thin as Cura Romana is from all the quick fix slimming diets you may have tried over the years which have slowly but inexorably eroded your energy and increased the sense of disenchantment with your body.

Shamanism is an ancient and universal method, using simple tools and techniques, for connecting with the universe—both seen and unseen worlds—and moving beyond the limitations of rational thought into realms of sheer awareness. It helps us forge powerful relationships with the world around us—both seen and unseen. It helps us rediscover our links with our ancestral energies, power animals and helping spirits, all of which can enable us progressively and efficiently to come into alignment with our own soul energy, our destiny and our place within the order of the universe. Shamanism is useful for healing, for creativity, for visioning and for nurturing all life. HEALTH AND SHAMANISM At its essence, health is nothing less than a process of unfolding which enables a human being progressively to become more and more who he or she truly is, and to express the unique divine spark of their soul more fully in day-to-day life. I have seen this happening again and again, as participants in my Journey to Freedom workshops apply the skills they learn to their everyday lives. I continue to marvel at the exponential growth that takes place for them. When core shamanic techniques—which are tens of thousands, more probably hundreds of thousands years old—are applied to self development and the expansion of consciousness, this invariably results in improved health, joy and discovering one’s life purpose. The way in which this happens is not through a steady process of change, but through a series of quantum leaps which resemble the metamorphoses of caterpillars into butterflies—or the mythological phoenix, whose body is consumed by a fire of his own making, out of which a new being emerges in full beauty and glory. QUANTUM LEAPS In physics, the word quantum has very specific properties; it means a bundle of energy. Quantum leap is the term used to describe the movement of an electron from the orbit of one atom to another in a very special way: It moves from one place to another not by a linear process, as we expect change to take place, but by a discontinuous jump. In other words, it leaves one place and arrives at the next without passing through the space in between. By doing this, a quantum leap transcends the rules of time and space, as well as negating some of the linear laws of Newtonian physics—which for so long, scientists believed to be inescapable restrictions of reality—in the process. CREATIVE ENERGIES The kind of quantum leaps in growth and total health I witness among those who learn core shamanic techniques, and then apply them directly to the unfolding of their soul’s purpose (like the quantum leaps recorded sometimes in the lives of great mystics, artists and scientists), are similar in nature. The transformations they experience in their lives are discontinuous—progressive ‘rebirths’, which cannot be described either by the laws of mechanistic science or classic psychological theories. They are changes that take place from within in an individual way—changes which do not depend on following any external set of values, or on following any religious or philosophical set of beliefs. These are changes of the soul. TRANSFIGURE YOUR LIFE Although the changes which take place in a person’s life from working with these tools are unique to them, I have noticed that they all have certain things in common. First is their discontinuous quantum leap nature. Second is the fact that the major shifts I witness are not simple changes, for simple change implies the ability to change back again to one’s previous state. They are true transfigurations, which can only be described as passages out of a more limited way of operating in and experiencing reality, into another ‘reality’ in which health, creativity, joy, and their capacity to give and receive love have made a quantum leap. This kind of change, rather like leaving the womb to be born, is a leap to a higher order of being. SHAMANISM AND ME My work with shamanism developed as a result of my immersion—for many years—in intensive shamanic training, while I was teaching courses in core shamanism in Britain and Ireland as Guest Faculty on the Foundation for Shamanic Studies. By then, I had spent some thirty years studying meditation traditions and methods, and experimenting with other techniques for self-development. My Journey to Freedom workshops grew out of my conviction that shamanism, properly taught and directed towards the expansion of human health and creativity, was the most efficient method I had ever found. Practicing shamanism demands two things: First, a clear focus of intention—knowing exactly what you are wanting Spirit to bring help with—and second, deep compassion for all life. This makes it unique as a spiritual practice. The shaman is a spiritual activist, and shamanism is very down to earth. Its gifts are immediately applicable to day-to-day life. It is neither a religion nor a philosophy. WHAT LIES AHEAD The shamanic process has been described by various cultures using different names. The name is not important. What is important is this: Each of us appears to have encoded within our genes the ability to access personal power for healing, wisdom, divination and creativity. Following a series of severe accidents to my lower body, which took place over several years, I had to set aside my Journey to Freedom workshops. I could not travel—for quite a period, I could not even walk more than a few feet, and then only with a lot of pain. At last my lower body is almost completely healed, so I will be able to begin teaching again before long.

