Anthrax in drum skins?

At first I though it was a act of terrorism.
And then I did a search.
And this is what I found.

How dangerous is drum making?

http://current.com/1rkua4c

A second drum maker in two years has died after apparently inhaling anthrax spores from animal skins. What are the risks of this seemingly safe job?

Fernando Gomez had been in intensive care for more than a week after handling animal skins at his drum-making workshop in London. But his condition deteriorated over the weekend and the 35-year-old died from inhalation anthrax on Sunday night.

Two years earlier, Christopher Norris, a craftsman from Scotland, died after inhaling anthrax. But are these cases a coincidence or a cause for alarm?

In the UK, the death of Mr Gomez is the second case in more than 30 years. Across the world, there are four other known cases since 1974 of drum makers dying from anthrax.

It is difficult however to put these figures into context. There are no official statistics on the numbers of drum makers and handlers of skins for drum making in the UK come in many guises - the amateur attending drumming workshops, the professional who tends to work independently, members of African communities who carry out repairs and the drummer who replaces his skins himself.

African drumming is growing in popularity in the UK, but any drumming community is informal and loosely-knit.

Health experts do stress though that cases of death from anthrax are extremely rare among drum makers, and drum players are in no danger at all.

Anthrax is a naturally occurring disease, which can sporadically affect cattle and goat herds, as well as more exotic animals such as llamas, yaks and bison, all around the world.

The skins of cows and goats, in particular, are used to make traditional African drums. Outside of the African tradition, drum skins are usually more processed and come prepared without any hair.

Most European drums are made from man-made fibres, except for some antique orchestral drums and the Irish Bodhran, made with goat or deer skin.

Drum makers say hides produce a better sound and are gentler on the hands.

Dr Phil Luton, of the Health Protection Agency, said the "vast majority" of skins imported for drum making would not be infected with anthrax.

Anthrax can be contracted through cuts to the skin (cutaneous anthrax) or by inhaling the spores (inhalation anthrax), the latter being the harder to detect and to treat.

Drum makers are at risk, however low, during the preparation of the skin, which involves stretching it over the frame and scraping hair from the hide to give it a smooth finish. The danger lies in inhaling agitated spores or an open wound becoming infected.

RESPIRATORY ANTHRAX

Spores Bacillus anthracis organism produces spores that exist in the environment, often in soil
Inhalation Humans exposed to animal skins may breathe in the spores, but cannot pass on to other humans
Trachea Larger spores lodge in throat and windpipe
Lungs Some spores are destroyed by immune system, but smaller ones may penetrate alveoli within lungs
Consequences If untreated, flu-like symptoms are followed by severe breathing difficulties, blood poisoning and shock, usually fatal

The Health Protection Agency (HPA) says there are no other occupations known to be at risk, as jobs like rug making are more rigorously regulated.

In the case of drum makers, the HPA advises carrying out work in a well-ventilated space and to avoid breathing in dust. It says it will be reviewing its advice once the findings of the investigation into Mr Gomez's death are available.

Drum maker John Sullivan, also known as Bodhi, uses the common-sense approach, which has worked for him for the past 20 years.

John Sullivan has been making drums for 20 years

He makes djembes, a goblet-shaped West African hand drum, by carving a solid log from hardwood and covering it with goats' skin imported from Gambia and Senegal.

He says he is careful not to cut himself when shaving bristly hair off with a double-edged razor blade and has considered wearing rubber gloves.

When rubbing down a bristly skin, he goes outside and checks the wind direction to ensure any spores blow away from him.

The 54-year-old, from the Suffolk coast, said the latest death had made him think twice about his own safety, but not enough to stop.

"I have been doing it 20 years and I'm still here," he said.

Found on the BBC network.

And now I think about the news of the woman in the US that also caught a illness from anthrax in a drum circle in the US.

New Hampshire Woman Diagnosed With Rare Type of Anthrax After Attending 'Drumming Circle'

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,581460,00.html

CONCORD, N.H. — A New Hampshire woman diagnosed with a rare gastrointestinal anthrax case may have swallowed spores propelled into the air by vigorous drumming, a state health expert said.

Officials haven't confirmed how the woman contracted the disease but are focusing on a drum circle gathering she attended Dec. 4 at the United Campus Ministry center in Durham shortly before becoming ill. Public health officials who learned of her diagnosis last week immediately began investigating, and earlier this week shut down the ministry center after anthrax spores were found on two drums.

Some health officials believe it's the nation's first case of gastrointestinal anthrax, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is unsure.

Dr. Elizabeth Talbot, an adviser to the state's public health division, said one theory is that the woman ingested airborne spores from a drum's animal-hide covering.

"This was a wild type of anthrax that is found ubiquitously in our environment. It can become stirred up or agitated to a place where it briefly suspends in the air, and this patient likely contacted it on her fingers and introduced it into her mouth or inhaled a ... spore into her mouth and then swallowed it," she said.

Two recent U.S. anthrax cases involved African drums covered with animal hides, but those involved spores that were inhaled or entered through the skin.

On Tuesday, officials said spores also were found on an electrical outlet and that antibiotics and vaccines would be offered to about 80 people, including about 60 who attended the drum circle as well as University of New Hampshire students who lived in the building and those who worked there.

Samples have been sent to the CDC to determine whether the patient's anthrax strain matches that found on the drums or electrical outlet.

The ministry center is not part of the university, but it houses students and runs a variety of campus-based programs. Pastor Larry Brickner-Wood, the center's director, said the monthly drum circles involve people playing hand drums and other percussion instruments to build community spirit and promote well-being.

"Our thoughts and prayers remain with this young woman and her family," he said.

Anthrax is a potentially fatal disease caused by bacteria. There are three types of infection based on where the disease manifests itself: inhalation affecting the lungs, cutaneous affecting the skin and gastrointestinal affecting the digestive tract. Infection from natural sources such as animal skins, soil or contaminated meat is rare in developed countries, but occurs regularly in poor nations. It is not transmitted from person-to-person.

