Third Discussion in the Nature and Medicine Series. The Circle of Nature: Life and Death by Dr. John Hughes, DO

1. The Circle of Nature: Life and Death
Third Discussion in the Nature and Medicine Series
Dr.John C. Hughes, D.O.
Shaman Woo Du-An
ACES at Hallum Lake
Aspen, CO
August 15, 2012

2. The Circle of Nature: Openness to Life and
Death
 I. Introduction: “Dust in the Wind”
 II.Review: We ARE Nature, Nature is Sacred Medicine
 III. The End of Death equals Life: Why Be Afraid?
 IV. How Do we Live in the Face of Death?
 V. Nature’s Circle of Life and Death is Healthy Medicine

3. Dust in the Wind
A green-black hue
Follows the sunset
As wild thoughts
Race upon young minds.
"Is our fate
Like the sun's,
Where we hurry
Across the Earth's surface
To an unknown horizon?"
Building houses, accepting offers,
Making new contacts,
Giving everything away
That light might
Be shed upon
An ever approaching future.
Mimicing our models,
We set our minds
Upon the Goals
Secretly believing
In the reality
Lying only up ahead.

4. "Is it Stability or
Comfort that we seek?
Do we lie when we
Claim neither desire?
Why do we continue
To hunger for these
Ungraspable attributes?
Do we not know,
Have we not heard?
Or do we merely forget
In vanity, O vanity.
Is the temporal fulfillment
Of hopes, hungers,
And even heartfelt dreams
Worth the sacrifice.
Do we not see the crumbling,
The aging, the dying
Of past dreams
In our Fathers and Mothers?
Where are we headed?
Do not all waters
Flow into the sea
And again return
To the Sky?
Can we claim distinction?
Are we really
More than sand and water?
But oh how we love
The exquisite Beauty
Of snow-laden mountains,
Of a mother's love,
Of a perfect rose.
Please answer "Yes"
Not "No"
Because of the Beauty
It too cannot
Be but vanity."

5. Are we not but poetry?
Do thoughts consist of more
Than organizations of the wind,
In which we, as particles,
Fly here to there
Or twirl about in one place?
Dust in the wind,
Pieces of Earth
Filled with Holy breath
We all journey
Through birth, life, and death.
You see, my friends,
Friends of fellow dust,
We are those bodies
And they are us.
So cherish your learning
Of that honorable dust,
Because though the horizon matters
In our wheel of time,
It’s the memories that show us
Where true existence abides.

6. Review (Talk 1): We Are Nature
 We Are Animals (Mammals)
 We are like all Sentient Beings: Conscious and Alive
 We are Wild Beings
 We have Natural, Animal Minds
 If Nature is Medicine, the Medicine is You

7. Review: We ARE
Wild Beings, Inside and Out
 Think about the minds of these wild creatures we seek are:
 Independent, yet part of the web of life
 Free to live out a natural destiny in accordance with their
genes and habitat
 Subject to the laws of Nature
 Not caged in (including cages from a religion, career
advancement, parents, philosophy, etc)
 But guided and taught by elders in accordance with their
instincts, intellect, and intuition

8. You ARE Nature: You ARE the Medicine

9. Review (Talk 2): Sacred Nature Is Medicine
 Note the common phrases about Nature:
 Being Outdoors, Love for the Woods, Open Space,
Freedom
 Through loving and being those aspects of ourselves,
we begin to experience the wonderment and awe of
Nature
 In awe, our bodies, minds, and spirits truly become
Nature’s cathedrals in sacred unity with the cosmos

10. Review: Sacred Nature Is Medicine:
A Howling, Loving Mother
 Here is this vast, savage, howling mother of ours,
Nature, lying all around, with such beauty, and such
affection for her children...and yet we are so early
weaned from her breast to society, to that culture which
is exclusively an interaction of man on man. --Henry
David Thoreau

12. The End of Death equals Life:
Why Be Afraid?
 Exercise:
 Close your eyes and Be Silent
 Are you alive or dead?
 If you were not breathing, would it be
different? Would you still be conscious?
 Still scared of death?
 Why? Why Not?

