I gave up drinking soda 8 years ago.
A family member had serious health problems from an over-consumption of diet soda.
At the time, the news was reporting that soda drinking caused weight gain, osteoporosis, and tooth decay. But here is another reason to avoid soda (Since then, I know someone who has problems with potassium levels.)
I don't miss soda at all. I feel a lot better, and I like being able to spend my grocery money on other things, like organic fruits and veggies.
"Too Much Cola Zaps Muscle Power
Sugars and caffeine in cola are probably to blame.
Excessive cola consumption can lead to anything from mild weakness to profound muscle paralysis, doctors are warning.
This is because the drink can cause blood potassium to drop dangerously low, they report in the International Journal of Clinical Practice.
They tell of the curious case of an Australian ostrich farmer who needed emergency care for lung paralysis after drinking 4-10 litres of cola a day.
He made a full recovery and was advised to curtail his cola drinking.
"We have every reason to think that it is not rare."
~ Dr Clifford Packer from the Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Centre in Ohio
Another example included a pregnant woman who regularly consumed up to three litres a day for the last six years and complained of tiredness, appetite loss and persistent vomiting.
A heart trace revealed she had an irregular heartbeat, probably caused by her low blood potassium levels.
Once she stopped drinking so much cola, she made a full and uneventful recovery.
The investigators believe these cases are not atypical and that many people risk problems due to their intake.
The author of the research paper, Dr Moses Elisaf from the University of Ioannina in Greece, said it appeared that hypokalaemia can be caused by excessive consumption of three of the most common ingredients in cola drinks - glucose, fructose and caffeine.
Excessive consumption has already been linked with obesity, diabetes and tooth and bone problems. "
~ BBC News, 19 May 2009
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8056028.stm
====================================
"Avoid This if You Want to Keep Your Thyroid Healthy
Bromides are a common endocrine disruptor. Because bromide is also a halide, it competes for the same receptors that are used in the thyroid gland (among other places) to capture iodine. This will inhibit thyroid hormone production resulting in a low thyroid state.
Iodine is essential for your body, and is detected in every organ and tissue. There is increasing evidence that low iodine is related to numerous diseases, including cancer. Various clinicians and researchers have found iodine effective with everything from goiter to constipation.
Bromide can be found in several forms. Methyl Bromide is a pesticide used mainly on strawberries, found predominantly in the California areas. Brominated Vegetable Oil (BVO) is added to citrus drinks to help suspend the flavoring in the liquid.
Potassium Bromate is a dough conditioner found in commercial bakery products and some flours.
Mountain Dew, one of the worst beverages you can drink, uses brominated vegetable oil as an emulsifier. Not only that, it contains high fructose corn syrup, sodium benzoate, more than 55 mg of caffeine per 12 ounce can, and Yellow Dye #5 (tartrazine, which has been banned in Norway, Austria and Germany.)
A weapon of mass destruction -- in a can."
~ Dr. Mercola
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/08/22/Another-Poison-Hiding-in-Your-Environment.aspx
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
How can a society change, if people aren't willing to change?
"Why do we depend on leaders for change, while casting a blind eye towards our own personal responsibility towards it?
How can a society change, if people aren't willing to change? "
How can a society change, if people aren't willing to change? "
Change itself is a controversial topic.
I think that sometimes people change tremendously in an attempt to keep things the same.
To uphold tradition, to protect a culture and a native tongue, to "save" what is already changing...
People who do this might consider that to save what you want, you might destroy it by letting the end justify the means. If you are willing to fight for what you believe in, what you believe in can't be Peace, then. Or tolerance of diversity. Or grace and forgiveness.
So then, you say, is there anything of value that is worth fighting for? Well, yes, if what you value is gotten during the battle for it. Sometimes you only learn what is important to you as you are fighting for it. Or fighting for something else.
Fighting for Peace might be an oxymoron, if there wasn't a non-violent form of political action such as Thoreau, Ghandi and Martin Luther King advocated.
Battle can teach the value of peace. Death, destruction, loss and grief can teach strength, resilience and the need for reconciliation, cooperation, forgiveness, mercy, dignity, tolerance and grace. Or not.
The time may come when the direct personal experience of the horrors of war is not necessary to teach us these things. In the meantime, we might find that our battles divide us by those that have learned these human values, and those that have learned their opposite--bitterness, resentment, hatred, vengeance, inflexibility, intolerance, fear and paranoia.
Monday, January 4, 2010
On Change
"The purpose of life is undoubtedly to know oneself.
We cannot do it unless we learn to identify ourselves with all that lives.
The sum total of that life is God."
