THE MAKINGS OF A CONSCIENTIOUS LIFE
Living and Breathing Conscientiousness
If you had ever met my wife, Mary-Charlotte, and spent any amount of time in her presence, you would have known what conscientiousness means. Chardy, as all her friends called her, embodied the essence of this personality trait, something I knew from the moment I met her. We had our first date on my 26th birthday, and I knew my search for the right mate was over!
Chardy was clearly the perfect match for me. She was conscientiousness personified, and she had so many wonderful qualities that I adored, such as her love for animals, beautiful singing voice, intelligence, and quiet elegance. Plus she was willing to put up with me and fully support all my activities and professional aspirations—what more could I want? We both wanted children, and we carefully planned for them. Our lives unfolded with love and without too much drama until 2010, when things suddenly shattered.
We had been married for more than 50 incredible years and saw no reason why we would not live to enjoy another 50! We both took excellent care of ourselves; we were conscientious about our health, embraced all aspects of a holistic lifestyle, ate an almost perfect diet, exercised, took supplements when needed, and basically followed all the steps that I knew were right for a long and healthy life. We were continuing to enjoy happy and healthy lives with our horses and other animals on our farm just outside of Springfield, Missouri.
What a shock when we found out that Chardy’s genetic predisposition to myelodysplasia had caught up with her. Her father, her grandmother, and an uncle all experienced similar problems, but still we did not expect such a dire prognosis as she received in 2010—the doctors expected that she would live only another few months! She had developed acute myelogenous leukemia (AML), which evolved from myelodysplasia.
I knew from my career as a doctor and being active in medical research that even though we can control 75 percent of the factors impacting health and longevity through conscientious living, when faced with the reality of our genetics (which controls the other 25 percent), we can’t always change the overall outcome.
This was the case with my beloved Chardy. Despite our best efforts and her own courageous fight, she could not beat it. They gave her only 3 months, but she fought it for 13. When she passed over, a part of me went with her.
Moving On Proved Harder Than Imagined
In 1994, I had a remarkable experience while on a holistic retreat; I felt my heart chakra fully open, and from that point on I understood more about love than I could ever comprehend before. I see now that this spiritual opening was a particularly important gift, because it helped me immensely as I tried to deal with my grief in losing Chardy—a reality that has been far more intense than I could have ever anticipated.
In the time since her death in 2011, I have cried more than in the first 77 years of my life. I discovered in a very personal way the true value of the many therapies and products that I developed over the years to help my patients overcome pain, depression, and loss. When I turned to these same techniques, they helped me immensely. For example, I have used my Liss Cranial Stimulator (LCS) more since her death than during the entire previous 25 years, and I use the Air Bliss essential oils blend daily, which I know is one of the main reasons that I have been able to go on without her.
I will fully explain these products and therapies in the coming chapters, because that’s what this book is all about. But first, in order to understand all of that, I feel it is crucial for you to first know why conscientiousness is so important and how boosting certain hormones and biochemical processes in the body can help bring out greater self-love and self-care. This has been a long journey of discovery for me, and one that I am very happy to share, because I know it will change your life.
Why Should You Strive to Be Conscientious?
The study of conscientiousness by psychologists goes back decades. Conscientiousness is one of the big five personality traits, according to psychologists. Specifically, the five sets of traits that psychologists like to measure are: extroverted vs. introverted, agreeable vs. antagonistic, conscientious vs. unfocused, neurotic vs. emotionally stable, and open to experience vs. not open to experience. For our purposes, we are going to concentrate primarily on conscientiousness.
What is it that conscientious people care about, and why should you care? Well, these individuals are pretty easy to recognize. They are prepared, neat, and orderly. They like things scheduled, and they approach tasks in a focused, organized, and disciplined manner. Conscientious individuals are careful, thorough, reliable, persistent, and prudent; it may sound a bit boring to some of you, but all these traits are good to have if you want to live a long and healthy life. Conscientious people are particularly resilient when life gives them big challenges that must be faced.
But the most critical aspect of conscientiousness is responsibility; they do not blame others for their own problems. It is responsibility for self that is the cornerstone, and it leads a person to become stronger in all other aspects of conscientiousness.
Not surprisingly, conscientious individuals achieve high levels of success by starting with purposeful planning and persistence and the knowledge for how to learn from their mistakes. They know that they need to process their life experiences in order to extract the big lessons, and they also know how to flush out the residue.
