Tidbits Galore
06/05/07 12:45 Filed in: Health News
Hey,
L.A.,
free admission for
the month of May. Use any Bank of America card as
your ticket to fifteen local museums and cultural
attractions. Visit as many participating museums as
you like and bring a guest (they get in free, too).
Learn more online at
bankofamerica.com/museums.
Climate Counts movie: http://www.climatecounts.org
More than half the water consumed in the U.S. is used to raise animals for food. It takes 2,500 gallons of water to produce a pound of meat, but only 25 gallons to produce a pound of wheat. A totally vegetarian diet requires 300 gallons of water per day, while a meat-eating diet requires more than 4,000 gallons of water per day.
More than 260 million acres of U.S. forest have been cleared to grow crops to feed animals raised for meat, and another acre of trees disappears every eight seconds. The tropical rain forests are also being destroyed to create grazing land for cattle. Fifty-five square feet of rain forest may be razed to produce just one quarter-pound burger.
PRODUCT PLUNDER OF THE WEEK: ANTIBACTERIAL HAND CLEANSERS A new study published on the Environmental Science & Technology research website found that triclosan, a widely used ingredient in antibacterial hand sterilization products, combines with chlorine in tap water to make the toxin chloroform. The researchers found that people using these products would be exposed to chloroform levels 40 percent higher than that found in tap water. Chloroform is a toxic chemical and a probable carcinogen. Previous studies have shown that the overuse of antibacterial soaps produces "super bacteria" that are able to survive exposure to antibacterial products. It is recommended that such products be used on limited and minimal levels. Learn more: http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_4535.cfm
MARK YOUR CALENDARS:
STEP IT UP! NATIONAL DAY OF ACTION ON CLIMATE CHANGE
This April 14th, tens of thousands of Americans will gather all across the country at meaningful, iconic places to call for action on climate change. We will hike, bike, climb, walk, swim, kayak, canoe, or simply sit or stand with banners of our call to action: "Step It Up Congress! Cut carbon 80% by 2050." This is an invitation to help start a movement‹to take one spring day and use it to reshape the future.
Learn more: http://www.stepitup2007.org/
PAPER OR PLASTIC? SAN FRANCISCO MAY BE FIRST IN NATION TO REGULATE GROCERY BAGS The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is considering a measure that would require grocery stores with annual sales of at least $2 million to provide customers with grocery bags made of recyclable paper, plastic that can be turned into compost, or sturdy cloth or plastic that can be reused. Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, who wrote the measure says, "By doing so, we will save millions of dollars for city coffers and for our refuse rate payers." Supervisors also note the reduction of fossil fuels needed to make plastic bags, litter in the streets, and refuse that chokes wildlife. If the measure passes, it will be implemented in as short as six months and will likely create a domino effect for other municipalities around the U.S. Learn more: http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_4467.cfm
CHIA SEEDS: FUNNY NAME, SERIOUS NUTRITION Superior to Flax Seed, Rich in Omega Acids
Chia seeds have a funny name, but there’s nothing comical about the nutritional benefits of this tiny seed. Want to learn more about chia seeds? Good Cause Wellness has just published a free 16-page report on the benefits of chia seeds with dozens of recipes. It can be downloaded at http://www.GoodCauseWellness.com If you’re using flax seeds, consider switching to chia seeds for their superior nutrition and ease of use. Chia seeds have the highest percent of combined Omega 3 and 6 fatty acids of any plant, including flax seeds. Plus, chia seeds offer 38% more fiber and 247% more calcium, with less calories and sodium than flax seeds and no cholesterol. Chia seeds are easier to use and more versatile than flax seeds. Because chia seeds have much higher antioxidant levels than flax seeds, chia seeds don’t go rancid like flax. Every order from Good Cause Wellness supports organizations like the OCA because Good Cause Wellness pledges 10% of sales to Good Causes. Learn more: http://www.GoodCauseWellness.com
TIP OF THE WEEK: FIVE WAYS TO REDUCE YOUR ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT WHEN SHOPPING This month's issue of E Magazine includes interviews with leading advocates for ecological shopping, including OCA's Environmental Scientist Craig Minowa. Here are five quick tips for becoming a green shopper:
0. Switch to environmentally friendly cleaning supplies. The use of conventional cleaners exposes your family and our environment to some very nasty toxic chemicals.