~ Mahatma Gandhi
Pushing against something you don't want makes the focus be "the unwanted." And thus more unwanted is brought into this world. If you think you must do what you don't want to do, or wouldn't want to have done to you in order to accomplish something, then you are inadvertently creating more of what you don't want.
Focus on what is wanted, walk in that direction, have fun doing it and people will join you.
Praise the good, appreciate those who are doing it, be grateful for everything and everyone that has part of what is wanted. Gratitude expands what is appreciated.
Love is the only thing that creates something out of nothing. People shine when loved. We all grow towards the light, the shadows are just that, only shadows. Peace comes from knowing that shadows are simply the unloved places.
Be the sunflower whose face follows the sun across the sky.
Peace on Earth
We cannot do it unless we learn to identify ourselves with all that lives.
The sum total of that life is God."
~ Mahatma Gandhi
"How can a society change, if people aren't willing to change?"
Pushing against something you don't want makes the focus be "the unwanted." And thus more unwanted is brought into this world. If you think you must do what you don't want to do, or wouldn't want to have done to you in order to accomplish something, then you are inadvertently creating more of what you don't want.
Focus on what is wanted, walk in that direction, have fun doing it and people will join you.
Praise the good, appreciate those who are doing it, be grateful for everything and everyone that has part of what is wanted. Gratitude expands what is appreciated.
Love is the only thing that creates something out of nothing. People shine when loved. We all grow towards the light, the shadows are just that, only shadows. Peace comes from knowing that shadows are simply the unloved places.
Be the sunflower whose face follows the sun across the sky.
Peace on Earth
Indicating That
. . . . . . . . . Traces
This is that. I am.
It is possible to view here the indication of ideas I have decided to give form to.
Many have been previously posted elsewhere, they are collected here like various pebbles from my walks, dutifully staying where they have been put until the electrical weather erases them.
Unconcerned with your expectations, yet aware of your excitable sensibilities, I have purposefully made this dull and uninteresting so that only the persistent will read this, as I have no desire for fame or fortune except that it is well-deserved.
I expect the kind reader to do his or her own fact-checking, and although at times I will provide references, they are not to prove truth, for that cannot be proven, but rather to further indicate new directions.
*
I can point a way, I can indicate a star, but I cannot walk for you there from where you are.
I can look, I can see, I can understand,
but I cannot look through your eyes, or conjecture with your mind, or understand how you feel.
I can touch, I can care, I can feel,
but I cannot touch your hand, dear reader, or live your experiences.
I can taste, I can smell, I can enjoy my own reward of sustenance,
but I cannot make a meal for you dear reader, though I would like to serve more than to be served. The meal we share while I write and you read, is separated by time and distance, yet I would share with you if I could, in the ways of old; food and drink served with ideas enhances the experience of both.
I can share a thought,
I can share a feeling,
I can share a memory,
a recipe,
a quote,
a photo
and a song,
but I can only know if I have shared if you leave a note, an indication, a trail of breadcrumbs that says you have been here.
The moving finger writes, and having written, moves on.
The tapping fingers type, and having typed, move toward mouse button-pushing, fork lifting, folding laundry, washing dishes, combing hair, and other mundane yet lovely tasks.
This is that. I am.
It is possible to view here the indication of ideas I have decided to give form to.
Many have been previously posted elsewhere, they are collected here like various pebbles from my walks, dutifully staying where they have been put until the electrical weather erases them.
Unconcerned with your expectations, yet aware of your excitable sensibilities, I have purposefully made this dull and uninteresting so that only the persistent will read this, as I have no desire for fame or fortune except that it is well-deserved.
I expect the kind reader to do his or her own fact-checking, and although at times I will provide references, they are not to prove truth, for that cannot be proven, but rather to further indicate new directions.
*
I can point a way, I can indicate a star, but I cannot walk for you there from where you are.
I can look, I can see, I can understand,
but I cannot look through your eyes, or conjecture with your mind, or understand how you feel.
I can touch, I can care, I can feel,
but I cannot touch your hand, dear reader, or live your experiences.
I can taste, I can smell, I can enjoy my own reward of sustenance,
but I cannot make a meal for you dear reader, though I would like to serve more than to be served. The meal we share while I write and you read, is separated by time and distance, yet I would share with you if I could, in the ways of old; food and drink served with ideas enhances the experience of both.
I can share a thought,
I can share a feeling,
I can share a memory,
a recipe,
a quote,
a photo
and a song,
but I can only know if I have shared if you leave a note, an indication, a trail of breadcrumbs that says you have been here.
The moving finger writes, and having written, moves on.
The tapping fingers type, and having typed, move toward mouse button-pushing, fork lifting, folding laundry, washing dishes, combing hair, and other mundane yet lovely tasks.
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