mind body planet

Today I bet that almost everyone reading this had some form of caffeine. Weather it was through consumption of chocolate, coffee, or an energy drink 90% of people in America consumer it every single day. I for one will not deny it because it is the most widely used drug in the world that had absolutely no regulation as to its use in our daily lives. Though the dosages of this chemical compound would have to be quite high to hurt you or even kill you, there are plenty of things to think about when it comes to consumption of the compound. For me the form of it comes daily through my coffee which I make sure is always organic and fair trade, but that does not negate ay problem that may be incurred by its consumption on a daily basis.

Wikipedia:

“Caffeine is found in varying quantities in the beans, leaves, and fruit of some plants, where it acts as a natural pesticide that paralyzes and kills certain insects feeding on the plants. It is most commonly consumed by humans in infusions extracted from the beans of the coffee plant and the leaves of the tea bush, as well as from various foods and drinks containing products derived from the kola nut. Other sources include yerba mate, guarana berries, and the Yaupon Holly.

In humans, caffeine is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant, having the effect of temporarily warding off drowsiness and restoring alertness. Beverages containing caffeine, such as coffee, tea, soft drinks and energy drinks enjoy great popularity. Caffeine is the world’s most widely consumed psychoactive substance, but unlike most others, it is legal and unregulated in nearly all jurisdictions. In North America, 90% of adults consume caffeine daily.”

Most people consume caffeine every day without considering what the effects of it may be. Every study I have found points in on direction on its health risks or benefits and then there is always another study that shows exactly the opposite as fact. Caffeinism is something of a problem for people who consume too much of this helpful energy aid. This condition is similar to any kind of chemical addiction which can result in a strong dependency and various nervous issues from its withdrawal from the body. One big condition that can result from over consumption is sleep disorder which is simply like insomnia but is aided by the dependency on the substance which actually causes the condition. 

There is also the issues of the effects of caffeine on memory. For college students who drink a lot of caffeine you may want to reconsider since much research has shown that lots of jolt can lead to loss of some ability to do broad thinking and that it really only enhances momentary task thought function. In other words, you drink too much you completely destroy the part of you brain that you’re trying to enhance while in school. 

Sustainable tidal wave

In my lifetime there are two big developments in the world around me that I have come to think of as quite significant. The development of the internet and computer technology has completely changed the way that everything is our world functions. The other change has been the growth of what I see as efforts to make life’s consumption much more sustainable. Nothing stands out more in the history of the world during my lifetime than these two developments that give me hope for the future of our species and the entire planet as it is. Neither of these seem to be slowing down any time soon and I hope that they never do because with them goes the rest of humanity.

In my community here at school I have seen many great developments in sustainable technology and efforts by people at the grassroots level and upwards in the economic hierarchy. Here on campus we now have a center for sustainability where students and faculty work to develop new technology for every day life that would lower their environmental impact. On campus all of our construction vehicles are being switched over to run on vegetable oil as their primary fuel source for hydraulic pumps. Also, our bus system has begun to convert all of the public buses in the area over to hydrogen from natural gas. We have also seen the explosion in the numbers of farmers markets and CSA programs being offered each season. All of these factors have sort of changed the landscape of this little community to the point where our farmer’s markets are even being included in the use of food stamps programs.

On a national level we are of course seeing the same level of explosive interest in sustainable technologies and products. All across the country you can find brand new majors popping up surrounding the use of sustainability in all forms of society. Our school this year began an environmental energies major for the first time. There are now plenty of school that offer sustainable community planning, and sustainable agricultural degrees. All of these are an obvious sign that things are changing because typically it is the academic world that is a bit slow to change when it comes to big issues such as this.

In the consumer markets we are also seeing a much more sustainable push when it comes to products. Though the use of corn for various ecological projects has been found to be a cause of bigger problems, their are many products out there which stress recycling and composting, as well as non toxic ingredients that will not effect an ecosystem or water source. I even just bought a chain lube for my bike that is totally biodegradable and will not harm life, which is big part of its advertising scheme.

All around us we are seeing the world shift from the extreme consumerism to what we’re sort of being force to take on. Most of us don’t want to give up the luxurious lifestyle that we so enjoy, but the future looks bleak for us all if we don’t change something. That is what  I think we’re all waking up to these days.