In 2007, two members of a Connecticut family were treated for skin anthrax traced to animal hides used to make African drums. In 2006, a New York dancer and drum maker who collapsed after a performance in Pennsylvania recovered from the first case of naturally occurring inhalation anthrax in the United States since 1976.

According to state public health officials and The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases there have been no previous confirmed cases of gastrointestinal anthrax in the United States. A Minnesota farm family was believed to have symptoms of the disease in 2000 after eating meat from an infected cow, but blood test results from exposed family members were negative, state health officials said.

A CDC spokesman did not have details of any other U.S. cases but said the agency's Web site and literature from CDC authors indicate that gastrointestinal anthrax and exposure have rarely been reported.

The last New Hampshire anthrax cases were in 1957 when there were nine cases — four skin and five inhalation — in employees of a textile mill in Manchester. Since then, there have been 11 cases of naturally occurring anthrax in the United States.

In 2001, letters containing anthrax spores were mailed to journalists and two U.S. senators in the weeks following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. At least four people, including two postal workers and a photo editor, died from exposure to those letters, and more than a dozen others became ill.

And not that it made any more sense.

But it didn't sound like a act of terrorism.

And that is a good start.



respect

My favorite seldom known quote!

"The greatest sin of our time is not the few who have destroyed. But the vast majority who've sat idly by..."

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

The worst sin I have seen is the amount of people around Me who have become that Majority that still sits and bitches from the cheap seats at and about the few who don't mind getting dirty for a greater cause than just their own image.

If you don't stand for something?

You are doomed to fall for anything.

And too many people don't mind.

respect

We ALL owe Uncle Tom a apology. And everyone we have ever called his name in vain.

My Grand Fathers family are from Locus Grove Ga.

His Brother was named Tom Harris. He was also the spiritual teacher for that area and everyone would gather on his land in the back of the house and have "church"... They called Him Uncle TH and not Uncle Tom because of the "Bad rap" the name Uncle Tom was associated with.

I remember as a child asking Him why He didn't like being called Uncle Tom and He said because that was a "Bad Word" for black people.

*blank stare*

Now this last comment reminded Me of a certain ignorance that our people (Colored folks as they called themselves back then) seemed to still suffer from today.

I read the book Uncle Tom's Cabin. And I was moved by Uncle Toms devotion to his people and his character in that Novel. And I wondered how and where at what point did the name of that character become offensive to POCs. And all I could find was TWO issues. Ignorance and the fact that Uncle Tom was of lighter skin. But nothing else. And I even did a search for more answers today and all I found was others who questioned the reason why Blacks and POCs considered the name Uncle Tom to be a insult after all this time we have had to research this issue and READ the actual book!

Turns out that the problem is the folklore that is more powerful than the facts within our own race. Because the Phrase "Uncle Tom" is STILL considered a offensive word used by other blacks and POCs against each other.

And then I reflect back to My family back in the "Country" and the words and the image of My Uncle TH when He told me of that meaning. And I think of the amount of pain and ignorance that My own people have put each other through to such a degree that we can't even understand the importance of that book "Uncle Tom's Cabin" and it's influence on the WORLD at that time and the American people as well as blacks and POCs. THAT BOOK was one of the most POWERFUL Novels of it's time and was even noted as one of the influences that made the World view of this country's history and treatment of blacks and POCs in this country ring the alarm for protest of this country and even caused the call for Civil War. The Book it's self was outlawed in this country for a while and the image of Uncle Tom was manipulated to such a degree that even black folks and POCs who had the chance to LEARN the TRUTH about that folklore did nothing still to this day. And That Book is a very important part of our history too. And it shows that all the images of slavery during that time were not all ugly and we were not all useless and powerless even in slavery.

I remember a few college educated black folks use that word against Me in a discussion about our history that got heated over My impression of our history and their emotional instinct to find nothing good about our past. And even as I questioned had they READ the actual book Uncle Tom's Cabin and if they knew the history behind the book all they did was shut down and consider Me less than a honorable black Man in their yes.

I now relate that conflict with the same issues I have had with many of the so called educated blacks and POCs on this site and around the net who seem to have the same bigoted traits towards others who don't agree with their ignorance and emotional traits that are connected more to folklores they know very little about more than they care to find they may be Mis-educated.

I live in a city that was a focal point to the Underground Railroad and the first point of freedom for many in slavery. In a city built by both slaves and free blacks and POCs who are all on record for their contribution to this country's growth and history. Some of which is still unknown or ignored by many who claim to be educated to some degree. And many of them graduated from HBCU's without common knowledge of their own history enough to not consider our past as painful as they think and feel.

I remember being called a Uncle Tom by a black educated person for telling them that blacks fought on the side of the Confederacy and were Republicans in the south before the Civil war. And I was shocked at their ignorance as well as their consideration of being more educated enough to be right without having to do the research.

So when I read the title of this thread?

I think about how much and how little many people especially Americans know about their own history and the history of WHY race is such a big issue between so many people in this country.

And if you were to ask anyone who has a issue with racism "why" and how did it get to such a painful emotional instinct. The ONLY thing that can say is because that is what they were taught.

And then I wonder to Myself. What was My Uncle TH teaching all of them Colored Country people back int that day. And what effect did it have on the people today and how they deal with race and each other.

And why is race still such a issue to many people who never suffered the amount of racism that was penned as being racism in America.

And all I can come up with is ignorance is what ignorance does.

Here's one of the best post I have read on this subject...

http://evz-yoyo.blogspot.com/2009/08/irony-of-uncle-tom.html

The Irony of Uncle Tom.

Boy, Uncle Tom's Cabin has really gotten a bad rap.

Many Black folks cringe when the subject is brought up.
Not to say that Black folks are so literary, whether they hail from the Ivy league or the ghetto, that their taste for fiction has lead to a unanimity in distaste for the 19th century work.
Far from that. The main ingredient in their taste is the name of the book and it's connotation to kow-towing Blacks.

