" Vous n' êtes pas seul "

Parce que les visiteurs de ce blog sont majoritairement anglophones  , ce texte  important et généraliste est laissé en langue anglaise avec une traduction automatique  ici : https://tinyurl.com/ymetjavr

 De : https://www.midwesterndoctor.com/p/you-are-not-alone?

May's Open Thread

A Midwestern Doctor

May 05, 2024

When someone choses to financially support a Substack publication, Substack gives them the option to send a note to its author. Recently, I figured out where those notes were stored, read through all of them, and noticed a lot of readers here had recognized what I set out to do in this newsletter and felt it was accomplishing that for them.

Initially, I didn’t see a reason to share that feedback, but then it dawned on me there were three reasons that justified doing so. Specifically,

1. I’ve always believed the most effective way to “fix” things is not to attack people who are being “bad” but rather to create a positive example others want to follow.

2. Since the rushed and depersonalized nature of medicine makes it impossible for patients to feel heard or listened to (which really bothers me), one of my goals has been to provide a way for the people here to feel heard. Initially, I tried to respond to every commenter and each person who reached out to me through other channels, but as the readership became larger, that was no longer feasible for me to do. This is turn was why I decided to start making monthly open threads like this one where people could inquire about whatever topic they wished to (and I prioritized responding to the threads). By this same logic, sharing some of the notes gives me the ability to show each of those people were heard.

3. Propaganda is often insane, so for it to work, it has to prop-up a distorted version of reality that makes everyone who questions it doubt their own sanity. This mass gaslighting hence makes each person thinks that they are alone and no one else can see what they are seeing. In turn, I believe most of you will be able to relate to the notes that were left here, see that it’s “not just you” who sees what’s happening, and hopefully have that help you facilitate forming our own nourishing connections within this community.

Note: I have long believed “awake” people who see things as they are represent a constant threat to the propaganda many societies revolve around, and for this reason, a variety of approaches are always implemented to prevent awake individuals from connecting with each other so that they never are able to gain the courage to oppose the existing system. In turn, throughout my life, I’ve met numerous awake people who shared that our encounter was a blessing that made them realize they weren’t alone, and one of my own missions has been to connect these people together (hence why I belong to a very unique network of doctors around the country). Likewise, many well-known figures in this movement have shared with me that the most common piece of feedback they receive from their supporters at public events is “you’ve helped me get through all of this because you made me realize I’m not crazy and other people can see what I’m seeing.”

Imprinting Philosophies

One of the key things that drives many people to enact massive endeavors is them holding a philosophy and them believing if they enact it upon the world, the world will accept and adopt it.

For example, in a previous article, I stated that I believe the previous leader of Libya, Muammar Gaddafi, had one of the best track records in modern history of a dictator advancing the interests of his own people (as rather than hoard the country’s wealth like a typical dictator, he funneled most of Libya’s oil wealth into it’s people, and furthermore did it in an intelligent way rather than just giving handouts). This, I in turn believe arose from Gadaffi creating his “Green Book” in 1973 (six years before he rose to power) which outlined his vision of how society should operate (e.g., that the government was obligated to provide everyone with a house) and then becoming fixated on what he wrote in it to the point it was always prioritized during his 32 years of governance.

When I was younger, I spent years pondering and debating with my peers what type of frameworks were ideal for directing human interactions and how one should lead their life. In turn, the unique style I’ve used to write this Substack (e.g., the heart centered writing) has been guided by those frameworks, and in one way, much like my medical practice, my endeavor here has been an experiment to see if my approach was “correct” and actually embodied what my fellow human yearned for.

In turn, I would argue that the success of this newsletter (i.e., in two years I’ve gone from nothing to becoming the most read anonymous publication on Substack, and the 7^th ranked one in this genre) suggests that the philosophy behind this newsletter has merit. More importantly, I believe that if this philosophy is adopted by our movement, it will allow us to be much more successful in enacting the changes we seek in society, so I have continually tried to explain my thought process in my writing so others can adopt the parts they agree with and done what I could to steer us away from divisive and unproductive discourses. Likewise, my hope is that the unprecedented success of this newsletter will inspire other authors to try and utilize my approach, and that their success in turn will help cement this approach within our movement so that that will persist long after my time has passed.