It’s little wonder that people are confused about where to go and what to do when they get ill. I personally hear all about this, because I mentor hundreds of men and women throughout the world. They become overwhelmed by the media propaganda and aggressive advertisements they see on television. Our medical industrial complex has turned into a bizarre conglomeration of misinformation, lies and deceptions designed to further the corporate agendas of Big Pharma, government regulatory bodies and mainstream medicine, with little regard for human wellbeing. Now let me be clear: I am by no means damning all doctors. Far from it. I have the highest regard for conscientious practitioners who— because of the pressures they themselves have been put under to dole out drugs—find themselves caught in the same trap as their patients. This means that even doctors who have a genuine will to bring healing to those who need it are often prevented from doing so. DRUGS DON’T CURE Pharmaceuticals are designed to suppress your symptoms, not to cure your problem, despite all the aggressive hype and publicity which would have us believe otherwise. Also, the vast majority of what medical studies conclude in their research has been exaggerated, is misleading or plain old bad science. Dr John Ioannidis is one of the experts who have been exposing bad medical science with great clarity and conviction. His article Lies, Damned Lies and Medical Science, in the October 4 issue of “The Atlantic” magazine, is well worth reading if you want to understand the way in which medical research is supposed to work, but how most often it does not. The corruption, lies and deceit which pervade the functioning of our medical industrial complex are enormous. Pharmaceutical corporations bring in from five to six times more earnings each year than any other corporations. You need to become aware of all these implications. FALSE BELIEFS RULE Take anxiety and depression, which are so widespread now, and so fundamentally undermining to your health long-term. In 1987, SSRIs—selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors—arrived on the scene, spawning with great fanfare a gigantic market for the treatment of anxiety and depression. The assumption on which these drugs were manufactured is this: “Anxiety and depression happen because of low serotonin levels in the brain.” This belief was neither scientifically tested nor proven. Nonetheless, the mainstream medical profession, sold a bill of goods by the pharmaceutical salesmen, embraced prescribing these drugs hook line and sinker—and Big Pharma began to make a fortune on them. Prozac (Fluoxetine) came first. It was followed by Celexa (Citalopram), Zoloft (Sertraline), Paxil (Paroxetine) Lexapro (Escitalopram) and several others. TRUE OR FALSE When the National Institutes of Mental Health decided to find out if anxious and depressed people do indeed have low serotonin levels, they found there was no evidence to support the claim. In 2007, more research concluded that the claim that low serotonin causes anxiety and depression was incorrect. Another Swedish research project confirmed that SSRIs are not a valid treatment for anxiety and depression. Did Big Pharma take note, and begin to question their aggressive sale of these drugs to the public? Not a bit! They continued to assert that adding more serotonin to the brain is the right way to treat these alleged “chemical imbalances.” Other commonly prescribed pharmaceuticals for anxiety include Valium, Ativan, and Xanax. What are the significant risks associated with such drugs? Hip fractures, memory loss, addiction and bone fractures, to name a few. We also know now that those who continue to take SSRIs can be four times more likely to die prematurely and have a 35% greater risk of cancer than those who do not. This was reported in Medical Daily June 17, 2015. EUROPEAN ANALYSIS A fascinating debate recently took place between the highly respected BMJ Danish medical researcher, Dr Peter C Gøtzsche, and a London based researcher Allan H Young, during which mind-altering drugs were rigorously investigated for their safety and effectiveness. Gøtzsche claimed that antidepressants do little more for patients than swallowing a placebo. He pointed out that there are likely to be 15 times more suicides among patients taking them than are being reported by the Food and Drug Administration, which issued a black-box warning on these drugs more than a decade ago after carrying out meta-analyses of hundreds of studies involving almost 100,000 people. At that time they had discovered that the rate of suicidal thinking or behavior doubled among those on the drugs. “Psychiatric drugs are responsible for the deaths of more than half a million people aged 65 and older each year in the Western world.” Gøtzsche estimates that this means an astounding 539,000 deaths take place each year in the U.S. and the European Union. This is based on studies showing higher mortality rates in older patients taking antipsychotic drugs, such as those used to treat schizophrenia; benzodiazepines, which are prescribed to treat panic and anxiety disorders, as well as antidepressants. VACCINATION WARNINGS Dr. David Brownstein is Medical Director of the Center for Holistic Medicine in West Bloomfield, MI. A member of the American College for the Advancement of Medicine, he frequently lectures to physicians about the use of natural hormones and nutritional therapies. He also has much to say about vaccines which are indiscriminately being given to both adults and children. In some countries, such as Australia, ongoing vaccination of your child is mandatory. It may soon become mandatory in the