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Upcoming Events
3-week Intensive at New Lebanon, New York
Healing with Whole Foods —
Asian Traditions in Modern Nutrition
with Paul Pitchford and staff
August 8th - 28th, 2009
Whole foods are now heralded by leading nutritional authorities as the most effective dietary approach. This intensive course—with two additional trainings this year—includes in-depth diagnostic methods that assist you in making custom nutrition and lifestyle plans. You will be shown how to recognize imbalance and restore harmony, using the principles and information in Paul Pitchford's classic text, Healing with Whole Foods: Asian Traditions and Modern Nutrition.
In addition to a wealth of nutritional information, this intensive features training that opens one's mind to the experience of life force healing energy (Qi) and to the guidance by our highest intelligence (Spirit), creating a sense of unity in all aspects of life. This program is based on the assumption that to succeed in whole foods nutrition, mindful awareness must merge with diet so that one's attitude, desires, and emotions support quality food choices.
This course includes the following:
Foundations of Nutrition
- The value of a whole foods diet, including the latest science on the remarkable action of glyco-nutrition for tonifying immunity and overcoming virtually every type of degenerative disease
- Understanding emotional demeanor and roots of responsible nutrition within the Ayurvedic Sattvic diet
- Nutrition basics, including insights into fats and oils and the fatty acids to use in therapy, proteins and whole-food sources of amino acids, sweeteners and their impact on microbial and parasitic infections, green super foods including how to utilize the substantial healing benefits of micro-algae and cereal grasses, cooked and raw food therapies that are client specific, fasting and cleansing protocols for modern people, food combining made simple, food for children and elders, overcoming modern stressors such as radiation at home and in the workplace, medicinal use of herbs and spices in food preparation, evaluations of various popular diets, and more
- Quality versus Quantity: Consuming for the whole person and planetary health; awareness of where our food comes from, how it is grown, and the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) approach to seasonal diet
- Demonstration of food preparation such as: probiotic rich ferments (sauerkraut & kimchee), sprouted soymilk and soy yogurt, nut and seed kefir, natural leaven bread, sprouted grain dishes, beans and legumes, and congees. How to, in a few hours, plan and actually prepare the food in a simple menu for the coming week.
Fundamentals of Chinese Medicine:
Assessment and Treatment
- Law of the Five Elements and Five Flavors, the Six Pernicious Influences, the Eight Principles, the Twelve Organ systems and their major syndromes (e.g., spleen Qi deficiency, kidney Yin deficiency) along with nutritional remedies for these syndromes
- Techniques covered for proper assessment and recognition of excesses, deficiencies and imbalances will include: the tongue, the pulses, facial diagnosis and key acupoints (below)
- Tai Ji and medical Qi Gong practices, essential for developing your ability to experience, perceive and influence Qi flowing in the body. Learn how to recommend these exercises to restore balance
- Acupuncture points and meridians; you will learn to sense via touch the qi vitality of these diagnostic areas. Healing touch is a primary diagnostic tool for our nutrition counseling. With this system of assessment you feel the actual energetic condition of the organs, e.g., the precise degree of liver stagnation can often be sensed via skilled touch better than any other method. You will also receive a self acupressure system that you can provide to your clients to hasten healing
- Ancient Chinese breathing practices and Dhyana-Zen meditation methods for sparking regeneration, Dharma discussions about the nature of life and food, and East Asian Pure Land methods of mindful walking and chanting. These skills engender success in every facet of life because they build, stabilize, and focus the mind.
Facilitating Whole Foods Nutrition: Educating and Counseling Skills
- "Clinical Theater" where you will learn basic nutritional assessment and recommendation skills for your clients
- Highly effective cleansing and renewal protocols developed by Paul Pitchford over the past 30 years — approaches that cleanse toxic residue from the body and purge excesses such as yeasts, parasites, and heavy metals. Such approaches have benefited individuals worldwide
- The remarkable functions of whole food therapy in overcoming many imbalances (e.g., infections and inflammations, poor immunity, digestive upset, blood sugar imbalances, obesity, depression, addictions) as well as degenerations, especially diabetes, heart disease, cancer and arthritis.
Special offerings in this year's intensive —
A module on fertility and women’s health will be taught by Jeanie Bussell, L.AC, one of the leading fertility practitioners in the US. She will present menstrual health and gynecological care and why proper nutrition is important to optimize fertility. Read more...
Whole Foods Chef and Certified Holistic Health Counselor Robin Gentry McGee will offer trainings in preparing healthful meals efficiently; stocking the whole foods kitchen; how to shop; food diary therapy and many more useful tools to utilize in private practice or in your dietary journey. She will also discuss environmental toxins, non-toxic skin care and household cleaning products — how to create your own, as well as identify safe commercial products. Read more...
The Integrative Healing Arts Advantage
- Featuring an emotionally secure healing and learning environment at the inspiring Abode of the Message Retreat Center, nestled in the gentle Berkshire mountains of upstate New York.
- Creative organic, whole-food meals prepared with leading edge methods
- A unique and truly integrative Whole Foods program: delivering a fusion of modern nutritional science with ancient traditions, supported by TCM theory, meridian-based bodywork, meditation, and Tai Ji/Qi Gong
- The only nutrition program to emphasize Qi-assessment via [Zen Shiatsu] acupoints and TCM as primary diagnostic tools, while utilizing sound scientific principles
Upon successful completion, participants will receive a 140-hour certificate of completion endorsed by Paul Pitchford.
21 Days, 140 Hours Tuition: $1995 plus accommodations
What people say about the Healing with Whole Foods Program —
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Paul Pitchford studied and apprenticed with masters of pre-Revolutionary* Traditional Chinese medicine, nutrition, and Tai Ji and Chan (Zen) meditation. His landmark book, Healing with Whole Foods: Asian Traditions and Modern Nutrition (North Atlantic Books, soon to be available in 7 languages, including Chinese), forms the foundation of his unique dietary teachings, which unify Eastern and Western therapies.
Over the past 12 years Paul has been a key lecturer with the prestigious Institute for Integrative Nutrition in New York City. His work has become a primary impetus behind the most fundamental, clinically effective and innovative dietary movement today, widely known as “whole foods nutrition.” He sees a universal shift to whole foods nutrition as essential for overcoming ecologic ravages to the Earth as well as quelling pervasive disease and degeneration among her peoples.
Paul has been teaching nutrition in the context of foundational healing for 38 years. This approach prioritizes three basic integrative steps in a person’s pathway to enduring health: a) awareness practices, b) mindful movement including yoga, Tai Ji and Qi Gong, and c) nutrition based on regional, unrefined (whole) foods. He has designed and taught programs at Heartwood Institute regularly for the last 25 years. He currently receives invitations to teach worldwide and has given seminars at colleges (including Harvard), schools of acupuncture, nutrition and various healing arts, and on major radio shows.
* Teachings developed prior to the Chinese Cultural Revolution incorporate an abundance of ancient methods and traditional values.
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