Inflation has been a major problem recently. The cost of items we need to live keeps rising faster than paychecks. We may even be earning more money, yet it’s a struggle to keep up with the prices at a grocery store, gas pump, or housing and utility costs — we are worse off than a few years ago. Yet the financial system is working: banks are staying afloat, the stock market is doing ok, businesses are perhaps struggling more than usual but generally are still operational. The Fed (U.S. Federal Reserve) raised rates to slow the economy, and is still anticipating a “soft landing” where inflation settles while the economy avoids a severe downturn. Does that mean that the issue of inflation been fixed?
There are many factors that contribute to the value of the American dollar, but at its core, there is only one basic formula: supply and demand cause the value of anything. When supply of something is high, it is easy to get, so its value goes down. When demand is high, there are not enough to go around, and people compete for it, causing the value to rise. In the case of inflation, the money supply keeps rising because of high government spending of money that doesn’t exist, so it prints the additional money. The money supply increases without a corresponding supply of value being added, thus inflation occurs. When value is added to the economy (greater supply of consumer goods for instance), deflation occurs as the supply of goods is greater than the demand: competition ensues, and prices drop.
Inflation is occurring because the open market is working perfectly normally. It is doing what it should do. The Fed is attempting to manipulate the supply and demand formula by reducing demand for goods and services, which is a somewhat painful process for the country — the Fed doesn’t have control over the supply of those goods and services, so they hurt the economy to reduce the ability of consumers to purchase, reducing demand. Not an easy job, because the country is looking to the Fed to control inflation, but will be quick to blame the Fed if the economy suffers too much in the process.
Simple rules
Inflation, spending, and the economy collectively show how a system can appear to be complex, but is really governed by simple rules. When it comes to health, the problem is inflammation rather than inflation. Inflammation is a sign of trouble, but it is a completely natural reaction that should happen and must happen under certain circumstances. Because inflammation occurs before all chronic diseases, we might be tempted to blame it for those diseases. That would be like blaming water for being wet.
There are certain “markers” which physicians test for to determine your level of systemic inflammation. These are in the blood, so blood tests for IL-6 (interleukin-6) and CRP (C-Reactive Protein) are commonly tested. Elevated levels of either generally indicates wide scale inflammation is occurring. IL-6 promotes the development of immune system T-cells and B-cells, and promotes antibody release. CRP tends to follow where IL-6 has caused inflammation and activates cytokines. CRP rises and falls rapidly in response to inflammatory stimulus, which could be an infection or disease, but chronically high CRP suggests a chronic infection or disease condition. This makes it a sensitive and rapid marker of inflammation.
Inflammation also runs on a simple formula: it rises or falls with stress levels. The stress could be a foreign invader, toxin buildup, or, as is all too common these days, mental stress. But if the inflammation is chronic, it means the stress is also chronic, because it ignites the immune system reaction. The IL-6 and CRP levels rise and stay elevated. So what do we do about that?
Not all in your head
If mental stress is the culprit, and you reduce your stress, you would expect those marker levels to drop. They might, but when you see studies like a recent one published in Psychosomatic Medicine, you might become confused. This study did a before and after study of older adults who tried “mindfulness” techniques. First you could be misled by the term “mindfulness” — what are you mindful of? Obviously being mindful, or especially aware, of unhappy events in the past or worry about the future would not reduce mental stress. The term is referring to being aware and focused on the present moment. A better term would be “living fully in the moment.” Regardless, the study participants did not show a significant change in their IL-6 or CRP levels after practicing living in the moment. They did however show a significant reduction in proinflamatory gene regulation, which in itself is very important, showing a change in their genetic expression due to disconnecting from problems of the past and worry about the future. We would expect the inflammation markers to follow suit. Did we get the rules wrong? Is the system broken? Do you look at your IL-6 and CRP elevated readings and give up? Not at all — we just have to look deeper.
Like the economy that seems very complicated even though it follows simple rules, inflammation can appear complicated and hard to deal with. Absolutely you need to deal with stress, because it feeds everything, but it isn’t the only factor in inflammation. A number of factors can cause inflammation, which is meant to be a healing mechanism in your body. If you are totally calm mentally but get an infection, you very much want your immune system, the harbinger of inflammation, to activate. Those levels will rise when you get injured, or get an infection — this is your system working correctly and following the rules. But if your body is toxic, a correctly operating system will attempt to counter that toxicity. In other words, even the least mentally stressed person cannot get away with skimping on diet, exercise, sleep, or hydration: they all are important to reducing inflammation and keeping it lowered.
Let’s consider other research. In a review of studies published in Nutrition, Metabolism, and Cardiovascular Disease, researchers determined that most studies show a strong reduction in IL-6 and CRP levels when vegetarian diets were maintained for at least 12 weeks. One study did not show a lowering of IL-6 levels. Again, the findings were not unanimous, so what are we to conclude?
Let’s try another study, this time on the effects of exercise. Published in Diseases, researchers from Univerdidad de Valencia, Valencia, Spain found that exercise increased IL-6 levels initially, but in the long run, chronic IL-6 levels reduced. In fact, exercise even muted the acute increase of IL-6 levels during subsequent exercise. Did the initial rise in IL-6 levels indicate a broken system? No, exercise is stress which causes a rapid but temporary (acute but not chronic) increase in IL-6. IL-6 is rising in response to the stress, but it is good stress which prepares the body for future physical exertion and partially alleviates the effects of all stress, including mental stress.
