Master of My Universe

A little-acknowledged fact of biology is that it is our own immune system that heals us, not any form of medicine or drug. Drugs, prescribed by doctors in the Western world, interact with our body's cellular structure, and suppress symptoms of disease. Sometimes, our immune system heals the underlying disease, and the suppression of the symptoms which was caused by the drugs doesn't do any harm. Other times, the suppression of the symptoms just causes the body to move the disease somewhere else, and a different symptom appears, requiring our doctors to give us new drugs for the new symptom. This is why so many Americans today sit down to their meals with an array of 8 to 15 pills to take before eating. Each pill to suppress a symptom causes new symptoms, which are then “corrected” with another pill. Of course, there are times when suppression of the symptoms . . . read more

My family faced a dilemma. Our credit had been just too good, and we were deeply in debt. I wasn't losing my job, but I wanted to leave. I wanted to be home with my two young boys. In fact, I felt disheartened by my job, and believed that keeping it would begin to make me physically ill. Stress does that, you know.

At the time, we had bought our house at the peak of the housing market . . . read more

It's a beautiful day. I'm working outdoors. My chair is lodged creatively on a rocky landing, twenty feet above the Shenandoah River, where I can look out at the river's seductive, calming flow. The morning sun sparkles on the tumbling water, creating flashes of crystallized light shining on the water, like glittering fireflies twinkling in an evening sky. I feel the heat of the sun breaking through the leafy canvas of sheltering birches above. A cool breeze wafts across the water, carrying the faintest hint of river oysters, broken open on the rocks by otters during the night. A snapping turtle suns himself on the bank of the river's opposite shore, some 100 feet away. I hear the flapping of a heron's wings, as he skims across the water and lifts into the air. In the distance, the caw-cry of a baby hawk summons its mother. The rabbit by the clover patch scurries out of sight.

This is my life now, through the four seasons, in a cabin wedged between the river and the George Washington National Forest. My husband lies on the deck, sunning himself in his swimming trunks, while listening to Mozart. The gray cat yawns, and stretches out in the shade of a wheelbarrow.

It wasn't always this way. Ten years ago, I was a corporate executive in a high tech business. I had 300,000 Frequent Flyer miles on United Airlines that year, but I had no use for them, because I lost all desire to fly anywhere. Monday mornings, I left my children . . . read more