After 43 years of injecting insulin and surviving I can tell you that your most important and useful tool in your “bag of tools” is your intuition.  It takes time to develop but as those of us know who have been dealing with this physical condition and the daily minimum requirements needed to stay here, the “math” does not always work.  There are times when I am in the 200’s and I can do a correction according to the numbers and I can check 2 hours later and I am 25 points higher.  Too many factors at play for the numbers to work the same all the time.  It’s kinda like playing whack-a-mole all day long sometimes.  I realized about 20 years ago that I could develop my intuition.  Make it stronger.  Bring it more into play.  I understand it.  That’s why, after being introduced to yoga, I continued to inquire into it, practice it and even went to a 30 day intensive 200 hour yoga teacher training.  I use to be a corporate trainer; hiring and training sales people and managers.  I think I will make the yoga room my new training room. 

It is my experience and my current working assumption that what is within is what is worth seeking.  Having to live with T1D is like turning up the volume on needing, wanting.  We now need insulin, a way to deliver it and a way to continually check where our blood sugar is at.  The focus is put on us.  There is a saying or quote you may come across when exploring Chinese Medicine.  ….  “The bigger the front, the bigger the back.”  SUDDENLY, upon diagnosis we are confronted with a bigger front; tremendous work to stay healthy and alive.  I am here to tell you it is doable and it is made more doable when you cultivate your intuition.  This is not a condition to rely on the Doctor, Nurse, or CDE for.  They are excellent in introducing you to the “game” and monitoring your “results.”  But they can’t do what you have to do.  And knowing the math and the grams of carbs and your stressors is important.  More important is you connecting to, inquiring into, awakening and growing your intuition.

We all struggle with the daily grind of this dis-ease.  All of us.  I have always seen it as a curse.  And I am not here to tell you it was a blessing in my life.  It freakin sucks a#@.  However, there is an opening that appears with this struggle that I am saying is worth, at least inquiring into.  And this opening can lead to a tremendous blessing.  It is the opening of going within and knowing thyself.  There are many ways to do this.  Stay safe today.  

We all want to “fly.”  I use to play soccer and hockey as a kid.  We would talk about being “in the zone” and how it felt like we were flying.  As parents, we want our children to “fly.”  A diagnosis of T1D is a tremendous shock to life.  Those of us who really understand it know that it has a lot to do with energy in the body.  We need energy to fly.  As a teenager I often felt “grounded” because of all that I had to account for in order to participate and compete.  As I would find out later…..T1D would require me to become a marathon pilot.  There was no landing the plane.  I could crash! I often did not feel well.  When I was too high I was tired and apathetic.  When I was low I was uncertain and reactive.  My behavior in these times affected everything around me.  My mother was my co-pilot when I was young.  I had others along the way willing to get in the cockpit with me but they could always leave.  Not me.  I needed to stay and “FLY THE PLANE.”  Why?  Why this experience?  

It’s not easy.  It doesn’t feel good.  If God is all powerful, all good and all that then why this suffering?  I think I know why.  We live in a world that is a world of duality.  Anything that arises can only do so with its’ polar opposite.  Type 1 Diabetes is, in the physical world, a major challenge that causes much suffering.  There are a lot of other things that cause just as much suffering and more.  But T1D is definitely up there on the Opponent’s favorite physical curses.  But, for every curse there is a blessing.  Or, at least a lesson.  And, perhaps, lessons are the highest blessings.  

None of us knows the Big Picture.  Maybe we got caught in traffic and missed our flight because, in the big picture, it saved our life.  I don’t know.  However, living with diabetes for over 42 years now has awakened me to a TRUTH that is apparent, at least to me.  Every thing is made of energy.  And if it manifests in the physical world then it has a deep root in the non physical.  And we are here to find and to journey upon a quest back to Source.  Ok.  I might be getting a little metaphysical here, however, think about!  If you are reading this you know what I mean when I use the metaphor of “Flying The Plane.”  Food is the fuel, our body is the physical plane itself, checking our blood sugar levels is like checking the altimeter and insulin and the delivery of insulin is our acceleration system.  If we are too high we need to step on the accelerator.  If we are low we need to “take our foot off the gas pedal”.  Can’t go too low our we could crash.  Can’t stay too high for too long our else the environment gets too thick to stay in the air.  There are a lot of things we need to account for that are our “turbulence.”  Thinks like stress, hormone levels, being sick, quality of insulin, exercise, infusion sites.  We learn as we go.  There are three rules to flying a plane:

1,  FLY THE PLANE

2.  FLY THE PLANE

3.  FLY THE PLANE

NAMASTE…….MICHAEL