0. If you buy only one or two organic items, make them milk and meat. Most conventional milk and meat are produced on factory farms that feed their animals massive amounts of pesticide and fossil-fuel intensive conventional corn, at the same time creating massive manure lagoons that contaminate local ground water.
0. Be as conscious about the packaging as you are about the product. The production and disposal of packaging takes a heavy environmental toll. You can eliminate 1,200 pounds of carbon dioxide (CO2) every year by simply reducing your waste by 10%. While you're at it, bring your own shopping bags.
0. Buy local and regional, or at least USA-grown, whenever possible, to reduce energy and pollution from long transportation. But of course some products are not produced in the US.. For overseas products, look for the organic and Fair Trade label.
0. Buy in bulk. If you regularly buy a certain product, consider buying it in bulk. It usually has less packaging, is more affordable, and requires fewer trips to the store.
http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_5006.cfm
PRODUCT PLUNDER OF THE WEEK:
PET FOOD CONTAMINATION MOVES INTO USA MEAT SUPPLY
The pet food poisoning scandal that has prompted the largest recall of pet foods in history has spread into the livestock and meat sector. This week, the USDA admitted that the contaminated food ingredients that have killed thousands of pets across the U.S. were also used to feed hogs and chickens that have already been processed and eaten by several million Americans. Over three million chickens and pigs have consumed the tainted food. Although there have been no government studies done on the toxicity of this contamination, the FDA claims the risk is low. It’s important to note that organic animal feed was not contaminated in this latest incident, underlining the obvious point that pet owners and meat eaters should give preference to safer, more nutritious organic products (find organic pet foods here).
Learn more: http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_5017.cfm
Birth Control Alternative or Fertility Enhancer
* You're trying to become pregnant.
* You're trying to avoid pregnancy.
* You want to determine whether you're ovulating.
* You want to enhance your awareness of your menstrual cycles.
During a woman's menstrual cycle, there are only about three days when her egg is available for fertilization. Sperm can survive up to 72 hours (3 days) in the vagina and uterus, so if sexual intercourse occurs up to three days before a woman is fertile, she can still potentially become pregnant. Thus, there are about six days per month (3 days prior to fertility, and 3 days of fertility) that a woman can conceive.
It is scientifically well established that hormones filter into saliva and that during fertility a ferning pattern can be seen in saliva under a high powered magnification lens. Just prior to or during fertile days the sample will typically resemble "ferns," while during non-fertile days, only random and shapeless dots will be visible.
The Ovu-Tech is a hand-held mini-magnification lens about the size and shape of a lipstick holder. If you want to check whether you may be fertile, you simply:
1. Make sure you haven't had anything to eat or drink for 2 hours.
2. Put a small amount of saliva on the lens and allow it to dry.
3. Insert the lens into the magnification lens and push a little button to illuminate the lens.
If you are just about to become fertile or if you are fertile, you will easily see a beautiful crystalline ferning pattern under the magnification lens. This is an easy and convenient way for you to monitor your hormonal changes and enhance your awareness of your menstrual cycle. If you track your cycles and fertility on a calendar, soon you will have a keen awareness of where you are in your monthly cycle, and what is happening hormonally in your body.
Cycle awareness can be especially helpful for women who tend to have anovulatory cycles (no ovulation occurs and thus there is infertility, and no progesterone is made). If you know that you haven't ovulated in any given cycle, and thus your ovary won't be producing progesterone, you can then supplement with progesterone that month and avoid estrogen dominance symptoms such as PMS.
The ovulation kits that measure hormones in urine to determine fertility tend to be expensive, messy, and can only be used once. In contrast, at the cost of not much more than one ovulation kit, the Ovu-Tech can be used over and over, and has a lifetime manufacturer's warranty.
Magnification lenses for only $29.99 each (plus $3.00 Shipping and Handling). 1-800-528-0559
Dr. Mercola's Comment:
This is NOT a paid advertisement. I really believe that this tiny microscope offers a practical option for those who are currently using birth control pills yet seek a more reliable form of contraception. This will greatly aid that effort. It is hard to go wrong for $33 and it completely reusable. That is about the cost of one month’s worth of birth control pills.
This option is also completely non-toxic. When tracking the days of the menstrual cycle, the first day of menstruation, or bleeding, is called day 1 of that cycle. The cycle ends when the next period begins, anywhere between day 17 and 35 (with most women it's around day 28). The egg may become available for fertilization by sperm at anywhere from day 3 to day 14 of the cycle.
