The Placebo Effect Is Proof of Mind Over Matter

   For the life of me, I don’t understand why everyone isn’t jumping up and down with excitement about the placebo effect.  If we can cure diseases and erase problems merely by thinking we are well, then what does that say about the power of belief?  It says we are able to heal ourselves merely by changing our perceptions!

Often, those who were unknowing recipients of a placebo drug were embarrassed to learn they had a positive response to nothing more than a sugar pill.  They should have been ecstatic!  What they learned about themselves is that changing their beliefs changed their biology.  They now understand they have the ability to heal themselves.  Unfortunately, not everyone believes that; thus, they remain victims to their perceptions.

In an article on the placebo effect in the Skeptics Dictionary it is written:

     <<A person’s beliefs and hopes about a treatment, combined with their suggestibility, may have a significant biochemical effect, however. Sensory experience and thoughts can affect neurochemistry. The body’s neurochemical system affects and is affected by other biochemical systems, including the hormonal and immune systems. Thus, it is consistent with current knowledge that a person’s hopeful attitude and beliefs may be very important to their physical well-being and recovery from injury or illness.

The psychological explanation seems to be the one most commonly believed. Perhaps this is why many people are dismayed when they are told that the effective drug they are taking is a placebo. This makes them think that their problem is “all in their mind” and that there is really nothing wrong with them. Yet, there are too many studies that have found objective improvements in health from placebos to support the notion that the placebo effect is entirely psychological. 

Doctors in one study successfully eliminated warts by painting them with a brightly colored, inert dye and promising patients the warts would be gone when the color wore off. In a study of asthmatics, researchers found that they could produce dilation of the airways by simply telling people they were inhaling a bronchodilator, even when they weren’t. Patients suffering pain after wisdom-tooth extraction got just as much relief from a fake application of ultrasound as from a real one, so long as both patient and therapist thought the machine was on. Fifty-two percent of the colitis patients treated with placebo in 11 different trials reported feeling better — and 50 percent of the inflamed intestines actually looked better when assessed with a sigmoidoscope (”The Placebo Prescription” by Margaret Talbot, New York Times Magazine, January 9, 2000).*

It is unlikely that such effects are purely psychological.>>

Although some argue that the placebo effect is purely psychological, there is strong evidence that is not true.  Dr. Bruce Lipton, in his book The Biology of Belief, explains exactly why a placebo not only affects the psychology, but also the physiology.  The information taken from our environment through the body’s receptors (skin, eyes, ears, nose, tongue) is interpreted by our perceptions.  Perceptions, in essence, tell the body how to respond to the factors in the environment.  If the person believes they are receiving a beneficial drug, the chemical responses sent to the affected area tell the cells that help is on the way!  The body responds exactly the way it would if drugs were there because it is releasing everything needed to react to that belief.  The immune system kicks into high gear, because it has been told to do so by the person’s beliefs.  Remarkably, the person finds themselves healed…not due to a drug, but due to the belief in the healing power of the drug which triggered the immune system to heal itself!  The placebo effect, in fact, may be responsible for healing in well over half of the people who take medications.

Have you ever seen a person who spent 20 years being overweight, but suddenly lost 30 pounds just because he or she was going to a class reunion and wanted to look good?  Have you ever seen a smoker who has smoked for 40 years who suddenly quit after being told he was going to die if he continued?  Have you ever seen an actor who “became” the role they were playing…not only in personality, but also in body?  (Think of Will Smith as Ali, Rene Zellwegger as Bridget Jones or Tom Hanks in Castaway.) Have you heard about spontaneous remission or people who got up off the death bed and went on to live well into old age?  Did you know there are documented cases where people with multiple personality disorder not only changed personalities as they switched from one identity to the next, but also changed physical characteristics, like eye color, within minutes of becoming one or the other?  Do you wonder how they were able to do this?  Some call it willpower.  Others call it luck.  Most people don’t know what label to put on it.  No matter what we name it, how can we just ignore this?  Obviously, if one person can do this there is something to it.  These are all demonstrations of how changing our beliefs changes our reality…not just in mind, but also in body.

For decades, we’ve been told our genetic inheritance was absolute.  If we have a family history of one disease or another, we are doomed to a similar fate.  But that is only true if we believe it to be so.  What we are learning is that our DNA is not carved in stone.  Our beliefs are convincing us this is truth.  The great news is that we can change our beliefs by rewriting the programs we downloaded in our youth.

Whose life are you living today?  Whose beliefs are you operating under?  What if you could rewrite the script by changing your beliefs?  You can, and the placebo effect is all the evidence needed.

When you decide to take charge and start living from your present awareness rather than from the same old repetitious, programmed perceptions, everything changes.  Since approximately 70% of our daily thoughts are negative, it is no wonder we have so many problems and illnesses in our lives.  We must replace those beliefs with ones that better serve us.  How?  Erase the old tapes and start playing better-serving ones!  Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) is one of the fastest and best ways to do this.  Need evidence that it works?  Go to www.tryitoneverything.com and order the movie/book and see for yourself.  Visit www.emofree.com and read the thousands of reports.  Ask me!  I’m living proof!  Go to http://www.youtube.com/mcgolf7 and listen to me talk about it.

Drug companies would be more than happy to get rid of the idea of the placebo effect, but it’s too late.  The word is out and more and more incredible stories are being shared about the power to heal ourselves.  It’s all in what we believe.

Change your beliefs and you can change your life!  It’s time the world woke up to understand we have that ability.

Do you have a great story to share about how a change in your beliefs created a change in your life? 

I AM…Jodi
www.godisaverb.com/blog