Alberto Villoldo
Grow A New Body: How Spirit and Plant Nutrients can Transform Your Health Hay House, Carlsbad, CA 2019
BOOK REVIEWS Kazuaki Tanahashi
Painting Peace: Art in A Time of Global Crisis Shambhala, Boulder, CO 2018
Peacemaker and Buddhist scholar Kazuaki Tanahashi is an inspiration to anyone working for peace and justice. Founder of international organizations including World Without Armies and Plutonium Free Future, his art and his writing is social activism. Using prose, poetry and art, Painting Peace is Tanahashi’s humble self-portrait of a man whose life’s work is to ease the suffering of the world and celebrate all that is good. His deep understanding of humankind is evident in the universality of his calligraphic art. Exhibited around the world, his work includes the iconic No nukes! poster, and the “Circle of All Nations,” an enormous single multi-colored circle painted on a giant five-panel canvas using the world’s largest brush. Created to celebrate the United Nations fiftieth anniversary, the circle symbolizes all people coming together. Tanahashi says he knew from the beginning the circle had to be large, multicultural and multicolored, and, he reasoned, “If we were going to paint a giant circle, why not build the largest brush in the world?” Two architect friends helped him design the 6-foot high, 150-pound brush that needed four artists to hold its four handles. Tanahashi’s art informs as it questions. A piece titled “Can We Stop The Violence Non-Violently?” addresses the common belief that humans are violent by nature. Often those in power work to shape the thinking of the citizenry through propaganda of cultural, religious, gender or ideological supremacy and an education system that hides the bloodshed and disturbing reality of suffering for many people. When earnest diplomacy and negotiations fail, whether by a government or groups of citizens, then what? The general public is left to simplistically consider two options, “Shall we strike, or shall we not strike?” There is nothing life-affirming about weapons. By design, they exist to injure or kill others. They don’t produce food or medicine, they are environmental 70 Spirit of Change | SPRING/SUMMER 2019
By Gail Lord
pollutants and they blow up villages and the people in them. The weapons industry and the infrastructure that supports it require an unfathomable amount of energy. The single largest consumer of energy in the world is the US Department of Defense. Bombers and aircraft vehicles are not designed to conserve energy. The defense industry and government, including parliaments and congresses, are closely linked in a reinforcing relationship. They protect their mutual interests and enormous defense budgets continue to expand. Nobody seems to be able to stop it, reverse it or even slow it down. Countries make money by selling weapons that kill people. It sounds outrageous, and it is. Tanahashi’s response is determined empathy for the whole world. Until the middle of the twentieth century most everyone on Earth assumed humanity would go on forever. We now have weapons that can destroy the entire planet, environmental catastrophes, and political policies that value national survival over human survival. Where do we go from here? Tanahashi feels one of the goals of an artist is to “transform people’s consciousness in the direction of a world in which we do not have to fear global suicide.” The Ten Millennium Future is a project he conceived to make the present time a turning point for change. The project asks the question “Where are we all going?” Our actions and thoughts ought to be for long-term global survival instead of short-term corporate interests. How helpful it would be if each person currently on the planet embraced Tanahashi’s definition of awakening, which is “to realize the infinite value of each moment of your own life as well as of other beings, then to continue to act accordingly.” We need to listen to and respect all ideas for an ultra-long-term future, including those of young people, specialists and leaders. Can there really be a world without war, without poverty, without oppression? Perhaps no one alive today will live in a time of great global peace. That should not stop us. If we choose to, we can roll up our sleeves and take on the issues of a future that will exist beyond ourselves. We can envision and humbly participate in actualizing a world safe and peaceful for all sentient beings. Like Tanahashi, we can use our gifts and talents to do the great work of peace.
Your body is marvelously designed to grow and regenerate, at any age. This exciting lab-researched news is ancient shamanic wisdom. How did the shaman know? “They asked the plants,” says medical anthropologist Alberto Villoldo. Villoldo combines science and shamanic traditions in Grow a New Body, a seven-day spirit, body and brain self-repair program called One Spirit Medicine that’s repeated every three months. The program can almost be called anti-Paleo, as it views proteins as the “new sugar” and advocates significantly limiting protein intake. Of course sugar gets lumped in with the no-no’s, too. Amazingly, you can grow a new body regularly, according to Villoldo. But first you need to clear out the garbage in your system. Imagine a city where everyone puts out the trash on trash day, but the garbage truck workers never show up. More trash goes out the next day, and the next. Add in environmental pollutants and the anger of residents who constantly encounter the piles of festering garbage, and what a mess! The habit of eating excess sugar and excess protein creates a similar toxic load in the body. Cells are dumping garbage that’s not getting removed, so the toxins remain, floating around, creating havoc in the gut and going places they don’t belong, like up to the brain. Among the healthiest people on Earth, the blue zone Okinawans eat the equivalent of one egg or one piece of fish per month, suggesting that we don’t need as much protein as we are lead to believe. Another myth dispelled in Grow A New Body is that we should avoid fat. Instead, your brain and body need fat every day, and it’s where most of your calories should come from. Have it in healthy forms, like nuts, avocados, seeds and hummus. Villoldo’s self-repair plan also reveals many hidden benefits of certain foods. Did you know that some plant foods provide your DNA with instructions? The codes activated by a fresh green juice with parsley, ginger and lemon repair organs and restore brain health. The best choices to help your gut and brain are the cruciferous vegetables such as broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, and mustard greens, which is second only to Brussels sprouts in cancer prevention. These superstar foods trigger a specific protein that is able to protect every organ and tissue in the body. Once activated, it gets to work detoxifying and creating anti-inflammatory agents switching on the repair system of the body. Villoldo compares this to Navy SEALs sitting around waiting at a military base, then called to action to go into the DNA and clean out the (free radical) terrorists. Once the mission is accomplished, they remain on alert after returning to the cell membrane. Bok choy and kale are two more veggies in this powerhouse category, and both are great additions if you’re making a green juice. Use bluer kale when you find it; like most fruits and veggies, the