Are You S.A.D.?
by Primrose Cooper
 THE
SUN: SOURCE OF LIFE
As light is necessary for the growth of plants and trees, animals, insects
and bird life, so it is essential for us. Plants grow through the process of
photosynthesis (photo means 'light' in Greek), absorbing light. Equally we need
to absorb light and we have an instinct for it. The sun draws us outdoors and
just to feel it on our face for a few minutes can make us feel so much better.
We need sunlight to build strong bones and teeth. Without it children can
develop rickets and dental decay. Without realising it we can suffer from light
starvation, or 'malillumination', just as we can suffer malnutrition from lack
of food.
SUNLIGHT HEALS
Doctors have long known that sunlight is a nutrient and a healer particularly
useful for tuberculosis and deep skin wounds. It is also helpful for those with
osteoporosis, depleted immune systems and the winter depression that can set in
in autumn and run until the levels of daylight increase again the following
spring.
In the 1920s and 1930s Dr Auguste Rollier (AD 1874-1954) pioneered the
building of special sanatoria high in the Swiss Alps and introduced sun baths'
at his own TB clinic at Leysin. He became the most celebrated practitioner of
'heliotherapy' (helios is Greek for 'sun'). It was only with the coming of
penicillin in 1938 and the growth of the drug industry that doctors prescribed
pills rather than free healing sunlight. Now, with the emergence again of
tuberculosis in the Western world, the benefits of sunlight are being
rediscovered.
Another practitioner who recognised the healing properties of sunlight was Dr.
Bates, an oculist working in New York at the beginning of the
twentieth century to improve natural vision. He developed a set of exercises to
enable his patients to take in as much sunlight as possible. These included
periods of 'sunning', looking at the sun through closed lids, 'palming', placing
the palms of the hands over the eyes to rest them in an enveloping blackness,
blinking, swaying and shifting. He trained his patients to focus with and
through the centre of sight in the eyes, the fovea centralis. He believed that
with this and the supporting exercises it should be possible to do without
glasses altogether. Dr Jacob Liberman's contemporary book "Take
Off Your Glasses and See" echoes Dr Bates' conviction.
SEASONAL AFFECTIVE DISORDER -- THE WINTER BLUES
This disorder, so named in 1981 by Dr Norman Rosenthal, who has researched
the connection between light and the human brain for the last 20 years, as has
Dr George Brainard, Consultant to NASA on Space Environments, is known to many
depressed people for whom the acronym SAD is only too apt. From November to
March those affected can be almost reduced to complete inactivity by the reduced
levels of sunlight. Four times as many women as men suffer from the disorder.
There is little motivation to get up in the morning or even to live at all. Low
sex drive, overeating to compensate and the inevitable weight gain add to the
misery. One woman said she would just like to be a bear -- hibernate and wake up
in the spring. What causes this condition, which is prevalent in northern Europe
and North America?
The Pineal Gland and Melatonin
We live by sunlight. It reaches our brain through the eyes and is monitored
by a very important gland -- the pineal gland, which is really a light metre.
The gland controls puberty and influences our sleep patterns. It secretes a
hormone called melatonin (mela means 'dark' or 'black'), which induces
hibernation and sleep. With limited sunlight, levels of melatonin are high by
day as well as by night. Sunlight, however, suppresses melatonin. We are, after
all, programmed to be active in the daylight and to sleep at night. Our
ancestors lived by the sun and the great rhythms of light and darkness, as do
many people currently across the globe. In fact that was the pattern for us all
until, in 1879, Thomas Edison invented the light bulb and showed that night
could be turned into day. That in itself has created a huge revolution in
society. In the cities particularly, a new indoor lifestyle has developed with a
fair degree of stress and dubious commercial advantage, as it is possible to
exchange the sunlight for working all hours.
But the light bulb has given us another means of tackling SAD. Sunlight
suppresses melatonin, but so does light from a light box. 'Bright light
therapy', as it is called, can lift moods and also has been found helpful to
those suffering from eating disorders and those undergoing detoxification from
drugs and alcohol. These light boxes are increasingly available. There is even a
dawn simulator -- a clock that lights up slowly before the alarm goes so you
wake to your own sunrise.