state of California. While recently watching a movie “Trace Amounts: Autism, Mercury, and the Hidden Truth”, Brownstein felt impelled to spell out some of the horrific truths which conventional medicine chooses to ignore in regard to the dangers of such vaccinations. Here are some of the things you need to be aware of: Mercury is one of the most toxic substances known to man. You will not find even one study that has ever shown that it is safe to inject mercury into a living body. Yet it continues to be used for DTaP, Japanese encephalitis, Influenza, rabies, tetanus and many other vaccines along with other toxins such as aluminum, formaldehyde and even MSG. TOXIC INVADERS Brownstein writes: “In regard to the flu vaccine, there is a whopping 51,000 ppb (parts per billion) in the multi-dose flu vaccine—the most common type of flu vaccine given. How much is 51,000 ppb? It is 25,000 times the legal maximum for mercury in drinking water established by the Environmental Protection Agency.” Remember that when you inject mercury, it is 100% absorbed, so it is more toxic to inject it as compared to eating it in fish or drinking it in water. The autism rate that has gone up from 1:10,000 in 1970 to 1:68 now. He writes, “This is NOT a genetic problem. This is a multifactorial problem that is being caused by toxicities, as well as nutritional and hormonal imbalances. And, toxic vaccines are part of the problem. We have already damaged a whole generation of children because of this mess.” Yet the powers that be, following Big Pharma’s lead, continue to legislate for yet more vaccinations. INTO THE DARKNESS Editor and Chief of The Lancet-considered to be the most prestigious peer reviewed medical journal in the world-Dr Richard Horton, recently published a courageous statement in regard to the quality of medical research. He writes, "The case against science is straightforward: much of the scientific literature, perhaps, half may be simply untrue. Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses, and flagrant conflict of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, science has taken a turn toward darkness." I recently came upon an excellent video by Gwen Olsen, who was herself an ex Big Pharma sales rep. I strongly urge you to watch it. There is a lot more for all of us to learn if we are to become genuinely well and remain that way, and she has much to share with us. 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A child is born. The waiting and planning, the exercises for birth, the hoping that everything will be all right has finished. Parenthood begins. Oh my God - where do we go from here..? The task ahead seems monumental and you feel completely inadequate in the face of what is required. One moment you are filled with tenderness and wonder as your baby's tiny hand grasps your little finger in complete trust. The next you wish the thing would go away and leave you in peace. Why didn't somebody warn you that within the first three weeks, every item of clothing you own would be stained with baby vomit? Becoming a parent changes your life beyond all description. It could be years before you get another night's uninterrupted sleep. You learn about self-sacrifice for the first time in your life when a baby arrives. All at once everything revolves around caring for this tiny but determined creature who has entered your home, and finding the wisdom to do what is right for your child. There are so many unanswered questions. What do you do when he gets ill, or is unhappy? How do you feed him? Do you let him cry so he won't get spoiled, or do you see to his every wish so he won't be scarred by neglect? Welcome to the world of parenthood. Take heart. You are not alone in your confusion. Now for the good news: the task of raising a child is not as difficult as all the doctors and psychologists would have us believe - especially if you decide to raise a Nature's child. child rearing by the rules A few years ago I had lunch with a beautiful and successful American woman in her mid thirties. Sooner or later the conversation got around - as it often does with me - to children. This woman told me that she had a five year old daughter. I asked her if it was difficult living and working in New York while raising a child on her own. She replied that it had been hard but that now it should get better since she and her little girl were going to parenting classes. `Parenting classes,' I asked, `whatever are they?' `You know, where you learn how to be a parent. We go twice a week together,' she reported with enthusiasm. Curious about what was taught in these new programs, and at the same time suppressing a smile at the latest American attempt to package up something as rich and complex as parenthood and spoon feed it to clients well heeled enough to afford the indulgence, I asked, `What do they teach you?' `Oh, they teach you everything!' she replied, sweeping her hand across the table in a way that makes British head waiters loathe American clients. `For instance, when your child goes to pick up something from the coffee table that you don't want her to have, you must never be negative,' she said. `Negativity is not good for children,' she added, leaning closer in a conspiratorial fashion. `So instead of saying, "No, no," which might crush your child's spirit, you say, "Now darling that is a no, but this is a yes (pointing to other objects near by), and this is a yes and this is a yes."' forget perfect parenting I have little patience with such practices - nor do I believe there are a lot of set rules to follow to raise a child well. That is because, like a lot of seasoned parents, I have learned about parenthood