I believe that in the same way we process food when we eat, we also need to chew up our experiences. We need to sort them out to understand what has happened to us and why. This allows us to digest the real substance and extract what we need to learn. Through reflection of our experiences, we assimilate wisdom and insight, and in turn we can revise our beliefs, priorities, and methods continuously. As we do that, we can flush out what is left over, the residue, or irritation.
This concept of irritation came to me from Torkom Saraydarian, an American teacher, author, and spiritualist who said in his wonderful booklet that irritation destroys the etheric nervous system, while also listing almost 30 “causes” of irritation. In other words, you cannot afford the luxury of anger, guilt, anxiety, or depression!
To be conscientious in this sense means to discern thoroughly and skillfully your life experiences and apply what you have learned. This makes real growth in life possible. It also gives us the capacity to recognize our responsibilities and manage them in a practical and effective manner.
However, many people are just the opposite of conscientious. They are the ones who don’t know how to take personal responsibility and are quick to blame anyone and everyone else, even society or the universe, for the misery that they face. You quite likely know a person like this—probably quite a few. It’s never their fault that they don’t have a good job, their spouse left them, or they have this nagging back pain that sidelines them from life.
During my career, I have met thousands of these kinds of souls, and I would say that virtually all of them were depressed. I have devoted my entire career, some 40 years, to the researching and perfecting of techniques that would allow these individuals to overcome depression, recover from chronic pain, and live longer and healthier lives than even modern medicine would expect. One of the main keys to this puzzle was the study of dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), and that is where we’re going next.
Discovering the Amazing Role of DHEA
One of the most important “aha” moments in my whole career was when I realized that there was a way to raise the levels of DHEA naturally in our bodies—not just one way, but four ways. This was something that no one had known was possible before this point.
This was a very important discovery, because DHEA is produced naturally in the human body and is the most abundant circulating steroid we have. Optimal health requires optimal levels of DHEA, but these levels in the body begin to decrease naturally after age 30.
DHEA is produced in the adrenal glands, the testicles, and the brain. In the human body, it functions predominantly as a metabolic intermediate in the creation of the male and female sex steroids.
It has been used by doctors as a treatment for some conditions, such as adrenal insufficiency and depression, but no studies of long-term supplement effects have been conducted. It is suspected that taking DHEA can cause higher-than-normal levels of androgens and estrogens in the body, and theoretically this may increase the incidence of some cancers. Therefore, taking DHEA as an oral treatment is not without risk, and so I asked myself, “Is there some other natural way we could encourage our bodies to increase DHEA levels?”
My quest for this discovery became the number one priority of my research efforts in the early 1990s, since I was working with thousands of depressed, pain-filled patients and wondering what would help them the most. While seeking answers, I developed the concept of neurochemical profiling, which is a critical diagnostic system for depression.
With neurochemical profiling, I set out to measure the levels of various neurochemicals in the body through inspecting spinal fluid or blood. That’s when I found out that 100 percent of my patients who had chronic pain and depression were deficient in DHEA! One hundred percent!
Overcoming Deficiencies Within Our Bodies
While researching DHEA, I found many other deficiencies as well. In fact, when I looked at the 10 essential amino acids in the human body, patients seemed to be deficient in one or most of these or their optimal ratios were not in balance, which I suspected we needed to resolve.
For example, at this time I also discovered that 84 percent of depressed patients were deficient in taurine and 100 percent of them were deficient in intracellular magnesium, but those cases were a little easier to understand and alleviate. Both taurine and magnesium are critical in maintaining the electrical charge on cells, and taurine is now considered “conditionally essential” for the human body. Interestingly, it is present only in animal protein. There is no taurine in any vegetable. While my patients did usually eat meat, they seemed to neither digest nor absorb the animal protein or they somehow had an increased need for taurine. Fortunately, it is available as a supplement.
As for treating the magnesium deficiency, I found that rather than take an oral magnesium supplement, patients actually got a far better and quicker benefit by using magnesium lotion and rubbing it directly on their skin twice daily. When I was testing these theories, I also developed many other techniques and therapies to help treat these same depressed patients, which I will talk more about in the coming chapters.
But I’d like to return now to the DHEA discussion, because it is still the most critical hormone in the body for determining health. Through my research, I discovered four natural methods of rejuvenating the body’s ability to make DHEA. I found that each of the four techniques would have its own incremental effect on raising levels, but no single innovation seemed to be able to do it all on its own.