13. The End of Death equals Life:
Why Be Afraid?
 Ok, So you no longer fear death?
 Is there anything else to fear?
 Are not all fears subordinate to the fear of death?

14. The End of Death equals Life:
Why Be Afraid?
 Movie: The Dark Knight Rises
 Pivotal point of the movie: Bruce Wayne is
jailed in a large well-like cavern
 He has to climb out of the well to get to
freedom and save Gotham
 Only one person has ever climbed out of the
well

15. The End of Death equals Life:
Why Be Afraid?
 Movie: The Dark Knight Rises
 Wayne (aka Batman) is challenged by an old
prisoner--He says, “You think that because
you do not fear death that makes you strong.
But why not use the strongest force in the
universe to aid you. Climb without the rope.”
 And he climbs out to save Gotham

17. How Do we Live in the Face of Death?
 So, if we are like Batman, we are live more
potently knowing our imminent death.
 What does that mean?
 It means that health in Nature is “Truly seeking life in
the face of death”
 It also means that health in Nature is “Truly facing
death in the pursuit of life”

18. How Do we Live in the Face of Death:
But what happens if we really die?
 The end of life = death; and the end of death = life (it’s
a healthy circle)
 Or, do we just die and that’s it?
 “The purpose of man is like the purpose of the
pollywog—to wiggle along as far as he can without
dying; or, to hang to life until death takes him.”
-Clarence Darrow
 REALLY?

19. How Do we Live in the Face of Death:
But what happens if we really die?
 In death, human bodies, in a very real manner,
constitute the indissoluble bond of all creatures to the
earth. Genesis 3:19 states, "…for dust you are and to
dust you shall return,"
 Death thus composes part of humanity’s and all nature
normative essence.
 While sometimes tragic, a healthy death always points
beyond itself--for example, to the fertility of the soil and
the hope of future life.

20. How Do we Live in the Face of Death:
But what happens if we really die?
 Instead of fostering the human body's reconnection to
new life and fertility in the earth, modern humans cage
dead bodies, full of plastic and formaldehyde,into air
and water-tight caskets that nullify their role in the cycle
of life.
 Because modern humans reject the idea of new life
after death, they try to immortalize the life of the human
bodies by preserving them for eons…. or do exhaustive
procedures to save some sliver of life.

21. James Brown in the casket.

22. Nature’s Circle of Life and Death is Healthy
Medicine
 Teleology: The study of ends or teleology-study of the
purpose, or end of creation
 All creation moves towards an end--either death or life
 Nothing is static
 Nature is a cycle--a circle of health that includes life
and death as points along the circle
 The whole circle of life-death-life-death is the medicine
of Nature and her Creator/Destroyer/Recreator

23. Nature’s Circle of Life and Death
is Healthy Medicine
 The “God” of Nature may be simply known a Recreator
who simply recreates and recreates in the cycle of life-
death-life
 As we get closer to God-like in our natural beings (as
we get healthier), we become more involved in
recreation.
 This priority upon recreation is seen in many of the
high order mammals--for example, the dolphin

24. Pelicans airsurf a few inches above breaking waves, using
the ever-shifting updraft to fuel their down-coast commute.
Seals bodysurf with a style and velocity that men wearing
Speedos and fins only dream about.
Dolphins torpedo through the curl in the exact position that
surfers seek, launching into the air as the waves close out.
Nature’s Circle of Life and Death
is Healthy Medicine

25. There’s no Darwinian explanation for such
goofiness. Time spent riding waves is time spent
away from the things a person or a sea lion needs
to do to survive: making money, raising babies,
catching fish.
Or maybe Darwin could explain it. As animals move
up the evolutionary ladder, they get smarter. As
they get smarter, they get more efficient at feeding
and protecting themselves and thus have more time
to play. That’s why ants never relax, and why
dolphins make surfers look like dorks.
--Steve Hawk, Waves
Nature’s Circle of Life and Death
is Healthy Medicine