Spontaneous Healing

Zusatztext "DR. ANDREW WEIL IS AN EXTRAORDINARY PHENOMENON." --The Washington Post "MEMORABLE . . . DR. WEIL MAKES HIS CASE CAREFULLY AND CLEARLY." --The New York Times Book Review "HIGHLY RECOMMENDED." --Library Journal (starred review) Informationen zum Autor Andrew Weil, M.D. Klappentext The body can heal itself. Spontaneous healing is not a miracle but a fact of biology--the result of the natural healing system that each one of us is born with. Drawing on fascinating case histories as well as medical techniques from around the world, Dr. Andrew Weil shows how spontaneous healing has worked to resolve life-threatening diseases, severe trauma, and chronic pain. Weil then outlines an eight-week program in which you'll discover: - The truth about spontaneous healing and how it interacts with the mind - The foods, vitamins, supplements, and tonic herbs that will help you enhance your innate healing powers - Advice on how to avoid environmental toxins and reduce stress - The strengths and weaknesses of conventional and alternative treatments - Natural methods to ameliorate common kinds of illnesses And much more! Zusammenfassung The body can heal itself. Spontaneous healing is not a miracle but a fact of biology--the result of the natural healing system that each one of us is born with. Drawing on fascinating case histories as well as medical techniques from around the world! Dr. Andrew Weil shows how spontaneous healing has worked to resolve life-threatening diseases! severe trauma! and chronic pain. Weil then outlines an eight-week program in which you'll discover: - The truth about spontaneous healing and how it interacts with the mind - The foods! vitamins! supplements! and tonic herbs that will help you enhance your innate healing powers - Advice on how to avoid environmental toxins and reduce stress - The strengths and weaknesses of conventional and alternative treatments - Natural methods to ameliorate common kinds of illnesses And much more! ...

"DR. ANDREW WEIL IS AN EXTRAORDINARY PHENOMENON."
--The Washington Post

"MEMORABLE . . . DR. WEIL MAKES HIS CASE CAREFULLY AND CLEARLY."
--The New York Times Book Review

"HIGHLY RECOMMENDED."
--Library Journal (starred review)

Auteur

Andrew Weil, M.D.

Texte du rabat

The body can heal itself. Spontaneous healing is not a miracle but a fact of biology--the result of the natural healing system that each one of us is born with. Drawing on fascinating case histories as well as medical techniques from around the world, Dr. Andrew Weil shows how spontaneous healing has worked to resolve life-threatening diseases, severe trauma, and chronic pain. Weil then outlines an eight-week program in which you'll discover:

• The truth about spontaneous healing and how it interacts with the mind
• The foods, vitamins, supplements, and tonic herbs that will help you enhance your innate healing powers
• Advice on how to avoid environmental toxins and reduce stress
• The strengths and weaknesses of conventional and alternative treatments
• Natural methods to ameliorate common kinds of illnesses
  And much more!

Échantillon de lecture
1
 
PROLOGUE IN THE RAIN FOREST
 
LET ME TAKE YOU with me to a faraway place I visited more than twenty years ago: the sandy bank of a wide river on a sultry afternoon in 1972. The river was a tributary of the Río Caquetá in the northwest Amazon, near the common border of Colombia and Ecuador, and I was lost. I was searching for a shaman, a Kofán Indian named Pedro, who lived in a remote hut somewhere in the huge, dense forest, but the trail that was supposed to take me there left me at an uncrossable river with no sign of how to proceed. It was getting late in the day.
 
Two days before, after a long, hard drive, I left my Land-Rover at the end of a dirt road and took a motorboat to a tiny frontier settlement, where I spent a restless night. The next day, I found some Indians who took me by canoe to the beginning of a trail they said would eventually bring me to the clearing where Pedro lived. “Half a day’s walk,” they told me, but I knew that half a day’s walk for an Indian might be more for me. I had a backpack with essentials, but not much food, since I expected to be staying with the shaman. After several hours in dark forest, the trail forked. No one had said anything about a fork. I listened for the whisper of intuition and decided to go to the right. After another hour I came upon a clearing with several huts and five Kofán men painting each other’s faces.
 
I was terribly hot and thirsty and asked in Spanish for water. The men ignored me. I asked again. They said they had no water. “No water?!” I exclaimed. “How can that be?” They shrugged and continued to apply their makeup. I asked for the shaman. “Not here,” said one of the Indians. “Where can I find him?” There was an offhanded indication of a trail beyond the huts. “Is it far?” I asked. Another shrug.
 
This was a new experience for me. In the hinterlands of Colombia I had always found Indians to be exceedingly hospitable. It was the inhabitants of the rough frontier towns, the mestizo fortune hunters, who were unfriendly and intimidating. Once I passed through them to Indian territory, I always felt safe, assured that the native people would take in a stranger, help him find his destination, and certainly give water to a thirsty traveler.
 
The five Kofán men were young, handsome, and, obviously, vain. They wore simple cotton tunics, had long, glossy, black hair, and were intently devoted to their cosmetic art. After one would apply new markings to forehead or cheek, the recipient would spend long minutes evaluating the additions in a broken piece of mirrored glass, grunting approval or requesting further embellishment. This was clearly going to take all afternoon. My presence held not the slightest interest for them, and after half an hour of being ignored, I put on my pack and continued down the trail, until, several hours later, it disappeared in a dense thicket at the edge of the big river, leaving me stranded.
 
It was strikingly beautiful there, although I was inclined to view the river and forest more as obstacles than as sources of sensory pleasure. Big, billowy cumulus clouds floated above the canopy of trees. The river was swift and clear. There was not a sign of human presence, no sounds except those of insects and birds. Were it not for the sandflies, small biting pests that are out in great numbers from dawn to dusk, I would not have minded camping there. I had a hammock and mosquito net in my pack and could have spent the night if necessary, but I felt anxious at the prospect of being lost, and discouraged by the fruitlessness of my quest.
 
This shaman, so difficult to reach, was said to be a powerful healer. In a year I spent wandering in South America, most of the shamans I met were disappointing. Some were drunks. Some were clearly out for fame and fortune. One, when he learned I was a doctor from Harvard, was interested only in persuading me to obtain for him a certificate from that institution testifying to his powers so that he could one-up his rivals. I had plenty of adventures during these travels, but in the end, none of them had taught me how to be a better doctor. Pedro was my last hope. He was unknown to the outside world. I would be the first gringo to visit him, and I had high hopes that he would teach me the secrets of healing I had so long been searching for.
 
But now I was lost, and the brilliant Amazon sun was taking on the rich golden tones of the end of afternoon. Night would come quickly here, meaning surprising chilliness along the river and no chance of reaching a habitation.…