From the Archives

Healing Power

Herman Aihara

conditions even though we are in dif

ferent seasons, climates, eating differ
ent foods, and at any different outside
conditions.
The following passage is the ex
planation of homeostasis by Hans
Selye, M.D. written in the book, The
Stress of Life.

here are three levels of our

healing power.
The first one is mechanical
healing power, that is to say the heal
ing power caused by our homeostasis
and the body's changing ability. That
is to say, one is our ability to change
and the other one is our ability to
maintain constant internal conditions
even in severe change of outside en
vironments.
The next level of healing power is
that of autonomic and hormonal heal
ingpower.
The last and the most powerful
healing power is the spiritual healing
power.

THE FIRST LEVEL OF

HEALING POWER

Our body consists of about 60 tril

lions cells, of which 280,000 cells die
every second. The blood washes them
away through urination and the same
number of new cells will be born.
Without this changing ability, the sick
would stay sick, not one 'miracle'
drugs could work, and all surgery
would be in vain.
In contrast to change, our body
manifests an amazing ability of main
taining the constancy called homeo-

HERMAN AIHARA

stasis. By the ability of homeostasis,

our body can maintain almost con
stant internal conditions of acidity
or alkalinity, the amount of glucose,
amount of oxygen, amount of liquids,
amount of minerals such as salt, cal
cium, potassium, body temperature,
etc. Maintaining those things constant
is health.
Our healing power is this ability
to maintain almost constant internal

Homeostasis-the maintaining
power of the body:
During the second half of the
nineteenth century, the great French
physiologist, Claude Bernard, at
the College de France in Paris,
taught that one of the most charac
teristic features of all living beings
is their ability to maintain the con
stancy of their internal milieu, de
spite changes in the surroundings.
The physical properties and the
chemical composition of our body
fluids and tissues tend to remain
remarkably constant despite all the
changes about us. For instance, a
man can be exposed to great cold or
heat without varying his own tem
perature. He can eat large amounts
of one substance or another with
out greatly influencing the compo
sition of his blood. Whenever this
self-regulating power fails, there is
disease or even death.

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Walter B. Cannon, the famous

Harvard physiologist, subsequently
called this power to maintain con
stancy in living being homeostasis
(from Greek homoios, like, simi
lar, plus stasis, position, standing)
the ability to remain the same, or
static. You might roughly translate
it as "staying power."
Let us now take a look at these
concepts and ask ourselves what
we can learn from them as regards
the nature of disease.
Apparently, disease is not just
suffering, but also a fight to main
tain the homeostatic balance of our
tissues, despite damage.
According to Hans Selye, a fight
to maintain the homeostatic balance is
the cause of diseases and the disease
is the broken balance of homeostatic
conditions. Returning to the normal
internal condition by homeostasis is
the healing. Therefore, the homeo
stasis is the power of healing our dis
eases. This homeostasis exists as our
life starts. Therefore it is a primordial
power or biological power. This is the
first level of healing power.

produces self-protective conditions

such as heat through out, discharge
and etc. in the form of fever, diarrhea,
vomiting, and rash. In other words,
production of STH creates the feeling
of sickness as well as working toward
curing sickness.
Therefore, symptoms of sickness
are the body's self-protection against
microbial invasion and emotional
stress. These symptoms may create
in us emotions that we are sick, los
ing hope, or a desperate feeling which
produces too much STH. When these
emotional complications continue and
become subconscious, then this sub
conscious attitude will be the cause of
the second level of sickness. Curing
of these sicknesses is the second level
of healing power, which exists in the

"There are two ways

to make the interbrain

strong. One is to stay

always hungry...Another

way... is to keep positive

emotions... "

