While in New York, Dr. Cousens also developed a sickle-cell screening program with the PS 175 grammar school in Central Harlem. The results of this program were also followed through by the New York Department of Health.
In 1969, during his medical internship, Dr. Cousens developed several community programs in San Francisco supporting socio-cultural peace. When he moved to Boston to complete his psychiatric residency and to attend the Boston Family Institute for two years, he developed a teen center for white working-class teenagers providing family therapy and teen counseling as well as social activities.
In 1973, Dr. Cousens transitioned into a vegan lifestyle and began teaching meditation. He co-founded the world’s first Kundalini Crisis Clinic with Lee Sanella, M.D. in 1976. By 1983, he transitioned to a 100% vegan live-food lifestyle. Since 1985, Rabbi Cousens has been leading Peace 21 meditations around the world, including a quarterly peace meditation at the United Nations in New York City. His worldwide Peace Everyday Initiative (PEDI), started in 2003, encourages all spiritual traditions to work and pray for peace. PEDI has enrolled over 192 world organizations, and participants include spiritual leaders, rabbis, ministers, sheikhs, and meditation teachers. PEDI has received the blessings of religious and spiritual leaders around the world.
After graduating from medical school, Dr. Cousens was one of eight people who received an appointment at the National Institute of Mental Health in community psychiatry. He also received a commission as a lieutenant commander in the Public Health Service where he served for three years.
After his residency, he moved to Petaluma, California, where he became a consultant for the California State Department of Mental Health. He also became the chief mental health consultant for Sonoma County Head Start programs, which ranged over an area of almost 300 miles. During this time, he worked with white, working- class parents and Pomo Native American parents and teachers in developing a Head Start Program, which included teaching family dynamics to the Head Start teachers and developing an innovative lead-screening program.
Over a period of several years, Dr. Cousens established the Petaluma People’s Services Center, which is a community-controlled network that provides social services for all of Sonoma County. It involved organizing over 40 agencies, plus developing new programs and networking to serve the elderly, a child-abuse hotline, and parent crisis hotlines. This center has been operating since 1973 and has been successful in its endeavors. It has become a significant social service agency in southern Sonoma County.
One focus of Dr. Cousens’ humanitarian work is creating world peace on all levels. He has been leading peace meditations around the world since 1985. He has established a Peace 21 meditation where as many as 2,000 people have come together at one time to meditate for peace four times per year on each equinox and solstice. In 1996, while in Patagonia, he established this quarterly peace meditation at the United Nations in New York for world peace. This is all part of an overall process to create peace and healing of the planet on the physical, mental and spiritual levels. In 2003 he initiated the worldwide ‘Peace Everyday Initiative’ to encourage all traditions to work for peace. He recently organized a December 21st, 2012 Peace Gathering and Meditation in Tree of Life Center US and an International Peace Gathering at the Dead Sea in Israel.
Based on his book, There Is A Cure For Diabetes, he is developing a global initiative to heal diabetes naturally. He is now speaking at medical schools and to diabetic, vegan, live food, and medical audiences in the US and internationally on how to reverse diabetes naturally. His revised and more comprehensive edition of There Is A Cure For Diabetes was released on April 9th, 2013. The new edition includes his new research with 120 diabetics and postulates a new application for healing diabetes naturally with diet and lifestyle in support of his methodology. In three weeks, 61% of the type-2 non-insulin dependent diabetics and 21% of the type-1 diabetics were cured