Interactive healing videos transcend gaming
by Cate Montana
Today, the term “healthy videogame” is almost self-contradictory. By far and away the majority of videogames, including console and handheld console games, PC games, online games, and wireless games have some sort of violent action theme or component to them. Since the early 1990s, the number of new ultra-violent games has been steadily on the rise – as have been the concomitant statistics on adolescent violent crime.
The flip side to this grim trend is a movement to improve the mental and physical health and well being of gamers through product use. Leading the vanguard is The Wild Divine Project in Eldorado Springs, Colorado, which produces positive transformational multi-media products as well as different genres of healing music through its recording label, Healing Rhythms. Its flagship product, The Journey to Wild Divine, is a sumptuous interactive videogame and biofeedback program designed to teach people how to reduce stress, deepen relaxation and develop their imaginal and creative abilities.
Last month, the company released a new product,Healing Rhythms, the first whole-body wellness program to bring together three of the most prominent leaders in the field of health and wellness – Deepak Chopra, M.D., Dean Ornish, M.D. and Andrew Weil, M.D. An exquisitely produced and interactive 15-step biofeedback training Program, Healing Rhythms gives individuals the tools to help build a happy mind and a healthy body.
“One of the most important tools you can incorporate into your daily life to affect not only the longevity of your life, but the quality of your life, is a deeper, slower breathing practice,” says - Dr. Andrew Weil. “The exercises in Healing Rhythms do just that.”
While the medical experts guide the meditation and breathing exercises, users can either watch the sumptuous screen imagery that accompanies each exercise, or switch the screen to monitor their bodies’ responses. A biofeedback unit attached to the fingers of one hand measures skin conductance and heart rate variability. The input drives the various biofeedback challenges, such as learning to juggle balls with your laughter, build a stairway with your breath, and meditate to open doors. As proficiency increases, so does the difficulty level of each video challenge. Eventually, as you begin to master your new skills with the game, you become comfortable practicing them in your everyday life.
Headed by founder Kurt Smith and chief design director Corwin Bell, The Wild Divine Project is the result of their mutual vision of creating healing products that are interactive, empowering and accessible to the general public. Their goal is to engender greater self-awareness in individuals in order to support the development of a peaceful, more highly conscious world.
“We’re really here because we believe in our mission of trying to deliver tools to people that can help them transform their lives, and for them to do it themselves,” says Smith, a Ph.D. biomedical engineer. “There is a quantum effect - the more and more people that are actually spending some time discovering themselves and cultivating their own awareness of what reality really is; the more people we have doing that, then there is a meta-network effect in terms of collective consciousness.
Kurt Smith (right) and Corwin Bell
“It’s really about self responsibility. How can I, individually, make a difference? And the more people we get off the street corners carrying their flags and yelling [for their causes], and into their meditation studios, the more effect it will have.”
The business partnership started when Smith left Medtronics, one of the world’s largest biomedical manufacturers, and started looking for a way to create an in-home, self-care health device. He went rock climbing one day with his new neighbor Bell , who had a masters degree in communication and graphic arts, and years of work in the commercial film and advertising industries. Bell started talking about his dream of developing a computer-based biofeedback device for consumers that would be fun and yet health effective. It was a perfect match. Smith started the corporation and together they set up a design studio deep in the Colorado backcountry. The mission? To create a world that could transport players into deeper self-awareness and a higher realm of consciousness.
”The concept in gaming is called telepresence,” says Bell. “The Holy Grail of gaming is being able to get the person that has a presence outside the computer screen, and all of a sudden, you work it so that the screen itself kind of dissolves into a projection; they teleport their presence into this virtual space. And from then on it’s them…. You are in there, and it is affecting you.”
Although it is common knowledge in the gaming industry that heart rate, blood pressure, respiration, and adrenaline levels increase when a gamer is shooting his or her way out of some fantastic firefight, most companies - much like the tobacco industry - deny their fantasy murder and mayhem products adversely affect juvenile and adult fans over the long term. The vast majority of studies, however, indicate that the net cumulative affect of using violent games is significant – and negative.
