“Dr. Viggiano, noting that the act of taking a pill is often just an external trigger to what she describes as an internal or ‘central’ healing response, wonders what this tells us about our thoughts in terms of their effect on health and healing.”

Eric Nelson

This observation comes from Dr. Darlene Viggiano at the Saybrook School of Mind-Body Medicine in a thoughtful Washington Times article last week by Eric Nelson of Los Altos, California. Nelson interviewed three doctors who work at Saybrook University in San Francisco, the only institution in the U.S. offering advanced degrees (PhD, Masters) in mind-body medicine.

The article includes two very interesting accounts, one of a young girl suffering anxiety attacks learning to rely on thought-based coping skills and another of a patient who suffered declining health as a result of misinterpreting something his doctor told him.

Nelson concludes by discussing the need for “an individual willingness to adopt a higher, more inspired view of health.”

Definitely recommended reading: The success of mind-body medicine depends on us.