A placebo is a cheat with remarkably positive effects. You are given a pill containing no active substance, but you firmly believe it is a real medicine…and it works. Triggered by belief, your neurones send messages to various organs and these generate the hormones, chemicals, tissues or whatever is needed for recovery. All natural, no harmful side effects. The strength of placebos is well documented by mainstream science.
But could belief with similarly positive effects be induced in our neurones without having to be cheated?
Yes, definitely, but under one important condition: belief must be genuine and complete. Nagging doubts spoil the mechanism.
Ah. Here the sceptics will jump and briskly dismiss the whole idea as old magic practices rooted in credulity and ignorance. Note, by the way, that the word “sceptics” is a gross misnomer for people who routinely accept any piece of misinformation from the establishment without much if any critical analysis. But let’s leave this aside.
Thoughts can set physical processes in motion in the body; this is well established and recognised by official science. Thoughts of resentment, despair, hatred …lead to various ailments, sometimes very serious. On the other hand, thoughts of optimism, joy, gratitude, forgiveness…. do reinforce the body’s natural resistance.
Furthermore, recent studies have shown that the altered state of consciousness attained through meditation not only calms the mind but leads to more regular heart activity, improved digestion, better skin condition, stronger immune system, etc.
All this is good news, but does it provide a sufficient basis for effective natural healing relying mainly on positive thoughts?
The answer is entirely linked to the worldview you choose to adopt.
In the materialist worldview, physical things follow a cold mechanistic logic, with few if any influences of the mind, and on the contrary thoughts themselves are seen as solely based on a sophisticated physical mechanism as yet largely unexplained. From that perspective it is hard to imagine that pure thoughts could do the trick when required; reliable cure has to come from medical procedures, either with chemicals or natural remedies.
In the holistic, energy and consciousness based worldview, thoughts are expressions of universal awareness. They are totally intertwined with energy flows. What appears to us as “material” is structured energy. Structured dynamically by information, which itself originates in consciousness. This is a model of metaphysics. It is consistent with hard science, but it goes further in that it is enriched by intuition.
Self healing is part of total opening to intuitive guidance. Overcoming specific ailments, however satisfactory and important per se, is far from the whole story. The consequences of trusting intuition to receive guidance from universal source are wide and far reaching. Life is fundamentally changed. Relations with oneself, one’s own body, other people, other creatures, situations, events are experienced in a totally new way, lighter, deeper, freer, more serene.
There are quite a few practitioners, writers and teachers of intuitive self healing and more generally intuitive guidance. Here is one I know through someone close to me: Inna Segal, an Australian lady originally from Belarus. She has a written a very clear and well structured book. Her site is at http://www.innasegal.com/
When you improve your own health and life trajectory through non egotist self healing, you radiate to the world. With more power than you can imagine.
Fear not, take a sip of good wine and open your heart.
Love,
Leo
Copyright © Leo Foresta 2012
Leo Foresta 