Category: Exercise

I was reading an article about grounding and the benefits of walking barefoot when I saw a comment suggesting that there was no scientific evidence for grounding and that it “sounds like placebo.”

I’m always amazed at the way people sneer as they say “placebo.” It’s a bit like those stories of doctors looking patients over and then declaring, “There’s nothing wrong with you. It’s all just in your head.”

You’re merely stupid and weak-headed, right? Ready for the loony bin.

My advice if this happens to you is to walk out of that surgery and never look back. Find someone who is capable of seeing you as a human being and not just a series of moving parts.

We underestimate the power of the mind to affect our health at our peril. Even if the doctor is right and the symptoms are entirely in your mind, that doesn’t mean you’re not ill. It just means the illness is in a different place.

There have been numerous studies which show the power of the mind in healing. A lot of people feel better just by fixing a doctor’s appointment. There have been controlled studies where patients healed better on a placebo than using the prescribed drug for the problem (not really surprising if you consider the crap that goes into patented drugs).

You’ve heard of Quantum and Newtonian physics? Well, there’s Quantum and Newtonian medicine too.

Let’s say you have a pain in your knee. You go to the doctor and he looks carefully at your knee. He might take an Xray. He might suggest an exploratory operation. He might tell you that your cartilage is worn out. But the chances are, he won’t examine the rest of your body to find out if something else is causing the problem in your knee. Essentially, he’s looking at the knee as the site and the cause of the problem. This is Newtonian medicine. You look at the result, but you don’t necessarily search for its real origin.

Quantum medicine is when you look at the person as a whole and try to understand the forces at work behind a problem. A physical problem may very well have its origin in your mind, your emotions, your experiences or in a completely different part of the body from the site of the pain. It’s important to realize this, because until you get to the root of the problem, it will never really be solved. This is where good nutrition, for example, or tools like tapping come in handy.

Last summer, I talked to a school friend that I hadn’t seen for some years. He was a GP (General Practitioner doctor) for many years after leaving school and one of his tasks these days is to go round medical surgeries in the UK and verify ‘best practices.’ I suggested that one way of tackling the soaring health costs that bug the UK – or any other developed country for that matter – might be to use more alternative medicine.

‘What about nutritional advice?,’ I said.
‘No scientific evidence that it makes any difference,’ he replied.
‘What about tapping?’
‘No scientific evidence.’

To be fair, the medical care system in the UK is so blinkered that a doctor suggesting alternative protocols can lose his right to practise. It does, however, indicate the problems that individual patients face in using conventional medicine.

‘Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food,’ said Hippocrates (he of the Hippocratic oath).

Most doctors now practising spent approximately one morning learning about nutrition in the course of their seven years of study. Things are gradually changing, but it’s going to be a slow process.

The person in the best position to look after your health is YOU. No one else can be in your skin and no one is going to care about your health as much as you. So if you feel that your health interlocutor is not really listening to you or your concerns, take matters into your own hands. Research on internet, change your diet, do more exercise, try working on your self-limiting beliefs, your traumatic past experiences, even find another doctor who takes your problem seriously.

But don’t give up and don’t underestimate the power of your mind, both as a prime cause of illness and as an indispensable tool for healing.

Have a great week.

Love

Richard