7
We forgot about Neale again.
True.
What about his statement about physicians. Did that tick you off?
No. But I don’t exactly agree with him either. He states that the institutions of physicians fight against anything they don’t understand. Therefore, physicians are “against” alternative medicines. What he fails to understand is that physicians would use anything if it can be shown to work.
But, a lot of what physicians use now have never “been shown to work.”
True. My philosophy about treatments that have not been shown to work is to ask; 1-does it cause harm; 2-how much does it cost? If there is no evidence of harm, and it does not send my patient to the poor house, I tell them to try it for themselves. The majority of physicians I know use this philosophy.
What about alternative medicine?
First of all some alternative medicine is really complementary medicine. Acupuncture, herbal supplements, even magnets, can be used in parallel with “allopathic” western medicine. And much of complementary medicine is precisely what I’ve been advocating over and over again. Movement and meditation. Exercise and relaxation techniques.
So, some alternative therapies can’t be used with allopathic medicine?
Yes, some alternative therapies, are truly alternative. Homeopathy usually precludes the use of allopathic medicine. The whole system of homeopathic diagnosis differs from allopathic methods. Homeopathy has shown mixed results in blinded trials. We really are at a stage of evolution. Western medicine is incorporating many of these alternative and complementary therapies. We just want to make sure that first of all we “do no harm.” After that, we would like to make sure that these treatments are better than placebo. The active ingredient in ginko was shown to help demented patients with Alzheimer disease in a placebo-controlled trial.
What about placebos?
A very interesting question. The placebo effect is the powerful effect of giving “nothing.” Giving a sugar pill, or salt-water injection can exert powerful healing effects. But, you really are not giving “nothing.” You are giving the power of being associated with a trial of a medication and you are giving the presence of nice people who are giving you those treatments. Perhaps what we are really seeing is the power that humans have to heal themselves. Now we need to explore how we can harness that power of the placebo. How we can give people techniques to help them heal themselves.
Then we wouldn’t need medicines and surgery.
Maybe after a few thousand years of evolution. Even enlightened gurus have been known to get cancer or die from alcoholic liver disease. So I think we still have a long way to go. Most importantly, as we wrote previously, there are diseases we are at a loss to treat. Those diseases are the best candidates for trials of alternative and complementary therapies.
So is anyone pursing those trials?
Yes. But clinical trials are very expensive. Corporations like to have proprietary medications, patentable medications, so they can make their money back on their investments.
So what about the US government?
The government is realizing that some of these therapies are not very expensive. Therefore, alternative therapies might save the government billions of dollars. The National Institutes of Health has an Office of Alternative Medicine (Now upgraded to a Center of Complementary and Alternative Medicine). We are starting to see some studies being performed. I think there will be an explosion of studies within the next several years. Once insurance corporations see that they can save money, they will use alternative and complementary medicine first. Indeed, many insurance companies are already covering many of these therapies.
So why do they not cover all the therapies?
The scientific method drives traditional medicine. Scientists want to know how things work. Physicians will settle for knowing that something works better than placebo. However, again maybe we should consider that not everything is best studied in a double-blind manner.
Talking heresy again.
Yea, I’ll probably get excommunicated from my physician societies.
8
OK. Let’s talk about death and “returning to the source.” That brings up all sorts of questions about heaven and hell. That discussion will also bring up the concept of karma and reincarnation.
Oboy. I’m probably going to piss-off a lot of people in this chapter. First of all, I agree with Neale on the definition of hell. There is no hell, except the hell we make for ourselves on this earth. When we deny the inner truths, when we choose paths to hurt ourselves. We create hell for ourselves.
And heaven?
Well, first of all I don’t believe in the concept of a soul. We are always part of the Source. When we recognize that we are part of the Source, we can feel these strong feelings of pleasure. We then create this concept of our “soul” being the part of the Source. Then we are saying that the soul exists as a separate entity within us. But, then that means our physical body is not part of the Source. Dualism again. Body and soul as two separate things. Or the “Triune “ of body, mind, spirit/soul. But, everything is Source. The concept of a soul is just another one of those “10,000” things that we create when we try to put concepts into words. Maybe I am just not satisfied with any definition of soul. So, I just don’t get the concept of a soul. Maybe its just my own ignorance.
You forgot heaven.
OK, OK. I’m getting to heaven. I don’t believe in heaven either, at least not any traditional concept of heaven. I guess that follows my concept that I don’t believe in a soul. If there is no soul, there is nothing to go to heaven.
OK. What about a nontraditional concept of heaven.
Yes, my concept of heaven is the opposite of hell. There is no heaven except the heaven we make for ourselves on this earth. When we accept the inner truths, when we choose paths to help ourselves evolve. We create heaven for ourselves. In eastern philosophy that is the true Nirvana. So, Neale and I do agree about heaven.
So what happens when you die?
Well your body goes back to the material world, recycling the physical stuff is the easy part. Dust to dust as they say. The more difficult part is what else happens. Now we get into philosophy and what happens to your “mental” part, your “soul” that everyone talks about. Well everything is Source. So if you want to consider a spark of life within you, your spirit/soul, as a separate entity, that also goes back to the Source. But, and this is the hard part for humans, there is nothing that identifies you from that part onward. Sorry. Think about yourself as a wave on the ocean. You exist for a brief moment, a beautiful existence, you crash onto the shore, and you return to the ocean. That’s it. You can’t identify that wave anymore. Maybe that wave does influence subsequent waves. But only in an indirect way.
OK. How about another example.
Well, I seem to be stuck with water examples. The other one I like is that of a swirling eddy current at the side of a river. Again, you can identify it, and it does stuff. You can even get poetic and think about dirt and sticks getting caught in that swirling water. Then the eddy current cleans itself of that debris. That eddy current can even change that small part of the river, eroding into the earth, maturing the river bed. Then after changing the river’s course it disappears. You can’t distinguish it from the rest of the water. It was just a manifestation of the Source. Productive, but when its gone its gone.
How poetic.
Thank you. I have others. Icebergs splitting from a glacier, and then melting. Drops of water running down the window, merging with other drops and then splitting apart again.
OK. OK. I get the point, enough with the water analogies. Now I have to pee, please let me out, you can talk to me when I’m outside. So, where does that leave reincarnation and karma.
You just want me to get in more and more trouble. If you followed my stuff so far, the logical conclusion is that there is no reincarnation and, therefore, no karma from one life to the next. On the other hand, karma is very important in your current existence. What you do in this physical manifestation of Source greatly affects what will happen to you. The “hell on earth” compared to “heaven on earth” we talked about earlier. Your actions in this life is intimately connected with your future actions.
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