The FLO

A few years ago I was making my decision about school and which college I was going to attend. I considered just about everything I had to look at and it came down to two schools; Berklee College of Music in Boston and Penn State. I finally decided to come here because of the fact that I couldn’t afford to live in Boston for a day let alone four years. So now I am here making the best of what I can get out of my education. But I have found a way to keep myself in both worlds as best as possible.

I had been considering Berklee College of music because they offer a great degree in Music Therapy for guitar players like myself. One of my favorite family friends from back home was actually a music therapist who had been working at the job for longer than most people had known about the practice. He had given me a bunch of free treatments when I was a kid in the midst of the troubles of puberty. Ever since then I have wondered how I can best make money out of my love of music. Music therapy just stuck out as something I would have liked to have done. Now I have managed to find myself a way in to the field without ever leaving my major.

Last fall, right after I had started school here, I was asked by one of my professors if I wanted to help out with some music therapy research. She knew about my interest and so she got me involved in this project. The whole research centers around this machine called The FLO which is basically a distressing music therapy machine. It is very similar in effect to doing things like extended meditation, massage, sensory deprivation, and other distressing machines. What I love about it most is how it incorporates the bathing of a person in a room full of very peaceful music. All of the music is chosen specifically because it plays around the super learning tempo of what I believe is sixty beats per minutes.

Each session of this distressing machine is very similar and it is just the individual experience that differs. I can’t say too much about people’s experiences because of confidentiality but I can say that of the nearly fifty people I have personally put through a session, only one reported no effects while inside of after the experience. All of them range from mild drowsiness all the way to an extreme feeling of relaxation and well being. Personally I have experienced the entire range of experiences and so I can say that it really does work.

Though I don’t get to do what I thought I would be for a degree, I am obviously doing my best to make it work for my life right now. Hopefully all of you can get a hold of me and try the FLO some time.

Reducing your Footprint

Every once in a while now, and that is increasing, we hear more and more about something called our carbon footprint. For most people this term can seem a bit vague and maybe even a little bit silly if you don’t have any sort of frame on the issue of climate change. Though there has been a huge amount of consciousness shifting because of efforts by people like Al Gore and all of the environmental crusaders worldwide. For these people I don’t necessarily need to try and inform you of anything because you are out there on the front lines of your issue. At the moment I have been sort of forced out of making any large scale actions on the basis that my schedule is packed full of class and work. I have been sort of forced in to the level of what I imagine to be where most people can function in the effort to reduce their footprint and change their consumption habits. For now I just want to begin my telling you a little bit about your footprint.

If you do anything that burns a fuel or electricity, use products that are manufactured in any way, or make use of any natural resource such as timber, then you have a carbon footprint. A carbon footprint is roughly the amount of energy it takes to sustain all of your habits and daily activities like those I have just stated. By measuring it this way you can see exactly where in the world all of the consumption and pollution issues are really centered. In this country, mots of us has a carbon footprint so large that we use seventeen times more than what is sustainable on this planet. In other words, if everyone on earth consumed as much as the average American, then it would take seventeen earth’s to sustain all of that consumption.  Your carbon footprint is not an extremely accurate number in terms of how much pollution you put out, but it does give great frame of reference. From here we can make decisions about things like reducing our level of waste and even how is the best way to travel in terms of environmental impact. I know personally of several web sites out there online, I don’t want to name any for fear of being considered a sponsor, and they are all usually a free test as to how big your footprint is and they can get extremely particular with the input data.

` Personally I have found that reducing your footprint is not the hard part, what is really difficult is keeping it that way for a long period of time. It seems to be common knowledge around the world that American’s love to consume and it is not just a meaningless stereotype. We all have a strange sort of addiction to things that are wasteful and comfortable. Breaking the habit of consumption is easily shown by taking the average American effort to lose weight. We try hard for a while after making our resolution and then when we hit the target weight we let it all go again and start over. It is a problem with our waistband as well as our environment. Hopefully we can all find the courage, determination, and sense to see that reducing our footprint is a big help for the environment and a great way to be socially active without causing a scene.

Of all of the alternative or complimentary medicines that most people have heard something about, I think that one of the least understood is herbal medicine. Most people thing of herbal medicine as something that has long since either passed out of use or is currently being revived by a bunch of hippies on the west coast. Within my own experiences I have seen both the up and the down sides of what is known as traditional herbal medicine.  Hopefully from my writing tonight I want to try and change your mind if you are of the cynical brood, or just make you feel a little bit of validation, we all need it every once in a while, for doing something for yourself.

