Fill your mind with light, happiness, hope, feelings of security and strength, and soon your life will reflect these qualities.
Remez Sasson
For a long time, I can't seem to put on much weight and I think I know why now. Apparently acccording to my doctor here, I have been using lugol solution (ie iodine) alone in my carrot+apple juices. As such my thyroid gland has been hyperactive causing my metabolic rate to increase. I need to balance it with thyroid supplement but back then at home I could not get that supplement. My doctor is now correcting this imbalance.
Despite being here for four days, I have still not summoned enough courage to learn how to take injections. I will have to try and overcome my fear of giving myself injections. Many have done it and I hope by the time I leave here I can do it.
The atmosphere here is very good and the staff and the patients are all supportive of each other. Many of the patients here, including me go through up and down mood swings. One day good and another day bad. I can also see the fear in many of them, although unspoken. I was told they were encouraged by my presence here because I have completed the Gerson Therapy for 14 months before I came to the clinic and I am still alive despite being a Stage 4 cancer patient. In a way I felt good to have given some people some hope and we all really need it.
You are right that I am enjoying myself here. Its eating and resting here. I wish I could stay here for three weeks instead of two.
La vida es buena.
A quiet reflection from a great Zen master for you.
ReplyDelete“There is a story I would like to tell you about a woman who practices the invocation of the Buddha Amitabha’s name. She is very tough, and she practices the invocation three times daily, using a wooden drum and a bell, reciting, “Namo Amitabha Buddha” for one hour each time. When she arrives at one thousand times, she invites the bell to sound. (In Vietnamese, we don’t say “strike” or “hit” a bell.) Although she has been doing this for ten years, her personality has not changed. She is still quite mean, shouting at people all the time.
A friend wanted to teach her a lesson, so one afternoon when she had just lit the incense, invited the bell to sound three times, and was beginning to recite “Namo Amitabha Buddha,” he came to her door, and said, “Mrs. Nguyen, Mrs. Nguyen!” She found it very annoying because this was her time of practice, but he just stood at the front gate shouting her name. She said to herself, “I have to struggle against my anger, so I will ignore that,” and she went on, “Namo Amitabha Buddha, Namo Amitabha Buddha.”
The gentleman continued to shout her name, and her anger became more and more oppressive. She struggled against it, wondering, “Should I stop my recitation and go and give him a piece of my mind?” But she continued chanting, and she struggled very hard. Fire mounted in her, but she still tried to chant “Namo Amitabha Buddha.” The gentleman knew it, and he continued to shout, “Mrs. Nguyen! Mrs. Nguyen!”
She could not bear it any longer. She threw away the bell and the drum. She slammed the door, went out to the gate and said, “Why, why do you behave like that? Why do you call my name hundreds of times like that?” The gentleman smiled at her and said, “I just called your name for ten minutes, and you are so angry. You have been calling the Buddha’s name for ten years. Think how angry he must be!”
"Enlightenment, for a wave in the ocean,
is the moment the wave realises it is water."
Thich Nhat Hanh