Don’t Skip a Step
Your body is very complicated, but the underlying rules are simple. Reducing chronic disease requires reducing inflammation, but it takes a multi-faceted approach to do so effectively. Just relying on one factor won’t do it. Research studies tend to focus on one factor, because that greatly simplifies the study, but your body is an intertwined set of metabolic processes which work in concert. This is normal and natural. If your lifestyle is good on all the factors, your inflammation will be low and so will your propensity for disease.
Don’t get confused by stray statistics. We get those all too often in discussion about the economy, but when you boil it all down, the rules are simple. Same with health. Follow a healthy lifestyle, avoid toxic drugs and your body will respond with health. it’s not any more complicated than that.
Dr. Nemec’s Review
In summary:
Study number one:
Living in the moment decreases pro-inflammatory gene activity, but did not decrease IL-6 nor CRP.
Study number two:
A plant-based diet did decrease IL-6 and CRP in all of the studies but one.
Study number three:
Exercise decreased IL-6.
Putting all three studies together: living in the moment decreases the gene activity that makes inflammation in the long term. Eating a plant-based diet decreases IL-6 and CRP in almost all the cases, and for those that needed a little extra help with IL-6, exercise lowered it.
IF you want to decrease the genetic activation of inflammation and to keep inflammation down permanently. It requires three factors:
- Living in the moment, fully staying out of the past and staying out of the future. Stopping to smell the roses now, living life to the full as if this is the last day of your life.
- Eating a plant-based diet. This has been documented over and over again: if you want to live long with little inflammation and little chance of disease, you must eat plants, not animals. Animals include meat, chicken, fish, dairy, and eggs. The best plants are uncooked, raw and living, preferably as green as possible.
- You must move to live. Exercise is key in health and longevity and also decreasing inflammation.
It’s interesting what the research shows. We’ve been teaching this at Revolution New Medicine for the last 40 years. It’s called our Seven Basic Steps to Total Health.
When it comes to health, longevity and anti-aging, you must address the mind and the body. As these studies showed, you cannot leave anything out. If you work on the mind, but neglect the body, you will not see the results in any major way, because you’ll be sabotaging the system with more inflammation from poor diet and no exercise. But on the other hand, if you master the diet and exercise but neglect the importance of the mind, you will still see little long-term results.
Why? Because the body is a symphony orchestra, and everything has to work together in unison, in harmony. You were designed to live in the moment, to eat plants and to exercise daily throughout the day, you were designed to go to sleep when the sun went down and wake up when the sun came up: this was the original design. This is the way the body is designed to function — the sooner we get back to the basic design, the sooner we are going to achieve health, longevity, and most importantly, living life to the full each moment.
It’s all up to you
Nobody can live in the moment for you. Nobody can change your diet but you, and nobody can start exercising permanently as a lifestyle but you, by you when you choose to do it, so it all comes down to you. You have free will to choose your destiny, but choose carefully: make a wise investment in your time and in your life, because not only will the quality of your life be greatly impacted, but so will the quantity of your life.
If you like, start with one of them — once you’re in the groove with the first one, then add the next one, and then eventually add the third one. The key is getting started and staying committed. It amazes us how many people start new year resolutions and drop them after a month or two — the problem is when the going gets tough, you must’ve made the decision ahead of time to finish it no matter how painful or what it costs. Remember, the mind does not like pain. The body does not like pain, but there’s always a period of discomfort in any change in life, and after that period of uncomfortableness, then you are in the groove: it becomes a habit and you reap the rewards for all the years to come.
The journey of 1000 miles begins with the first step, so take your first step today. Stop and smell the roses, and just remember this could be your last day — so how do you want to finish your life and your last day: thinking about yesterday or tomorrow, or living life fully today?
Go on a journey and find the place where your Father in heaven IS this is the place where you come from this IS your origin. Find the door that brings you home to your true Family and true identity, and when you do, everything else will be secondary in your life because those things won’t matter as much. And never focus on the future nor the past, because the past is gone it no longer exists, no matter how good or bad. The future will be what it will be and you will be fine when it comes, as long as you’re living from your true identity as a member of your one and only true Family.
Here are the ways we can help you in your health journey:
- Outpatient Comprehensive Teaching and Treatment Program-has the most benefit of teaching, treatment, live classes and personalized coaching. This program has the most contact with Dr. Nemec with 3- 6 month programs that can be turned into a regular checking and support program for life. This is our core program that has helped so many restore their health and maintain that restoration for years.
- Inpatient Comprehensive Teaching and Treatment Program-is our four-week intensive inpatient program for those that are not in driving distance, usually over 4 hour drive. This is the program that is an intensive jumpstart with treatment, teaching, live classes and coaching designed for all our international patients along with those in the US that do not live in Illinois. This program is very effective especially when combined with our new membership program support.
- Stay at Home Program-is offered to continental US patients who cannot come to Revolution New Medicine but still want a more personal, customized plan to restore their health. This program also includes our Learn Membership Program.
- Membership Program is our newest program offered for those that want to work on their health at a high level and want access to the teaching at Revolution New Medicine along with the Forums: both Dr. Nemec’s posts and other members posting. And also, to have the chance to get personalized questions answered on the conference calls which are all archived in case you miss the call. The Membership Program has 3 levels to choose from: Learn, Overcome and Master. The difference is at the Overcome and Master levels you received one on one calls with Dr. Nemec personalizing your program for your areas of focus.