As a practitioner of alternative medicines and healing modalities, I feel that the key for all of them having an effect in my own life is the sense of empowerment I get from having healed or improved myself. Those of you who exercise regularly or strive for achievement in anything know this feeling well and have a good understanding of the kind of motivation you can derive from a single taste of it. For any of the practice I have talked about or will talk about, the biggest key is that you are playing an active role in your won health. That coupled with an honest belief in the power of the practice is what makes people succeed in their health goals, or all goals in general.

Herbal medicine, though thought of as an alternative medicine, has never truly left our modern civilization for a second. Every single one of the medication you find in stores today will be derived or based on some chemical combination found in plants used for centuries. We still use cranberries to cleanse the body and citrus fruit to give us the vitamins we need. The use of foods has no boundary in real terms from the use of herbal medicines. One of the biggest reasons for the loss of the knowledge of the traditional healing methods is the modern medical industrial complex. Organizations like the AMA have worked to rally push the fact that the drugs they sell you are more valuable than the plants you can grow.  Health insurance polices do not  cover alternative medicine so many do not explore it.

I can possibly give only one side of the argument though because I am not one to skew the facts. The medications you find in stores are often highly concentrated forms of those chemical compounds and are designed to work faster and for longer. At the same time though, many people who use either of these forms of medical treatment miss the fact that they are treating symptoms and not the problems which may require much more digging in to one’s own physical make-up. That is where we get the use of other forms of treatment such as homeopathic, yoga, qigong, acupuncture, massage, and chiropractics. All of these treatments are meant to work at the deeper problems that really are the cause of those symptoms that we drown out with medications or herbs.

After all is said and done I will bring it all together with my vague lesson of it all. There is no right  or wrong answer to whether you should use any of these forms of health treatment. It all comes down to the level of empowerment that comforts you and how much you believe in any medications you take. If you don’t believe it is going to work then it probably won’t help you at all.

Naturopathy

When my little brother was born he was delivered in our own home by a midwife. We were friends with her because my mother had trained with her long before I was born and trusted her to deliver the baby.  In the middle of her pregnancy both she and her midwife began to notice some problems occurring with her body. She was testing very highly for sugars in her blood and she actually failed diabetes tests. This was an easy diagnoses for gestational diabetes. Because of this diagnoses she was made to watch her diet very closely and to exercise every single day without fail or else she would have to deliver in a hospital. She stuck to her routine religiously until the day when she went in to labor. Her labor started before the sun came up one morning and she labored for about four hours. When the time came to push she was perfectly calm. She pushed for about fifteen minutes until my brother’s head came out. Then as she tried to push him out he wouldn’t move an inch. He became when is called a should distoshia which means that his shoulders were so broad that they got stuck to the pelvis and wouldn’t budge. After some working by the midwife and a broken arm my brother was born amid some tears and the hiss of an oxygen bottle ready just in case there was an emergency.

The next few months for him were pretty miserable. With babies that young they do not cast their arms if broken and we were told to just keep it immobile. This proved to be impossible pretty quickly. So we took him to see a bunch of specialists for the next six months or so. He still goes to see the same chiropractor for monthly adjustments and a craniosacral therapist comes to their house once a week to work on his head. Though he is not living pretty comfortably for a seven year old little guy, he had a really hard time that first year because he was in so much pain the entire time. I remember him screaming for hours on end day and night. One day around six months after his birth my mother took him t o see a naturopath.

A naturopath is a certified doctor that specializes in full life care for the body. When I go to see my naturopath, we talk for about two hours about all of the things that are going on in my life. He doesn’t try to counsel me or pull apart the things I am saying. He is really just interested in getting as full a picture of my life as he can possibly get. After the appointment I go home and a week later he sends me my homeopathic remedy that I mix in to my medicine bottle. This is not covered on my health insurance, but it is worth it.  For my brother the interview was given to my mother and from that he was able to build up a picture of his experience both in utero and beyond. After he began getting his remedy his attitude seemed to change pretty darn quickly. I was only thirteen at the time and I remember thinking that this naturopath must be some kind of a magic doctor because his medicine worked wonders.

That is my experience with Naturopathy. I strongly recommend that anyone out there who feels they are in some way unhealthy should at least try out a naturopath at least for one remedy and see what they think of the results.