Note: one of the key things that drove the founders of Substack to create this platform was a belief that communication on the internet needed to evolve into communities which provided real connection and value to their participants rather than the headline grabbing clickbait which characterizes most of the internet. When I read their philosophy, I realized that it described what this newsletter was becoming and marveled at how well Substack’s platform was structured to allow that to happen for authors who shared that goal.

Conversely, I’ve also been influenced by the philosophies other people put forward. For example:

•Joseph Mercola believes seed oils are one of the primary causes of illness in society, he’s put a lot of work into promoting that message, and because of his work (along with my body telling me it didn’t want to eat them) I now avoid seed oils.

•Glenn Greenwald used the fame he got from breaking Edward Snowden’s NSA story to found The Intercept so that an independent platform would exist to put forward stories he felt were important (which inspired me to read the Intercept) and then left The Intercept once he realized the same censorship he’d seen consume the mass media had taken over The Intercept. When this happened, he made the decision to take the risk of moving to Substack as he felt the only path forward for journalism was for journalists to be funded by their readers (and hence be accountable to them) as that was the one thing that would incentivize journalists to prioritize producing quality content which challenged the vested interests that always bought out media platforms. His philosophy resonated with me, so after his move I began supporting writers on Substack, and I’ve since realized beyond Greenwald being correct, it also empowers the audience by allowing them to shape what enters the public discourse (rather than being passive consumers—a role the mass media always strives to place us in).
Note: I believe the grassroots support Substack’s business model enabled was one of the most pivotal things which allowed us to overturn the disastrous COVID-19 policies, so I am immensely grateful individuals such as Greenwald pushed this philosophy into the public’s awareness.

My Philosophy

For today’s open thread, I would like to share a few of the key aspects of my personal philosophy.

Shared Values

I believe that most people want similar things (e.g., the best for others) and at the core we all hold very similar values. However, since most of those values are incompatible with the populace being exploited by a predatory upper class, our rulers always follow a similar playbook—get people fixated on divisive topics that have no relation to their core interests, use those ideas to pit them against each other, and then have a divided populace blame the other side for every problem they have so they never come together as fellow human beings to stop the upper class’s predatory behavior.

For example, the COVID-19 vaccine mandates were completely unjustifiable, but by having them framed as a political issues and using propaganda to paint those opposed to the mandates as murders, half of the population readily went along with that narrative and became very nasty to anyone opposed to the COVID policies—even after it became clear no amount of boosting prevented one from getting COVID and more and more injuries began piling up.

My perspective here is by no means unique, and in each generation before me, many others have given compelling talks about how toxic the artificial divisions society forces upon us are. For example, one of my favorite contemporary examples was aired at the end of the movie Zeitgeist:

In turn, I believe one of the biggest obstacles to people recognizing their shared values and that they are not alone is the fact we are all taught to engaged in closed communication, something which inevitably leads to us being divided.

Open Communication

From a young age, like many of you, I noticed that interpersonal conflicts frequently resulted from poor communication. Eventually, we concluded the “problem” was the communication not being open, and defined open communication as having three requirements:

1: Do not expect, beg for, or seek a specific response.
2: Do not hide your words.
3: Do not hide behind your words.

Note: the core quality of open communication is your heart and mind being open rather than tightening up and closing down. When the three above rules are followed, it is unlikely you will be having “closed” communication, but ultimately, they are there as guideposts rather than being equivalent to the core quality of open communication. Conversely, there has been a big push for “nonviolent” communication (NVC), to solve the communication divide, but I frequently observe it fail because the people who use it focus on the “rules” of NVC rather than the essence of it and hence often violate the above tenets while using it.