the hard way. When my first child was born I was determined to bring him up right - not to make the mistakes that my parents had made with me, to ensure that he developed quickly both physically and mentally, and that he turned into the kind of person that I thought he should be. I worked hard at it. I read everything I could get my hands on about child development - all the latest theories and all the traditional wisdom. No time or expense was to be spared in bringing up this child. He would be breast-fed, disciplined, and taught to read by the time he was a year old using special equipment designed for the task. I would instill in him a strong sense of moral rectitude and good manners, and he would be given every kind of educational toy I could lay my hands on to help develop his creativity. Also I would never lose my temper, always be patient and kind (but firm of course) and make sure he didn't watch too much television. My master plan for child rearing might have sounded good on paper, but it had a couple of big drawbacks. First, no human being could ever have carried it out. Second, it completely ignored the most important truth there is about child rearing - a truth which I did not myself come to know until I had two or three more children under my belt. It is this: You don't have to read a thousand books and follow a lot of rules the so-called experts make up to raise a healthy, happy, creative child. You only need to learn to trust in yourself and in the incredible powers of Nature. You also need to develop the art of listening - with your heart and mind and instincts as well as your ears - to your child. Most of the time he will tell you what you need to know. Once I finally figured this out - many tried and failed strategies down the road - I let go of my anxieties and theories. Then motherhood became not only a joy for me but a source of never-ending wonder. I discovered that each child - not only my own children but boys and girls with whom I worked as a nursery school teacher, and others - is utterly unique and perfect in his or her own way. I also learned that one's relationship to a child has a life of its own and that, so long as you are willing to face each child honestly and openly day by day, and so long as you honor and respect this relationship, not only does this empower you to give the best guidance and care for the child, in some magic way which I still don't fully understand, it can even help heal deep emotional wounds within you as a parent. Most important of all, I discovered that the whole idea of perfect parenthood is a big fraud. There ain't nothing perfect when it comes to parenthood. Perfect by who's criteria anyway? The sooner you accept this fact, the sooner you can get down to the business of child rearing and enjoying it. For me, raising children - whether it be dealing with a tiny baby or seeing your twenty-five year old develop year by year - has been the most exciting and rewarding thing I have ever done - or ever hope to do.

Below you will find a list of good sleep foods and bad sleep foods. good sleep foods Bananas Figs Dates Yogurt Tuna Wholegrain Crackers Nut butter Turkey bad sleep foods Caffeine Alcohol Sugar Cheese Chocolate Sauerkraut Bacon Ham Sausage Aubergine Potatoes Spinach Tomatoes

The second most cultivated and widely-eaten fruit in the world is the apple. It seems we had to be well into the 21st century before science finally discovered its nutritional value. Not long ago, Medical News Today featured an article about the top 10 healthiest foods. Apples were number one. Apples are extraordinarily rich in antioxidants, flavonoids, and marvelous dietary fiber. The phytonutrients and antioxidants they contain help reduce our risk of developing cancer, diabetes, hypertension and heart disease. But there’s lots more news, too. MAGIC FROM A HUMBLE APPLE Recent studies show that apples have the ability to improve neurological health as they are rich in quercetin, which reduces cellular death caused by oxidation and inflammation of neurons. According to research carried out at the University of Quebec, apples also reduce our risk of stroke. A large study involving 9,208 people showed that those who ate the most apples over a 28-year period had the lowest risk of stroke. At Florida State University, scientists praised the apple as “a miracle fruit”. Older women who ate apples every day had 23% less LDL—the bad-guy cholesterol—and 4% more HDL—the good cholesterol, over a 6 month period. Meanwhile, researchers at Cornell University discovered that apples can help “protect neuron cells against oxidative stress-induced neurotoxicity”. This reduces our risk of developing disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease. Also at Cornell, researchers discovered that an apple a day may help prevent breast cancer. There is some mounting evidence that apples help reduce the risk of diabetes. A large study involving 187,382 people showed that those who ate 3 servings of apples a week had a 7% lower risk of developing type-2 diabetes compared to those who did not. Finally, researchers at Oxford University discovered that eating an apple everyday can be just as effective as statins are in preventing vascular death in people over 50. It’s about time that contemporary research is starting to celebrate the power of the apple. I have known for 50 years that apples are a miracle food. With so many benefits and uses, it is hard to list them all. HEADSTART TO A HEALTHIER LIFE One of the best ways to trigger rapid detoxification in your body, and get you started on a way of living that will keep you healthy all around, is to do an organic applefast for a few days. Of