The four natural methods to raise levels of DHEA in the body that I discovered were these: using natural progesterone cream, taking a specific vitamin-mineral complex that I developed called Youth Formula, applying magnesium lotion to the skin, and activating a series of points on the body that correspond to the Ring of Fire (this is one of five Sacred Rings that is explained in more detail in Chapter Seven). Research also indicates that levels of DHEA in our bodies are naturally enhanced when we are experiencing joy, having sex, and spending time out in the sunshine, but of course it’s rather hard to measure the exact benefits in those cases.
By the way, my first intuitive hit for DHEA restoration was to use natural progesterone cream. This idea came to me as an inspiration, and it worked. Many of my new ideas—I guess virtually all of them—seem to be downloaded into my brain from divine guidance, and then I have been fortunate to be able to use my medical training and research capacity to study these ideas further in order to prove or perfect them.
So What Has Made You What You Are?
I’d like to return now to the discussion about personality, because it helps explain why some people are conscientious in their approach to life and others are not. It has been commonly accepted that personality and mood are conditioned by many different factors, such as your genetic makeup and your environment, and many people believe your birth order, your astrological sign, or even karma play a role.
But there is a growing body of knowledge that says that our emotional environment during gestation (when we were in our mother’s womb) and the moment of birth may well be more critical than all the other factors combined!
Research is showing us that these factors, occurring from the very moment of conception to age seven, help to determine the personality and mood of a person. And once that early foundation is created, it is difficult to change—not impossible, but it takes effort.
Here’s how it works: The human baby about to be born has an oxytocin system that is ready and waiting to be activated, and that burst of oxytocin is conditioned to happen naturally at birth. (Oxytocin is the nurturing, bonding hormone that is so vital to our lives.) This burst of oxytocin from the mother sets the child up to bond naturally with the mother and allows the child to form a healthy attachment that will serve the child well as he or she begins a new life on Earth.
However, when the mother undergoes any kind of trauma while pregnant or while giving birth, it can and does impact the child. For example, when a mother undergoes a Cesarean section to deliver the child by surgery, the natural surge or burst of oxytocin is not delivered to the baby the way it would happen through the natural process of birth. Likewise, if women are given artificial oxytocin (in the form of Pitocin) to induce delivery, that can also prevent the child from getting that natural burst of oxytocin.
We also know that if any kind of major trauma happens in the first seven years of life, a child’s oxytocin mechanism can shut down. Any kind of abuse, whether it is physical, sexual, emotional, or verbal, can cause trauma to the child, as can parental divorce. While divorce is not obviously abusive, it more often than not interrupts the nurturing process. So while the children of divorce are not in any physical danger, they might not feel as safe and secure as they once did, if they lived with two loving parents.
But whenever a person of any age who has healthy levels of oxytocin enjoys a happy, nurturing episode, it causes the emotional center of that person to say, “Hey, that feels good,” because a burst of oxytocin is released. The person enjoys a warm feeling of comfort and happiness. Oxytocin also brings out increased optimism, and the hormone acts as a powerful modulator of social behaviors. It also modulates the release of serotonin, which is one of the body’s most critical mood chemicals.
Even young children who are secure and happy on a daily basis exhibit conscientious traits, and if those traits or actions are encouraged, modeled, or rewarded, the young ones become even more conscientious as they mature. However, if they have not had the reinforcement of the bonding experience at birth, and in the first seven years have not felt a sufficient level of self-esteem, they will feel this lack throughout their lives.
Here is another example: If one or both parents are not fully approving of their son or daughter, as might be the case if mom and dad chastise the child because his or her test scores at school were not good enough, the child’s self-esteem might resultantly be damaged. Now, it should be pointed out that this does not cause as much damage as physical abuse, but parents being overly critical can, and very often do, create doubt in their children as to their own self-worth. By the time kids reach their teenage years, most personality problems they may exhibit can be directly linked to a deficiency in oxytocin.
The bottom line is that the quantity and quality of the nurturing you got during the first seven years of life determined to a great degree the level of social competence you have as an adult and your ability to cope with stress and aggressiveness.
Too Little Oxytocin Can Cause Big Problems
In addition to being a primary factor in poor self-esteem, there is a huge body of evidence indicating that oxytocin deficiency influences a wide spectrum of disorders, including autism, attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), borderline personality, addiction, and schizophrenia.
In fact, almost all psychotherapy from the past 200 years has been related to these problems. I feel shock and dismay when I think that therapists have been attempting to change personality within their patients without resetting the thermostat that actually controls it—which is oxytocin!
