Crucial Minutiae

During my first week as a Montana resident, I stood face to face with a politically conservative, devoutly Christian, Bikram-yoga loving, Scottish electrician who told me to have faith that the negative ions in this pure country air will cure all ills. I took an exaggerated inhalation and smiled at him. He proceed to share his idea that negative ions could be bottled and sold. It’s no news that our environment affects our health. However, it has become popular news recently. Nicholas Kristof devoted this week’s Op-ed to the topic, linking studies that show the low incidence of breast cancer in women living in Asia. But ethnic Asian women born and living in the United States have a much higher risk of cancer. Hmmmm. Oh, plastic. I’ve long feared microwaves and, despite my family’s incessant teasing, collect glass jars for storing leftovers. But I’m not convinced that’s going to keep me in the clear.

We can intend to shift our home environment (chuck everything plastic and eat well) and our external environment (live and work in a calm and nourishing place). But let’s face it, one or both of those is a complete luxury. Two other Crucial Minutiae-ers and I recently email chatted about internal environment versus lining all the externals up in a row. Perhaps an inner peace is the ultimate healer. Then the word “disease” came up and one of them passed on the reworking of that word into “dis-ease.” A brilliant understanding. You can live a pristine, wholesome, uncluttered, chemical-free life and still feel emotionally burdened and insane. Or you might, like a monk I once knew, live in the rush of mid-town New York surrounded by smog and the throng of unpredictable people, somehow maintaining the deepest ease in your heart.

Tags: cancer, disease, Environment

This entry was posted on Monday, December 7th, 2009 at 2:41 pm and is filed under Environment, Health. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.