I can speak personally about that same feeling for it resided within me.
I've always been hesitant about the book.
As an analogy, it's as if I had never tasted honey and for the first time, I stood by a beehive in a net mask, as angry bees buzzed and attempted to sting and kill me, as a tender pulled honeycomb from deep within the bowls of the insects lair and then implored me to taste the golden sap of the bees vomitus.
Well, taste I have, and I love it.
Harriet Beecher Stowe's book is much the same.
What on the surface may appear, sound like and feel racist, is but the most sweet delicacy of thought and exposition.

I never really understood the role of Uncle Tom's Cabin on the history of the United States.
It was always included in discussions of abolitionist movements, and as a seminal piece, but the impression formed within my mind was that this novel was blaxploitation, and that it's success was, rooted in the same vein as minstrel shows, stepin fetchit, hattie mcdaniel, bill bojangles robinson and a host of other negative depictions of Blacks.
Seeing drawings from the book, or posters, they were all in a manner of Black supplication to Whites.
Uncle Tom is often pictured with a young white girl, much the same as "Uncle Remus"
And there you have it. The old, aged, supplicating, Black slave, and the golden, beautiful flower of humanity, White girl.
There is much more to the relationship, but just as a picture tells a thousand words, the words of love and love of Christ were not words told in that picture.

The folks who have damned Uncle Tom, could have chosen another character to hold forth as a champion of the novel. They could have chosen Eliza's husband George.
Light skinned from several generations of plantation rape and sexual exploitation of Black women,
George was proud, held himself in a princely manner, was intelligent, industrious, proud and willing to fight to the death in order to achieve his freedom. A man who once he got his freedom, he relocated to France with his family and earned a College education. Then returned to America with his family before heading off to Liberia to take part in the great experiment of creating a free, new and world recognized nation and home to a new generation of Black power and self-sufficiency. This man was a production of Harriet Beecher Stowe's immense faculties, and he was a model for the future coming of Frederick Douglas, W.E.B. DuBois, A. Philip Randolph, Marcus Garvey, Paul Robeson, Robert F. Williams, E.D. Nixon, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King and Huey Newton.

And yet in this, many Blacks could find fault. For his light skin would be seen as a commentary on his intelligence and worth, despite the fact that George himself states his own wish that he were "two shades darker, rather than another shade lighter". A man who was Black, suffered as a Black and was proud and loving of his Blackness. Yet in this character, Stowe did not use him to comment on in-race hierarchies. He was a man, complete and whole and an undeniable product of years of the parallel track of sexual bondage and sex trade of Black women that sat squarely and equally protected within the evils of Slavery itself. how many Blacks in the south, after 200 years of rape and sexual exploitation, did not have White blood? Was there not much debate about the "percentage" of blood that made one Black? 1/32nd Black was "Black" that's if you had a single Black great-great-great-great-grandfather... And bottom line, if your mother was "Black" it made no difference, you were a slave. Surely there were probably many children that were so white in appearance, that it would have been "unconscionable" to place them in the field among those that look obviously Black. but such occasions were rare. There are more than a handful of U.S. Presidents that have had offspring with Black mothers and it is alleged that 5 U.S. Presidents (not counting Barack Obama) were African Americans.

And so race, is the history of the United States.

I assumed that the books popularity and oblique role in abolitionism was in perhaps the anger and rage it caused within abolitionist.
I didn't understand it fully.

My curiosity has been in this way pricked and sedated over the years.
I was ok with the book, and it's legacy being so closely identified with the black struggles and sufferings during slavery.
None of us had any choice in it's history.

But reading Frederick Douglas' "My Bondage, My Freedom" he spoke in a neutral tone about Uncle Tom's Cabin." He may have praised it a bit. He did not shrink from it, nor feel offended by it. The subject matter was distasteful, but it seemed more from the subject matter itself, rather than the perspective or wounds inflicted by the piece.

And so, If Frederick Douglas, as intelligent, acute of mind, a former slave, and leader of the Black abolitionist movement, was fine with Uncle Tom's cabin, then what right have any present day Blacks to object? In fact, it would seem that the proper course would be to read the book.

And read it I did.

could a more beautiful book be written?
In the world there are in truth, two kinds of books.
Truth and Fiction.
In my experience the most powerful Truth has come from those who have survived incredible situations, such as memoirs from Treblinka, Sudan, slave narratives, shipwrecks, natural disasters, people against the odds who miraculously survived. In these stories, the only thing to be done, is to tell the tale. circumstance provides all the drama. The experience is the setting. The task, is to survive. These stories are the most powerful. Not the dramatized.

"Uncle Tom's Cabin" captures the power of such truth and tells a story built upon innumerable stores of Truth, reinterpreted and woven together, by Harriet Beecher Stowe. Her intent, her history, her family, the time, the circumstance, the reception and it's importance all play but minor roles to the overwhelming beauty and skillfulness of the prose.

All of which adds up to the inescapable conclusion that to call someone an "Uncle Tom" is so completely backwards and misbegotten to the Truth of Uncle Tom.

Even the Title, "Uncle Tom's Cabin" is a reference to a line by George Shelby, a soon to be ex-slave owner, who frees his slaves, and allows them to work for wages, free from the capriciousness of death and re-sale. He tells them to look upon the cabin of Uncle Tom and let it forever be a memorial to the man, his beauty, his immense love and faith, as well as the preciousness of freedom.

All of this must be contrasted with the reality that today, to be called an Uncle Tom is to be called less than a man..
in reality, Uncle Tom was Christ-like.
He endured his fate like Christ.
refusing to do wrong. refusing to hate, refusing to betray trust and loyalty. shielding others, being selfless, and always in the bountiful grace of his lord and savior.

