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The Placebo Effect is reported contributing 30-40% in anti-depressant studies. This is not remarkable given the mind may have created the depressive patterns initially.

Pushing this further, placebo in chronic pain management decreased by about 20–30% pain intensity. Again, this can be explained well as Equanimity in Buddhism (“upekkha”). The Buddha described a mind filled with equanimity as “abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility, and without ill-will.”

Harvard Medical School supports this constraint.

Placebos won’t lower your cholesterol or shrink a tumor. Instead, placebos work on symptoms modulated by the brain, like the perception of pain. “Placebos may make you feel better, but they will not cure you,” says Kaptchuk. “They have been shown to be most effective for conditions like pain management, stress-related insomnia, and cancer treatment side effects like fatigue and nausea.”

You can always expect the new-agers to jump-the-shark – with stories containing words like “quantum”. The problem with people who use faith, “the secret” or prayer against nature and biology is that the odds are stacked in favour of the entity that doesn’t have an ideology. Belief works in a domain where belief has some leverage (thought processes, memes, culture, psychosis, creativity, hypnosis, imagination, meaning etc).

One such “quantum” case study is Dr Joe Dispenza.

Joe Dispenza is an MD who claims the reconstruction of his spine after being hit truck during a triathlon. He replaced his fear by visualising the reconstruction. I’ve struggled to find evidence of this actually happening.

There is some difficulty surfacing x-rays of Joe’s spine but there is no problem buying Joe’s books, guided meditations etc at a quantum multiple of market prices. Compare with Tara Brach’s freely given meditations .

 

 

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2016/11/placebo-health-science-brain-suggestible-you-erik-vance/

 

Indonesia // new-agers pray to avoid covid-19.

compare to US, trump gone by easter “miracle”

Skillful means

Tantric

Western magical tradition

set and setting

ultimately a (or the) creative process. possibly the whole point of the human project.

Popularisation of sauna in recent years has come from Rhonda Patrick and her exposure through Joe Rogan. Specifically the benefits relate to production of  heat shock proteins , growth hormone release, feeling good and the additional benefits for detoxification, cleansing and some more speculative claims of weight loss.

Old school sauna runs much hotter and the new breed is infrared sauna which has no steam, no water, no fire. The proven benefits are:

• able to do longer sessions (30 minutes)
• does not provoke facial veins

Just plug it in. There are 2 types of infrared “treatment”:

1. Near Infrared
2. Far Infrared.

I actually started with Near Infrared a year earlier when I made a DIY setup for to facilitate healing of surgical cuts (more on this later).

Far Infrared

This is closest to traditional sauna, the “far” relates to the wavelength (1500nm-10000nm) and the purported (and I can confirm, actual) operation is to heat you from the inside out.

The big concern with Infrared Saunas is the presence of EMF (Electromagnetic Fields – radiation at low frequencies, 50 Hz from our power supplies).

Because I was trained as an electrical engineer and actually did EMF studies back when CRTs were around – I thought it was a valid point, reducing harm is a good thing.

I spent a lot of time researching and the industry is full of scams and mis-information. Clearlight and Sunlighten are 2 top brands:

1. Clearlight apparently seems to have excellent EMF credentials.  They sell an inclusion of near-infrared that for me was a hoax  –  small panels that are often too far away from the body for impact. More on this later.
2. Sunlighten was underwhelming in the ratings and the local sales contact didn’t demonstrate and specific skill in handling the question – the links sent were dated and based in labs from a deconstructed unit.

I ultimately chose the Sunstream 2019/20 variant of the Evolve 20 EHS as it had excellent EMF credentials (I didn’t measure myself but watched a lot of youtube).