course, no one experienced in the art and science of fasting should fast on water for more than a couple of days, unless they are under the watchful eye of a health practitioner well-trained in natural methods of healing—and never if they are pregnant, suffering from kidney or liver disease, or on drug therapy. But an apple fast is different. In truth, it is not a fast at all. You eat as much as you want—but only organic apples, in place of regular meals. Like the traditional water-fast, the applefast is a powerful tool for stimulating the process of detoxification on which high-level health depends. An applefast can be used in many different ways, each of which is powerfully helpful. First, if you are keen to change the way in which you’ve been eating, an apple fast can get you off to a good start. It spurs the rapid elimination of waste, clears away food sensitivities—which can be present as a result of eating convenience foods, too much carbohydrate and sugar—and it can banish the ravages of unnatural appetite that develops due to chronic overstimulation of the digestive system. After your first 2 or 3 day applefast, try to set aside one day each week for applefasting. A once-a-week, one day applefast is a great boost because a day a week on apples is an excellent discipline. It’s a practice that helps us break through ingrained habit patterns which make us unconscious and mechanical in the way we live, and largely unaware of what we’ve been eating. Finally, you can also use the applefast whenever or for whatever reason you have slipped and eaten something that you know your body was not happy with. For example, if you discover you have eaten more than you really wanted, or your system has become somewhat polluted because you were trapped in a smoke-filled room the evening before. A day of applefasting quickly helps correct digestive disturbances and internal pollution problems which can result. It left unchecked, being out of sorts can trigger unnatural and excessive appetite. In effect, an applefast puts you back on track again, and can have you feeling great when you wake up the following morning. APPLEFASTING—HOW LONG If you’re keen to get off to a good start with detoxification, set aside two or three days for an applefast. Buy a box of organic apples. Usually the greengrocer will give you a good discount when you buy a box at a time. Or, buy three or four different kinds for variety to get you started. They must be organic. Eat as many as you like, but eat the whole apple, including the peel, the seeds and the core. You must chew it all very well, until the last drop of flavor has been extracted from the fruit. The only part you throw away is the woody stem. The apples you eat must not only be organic, they need to be fresh and eaten raw too. You can munch these crisp organic fruits au naturel, or you can grate them and sprinkle a little cinnamon on top. You can even put them in a blender with clean water to make a whole apple drink. Eat apples whenever you’re hungry throughout the day. How long you carry out your first applefast depends on how convenient it is for you to munch on nothing but apples, and on how you feel. Usually a couple of days are enough to give you a good start on spring cleaning the body from within. Three days is as much as any healthy body should do on his or her on, without being under the supervision of a health practitioner well-versed in fasting and the use of living foods. No pregnant or lactating woman should do an applefast, nor should anyone with a kidney, liver or heart complaint, for in such cases a sudden change of diet carries with it potential dangers to health. But, if you are generally well, then a short applefast is a great way to clear the decks for a new way of healthier living. When your day or two on apples alone is finished, then you can start the next morning to apply your healthier way of eating based on fresh foods. ONCE A WEEK TREAT It really is a treat, too, as you’ll find after you’ve got into the swing of it. To lay aside one day of rest from the three-meals-a-day routine and spend it applefasting gives your digestive system a break. It helps clear your mind and encourages the letting go of old poor eating habits. It’s also an excellent tool for giving an extra push to the detoxification process. For me, applefasting is a pleasure. When I travel, and hate being faced with some of the airplane, hotel and restaurant food which I would otherwise be forced to eat. So instead, I carry a sack of apples with me, and munch away. I always find it increases my energy and has me sailing through whatever I have to do. I tend to vary the day of my applefast from week to week. Most often, it is Monday, because I feel that this is a good way to start the week. But when I have a commitment which entails lunch or supper or Monday, I simply shift it to a day later during the week. THE QUICK CORRECTOR In many ways, the most useful thing of all about the applefast is that you can call on it when you most need help to get you back on the rails again. Each of us occasionally finds ourselves in a situation where we’ve eaten something that we would rather not have eaten. You may find your system has been upset by some dish you were served the day before, which has forced the return of false appetite, and does not seem to want to go away until your digestive system is calmed and your body is balanced once more. Or perhaps you’ve overeaten—old habits die hard, and you must be patient with yourself if this does happen—or you’re under heavy stress for some reason, and feel you need help to smooth things over. The applefast is ideal as a “quick corrector” in any of these