Research has showed that light travels to the hypothalamus, an area in the
brain rich in serotonin, which influences melatonin secretion. Serotonin levels
are lowest in the winter and are stimulated by light to control the melatonin.
Light boxes are available for private use as well as in clinics. The minimum
intensity required for phototherapy treatment (light therapy) is 2,500 lux --
equivalent to a bright spring day. One lux is the power of one candle. About 85
per cent of sufferers find partial or total relief from their symptoms after a
period of two hours (or one hour at 1,000 lux) in the presence of the lamp.
Treatment is best taken after waking and the time can be split between morning
and evening, though not late at night. Patients who start their treatment in the
autumn when their symptoms are mild are encouraged to go for a daily walk in the
fresh air and to increase the general lighting levels in their homes.
A light box can be as small as a suitcase containing six fluorescent tubes of
about 40 watt strength, creating the equivalent of 2,500 lux one fortieth the
brightness of a sunny summer's day.
MIMICKING THE SUN: FULL-SPECTRUM LIGHTING
Full-spectrum lighting contains the full rainbow range of colours with a
level of ultraviolet light appropriate to natural daylight. There are various
versions of this and some, particularly the 'cool white fluorescent', are to be
avoided. The cool white fluorescent has excessive levels of yellow and orange
and too little red or blue.
Most of our domestic lighting is deficient at the green/blue end of the
spectrum. It is concentrated on the orange/red end for a 'cosy' effect. That is
our choice, of course, but for public areas of work and leisure such as schools,
hospitals, prisons, offices and recreational spaces, it is important to have
full-spectrum lighting. Research has shown that hyperactivity in children and
their levels of dental decay have been linked with poor classroom lighting and
have improved with full-spectrum lighting.
JOHN OTT: PIONEER OF LIGHT RESEARCH
The greatest pioneer of light research in our time is John Ott, now in his
nineties. A successful Chicago banker for 20 years, he became interested in the
new field of photobiology through his hobby, which was photography. As far back
as 1927 he was working on Walt Disney nature documentaries with special
time-lapse sequences showing flowers opening and fruit ripening. His free time
was spent photographing plants under fluorescent lighting in the basement of his
home and coaxing seedlings to grow. He became intrigued by the connection
between varying light waves and plant growth. In My
Ivory Cellar, published in 1958, he gives the case of the stubborn
pumpkin which would produce only all-male or all-female flowers, depending on
what type of lighting the plant received.
Ott developed this research in the animal world too. He presented his
findings to Loyola University, Chicago, and was awarded a doctorate in Science.
To co-ordinate his continuing studies into the way in which light can enhance
the health of plants and animals -- and eventually human physiological
conditions -- he then founded the Environmental Health and Light Institute.
Ott's work was met by polite indifference from the scientific community, but
the wider public began to listen to his theories of malillumination, which is
brought about by shielding ourselves with such things as tinted windows,
windshields and sunglasses from the full-spectrum daylight we need. Over the
last 50 years the 'three-screens syndrome' (cinema, television, computer) has
driven the human race indoors and deprived us of our natural light environment.
John Ott developed an indoor lighting system to mimic the full-spectrum range of
natural sunlight.
SAFE SUNLIGHT: THE ULTRAVIOLET LIGHT DEBATE
Ott's work directly influenced that of Jacob Liberman, whose research and
personal life emphasise his concern with just how important it is to value the
sun, the source of life in our solar system. Liberman gained his doctorate in
optometry at the University of Georgia in 1973 and his Ph.D. in Vision Science
for his pioneering work in phototherapy. He has lectured extensively in the US
and Europe and treated well over 15,000 people with learning disablement and
emotional trauma, from business executives to Olympic sportsmen. He is a leading
figure in the world of holistic vision science and a patron of the LIGHT Trust.
Liberman's Light:
Medicine of the Future is a classic on the importance of sunlight and
the need for proper artificial lighting.
