Respiratory System Disorders and Therapy From a New - Louis Bolk ...

already observed in fever. This also occurs with hormones that boost the metabolism, such
as adrenaline and thyroxin.
The human organism has a circadian rhythm of approximately 24 hours. The sun dictates
this circadian rhythm. Whenever we create a rhythm in life that does not adhere to day and
night, changes occur in our circadian rhythm. Human beings, as self-conscious creatures,
can remove themselves from the imperative physiology of the 24-hour rhythm, by for
example, having night duty. In chapter 3.3.2., we discussed jetlag as another example.
In short, to form a true-to-life picture of the human organism, we must think in terms of
continually changing compositions of substances and processes that function rhythmically.
Each still image or image of a dynamic in one direction, not followed by a counter-movement,
is an image of disease. The stone in the gall bladder or the kidney, the fat deposits in the
arteries, the uric acid crystals in gout, everything that no longer flows can make us ill.
The reverse is also true: everything that dissolves too strongly and remains in flow without
ever changing its dynamic makes us ill as well: the maceration of lung tissue in certain types
of tuberculosis, the formation of pus in an abscess, hydrocephaly caused by unrestrained
production of cerebral fluid, profuse bleeding during menstruation or clotting disorders, and
an on-going dissolving of bone in osteoporosis. Every one-sidedness, in which the rhythm
is lost, is pathology. The relation to previous chapters is clear here, in particular where we
stated that health is a state of homeostasis with a dynamically oscillating equilibrium, acute
disease is a temporary dysbalance of the equilibrium, and in chronic disease the dysbalance
persists and the balance setpoint is reset (section 3.3.3.).
The healthy organism is in homeostasis. The healthy balance is maintained by the rhythm
of manifold related polar processes that oscillate around a midpoint.
7.4. Rhythm in Therapy: Conclusion
We have attempted to show the significance of a process that occurs outside of its ‘healthy
rhythm’ in dimension, location, and time (Chapter 5), using the phenomena in asthma
and pneumonia. Whether it is to one direction or another, a one-sided dynamic leads to