Here's an article that reminds us of that fact... I watch or listen to some comedy every day- I have my digital video recorder save all the Conan O'Brien shows and then watch them during dinner, or in the evening before bed. What do you do for laughs?
By LINDSAY TAUB
Perhaps one remedy to combat pain and stress was written in an ancient proverb - ‘‘A merry heart doeth good like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones.’’
Nearly 3,000 years later, doctors and health professionals are discovering - and touting - the benefits of laughter.
Studies have shown:
— Laughter is preventative medicine. It can improve blood flow, which over time may protect against heart disease.
—Levels of stress hormones went down when laughter increased, leading to a boost in the immune system.
—Laughing also reduces depression and improves self-confidence.
Physiologically, when a person laughs, every organ is stimulated. As with any aerobic activity, it increases heart rate and circulation, exercises the lungs, facial muscles and diaphragm, said Dr. Michael Miller, who was the principal researcher on a recent study at the University of Maryland Medical Center. These findings recommend a 15-minute gut buster a day.
Researchers showed 20 adults two movie scenes - one from the comedy ‘‘Kingpin,’’ the other a battle scene from ‘‘Saving Private Ryan’’ - while monitoring artery function. After viewing the funny clip, subjects’ blood
vessels dilated by 22 percent; they constricted by 35 percent after the war sequence. Dilation allows blood to move through the vessels with ease, taking strain off the heart and arteries.
‘‘That magnitude of change is similar to what you’d get from aerobic exercise,’’ Miller said. Laughter may trigger the release of nitric oxide, a chemical that relaxes blood cells, he said. It may also release endorphins, hormones shown to be natural painkillers.
Props to ‘Patch’
Before there were laughter studies, however, Dr. Hunter Adams, in the early 1960s, treated each patient with a joke and a smile. He was the subject of the 1998 movie, ‘‘Patch Adams,’’ starring actor/comedian Robin Williams as the beadpan-on-the-head wearing doctor who also donned giant shoes and a clown nose in order to draw giggles from his patients.
Since then, the ‘‘laughter is the best medicine’’ concept became more tangible - in part due to the research of Drs. Lee S. Bark, Stanley Tan and William Fry. They showed through controlled scientific studies in the 1970s that laughter affects blood pressure and heart rate.
Fast-forward 30 years and there are 3,500 ‘‘laughter clubs’’ in existence, including one at the U.S. Pentagon and more than 2,500 certified ‘‘laughter leaders’’ from the World Laughter Tour, an organization that promotes wellness through laughter.
A laughter club is a group that usually meets weekly to practice a combination of routines that trigger laughter and yoga breathing - called yoga laughter.
Dr. Madan Kataria, an Indian physician, founded the movement in 1995, and it has grown worldwide. So inspired was psychologist Steve Wilson by Kataria that he brought the techniques back to the United States and founded the World Laughter Tour.
While Wilson echoes Kataria in saying ‘‘adults are not laughing nearly enough,’’ he said there is no scientific basis to support the statistic that children laugh 300 to 400 times a day, compared to 15 times a day for adults.
‘‘The numbers are symbolic and a way of showing that adults need to laugh more,’’ he said.
Wilson uses therapeutic laughter in his counseling practice. He was also the chairman of the Dept. of Mental Health and Retardation at Columbus State Community College in Ohio, where he has also taught since 1973.
The techniques Kataria taught Wilson in India were heavily yoga-based and might not have been acceptable in mainstream America, Wilson said.
‘‘It’s very easy in India for people to accept that something is a yoga practice,’’ Wilson said. ‘‘But here yoga is popular, but not part of our culture. It’s chic to go to yoga but the idea of it as spiritual and healing is still somewhat off-putting to some people.’’
To make the practice more accessible for the western world, Wilson said he refined the techniques, softened the spiritual talk and strengthened the physical focus. He also developed a training program for health professionals and therapists to become ‘‘certified laughter leaders.’’
‘‘The whole idea is where humor is psychological, laughter is physiological,’’ Wilson said. ‘‘We do playful exercises that recruit people into their own body mechanism, creating the possibility for endorphins to be released and consequently, a decrease in depression and anxiety.’’
Locally, Nancy Davis, a certified laughter leader, worked with a group at the West Acres Nursing Home in Brockton. She had a handful of residents flapping their arms, doing the chicken dance all in the name of relieving stress and having fun. Other techniques include walking like a penguin and walking over hot sand.
‘‘A lot of clubs will start up again after the first of the year,’’ Wilson said. ‘‘October, November and December, with all the holidays, are the emotional loaded months of the year, so people are going to need to laugh.’’
For more information and to find a certified laughter leader or laughter club in your area, visit worldlaughtertour.org.
Jumat, 16 Desember 2005
Selasa, 06 Desember 2005
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Rabu, 09 November 2005
Sabtu, 05 November 2005
Bird Flu Schmird Flu
You understand, don't you, that the media has to talk about something every day? And they seize upon the stories most like to rouse your emotions. They need your attention. If they can scare you, they've got your attention, and then the advertisers are happy, and the media gets paid.
What's the likelihood that the avian flu will morph into a human pandemic?
According to The Potential Economic Impact of an Avian Flu Pandemic on Asia, the threat is quite real, since all three of the great flu pandemics of the 20th Century orginated in mutated bird viruses.
Ok, so we know it's a possibility.
But the CDC says, "sporadic human infections and outbreaks (of avian flus), however, rarely result in sustained transmission among humans."
Since 1997, nine avian influenza viruses have infected humans. The total number of deaths from these nine viruses? Seven.
So, typically, even if humans do get an avian flu, it doesn't spread like the flu we're used to.
This isn't the only reason I'm not worried about the avian flu. If you understand how the immune system deals with new antigens (viruses), you know that the body learns how to fight and overcome it while you're experiencing the flu symptoms. If you're healthy when you get the new virus, your immune system is quite capable of doing this successfully.
Who's at risk?
Of course, if you're elderly, immunocompromised (e.g. have AIDS or some other reason for a weak immune system), or take immunosuppressant drugs (people who've had organ transplants), you need to be more careful about not contracting new antigens and more diligent with self-care when you do.
Smart Advice for When You Do Get Sick
Regardless of your state pre-infection, once you get sick, you should rest, drink lots of fluids, eat well (I like chicken noodle soup), and let your body do its job. Don't overwork, exercise, or ignore your physical needs. Avoid stress. Watch movies. Take hot baths. Sleep.
You can also take Chinese herbal forumulas that boost the immune system and have a general effect against viruses and bacteria. These formulas contain complex, sophisticated herbs that use multiple biochemical agents to do their job. Like newer drug "cocktails", they can be more effective against resistant or new viruses than single-chemical drugs.
Read more about Chinese medicine and Viruses
Senin, 24 Oktober 2005
Pinpointing pain
Western medicine is learning how acupuncture works. The answer may lie with the body's natural painkillers and responses deep in the brain.