In turn, one of the things I find immensely frustrating about society and particularly medicine is how hard it is to have open communication (as there are always things you will face serious consequences for saying—hence requiring you to hide your words) so my challenge in medicine was to see how I could violate the above tenets without closing down my body, mind or spirit and how I could position myself within the medical field so that it wasn’t necessary to do that in the first place (e.g., I prioritized making a large investment to set up an independent practice where my patients appreciate authenticity and I hence rarely have to hide my words with them). Likewise, one of the key reasons I value my anonymity on here is because it allows me to speak my truth and not have any fear of doing so.

Truth is Universal

I don’t like to attribute my beliefs to a specific person or philosophy because, like many before me, I’ve come to the recognition that if something is “true” it will be discovered again and again by different people who had no knowledge of those who preceded them. In turn, one of the things I always found the most alluring about the “Forgotten Sides of Medicine” is how often I see the same remarkable innovations be discovered, be forgotten, and then be discovered again.

Similarly, as best as I can, I’ve tried to distill the immensely complex picture around us into the core truths at work there, under the theory that if my distillation is representative of the “truth” behind it, then many here will be able to recognize what I am pointing out and have it resonate with them because they likewise will have come across that truth in what their own life brought to them.

In tandem to this, I’ve felt I’ve been placed in a unique position of responsibility to present many of the things my teachers have taught me (e.g., the importance of zeta potential) to the public. In turn, I’ve essentially tried to present it to you in the best possible light (e.g., by providing the necessary references to back up what I am claiming, by making sure I don’t introduce the concepts I really want to talk about here until the context behind them has already been presented, and to present each idea in a clear, understandable and relatable manner—something which is often tricky to do if the idea is something people have not come across before). Fortunately, this has essentially “worked out” because while the ideas are new, they have kernels of truth behind them many can relate to.

Note: I’ve also tried to engage the comments here in such a way that it helped create a community where a nourishing and non-polarizing discourse was created (e.g., I almost never ban people, I find productive ways to engage with difficult commenters, and I try to encourage new ways of thinking with my commentary). It took a significant initial investment on my end, but I am very fortunate this worked, and that there is now a thriving and self-sustaining community here many readers find they benefit from engaging with other the readers in.

Quality over Marketing

Many of our core life decisions are guided by deep unconscious beliefs we hold. In my case, two of the most influential ones were a strong aversion to pharmaceuticals (which likely saved me from becoming permanently injured by a few toxic medications my doctors tried to push on me) and a visceral disdain for modern marketing.

In turn, one of the great challenges I faced prior to becoming a doctor was having to reconcile my immense dislike of marketing with the fact you have to market oneself to get patients (i.e., every holistic healer I knew devoted a significant amount of energy into marketing their practice).

Part of my motivation for becoming a doctor was a belief that if I earned that degree, it would eliminate much of the need to market myself as I could instead piggyback on the decades of marketing the medical profession had already done in our society and hence succeed on the merits of my work rather than how well I marketed it.
Note: most of the best doctors I know do not market their practice and instead find all their patients through word of mouth. This is both because their practices are already full (so they don’t want more patients—especially ones who aren’t drawn to their medical philosophy) and because being off the radar gives them much more latitude to practice the way they want to. This in turn is a major reason why I don’t give referrals (e.g., many of my colleagues have specifically asked me not to do so here).

Conversely, the mentors who I held the greatest respect for (both for their ethics, clinical results, and business success) all told me that the single most important thing was to prioritize the quality of your results. Because of this, they would often chose to utilize the most expensive variant of a therapy if it produced a superior outcome even if that extra cost greatly reduced their profit margins. In turn, they argued that while you might lose money from those poorer margins, over time, it was worth doing this because of the superior results they got and your patients recognizing them.
Note: this holds true for many therapies in both the conventional and integrative field. For example, you get very different results depending on which platelet rich plasma kit one uses (PRP is a form of regenerative medicine), but the good kits are rarely used due to their higher costs.