Uncle Tom is surely one of the most beautiful, moral and meek martyrs there ever was or could be.
He in fact gave his life and was beaten to death for not divulging the whereabouts of two female runaway slaves.
He even told his "Masser Legree" that he knew where they were, but the regardless of what happened, he could not, would not ever betray them. and for this he was beaten to death. and with his dying breath, he forgave his attackers and prayed to God for their salvation.

And now we call "Uncle Tom's" the guys who have the exact opposite of the qualities of the original.

And Harriet Beecher Stowe, hastened the end of slavery and struck one of the mightiest, if not the mightiest blow against the entire system of slavery. A staunch abolitionist, daughter of a preacher, sister of a preacher, from a family of abolitionist. she did everything she could to lay the thing bare.

This book was the second best selling book in the United State in the 19th Century, right behind the bible. You'd be hard pressed to find any book, by any author, written at any time that was more respectful, more praising of Blacks, more condemning of slavery than Uncle Tom's Cabin.

it is truly an irony, that as we've matured in the battle against discrimination, we have trampled this holy book underfoot, and declared it a racist artifact, despite it's power, it's beauty, it's intention and the vast work that it achieved in the struggle for freedom.

And if there could be any doubt in the minds of any as to the motivation, intent, truth, morality and ethics of the author, then they should forsake the reading of the book, and read chapter forty-five (45) the last chapter. There, plain and simple, is where the truth lay for all those who have any desire to know of it, and once having read it, there should be no need for speculation, interpretation, analysis, debate or deconstruction.

The real issue now is not who is at fault for the mis education of not just the negro but of the American people?

But HOW are we going to Re educate the American populace who now suffers from the ignorance of a mis quoted history of their own past?

respect

I'm kinda famous now I'm a cartoon in the Washington Post!

I bet you can find Me!

respect

The Matrix pays Black Female Author for theft of the concept and movie idea.

Author of the Matrix Sophia Stewart

I knew there was a deeper connection to the Matrix and it's story line than the "white washed" movie version we all know.

And here's the real scoop!

This little known story has met a just conclusion, as Sophia Stewart, African American author of The Matrix will finally receive her just due from the copyright infringement of her original work!!!

A six-year dispute has ended involving Sophia Stewart, the Wachowski Brothers, Joel Silver and Warner Brothers. Stewart’s allegations, involving copyright infringement and racketeering, were received and acknowledged by the Central District of California, Judge Margaret Morrow presiding.

Stewart, a New Yorker who has resided in Salt Lake City for the past five years, will recover damages from the films, The Matrix I, II and III, as well as The Terminator and its sequels. She will soon receive one of the biggest payoffs in the history of Hollywood, as the gross receipts of both films and their sequels total over 2.5 billion dollars.

Stewart filed her case in 1999, after viewing the Matrix, which she felt had been based on her manuscript, ‘The Third Eye,’ copyrighted in 1981. In the mid-eighties Stewart had submitted her manuscript to an ad placed by the Wachowski Brothers, requesting new sci-fi works.

According to court documentation, an FBI investigation discovered that more than thirty minutes had been edited from the original film, in an attempt to avoid penalties for copyright infringement. The investigation also stated that ‘credible witnesses employed at Warner Brothers came forward, claiming that the executives and lawyers had full knowledge that the work in question did not belong to the Wachowski Brothers.’ These witnesses claimed to have seen Stewart’s original work and that it had been ‘often used during preparation of the motion pictures.’ The defendants tried, on several occasions, to have Stewart’s case dismissed, without success.

Stewart has confronted skepticism on all sides, much of which comes from Matrix fans, who are strangely loyal to the Wachowski Brothers. One on-line forum, entitled Matrix Explained has an entire section devoted to Stewart. Some who have researched her history and writings are open to her story.

Others are suspicious and mocking. ‘It doesn’t bother me,’ said Stewart in a phone interview last week, ‘I always knew what was true.’

Some fans, are unaware of the case or they question its legitimacy, due to the fact that it has received little to no media coverage. Though the case was not made public until October of 2003, Stewart has her own explanation, as quoted at aghettotymz.com:

‘The reason you have not seen any of this in the media is because Warner Brothers parent company is AOL-Time Warner…. this GIANT owns 95 percent of the media… let me give you a clue as to what they own in the media business… New York Times papers/magazines, LA Times papers/magazines, People Magazine, CNN news, Extra, Celebrity Justice, Entertainment Tonight, HBO, New Line Cinema, DreamWorks, Newsweek, Village Roadshow and many, many more! They are not going to report on themselves. They have been suppressing my case for years.’

Fans who have taken Stewart’s allegations seriously, have found eerie mythological parallels, which seem significant in a case that revolves around the highly metaphorical and symbolic Matrix series. Sophia, the Greek goddess of wisdom has been referenced many times in speculation about Stewart. In one book about the Goddess Sophia, it reads, ‘The black goddess is the mistress of web creation spun in her divine matrix.’

Although there have been outside implications as to racial injustice (Stewart is African American), she does not feel that this is the case. ‘This is all about the Benjamins,’ said Stewart. ‘It’s not about money with me. It’s about justice.’

Stewart’s future plans involve a record label, entitled Popsilk Records, and a motion picture production company, All Eyez On Me, in reference to God. ‘I wrote The Third Eye to wake people up, to remind them why God put them here. There’s more to life than money,’ said Stewart. ‘My whole to the world is about God and good and about choice, about spirituality over ‘technocracy’.’
If Stewart represents spirituality, then she truly has prevailed over the ‘technocracy’ represented in both the Terminator and the Matrix, and now, ironically, by their supposed creators.

Stewart is currently having discussions with CBS about a possible exclusive story and has several media engagements in the near future to nationally publicize her victory. June 13th 2004. Sophia Stewart’s press release read: ‘The Matrix & Terminator movie franchises have made world history and have ultimately changed the way people view movies and how Hollywood does business, yet the real truth about the creator and creation of these films continue to elude the masses because the hidden secret of the matter is that these films were created and written by a Black woman…a Black woman named Sophia Stewart. But Hollywood does not want you to know this fact simply because it would change history. Also it would encourage our Black children to realize a dream and that is…nothing is impossible for them to achieve!’

