A Diamond in the Darkness, Illness As Your Ally

If I could make an ugly face at my body for my disappointment, I would. This body got sick on vacation! My beach vacation! In Cancun, of all places.  How can my body get sick when I'm in beach mode? I only get sick when I am torturing myself with a 3 page to do list. But in this instance, my to do list was sand volleyball, Mexican feasts, and vodka sodas to consume. No, there is no room for immune system glitches on a beach vacation. But it happened and it taught me two very interesting lessons.

First, what you may think I had, I didn't. Montezuma did not take revenge on this gal! I had an intense head cold. So when I woke in the morning of day 1, I was clogged in the nose and face and very ornery, so I mossied to the shower to create steam to clear my clogged head. Then realized that's only something a Denverite would do - because Colorado air is dryer than gluten free bread. Instead, I looked out over the balcony, oh, hello beautiful ocean. Breaking no land speed records, I walked to the beach and began a one-nostril (cocaine style) snort of the ocean. Take that Neti Pot, this nasal irrigation was complimentary. I'm happy to report, I didn't get explosive diarrhea from my experiment, despite hubby's hesitation. And there were multiple snorts on the trip. So next time you have a cold and you're near the blessed salty ocean, you know what to do   I really doubt that happens much to other people.

Lesson Number Two, Going deeper (ocean pun suggested)
The second lesson has come from my most recent Detoxification and Digestion class at Nutrition school. Something I read that tinted my vision like rose colored glasses. So first, let me prep you and request you read this with an open mind. Closed minds are for old people, so don't act old.


The body uses illness as a way to cleanse the body. OK. Yes, we kinda know this, like we sweat, we get pimples, we girls have periods,  but I'm going in deeper here. Think of it like a favor. Being sick is not meant to shine a light on your weak immune system, or punish you for having donuts at work. (Although, sugar does thwart the immune system, so if you do donut up, make sure its delicious and don't waste your experience feeling guilty). No, your body loves you and is only helping you. Your body is looking at the big picture. Stay with me here.

Illness is used to protect us. We get sick to gather all the old and no longer needed materials, including cells, bacteria, old emotions, bad food, and dump them out of the body. We get sick to give a swift kick in the rear to viruses and not-serving-us molecules. Your eye will water up when you get a speck of dust in it, to flush it out. Your body will kick out a splinter even if you don't pull it, because it's a foreign invader. Your body will heat up with a fever when you have a bad guy it needs to kill. The symptom is the fever, the fever is not the illness. Just like the ocean washes out seaweed and drift wood, we cleanse too. Side note, imagine if the pharmaceutical companies could talk to the ocean, they'd convince it that the seaweed was a symptom of weakness and that the salt in the water was disappearing.

Your body is working hard to cleanse the body to keep it in tip top shape and we've just been working to rid the symptoms in order to be comfortable. Western medicine has taught us that discomfort is bad. But what discomfort really is, is just plain necessary. It's also based on your emotions and thoughts. Physical symptoms stem from your thoughts, ya? Don't believe me? Why else do you blush when you get embarrassed? Or yawn when someone else does? Did you know that your body can't tell the difference between extremely cold or extremely hot water? Anyway, your body's emotions follow your thoughts. Lots of info on this, but let me steer you back to this cleansing topic.

When the cleansing process is halted, say, when you run to your medicine cabinet to pop an Advil because your head is hurting, you slow down the cleansing, add in more toxins that drive the illness deeper into the organs. It's like telling yourself to walk but stepping on your left foot with your right one. Drugs, yes even over the counter ones, are bad. Let me say it again, drugs are bad. Drugs insult the body's natural rhythm. And drugs make you feel loopy, they add to your toxic load (hello obesity epidemic!) and disrupt your natural cleansing process. It's like having a housekeeper come to your house and when she starts to clean you tell her you'd rather not clean it but just rub the house down with a rag and water.

One of my newest CD's I've been listening to is a book called, "Your Body is Your Subconscious Mind" by Candice Pert. Oh man! If you have a drive toward science, you'll love it and if you don't then she'll help you hate it less. One of the things she said was that every cell in your body responds to your thoughts. Boom. We knew that right, at least a little. But she proves it through science, and she got me really excited for the potential in this shift. Your body is responding to everything; in your physical and your non-physical  environment. This means your body responds to your thoughts. Your body is even responding to other people's thoughts. Open mind, people. So many people can prove this now. Life is WAY different than what our parents taught us. And science can prove it.

 So being armed with this power, I challenge you to think delicious thoughts, and to breath in the greatness of each illness, the body is here to help. Wave a white flag of truce to every cell in your body, the battle is over and the celebration is now here. Consider facing a little bit of discomfort the next time you feel under the weather. Consider natural remedies like chicken soup, rest, breathing, fresh air and tea with honey. Remedies that relieve the discomfort but don't halt the cleansing process. Consider just saying no to drugs and yes to cleansing.

The Body is Your Subconscious Mind