since you changed your diet, or stopped eating dairy?”“ About three months,” is the answer.“ Ah. And deep down inside, does it feel OK or not OK?” Thoughtful pause.“ It feels OK. It feels like a clean-out.” I always take such communication at face value. For the one who is helping someone else heal, as well as for the one who’ s healing, it is essential to listen to all the healing body’ s feelings and signals. They will always tell us whether or not we’ re on the right track. In the case just illustrated, we obviously were. The only thing left to do was to take care of the externals— fasting, drinking ginger tea, or doing whatever facilitates the speedy completion of the mucus discharge— and wait till it stopped. After the initial three- to four-month period there may be a few more discharges, on and off, for the following six months to a year. In each instance ask yourself how you feel deep down inside. Whenever the answer is,“ Not OK. I’ m worried,” I recommend a visit to a doctor or other health professional for a more thorough diagnosis. It has been estimated that it takes about seven years for every cell of our bodies to be renewed. That means that every seven years or so we are a new being, totally different, materially speaking, from what we were seven years before. In my experience, during the first seven years any transgression from a healing regime that suits us is keenly felt and results in some immediate reaction or discharge.( I used to get colds regularly after eating in restaurants.) After seven years, these reactions are less pronounced, and we can better cope with disturbances or deviations. After fourteen years, errors in diet are often felt more on the psychospiritual level than on the physical. For example, in the time period between twelve and fourteen years A. C.( After Change), if I ate meat and I didn’ t need it— which happened maybe once or twice a year— I didn’ t actually get sick, but I quarreled with people and had trouble concentrating. After twenty years— where I am now— I’ m just grateful that there is food around when I need it, whatever it is. If I eat meat when I don’ t need it, I just feel a bit dense. I know what to stay away from always( milk, sugar, honey), what I must be careful with( spicy peppers, chili, fried foods, fatty or oily meals, vinegar, raw spinach, cheese, overcooked food, too much miso, soy sauce, or seaweeds, over 30 percent grain), and what I can indulge in when I feel like it( fish, chicken, butter, tunafish sandwiches, pizza, Chinese food). I’ m curious to see what the situation will be after twenty-five or thirty years. CAN HEALTH FOOD MAKE US SICK? Just as too little or too much of an individual foodstuff can be detrimental to health, so can a health regime pursued beyond the balance point. If someone with difficult digestion or other gastrointestinal disturbances goes on a diet entirely devoid of raw foods, that is wise. The absence of the irritating food will encourage the body to start the healing process; if the rest of the diet consists of whole foods that keep the system balanced and on track, that process will continue until completed. After a number of months, the body will have become stronger, and a bit of raw fruit or a salad here or there will cause no problems. Much later, when healing is completed, a more frequent intake of raw foods will prove as healthy for this person— and indeed, as recommended— as it is for the rest of us. As you heal, you have to modify your food intake so as to adjust it to your changing condition. In other words, as you yourself change, you must make changes in your manner of eating. If you fail to do so, you will become stuck, regardless of how“ good” your food is, and if you’ ve read everything in this book so far, you know how that can be a problem. It’ s the pendulum concept again. A“ health regime” is one that we embark on with the express purpose of swinging into a comfortable pattern, and thereby( a) undoing the damage done so far; and / or( b) improving upon the present condition. The healing regime is successful insofar as it helps us achieve one or both of those goals. In our society, healing regimes that undo the damage done by the modern diet and lifestyle are invariably based, as we have seen earlier, on fresh, natural foods, sometimes with supplements, but always high in vegetables, fruit, grains, beans, and low in or devoid of fat, meat, salt, sugar, coffee, dairy, canned and frozen foods. Yet the pendulum swings, and I’ ve also seen many imbalances arising from the rigid application of these regimes. These imbalances occur for two principal reasons: 1. excesses in doing— that is, overemphasis and overreliance on individual foods or substances that may indeed be quite healthy but are not, realistically speaking, endowed with superpowers. 2. ignoring or explaining away the body’ s alarm symptoms, because the intellect is saying“ This couldn’ t possibly be bad for me.” The tuning-in-to-self test( does it feel OK or not OK?) has generally not been done in these cases, or its warnings have been ignored. EXCE EFFECTS SS IN DOIN G
Vitami ns and suppl ement
Constant hunger, weight gain, skin cracks or discharges, other unexplained symptoms that don’ t go away even if the diet is changed but the pills are continued