Your Beliefs Can Influence Your Health

When I was diagnosed, over eight years ago, with an autoimmune condition, I latched onto that diagnosis. It became my identity. I joined Facebook groups, signed up for 5k runs to benefit the disease, ordered books online, read article after article and absorbed everything I could about it.   

This happens to many people who are diagnosed with ‘something’.   Some may say this is a way to deal or cope with it.  But for many of us, it hinders us and we use the diagnosis as a fearful label that we attach our identity to; one that tells us that something outside of us is responsible for our healing.  

When in fact, we do a lot of healing on our own.    

I am sure you have heard of the placebo effect.   If not, let me explain; the placebo effect is a beneficial effect produced by a placebo drug or treatment, which cannot be attributed to the properties of the placebo itself, and must therefore be due to the patient’s belief in that treatment.  In other words; we believe it will help us so it does.  Researchers use the placebo effect in order to understand the efficacy of a drug or treatment. 

How is this possible? 

One of the most common theories is that the placebo effect is due to a person’s expectations. If a person expects a pill or treatment to do something, then it’s possible that the body’s own chemistry can cause effects similar to what a medication might have caused.  The brain will actually create neurons and chemicals within the body that the person expects to happen as if it really is receiving the beneficial drug or treatment.

There is a flip side too

Just as there is a positive placebo effect to expectations, there is also a negative one known as the nocebo effect.  In this case, if you believe a treatment or drug or surgery (etc) will have negative side effects or outcome- then it does.  “Just imagining something is happening is enough to activate those portions of the brain associated with that thought, or worry, or pain.” says John Kelley, Ph.D., deputy director of Harvard Medical School’s Program in Placebo Studies & Therapeutic Encounter.

In 2012, researchers from the Technical University of Munich, Germany published an in-depth review on the nocebo effect. They looked at 31 empirical studies and found that not only does the nocebo effect exist, it’s surprisingly common.

This doesn’t mean we don’t actually feel the benefits of placebo or the suffering of nocebo- it means that sometimes we actually create these benefits and suffering ourselves- with our brains. 

What does this mean for you?

When it comes to illness, diagnosis or treatment- what you believe about the treatment has just as much of an impact (if not more) than any treatment, drug or procedure.   Our body responds to our brain.  Our brain can release chemicals to heal or hurt us depending on what you are expecting to happen.

How does this apply to today?

What are you thinking or believing about COVID-19 right now? Are you watching the news and YouTube videos and social media posts about how terrible it is?  Are you seeing things that talk about all the terrible symptoms and that share a hopeless viewpoint?

Or are you watching the thousands of videos of people who had minor symptoms (or didn’t know they had it) or those that did have terrible symptoms but was able to treat it with specific approaches and are feeling fine now?  What do you believe about COVID-19?

This isn’t downplaying the severity of the virus or the true suffering that is happening.  This is inviting you to stop feeding into the terror and fear around COVID-19.  There is MUCH more good to celebrate with the millions recovering from it than what is being focused on and it is SCIENTIFICALLY PROVEN that what you focus on, what you believe, what you expect-  WILL have an impact on how you feel/recover if you do get COVID-19.  

It does work

Remember when I talked about my autoimmune diagnosis?  About a year ago I decided to stop being attached to that identity.  And as soon as I did- many of my symptoms DISAPPEARED.  Gone.  Was my mind creating them?   Maybe.  Probably.  I don’t really know exactly- I just know when I decided not to participate in the illness and set my mind to healing, I felt so much better. 

Here’s what is known: more often than not- you control more of your health than any doctor, government, medicine or treatment.   Again, this isn’t saying treatments, drugs and procedures don’t have their place (of course they do).  But understanding we have as MUCH (if not more in some cases) influence critical to our healing, recovery and overall health can make all the difference if we are diagnosed with COVID-19…or anything else for that matter.

Information obtained from here and here.