By Elena Conis
Special to The Times
October 24, 2005
WHEN Melanie Burke's infertility treatments went awry a few years back, she came down with constant throbbing muscle aches, searing back pain, insomnia and migraines so severe they affected her vision.
Burke's doctors wrote off the symptoms as a reaction to the hormones she was taking to help her get pregnant. But the pain persisted long after Burke stopped those treatments. "I saw an orthopedic doctor, a neurologist, two endocrinologists and a physical therapist," says the 47-year-old Santa Monica psychotherapist. "Nothing helped — I was beginning to think I had something very serious."
Finally, after six straight months of pain-racked days and sleepless nights, Burke turned to acupuncture — and found relief within two treatments. Her pain subsided so quickly that "within five minutes, I was so relaxed I was on the verge of sleep," she says.
From the traditional Chinese medicine point of view, Burke's qi, or energy flow, had been out of balance. Needles inserted at specific points in her body redirected the flow of her qi and restored her to good health.
From the modern medicine point of view, Burke may have had an endocrine imbalance caused by fertility treatment. The needles helped her through a combination of hormone production, cell changes, neurons firing — and possibly a bit of mind over matter.
Hundreds of thousands of Americans attain pain relief through acupuncture each year, according to a recent national survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — and many, these days, seek the treatment at their doctor's suggestion. Mainstream medical interest in acupuncture has grown as the studies pile up: A National Institutes of Health statement, published in 1997, concluded that the procedure appeared most promising in treating nausea, then pain.
Yet despite this growing Western faith in an ancient Chinese practice, scientists and doctors understand remarkably little, in modern medical terms, about how the procedure works to provide lasting pain relief.
In recent years scientists have begun studying the body's biological responses to the treatment in hopes of shedding light on how a handful of needles and some heat lamps can perform as well as, or better than, Western medicine's strongest pain-killing drugs. They have come up with an array of theories to explain the technique's effectiveness, some of them widely accepted, others too new to assess.
"We're still in the early stages of understanding how it works," said Dr. Ka-Kit Hui, founder and director of the Center for East-West Medicine at UCLA. Already, he adds, studies on the topic are raising interesting questions about the body's physical and emotional responses to pain — and might someday force Western medicine to reassess its understanding of the nauseous sensation.
A philosophical approach
IN traditional Chinese medicine terms, good health depends upon two things: an unobstructed flow through the body of energy, or qi, along 12 major channels, or meridians, and a balance between the two life forces — cool, passive yin and warm, active yang. Illness or pain occurs when the flow of qi is blocked, or when one life force dominates the other.
Acupuncture is thought to act on meridians. In the form of the treatment most widely practiced in the U.S., hair-thin needles are inserted into the skin at specific points along the meridians to redirect or unblock stagnant qi. (Other types of acupuncture apply pressure, smoldering herbs or electrical currents at the points.) These so-called acupoints correspond (in traditional theory, at least) to different organs or systems in the body.
For example, inserting a needle at a point inside the forearm known as P6 is intended to treat nausea; needling Liv3, on top of the foot, is meant to help with motor function.
Studies suggest that inserting needles into acupoints does affect the body, and in potentially meaningful ways. In a study of 37 subjects published this year in the journal Neuroscience Letters, inserting a needle into acupoint L14 on the hand — traditionally used to treat pain — was shown to deactivate parts of the brain that are involved in processing pain.
Indeed, a decade of acupuncture imaging research has shown that "people who get better with acupuncture have clear changes in their brain function," says Dr. John Farrar, a pain researcher at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Changes are seen in the thalamus, a brain region that processes information from the senses, including touch and also pain.
But acupuncture also affects activity in the brain region called the cingulate gyrus as well as other brain structures that make up the limbic system, which processes the range of human emotions and memory.
The fact that acupuncture deactivates the brain's limbic system suggests it "diminishes the emotional part of the pain experience," such as anxiety or that woe-is-me feeling, says Terry Oleson, a board member of the Society for Acupuncture Research and a director at Emperor's College of Traditional Oriental Medicine in Santa Monica, which trains acupuncturists and offers degrees in Oriental medicine.
Hormone release could be key to such brain changes. Thirty years ago, about the same time acupuncture started to pique the interest of Americans, Chinese medical researchers began studying it in animals. They showed — and subsequent Western researchers confirmed — that acupuncture increased the body's production of its own natural painkillers, known as endogenous opioids, or endorphins. People experienced no pain relief from acupuncture if they were first injected with a drug that blocked the opioids' activity.
Today most Western researchers agree that acupuncture's stimulation of endorphins plays a big part in explaining how the practice works, says Dr. John Longhurst, director of the Susan Samueli Center for Integrative Medicine at UC Irvine.
But some medical acupuncture researchers maintain that this can't be the whole picture.
Most crucially, they say, endorphins alone cannot explain why individual acupuncture points or meridians would correspond to particular functions or parts of the body — if, indeed, they do.
The meridian theory
FOR thousands of years, acupuncture has been based on the premise that specific points along the meridians correspond to specific organs, such as the liver, and functions, such as motor control. From the 1970s through the '90s, the relationship between acupoints and their related organs was a key focus of acupuncture research. Some early studies supported the idea that the links were real.
For instance, in his work as a graduate student and postdoc at UCLA and UC Irvine in the 1970s, Oleson reported a link between tenderness or sensitivity in ear acupuncture points governing a certain organ or body part, and the corresponding health of that part of the body. For example, if a patient had foot pain (say, from plantar warts or some other condition), a foot-specific acupoint on his ear was likely to be tender and inflamed too.
The same type of finding has been reported for non-ear acupoints. Chinese researchers, for example, found an association between pain or sensitivity at acupoint Li8 during acupuncture and severity of disease in the liver, which Li8 governs.
But such studies are hard to perform objectively, and scientists aren't sure what to make of them. Recently, focus has shifted to the unique physical properties of acupoints and meridians without attempts to link them to specific organs or functions.
The meridians depicted in Chinese medical charts have no obvious anatomical basis — though diagrams of them do bring the nervous system to mind, says Farrar.
Meridians and acupoints might also correspond to areas of the body with physiologically distinct properties. In a study published in the scientific journal Anatomical Record in 2002, Dr. Helene Langevin, an associate professor of neurology at the University of Vermont College of Medicine, showed that about 80% of the acupoints on the arm correspond to areas of connective tissue between muscles.
This might be why practitioners and patients alike often notice a distinct feeling when an acupuncture needle is inserted into the skin, says Langevin. Patients sometimes describe the feeling, called de qi in Chinese, as pressure, a nick, something akin to a mosquito bite. To the practitioner, the grip on the needle feels like catching a fish on a line, or a "tightening" of the skin around the needle.
