In my last post, I was trying to help others understand about Macrobiotics and disease.  The recent news of Angelina Jolie’s preventive double mastectomy concerned me because women look to her and could repeat this procedure.  I hope that someday everyone can understand that there is another way to prevent disease, especially breast cancer.  I see illness as direction, rather than a static state.  Diet and lifestyle lead us towards health or sickness, and as we can see, the modern diet and lifestyle together lead the majority of our population towards sickness.  Breast cancer is becoming an epidemic and effecting younger and younger women, and the same is true for diabetes.  I believe the answer is our open and flexible approach to Macrobiotics, as a lifestyle, not just a dietary change.

Most people who develop serious illness have already made an attempt to improve their diet and lifestyle, which makes it even more shocking that they end up with disease.  I often have the opposite opinion as the mainstream on how behaviors and food contribute to health, and how to prevent problems.  Just about all cancer relates to our diet.  Cancer may lie in our DNA, but it will not activate or express itself unless we tell it to with our diet and lifestyle.  We have the power to increase health IF we know what to do.

Breast cancer is another result of deteriorating health.  From my research and experience, I have listed below what factors contribute to illness in the breast.

Physical Factors:

Irregular menstruation and digestive issues including irregular bowels, indigestion, constipation, and irregular periods.  When we have a healthy hormonal balance, we will eliminate effectively through urination and our bowel movements, and women through menstruation.  In oriental medicine, our body is seen as complimentary systems.  The intestines are complimentary to the lungs (and the breasts).  This is the connection between bowel health and breast cancer.  Making sure that these two systems eliminate excess promotes a positive direction for breast health.

Emotional and Spiritual Factors:

The heart chakra is our center of emotion.  We give and receive feelings from a passionate center in our chest.  Too much passion can be dangerous as well as the lack of emotion and the inability to create expression.  Both can create stagnation and difficulty connecting to emotions.  Many people, especially women, perform their lives under high stress because they do not live a lifestyle that allows for healthy limits of passion.  When we operate on stress, we move in the direction of disease, which can manifest in our body as breast cancer.  When I think about this spiritually, I think of breast cancer as a disease of excess located in the fourth chakra.  Since this is our center of passion, I don’t find it difficult to draw the connection that most of my breast cancer clients tend to over nurture others.

 OK- What can we do about it?

Regular meals are crucial to maintain regularity in the body.  Try to sit down and eat at regular times.  Please stop what you’re doing to allow space for self-reflection.  Eating can help us to readjust our minds in the same way that meditation allows us to create space and become more open.  Also of immense importance: WALK OUTSIDE.  It settles the energy down, balancing both sides of our body, and creating healing vibration through the reproductive and digestive organs.  Spiritually, a steady and comfortable walk allows us to eliminate any energy imbalance we harbor inside.

Other tips: Try rolling a ball on the bottom of your foot and walking barefoot through the grass.  If you can, take a stroll at the edge of the ocean just where the sand and ocean meet.  These habits further allow us to settle our energy down and eliminate what we don’t use.

 *Please remember that if you do the right things for health, your body will naturally respond with health.  This is where a practical understanding of diet, lifestyle, and health becomes important.  Regular meals and walking needs to be an active member is your team of healthcare modalities.