On Substack, I made a decision that I would prioritize quality over everything else. For example, I don’t publish as much as frequently as I’d like to here (I shoot for two articles a week), and I take the time to make sure I feel good about each article I publish before it goes out (which often gets me down to the wire as I essentially work seven days a week since I have a variety of professional responsibilities outside of this newsletter). Similarly, because I have limited time to write, I put quite a bit of thought into exactly what I will cover (or when I will cover it) because anything I cover necessitates omitting other topics I’d like to write about.

The theory I in turn had was that this approach would likely lead to a slow but sustainable rate of growth for this newsletter (whereas had I focused on more sensationalizing topics, I would have had a quick but rapidly fading growth of the newsletter). Ultimately, this choice was motivated by the fact I wasn’t willing put my time into writing here if I didn’t feel what I produced was meaningful (e.g., it would have been much more satisfying for me to spend that time treating extra patients), but I simultaneously expected my approach would take a lot of patience because organic growth in the absence of marketing is always a much slower process.

However, contrary to my expectations, the growth here was very rapid because my approach (e.g., the heart-centered writing that open communication creates) fit into a core need of this community and many people (including those with larger platforms) felt comfortable sharing the content here due to the consistency I’ve demonstrated in my commitment to quality throughout my writings.
Note: I discussed the heart centered approach I use in writing (something I feel is essential but largely lacking in this genre) here.

I feel this point is very important because marketing based cultures inevitably promote products which promise “instant gratification” (as that is easier to sell to people) rather than meaningful things which take a steady and sustained effort to earn. This lies in direct opposition to the views in many other cultures (e.g., the Chinese believe nothing of value can be earned quickly), and I believe this mentality is responsible for many of the widespread issues we see in our society. For example, many Americans suffer from low self-esteem because they are never encouraged to work at something over a long period of time which bestows them with an innate sense of self-worth and value.
Note: in my own case, one of the things which really made me get this was how many different things people convinced me to go into (which promised rapid benefits and immense success) that ultimately were scams that left me with nothing of value. So before long, I saw that the fastest way to get something tangible and real was to commit to spending years working at something I felt had genuine value.

Empowering Patients

I have long felt one of the greatest problems with modern medicine was the decades of work it did to instill the belief into the population that “you need a doctor to be healthy.” From a business standpoint, this was an excellent tactic, but in every other perspective it was atrocious. For example, if patients believe they need an external resource to be “healthy,” this necessitates them requiring an ever-increasing amount of medical resources to be “healthy,” something best demonstrated by the fact that for decades we’ve spent an ever-increasing amount of our national budget on medicine (e.g., in 2023 America spent 4.7 trillion, or 18% of the GDP on healthcare—despite the fact its healthcare outcomes are abysmal compared to many other nations).

Medicine in turn largely follows a paternalistic model where patients are told what to do by their doctors, expected to follow it, and given scary terms (e.g., diagnoses) to justify that compliance (which are never properly explained to the patient). Because of this, I’ve essentially tried to do the opposite and empower each of the readers here through providing information I think they can directly apply to their health, and to do so in a clear and understandable way that one does not require a complex medical background to comprehend.

Note: in addition to it allowing me to help the readers here, my broader motivation for doing so is that I believe this is the direction medicine needs to go in as it is clear our current model is failing, so my hope is that the success of this publication will be one of the many things that helps to inspire that change within medicine.

The Richness of Life

From studying life and nature, I’ve noticed again and again there is much more there than what meets the eye, and if you appreciate the depth of the natural sciences, a wondrous world emerges around us. Since I get a deep level of joy each time I become aware that there is so much more to life than I had initially realized was there, I’ve sought out the branches of “transformative science” which open us up to that broader reality. In turn, I try to share those discoveries, both because I want others to experience the joy I did when I first learned of them, but also because I believe if you have an appreciation for the depth and mystery of life, it is greatly empowering as it makes one much less susceptible to being swayed by the current inane narrative being pushed upon society for the ruling class’s benefit.