“Violent video games are significantly associated with increased aggressive behavior, thoughts, and affect; increased physiological arousal; and decreased pro-social (helping) behavior,” says Craig A. Anderson, a Ph.D. psychologist and member of the Executive Council of the International Society for Research on Aggression. “High levels of violent video game exposure have been linked to delinquency, fighting at school and during free play periods, and violent criminal behavior (e.g., self-reported assault, robbery).”
Unlike mainstream games which trigger adrenaline-based fight or flight physiological and emotional responses, The Journey to Wild Divine’s effects and, of course, those of Healing Rhythms, are uplifting and turned to positive use. As people learn that their emotions and other responses to the exercises affect them, they learn to control and direct their responses via the biofeedback component of the game. They learn to become peaceful, calm, positively energetic and focused. They team with the machine, so to speak, on a journey of conscious growth.
“People’s whole thinking is transformed about what a computer can be as a tool for de-stressing, etc., and having mind blowing experiences,” says Smith.
Vive la difference
Currently, several clinical studies are being done to gauge the effectiveness of using The Journey to Wild Divine in different healing modalities. One acute pain study utilizing the game is being conducted by resident anesthesiologist Paul Lynch at New York University Medical Center.
“It's been shown that biofeedback is really good for chronic … long term pain, fibromyalgia, headaches, things like that,” says Lynch. “The acute research, like someone has surgery and then used biofeedback, there's much less data out there. So we wanted to do a study of the acute area to see if we could take people right after surgery and reduce the amount of pain they feel by having them go through these different exercises and stuff in the Wild Divine Project.”
This is precisely the kind of testing that needs to be done to bring self-healing tools like The Journey to Wild Divine to the attention of mainstream medical institutions, a market Smith wishes would develop more rapidly. Every year he and Bell go to the Games for Health conference which brings together companies in the gaming industry with medical doctors, but results from the conferences so far are lackluster.
“Everybody gets high-minded for a bit and says, ‘Wouldn’t it be great. We should be doing this and that.’ But, you know, we’re really the only product at that conference that people can point to and say, ‘Here’s an example. So, yes we are, in that sense, a role model for those kinds of things.”
“The difficulty is getting the people with that [typical gaming] attitude to try it in the first place,” says Smith. “But yeah, once they do – all of a sudden they discover that there’s something they can do to get an awareness of themselves. If we can kind of help cultivate those things in the users that acquire our product, then we will have done our job.”
Climate Counts movie: http://www.climatecounts.org
More than half the water consumed in the U.S. is used to raise animals for food. It takes 2,500 gallons of water to produce a pound of meat, but only 25 gallons to produce a pound of wheat. A totally vegetarian diet requires 300 gallons of water per day, while a meat-eating diet requires more than 4,000 gallons of water per day.
More than 260 million acres of U.S. forest have been cleared to grow crops to feed animals raised for meat, and another acre of trees disappears every eight seconds. The tropical rain forests are also being destroyed to create grazing land for cattle. Fifty-five square feet of rain forest may be razed to produce just one quarter-pound burger.
PRODUCT PLUNDER OF THE WEEK: ANTIBACTERIAL HAND CLEANSERS A new study published on the Environmental Science & Technology research website found that triclosan, a widely used ingredient in antibacterial hand sterilization products, combines with chlorine in tap water to make the toxin chloroform. The researchers found that people using these products would be exposed to chloroform levels 40 percent higher than that found in tap water. Chloroform is a toxic chemical and a probable carcinogen. Previous studies have shown that the overuse of antibacterial soaps produces "super bacteria" that are able to survive exposure to antibacterial products. It is recommended that such products be used on limited and minimal levels. Learn more: http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_4535.cfm
MARK YOUR CALENDARS:
STEP IT UP! NATIONAL DAY OF ACTION ON CLIMATE CHANGE
This April 14th, tens of thousands of Americans will gather all across the country at meaningful, iconic places to call for action on climate change. We will hike, bike, climb, walk, swim, kayak, canoe, or simply sit or stand with banners of our call to action: "Step It Up Congress! Cut carbon 80% by 2050." This is an invitation to help start a movement‹to take one spring day and use it to reshape the future.