Liberman outlines the benefits of ultraviolet light in a climate of fear
which seeks to cut it out at all costs with sunglasses, barrier creams, and
tinted windows. While agreeing with Dr. Ott that too much ultraviolet light is
bad, Liberman points out that we all need a basic amount of UV to support life
and a healthy immune system. The benefits include the creation of vitamin D,
which we need to absorb calcium and other minerals from our diet. UV lowers
blood pressure, increases the efficiency of the heart, reduces cholesterol,
assists in weight loss, increases the level of sex hormones, activates the skin
hormone solitrol, which works with the pineal hormone melatonin to control body
responses to light and darkness, and is also an effective treatment for
psoriasis, tuberculosis, and asthma.
Dr. Liberman maintains that the UV issue has been exaggerated beyond belief
and that people have become paranoid about the sun harming them. He recommends
some common-sense measures. Spend an hour a day, at least, rain or shine,
outdoors without glasses or sun lotions. Fourteen out of seventeen suntan
lotions, according to the United States Food and Drug Administration, can be
carcinogenic if used in the sun and containing PABA (paraaminobenzoic acid),
designed to block UV radiations. Avoid exposure between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. and
do not stare directly at the sun. If sunglasses are needed to cut the intensity
of the sunlight, then use neutral grey lenses.
LIVING ON LIGHT: SPIRITUAL NUTRITION
Taking in sunlight includes, of course, the whole area of nutrition, from
organically grown food eaten within the briefest period of time after gathering
to eating no food, solid or liquid, at all but living on light itself, as the
Breatharians do. Thousands of people across Europe, the USA and Australia have
been living, it is claimed, full and healthy lives by living simply on prana,
life energy that yogis have drawn on from within themselves in time of fast.
This is no health-freak exercise, so it is said, but a spiritual path.
Jasmuheen's book Living
on Light explains the process by which this is both possible and, for
some, desirable. Her story and teaching are well worth pursuing further. They
have an importance, it is claimed, for world hunger.
It is also worth considering why we eat and what part food and drink actually
play in nourishment. What is our goal in life and what supports that goal
nutritionally? If our goal is spiritually orientated, then maybe we should be
drawing on spiritual nutrition and exploring what yogis and others have known by
so-called 'fasting for health'. Those who live on spiritual resources seem to be
more fit and full of energy sometimes than those eating and drinking more
conventionally. For this, it is important to gain an understanding of prana and
the pranic currents within our system.
LIGHT RHYTHMS AND CYCLES
We have spoken at length of the sun, but there are other sources of light
that affect us -- the moon, the stars, the planets and even the comets. Together
they all demonstrate a rhythm, a seasonal ebb and flow, a predictable cycle, as
indeed all life does. For the most part we rise with the sun and sleep when it
has set sharing its 24-hour cycle. The moon, which pulls the tides and affects
not only a woman's menstrual cycle but also the body fluid levels of us all,
waxes and wanes over 28 days. It is said that crops should be planted on a
waxing rather than on a waning moon. The seasons turn, spring giving way to
summer which in turn gives way to autumn and to winter.
These great bio-rhythms are inseparable from all sources of life, even the
most occasional such as the comet HaleBopp. It is from the movement of the
stars, their rising and setting, that we have made time -- for it is a human
construct -- putting parameters on an infinity of sameness and charting the
comings and goings of our sources of light.
There is a human resonance with the seasons in the seven ages of man, as the
child becomes the man and then passes perhaps to a second childhood before he
dies -- maybe, as many say, to repeat the cycle of lives until he has become
enlightened and has no need to return. Life is cyclical in an upward direction,
like a spiral -- a pattern borne out in many ways. We retreat in order to
advance the better and each night withdraw into darkness that we may resonate
more truly with the new light of the coming day.
 This
article is excerpted from The Healing Power of Light, ?2001, by Primrose
Cooper, Inc. Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Weiser Books, Inc. www.weiserbooks.com
Info/Order
this book.
About the Author
Primrose
Cooper is a colour therapist and a Radionics Practitioner, who opened the
Meridian Center in England for treatment and training in 1995. She has served as
administrator for the Light '98 conference at Reading University and as a
speaker at The Light and Sound conference in Chicago, sponsored by the Spectrum
Institute for Wellness, Education and Research with the Chicago Medical Society.
An avid teacher and speaker, she is currently planning Light, Colour and Sound
for Health in the 21st Century, to be held at Queens College, Cambridge,
England. This is her first book. She lives in Uckfield, England.
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