Greg Thomas, Editor

Now does this change the image of the Matrix theory for you now?

And she is sexy too!

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Positive energy

The old folks used to say
"other than a few miracles, we all are just dirt and water"

Energy

The miracle we all posses but never learn to respect

The brain is a organ
The mind is created by our learned traits

So we have the power over our own bodies
Over our own thoughts
Over our own health
Over our own well beings

In theory

But how many people get any deeper into the many wonders of the brain, and how to better use your own mind in a positive manner?

Religion is not enough

So what more can you get into?

You talk about Karma Sutra and Tantra

You play with these lifestyles like they are mind games and freaky kinky things to get into when you are bored

You claim you know about the Egyptian and other Mythical cultures

You use symbols like
Yin yang
and many other eastern and western teachings

You claim that you can bone up on your chi and learn how to become more Zen

But how deep do you really get into it?

Why not?

Not enough time or guts to find something more that can assist you in your journey of self elevation

Yet you want what out of life?

Let's start off slow

Because most of you will never get any further than this:

Obtaining 'Positive Energy'

Methods To Get Body And Mind On A Healthy Track

If you find yourself always fighting off exhaustion and constantly in a rush, author Judith Orloff has written the perfect book for you: "Positive Energy." It offers advice for increasing vitality and happiness.

Orloff tells The Early Show co-anchor Harry Smith, “I believe there is an epidemic of exhaustion going around where so many are tired and tolerating it and don’t know what to do. I wrote the book to say we don’t have to feel that way.”

The author says she believes we all suffer from a lack of positive energy, because we are constantly bombarded with emails, cell phones, pagers and more, which causes people to feverishly work around the clock.

“We need more positive energy,” she says. “We need to turn the negative thoughts in our heads, when the fear comes up, when the lack of security comes up, replace those with positive thoughts and positive energy.”

She advises people to:

Live in the now
“The reason we get so exhausted is, our minds are way ahead of ourselves. Tune into the now,” she says. “Most people walk around in their head all the time but it’s about sensing things in your body, looking out at the beautiful flowers, looking up in the sky. Not rushing around so much that you forget to look at life.”

Observe masters of the moment
She explains, “Masters of the moment are people like Michelangelo or Yo-Yo Ma - people totally present in their bodies, with their music, with their passion. You want to emulate these people or watch babies and children. They’re in the moment. They’ve got this precious energy.”

Follow your breath
“It means don’t hold your breath,” she says. “Stop for a moment and breathe in and breathe out the tension. Breathe in clarity and light and gain to feel that centering. Throughout the day, you can do that many, many times.”

Check your pulse
She says, “You put your hand on your pulse. That’s your life force. That’s your pulse. As a physician, I learn to take the pulse all the time to see if someone is dead or alive. We can do that, too, to be in the moment, take our pulse, take a breath, and come back to the body. That replenishes our positive energy.”

Adopt a mantra
She explains a mantra is “a protective word, a sacred word. It could be anything like peace, Shalom, let it be.”

The two enemies of living in the now, she says are workaholism and energy vampires – “people who suck our energy dry to be around them. Their negative energy sucks us dry.”

The book is divided into 10 chapters. Each chapter represents a prescription to get your body and mind on a healthy track.

The 10 prescriptions are:

• Awaken Your Intuition And Rejuvenate Yourself
  
• Find A Nurturing Spiritual Path
  
• Design An Energy-Aware Approach To Diet, Fitness, And Health
  
• Generate Positive Emotional Energy To Counter Negativity
  
• Develop A Heart-Centered Sexuality
  
• Open Yourself To The Flow Of Inspiration And Creativity
  
• Celebrate The Sacredness Of Laughter, Pampering, And The Replenishment Of Retreat
  
• Attract Positive People And Situations
  
• Protect Yourself From Energy Vampires
  
• Create Abundance

Read an excerpt from "Positive Energy":

The First Prescription:
Awaken Intuition And Rejuvenate Yourself

Let me tell you a secret that will change your life.
It’s about energy, creativity, the rhythms of existence—how their compelling interconnection gives birth to an inner voice so sophisticated it’ll teach you to harness the positive and dispel negativity. Intuition brings magic to traditional wellness approaches, but also opens you to the intriguing realm of energy fields—vibes that radiate from people, places, plants, the night sky. Think of the contagious electric buzz of Tokyo or Rome; the mellow, cool groove of Coltrane’s sax; or the orgasmic surge of applause at Yankee Stadium when the home team wins. Each day you’ll encounter a wonderfully diverse but often unacknowledged range of energies. In this prescription you’ll see how intuition registers them and sharpens your sensitivity to your life force’s fire, showing ways to metabolize and protect it. By awakening your intuition, you can access your full energy. This is the true secret of secrets: I won’t be satisfied with anything less and hope you won’t either.

As a specialist in Energy Psychiatry, and personally, I worship my high-octane intuitions: I owe the blessing of becoming a physician to one. However, at twenty, when an unwavering inner voice told me I was going to medical school, it was the last thing I thought I wanted. Yes, I was the only child of two physician parents with twenty-five physicians in my family, from cancer researchers to gynecologists, a lineage I seemed ordained to join. But I’d never liked science, would get bored around my parents’ doctor friends. At the time I was a hippie living in an old converted brick Laundromat with my muralist boyfriend in Venice Beach. I worked in the May Company’s towel department. Still, as my intuition sank in, it gave me tremendous energy. So, dubiously, I enrolled in one course in a junior college just to see. One course became two, became . . . fourteen years of medical training—a trek that would’ve pushed Indiana Jones to the edge. But my intuition had staying power, provided all the oomph needed to propel me to my calling.