Langevin is now examining what implications this might have for how acupuncture sends messages to the brain. She has published data showing that when needles are inserted into acupoints, the underlying connective tissue winds around the needle "like spaghetti around a fork," she says. This doesn't happen when a needle goes into a non-acupoint area.
Langevin has also shown that the winding action causes the cells in the area to change shape, a process that she theorizes might signal the central nervous system. She is testing the theory in a series of animal experiments.
Other, older studies conducted and published in Asia and Europe during the 1970s and '80s produced evidence suggesting that acupoints might be areas of very low electrical resistance, might be slightly more sensitive to touch or might lie near major nerve pathways. But scientists don't know the significance of these characteristics.
In more recent years, brain imaging has been used to clarify the relationship between acupoints and the functions they represent. The practice was pioneered by Zang-Hee Cho, an imaging expert and UC Irvine professor of radiological sciences who, just over a decade ago, took a spill while on a hike in South Korea. Plagued by the pain that later radiated from his back, he eventually gave in to his wife's suggestion to see a local acupuncturist — who made his pain disappear in 15 minutes, he says.
Cho showed in a series of imaging experiments, published in 1998 in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences, that needling several acupoints for eye problems — located near the little toe — in a group of 12 volunteers increased activity in the visual cortex, the part of the brain governing vision.
Yet when Cho and his colleagues stimulated random points, located a few centimeters away from each acupoint, no activity occurred in the visual cortex.
Dr. Randy Gollub, assistant director of psychiatric neuroimaging at Massachusetts General Hospital, is also investigating the differences in brain activity generated by needling at real and fake (or "sham") acupoints. In an ongoing study — Gollub hopes to publish the results next year — healthy volunteers are subjected to pain (a hot probe applied to the skin) and then given either real or sham acupuncture. So far, both treatments appear to activate or deactivate various regions of the brain involved in controlling the body's reaction to pain: "They're a lot more alike than they are different," Gollub says.
But, she adds, it looks as if the brain's response is stronger for true acupoints than for sham ones. "Think of it as a mountain range, with the acupuncture points as peaks," Gollub says. "As long as you're not in the valley, the acupuncture is probably going to have some effect."
Competing observations
NOT all scientists are believers in the so-called "point specificity" of acupuncture. They note that many studies have shown that simply inserting needles in the skin can relieve pain — regardless of whether the needles are placed at random or in the places defined by traditional Chinese medicine.
For example, in studies comparing real, sham and no acupuncture for osteoarthritis of the knee, real and sham acupuncture both offered more relief than no acupuncture at all — suggesting that acupuncture might be effective regardless of needle placement.
This raises an important question for acupuncture researchers: Does something highly location-specific occur at the point of needle insertion, or does simply inserting a needle, no matter where, trigger a set of pathways that enable patients to "turn on" their brain's own healing capacity?
Cho, for one, has found in recent studies that inserting needles in real or sham sites produces similar changes in parts of the brain perceiving pain.
In simplified terms, he thinks that inserting a needle at almost any point on the body triggers a series of biochemical messages between the brain's hypothalamus and the hormone-producing pituitary and adrenal glands. The signals tell the body to alter its production of, for example, certain stress hormones and immune molecules that help the body cope with stressors — such as bacteria, viruses, emotional trauma or pain.
In fact, Cho believes that acupuncture might someday be refined to the point where the use of a dozen or more needles could be traded in for a single well-placed needle. "One good stimulation may be enough" for lasting pain relief, he says.
As acupuncture research evolves, scientists acknowledge that there might be other effects of the therapy that have little to do with slipping needles into skin. For instance, skeptics have long held that acupuncture helps heal through the power of the mind: that patients feel better because they think they are receiving an effective treatment. The placebo effect, as it's called, can be powerful.
And the truth, some experts say, is that Burke and other acupuncture patients rarely find relief from needles alone.
According to Burke's acupuncturist, UCLA's Hui, Burke's busy, hectic life had a bit too much yang and not enough yin. The intensity of her work life, the personal stress of trying to conceive and her hard-core exercise regimen left little room for calm and relaxation.
So, along with the acupuncture treatments, Hui prescribed a more modest work schedule, a less rigorous workout routine and smaller, more frequent meals.
"I walked out of his office feeling like I was in control of my healing," says Burke.
Such an experience might help subjects "turn on" their brain's own healing pathways.
"If you have a cold or the flu and do something you like, like going to a movie or watching TV, you will experience less of the symptoms than if you just sort of lay around in bed and feel sorry for yourself," Farrar says. "It's a very real effect — you're turning on something in your brain to help you suppress or turn off the symptoms."
In other words, when pain patients turn to acupuncture, other simple changes may produce measurable alterations in brain function with real implications for pain relief.
The herbs, dietary shifts and exercise regimens often prescribed by traditional acupuncturists might have as much to do with the treatment's effectiveness as the needles themselves — physically as well as psychologically.
But for patients convinced of acupuncture's effectiveness, it might be of little importance whether the procedure takes one needle or 20, and whether it's the needles themselves or other aspects of the treatment that provide relief.
What matters is that the treatment helps.
Burke, for one, says her success with acupuncture has brought her back to Hui's office again and again.
"I go for a treatment as soon as I feel the pain coming back," she says, "because I know it works."
By Elena Conis
Special to The Times
October 24, 2005
WHEN Melanie Burke's infertility treatments went awry a few years back, she came down with constant throbbing muscle aches, searing back pain, insomnia and migraines so severe they affected her vision.
Burke's doctors wrote off the symptoms as a reaction to the hormones she was taking to help her get pregnant. But the pain persisted long after Burke stopped those treatments. "I saw an orthopedic doctor, a neurologist, two endocrinologists and a physical therapist," says the 47-year-old Santa Monica psychotherapist. "Nothing helped — I was beginning to think I had something very serious."
Finally, after six straight months of pain-racked days and sleepless nights, Burke turned to acupuncture — and found relief within two treatments. Her pain subsided so quickly that "within five minutes, I was so relaxed I was on the verge of sleep," she says.
From the traditional Chinese medicine point of view, Burke's qi, or energy flow, had been out of balance. Needles inserted at specific points in her body redirected the flow of her qi and restored her to good health.
From the modern medicine point of view, Burke may have had an endocrine imbalance caused by fertility treatment. The needles helped her through a combination of hormone production, cell changes, neurons firing — and possibly a bit of mind over matter.
Hundreds of thousands of Americans attain pain relief through acupuncture each year, according to a recent national survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — and many, these days, seek the treatment at their doctor's suggestion. Mainstream medical interest in acupuncture has grown as the studies pile up: A National Institutes of Health statement, published in 1997, concluded that the procedure appeared most promising in treating nausea, then pain.
Yet despite this growing Western faith in an ancient Chinese practice, scientists and doctors understand remarkably little, in modern medical terms, about how the procedure works to provide lasting pain relief.
