Once Upon A Time We Had A Pet Guinea Pig...

A New Year Story And A New Year Message

My New Year Story

I’d like to tell you what may at first seem like a sad tale but please bear with me for it holds a key message for 2024.

In 2006, I accidentally harmed my son’s guinea pig. The guinea pig’s name was Sparky. The circumstances surrounding Sparky’s death were such. Sparky had a happy life – an abundance of good food, clean water, green grass, and fresh air.

Then, one evening I made the mistake of giving Sparky some sprigs of a plant called Plectranthus. Indeed, it was Sparky who first signposted me to the Plectranthus by constantly nibbling at it through his enclosure. However, the morning after he ate the bunch, a very sad little boy brought Sparky’s stone cold body to me in his arms.

Plectranthus….the plant Sparky wanted to eat, and which I stupidly gave him

As both a mother and a doctor I was mortified.

What had I done? Why had I not checked before giving Sparky the Plectranthus treat? What was I thinking? Why, why why –?

Then other rather more unsettling questions set in, and these questions pertained to Sparky himself. Why had Sparky not known what was good for him? Why had he eaten so much of the juicy plant? If one only judged by his enthusiasm, one would have thought his taste for Plectranthus had been honed by evolutionary guidance.

 Instead, it seemed to me that the opposite was true!

Sparky’s ignorance had been so shaped by domestication and farming, ancestral wits obliterated, that the poor creature no longer had any instinct for what would lead to him to good health and what was likely poison.

I forgave myself, and fortunately my son forgave me too. However, Sparky’s spirit remains with me and serves to remind me of the importance of ancestral wisdom and our human intuition too. Not only that, Sparky has had me bear witness to how humanity has fallen into the same trap. In the case of human ignorance and wilful blindness, it’s convenience, pleasure, conformity, and material wealth that is put before our own good health and often leads to an early departure from these shores.

My New Year Message

My message to you today is “Don’t be like Sparky, remember what’s good for you.” (And don’t blindly do what others tell you to do).

If in doubt, visit the World Council for Health website for some reminders on how we humans thrive and what we need to be healthy.

Let 2024 be the year we work off the tricks and treats of the last few years. Let 2024 be the year that we work on what has been spoiled.

About rectification of spoiling, Richard Wilhelm’s translation of the I Ching says:

“What has been spoiled through man’s fault can be made good again through man’s work. It is not immutable fate that has caused the state of corruption but rather the abuse of human freedom.[] Work towards improving conditions promises well, because it accords with the possibilities of the time. We must not recoil from work and danger, but must take hold energetically. [] Decisiveness and energy must take the place of the inertia and indifference that have led to the decay, in order that the ending may be followed by a new beginning.”

2024 is a new beginning, folks.

2024 is the year we remember what it means to be human.

2024 is the year we reclaim our health, freedom and sovereignty.

2024 is the year we work together on what has been spoiled, regenerating community and restoring dignity to mankind.

Humanity is on the rise again.

Rise Almighty People.

Sending you much love, decisiveness and energy from me and the World Council for Health Team. As always, thank you for your support!

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