Similarly blessed, my patient Laura literally owes her life to an intuition about energy. A math teacher with moxie, at forty-five she began experiencing a terrible pounding in her ear, diagnosed by a top neurologist as a routine recurring migraine. Despite his reassurance, she kept feeling “an energy like a train roaring through my body screaming something was wrong.” As I heard the dire immediacy of this intuitive warning, I convulsed with chills. I was very afraid for Laura; she had to act. At my urging, Laura sought a second opinion.

I’m all for protesting when something doesn’t feel right. It’s foolish, even reckless to ignore such energy signals. An angiogram was ordered; dangerous blockages in her cerebral arteries were found. This new doctor told her: “The good news is you didn’t have a stroke or die. The bad news is you have fibromuscular dysplasia. You’ll need surgery to keep your arteries from collapsing.” Arteries collapsing? Of course, Laura was terrified, but also relieved to have a possible solution. Then, the medical machine kicked into high gear. Laura’s emergency brain surgery both cured her symptoms and saved her life. For a year, her angiograms have been fine. Now, Laura listens to her intuition like a fiend. She and her doctor agree: doubting it would have proven lethal.

In my Energy Psychiatry practice I advocate a “take no prisoners” style of intuition. This gut-centered voice is committed to your happiness, health, and survival. With practice, you can learn to tune into it. I want you to start listening. Really listening. I guarantee: your positive energy will grow. Why? You’ll be operating from a spot inside that’s juicy, core-felt, authentic—not from an impulse to conform or disown your strength. You won’t be seduced by what may look good but betrays your gut. Intuition is a truth detector. When you deviate even a nanofraction from your inner voice, your energy will wane, whether a subtle seepage or radical bottoming out. The more ferociously faithful you are to this truth, the more energized you’ll be.

Intuition offers a direct line to your life force and also, as I experience it, to a divine intelligence. It’s the language of energy. You need to speak it to thrive, though our techno-crazed society doesn’t recognize this essential fact. At best it equates intuition with a woman’s trait (try telling that to Native American male shamans!). At worst, it’s considered a magic trick or fluff. No surprise there’s an epidemic of worn-down, confused people out there.

Our energy issues are solvable, but we can’t afford to remain deaf to intuition’s messages. Its expertise is energy; its job is to know every nuance of what makes you tick. A master at reading vibes, intuition is constantly tallying: what gives you positive energy, what dissipates it. Your intuition evaluates who you meet, where you go, your job, your family, current events—all crucial data this program will show you how to interpret and apply.

As an Energy Psychiatrist, I train patients and workshop participants to tune into vibes, a skill you’ll learn. I’ve watched thousands of people do it. Consider Gloria, who’s driven a sixteen-wheeler for thirty years: “I can sense the bad vibes of someone’s road rage and maneuver around the aggravation.” Or Janet, a homicide detective: “By shielding my energy, I’m not emotionally destroyed by gruesome crimes.” My friend serving in an elite naval team in Afghanistan told me, “An effective point man catfooting behind enemy lines has to use ‘Spidy Sense,’ like Spider-Man does. It means reading energy, attending to internal alarms beyond the five senses.” Whatever your field, you’ll benefit from intuiting energy too. Get ready to put the Positive Energy Program’s First Prescription into action.

Get in Sync with Your Life
Think of yourself as a spy whose mission is to detect how much in tune you really are with your life—the big picture and the details. Unlike more cerebral methods, intuition offers you the edge of having X-ray vision into all energy matters. Whether revealing the hard truth about toxic relationships, your exhaustion level, or a thankless job, intuition is always trying to communicate, though you may not hear. It resides in a quiet place obscured by the chatter of everyday thoughts. I will take you there.

Prepare to raise your antennae. You’re constantly having intuitions about energy, but may not realize it. Suddenly, bam! A gut feeling, goose bumps, or a flash affirm what fuels or depletes you. Intuitions can be positive. For instance, you’ll feel a burst of aliveness, clarity, or tension lifting about a new project. Or negative—your skin crawls or you wilt at the prospect of a sleazy business deal. In the Positive Energy Program, you’ll get in the habit of intuitively tracking your energy response. (Mine soars around full moons, puppies, and during uninterrupted days of writing alone, but shrinks at the thought of black-tie events, greasy food, and fast talkers.) As I do and teach my patients, you’ll identify information that zings and feels right. By noticing your energy’s fluctuations, you’ll get a jump on where you’re off-center—in relationships, health, and career—so you can change.

Intuition also involves picking up vibes. People and situations can give off welcoming positive energy that invigorates, or oppressive negative energy that repels. Our colloquial language reflects these intuitions. One patient affectionately calls his gangly, six-foot-five brother a “tall drink of water”; another says, “My boss shoots daggers with his eyes.” Sensing vibes provides instinctual gauges of your comfort level.

Techniques for Sensing Positive and Negative Energy

In the mid-eighties when I’d just begun to expand my traditional psychiatric practice to include intuition and energy, I did plenty of experimenting. My good buddy for the first few years of this exploration was Michael Crichton, filmmaker, author, and Harvard M.D. A towering six foot nine, Michael has a wicked mix of intellect and humor with a cynical edge. For me, he was the perfect companion to investigate a dimension of health I’d never heard of in medical school: our body’s subtle energy system.

My world has never been the same; this was my initiation into Energy Psychiatry. I want to share with you our discoveries, and what I’ve been learning since. Being able to sense and direct our life force gets positive energy going: we exude it, attract it, and can read it in others. Our subtle system is the engine that drives well-being. Acupuncture activates energy by placing tiny needles in meridian points in the body. So does exchanging good vibes with people. First, I’ll teach you what energy feels like, a sublime experience that intuition conveys. You may perceive it as colors, light, or positive and negative vibes. This program makes real for you what Energy Psychiatry is based on: that our bodies and spirits are microsystems of energy, and that health is about balance, which intuition helps us achieve.