In recent years scientists have begun studying the body's biological responses to the treatment in hopes of shedding light on how a handful of needles and some heat lamps can perform as well as, or better than, Western medicine's strongest pain-killing drugs. They have come up with an array of theories to explain the technique's effectiveness, some of them widely accepted, others too new to assess.
"We're still in the early stages of understanding how it works," said Dr. Ka-Kit Hui, founder and director of the Center for East-West Medicine at UCLA. Already, he adds, studies on the topic are raising interesting questions about the body's physical and emotional responses to pain — and might someday force Western medicine to reassess its understanding of the nauseous sensation.
A philosophical approach
IN traditional Chinese medicine terms, good health depends upon two things: an unobstructed flow through the body of energy, or qi, along 12 major channels, or meridians, and a balance between the two life forces — cool, passive yin and warm, active yang. Illness or pain occurs when the flow of qi is blocked, or when one life force dominates the other.
Acupuncture is thought to act on meridians. In the form of the treatment most widely practiced in the U.S., hair-thin needles are inserted into the skin at specific points along the meridians to redirect or unblock stagnant qi. (Other types of acupuncture apply pressure, smoldering herbs or electrical currents at the points.) These so-called acupoints correspond (in traditional theory, at least) to different organs or systems in the body.
For example, inserting a needle at a point inside the forearm known as P6 is intended to treat nausea; needling Liv3, on top of the foot, is meant to help with motor function.
Studies suggest that inserting needles into acupoints does affect the body, and in potentially meaningful ways. In a study of 37 subjects published this year in the journal Neuroscience Letters, inserting a needle into acupoint L14 on the hand — traditionally used to treat pain — was shown to deactivate parts of the brain that are involved in processing pain.
Indeed, a decade of acupuncture imaging research has shown that "people who get better with acupuncture have clear changes in their brain function," says Dr. John Farrar, a pain researcher at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Changes are seen in the thalamus, a brain region that processes information from the senses, including touch and also pain.
But acupuncture also affects activity in the brain region called the cingulate gyrus as well as other brain structures that make up the limbic system, which processes the range of human emotions and memory.
The fact that acupuncture deactivates the brain's limbic system suggests it "diminishes the emotional part of the pain experience," such as anxiety or that woe-is-me feeling, says Terry Oleson, a board member of the Society for Acupuncture Research and a director at Emperor's College of Traditional Oriental Medicine in Santa Monica, which trains acupuncturists and offers degrees in Oriental medicine.
Hormone release could be key to such brain changes. Thirty years ago, about the same time acupuncture started to pique the interest of Americans, Chinese medical researchers began studying it in animals. They showed — and subsequent Western researchers confirmed — that acupuncture increased the body's production of its own natural painkillers, known as endogenous opioids, or endorphins. People experienced no pain relief from acupuncture if they were first injected with a drug that blocked the opioids' activity.
Today most Western researchers agree that acupuncture's stimulation of endorphins plays a big part in explaining how the practice works, says Dr. John Longhurst, director of the Susan Samueli Center for Integrative Medicine at UC Irvine.
But some medical acupuncture researchers maintain that this can't be the whole picture.
Most crucially, they say, endorphins alone cannot explain why individual acupuncture points or meridians would correspond to particular functions or parts of the body — if, indeed, they do.
The meridian theory
FOR thousands of years, acupuncture has been based on the premise that specific points along the meridians correspond to specific organs, such as the liver, and functions, such as motor control. From the 1970s through the '90s, the relationship between acupoints and their related organs was a key focus of acupuncture research. Some early studies supported the idea that the links were real.
For instance, in his work as a graduate student and postdoc at UCLA and UC Irvine in the 1970s, Oleson reported a link between tenderness or sensitivity in ear acupuncture points governing a certain organ or body part, and the corresponding health of that part of the body. For example, if a patient had foot pain (say, from plantar warts or some other condition), a foot-specific acupoint on his ear was likely to be tender and inflamed too.
The same type of finding has been reported for non-ear acupoints. Chinese researchers, for example, found an association between pain or sensitivity at acupoint Li8 during acupuncture and severity of disease in the liver, which Li8 governs.
But such studies are hard to perform objectively, and scientists aren't sure what to make of them. Recently, focus has shifted to the unique physical properties of acupoints and meridians without attempts to link them to specific organs or functions.
The meridians depicted in Chinese medical charts have no obvious anatomical basis — though diagrams of them do bring the nervous system to mind, says Farrar.
Meridians and acupoints might also correspond to areas of the body with physiologically distinct properties. In a study published in the scientific journal Anatomical Record in 2002, Dr. Helene Langevin, an associate professor of neurology at the University of Vermont College of Medicine, showed that about 80% of the acupoints on the arm correspond to areas of connective tissue between muscles.
This might be why practitioners and patients alike often notice a distinct feeling when an acupuncture needle is inserted into the skin, says Langevin. Patients sometimes describe the feeling, called de qi in Chinese, as pressure, a nick, something akin to a mosquito bite. To the practitioner, the grip on the needle feels like catching a fish on a line, or a "tightening" of the skin around the needle.
Langevin is now examining what implications this might have for how acupuncture sends messages to the brain. She has published data showing that when needles are inserted into acupoints, the underlying connective tissue winds around the needle "like spaghetti around a fork," she says. This doesn't happen when a needle goes into a non-acupoint area.
Langevin has also shown that the winding action causes the cells in the area to change shape, a process that she theorizes might signal the central nervous system. She is testing the theory in a series of animal experiments.
Other, older studies conducted and published in Asia and Europe during the 1970s and '80s produced evidence suggesting that acupoints might be areas of very low electrical resistance, might be slightly more sensitive to touch or might lie near major nerve pathways. But scientists don't know the significance of these characteristics.
In more recent years, brain imaging has been used to clarify the relationship between acupoints and the functions they represent. The practice was pioneered by Zang-Hee Cho, an imaging expert and UC Irvine professor of radiological sciences who, just over a decade ago, took a spill while on a hike in South Korea. Plagued by the pain that later radiated from his back, he eventually gave in to his wife's suggestion to see a local acupuncturist — who made his pain disappear in 15 minutes, he says.
Cho showed in a series of imaging experiments, published in 1998 in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences, that needling several acupoints for eye problems — located near the little toe — in a group of 12 volunteers increased activity in the visual cortex, the part of the brain governing vision.
Yet when Cho and his colleagues stimulated random points, located a few centimeters away from each acupoint, no activity occurred in the visual cortex.
Dr. Randy Gollub, assistant director of psychiatric neuroimaging at Massachusetts General Hospital, is also investigating the differences in brain activity generated by needling at real and fake (or "sham") acupoints. In an ongoing study — Gollub hopes to publish the results next year — healthy volunteers are subjected to pain (a hot probe applied to the skin) and then given either real or sham acupuncture. So far, both treatments appear to activate or deactivate various regions of the brain involved in controlling the body's reaction to pain: "They're a lot more alike than they are different," Gollub says.
