Whole Health (30 page)

We must keep in mind that the multiverse is dual. Separation is an illusion. The Ta'i Chi Circle is intended to serve as an ever-present reminder that everything, including you and me, has a mortal and an immortal nature. I often remind my patients who pray to stop praying outward and upward and to start praying inward and
deeply downward. God is a resplendent energy that resides within, as well as without. We may be half human, but we are also half divine. Self-forgiveness is less difficult to conceptualize when you come to understand this. By design, we must both fail and succeed in all that we attempt. One of the greatest secrets of life is that life is not about attaining fleeting success—it's about gaining eternal wisdom. This is wisdom that results from our understanding of the sacred nature of failure, pain, and suffering. The zone of tension between success and failure is the divine catalyst that powers the multiversal dance of life. Self-contempt resists this life power—self-forgiveness invites its flow.

The ancient Chinese referred to the spirit of the liver as the Immortal Soul. Kindness brings an end to the contempt that prevents the immortal soul from delivering its precious life force to our being. The pain and destruction brought on by self-contempt disguise tension to appear as something negative. Tension must be thought of as a sacred catalyst that initiates destruction and consummates with creation. Tension from self-contempt is designed to bring us full circle from destruction to regeneration and self-creation. Kindness, forgiveness, and gentle self-reflection open the energy gate of the immortal soul, allowing for the flow of life-giving ch'i to awaken and resuscitate our being.

THE HEART SPIRIT'S HATRED

History has proven that one man's hatred has enough negative power to destroy civilizations. Nonetheless, Chinese Taoist wisdom reminds us that all emotions are natural, even hatred, and that dis-ease only results when there is an unnatural imbalance in emotion. It's not the emotion, it's the suppression of the emotion that leads to the excesses that causes dis-ease. The ancients felt that it
was natural to hate evil people, addictive substances, or tragic events. In such cases, our hatred serves as a protective agent that keeps us out of harm's way. They advise us to honor all our emotions, and to consciously remember that they are merely energies that require constant balancing.

Our culture tends to sanitize emotion with drug, drink, and distorted belief. Many with whom I've met suffer from their illnesses in part because they have disconnected from their deeper emotions. We must remember that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only transmuted. Therefore, when hatred comes up for us, it should be recognized as an energy that must be expressed externally, or else it will be internalized, increasing our likelihood of unconscious self-destruction. I advise my patients to demystify these deeper emotions, and to think of them merely as pure energy. When we become shamed, intimidated, or guilt-ridden over our natural emotions, we open the door to a flood of dis-ease-producing energy. This negative energy then masses and shifts its movement from spiritual and emotional to physical channels.

This is actually a perfect place to once again point out the paradox of duality. As we have repeatedly said, everything is a reflection of the T'ai Chi Circle and, as with all things in the multiverse, we are dualistic. We are both mortal and immortal beings. We are composed of dark and light energies, and as with yin and yang, our opposite manifestations are constantly flowing into each other. The tension of our duality was intended to result in our integrated oneness, for separation is but an illusion that results in dis-ease. The higher self clearly understands the mutual compatibility of opposition. Our divine consciousness knows that hatred naturally emanates from the spirit of the human self, even as joy flows forth from the spirit of the divine self. The tension that arises from our hatred does so only to get the attention of our higher consciousness. By paying closer attention to the tension, we increase our probability for solution finding. In this case, the solution is only arrived at
by integrating our duality so as to naturally express our hatred, feel the resulting hurt, and heal the divide within. Destructive hatred can then be understood as the catalyst for the creational integration of self.

THE HEART SPIRIT'S JOY

The ancient Chinese referred to the heart's spirit as the Emperor. It's important to keep in mind that they believed their ruling Emperor to be a direct descendant of God. Thus, the spirit of our heart was thought to represent our “God self” and its divine joy. By cultivating true unconditional joy, we heal our heart's spirit, and our heart's spirit then fills us with abundant ch'i. Material joy is a conditional and temporary state reactive to the rising and falling vicissitudes of life. In this sense, one is conditioned to be joyful only when gratified. Love, money, and fun are among the many material prerequisites that allow for material joy. Spiritual joy is a state attained only by grace, or through spiritual cultivation. Neuroscientists are now saying that happiness is a learned skill and that, by retraining our thoughts, we can map out new nerve pathways that reshape the joy pathways in our brain. They also tell us that repetition is important. By continually rehearsing positive thoughts and perceptions, we give direction to our reality architects—the mind and brain—to construct a domain of unconditional joy. True heartfelt joy doesn't come naturally to most of those who've been raised in this highly conditional culture, but it can be realized through dedication to spiritual cultivation.

The title of my first book is
The Wu Way
. I adapted the spelling from the ancient Taoist philosophy of
Wu Wei
, or “doing without doing.” This represents the highest wisdom, which suggests that there is abundant joy awaiting the seeker who allows it to get their attention. Wu Wei reminds us that within the silent depths of our immortal heart, there is a wellspring of joy that needs only to be left
undisturbed. For only when we close our eyes, empty our hands, and silence our noise will we at last see, touch, and hear all of the true joy that has forever awaited us.

THE SPLEEN SPIRIT'S ANXIETY

When we live our life out of balance, negative reaction naturally follows—all pain demands a response. The manner in which we respond to pain parallels our level of consciousness. Ultimately, all human response to pain is either of a destructive or a creative nature. Our destructive reaction to pain generally manifests as an obsessive drive to distract from the hurt. Just make the pain stop, and make it stop now! Thus, our self-destructive nature is drawn to fast-acting substances that numb the nervous system from its sensory awareness of pain. This ego-driven approach to pain resolution is immediate and short term, setting the stage for addiction.