Learn more: http://www.stepitup2007.org/
PAPER OR PLASTIC? SAN FRANCISCO MAY BE FIRST IN NATION TO REGULATE GROCERY BAGS The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is considering a measure that would require grocery stores with annual sales of at least $2 million to provide customers with grocery bags made of recyclable paper, plastic that can be turned into compost, or sturdy cloth or plastic that can be reused. Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, who wrote the measure says, "By doing so, we will save millions of dollars for city coffers and for our refuse rate payers." Supervisors also note the reduction of fossil fuels needed to make plastic bags, litter in the streets, and refuse that chokes wildlife. If the measure passes, it will be implemented in as short as six months and will likely create a domino effect for other municipalities around the U.S. Learn more: http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_4467.cfm
CHIA SEEDS: FUNNY NAME, SERIOUS NUTRITION Superior to Flax Seed, Rich in Omega Acids
Chia seeds have a funny name, but there’s nothing comical about the nutritional benefits of this tiny seed. Want to learn more about chia seeds? Good Cause Wellness has just published a free 16-page report on the benefits of chia seeds with dozens of recipes. It can be downloaded at http://www.GoodCauseWellness.com If you’re using flax seeds, consider switching to chia seeds for their superior nutrition and ease of use. Chia seeds have the highest percent of combined Omega 3 and 6 fatty acids of any plant, including flax seeds. Plus, chia seeds offer 38% more fiber and 247% more calcium, with less calories and sodium than flax seeds and no cholesterol. Chia seeds are easier to use and more versatile than flax seeds. Because chia seeds have much higher antioxidant levels than flax seeds, chia seeds don’t go rancid like flax. Every order from Good Cause Wellness supports organizations like the OCA because Good Cause Wellness pledges 10% of sales to Good Causes. Learn more: http://www.GoodCauseWellness.com
TIP OF THE WEEK: FIVE WAYS TO REDUCE YOUR ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT WHEN SHOPPING This month's issue of E Magazine includes interviews with leading advocates for ecological shopping, including OCA's Environmental Scientist Craig Minowa. Here are five quick tips for becoming a green shopper:
0. Switch to environmentally friendly cleaning supplies. The use of conventional cleaners exposes your family and our environment to some very nasty toxic chemicals.
0. If you buy only one or two organic items, make them milk and meat. Most conventional milk and meat are produced on factory farms that feed their animals massive amounts of pesticide and fossil-fuel intensive conventional corn, at the same time creating massive manure lagoons that contaminate local ground water.
0. Be as conscious about the packaging as you are about the product. The production and disposal of packaging takes a heavy environmental toll. You can eliminate 1,200 pounds of carbon dioxide (CO2) every year by simply reducing your waste by 10%. While you're at it, bring your own shopping bags.
0. Buy local and regional, or at least USA-grown, whenever possible, to reduce energy and pollution from long transportation. But of course some products are not produced in the US.. For overseas products, look for the organic and Fair Trade label.
0. Buy in bulk. If you regularly buy a certain product, consider buying it in bulk. It usually has less packaging, is more affordable, and requires fewer trips to the store.
http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_5006.cfm
PRODUCT PLUNDER OF THE WEEK:
PET FOOD CONTAMINATION MOVES INTO USA MEAT SUPPLY
The pet food poisoning scandal that has prompted the largest recall of pet foods in history has spread into the livestock and meat sector. This week, the USDA admitted that the contaminated food ingredients that have killed thousands of pets across the U.S. were also used to feed hogs and chickens that have already been processed and eaten by several million Americans. Over three million chickens and pigs have consumed the tainted food. Although there have been no government studies done on the toxicity of this contamination, the FDA claims the risk is low. It’s important to note that organic animal feed was not contaminated in this latest incident, underlining the obvious point that pet owners and meat eaters should give preference to safer, more nutritious organic products (find organic pet foods here).
Learn more: http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_5017.cfm
Birth Control Alternative or Fertility Enhancer
* You're trying to become pregnant.
* You're trying to avoid pregnancy.
* You want to determine whether you're ovulating.
* You want to enhance your awareness of your menstrual cycles.
During a woman's menstrual cycle, there are only about three days when her egg is available for fertilization. Sperm can survive up to 72 hours (3 days) in the vagina and uterus, so if sexual intercourse occurs up to three days before a woman is fertile, she can still potentially become pregnant. Thus, there are about six days per month (3 days prior to fertility, and 3 days of fertility) that a woman can conceive.