But, she adds, it looks as if the brain's response is stronger for true acupoints than for sham ones. "Think of it as a mountain range, with the acupuncture points as peaks," Gollub says. "As long as you're not in the valley, the acupuncture is probably going to have some effect."
Competing observations
NOT all scientists are believers in the so-called "point specificity" of acupuncture. They note that many studies have shown that simply inserting needles in the skin can relieve pain — regardless of whether the needles are placed at random or in the places defined by traditional Chinese medicine.
For example, in studies comparing real, sham and no acupuncture for osteoarthritis of the knee, real and sham acupuncture both offered more relief than no acupuncture at all — suggesting that acupuncture might be effective regardless of needle placement.
This raises an important question for acupuncture researchers: Does something highly location-specific occur at the point of needle insertion, or does simply inserting a needle, no matter where, trigger a set of pathways that enable patients to "turn on" their brain's own healing capacity?
Cho, for one, has found in recent studies that inserting needles in real or sham sites produces similar changes in parts of the brain perceiving pain.
In simplified terms, he thinks that inserting a needle at almost any point on the body triggers a series of biochemical messages between the brain's hypothalamus and the hormone-producing pituitary and adrenal glands. The signals tell the body to alter its production of, for example, certain stress hormones and immune molecules that help the body cope with stressors — such as bacteria, viruses, emotional trauma or pain.
In fact, Cho believes that acupuncture might someday be refined to the point where the use of a dozen or more needles could be traded in for a single well-placed needle. "One good stimulation may be enough" for lasting pain relief, he says.
As acupuncture research evolves, scientists acknowledge that there might be other effects of the therapy that have little to do with slipping needles into skin. For instance, skeptics have long held that acupuncture helps heal through the power of the mind: that patients feel better because they think they are receiving an effective treatment. The placebo effect, as it's called, can be powerful.
And the truth, some experts say, is that Burke and other acupuncture patients rarely find relief from needles alone.
According to Burke's acupuncturist, UCLA's Hui, Burke's busy, hectic life had a bit too much yang and not enough yin. The intensity of her work life, the personal stress of trying to conceive and her hard-core exercise regimen left little room for calm and relaxation.
So, along with the acupuncture treatments, Hui prescribed a more modest work schedule, a less rigorous workout routine and smaller, more frequent meals.
"I walked out of his office feeling like I was in control of my healing," says Burke.
Such an experience might help subjects "turn on" their brain's own healing pathways.
"If you have a cold or the flu and do something you like, like going to a movie or watching TV, you will experience less of the symptoms than if you just sort of lay around in bed and feel sorry for yourself," Farrar says. "It's a very real effect — you're turning on something in your brain to help you suppress or turn off the symptoms."
In other words, when pain patients turn to acupuncture, other simple changes may produce measurable alterations in brain function with real implications for pain relief.
The herbs, dietary shifts and exercise regimens often prescribed by traditional acupuncturists might have as much to do with the treatment's effectiveness as the needles themselves — physically as well as psychologically.
But for patients convinced of acupuncture's effectiveness, it might be of little importance whether the procedure takes one needle or 20, and whether it's the needles themselves or other aspects of the treatment that provide relief.
What matters is that the treatment helps.
Burke, for one, says her success with acupuncture has brought her back to Hui's office again and again.
"I go for a treatment as soon as I feel the pain coming back," she says, "because I know it works."
Kamis, 15 September 2005
9 Ways to Nurture Your Emotional Well Being
9 Ways to Nurture Your Emotional Health (Book Excerpt)
By Brian Benjamin Carter, MSci, LAc
At my literary agent's behest, I've been working on radio and magazine press to pre-publicize my book, Powerful Body, Peaceful Mind: How to Heal Yourself with Foods, Herbs, and Acupressure. In the process, I've been distilling how-to lists. I've gotten so excited about them, that it's been very tempting to include them in the Pulse. But, I can't give it all away, or there'll be no reason to buy the book, and neither my publisher nor my agent will be very happy with me!
Translation and Distillation
As I've discussed elsewhere, Chinese medicine is still in the midst of a long and complicated process of translation. Since Chinese language is made of symbols, you could say the Chinese think differently than those of us brought up in the romantic languages. It's not easy, for example, to translate qi into just one word. Well, I'll leave the translation to the scholars, and monitor that discussionfor you. My thing is explaining it to the public… and that's how we come to distillation.
Because Chinese and Chinese medicine are both very complex, and because most of us are so busy and overwhelmed, I think we need to break it down into bite-sized, practical pieces. Though I think they are rather cliché and simplistic, the popular magazine style, "5 Tips to Make Your Life Perfect in 5 Minutes Without Lifting a Finger!" piques the curiosity, and gets in our heads. If we can pick up one useful thing, we've learned and can live better. On the other hand, it does no good to overwhelm people with something they can't digest or use.
This list is based on Chinese medicine advice for the emotions through the centuries. The how-to's and benefits are mostly my ideas. The daily blueprint comes from the book, The Power of Focus. You can find other self-examination and spiritual tools in a wide range of books.
1. Be Grateful: Recognize what you've achieved, and enjoy it. Once you've reached a goal, celebrate. Otherwise you get stuck in the 'never enough' trap.
How: Make a weekly list of the things in your life for which you are grateful. Review both new and perpetual reasons for gratitude.
Benefit: You can't be grateful and hateful at the same time, so the more grateful you are, the happier you'll be.
2. Choose Achievable Goals: Avoid overly ambitious goals, because foiled plans lead to frustration, with-drawal, and depression.
How: Review your plans and dreams, and then break them down into subtasks you can definitely finish (this is called a critical path). Set realistic dates for each task. If you run into an impasse, then reassess your path, or your goal.
Benefit: You'll achieve more, and feel more capable and successful.
3. Live Moderately: Work and live moderately. Balance means not overworking and not being lazy.
How: Make a blueprint for each day that allocates specific times for action, learning, exercise, review, relaxation, and family. See the book, The Power of Focus.
Benefit: Stay well and avoid the diseases that come from overwork. Feel fulfilled and avoid guilt, which drains your energy. Sharpen your saw. Improve your effectiveness and understanding. Feel satis-fied you're available to loved ones.
4. Be Regular: Keep a consistent routine in work, meals, exercise, and rest. Regularity is easier on your nervous system, so your body will know what to expect.
How: Use the daily blueprint tool from #3.
Benefit: You experience less stress and have more vitality.
5. Eat and Sleep Sensibly: Quality sleep and a normal appetite are the best signs of health, and everything else depends on them. If you want to get or stay well, take care of these two aspects of your health.
