It’s not “just” a placebo…
…it’s your human ability to use your mind to trigger biochemical changes in your body, and your body to trigger thoughts in your mind (for better or for worse.)
I’ve been following the rise of placebo research coverage by mainstream news sources, and reader comments are always heated. People who have been taking medications for many years get very upset about placebo coverage — a good example are the comments posted after this CBS interview between Lesley Stahl and Irving Kirsch (author of the controversial book The Emperor’s New Drugs: Exploding the Antidepressant Myth).
Personally, I don’t think that the placebo effect needs to be presented as some ultimate anti-thesis to prescription medication. If the drugs work, they work. Rather, I think the mental strategies that harness the placebo effect need to be taught as fundamental skills, as crucial to a person’s survival as looking both ways before crossing the street.
So, I wrote a book about how the mindbody connection works and how you can develop your awareness of it in order to survive. The placebo effect isn’t only a sugar pill or some kind of trick. I prefer to think of it more like a regimen of thought experiments that you can feel having an effect in your body.
The book is called “You, Resourceful: Return to Who You Want To Be.”
For a limited time you can get it directly from me and pay only $5.99 (plus $1.75 S&H) through Pay Pal.
And if you can post your comments to the book’s Amazon.com page, that would be terrific.
As health insurance rates continue to rise and more and more people are stuck with less-than-adequate coverage, I’m hopeful that seemingly radical but ancient understandings about how our minds and our bodies work together to activate powerful internal healing resources will finally become mainstream.
Thanks for reading.
Warmly, Kristin