It is scientifically well established that hormones filter into saliva and that during fertility a ferning pattern can be seen in saliva under a high powered magnification lens. Just prior to or during fertile days the sample will typically resemble "ferns," while during non-fertile days, only random and shapeless dots will be visible.
The Ovu-Tech is a hand-held mini-magnification lens about the size and shape of a lipstick holder. If you want to check whether you may be fertile, you simply:
1. Make sure you haven't had anything to eat or drink for 2 hours.
2. Put a small amount of saliva on the lens and allow it to dry.
3. Insert the lens into the magnification lens and push a little button to illuminate the lens.
If you are just about to become fertile or if you are fertile, you will easily see a beautiful crystalline ferning pattern under the magnification lens. This is an easy and convenient way for you to monitor your hormonal changes and enhance your awareness of your menstrual cycle. If you track your cycles and fertility on a calendar, soon you will have a keen awareness of where you are in your monthly cycle, and what is happening hormonally in your body.
Cycle awareness can be especially helpful for women who tend to have anovulatory cycles (no ovulation occurs and thus there is infertility, and no progesterone is made). If you know that you haven't ovulated in any given cycle, and thus your ovary won't be producing progesterone, you can then supplement with progesterone that month and avoid estrogen dominance symptoms such as PMS.
The ovulation kits that measure hormones in urine to determine fertility tend to be expensive, messy, and can only be used once. In contrast, at the cost of not much more than one ovulation kit, the Ovu-Tech can be used over and over, and has a lifetime manufacturer's warranty.
Magnification lenses for only $29.99 each (plus $3.00 Shipping and Handling). 1-800-528-0559
Dr. Mercola's Comment:
This is NOT a paid advertisement. I really believe that this tiny microscope offers a practical option for those who are currently using birth control pills yet seek a more reliable form of contraception. This will greatly aid that effort. It is hard to go wrong for $33 and it completely reusable. That is about the cost of one month’s worth of birth control pills.
This option is also completely non-toxic. When tracking the days of the menstrual cycle, the first day of menstruation, or bleeding, is called day 1 of that cycle. The cycle ends when the next period begins, anywhere between day 17 and 35 (with most women it's around day 28). The egg may become available for fertilization by sperm at anywhere from day 3 to day 14 of the cycle.
Interactive healing videos transcend gaming
by Cate Montana
Today, the term “healthy videogame” is almost self-contradictory. By far and away the majority of videogames, including console and handheld console games, PC games, online games, and wireless games have some sort of violent action theme or component to them. Since the early 1990s, the number of new ultra-violent games has been steadily on the rise – as have been the concomitant statistics on adolescent violent crime.
The flip side to this grim trend is a movement to improve the mental and physical health and well being of gamers through product use. Leading the vanguard is The Wild Divine Project in Eldorado Springs, Colorado, which produces positive transformational multi-media products as well as different genres of healing music through its recording label, Healing Rhythms. Its flagship product, The Journey to Wild Divine, is a sumptuous interactive videogame and biofeedback program designed to teach people how to reduce stress, deepen relaxation and develop their imaginal and creative abilities.
Last month, the company released a new product,Healing Rhythms, the first whole-body wellness program to bring together three of the most prominent leaders in the field of health and wellness – Deepak Chopra, M.D., Dean Ornish, M.D. and Andrew Weil, M.D. An exquisitely produced and interactive 15-step biofeedback training Program, Healing Rhythms gives individuals the tools to help build a happy mind and a healthy body.
“One of the most important tools you can incorporate into your daily life to affect not only the longevity of your life, but the quality of your life, is a deeper, slower breathing practice,” says - Dr. Andrew Weil. “The exercises in Healing Rhythms do just that.”
While the medical experts guide the meditation and breathing exercises, users can either watch the sumptuous screen imagery that accompanies each exercise, or switch the screen to monitor their bodies’ responses. A biofeedback unit attached to the fingers of one hand measures skin conductance and heart rate variability. The input drives the various biofeedback challenges, such as learning to juggle balls with your laughter, build a stairway with your breath, and meditate to open doors. As proficiency increases, so does the difficulty level of each video challenge. Eventually, as you begin to master your new skills with the game, you become comfortable practicing them in your everyday life.
Headed by founder Kurt Smith and chief design director Corwin Bell, The Wild Divine Project is the result of their mutual vision of creating healing products that are interactive, empowering and accessible to the general public. Their goal is to engender greater self-awareness in individuals in order to support the development of a peaceful, more highly conscious world.