How: See the healthful eating tips in chapter 33 and the sleep tips in chapter 56.
Benefit: Natural, deep sleep renews and refreshes your mind and heals your body. Proper eating and digestion optimize your immune system and prev-ent sickness.
6. Avoid Worry and Overthinking. It taxes your mind and your digestion. It's usually not productive anyway. You may know that but be unable to stop.
How: Some people tend to worry. They need simpler, unprocessed foods, and to avoid simple sugars, alcohol and coffee. Physical digestion affects your mind's ability to digest worries and possibilities. Get some moderate exercise daily to move your qi.
Benefit: Worry-free living! More energy, positivity, and peace of mind.
7. Strive to Be Openhearted, Open-Minded, and Content. When we're closed down or discontent, we become inflexible, intolerant, and insufferable. We experience more stress. Stress takes its toll, and we get sick.
How: List people, institutions, and ideas you resent or fear. Admit your selfishness, dishonesty, and fear, at least to yourself! Find Someone bigger than yourself to trust in. Pray and meditate. Read spiritual books and write about how they relate to your life. Think outside of the box. "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face." Do the thing you are afraid of. Reach out to people no one wants. Be grateful and accept life as it is.
Benefit: Openheartedness is freedom and real love. Open-mindedness is freedom and the quickest way to truth. Contentedness is what everyone truly seeks.
8. Form Social Bonds to Sustain You in Times of Trouble. If you give a baby physical nourishment but not physical affection, it can die! Human beings are meant to live in communities. We need one another. Don't spend all your time absorbed in your problems and plans.
How: Meet people in networking groups, support groups, adult education classes, Toastmasters, Rot-ary clubs, church, etc.
Benefit: Other people strengthen and support us, listen to our problems, make helpful suggestions, point us in the right direction, and help us get where we need to go. The right people are your best allies and advocates for a positive and stable future, and thus are an essential part of getting and staying well. Plus, a good social life provides opportunities for the next suggestion…
9. Help Other People! Invest yourself in the lives of others.
How: List specific people you can help in your plans and goals, and in your daily blueprint. Think about what these people need, and how you can help them get it. It may seem counterintuitive and perhaps impossible when faced with real worries and problems, but if you help someone else, you'll find it's worth it. Remember, sometimes helping means saying no. Agape (perfect love) gives people what they need regardless of what they want.
Benefit: You'll end up feeling better, and more positive. In that better frame of mind, you'll plan and live your life more effectively.
For more about the book, go to What Preview Readers Said about Powerful Body, Peaceful Mind
By Brian Benjamin Carter, MSci, LAc
At my literary agent's behest, I've been working on radio and magazine press to pre-publicize my book, Powerful Body, Peaceful Mind: How to Heal Yourself with Foods, Herbs, and Acupressure. In the process, I've been distilling how-to lists. I've gotten so excited about them, that it's been very tempting to include them in the Pulse. But, I can't give it all away, or there'll be no reason to buy the book, and neither my publisher nor my agent will be very happy with me!
Translation and Distillation
As I've discussed elsewhere, Chinese medicine is still in the midst of a long and complicated process of translation. Since Chinese language is made of symbols, you could say the Chinese think differently than those of us brought up in the romantic languages. It's not easy, for example, to translate qi into just one word. Well, I'll leave the translation to the scholars, and monitor that discussionfor you. My thing is explaining it to the public… and that's how we come to distillation.
Because Chinese and Chinese medicine are both very complex, and because most of us are so busy and overwhelmed, I think we need to break it down into bite-sized, practical pieces. Though I think they are rather cliché and simplistic, the popular magazine style, "5 Tips to Make Your Life Perfect in 5 Minutes Without Lifting a Finger!" piques the curiosity, and gets in our heads. If we can pick up one useful thing, we've learned and can live better. On the other hand, it does no good to overwhelm people with something they can't digest or use.
Nine Ways to Nurture Your Emotional Well Being
This list is based on Chinese medicine advice for the emotions through the centuries. The how-to's and benefits are mostly my ideas. The daily blueprint comes from the book, The Power of Focus. You can find other self-examination and spiritual tools in a wide range of books.
1. Be Grateful: Recognize what you've achieved, and enjoy it. Once you've reached a goal, celebrate. Otherwise you get stuck in the 'never enough' trap.
How: Make a weekly list of the things in your life for which you are grateful. Review both new and perpetual reasons for gratitude.
Benefit: You can't be grateful and hateful at the same time, so the more grateful you are, the happier you'll be.
2. Choose Achievable Goals: Avoid overly ambitious goals, because foiled plans lead to frustration, with-drawal, and depression.
How: Review your plans and dreams, and then break them down into subtasks you can definitely finish (this is called a critical path). Set realistic dates for each task. If you run into an impasse, then reassess your path, or your goal.
Benefit: You'll achieve more, and feel more capable and successful.
3. Live Moderately: Work and live moderately. Balance means not overworking and not being lazy.
How: Make a blueprint for each day that allocates specific times for action, learning, exercise, review, relaxation, and family. See the book, The Power of Focus.
Benefit: Stay well and avoid the diseases that come from overwork. Feel fulfilled and avoid guilt, which drains your energy. Sharpen your saw. Improve your effectiveness and understanding. Feel satis-fied you're available to loved ones.
4. Be Regular: Keep a consistent routine in work, meals, exercise, and rest. Regularity is easier on your nervous system, so your body will know what to expect.
How: Use the daily blueprint tool from #3.
Benefit: You experience less stress and have more vitality.
5. Eat and Sleep Sensibly: Quality sleep and a normal appetite are the best signs of health, and everything else depends on them. If you want to get or stay well, take care of these two aspects of your health.
How: See the healthful eating tips in chapter 33 and the sleep tips in chapter 56.
Benefit: Natural, deep sleep renews and refreshes your mind and heals your body. Proper eating and digestion optimize your immune system and prev-ent sickness.
6. Avoid Worry and Overthinking. It taxes your mind and your digestion. It's usually not productive anyway. You may know that but be unable to stop.
How: Some people tend to worry. They need simpler, unprocessed foods, and to avoid simple sugars, alcohol and coffee. Physical digestion affects your mind's ability to digest worries and possibilities. Get some moderate exercise daily to move your qi.
Benefit: Worry-free living! More energy, positivity, and peace of mind.
7. Strive to Be Openhearted, Open-Minded, and Content. When we're closed down or discontent, we become inflexible, intolerant, and insufferable. We experience more stress. Stress takes its toll, and we get sick.
How: List people, institutions, and ideas you resent or fear. Admit your selfishness, dishonesty, and fear, at least to yourself! Find Someone bigger than yourself to trust in. Pray and meditate. Read spiritual books and write about how they relate to your life. Think outside of the box. "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face." Do the thing you are afraid of. Reach out to people no one wants. Be grateful and accept life as it is.
