Month: July 2013

Letting go (of my stubbornness) and Learning to Love my Colon.

by Susan Lee, UK. 

I recently became aware of how stubborn I can be – I have always known it, but this time I felt it at a deeper level. A week or so after this awareness I became constipated.

A few days later I noticed some blood along with my faeces – twice this occurred before I took action.  As I am writing this I can see how deep-rooted this stubbornness is and how it has become part of my day-to-day living. I will not listen to my body giving me signs that everything is not OK until the last minute.

My first appointment with my local General Practitioner was great – he gave me an internal examination and the time spent with him felt as though he was a deeply caring man. He found nothing conclusive and referred me to my local hospital.

My next appointment was quite a different experience and, in retrospect, I realized I had not been taking the events seriously. I can now see, in hindsight, that I did not wish to even contemplate that I may have colon cancer, as this would mean that I would need to start taking responsibility for how I have lived my life. For many years now it has made sense to me that illness didn’t just happen to me, and that the way I responded to stress somehow harmed my body.   Continue reading “Letting go (of my stubbornness) and Learning to Love my Colon.” →

Getting Away with It…

by Anne Malatt, Australia.

A dear friend sent me a link to a funny photo, which came from a facebook page with the title:

“Yes, Officer I did see the Speed Limit sign, I just didn’t see YOU!”

When I saw the title I laughed out loud and then I was stopped in my tracks.

I realised that this was how I had lived my life, thinking I was getting away with it.

What do I mean when I say this?

For me, it means that I know I am doing something that is not right, but I somehow think I have a right to do it, and that it will not have the same consequences for me that it has for other people.

The arrogance of this is stupendous.

How do I do it?

When I was younger, I used to drink like a fish, smoke like a chimney and root like a rabbit. I did not get away with it, any of it. As a consequence, I was forced to make major changes to the way I lived, in order to keep on living. I made these changes at the age of 28, long before I moved to the Byron Shire and met Serge Benhayon. Even though I cleaned up my act, I was still not self-loving in the way I lived. There was still a hardness there, especially on myself, and a drive, that came from never feeling enough, just as I was.

Now, my life is much more loving and seen from the outside, probably pure and boring, but I still do stuff. Continue reading “Getting Away with It…” →

How Cancer has Changed my Life.

by Fiona McGovern, Isle of Arran, Scotland.

Two days ago I was in hospital for a surgical procedure. The porter took me in a wheelchair and a student nurse accompanied us. We all took the lift up to the surgery ward. As it went up it stopped at a floor, the doors opened and a man in his red dressing gown stood looking in. He had no intention of getting in the lift. At the time I was laughing. He looked at me sternly: “You are far too happy”, he said. “You can’t be ill.” The doors closed and we continued upwards, slightly bemused by his words and tone of voice.

I commented that this kind of remark was often said to me. Another person had said “It is bizarre that you can laugh with all you are going through” and another said “You must have bad moments”, by which they meant days.

I pondered on all these comments and wondered why it is assumed by many that illness means misery.

Are we looking at illness in a false light? Continue reading “How Cancer has Changed my Life.” →

The Mind-Body Connection: the effect of stress on our bodies

by Sue Kira, Naturopath, Gold Coast, Australia

Stress appears to be part of our normal lives, but does it have to be this way? What is stressful to one person can often have no affect on another. Stress occurs as a result of the way we think and react to life.

If we change the way we respond to stress then it doesn’t have to affect us harmfully. And that has to be good for us because science is now validating what we have intuitively known for years: stress can have a destructive effect on our bodies.

For example, you have probably been told not to go swimming directly after eating. This is not an old wives’ tale. It has more to do with a scientific reason that relates to our nervous and vascular systems.

The body’s parasympathetic nervous system governs the digestive systems. When we eat a meal our nervous system shunts a large volume of blood via the vascular system to the organs of digestion, assimilation and elimination. If we go for a swim or run while digesting food, there is less blood supply available for the heart, lungs, arm and leg muscles. As a result we can suffer from cramps. Not so good if we are in the water, as this can lead to drowning.

Continue reading “The Mind-Body Connection: the effect of stress on our bodies” →