All of us start life as a tiny cell, which replicates, differentiates and migrates to form our bodies in ways still mysterious. No drugs no interventions are needed.      We are the result.         Can we not learn to live better in harmony with this extraordinary body?

Weeik thoughts to make us strong…Week of New Year 2025

Recently I read Brading Sweet Grass by Robin Wall Kimerer

This is the sort of book that once you have read it life will never be the same again, There are so many memorable things in the book but one thing I was struck by was her explaining that in her own indigenous language thee was a word which mean only and specifically - the force which cuases the mushroom to rise out of the ground in a single night

It made me think “oh dear, how far we are from our indigenous culture”

Then I read in a completely different book that in Old English there was a word that meant specifically and only the warmth of the milk from the cow newly milked.

Perhaps we are not so far away!

Boxing Day Sunset ‘24, Stoke Bank; The end of the sort of day when you might think (however long you had lived), that you had lived just to experience that very day, but one thing I recall is her explaining that in her native language there was a word that meant specifically and only - the force that makes the mushroom rise above the ground in a single night,

5.1.25. I worked for 4 decades and more for The National ‘Health’ Service, who’s great treasure is the people who work and not always necessarily what they do.

Words are so important…… health is a good example; even today, little enough effort goes into that. A gargantuan and increasing effort goes into treatment and that is a response largely to a rising tide of chronic disease. I find treatment almost a dehumanising word - we treat woodworm afterall! What ever happened to healing? In an industrialised and monied place that is for children and simpletons - no?

Three mainstays of a treatment world are drugs, burning and cutting, and there are some instances where this trio are together or individually needed, but thank goodness so many people actually care, now isn’t that a better word than treatment?

Added 20.12.24 We had better start believing what we know!

We know that we can profoundly connect with animals and people - past and yet to come. This morning the sun is a real living presence in the room - so much more than radiation from our nearest star. We know that bodies, our own and others, are so much more than ever smaller-grain physics and chemistry and biology.

Yet increasingly we are smothered by a reductive science and technology and the more it piles up data the less it speaks to us as people. You are sick? don’t worry have a test and swallow a pill it’s all there in the ‘science’ A failing world? don’t worry - just buy a carbon credit!

So a massive dehumanising gap appears between what we know and what modernity tells us we can believe. It is so dangerous. We try and close the gap with sport, atts and box sets on the telly; glitz music or drugs……. and thank goodness some even still welcome the infant Christ into the world at this time.

For what it is worth here is my thought. Yes, we can believe what we know and yes there are more and more people in the world telling us why we should be confident to do so.

Added 30.11.24.

If we dare to listen, the soil whispers truths as old as time: that life is a cycle, that healing is possible, and that our future depends on the choices we 
make today.

Zac Bush

Added 28th Oct. 2024

80% of the remaining highly diverse eco-systems of the world are under the stewardship of indigenous peoples. These peoples tend to a much more harmonious relation to the natural world. All traditional religions also preach respect for nature. We cannot afford to ignore these ancient teachings.

The fate of humanity, it’s health and well-being, dramatically parallels that of the natural world.

The dire threats and opportunities for regeneration are the same.

Added 9.10.24

Think Global but act local!

A simple breathing practise - simple is not always easy , but well worth doing for all sorts of reasons.

Breathing is the best way to connect the voluntary system of muscles to the involuntary system . It also connects the sympathetic (high alert and anxiety) system with the parasympathetic (rest and digest) system.

I'd like to offer the method advocated by Andrew Weil (whose work is most interesting).

He suggests a 4 / 7 / 8 technique , that is breathing in through the nose to the count of four then counting 7 breath holding before counting 8 with audible exhalation through the mouth.

He advocates this done four times, but no more,  morning and evening at least.  he claims that the real benefits will only accrue after several weeks, which should include not only better states of mind but beneficial effects on all body systems including brain function and sleep.

I'd like to offer several of  my own thoughts on this technique.

1. simple is not always easy and some people will find holding concentration through 4 cycles of breathing quite a challenge so I suggest for example “breathing in 1234 for the first time, for the second time” , etc.

