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Chapter 2 : THE GENETIC PROGRAM
The fundamental premise of this book is that in order to be as alive and healthy as you can be, it is essential that the genetically-coded program that defines who and what you are be expressed to its fullest extent possible. Any time this program is blocked, disease, which means a deviation from the state of well- being, results.
You are in a very real sense 4 billion years old. What began then was a process whereby certain molecules acquired the ability to self-replicate. This ability of these molecules to self-replicate is what defines what we call life and the possession of this ability differentiates living from non-living things. The molecules that developed the capacity to self-replicate eventually organized into one-celled organisms.
Life remained one-celled for about 3.3 billion years, after which time it became multicelled. Some living organisms eventually left the water, where life began, to live on land. Some of these land-dwelling organisms evolved into mammals and our species of mammal, homo sapiens, is a member of the primate family composed of monkeys and apes. We happen to be on the ape side of the primate family.
All living things come from a common ancestor and have evolved into their various forms in response to the environments in which they found themselves. Therefore, life is truly one process with many, many components, and our species is one of those components. All living things have a continuous 4 billion- year-old chain of life experience that connects them to our common ancestor. Each living thing today simply represents a part of the way that life has been able to express itself at this time in order to continue its process of existence and self-replication.
Therefore, the life force within you is 4 billion years old and life is being partially expressed presently as you. The transformation from a non-cellular collection of self-replicating molecules to a human animal made of trillions of cells, or any of the other living organisms that have subsequently existed is truly incredible.
In its simplest form, however, this transformation has occurred because of the fact that as the molecules self-replicate, due to inexactitude in the self-replication process, certain variations occur in the next generation. Certain members of this next generation will have an advantage in adapting to the environment at hand and this advantage gets translated into more successful self-replication. Therefore, over a period of time, these more successful self-replicators replace the less successful ones and become the form that life takes on at that time. Clearly, with all the various forms of life that exist and have existed over this 4 billion year time period, life is an amazingly dynamic process.
The number one rule of life is to be and to continue to be. The self-replicating process that began 4 billion years ago has successfully continued throughout this time period and has evolved into very diverse forms in virtually every environment on the planet creating a remarkable mass of life. Life competes with itself within the various environments. Those forms of life that are less effective in self-preservation and self-replication disappear. The disappearance of any given life form is clearly catastrophic from the perspective of the individual organism or species. However, from the bigger picture perspective of life overall, it is simply an adjustment that life makes to the environment of the time as it carries on. Each form of life does whatever it is able to in order to maintain its presence on the planet.
The very fact that an organism exists implies some great degree of success in finding a way to adapt to the environment, since a tremendous number or life forms have disappeared along the way over the last 4 billion years. For the most part, even the successful life forms continue to adapt as circumstances change. Therefore, constant change is the reality of life. Furthermore, life never can and never does go back, it only goes forward. Each moment is new and unique and those living things that are able to self-maintain and self-replicate in the here and now have the opportunity to continue in the process.
What defines any given living thing is its genetic material, the molecular information passed from one generation to the next. This information determines the form of the living thing as well as its processes and the transformations that it is intended to experience over the course of its individual lifetime. For humans, this information is passed from the mother and father in the form of the egg and sperm which together form the one-celled new individual which eventually develops into a complex multicelled form.
All that is necessary to achieve successful existence and self-replication is determined through this genetic information. It is essentially a program for the individual's life that has evolved over a period of 4 billion years, and has been thus far successful to enable the individual to be a continuing participant in the larger process of life.
There exists an extremely powerful force within you to have this life program be expressed. This force is the force of life itself. Whenever this program is blocked, in some form you stop being who you are fundamentally programmed to be. To whatever degree this blockage occurs you become less alive. Furthermore, because the fundamental life program is blocked, you begin to deviate off the preprogrammed path that has been determined within you to optimize your likelihood of existence and self-replication. This deviation results in disease.
Each individual organism possesses its own genetic information and fundamental life program. As already stated, not all individual organisms will be successful in the process of maintaining their existence and in self-replicating. Those that are more successful go on, those that are not disappear. This process has been called natural selection. There is typically an overproduction in each new generation of each species and only a relatively small percentage of this new generation will reach the point of reproduction in order to pass on the genetic material of this most successful group.
In the order of things as life has operated over the last 4 billion years, no individual has the "right" to exist or self-replicate. In fact there exist no rights at all in nature, just opportunities which may or may not be taken advantage of.
Your genetic information is the hand of cards dealt to you in the game of life. These are the cards that got you into the game in the first place. There are those whose cards will inevitably result in failure and, at least in the natural order of things, a quick exit from the game. That is just the way things are and as unpleasant as it may be, that is how life continues.
Chances are, however, that if you are reading this, you are not inevitably doomed to imminent extinction. You probably have a reasonably good hand in your possession and have at least a passable chance of staying at the table for some period of time and enjoying success there. In order to be successful, it is imperative that you allow your life program to be expressed in order to optimally play out the cards that are in your hand.
Whether you like it or not, you are what your genetic material determines you to be. You can either allow the energy of the life force within you to be expressed in order to maximize the healthy self-actualization of your life program or you can attempt to block the force and the program's expression. By attempting to block the program you will make yourself sick, not utilize whatever it is about you that makes it advantageous to be you, and create internal conflict that will diminish your likelihood of survival in the struggle to maintain your existence among all of the other living things.
The choice is yours.
While allowing your genetic life program to be expressed is the key to health and vitality, it is essential that this program be appropriate for the environment in which you find yourself. Otherwise you will be in a double-bind situation in which blocking the genetic program leads to disease and self-destruction, and unblocking it results in self-annihilation. Clearly, you must migrate to or create an environment that allows its expression.
Your challenge and objective, therefore, is to remove yourself from the external cages which are in conflict with the expression of your genetic program and simultaneously eliminate the internal cages which you have developed which prevent its fulfillment. As you accomplish this, you will transform into a closer and closer approximation of the you that your life program dictated that you should become. As a result, you will experience a greater state of well-being and enhance the possibility of the continuance of your genetic material into the future.
At this moment, however, you are locked in your collection of cages and are, therefore, distanced from your true self-expression with the resultant disease and lack of vitality that accompanies that reality. Getting out of these cages will require all of the energy, effort, and ingenuity that you can gather for the rest of your life.
There exist very strong forces that can and will resist your fight for self-liberation. You will have many opportunities to surrender along the way. You may maintain temporary existence in the event of your surrender but the price of self-betrayal is ultimately extinction.
To triumph, you will eventually have to be stronger than your strongest oppositional forces. At the beginning of this process you may be relatively weak and perceive such an agenda to be impossible but, as you take down cage after cage, your confidence will grow and you will steadily unblock the life force energy that has carried you forward over the last 4 billion years to get to this point.
While there is no guarantee that you will be successful, you can be certain that not pursuing your healthy internal agenda will definitely result in your elimination. Furthermore, the very process of self-liberation will produce within you a state of vitality that you otherwise would never experience. At a very basic level, fighting for your life is what life is all about.
I can imagine no more challenging agenda for an individual, but I can also not imagine any that could be more worthwhile. Caged existence is not life, it is a perversion of life. You have the option to get out of your cages and see what life can be like in this wide world that is your home, a world for which you were built and one in which you can enjoy the experience of being alive.
If this is what you want, there is much to be done.
Let us begin.
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