situations. Spend a day munching organic apples, and it well you to rights again, so that when you awaken the next morning you feel more centered and more yourself, ready to get back to eating good-quality foods with renewed enthusiasm and energy. CLEANSING CRISIS Very occasionally when someone goes on an active program of detoxification beginning with the applefast, he or she has the experience of a headache at some time within the first day or two, or feeling moody or having an upset stomach or loose bowels. This is a sign that your body is throwing off wastes at such a pace that you are experiencing what is known in natural medicine as a cleansing crisis. In fact, this happens to very few people. If you happen to be one of them, be glad. Even though it may be a bit of a nuisance for a few hours, it’s actually a good sign. Your body is taking the opportunity to get rid of a lot of debris that it wants to eliminate. If a cleansing crisis does take place, make time to relax—in a darkened room if possible—and be kind to yourself. It’s quite a feat to be ridding your body of so much old debris at once. The cleansing crisis will pass quickly, leaving you better than ever. BEWARE THE CAFFEINE MONSTER People most likely to get a headache as part of the cleansing crisis are those who’ve been drinking several cups of strong tea or coffee a day. This kind of reaction is triggered by your tissues dumping a lot of stored caffeine into your bloodstream all at once in order to clear it from your body. The first time this happened to me, I had been in Vienna for six days, where everybody drinks coffee—and very strong coffee indeed—all day long. Not being much of a coffee drinker myself (apart from a cup of bitter Turkish coffee once every six months after a middle-eastern meal), while there, I decided to go along with the custom. The day I left the city, I got into an airplane to return to London and to my usual way of eating, and found I was struck down by the most appalling headache which lasted about four or five hours. It was no fun, believe me. But when it passed, I did a 3 day applefast. I was left with the most wonderful feeling of freshness and lightness—the way you feel on a beautiful summer’s morning when there is a light breeze blowing. This sense of lightness is a common one for people who turn to an applefast to clear their system of stored wastes. It more than makes up for the headache or tummy upset that heralded its coming. When you experience a headache as severe as the one I had that day, it makes you appreciate even more how valuable a one-day-a-week applefast can be, and what a source of pleasure and energy. It’s something I would never want to be without.

For decades I’ve warned men and women not to take calcium supplements—whether in pill form or by drinking and eating many cows’ milk products. All sorts of well-formulated scientific studies now confirm that such advice is right. Having long been bombarded with ill begotten misinformation about calcium it is time we learned some simple truths. For instance, supplementing your diet with calcium can not only be toxic to your body: It may even shorten your life. DANGERS OF TOO MUCH CALCIUM Thomas E Levy, M.D. is one of the world’s leading experts in vitamin C and antioxidants used to treat and protect against a myriad of medical conditions and degenerative diseases. A board-certified cardiologist whose work I have long admired, Levy has also written an excellent book, Death by Calcium, which I urge every man and woman who cares about health and truth to read. Here are a few surprising truths you need to know about calcium: All degenerative diseases, from heart disease to cancer and Alzheimer’s, show increased levels of calcium inside the cells where they do not belong. As calcium deposits both inside and outside the cells increase, this raises the chance of malignancies and encourages the development of cancers. A healthy diet based on organic fresh fruits, vegetables and protein foods can supply all the calcium your body will ever need, so long as you are getting plenty of sunlight or taking a good quality vitamin D3 supplement. Women who have the highest calcium consumption have a death rate two and a half times higher than those with a lower consumption of calcium, according to a long term study of 61,433 women followed over a period of 19 years. We have long, wrongly, been urged to supplement our diet with calcium to avoid osteoporosis. Someone who has unwittingly followed such advice is far more likely to die of a heart attack or stroke than from a bone fracture. Women with osteoporosis do not have an overall deficiency of calcium in the body. They have a deficiency of calcium in their bones while they have an excess of calcium in the rest of their body. While calcium supplementation can increase calcium density in bones, this does not decrease the chances of bone fracture. What it does do is lay down potentially dangerous deposits of excess calcium outside the bones. Excess calcium circulating in the blood is far more dangerous than high cholesterol when it comes to strokes and heart disease. Excess calcium over time, without adequate magnesium, sets the stage for the formation of atherosclerotic plaque build-up in the arteries. THE BOTTOM LINE The proofs for all this and much more are overwhelming. Get your calcium from fresh, organic vegetables and a healthy diet while shunning packaged convenience foods, sugars, grains and cereals, and you’ll not have to worry about doing it wrong ever again. So simple really. Meanwhile, I highly recommend that you read Levy’s book Death by Calcium. It’s a great read—clear, honest and so important for your health.

