“Do you have a healthy attitude?” This question is tackled in a recent article by Keith Wommack, a syndicated columnist from Corpus Christi, Texas who focuses on the impact thought and spirituality have on health. The article quotes Mark Hyman, M.D., author of Calm Your Mind, Heal Your Body, who said, “… the most powerful
You almost have to read the title of his article twice, and even then, you may still wonder if you got it right. Here’s the title: You are not prepared for a health miracle. In this recent Houston Chronicle article, Keith Wommack of Corpus Christi, Texas — a self-syndicated columnist writing about health, thought, and spirituality —
Think about it for a minute. How would you answer this question? What is mind? John D. Clague from Salem, Oregon, who writes about spirituality and health, discusses this after hearing neurobiologist Dan Siegel open his talk at a Portland, Oregon conference on integrative medicine with the question. Clague shares Siegel’s observation that in measuring the brain,
General Practitioners in England are now free to try a drug-free, thought-based approach – prescribing self-help books – to improve the mental health of their patients. Hear more about this in a short Christian Science Press Room video by Eric Bashor. If you can’t play the video below, you can view it by clicking here. To read the article cited,
The curious case of one Mr. Wright, suffering from advanced lymphosarcoma, who gets better and then worse and then better and then dies, reveals how what we think matters for our health. Mr. Wright was a patient of psychologist Bruno Klopfer in 1957, had large tumors, and was expected to die from the disease. Mr. Wright
Picture courtesy of Flickr user javacolleen
“McCoy’s syndrome” is defined, in an article¹ in a leading medical journal called The Lancet, as an excessive faith in medical technology (especially imaging), an absence of clinical reasoning and a lack of making emotional connections with the sick. The problem: frequent misdiagnosis.
Technological equipment in medicine helps physicians do their job better. But there can be a temptation to rely excessively or exclusively on a test result or image scan.
TRICORDER (Picture courtesy of Flickr user ted.sali)
The reference to McCoy’s syndrome is based on the fictional character named Dr. McCoy on a TV show called Star Trek in which the doctor diagnosed patients using a medical “tricorder” that scanned the patient and eliminated any need to discuss things with the patient or examine them any further. Take a reading, get a diagnosis.
But in real life, medical machinery today doesn’t accomplish this. And it may never do so. And one reason for this is that there is a mental component to health.
Blushing provides a great example, I think, of how consciousness can affect health. An emotional response in thought (e.g. feeling embarrassment) has a direct effect on the body – a change in blood flow seen as blushing in the face. I have found that through prayer, a change in thought resulting from feeling a connection to God, or feeling God’s love, can result in physical healing.
Charles Darwin (courtesy of flickr user shehal)
So I was pleasantly surprised to come across some of Charles Darwin’s writings about blushing in Chapter 13 of his book, The Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals (see pages 325-326). Now I’m not getting into any debate here between evolution and creationism. I’m just sharing interesting insights from a well-known and respected naturalist.
Darwin wrote (emphasis added by me), “It is not the simple act of reflecting on our own appearance, but the thinking what others think of us, which excites a blush.
“What is now proved, was once only imagined.” – William Blake
Earlier this month Israeli scientist Daniel Shechtman was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry for his discovery of a new chemical structure called quasicrystals that researchers considered to be impossible. Initially the scientific community was reluctant to accept his discovery, to the point where he endured mockery and even expulsion from his research team. The Academy said that his discovery “fundamentally altered how chemists conceive of solid matter”. This recognition came with a $1.5 million award.
This news item got me to thinking about “possible” and “impossible”. It seems that we deem things to be impossible until we have evidence to the contrary. Man couldn’t fly, until of course, the Wright brothers proved that we could. It is impossible to run a mile in under 4 minutes – or so we thought, until Roger Bannister did this.
You’ve probably heard the saying, “Don’t worry, be happy”. It’s a catchy tune sung by Bob Marley. Being healthy makes us happy. But did you know that being happy can help keep us healthy?
“Happy people live longer, probably because happiness protects physical health.”
This was the conclusion of a research paper by Dutch sociologist Ruut Veenhoven
in The Journal of Happiness Studies in 2008 that looked at 30 follow-up studies on happiness and its effect on health and longevity.