Notes on life, philosophy, and medicine

Our young country  At times taken and probably lesser known shared among those before us  - The indigenous people of this land - We rose to be a great nation.  Envy of many.  A field of dreams.  We had a system and a structure that supported dreams  for some.  Not just then -but in and along with the cycle of man - human nature in its unintentional ways -  saw it fit to reach for more, power grab, greed and subjugation.  By nature of change Hindsight 20/20 unintentional consequences  we failed to teach our children how to live  reading, writing, arithmetic...fine but without the hows of living there is little use we will end up fighting one another again  implode.  so we build up systems to catch our fallen  rather than deconstruct  the errors of our ways highlight growth  admit fault  we turn a blind eye  or perhaps we have not yet seen  the full consequences of our choices.  It is not to say no progress was made  but progress too was undone  because so simple  to overlook  our very b

There's a tendency for people in positions of power to concentrate power, which leads to increasing levels of bureaucracy. It's natural and something I've spoken about in the past from personal experience. The challenge is without careful monitoring, it seems to get us farther away from actually providing the help that is needed.  And that is my response to this idea of a physician or health care provider shortage. Yes, expert care and specialty care has its place. We have medicines and procedures now that save lives, but I do not believe we actually have a significant shortage of primary care providers; I believe we have unknowingly continuously and gradually taken away the power of individuals and communities to heal and serve one another well through this concentration of power.  We have also provided major corporations with an uncanny ability to expand unhealthy practices - fast food, personal motor vehicles, less green space, suburban homes, the list goes on.  So, we w

Today and maybe 10 -14 decades of life - that's what we have -  What are the terms we need to live by?  What has happened over the last few generations has resulted in our ability to not live life as the precious adventure that it is?  Two/Single parent working households?  No connection to nature/earth. Lack of understanding of where and how food comes from and our role in it.  No idea how to operate in a different economy, e.g gift economy.  There's a lot we can't change, right now, but we have to make some decisions about how we proceed in life and to figure out what we need to do to align our life with the values we believe in.  What does that look like for you? 

You know what happens when you "work" less, stay at home more, yes aside from the incredible ability to find the perfect novel and the perfect bingeworthy television show, it means you can pull your child away from the screen-sitter aka television especially if it is youtube (thank goodness we banned it except for "educational/instructional videos"  You get to be there for a neighbor when their cat needs sitting, or another neighbor when they need their packages picked up and house watered or to pick up their child on an odd scheduling day. It might mean you get to take care of your ailing parent.  It is not the responsibility of the government to find ways to pay for all of this, it may be the responsibility of the government to set the vision and help make it so that living is affordable enough SO WE CAN do what we need to do for our families and our communities...and robbing peter to pay paul might not be the answer. Just a thought. 

How does one find peace and joy in the midst of suffering or trouble?  Does the recognition and acceptance of trouble and suffering as a part of life allow it to be embraced?  In happy times and in sad/distraught times, still we can exert JOY?  These dichotomous ideas  Neither good nor bad  But it must be rooted in our ancestors, rooted in our connectedness and loving embrace of something bigger than ourselves, something that loves us infinitely and is stable without fail.  It must be acknowledged that it exists presently.  The sun that we breathe in and is a part of us as much as we a part of it, the water that flows through us not for our own selfish sake but for the sake of this greater being that is in us and moves through us. The ground beneath us that is solid.  This is our reckoning. This is what we must recognize...to hold within our hearts both the suffering and the joy.  We must trust that we can lay it down on solid ground and embrace the gift of our day.   

What does health look like? And how do we "get" healthy?  I became an osteopathic physician because I believe fundamentally in a body that was created with an inordinate amount of built-in healing mechanisms.  It is my job to help it along, to guide it when it has moved too far in one direction.  But it's not only my job, because healthy to me, looks like an entire community working together to enjoy, and to build on this life we were given.  And I believe we have spent the last couple of generations moving farther and farther away from our ability to do this for ourselves and for each other.  So, what do we do now?  Focus on food: how do we make it, where does it come from, how do we get it, how do we grow it? how do we cook it? where are all the herbs? FOOD IS MEDICINE.  Focus on community - the people involved from the farmer to the miller to the baker.  Focus on earth and all her many gifts. 

I live in a world, relatively free from financial struggles, my home is tucked away, and I can see and unsee the world if I want to. I wonder how I got here. I miss the family I grew up with every day, but most especially when the family I have here, that I fell into, breaks me; or I let it break me. I don't know.  I think about our taxation system, our government, our "citizens," brothers and sisters spending nights on the streets, and I think how far we have gotten from one another. I wonder how we got here.  How the power we have to give of ourselves has been stripped or overpowered by this great darkness - to only do and exchange our gifts and talents for money. Perhaps it is because the government sees it is within their duty to take from one to give to another despite their neutral distance and what they think they see, blinds them to the embitterment they have created.  There is no power great enough to care for and teach every one of our children; that power comes

Medicine note: for me, the care of a patient, a neighbor, a friend...is not in the one time heroic measures of surgery but the persistent, long term, empowered, and effort that goes into building a community: a safe haven, a place to practice peace, to change lifestyles that makes the lasting difference in the health of the individual and for the future community. To teach a man to fish, rather than to give him fish. This is the heart of medicine and healing.