Pain fuels an insatiable demand for intense distraction that can only be attained by abusing overpowering substances. There is no end to this destructive cycle of pain management. Pain creates affliction that drives addiction. The only natural solution is to consciously get in touch with, and release, the stored destructive energy around our accumulated emotional pain. If the volcanic energy of our pain isn't externally released, it is destined to implode.

We've become an addictive society largely because we are so driven to generate pain. We've even managed to find ways to create pain at the treatment end. We get people off heroin only to addict them to methadone. Attend an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, and you'll quickly get the idea that it's off the booze and on to the cigarettes, coffee, and sugar. Our dysfunctional health care system is having a hard time figuring out that our most painful wounds are rooted where it's unable to find them, deep within our spirits.

Our culture is fast becoming an assembly line expressly designed to manufacture bipolar imbalances. We tend toward the
extremes of repression, acting out, depression, and mania. Our wanton suffering self has been subliminally programmed to want pleasure, and want it now. Our ego is of course resistant to all the spiritual lessons of pain—it seeks instead to disable the process where our lessons can become our blessings.

As we evolve in higher consciousness, we become better equipped to process our pain at a spirit level. The five organ spirits produce extremely powerful vibrations, generating ch'i that is more than capable of healing the imbalances created by deep emotional pain, suffering, and self-abuse. Only by filtering pain through the prism of spirit can the most painful lessons lead to the grace of wisdom.

I worked with a man who first came to me quite some time ago with acute asthma. As a small boy, his philandering, addictive father became the source of stress and lifelong grief, which brought on his inflammatory asthma. His instincts told him that the reason his condition never responded well to medication was that it was emotionally rooted. The deep roots of his suffering had spread from his past to his present and even into his future.

He explained that the stress between him and his father laid the foundation for a dysfunctional relationship with his daughter. He had a distorted perception that she'd taken his love for granted—and for this he harbored great resentment. The more we discussed it, the more he began to realize that his vexation about his daughter ran deeper than he'd suspected. In fact, we came to see that he was actually angry about having to be a father at all. He felt so abandoned during his youth that his inner child didn't want to have to compete with his daughter for attention. Subsequently his daughter's been in therapy for many years. It might seem like a depressing story, but they're both spiritually evolving from pain to gain together. The pain that destroys is the same pain that can create. Only spirit can make it so.

THE SPLEEN SPIRIT'S COMPASSION

Passion
is a word that evokes a powerful visceral effect. If any word generates energy, it's
passion
. The word
compassion
is equally powerful. I've always said that compassion's energy is passion minus the fire. Fire is extreme yang, and indeed powerful, yet the weakest form of yin (water) is the most efficient way to extinguish it. The power of passion commands our immediate attention—the power of compassion tends to elude us. Compassion may be passive in the material world, but in the world of energy its power is truly great.

The Five Elements Principle teaches that only compassion has the power to distract the brain's anxiety signal. You could be experiencing great anxiety, but by simply shifting your anxious mind's thoughts to thoughts of compassion, you can greatly relieve your tension.

The ancient Chinese believed that the spirit of the spleen was the energy center for the Intellect. As the primary residence of our wisdom, the spleen is where we contend with the delicate balance between grounded reality and free-floating, negative imagination. Think about it: much if not most of what we worry about never happens, and some never really could. When balanced, the spirit of the spleen is the intellectual balancing point where we ground our thoughts. Compassion intellectually snaps us out of our negative imaginary delusions, bringing us back down to earth. Imagine yourself walking down the street filled with unrealistic anxieties. Your thoughts are spiraling out of control when suddenly you come upon a lost, crying child. The compassion from within your spleen's spirit compels you to “get real,” fast! This child needs your help immediately! No questions asked, you're in service and all your anxious delusions are long gone and far away.

The human brain produces a number of different brain wave states, most of which are scientifically observable. One state in
particular, called beta brain wave bursts, was once believed to be untraceable. That is, of course, until a group of Buddhist monks were recently hooked up to brain scans and observed. I described earlier how the monks engaged in what they called a compassion meditation, where they exercised powerful mental intention to send healing energy through the ethers to wherever it was most needed. Lo and behold, following the compassion meditation exercise, the scientists were able to observe beta brain wave bursts. It was determined that the traceability of the elusive bursts was due to the power of their loving intention.

THE LUNG SPIRIT'S GRIEF

Grief is energy that, if out of balance, tends to generate great hopelessness. Chronic, acute grief might be thought of as clouds of spiritual darkness that don't allow the light in. We've all been there. It's human nature to experience temporary grief from loss, or deep disappointment, but with some, grief is like being sentenced to life in prison.

I often explain to my patients that grief, like all emotions, is a natural tool provided to us by nature to help us with energy decompression. As the pain of loss hits, we build up intense pressure that the release of tears helps relieve. Studies have shown that human tears contain the stress hormones prolactin, adrenocorticotropic, and leu-enkephalin, which are all released by crying. At some point toward the end of our crying release, tears reveal higher concentrations of “feel-good” endorphins. The key point here is to turn the corner from the “feel-bad” part of grieving to the “feel-better” part. It's important that we try to grieve with a conscious intention to finalize—to go through the stages of grief only once and not repeatedly. It's called “natural healing.”