Remember food combining, developed by William Howard Hay MD? It has changed thousands of people’s lives, protecting them from fatigue, weight gain, degenerative diseases and early aging. The basic principles behind food combining are simple: Don’t mix foods that fight. Never eat proteins and starches at the same meal. Never eat fruit and vegetables at the same meal. And do not eat dessert after a meal. If you do, the dessert gets trapped in the stomach and starts to rot, since it can’t be digested properly. These fundamentals of what has long been known as Conscientious Food Combining are easy to learn and even easier put into practice. The benefits of doing so are many, including freedom from reflux, poor digestion and long-term fatigue. DIGEST TO THRIVE Your body expends more energy on the digestion of food than on any other function. Think how sluggish and sleepy you feel after a traditional Sunday lunch. It may surprise you to learn that the energy your body needs to digest food is even greater than that which you use when taking strenuous exercise. When you take in food, your system has to redirect blood supply—and therefore vital life energy—away from the brain and other organs towards the gut. Once there, your energy reserves get busy breaking down your meal. When you eat foods that fight each other, or more food than your body needs, you greatly diminish your overall vitality. You also build up body pollution. Any food—even good quality food—in excess tends to pollute the body. PROTEINS AND CARBS ARE NO-GO Leave behind the old practice of meat-and-potatoes or fish-and-chips. When the wrong foods are mixed together, this further delays digestion and produces toxicity while increasing both appetite and digestive upsets. Most people’s bodies are not designed to efficiently digest more than one concentrated food in the stomach at once. In the simplest terms, you need an acid medium to digest protein and an alkaline one to digest starch. Eat concentrated proteins and starches together—fish and chips, bacon sandwiches, meat and potatoes—and nothing gets digested. An awareness of this principle lies at the core of virtually every tradition of natural healing. Eating concentrated proteins and starches at the same meal wreaks havoc with digestion. It increases the number of incompletely broken down food particles that find their way into the bloodstream to cause food allergies, depression and exhaustion. Concentrated proteins such as cheese, eggs, fish and meat must have an acid medium for good digestion. If there are any starchy or sugary food including breads, pastas or sweets in the stomach at the same time, they neutralize the acid medium, so the proteins remain incompletely digested and poorly assimilated. All carbohydrates foods need an alkaline medium for digestion and must be eaten at a separate meal. What you can get away with is the occasional garnish for protein foods or fruits—such as sesame seeds or raisins—but you would not want to add them in greater quantity. OUT WITH Convenience FOODS Ready-in-a-minute pre-cooked meals, junk foods, and the standard meat-and-two-veg Western meals are incredibly energy-draining. They present your digestive system with the greatest difficulty of all. Virtually all of these manufactured items are grossly deficient in essential nutrient. for it to break down and make use of. Convenience foods and junk foods are also grossly deficient in essential nutrients as well. So are chemically fertilized fruits and vegetables and foods which have been excessively processed to alter their natural state. Convenience foods contain additives such as artificial colorings and flavorings which are potentially harmful. Such foods include breads, sugar, most meats, sweets, and coffee and all the ready-in-a-minute snacks and meals that fill the shelves of our supermarkets. They have no place at the food combining table. CREATE VITALITY If you want to build energy quickly, start right now to separate your concentrated starches from your concentrated proteins, eating each at separate meals. This will help protect your system from a build-up of acid wastes, restore metabolic balance, and resolve the energy crisis which takes place when digestion is overtaxed. Most important, it can bring you a whole new kind of energy which can have you looking good and feeling better than ever with each week that passes. It is not only separating the kind of foods that you eat that matters for an abundance of energy. You need to be just as conscientious about what you eat. The human body is not genetically equipped to handle the refined flours, sugars and excess quantities of poor quality proteins that make up the typical