That’s why I am suggesting that a different approach is needed. While I fully accept that nutritional factors, social circumstances, and environmental conditions are all part of the picture of how we turn into functioning adults in our society, I also believe that boosting oxytocin actually has the potential to make a far greater impact and improvement on our lives than just about anything else.
Although the full effects of boosting oxytocin have not yet been studied in the long term, the results seen in the past ten years, for example, are far more striking than any other single intervention. So far, the main way of increasing oxytocin in the body is to take it via a nasal spray.
I have found more than 20 references to the power and effectiveness of oxytocin, which I have included in the bibliography. Many of those studies have shown, for instance, that acute intranasal oxytocin improves positive self-perceptions of personality and reduces social anxiety and fear.
Raising oxytocin levels through a nasal spray, however, is somewhat cumbersome, and I believe this spray would be very hard on sensitive nasal membranes if used for extended periods of time. But since we know now that oxytocin does work, my approach was to find natural ways to increase oxytocin levels. And so I have.
Understanding Oxytocin and Its Power
While I have worked with DHEA for more than 20 years, I became aware of the recent oxytocin studies only a few months after Chardy’s death in 2011. I happened to find a few articles on oxytocin, and I knew instantly that this had to be another divine inspiration knocking on my door. I felt pretty strongly that the therapies I had been developing that were increasing neurotensin, critical for reducing stress, in the body must also raise levels of oxytocin. But how was I to be sure?
This was such a new topic that I had difficulty finding very much credible research. I spent hours on the Internet and finally found a research paper reporting that oxytocin is released when neurotensin increases. I knew it! I was so excited that I actually had difficulty sleeping that night. At this point, I already knew that one of the therapies I’d developed allowed the body to increase its production of neurotensin; now I knew that that particular approach would also allow the body to raise its level of oxytocin in the same natural way.
This is particularly good news if you are one of the individuals who did not feel as loved, wanted, or nurtured from birth onward as you should have been. If you experienced trauma in your early years, or even on your way through life as an adult, it is not too late. Anyone suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can be helped. You can learn to nurture yourself by becoming more conscientious and also take steps to restore your oxytocin capacity. It is very important that you feel lovable and loved; everyone requires this.
Not only that, but oxytocin is also a major stress reducer. It’s important to humans because healthy functioning of your oxytocin system positively influences social behavior, social affiliations, and memory, while also helping to control anxiety, mood, and the tendency to overeat. Oxytocin also moderates fear by inhibiting the adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) and the release of cortisone. In other words, oxytocin is a natural antidepressant.
The Next Logical Step—Doing Good for Self and Others
There is another extremely important aspect of conscientiousness that I don’t want to leave out. It is related to the age-old debate about our purpose on Earth, the meaning of life. I was almost 40 years old when I figured this out. Simply put, I believe that our only purpose in life is to learn how to fulfill our greatest basic human instinct, and that is to help other people.
My premise is that if we felt adequately nurtured as children, then we will naturally feel this need as adults, clearly hearing and heeding the call to do good for ourselves and others. This awareness grows within us as we mature. However, if we weren’t adequately nurtured as children, we need to do that for ourselves now: nurture ourselves so we can then help ourselves and others.
This book gives you the understanding and the tools to boost your good feelings about yourself, regardless of where you are in life. Once you know how good you are and how much better life can be, then you will be ready to fulfill your primary purpose of helping other people.
Why Not Choose to Experience a Blissful Life?
Suppose I could give you an elixir of health and well-being. Not one you would drink, but one that you could apply to specific points on your body in just 30 seconds.
Suppose you could use specific elixirs to increase DHEA, which we know is the most important hormone in your body. What if you could activate calcitonin development in your body, which is essential for bone strength and pain control? Or perhaps you would like to reduce the scavenging effects of free radicals that essentially “rust” your body?
Of course, like so many people, you may just need a good surge of oxytocin, which helps you feel secure, happy, and at peace with yourself and the world.
Those elixirs are available now, and I describe them in detail in Chapter Seven. They have the capacity to help you rebuild your body’s own natural functioning, but they are not a magic bullet. If you truly wish to change your life and achieve optimal health, happiness, and longevity, I challenge you now to embrace your inner conscientious self and keep reading along.
In the next few chapters, I will describe how I came to discover the wisdom I am sharing with you now, and explain how you can understand better and embrace your own spiritual power. Then I will present the practical lifestyle adjustments that you can make to pave your way to optimal health and longevity.
But first, let’s look at a compelling research study that proves that conscientiousness is the first important skill you need to master. Without it, as you will soon see, life can take some pretty miserable turns.