“We’re really here because we believe in our mission of trying to deliver tools to people that can help them transform their lives, and for them to do it themselves,” says Smith, a Ph.D. biomedical engineer. “There is a quantum effect - the more and more people that are actually spending some time discovering themselves and cultivating their own awareness of what reality really is; the more people we have doing that, then there is a meta-network effect in terms of collective consciousness.
Kurt Smith (right) and Corwin Bell
“It’s really about self responsibility. How can I, individually, make a difference? And the more people we get off the street corners carrying their flags and yelling [for their causes], and into their meditation studios, the more effect it will have.”
The business partnership started when Smith left Medtronics, one of the world’s largest biomedical manufacturers, and started looking for a way to create an in-home, self-care health device. He went rock climbing one day with his new neighbor Bell , who had a masters degree in communication and graphic arts, and years of work in the commercial film and advertising industries. Bell started talking about his dream of developing a computer-based biofeedback device for consumers that would be fun and yet health effective. It was a perfect match. Smith started the corporation and together they set up a design studio deep in the Colorado backcountry. The mission? To create a world that could transport players into deeper self-awareness and a higher realm of consciousness.
”The concept in gaming is called telepresence,” says Bell. “The Holy Grail of gaming is being able to get the person that has a presence outside the computer screen, and all of a sudden, you work it so that the screen itself kind of dissolves into a projection; they teleport their presence into this virtual space. And from then on it’s them…. You are in there, and it is affecting you.”
Although it is common knowledge in the gaming industry that heart rate, blood pressure, respiration, and adrenaline levels increase when a gamer is shooting his or her way out of some fantastic firefight, most companies - much like the tobacco industry - deny their fantasy murder and mayhem products adversely affect juvenile and adult fans over the long term. The vast majority of studies, however, indicate that the net cumulative affect of using violent games is significant – and negative.
“Violent video games are significantly associated with increased aggressive behavior, thoughts, and affect; increased physiological arousal; and decreased pro-social (helping) behavior,” says Craig A. Anderson, a Ph.D. psychologist and member of the Executive Council of the International Society for Research on Aggression. “High levels of violent video game exposure have been linked to delinquency, fighting at school and during free play periods, and violent criminal behavior (e.g., self-reported assault, robbery).”
Unlike mainstream games which trigger adrenaline-based fight or flight physiological and emotional responses, The Journey to Wild Divine’s effects and, of course, those of Healing Rhythms, are uplifting and turned to positive use. As people learn that their emotions and other responses to the exercises affect them, they learn to control and direct their responses via the biofeedback component of the game. They learn to become peaceful, calm, positively energetic and focused. They team with the machine, so to speak, on a journey of conscious growth.
“People’s whole thinking is transformed about what a computer can be as a tool for de-stressing, etc., and having mind blowing experiences,” says Smith.
Vive la difference
Currently, several clinical studies are being done to gauge the effectiveness of using The Journey to Wild Divine in different healing modalities. One acute pain study utilizing the game is being conducted by resident anesthesiologist Paul Lynch at New York University Medical Center.
“It's been shown that biofeedback is really good for chronic … long term pain, fibromyalgia, headaches, things like that,” says Lynch. “The acute research, like someone has surgery and then used biofeedback, there's much less data out there. So we wanted to do a study of the acute area to see if we could take people right after surgery and reduce the amount of pain they feel by having them go through these different exercises and stuff in the Wild Divine Project.”
This is precisely the kind of testing that needs to be done to bring self-healing tools like The Journey to Wild Divine to the attention of mainstream medical institutions, a market Smith wishes would develop more rapidly. Every year he and Bell go to the Games for Health conference which brings together companies in the gaming industry with medical doctors, but results from the conferences so far are lackluster.
“Everybody gets high-minded for a bit and says, ‘Wouldn’t it be great. We should be doing this and that.’ But, you know, we’re really the only product at that conference that people can point to and say, ‘Here’s an example. So, yes we are, in that sense, a role model for those kinds of things.”
“The difficulty is getting the people with that [typical gaming] attitude to try it in the first place,” says Smith. “But yeah, once they do – all of a sudden they discover that there’s something they can do to get an awareness of themselves. If we can kind of help cultivate those things in the users that acquire our product, then we will have done our job.”