Benefits

• As mentioned above, google “heat shock proteins” to understand why hormetic stress (Anti-fragility) is great for living beings.
• Longevity and Telomere protection (refer RP on Sauna and longevity and 20 year Finland study)
• Reduced incidence of dementia and alzheimer’s
• The broadest old-school benefit of detox is widely documented. One hilarious side story of sauna is that one popular extreme “Niacin cleanse” was formulated by L Ron Hubbard of Scientology (in)fame. Dr Wilson, mentioned below advises against it. Hubbard’s book has some intrigue that you need to get earlier versions (1970s?) for the magic content.
• Endorphin rush (have a sauna and follow with a cold shower Cold Shock Proteins makes you feel great!
• Weight loss – loads of contradictory opinions on this (and whether high/low heats impact results).
• Relaxation, muscle repair, stress relief, inflammatory reduction, relief from arthritic joint pain, better circulation.
• combine with skin brushing for better skin condition.

Timing/Contraindications

• Don’t sauna after heavy exercise.
• I drink at least 1 litre of water in a 30 minute session
• Don’t sauna after alcohol.
• Cold Shock Proteins are beneficially effected if you cold shower after sauna.
• Don’t push it if you are getting dizzy or panicky.
• Consult your doctor first.

Near Infrared

I read a very old school book (or posts) by a Dr Wilson** which provides patterns for DIY use of incandescent red heat lamps (just like your mum had!).

I could go on for hours about the difference between infrared bulbs and normal bulbs coloured red, but these broad spectrum lamps live in the “red” range of the spectrum and adjacent to near-infrared (750nm-1400nm).

I built a grid of 4 Therabulb with switch to control the heat – it gets HOT ?. Don’t DIY this at home kids, you can buy them if you don’t have an electrician background.

I purchased an LED panel:

• 100mW/cm2 @15cm
• Color Ratio 660nm (RED) :850nm (NIR) =1:1

This thing generates very little heat, as its basically operating lasers of very narrow spectrum, so not a lot of power (heat) in comparison to the Therabulbs.

This is placed exactly the opposite side, so you can rotate – getting heated on one-side, and getting focussed NIR on the other side. The LED panel on its own would be too cool. Sessions are typically 15mins for 360 degrees (all round) at distances of around 15cm.

Alleged Benefits

If you are to believe Dr. Michael Hamblin, Harvard University, NIR has a lot of benefits:

If there was a pill that was proven to have powerful anti-aging effects on our skin, combat neurological disease, fight depression and anxiety, increase fat loss, speed recovery from exercise, increase strength and endurance, combat certain autoimmune conditions, fight hair loss, and speed healing from injury-all with little to no side effects it would be a billion-dollar blockbuster drug. Hundreds of millions of people would be told to start taking it by their doctors every day. And doctors all over the world would call it a “miracle drug.”Here is the crazy part: That drug exists, But it’s not a pill. It’s red and near-infrared light.Red and near-infrared light have already been proven in over 3,000 scientific studies.”In the next few years, every home with has one more maybe two light therapy devices”

Specific benefit summary:

• Mitocondrial stimulation:
  • I used it post an operation for wound healing and think it healed the 7cm cut pretty quickly. The scar exists but barely visible.
  • Could be placebo but I think skin tends to be less dry/aged (I don’t put creams/oil on much)
  • blemishes and skin health (beauticians use NIR)
• Sleep preparation – I do this before bed several nights a week and think it helps with preparation for bed. I speak elsewhere about how bad Blue Light is and this Red Light approach seems to counteract that. It can be explained in a Paleo/Naturalistic way:  For millenia humans have used campfire light, from an evolutionary perspective we are adapted to have a deep  interdependence with red light, therefore we should make use of that. The result is a pre-curser for better sleep.
• Dementia and Alzheimer’s https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-24/clinical-trials-for-wearing-led-helmets-treatment-parkinsons/10836906?pfmredir=sm

A hybrid NIR/FIR Hack.

I recently implemented NIR LED bulb inside the sauna, allowing positioning for treating the skin on the face, neck or hands whilst getting your FIR dose.

Notes:

** Wilson speculates (wildly) that Far Infrared is harmful without any precision of the technology, distances, reasons. If FIR was dangerous, then IR from the sun (yep the heating part) would have killed us off millenia ago. I agree with his comment of EMF risks – perhaps this is what he meant.