THE SECOND LEVEL OF

HEALING POWER

The second level of healing power

is in our psychological and emotional
state of mind by stimulating the ner
vous system and hormonal system.
Here is my explanation of Hans Se
lye's theory.
If we catch cold or are invaded
with influenza viruses, the pituitary
gland will produce STH (Soma Trop
ic Hormone), which warns all organs
to fight the coming viruses or bacte
ria. This STH will stimulate adrenal
glands to produce desoxychorticoste
ron (DOCA). Further, the production
of STH makes us feel sick-that is to
say, we feel dullness, tiredness, etc.
Furthermore, STH produces fever,
vomiting, diarrhea, rash, pains, and
an increase number of white cells,
antibodies, etc. by which the body
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MACROBIOTICS TODAY

nerve system, hormone system, and

emotional balance.
The production of STH creates
symptoms such as heat, diarrhea,
vomiting, rash, pain, swelling, and an
increase of white cells. As the result,
many microbes will die and acidity in
creases. This increased acidity stimu
lates one's interbrain-pituitary gland
which will produce ACTH (Corticoid
Tropic Hormone) which produces
cortical hormone from adrenal gland.
This cortical hormone reacts oppo
sitely with DOCA. In other words,
cortical hormone (in common names
are Cortison, Bledonin, and Bledonis
olon) will stop the function ofDOCH
and erase symptoms of sickness pre
viously mentioned.

March/Apri12009

According to Hans Selye,

ACTH stimulates the adrenal cor
tex to produce predominantly A-C
(anti-inflammatory corticoid) sub
stances. These in turn destroy the
white blood cells (lymphoid cells),
which are necessary both for im
munity and for allergic hypersensi
tivity reactions. Consequently, such
immune and allergic responses are
inhibited by the cortisone like hor
mones.
In short, our healthy conditions
are maintained by homeostasis, which
is our pre-conscious level of healing
power, and then by the antagonistic
and complementary hormones STH
and ACTH, which is the second level
of healing power.
However, the production of STH
and ACTH depends on the condition
of the pituitary gland. Since hor
mone secretion depends on the pitu
itary gland and is influenced by the
interbrain, if our interbrain is strong,
we will not be upset easily by most
stresses and our body will adjust to
stressful conditions without causing
sickness.
Therefore, it is important to keep
the interbrain strong.
There are two ways to make the
interbrain strong. One is to stay al
ways hungry, or hot and cold. In other
words, do not keep body protected
from natural environmental changes.
When the body is exposed to those
extreme conditions, it tries to work
hard to adapt to the conditions. This
strengthens the interbrain.
Another way to make the interbrain
strong is always to keep positive emo
tions, such as Norman Cousins talked
about in his book Anatomy of an Ill
ness. He writes:
I remembered having read, ten
years or so earlier, Hans Selye's
classic book, The Stress of Life.
With great clarity, Selye showed
that adrenal exhaustion could be
caused by emotional tension, such
as frustration or suppressed rage.

He detailed the negative effects

of the negative emotions on body
chemistry.
The inevitable question arose
in my mind: what about the posi
tive emotions? If negative emo
tions produce negative chemical
changes in the body, wouldn't the
positive emotions produce posi
tive chemical changes? Is it pos
sible that love, hope, faith, laugh
ter, confidence, and the will to live
have therapeutic value? ..
Agood place to begin, I thought,
was with amusing movies. We
were even able to get our hands on
some old Marx Brothers films. We
pulled down the blinds and turned
on the machine. It worked. I made
the joyous discovery that ten min
utes of genuine belly laughter had
an anesthetic effect and would give
me at least two hours of pain-free
sleep. When the pain-killing effect
of the laughter wore off, we would
switch on the motion picture pro
jector again, and, not infrequently,
it would lead to another pain-free
sleep interval. Sometimes, the
nurse read to me out of a trove of
humor books. Especially useful
were E. B. and Katharine White's
Subtreasury of American Humor
and Max Eastman's The Enjoyment
ofLaughter.
How scientific was it to believe
that laughter-as well as theposi
tive emotions in general-was af
fecting my body chemistry for the
better? If laughter did in fact have a
salutary effect on the body's chem
istry, it seemed at least theoreti
cally likely that it would enhance
the system's ability to fight the in
flammation. So we took sedimen
tation rate readings just before as
well as several hours after laugh
ter episodes. Each time, there was
a drop of at least five points. The
drop by itself was not substantial,
but it held and was cumulative. I
was greatly elated by the discovery
that there is a physiologic basis for
the ancient theory that laughter is

