Life Without Gall

1. A gallbladder with many stones. 2. The single stone in my gallbladder was as big as the one on the right.

Last month I held a ceremony of release the day before my gallbladder surgery. The time had come to say goodbye. The time had come to face the fact that I had physically, and, more importantly, spiritually abused my gallbladder beyond it's capacity to function within my body.

The physical errors I made were clear. I am a McProduct of my McSociety. Too many years of a high, nasty-fat diet and yo-yo weight fluctuations had taken their toll. By the time I had switched to a vegetarian diet the damage was already done.

The spiritual contributions to gallbladder dis-ease? A life of anger. Repressed or expressed does not matter. If anger is the main mode of ones reaction to life; if things in life just 'gall' you to no end; the gallbladder is the organ that takes the hit. In my family of origin anger was the main mode of communication. I have been angry all my life. I have carried grudges about people and situations around with me for a lifetime. I have gnawed on the bones of dead issues until they have filtered into my physical life and solidified, calcified, crystallized in the form of a rock hard lump of rage.

And the cleansing of the spiritual karma that I have been doing around this issue finally dovetailed into the need to cleanse the physical karma. I got physically sick beyond anything I have experienced in years. The pain and nausea were almost unbearable. Fourteen days after finally admitting that I needed to see my doctor I was on a gurney rolling down a hallway to the operating room.

In my meditations since my surgery I have experienced a purge of spirit and body. An opportunity for a new way to live. A release of an unhealthy pattern of destruction. Not only will I be even more aware and cautious with my diet, I will be extremely diligent about watching out for the angry mind, the grudging mind, the critical mind.

I am deeply grateful for this teaching.

[More women than men tend to have gallbladder disease for a number of physical reasons. Therefore, the link I chose to include with this posting is to a women's health site which lists several resources. Anger knows no gender boundaries, however, so the information found is relevant to both men and women.]