 

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In May 2020, we finally got our act together to have home solar (water is still gas). With a north facing aspect but a novel curved roof, we were able to implement 19 panels without degrading the roof line to the neighbourhood. Government rebates covered around 50% of the cost – total about $5200 for a 3-phase system.

Total output is intended for 5kW but because we’ve not sloped the panels for winter sun, the rates can be seen below. The Sungrow inverter is battery ready and we’ll explore in the coming months cost viability given no rebates are expected.

Implemented grid reduction

The largest contributor is heating (cooling) of any kind so look in those places first.

1. Replaced 95% of lights with LED. Its common for 100Watt incandescents of halogens, so get rid of them. Choose LEDs that are (or have) Warm White at around 2700K to 3500K, Don’t buy Cool White at around 5000K to 6500K except for maybe kitchen/bathroom/garage work surfaces, but still consider reducing spectrums that have Blue Light
2. To reduce Replaced 95% of lights with LED. Its common for 100Watt incandescents of halogens, so get rid of them.
3. For the same Blue Light reasons, keep lighting low after sunset
4. Run washing machines and dishwasher during the day
5. Run Sauna during middle of the day.
6. Run Dishwasher,  Clothes Dryer during middle of the day.
7. As mentioned we are gas hot water, so can’t benefit here.
8. The Zip hot/cold/soda seems energy wasteful (more wasteful than a kettle), if I had my time again, I would NOT buy this.
9. We opt for gas heating in winter.
10. We have aircon but use windows mostly for cooling (being near the ocean) but obviously a Sydney Summer day with full sun is a good use of Solar to drive aircon.
11. Water tank pumps are run on daytime cycles when needed.
12. trickle charge of 12v backup power

Tracking Solar Production

iSolarCloud access (mobile App and  comes with the Sungrow 3-phase invertor (SG5KTL-MT) that we used.  The App shows live and historic generation.

This is an example chart from a cloudy day on the winter solstice. Peaks of 3.5KWatt around midday is because of our north-facing location with no shadows. We could improve the tilt of the panels.

 

The “Grid” number is bullshit, you need to buy a $700 addon to get that number right (see below usage tracking).

Trending downward into winter.

Tracking usage

I bought this gadget (Efergy Elite Wireless Energy Monitor) to track internal usage, you install it with some induction probes over wires in the meter box. I still recommend you should not do this yourself as that POWER WILL KILL YOU if you do the wrong thing, but it was easy to install.

The display sits in the kitchen, getting wireless signal from the meter box and you can see in real-time what appliances use juice. This is why its good to Sauna and run dishwasher/washing machine during the day. The Energy providers charge you 300% for electricity used vs solar electricity fed into the grid. Dickheads.

Apparently I can upload this data but have not got around to it. There are excellent conversations on Whirlpool (its like a Reddit for australian geeky home gadget DIY-ers) and my good friend Andrew Rogers’ site.

Battery/Off-grid

Did you know if the grid goes down, it takes your solar house down too? Google it. Apparently Bimodal inverters will work for both Grid and Off-grid systems, I’ve not had time to look into it as battery technology is still a high cost.

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Meaning is as convoluted as the beholder.

Following a football team, carving a career, making money are the channels of “meaning making” – often for a period of time until a crisis or relationship changes that as the central priority – for some this is good enough.

For others incessantly scratching a meta-physical itch can be a joy or curse.

Perhaps the most common path to “meaning” is family.

Next is inheriting a religion from your surrounding culture. It’s odd that the  beliefs and ultimate truths in India are a statistical majority there but don’t have a profound statistical impact in western countries where Christianity and Scientism/Agnosticism/Atheism carry the numbers. Surely truth is not girt by sea?*

So meaning would seem to be what you “hang your hat on” that has an ongoing coherence until a crisis forces a re-framing. The coward’s approach is to choose from the main menu to reduce discomfort: the football hat wearers think the Christians are delusional who think the Hindus are delusional ad-infinitum.