2. Any posture is fine I reckon, but try and make the body as symmetrical as she or he can be from left to right - choose for yourself how to manage this - experiment!. Dr. Weil makes the point that all these techniques started in Ancient India but have been adopted by many groups and systems of thought and practice. Symmetry of the body is important, which consolidates a spiritual overtone.

3. when you finished your cycle just go to quiet breathing and enjoy the tranquilly of it…………. it should be breathing you notice and enjoy.

4. I think closed eyes are better and keep a lookout for shapes and colours when your eyes are closed. Children know all about this and if you're in contact with any small children just ask them.

5. Full inspiration (the name is no coincidence), and full expiration is important.  We generally only use a small proportion of our lungs in ‘tidal’ breathing.

6. In through the nose is really important to engage not only the lungs but the nose and the much neglected para-nasal sinuses which contain an important element of our microbial friends, so we are told. It is certainly true.

7. Outside must be better than inside preferably a natural green and tranquil place. Inside with good airflow is good.

8. Once you start to pay attention to these things they in themselves become exciting and of course yes….. inspiring.

9. You might argue that by far the most important point of all is how you breath. Don’t think of the ribs as structures that help you breath. You often see people breathing in and lifting their rib-cage especially in high emotion. Rather try and imagine the belly as the key to breathing. This does not come naturally to many of us and you have to work at it but the results are potentially spectacular. To achieve this you have to sit tall in a chair or lie on the floor with soles flat to the earth. Here is something to note straight away……. which ever posture you choose try to lengthen your dorsal spine - (roughly the bit where the ribs are attached to you spine), you feel the contact with the chair or floor. It is that part of the spine that is pleasurable to have scratched - no coincidence! That part of your back sends out a nerve at every spinal level, let’s call it the ‘spinal nerve’, because that is what it is. At a number of levels in this part of the spine, these spinal nerves merge with perhaps the body’s most important nerves - the vagus nerves which originally emerge from the brain. This combined neural force is a plexus, in this case The Oesophogeal Plexus. This is part of a system (it’s technical name is the para-sympathetic nervous system), which offers the mind and body space and tranquility - a very good in a world where we are being constantly demanded of and disturbed and over-stimulated. So here is an immediate benefit! By belly breathing - trying to blow up your belly as you breathe, the muscle sheet that separates chest from belly - the diaphragms, moves down and gently compresses the upper belly organs - more stimulation for of vagus nerves. You also preferentially fill the lung bases which can get neglected in breathing. Neglect of this is not good. Very quickly you may find that this alters your mental state and this is also because subtle changes in the chemistry of the blood - I say that as I don’t really understand these processes - I am not sure I ever did! The processes are complex but the end is not - you are working to maintain the body in the most stable way it can be, the technical term is homoestasis.

Best of all this requires no equipment and is free and can be done at any time - relaxing, driving, teleying, computing in a meeting (where is might help a lot) or in any other circumstance. That moment of tranquility where you know you have made a connection with something bigger than yourself could be golden.

I repeat - simple but not easy it requires determination and perseverance.

I hope this helps.

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How words fail us. We might want processes to be ‘holistic’ but find them ‘mechanistic’, ‘reductionist‘, ‘materialistic‘. A word that I seem to read and hear a lot these days is ‘gerstalt’, a german word which, as far as I can make out invites us to see things as a whole and may imply involve many processes of perceiving, thinking, engaging emotion, as well as history and matters of the soul - all human knowing in fact. It seems to imply broadness and imagination and intuition. It so militates against the modern the modern ‘spirit of the age’ which insists that ‘all you need is data - more of it and more and finer detail’.

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I am starting to put suggestions for listening and watching inspired by our visit to Groundswell last June. Please have a look at ‘Discussions or a course’ on this site, thanks.

I am also adding lessons learnt from a day conference in London, “Figuring out the Brain” organised by the British Society of Ecological Medicine and other similar sources. This is also under ‘Discussions or a course’.