Sunshine Natural Food & Grocery | Grants Pass, OR

Brain Keeps You Healthy

The Most Important Part Of Your Immune System Is Your Brain

Making Smart Decisions Will Keep You Healthy

By Rob Pell

 Especially during cold & flu season experts and average folks alike, are always trying to improve their immune systems. When addressing long term survival from life threatening illness like cancers, doctors also focus on increasing immunity.

Doctors and scientists love to talk about the intricacies of different parts of the immune system like T-cells, antibodies, bone marrow, white blood cells, the lymph system etc.

What’s so ironic is that the most powerful and protective parts of our human immune systems are totally ignored by most modern researchers. Only 1 out of 12 immunity articles I recently reviewed even mentioned the body’s largest immune organ – the skin.. The skin is the  primary boundary between germs and your internal organs. Your skin is a barrier in much the same way we use plastic wrap to protect food. It’s obvious that if we cut our skin – break the seal, so-to-speak –   infectibrain keeps you healthyon can result.

But this still doesn’t get us to the most powerful part of our immune system, which is,:our brain! Making good decisions is nature’s universal health care plan.

When a bachelor opens the Tupperware container from the back of his fridge with the pungent smelling, 3 week old, fur covered leftovers, he has 2 choices: Eat it, or send it to a land fill. At a minimum, his short-term health hangs in the balance. Will his white blood cells or bone marrow help make the decision? No, his brain alone is the only thing protecting him from
illness.

Over the last few years every health article I’ve written for the Courier has focused on stimulating and strengthening this most basic and powerful part of your immune system. In a 2011 article about the potential health dangers of cell phones, I began it with an attention grabbing, actual quote from a 1950s ad campaign: “More doctors smoke Camels than any other brand”! The point was to demonstrate that just because a modern day “expert” endorses a product or practice, doesn’t mean
that practice will stand the test of time.

In the case of smoking, only 10 years later, solid information  become public that demonstrated smoking can be a killer. There can be no greater defeat for every part of your immune system than death. But to protect yourself  from smoking you don’t need antioxidants, vitamins or T-cells. The only part of your immune system you need to engage is your brain, by simply making the decision  not to smoke.

Regarding cell phones I referenced an article from the prestigious British medical journal “The Lancet”, considered the most comprehensive and well-referenced report on this topic to date. It warned that the potential problems from cell phones can NOT be dismissed. and also included disturbing data showing that subjects who used a cell phone 10 or more years doubled the risk of developing a type of brain tumor.

At this point it’s become more clear. To protect yourself from serious health hazards, be smart and keep the cell phone away from your head. Use it as a speaker phone or avoid long conversations with the phone pressed against  your head, even one inch away can make a difference.

Last month I wrote about natural childbirth. The United States currently ranks 50th in the world  in infant mortality rate. That means 49 other countries do a better job of keeping babies alive. The Cesarean birth rate in the US is now over 30% and doctors routinely advise 25 doses of different vaccines for babies in their first 15 months. Something is very wrong with this picture.

If we use our brains and think about it, maybe there are better ways to help insure the health of babies than following what has now become the US medical model. Remember back in the 50s, part of that model including doctors recommending that newborns not be breastfed. Thankfully, smarter thinking is now widespread.

Whether it’s the survival of our children, avoiding unnecessary cancer risks or preventing osteoporosis and heart attack, your brain making good decisions will provide more protection from sickness and disease than anything else you can do.

Be smart, educate yourself and become your own expert. It’s the most far-reaching way to increase  immunity and stay healthy.

Rob Pell owns and operates Sunshine Natural Foods in Grants Pass, Oregon and has 35 years helping people with natural foods, products, exercise and healing. This article appeared in The Daily Courier 1-16-2013.