The famous proclamation by Nietzsche** states conundrum caused from the ascendency of rationality and the reification of science:

“God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. …who will wipe this blood off us?…”

Its fair to say that humans are meaning-making***, problem solving beings – Prismism projects explore creativity as a part of “meaning” and also a birthright. Creativity isn’t basket-weaving, its the most beautiful and responsible act for the present moment. The breaking of an old-frame and searching and uncovering a new frame (that will be broken again).

No profound solutions or prosaic “its about love”, “it about family”, “as long as you have your health” here ?. Its all of that and more.

If Nietzsche’s dilemma leads to chronic materialism (a baby boomer affliction) or nihilism (a millennial affliction) or fear/general-anxiety (all generation affliction) – the best current antidote to have deep appreciation and gratitude for each moment and to adopt practices that lean into arising resentments, fears. Meaning comes from presence clarity.

If we avoid the coward’s approach of joining some club out of sybaritic laziness (NOTE: joining an esoteric club is the same neural patterns firing) then we a coherence must be found.

Coherence of heart, mind, community, culture.

It’s an inexhaustible topic unique to each person but here are some things that I find interesting:

“Awakening from the Meaning Crisis” and related Religion that is not a Religion (RTNAR)

David Chapmans: Meaningness

Meditation

 

Education
Create
Practices

Yoga, slackline, western magical tradition,

Psychotechnologies –

RAIN, Affirmations, language, meditation

journaling

writing a book is a good type of journaling.

Alphabet in axial, arabic numerals from trade post-black-death. Roman numerals make maths hard.

Refer also Supplements and Biohacks

 

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girt_by_Sea

** Nietzsche’s complete statement is, “God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?”

*** Secularity and post-modernism’s ‘rejection of grand narratives’ inevitably lead to nihilism and a sense of meaninglessness. Combined with economically driven damage to the planet accelerates those feelings of hopelessness or extreme anger.

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Sprouting

I used to sprout in back in younger herbal days – I recently returned to include this in our meal without depending on supermarkets.

Benefits:

• non-linear growth, large harvests, several meals from a few spoons of seeds
• nutrient density – heuristically you can think of Broccoli Sprouts is 100x better than eating Broccoli vegetable. BTW steaming Broccoli vegetable is 10x better than microwaving.
• harvesting within 5-6 days.

Effort:

Is around 5mins per day, we use Ted’s Living Apartment loose sprouting approach with some colanders as seen in the picture above.

Microgreens

These trays of green are also great bioavailable foods. They have a longer period of growth in vermiculite, not as efficient speed of readiness – but look good!

Veges

Wherever we live, there is usually a marauding possum the eats sweet shoots of fruits and veges. The current combatants are possums and bandicoots and our current solution is these pods.

Things like cress, sweet potato, mint, passionfruit seem to not be interesting and can survive outside the pods but that could change in just one night.

Benefits:

Most health gurus say cruciferous and leafy green vegetables are the way to go.  They are also super-easy to grow so get on with it:

• Radishes are superfast and better than supermarket.
• Lettuce, Rocket, English spinach take a few weeks.
• Kale usually ends out being the sacrificial vege that the bugs decimate, we don’t use poison, so this is the first victim.
• Sorrell is voluminous but needs to be blanched. We like it in a creamy sauce on something like chicken.

Effort:

These pods retain water in the base, so…whilst we have rainwater tanks the pods are very economical on water. Initial setup was a few hours.

Actual gardening effort other than harvesting for lunch/dinner is 15 minutes per week.

Kombucha – 15 minutes per week

Non-Dairy Yoghurt

Native Bees
Not actually food, but we all need to help bees and they help gardens.

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Things related to being a body (the human vehicle) and what interests and nourishes us.

Foods for energy and pleasure

Movement for maintenance, cold shock proteins, ritual

Sauna for heat shock proteins, skin repair, sleep

Bloods supplements, indicators, genetics, epigenetics

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