Benefit: Openheartedness is freedom and real love. Open-mindedness is freedom and the quickest way to truth. Contentedness is what everyone truly seeks.
8. Form Social Bonds to Sustain You in Times of Trouble. If you give a baby physical nourishment but not physical affection, it can die! Human beings are meant to live in communities. We need one another. Don't spend all your time absorbed in your problems and plans.
How: Meet people in networking groups, support groups, adult education classes, Toastmasters, Rot-ary clubs, church, etc.
Benefit: Other people strengthen and support us, listen to our problems, make helpful suggestions, point us in the right direction, and help us get where we need to go. The right people are your best allies and advocates for a positive and stable future, and thus are an essential part of getting and staying well. Plus, a good social life provides opportunities for the next suggestion…
9. Help Other People! Invest yourself in the lives of others.
How: List specific people you can help in your plans and goals, and in your daily blueprint. Think about what these people need, and how you can help them get it. It may seem counterintuitive and perhaps impossible when faced with real worries and problems, but if you help someone else, you'll find it's worth it. Remember, sometimes helping means saying no. Agape (perfect love) gives people what they need regardless of what they want.
Benefit: You'll end up feeling better, and more positive. In that better frame of mind, you'll plan and live your life more effectively.
For more about the book, go to What Preview Readers Said about Powerful Body, Peaceful Mind
Patients petition for acupuncture
The Associated Press
LOUISVILLE - Patients who depend on acupuncture for pain relief and other ailments are urging Kentucky officials to regulate the practice so therapists can be licensed to operate in the state.
Only a physician or osteopath can legally practice acupuncture in Kentucky. That irks some patients, who travel across state lines seeking the ancient Chinese procedure.
"I don't have any options," said Melissa Brennan, a Dry Ridge resident who was paralyzed from the waist down after a car accident nine years ago. Brennan drives 40 minutes to her acupuncturist in Cincinnati, even though the therapist, Mimi Tagher, lives just 20 minutes from her home.
Brennan, 36, has severe pain in her lower back, where a metal plate holds her spine together, and says acupuncture is the only respite.
"I can't do anything in Kentucky. But here, Mimi has all of these diplomas and all of this education. She's amazing."
A bill has been pre-filed for the next session of the General Assembly that would create a board to regulate and license acupuncturists.
The Kentucky Medical Association acknowledges that non-physicians are practicing acupuncture in Kentucky and says it's time to regulate or license them.
LOUISVILLE - Patients who depend on acupuncture for pain relief and other ailments are urging Kentucky officials to regulate the practice so therapists can be licensed to operate in the state.
Only a physician or osteopath can legally practice acupuncture in Kentucky. That irks some patients, who travel across state lines seeking the ancient Chinese procedure.
"I don't have any options," said Melissa Brennan, a Dry Ridge resident who was paralyzed from the waist down after a car accident nine years ago. Brennan drives 40 minutes to her acupuncturist in Cincinnati, even though the therapist, Mimi Tagher, lives just 20 minutes from her home.
Brennan, 36, has severe pain in her lower back, where a metal plate holds her spine together, and says acupuncture is the only respite.
"I can't do anything in Kentucky. But here, Mimi has all of these diplomas and all of this education. She's amazing."
A bill has been pre-filed for the next session of the General Assembly that would create a board to regulate and license acupuncturists.
The Kentucky Medical Association acknowledges that non-physicians are practicing acupuncture in Kentucky and says it's time to regulate or license them.
Jumat, 10 Juni 2005
People Who Know Famous People
What's remarkable to me about becoming an acupuncturist in Southern California was how many people I met who had met or treated famous people. For example, just from my wife, a friend of hers, and my school study partner, we had...
I'm certain there are more, but those are all I remember off the top of my head.
So put on some Deep Purple, baby... one of the coolest 70s rock bands, and, as we all know deep in our bones, 70s rock is some of the most powerful there is.
- Arnold Schwarzenegger - Annika met him once
- Darn it if I can't remember the other famous people she's met besides me ;-)
- In the 80s, my wife, Lynda Harvey, treated Bob Dylan (Mr. B.O.) and Chevy Chase among others
- Lianne Audette, maybe my wife's best friend - heck a friend of both of ours now - got to jump out the window of a burning hotel with Frank Zappa - the story immortalized by the song learning by every budding young guitarist, Smoke on the Water.
I'm certain there are more, but those are all I remember off the top of my head.
So put on some Deep Purple, baby... one of the coolest 70s rock bands, and, as we all know deep in our bones, 70s rock is some of the most powerful there is.
Jumat, 13 Mei 2005
Jimmy and Mary
We've lived in our new house for a year now. I know because the NCAA basketball championships have come twice now. During the first sweet sixteen, I was measuring concrete floors to put in the hardwood. I watched the second one in the living room of a near complete renovation.
We have a great neighbor to the south, an Italian widower named Maria who is perhaps in her late 60s. She speaks broken (but nearly fixed) English with a strong Italian accent, and she calls me Jimmy- I've told her my real name, but she slips into calling me Jimmy anyway, and I think it's fine. I have another Italian friend in Clairemont name Jimmy. Maria calls my wife Mary even tho her name is Lynda.
Like all Italians (at least those who are 40 and older), Maria likes to give you lots of food. You hungry? Go to an Italian's house. If you leave an Italian's house hungry, it's your own fault.
I work from home, and Maria is almost always home. She brings me food at least once a week. Usually it's pasta or bread. She says her son gives her a lot of food (which she pronounces "fruit"), but no cat food, and the darn cat doesn't want to eat people food. The pasta is never al dente- as Michael Savage suggests, al dente may have been created by restauranteurs who want to save cooking time.
Mainly what Maria needs help with is her lawn. We live in East County San Diego, which means hickish and dry and hot, but we had one of the rainiest years since 1918 or so this year, so Maria had a backyard full of weeds and grass about 18 inches tall. She brought me pasta and asked me if I could help her with it.
I had been reading Imitation of Christ about being crucified with Christ- any suffering we do for good is like picking up our cross, being one with Christ in our suffering- so I went with gusto into her backyard jungle with my weed eater. An hour later, many weeds were dead, I was covered with green goop, and Maria was grateful.
Let me paraphrase James 1:27 - True religion is to visit orphans and widows in their trouble. I was thinking about that one, too. Isn't it funny? The woman who calls me Jimmy give me an opportunity to put James into action (and James is all about action).
She says Mary needs to eat more. Lynda tells her she does eat... Lynda needs Maria to alter her pants because she's changed weights again- Maria does amazing alterations very quickly, and probably would love to make some extra money doing more work, but doesn't want too much in case she gets sick and can't keep up.
