SPIRITUAL DEFENSIVENESS OR
LIFESTYLE STRESS PATTERN
This is an amazing newer hair mineral analysis pattern. I call it the lifestyle pattern, or out of integrity pattern.
DEFINITION
The pattern is present whenever the calcium/magnesium ratio in a hair sample that has not been washed at the laboratory is greater than about 13.5:1. The higher the ratio above 13.5, the more important is the imbalance.
BASIC MEANING
When this pattern is present on an initial or a retest hair analysis, it indicates that something in a person’s lifestyle or outer life is out of integrity and interfering with health.
BASIC CAUSES
Situations that cause this pattern are somewhat different in adults and in children.
In adults, the causes are:
- Job or career problems.
- Close relationship difficulties, such as remaining in a marriage when one should leave, or not being willing to work on the marriage to improve it.
- Drug use, including any use of marijuana. Social drinking of alcohol, however, does not cause the pattern. This seems unusual, but it is true. This is one reason I cannot ever recommend the use of pot or CBD oil.
- Homosexuality in men or women causes it.
- A bad attitude, usually a negative attitude about life.
In children, causes are:
- Family or parent-related issues. A common one is a bad attitude of a child toward his parents. Child abuse will also cause the pattern.
- School problems.
HISTORY
This pattern was discovered after Dr. Paul Eck’s passing in 1996. It has been observed many times, since then, and the incidence of the pattern appears to be increasing, in fact.
UNDERSTANDING THE PATTERN
When the calcium/magnesium ratio is above about 13.5 on an initial hair mineral analysis, the following appears to be the case:
1. It is not about the carbohydrates in the diet, or only about the diet. This is important as the elevated Ca/Mg previously was thought to relate only to the amount of carbohydrates in the diet.
It is possible that the carbohydrates are excessive and one is exceeding one’s carbohydrate tolerance, but the spiritual defensiveness pattern means far more than this.
2. It has to do with a factor in a person’s lifestyle or attitude that no longer serves the person. This might be:
a. A personal relationship that is not working well for a person. This could be a marriage, but it can also be any personal relationship, such as parent to child or some other.
b. A work or job-related relationship or situation that is not working to the person’s best interest. This could be the type of work, or the office situation, or something else to do with one’s work, job or career.
c. Another relationship, including a relationship with alcohol, for example, or an attitude, which is a relationship with an idea in one’s head.
d. Drug use. The use of any recreational drugs often causes this pattern. This includes marijuana. It does not occur with the use of medical drugs, however.
e. Rarely, it may have to do with a generally sloppy or disorganized lifestyle, rather than a particular lifestyle factor.
f. Another situation. Occasionally, the pattern has to do with one’s schooling, one’s location, a family matter or something else that impacts the lifestyle.
g. Homosexuality will cause the pattern in both men and women.
3. This is a very important pattern for counseling a client. If we see this pattern, often there is a situation that needs changing. It is a “need to let go” pattern. If we do not see the pattern, even a seemingly difficult marriage or work situation is more likely not really in need of changing as much.
4. Meaning of the Pattern on Retests
The spiritual defensiveness pattern may have a slightly different meaning on hair mineral analysis retests:
a. On a retest hair analysis, an elevated calcium/magnesium ratio may indicate the elimination of biounavailable calcium or “metastatic calcium” through the hair. This is excess calcium that was building up in the body in the wrong places, hence the name metastatic. It accumulates in places such as the arteries, kidneys, brain and elsewhere.
This can be a good sign on a retest, although it will unbalance the calcium/magnesium ratio temporarily.
b. The pattern can be a retracing of an old decision or lifestyle pattern.
c. If, however, the pattern shows up on the first mineral test and persists on the second or third test, most likely it is not an elimination of excessive calcium, but rather indicates a spiritual defensiveness pattern that has not been dealt with yet.
d. If the pattern shows up just on a retest, or becomes worse (the Ca/Mg ratio increases), it may also be because something in the lifestyle needs to be corrected, and the nutritional balancing program is bringing out this fact. For example, as one heals during a nutritional balancing program, it can become even more important to stop using marijuana, for example, or to let go of a toxic relationship that is harmful and no longer needed.