Friends can be the best coconspirators in charting the unknown. Michael and I set out to experience energy, a real adventure given our “rational” medical backgrounds. We were the blind leading the blind, but so curious. Here’s what we did, an exercise you’ll try later: I’d lie on my back on the floor as Michael placed his palm about two feet from my head. Slowly he’d edge closer until he described feeling “a distinct contour of warmth” inches above me—the halo depicted in sacred art. We all have halos, not just angels. Michael used the same sensing technique to outline my energy field from head to toe. Starting a few feet away, he’d move his palm nearer until he definitely felt warmth, tingling, quivering or pressure, marking an invisible energy border inches to a foot from my body. Then we’d switch places, and I’d practice with him. Michael describes this process in his autobiography, Travels: “I was terrifically excited like a kid with a new toy, a new discovery I didn’t think about, I just kept doing it. I could feel this warm contour just as distinctly as you can feel hot bath water when you put your hand into it.”

As part of the First Prescription, I’d like you to try sensing energy too. This is important because the energy that people exude can profoundly influence your health and mood. Once you know how to read it, you’ll better determine who nurtures or saps you. Practice with a friend: be playful. See how his or her energy feels.

Make Changes Now
Experience Energy Through Body Scanning at Home

Sit beside your friend as she lies on her back on the floor or a bed. Together, take a few deep, calming breaths. Once relaxed, observe your friend’s eyes, hair, clothes, then look further. Picture a capsule of light surrounding her body, what Carlos Castaneda calls “a luminous egg.” This is the energy you’re going to intuitively sense.

Start by cupping your hand a few feet over her head. Then slowly come closer. With the palm as your sensing device, notice a point at which you hit a subtle border of heat, coolness, pressure, a hum or vibration—the outer rim of her energy field. Raise your hand, then lower it against the rim until you’re sure. It’s all about feel. You also may see colors. Similarly, continue to map the subtle energy around her entire body, without touching the skin.

When you’re finished, it’s your friend’s turn. Then compare notes.

What a hoot to realize we are more than our physical selves! Each of us radiates a palpable energy. In practical terms: Have you ever sat next to someone at a luncheon and were drawn to her immediately? It wasn’t so much what she said or did, but how refreshing she felt to be around. Or how about that coworker who seemed congenial, but you always left a conversation feeling run down? We are medicine for each other, sometimes good, sometimes bad. An exchange occurs whenever you interact with someone.

Certain people give off positive energy, others negative. It’s the quality of someone’s being, a measure of the love with which they’ve led their lives. It also reflects the inner work they’ve done, their efforts to heal anger, hatred, or self-loathing, which poison us like toxic fumes. Energetically these linger, precluding joy from shining through. It’s important to grasp, however, that once you undertake the process of healing, it changes the quality of even the negativity that remains. Don’t be too hard on yourself—we’re all works in progress.

Signs of Positive Energy in People

They exude an inviting sense of heart, compassion, and support.

You intuitively feel safe, relaxed, wanting to get closer.

They emanate a peaceful glow.

You feel better around them. Your energy and optimism increase.

Signs of Negative Energy in People

You experience a sense of being demeaned, constricted, or attacked.

You intuitively feel unsafe, tense, or on guard.

You sense prickly, off-putting vibes. You can’t wait to get away from them.

Your energy starts to fizzle. You may feel beleaguered or ill.

Beginning to differentiate these energies, I was able to name something I’d always intuited: why as a child, within seconds of meeting someone, I knew whether or not I liked them. This knowing wasn’t about looks or how nice a person seemed. Rather, I could sense invisible tendrils reaching out to me from a person that transmitted information about them. It would happen before we exchanged a word. The confusing part for us is that people aren’t always as they appear. Sensing energy reveals a fuller picture. I don’t care how intelligent or attractive someone is on paper, if he zaps your energy, he isn’t for you. True chemistry is more than intellectual compatibility. Beyond surfaces, you must be intuitively at ease.

Make Changes Now
Experience Energy Through Body Scanning In The World

You can practice sensing positive and negative energy everywhere. Have fun. See what you find. The secret is to stand within two feet of someone—whether a coworker or shopper in the mall—and notice how he or she feels. Ask yourself: Am I attracted? Repelled? Unsettled or at ease? Honestly assess: Do I feel more robust or worn out?
Establish a baseline for each person. You’ll quickly know who nurtures you. If a loved one is in an arduous phase, try to cut him some slack. But also pinpoint those who consistently drag you down. Then, with a more realistic understanding, you can take better care of yourself.

I’m a big fan of being proactive in generating positive energy. The First Prescription’s formula for success: Do whatever makes your inner light brighter. In other words, try to treat yourself and everyone else with love. It’s a constant process of tuning in: finding people who support your spirit, trusting your gut-centered decisions to guide you. Then you won’t end up in a relationship that looks right but feels wrong. Or miss the chance to meet a loving man or woman because he or she doesn’t fit some preconception. When you’re with trying people, aim for the high road; find common ground rather than inflame negativity (more to come in Chapter 4). The care with which you approach life is intuitively evident in your energy field. We can feel each other’s love: that’s the great attraction. Spread openheartedness around. Stay true to your intuition. Your positive energy will blossom.

Intuitive Empathy: How to Stay Open and not Absorb Negativity

In Energy Psychiatry, my patients use intuition to understand their energetic health, and also to scrutinize their reactions to positive and negative vibes. So much happens to us that remains subliminal—the smile of a coworker; witnessing a devastating three-car pile-up while driving to work; the sight of children skating on Christmas Eve in Rockefeller Plaza—all pass through our consciousness so fast we may miss how each registers. Intuition is a master at bringing our attention to interactions, large and subtle, that modulate our energy.

For many patients and myself, staying receptive to positive energy has been the easy part. This openness I adore lets me live with more gratitude—for intimates, but also for Rick, my wisecracking Bronx-born plumber, and Khalsa, the white-turbaned mail carrier who, rain or shine, delivers packages to my door. The energetic quality of all our connections matter. Every moment seems wildly extravagant. Sipping morning coffee or gazing at the galaxies above, appreciation of positive energy instills wonder in the days we so casually inhabit.