western way of eating. Our ancient ancestors, whose genetic makeup we share, had no bread, sugar, junk fats or pre-packaged, pre-cooked convenience foods. They ate simple, ordinary, wholesome foods—as much of them as they could kill or gather. Their diet was high in green leaves and vegetables—all complex carbohydrates—and moderate in protein. This is the way our own bodies genetically expect to be fed: Good, wholesome, preferably organic foods, simply prepared and eaten as closely as possible to their natural state. FREEDOM TO THRIVE This way of eating calls for real foods rich in fiber, and plenty of the best fats: Organic coconut oil and extra virgin olive oil, for instance. The health-enhancing properties of real living foods have long been tested and eulogized by highly respected European and American physicians—from Gordon Latto and Philip Kilsby in Britain, Max Bircher-Benner in Switzerland and Max Gerson in Germany, to Henry Lindlahr and JK Tilden in the United States. Eating for energy asks that you combine your foods sensibly, and that as much as possible you choose foods grown on healthy organic soils and served as closely as possible to their natural state, either cooked or raw. This is not as complicated as it sounds. Here are the basic principles of eating of high vitality eating. They quickly become second nature. EAT FRUIT ON ITS OWN Fruit passes through your digestive system very rapidly. It needs little help from digestive enzymes to break it down. If you try to eat fruit at a meal with other foods, its digestion and assimilation are slowed drastically and you can get fermentation in the gut causing indigestion, wind and discomfort. If you have a blood sugar problem, insulin resistance or an overgrowth of Candida albicans, then stay away from sugary fruits altogether, or eat no more than a couple of servings of berries a day. Instead of fruit for breakfast you might have a green drink made from the tops of green vegetables in a juicer or a blender. MAKE ONE MEAL A DAY A BIG SALAD A vibrant, living salad based on home-grown or store-bought sprouted seeds and green vegetables is the mainstay eating for high energy. It’s the best way to get optimal support for rebuilding cells and tissues, rebalancing biochemical processes, and restoring normal metabolism. Sometimes, of course, this is not possible—for example, when you have to eat in restaurants all the time. In this case, you can replace the living salad with a big dish of lightly steamed or wok-fried fresh vegetables cooked in coconut oil and served with a side-dish of soup or a protein food. That being said, the more often you are able to make a living salad the focus of the meal, the sooner you will reap the rewards of your new lifestyle. Remember that your digestive system needs time to complete the digestion of a meal before you put anything else into it. Four or five hours need to elapse between lunch and dinner. Otherwise digestion is not complete, and increased toxicity ensues. Always drink as much filtered or spring water or herb teas between meals as you like. But don’t drink liquids at a meal as they will dilute the important digestive enzymes. AIDE MÉMOIRE Eat fruit or a green drink in the first half of the day followed by a protein or carbohydrate lunch and dinner, both of which should include a big, fresh, raw salad. Leave four to five hours between lunch and dinner for efficient digestion. Eat as much as your body needs and listen to its signals of how hungry you really are. Take your time, chew thoroughly and stop as soon as you feel you have had enough. Never overeat. Get rid of packaged convenience foods that rob you of vitality and undermine well-being. These include breakfast cereals, breads, pasta, sugar and all the so-called goodies made from it. Cut back on tea and coffee. If you drink either, make sure it’s organic so you avoid taking chemicals and pesticides into your body. After wheat, coffee is the second most sprayed commodity in the world. Restrict alcohol to a glass or two of good wine with a meal, once a day. Never eat a concentrated starch food with a concentrated protein food at the same meal. Eat fruit on its own, or leave at least 20 to 30 minutes between a fruit starter and the next course of your meal. You can pick and choose your own foods and make up your own menus once you get your head around these basic principles. Practice Conscientious Food Combining for a month and I think you’ll be delighted with how you look and feel. You can also say goodbye forever to mainstream medications designed to treat GERD—gastroesophageal reflux disease—with all their nasty side effects. Meanwhile your energy will just keep on building.