5. Other Meanings. A very high calcium/magnesium ratio could be due to a kidney imbalance that is affecting calcium and magnesium. These minerals are regulated through the kidneys, as are most minerals. However, usually it is a lifestyle pattern, as well.
6. Defensiveness, in General. An elevated calcium/magnesium ratio, especially with an elevated level of calcium and of magnesium, is indicative of defensiveness, in general. This was a discovery of Dr. Eck many years ago. In the spiritual defensiveness pattern, a person often is consciously or unconsciously defending a lifestyle factor or attitude that is not serving the person and really needs to change.
7. It can be an “Ending Pattern”. This means that something in a person’s lifestyle or attitude is no longer appropriate and needs to end.
Energetic Meaning. Magnesium is associated with energy, while calcium is associated with structure, hardness and protection. We may surmise that a spiritual defensiveness pattern is associated with excessive structure in relation to the amount of energy expended.
A somewhat related understanding is that one is expending too much energy in some way, but not getting much in return.
PASSIVE AND ACTIVE DEFENSIVENESS
Defensiveness can be:
ACTIVE
This is an active resistance to change, perhaps with denial or running away to avoid change. It can be due to ignorance, laziness, fear, resentment or inertia. It is common, especially as one ages and tires out.
PASSIVE
This is simply holding on to an attitude or idea from the past. The attitude may have served in the past, but no longer serves one.
This is an aspect of living in the past and not wanting to change. It is a kind of inertia of the personality that often sets in as one gets older, in particular, although it can occur even in a child. One simply does what one has always done, or thinks as one has always thought. This amounts to defensiveness even if one is not trying to defend one’s lifestyle or attitude.
Either way, if the pattern persists, it can eventually cause burnout and a four lows pattern. The body gets completely worn out from doing something that is useless and harmful, even if it seems to be okay.
HEALING SPIRITUAL DEFENSIVENESS
A nutritional balancing program often helps this pattern by improving a person’s adaptive energy and healing old traumas that can hold a person in an old lifestyle pattern.
Pointing out the presence of the pattern is also very useful for our clients. It can often help one to realize that something in one’s life is out of integrity and not working well.
PRETENTIOUSNESS
Dr. Eck felt that the calcium/magnesium ratio has to do with pretending or pretentiousness. One may be pretending or imagining that a situation is correct or good when, in fact, it is not.
A STUBBORN WILL
Pretending is an act of will and ego stubbornness in which one wishes something were a certain way, so one just assumes that is the way it is, even though it is not true. This is a common human trait.
Spiritual defensive pattern can be about a stubborn will that is being misused to defend or protect an attitude or other lifestyle factor or attitude.
AN ENDING, OR ‘NEED TO LET GO’ PATTERN
Spiritual defensive pattern always indicates that a lifestyle situation or attitude that perhaps was appropriate in the past is no longer correct - and one needs to let it go.
A woman might have been angry with an ex-boyfriend or ex-husband, for example, but that is over and now it is time to move on. Otherwise, the attitude of anger or cynicism is not appropriate and is holding her back on her life path. This is why it is an “ending” pattern or “need to release something” pattern.
NOTHING IS HOLDING YOU BACK BUT YOURSELF
When a spiritual defensiveness pattern shows up, one may say, “but I have to stay in this relationship, or I have to stay in this job”. However, the pattern usually indicates that, in fact, one can now leave the situation without serious consequences.
There may seem to be factors holding the person in the situation, but at the deepest level there is nothing holding the person to it and one can move on, and needs to move on.
Sometimes one may need to be in a situation, a job, a relationship, or one may even need an illness for some reason such as to learn some type of lesson. The spiritual defensiveness pattern seems to indicate that the situation or attitude is no longer needed. Perhaps the lesson, or debt has been completed or resolved.