For me, negative energy has taken more getting used to. An intuitive empath as a child, I was so attuned to people’s feelings, positive and negative, that I unknowingly absorbed them. Normally, when you have empathy, your heart goes out to someone in distress. When you’re an intuitive empath, you take on their tribulations. If a friend was upset or physically hurting, in a flash her discomfort would lodge in my body. As I’ve explained, crowded places intensified my empathy. Whereas shopping malls are havens for some, for me they were war zones: I was bombarded by the swarms of people, but couldn’t explain why. An angst-sucking sponge, I coped by shutting down. A teenager in the sixties, I numbed myself for a few years by taking drugs. Finally a wise therapist referred me to a UCLA lab that studied intuition, where I could meet other empaths. What a relief not to feel so out of control or alone. With their support, I developed ways to handle my empathy, to see it as a potent type of intuition, an asset.

Excerpted from Positive Energy by Judith Orloff, M.D. Copyright © 2004 by Judith Orloff, M.D.. Excerpted by permission of Harmony, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

For more information and lecture schedule: www.drjudithorloff.com

This is just one article that I could post
Because I know that many of you have no love of long post
No matter what the content

So I will try to keep it brief
But why?

We posses the power in ourselves to cure anything that is in us
and of us

But only by our faith and positive energy
So why do so many suffer?

Maybe it's because they don't notice how they cling to negative energy

You don't want to know any better!

You see me state on my profile that I am a
Ghetto Sufi Master in training

But most only see the ghetto

And that's cool

Weak people fall for weak game

But when you find that your life is more out of control than you have a clue how to get a better understanding or control over it?

You have only two choices

Learn more
or
Live as you are
Right now

These lifestyles are only starting points to enlightenment

But most never get past the sex

Because sex is a drug

And many will never understand my reasons for the use of the word
RESPECT

Because you are not ready to find out more

Your lives are just fine as they are

It's too much work to change

But maybe a simple prayer will help

"Let’s make a prayer: As one family, hearts joined, let’s keep saying a prayer for the world: “May our people and planet be healthy. May our people and planet be happy. May suffering be lifted. May we know enduring peace.”

But when you get up off your knees?

It's time to put your words into action

If you are ready to change

Because we all deserve



respect

Have we come too far to forget where we came from today as a people?

This year has been more than just a image of extreme change.

For many of us in America.

We have witnessed a change in what this country has been fighting to become.

More equal for all people to feel we all belong too, in the title of an image of "We the People" that is stated in our constitution that our fore fathers proclaimed as all that is fair and holy as a country united.

And in the past 70 years our history has been reformed from a image of racial divide to the true melting pot that this country has become respectfully.

While many of us have varied views of the memory and the struggle and politics of the past 70 years of changes and the dedication and sacrifice of so many for a common goal that has only as of late shown some form of positive results or not depending on the individual.

The proof is in the reality we all are now living closer together as a country.

I am not saying that we have become a more perfect union of sorts as a country.

But we have grown to become more perfect than we all were more than 70 years ago as a nation united and not as divided as before.

And in the past 70 years or so many people have fought and died for a dream that has become more of a reality today than ever before.

But I wonder...

Have we forgotten about so many who sacrificed so much to get us thus far?

Have we forgotten how far we have come in so little time?

Have we lost hope in our own growth today by forgetting how long it has taken for us to have the amount of change we now live with as a people?

Have we lost respect for the consideration that so many generations before us wished we did much more with so much we have now that we seem to still feel powerless as to what we still need to be fighting for?

Have we lost the ability to feel like we belong to a struggle that is just as needed today as it was 70 years ago?

Have we become ungrateful and unthankful for what we have thus far that so many have struggled and died for us to continue a fight that now has become uninteresting?

Have we become inconsiderate of the sacrifices so many others have made for us to be who we have become today?

Have we considered there is no debt to be repaid to our fore fathers who gave and lost so much for a freedom we now share with others who are just as inconsiderate?

I wonder about these questions and so many more like them while I watch and read so many opinions from so many others whom would not have such a voice or freedom of choice that now seem to have become more complaints as to why they feel they should have more than what they have as of late.

Many of you who now spew political views as if your views are being ignored by many others who all had less of the ability to be considered important enough to be allowed to vote less than 70 years ago.

Many of you who scream foul at the sight of racism and bigotry that was once common place and more extreme.

Yet, you do very little other than complain as a mass of people who have yet taken a torch passed on from pass generations of people who gave more for a struggle that many of you are ungrateful in your actions and deeds thus far.

Many of you think that we have grown more worthy of a freedom we have yet to build into something worth being free for. As if it has become your right to complain more than continue to fight for equality for all of us as Americans and not just for your own personal comfort and concerns.

What can you point too as repayment for what so many others gave you thus far?

Have you given enough to earn as much of a rest that many seem to be taking as not your fight anymore?

Have you forgotten or even shun the power that has been given you for the fear of not being able to do anymore than what you have done thus far?

Have YOU come this far to forget why YOU are here now?


So what's your next move?

As I was reading a very interesting book about the struggle of My people. And how they organized and formed tactics and connections to combine forces for the greater goal of getting us this far in our history.

I started to wonder why are we now doing so little to improve on what we have thus far and why we seem to not be concerned as to why the need for us all to continue to struggle together for a greater good seems to not be as important.

Maybe some of you will better understand what I'm talking about if you too choose to read this book as well.

We Will Return In The Whirlwind: Black Radical Organizations 1960-1975

http://www.akpress.org/2007/items/wewillreturncloth


I seldom read anything from many of the people who post on a regular about so many of todays issues anything about the importance of us picking up the torch left by so many great people who gave their lives in the struggle for more of the freedoms we indulge in now.

So what's your excuse?


Why do you not question yourself and offer more of yourself to a greater good than what we still suffer from today together?


We all have the power and the duty to do more than what we have thus far.

What do you fear?

Are you free enough as you are today?






respect