Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby's Total Health Newsletter #9. Week ending July 19th, 2009
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click the image or click here for more info  1. Reflections On Love and CompanionshipThis issue was put together in Oregon, visiting with my friend Joshua Parker (aka. Josh Korn). I walked Crater Lake rim and had time alone, to reflect (and sweat!)
I was listening to a Vaugham Williams piece on my MP3 player: Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis. I could write a whole newsletter on why I like certain pieces of music (see item #5 for a clue) but that's not the point here. What happened was I climbed to the observation peak and looked down on the lake, listening to this lovely music. Then I had a deja vu! I remembered a moment over 20 years ago where I listened to EXACTLY the same piece of music, looking down on Lake Lucerne in Switzerland. I was married to my first wife, we were troubled; but the music inspired me with love and heavenly feelings. I rushed to descend the peak and call her at home in England (this was in the days long before cell phones). I wanted to say "I love you; don't worry, we'll work it out; everything will be allright"). Bottom line: she didn't pick up! It took me 3 days to drive home across Europe, exhausted. By then my mood was lost and she was in another place altogether. It was less than 5 years after that she walked out with another guy. So in a way it was Fate. I got to marry the most wonderful person I've ever met, Vivien. The woman I once held so, so dear is now living all alone. She still won't speak to me in warm, civil tones. It's incomprehensible to me that you could share a bed with someone for over 28 years and then not want to treat them with accord and respect. Why am I saying all this? To set the stage for thoughts about love, companionship and being friends, even hate. Once that person was the most beloved on Earth for me. Now she's only a memory. We all know love and passion. It's exciting but doesn't last. Real love should not depend on lust. Real love is possibly our most urgent, wonderful feeling. I couldn't last without it. At this level we are blessed in many ways, including intimate, wonderful sex. But when it fades, what then? I think there is a level we might call friendship. There is still sex. Lots of couples end up in that band. But sometimes it really doesn't last either. People get to what I call companionship: living together, sharing space, recognition of each other's foibles, but not always with respect and not with love. Sex then is either cold and mechanical or just doesn't happen at all. Couples like that end up together, not even because of friendship, just because it's more convenient than that hassle of going through a break up! Not a good place to be but probably much to be preferred to living alone. Loneliness is pathological for a group-oriented species like us humans. As I walked, I was thinking of these levels. What comes next? I suppose indifference. Neutrality. Then the negative stuff below that. We don't need to go there. But I'd like to make a really important point: hate means love! You can't hate somebody you don't care about. Bitter feelings may be hard to bear and are very destructive but they don't come about without prior interaction. What do you feel for strangers? Nothing, of course. They are strangers, after all. So if you really hate somebody and told me that, I would say "Well, you love them deep down! Otherwise where does this deep hurt feeling come from?"
2. How To Survive In A World Without AntibioticsJust to let you know that I've been wrapping up this major eBook right here at Josh's. It's been a big project (more so than Cancer Confidential) but I think the final result is definitely worth it. There is nothing else comes even close to this report for it's comprehensive overview of so many, many possibilities. I haven't tried to cover everything, yet there must now be very little I didn't include! You know there are lots of successful antimicrobials out there that were used (successfully) long before antibiotics. Some you may know, but most of them you don't and some will astonish you! I realized as I wrote this report that it was probably antibiotics that got us in the frame of mind of "a pill for every ill". They were such a successful class of drugs, miracle healers, which saved hundreds of millions of lives, safely, cheaply and swiftly. From there we got suckered in to the post-war world of big pharmacy and the belief in drug-based medicine. It took a long while to realize that is was never going to happen; that drugs were not the universal answer. Most doctors, of course, still don't get it. It's over! Now, with resistant organisms springing up all over the place, we really are facing a "world without antibiotics". You need to wise up and learn what to do!
3. Retreat On WheelsMy good friend Ric McConnell called me today. He was driving in glorious sun from Las Vegas to Los Angeles; he was listening to my CD "The Secret Of Lasting Happiness" and enjoying it. We got to talk about long car journeys (a fact of life out West here); the time to relax, listen to some music, catch up on some instructional CDs. He said it was like being on a retreat. Then it hit me! We all know the expression "university on wheels": it means getting educated, listening to teaching audios, while you drive along. Well, I came up with "Retreat on Wheels"! It's the prefect answer to road rage; you just have to make a conscious effort to chill. Put on some slow Baroque or Celtic (see item 5) and ease off the gas pedal a touch. Instead of hammering metal and rubber for maximum car performance, why not make a choice to switch to quality of feelings on the journey? It is just a choice! If you choose frenzy and stress, more fool you! You don't HAVE to set records when you drive. It is simply not true that only losers come second; losers are the ones who get first to their grave! Who cares what the guy in the next lane is doing to himself; you cherish yourself and find space and calm behind the wheel. Anyway, to commemorate, I've put my "Secret Of Lasting Happiness" CD on a special sale price. Get it and go "retreat" next time you drive. And before you ask, Ric was hands-free on his cellphone. |
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