Jesus said the essence of the commandments was to Love God and your Neighbor- of course neighbor means more than your geographic neighbor, but if you can't love the people next door, who can you love? Most people know how isolated we've become- from not locking our doors in the 1950s to not only locks and alarm systems, but frequently to complete anonymity even in the midst of a neighborhood. Fortunately, around here there are kids, and kids force a bridge by playing between houses. It's good for us to have to interact with our neighbors- we need practice loving strangers.
We have a great neighbor to the south, an Italian widower named Maria who is perhaps in her late 60s. She speaks broken (but nearly fixed) English with a strong Italian accent, and she calls me Jimmy- I've told her my real name, but she slips into calling me Jimmy anyway, and I think it's fine. I have another Italian friend in Clairemont name Jimmy. Maria calls my wife Mary even tho her name is Lynda.
Like all Italians (at least those who are 40 and older), Maria likes to give you lots of food. You hungry? Go to an Italian's house. If you leave an Italian's house hungry, it's your own fault.
I work from home, and Maria is almost always home. She brings me food at least once a week. Usually it's pasta or bread. She says her son gives her a lot of food (which she pronounces "fruit"), but no cat food, and the darn cat doesn't want to eat people food. The pasta is never al dente- as Michael Savage suggests, al dente may have been created by restauranteurs who want to save cooking time.
Mainly what Maria needs help with is her lawn. We live in East County San Diego, which means hickish and dry and hot, but we had one of the rainiest years since 1918 or so this year, so Maria had a backyard full of weeds and grass about 18 inches tall. She brought me pasta and asked me if I could help her with it.
I had been reading Imitation of Christ about being crucified with Christ- any suffering we do for good is like picking up our cross, being one with Christ in our suffering- so I went with gusto into her backyard jungle with my weed eater. An hour later, many weeds were dead, I was covered with green goop, and Maria was grateful.
Let me paraphrase James 1:27 - True religion is to visit orphans and widows in their trouble. I was thinking about that one, too. Isn't it funny? The woman who calls me Jimmy give me an opportunity to put James into action (and James is all about action).
She says Mary needs to eat more. Lynda tells her she does eat... Lynda needs Maria to alter her pants because she's changed weights again- Maria does amazing alterations very quickly, and probably would love to make some extra money doing more work, but doesn't want too much in case she gets sick and can't keep up.
Jesus said the essence of the commandments was to Love God and your Neighbor- of course neighbor means more than your geographic neighbor, but if you can't love the people next door, who can you love? Most people know how isolated we've become- from not locking our doors in the 1950s to not only locks and alarm systems, but frequently to complete anonymity even in the midst of a neighborhood. Fortunately, around here there are kids, and kids force a bridge by playing between houses. It's good for us to have to interact with our neighbors- we need practice loving strangers.
Senin, 31 Januari 2005
Love Letters from Wayne Dyer's Insane Fans
I wrote a review on amazon some time back about Wayner Dyer's recent book, The Power of Intention. It was in the form of a fake testimonial- to demonstrate how ludicrous the concept is. Fortunately for Wayne, there's a sucker born every minute, and a lot of people want to believe in magic. So, some of his fans got mad at me- but some others read it and felt affirmed by me... so here's the review and the response I got.
Intention Worked for Me!, September 22, 2004
Wow, what a book! I'm writing this from the laptop inside my Lambourghini Gallardo, here on the Carribean island I manifested for myself. Before Dr. Dyer's book, I was a total loser, and it was all because I didn't have the right intentions! Plus, I was under the misconception that I should help other people, be polite and courteous, etc. But Dr. Dyer helped me realize that the most important thing in life was to get the world to work MY WAY! Once I understood his message, I got right to changing my intentions. And now here I am, sitting in my dream car on my own island, waiting for my beautiful trophy wife to get done shopping. She's buying me a Rolex!
And here are the emails I got back-
1. Hi there: I've NEVER written an Amazon reviewer before but I felt I had
to when I read your marvelously tongue-in-cheek review of the above
book.
At first I thought you were serious, because I USED to be heavily into
the New Age movement in Southern Calif., and the tone of your review fit
right into that S. Cal New Age vibe. Obviously, most of Amazon readers
didn't get it either, since not many people felt your review was
"helpful"
Anyway--wanted to let you know you were appreciated!
from M.S. in the medical field (name withheld)
2. Was that true about the Lamborgini and the trophy wife? Please let me know because I am going to buy the book..... You're an idiot. - Peter Severa (name not withheld because hate mail and hate mailers should be known to all)
My reply: Thanks. No, it was sarcasm. Let me know how that works out for you. Kind of like "pray and then take action" I think "intend and then take action" will do a lot more than just "intending" - I have plenty of experience with that kind of thing... it's nothing new, and I've seen other people get sucked into it- it's a dead end. Positive thinking is good, but intention is bologny.
- B
Peter's reply: God to know it all, must be wonderful, I think it was Einstein who said imagination is more important than knowledge....I guess you have a lot of knowledge....BTW, the book does talk about doing...one would actually have to read the book to know that though...
My reply: Ya, sorry too busy with work to read the latest fad flash. Buy any diet pills lately?
;-) Just kidding with ya. No, it's not good to know it all. It's very frustrating. :-)
- B
And then Peter gave up on me. Perhaps he read something about being nice in that Wayne Dyer book.
10 of 79 people found the following review helpful:
Intention Worked for Me!, September 22, 2004| Reviewer: | Brian B. Carter (San Diego, CA United States) - See all my reviews |
And here are the emails I got back-
1. Hi there: I've NEVER written an Amazon reviewer before but I felt I had
to when I read your marvelously tongue-in-cheek review of the above
book.
At first I thought you were serious, because I USED to be heavily into
the New Age movement in Southern Calif., and the tone of your review fit
right into that S. Cal New Age vibe. Obviously, most of Amazon readers
didn't get it either, since not many people felt your review was
"helpful"
Anyway--wanted to let you know you were appreciated!
from M.S. in the medical field (name withheld)
2. Was that true about the Lamborgini and the trophy wife? Please let me know because I am going to buy the book..... You're an idiot. - Peter Severa (name not withheld because hate mail and hate mailers should be known to all)
My reply: Thanks. No, it was sarcasm. Let me know how that works out for you. Kind of like "pray and then take action" I think "intend and then take action" will do a lot more than just "intending" - I have plenty of experience with that kind of thing... it's nothing new, and I've seen other people get sucked into it- it's a dead end. Positive thinking is good, but intention is bologny.
- B
Peter's reply: God to know it all, must be wonderful, I think it was Einstein who said imagination is more important than knowledge....I guess you have a lot of knowledge....BTW, the book does talk about doing...one would actually have to read the book to know that though...
My reply: Ya, sorry too busy with work to read the latest fad flash. Buy any diet pills lately?
;-) Just kidding with ya. No, it's not good to know it all. It's very frustrating. :-)
- B
And then Peter gave up on me. Perhaps he read something about being nice in that Wayne Dyer book.
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