good medicine.
Emotions such as irritations, un
comfortable feeling, sadness, an
ger, and fear stimulate production of
ACTH, which in tum produces too
much cortical hormone. If one has
such emotions chronically, one may
stimulate production of ACTH chron
ically, which stimulates the adrenal
gland always and in the end makes
the gland tired. If the adrenal gland
is tired, it will not be able to change
glycogen to glucose and unhappi
ness, sadness, depression and nega
tive thinking will be caused, which is
a more serious sickness than physical
sickness.
According to Buddha, there are
404 physical sicknesses and 84,000
psychological sicknesses. In this
highly civilized world, there will be
much more sickness-both physical
and psychological-but the psycho
logical will increase much more than

the physical.
Of course, there is no psychologi
cal sickness completely without influ
ence by physical conditions. By psy
chological sickness I mean sicknesses
that are caused more psychologically
than physically.
Since emotions will excite or dis
turb hormone secretion, emotions will
change the body's internal conditions
such as sugar level, amount of oxygen
in the blood, size of blood vessels and
etc. and in tum cause us fever, diar
rhea, rash, discomfort, vomiting, pain,
swelling and etc. Therefore, emotions
will be one of the important factors in
many sicknesses.
Since there are two kinds of all
emotions, namely yin and yang emo
tions, one can neutralize yin emotion
by giving yang emotions. (This is
analogous to giving yang foods to yin
physical sicknesses.)
For example, anger is yang emo
tion and fear or worry is yin emotion.

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Yin Emotion

No Emotion
Spirituality

Yang Emotion

Worry, Fear

Happiness

Anger

Depression

Peace
Faith, Hope

Frustration

Resentment

Contentment
Find meaning
of bad or hatred

Hate, Jealousy

Sadness

Happiness

Overjoyed

Apathy

Detachment

Attachment

So give fear or something to worry to

the person who is angry. The follow
ing is such yin and yang list of emo
tions.
Yin emotions and yang emotions
are two sides of the teeter-totter. Since
extremity of yin (negative) or yang
(positive) emotion is the psychologi
cal sickness, so to stay around the
balancing point is the cure of psycho
logical sickness. They are swinging
up and down. However, at the center
there is no movement. At this point,
emotions stop, balanced-at the emo
tionless moment. This point is the
high conscious mind or high spiritu
al mind or the supreme judgment of
Ohsawa.
When we reach this point, we
will maintain peace of mind, abso
lute faith, no fear, eternal happiness,
so that we can cure emotional sick
nesses and physical sickness induced
by emotional sicknesses. However, it
is usually a short time that we can stay
at this balanced point. Our emotions
tend to swing bigger the farther away
from the balancing point they are. It is
important to stay as much as possible
near the balancing point.
For example, for most cancer pa
tients, it seems to me that the most
difficult thing is to overcome the fear
of death or losing hope of ever being
healthy again. If they are confident of
recovering, they will be cured. How
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MACROBIOTICS TODAY.

to give them such a confidence or

faith in healing power is the major
task of the healer.

THE THIRD LEVEL OF

HEALING POWER
The third level-the highest and
strongest healing power-is to stay in
the balanced emotion or in Ohsawa's
Supreme Judgment such as Love,
Faith, Responsibility, Peace of Mind,
Gratitude, and Happiness. Accord
ing to George Ohsawa, having the
supreme judgment is the curing all
sickness including Spiritual sickness.
Ohsawa wrote that "the healing pow
er is in our mind" in his Guidebook
for Living.
Our bodies-knowable, see
able, touchable-are part of and
bound to this relative, material
world. Our minds, by contrast, are
absolutely free to go anywhere at
any time in the absolute, infmite
world. We have the power to look
into the past or future in an instant.
The world of mind is in reality
the world of God; it is infinity or
Oneness. Since all of us posses a
mind, we are inhabitants without
choice of the absolute world of
God.
He who cannot live in the in
finite world-the world of mind-

