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Opening Hearts: Chapter 5 Nutrition’s Nemesis: Sugar’s Outrageous Growth If I could select one substance to decrease in our diet it would be sugar. This unhealthy substance feeds the inflammation that damages arterial walls and has a long list of other harmful health consequences including cancer. Yet the average American consumes about 150 pounds of … Read more
From Opening Hearts, Chapter 5’s Five Cardinal Rules for Healthy Living – Rule 1 Nutrition When we consider all the gifts and resources we have available to us, we begin to understand that our food choices have spiritual as well as health consequences. Mindfulness and intentionality are just two of the spiritual aspects of … Read more
Recently I had the great honor of being a guest on Connie Whitman’s internet radio program, Architect of Change to talk about Opening Hearts, the book I co-created with the amazing cardiovascular surgeon Lester R. Sauvage, MD (1926-2015). Connie and I discussed the advice Dr. Sauvage shared about how to nurture the body as part of living a healthy … Read more
Like peacemaking, mercy is a habit of being. Conscious choice is the key to creating any new habit. Habits are the things we do repetitively. They are helpful to our being (such as exercise or meditation) or harmful (substance abuse or smoking). Habits are conscious or unconscious. To create peace we have to consciously choose … Read more
Here, then, is the reason for the Jubilee: because this is the time for mercy. It is the favorable time to heal wounds, a time not to be weary of meeting all those who are waiting to see and to touch with their hands the signs of the closeness of God, a time to offer … Read more
Mercy and compassion flow naturally from gratitude. I’ve seen this exemplified in people who have instinctively grateful personalities. One especially inspiring, grateful-by-nature person I’ve observed was Dr. Lester Sauvage. I was lucky enough (and very grateful!) to work with him on his final book Opening Hearts, which was his treatise on everything he found important: … Read more
When I wrote last year’s reflections about the Servant’s Way, I had no idea how much they would resonate for me throughout 2014. In November of 2013, I was contemplating what I would do for my Novena for Peace and it occurred to me that the Prayer of Saint Francis was the perfect backdrop for … Read more
Dr. Martin Luther King knew a great deal about forgiveness and Opening Hearts begins Chapter 4: Pain, Compassion, Choice, Transcendence with this quote from him: “As my sufferings mounted I soon realized that there were two ways in which I could respond to my situation—either to react with bitterness or to seek to transform the … Read more
It was only a week into the New Year and I already needed to smooth my wobbly start to 2014. But luckily, I was graced with a couple of serendipitous events yesterday that helped get me right back on track. One was a phone call with a dear, long-time, long-distance friend who changed my perspective … Read more
As December winds down, it’s time to reflect on where I’ve been and where I’m going. So what lessons learned in 2013 might guide me into 2014? The biggest one this year is that life itself is a miracle to be embraced every day with gratitude and love. It’s a lesson life has taught me before, … Read more