At the Heart of Natural Health:
Heart-felt Teachings
and
Heart-warming
Connections
What happens when more than 200 students and practitioners of natural healing come together on Earth Day, with the sole intention of spending the next four days learning, sharing and connecting with each other? Gifts aplenty as mysteries unfold…plus lots and lots of fun! Students arrived from as far away as Germany, Jamaica and the Bahamas. More than 40 attendees from our 2003 natural health conference came back in 2004—and for some of our students, At the Heart of Natural Health served as their third reunion! This year’s conference featured 15 of the brightest stars of natural health: herbalists, naturopaths, nutritionists, massage therapists, natural health media, an iridologist, holistic physicians and a chiropractor.
With a smile as bright as Jamaican sunshine, N.D. candidate Joan Callam described a desire to come and learn from herbalists such as three-time conference presenter Darryl Patton, whose own herbal muse was an old-time mountain man who called himself an “herbist.”
Callam explained that when fast food chains began invading her homeland she decided to reinvent her career; her degree in psychology became a springboard to health psychology and then to natural health. “Because our dietary choices determine how we live, I want to encourage people to keep growing our little gardens, to continue being content with simplicity and a light spirit.
 |
| Holistic physicians Rudolph Ballentine (above, top) and Elson Haas were co-headliners At the Heart of Natural Health. Above, bottom: Joan Callam. |
“I am learning to be a mind/body/ spirit healer,” she says. “We must all cleanse from within, in order to withstand the toxins that threaten the health of our entire world.”
Based on his own West Coast holistic practice, conference headliner Elson Haas, M.D., described a prevention-based approach that begins with periodic detoxification: “Our first emphasis is to help clients create a healthier lifestyle that supports immune function and removes toxins,” he said. “And then if treatment is needed, our first focus is herbal and orthomolecular.” If only more physicians could learn to consider synthetic drugs as a last option rather a first!
In a separate keynote address, a holistic physician from the Bronx urged practitioners to “meet each client heart-to-heart, being attuned to where they are, culturally and emotionally, and not just physically.” Rudolph Ballentine, M.D. advocates personal transformation for radical healing—healing our bodies, healing our hearts, healing the earth.
During the conference Haas and Ballentine joined a panel discussion with one of America’s foremost modern nutritionists, CCNH alumna Ann Louise Gittleman, Ph.D. Quoted in Time magazine during the same week as our conference, Gittleman advocates a “liver-loving” fat-flushing detoxifying diet that includes ample hydration to avoid digestive congestion and awareness of “the three sin foods: wheat, dairy and sugar.”
 |
Upper right: CCNH academic advisors Holly Cowan, Misty White, Christine Picior, N.D., Avie Overbach, M.D., communications director Mary Grace McCord and admissions advisor Sherri Johnstone were among the 26 conference staff members. We especially appreciate our 2004 conference registration coordinator, Chris Ballard. Lower left: Along with serving a healthy herbal lunch during our April 22-25 conference, Linda Page and CCNH are now cooking up a Native American Healing Traditions educational travel tour to Sedona, AZ, October 2-8. |
CCNH alumna Linda Page, N.D., Ph.D., and her healthy chef inspired us with a learning lunch that included the preparation of high energy sea vegetable concoctions including sweet and sour shrimp, exotic fruit and roasted vegetables.
Nurses, nurse practitioners and massage therapists who earned CEU credit At the Heart of Natural Health complimented CCNH’s conscious intention to provide an intimate-sized gathering in which students can interact meaningfully with keynote speakers, authors and fellow practitioners.
Your hard-working CCNH conference staff is always humbled by the hundreds of heart-warming stories we hear from students and graduates. Your desire to encourage, empower and educate can rightfully place people’s health back into their own hands—to heal the earth as we heal ourselves. Your work is an invigorating tonic, a healing balm to raise awareness and fuel a natural health revolution. Clayton College applauds the growing number of conference participants we met At the Heart of Natural Health.
Mary Grace McCord
At the Heart of Natural Health, CCNH interviewed conference attendees from throughout the U.S. and beyond. Below is a “sound byte” sampling of some of the common themes we heard. To hear several attendees’ videotaped testimonials, in their own words, visit our Health Conference Scrapbook.
| I came to At the Heart of Natural Health to help improve my family's health: | I believe that attending At the Heart of Natural Health will enhance my professional practice: | Learning At the Heart of Natural Health will help me change careers: |
 |
 |
 |
| Christl Reinig-Everett, CO Second-time conference attendee |
Aditya Sharma, CA Herbal manufacturer |
Karen DeMaruo, PA |
 |
|
 |
|
|
|