March/April2009

will never be happy or achieve

anything of real worth. He always
ends in sickness and sorrow.
In macrobiotics we say that
sickness comes from food. Our
choice of food, however, is actu
ally determined by the mind. If
we know God, or Mind, we never
choose bad food. He who does not
know God and cannot see the Or
der of the Universe cannot find the
right food and becomes sick. Physi
cal illness is an indication of illness
of mind or illness in thinking.
Some people think that
macrobiotics is no more than the
teaching of a diet-the eating of
gomashio, carrots and brown rice.
Others imagine that it is summed
up in the statement, "Don't eat
cake and sugar." How far from the
truth!
The aim of macrobiotics is to
provide the means for establishing
a joyful attitude. In the face of it,
all arrogance, complaints, fear, in
security, sadness and suffering fade
into nothingness. Happiness, love,
freedom, and belief remain. In
such a state there is infinite grati
tude. Even he who becomes ill or
has great difficulty, such a man can
change his suffering into happiness
immediately.
Western medicine cures the
symptoms of illness by artificial
means such as an injection or a pill;
the patient's understanding never
enters into the whole process.
Healing power is in .our minds.
The material for opening our minds
and for healing disease, however,
is food-food that is made by God
or by Nature. If we cannot clear
our minds, we cannot distinguish
correct food. Healing power is in
the mind. Sickness is given to us
so that we may discover this mind.
If we cannot, we had better remain
ill until we do. This is the order of
God.
We must be grateful to Western
medicine. Through the suffering it
gives us, we have the motivation

to change, to understand the Order

of the Universe. We are thus given
opportunity to achieve the fullest
health and happiness.
SPIRIT AND MATTER

In reality food produced by Na

ture is not mere material.
Western science considers our
body to be made up of protein, fat,
carbohydrate, vitamins, minerals,
oxygen, and water. However, add
ing up those things will never make
life-living stuff.
We are living. That means that mi
raculous power exists inside us. Sci
entists are ignoring this miraculous

material so that diet does not relate to

spiritual improvement.
This is a result of dualistic think
ing. They are dualistic because they
think foods are matter. They are di
viding spirit and matter. For real
spirituality, matter and spirit are one.
Therefore, foods are spirit and Spirit
is foods.
Our body and life are a transfor
mation of foods. Since our body and
life are not simple materialistic stuffs,
so foods are not just matter. Food is
spirit. People who think foods are
material are materialists; they do not
achieve high spirituality because they
are dualistic.

means that miraculous

power exists inside us.
Scientists are ignoring
this miraculous power
and think synthetic
foods ... will be food to
create our life. "

power and think synthetic foods

which contain enough protein, fat,
carbohydrate, vitamin and mineral
will be food to create our life.
This is ignorance and arrogance.
They are ignorant because they think
life is made of materials such as pro
tein, carbohydrate, vitamin and etc.
They are arrogant because they
think they can create foods for life
instead of realizing that only nature,
God or the Order of the Universe can
do this.
Such ignorance and arrogance are
the cause of our sickness and unhap
piness.
Many religious people-so-called
spiritual people--<:onsider food is

LOVE

Our modem day world

So cynically cold

Power and greed

Our society does mold

To take a stand

When all without

Darkness and fear

And war all about

IN CONCLUSION

"We are living. That

THROUGH

Everybody is born with the living

power that created our heart, kidneys,
liver and the most marvelous organ,
the brain.
Actually this living power is the
healing power. How did I make this
marvelous body that can think, mem
orize and create a new idea, concept.
We have this power from Infinity. To
me, our Mind is Infmity or God. This
mind is the healing power. Without
this mind we cannot cure our sick
ness. People die when they lose the
power to live, that is to say, the mean
ing of living.
My father was hospitalized by
heart attack, and then mother became
sick soon after. She was hospitalized
in the same hospital. She was not told
when her husband died. However, she
found out four months later about his
death. She died soon after the learn
ing about her husband's death.
We live because we want to live.
We die because we want to die. Mind
is creating our body. Healing power is
in our mind.

Herman Aihara (1920-1998) co

founded the
George
Ohsawa
Macrobiotic Foundation and is the
author of Acid and Alkaline, Basic
Macrobiotics, and other titles.

God's love is bigger

Than races or creeds

Is omnipresent

Filling our needs

God bless our world

With radiant light

Restoring wholeness

To make things right

For only Your blessings

Can give us a chance

That we as a world

Through love may advance

Excerpted from the book Sparks

from Life's Flint by multi-instru
mentalist and macro-enthusiast
Todd Green, which is available at
amazon. com and bamesandnoble.
com. Todd performs concerts and
clinics around the USA and Cana
da on over 30 instruments, along
with recording CD $, writing po
etry, and creating music for film.
Visit him at www.toddgreen.com.
copyright 2009 by Todd Green

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