OTHER, MORE SUBTLE ASPECTS OF THE PATTERN
Movement means how a person tends to feel when in this pattern. The feeling of spiritual defensiveness pattern is that one is stuck in a lifestyle situation. One may also feel as though one is getting ready to exit or leave the situation.
Oxidation Rate. Spiritual defensiveness is most commonly associated with a slow oxidation rate. It is a yin pattern, which is commonly associated with slow oxidation. However, the pattern rarely occurs with fast oxidation rate, four lows, four highs, three highs or three lows pattern.
Combined with a Calcium Shell Pattern. This is rather common. Together, spiritual defensiveness and a calcium shell form another pattern called. extreme lifestyle stress. If the latter is combined with a low potassium level, it is another pattern called wasting one’s time. All this can help one understand the pattern.
Energy Centers. It may be associated with problems of the third energy center. This center has to do with beliefs, attitudes and control over one’s life. This energy center is weak in many people.
A Bowl Pattern. An elevated calcium/magnesium ratio is half of a Bowl Pattern. Reading about the bowl pattern will help you understand spiritual defensiveness. In acupuncture, a bowl pattern is a yin and blood deficiency, which has to do with impaired nutrition.
Part of a Double High Ratio Pattern, and a Step Down Pattern. A spiritual defensive pattern is sometimes part of these other important hair analysis patterns.
MAGNESIUM DEPRESSION
A spiritual defensiveness pattern may be associated with another curious and newer observed phenomenon. At times, a life situation that is not working well will cause a depression of the hair magnesium level.
Physiologically, I do not know why this would occur. A psychological or more metaphysical reason is that magnesium, as an element, is bright and shining. It is possible that when a person remains with an attitude or lifestyle that is not appropriate for the future, somehow it ‘dims one’s light ’, and this is associated with a lowering of the tissue magnesium level in relation to the calcium level.
LIVING A LIE
This may be a good description of the meaning of a calcium/magnesium ratio greater than about 40. This needs more research.
CORRECTION OF THE PATTERN AND “GETTING HELP”
When the Ca/mg ratio begins to normalize on a retest hair mineral test when the hair has not been washed at the laboratory, meaning it dips below 13.5, and especially if the magnesium level increases by a factor or two or more (doubles, for instance), it can mean that a person has received some spiritual help called an intervention.
I know this is sounds a bit esoteric, but it seems to be true. Usually, one also lets go of a harmful attitude or other lifestyle factor at this time.
I believe the drastic rise in the magnesium levels that can occur with this is actually an elimination of a less beneficial form of magnesium in the body, and its replacement with a better form of magnesium that powers or activates thousands of enzymes better, leading to improved health.
DR. ECK’S BLOOD SUGAR RATIO
By way of reference, Dr. Eck called the calcium/magnesium ratio the blood sugar ratio. He found that when this ratio is between about 10 and 12, one is exceeding one’s carbohydrate tolerance. This means one is eating more carbohydrates than are optimal.
Exceeding one’s Tolerance. The ratio is not about a specific amount of dietary carbohydrate, because this varies from person to person. It is about exceeding one’s tolerance level. For one person, this may mean a lot of carbohydrate foods, whereas another person may not be able to eat nearly as much carbohydrate without exceeding his or her tolerance for this food.
A diabetic Trend. He also felt that a calcium/magnesium ratio greater than 12 was a diabetic trend. However, I have not been able to confirm this.
It is rare that I alter one of Dr. Eck’s discoveries. However, in this case I use 9.5 to 13.5 as the indicator for exceeding one’s carbohydrate tolerance. A ratio greater than 13.5 is spiritual defensive, not diabetes.
4-Lows Mineral Pattern
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4-Highs Mineral Pattern
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Calcium Shell Pattern
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Josephine, Your Certified Nutritionist
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I earned and completed my certification in holistic nutrition and in Functional Diagnostic Nutrition and I am now practicing Hair Mineral Analysis and Nutritional Balancing Science to people all over the globe from my home in Vancouver, British Columbia. You can contact me here. |