Unfortunately, the transformative sciences rarely gain traction in the society since they are harder to nail into the rigid framework modern science revolves around and because many of the innovations from the transformative sciences (e.g., biophysics) lend themselves towards creating medical innovations are difficult to profit from (e.g., biophysics based therapeutics often require a single unit to treat a variety of medical conditions, whereas the biochemical approach to medicine entails using a variety of proprietary single-use pharmaceuticals over and over for many different illnesses). Because of this, the transformative sciences have been solely neglected and our existing scientific models have lots of holes which can only be addressed by adopting those “transformative” models.

Likewise, I sincerely believe that our intuition is often what opens the door to this richer tapestry of life. Unfortunately, our society again and again tells us not to listen to our intuition as that makes us harder to control. For example, one of the most common stories I hear from people who had severe medical injuries was that their body was telling them to stay away from the drug, vaccine, or surgery their doctor pushed upon them, but they eventually gave in to their doctor. Since that medical intervention left them with years if not decades of complications, that one of their greatest regrets was not listening to their intuition and instead “trusting the science” their doctor pushed upon them.

Reader Feedback

As stated at the start of this article, the general feedback I received in the notes left by paid subscribers was them noticing aspects of my philosophy and them deeply appreciating it (e.g., many felt this newsletter empowered them and directly benefitted their own health and that of their family). Additionally, I noticed that beyond many of the readers here being patients who had been harmed by the system, many were also healthcare professionals (e.g., doctors across the world from many specialities, medical students, nurses, physician assistants, acupuncturists, chiropractors and naturopaths).
Note: the original target audience for this publication were individuals who had been injured by the medical system as many close to me had life-changing injuries from a pharmaceutical (that should have never remained on the market). As I saw first hand, these people really suffer, but have almost no one to turn to for help (rather everyone just gaslights them or offers them harmful medications that worsen rather than help them).

I feel the large number of healthcare workers who read this publication is important because it shows that many people in the medical field feel exactly the same way you do and want to provide the same model of medicine you want, but they are trapped by the medical system and hence can’t. In turn, my hope is that as the years go by, this will inspire more of them to embrace the Forgotten Sides of Medicine, and to gradually build a community where awake patients and healthcare providers can connect with each other.

Since I like to synthesize large amounts of information, once I started noticing the patterns I’ve described throughout this article in your feedback, I decided to try and find a way to concisely present them (which was tricky since there were a lot of notes). Because of this, while I read all of them, many are not presented here. Additionally, while many people checked the box to give permission for the entirety of their note (including their name) to be publicly shared, others did not, so I made the choice to redact everyone’s name and anything in the note I felt could potentially identify them. As stated at the start of the article, I am sharing these notes so that you can see other people feel the way you do and to illustrate to other writers and healthcare providers that there is a large body of people who want heart centered communication which empowers them.

Likewise, if for any reason you want your feedback removed, let me know and I will do so immediately.

Responses like this are incredibly touching to read (and are part of what compels me to keep on putting the work I put into writing this publication). Similarly, I am incredibly grateful for your support as it is beginning to make a few charitable projects me and my colleagues have wanted to do for decades possible (because we felt they were critically important for the world) and because I am able to support them through work I am ethically aligned with (whereas typically one doesn’t fully agree with what their work requires them to do). In turn, it would greatly help me to know which of these comments “spoke to you” as I have made my best guess about the direction everyone wants medicine to move in, but unless I hear your perspectives too, I will inevitably have an incomplete picture.

In the final part of this Open Thread (where you can ask about any unrelated topics which come to mind), I will share the rest of the feedback I compiled over the last week. Additionally, since I’m always receiving questions about who I am (which for obvious reasons I can’t go divulge) I realized that a “compromise” would be to share one of the songs I listen to as I write as it illustrates the presence of mind I am often in as I write these articles.
Note: that song was composed by an incredibly talented anonymous pianist who emerged on the internet 15 years ago and then a few years later completely disappeared without deleting any of their accounts—leading their fans to believe they died suddenly.