Mind Body Effects

Mind/body effects are part of almost every health-related issue. Our attitudes, derived from our families, our life experiences and their interpretations, determine how we respond to the challenges and opportunities life offers us. We all know people who seem to make the best of even the most difficult situations, as we all know people who can make a tragedy out of a windfall opportunity.

Our temperaments also effect how we respond to stress, in turn the way we respond to stress has significant effects on our vulnerability to illness, our ability to heal from illness, and our ability to cope with the effects of illness. However, we are also capable of learning and changing our responses to issues that affect our health and well-being.

In the last 20 years, we have learned a great deal about the interconnectedness of the mind and body, and much of the research indicates that we can learn to use our minds to support the health and well-being of our bodies.

Mind/body medicine covers a great deal of ground, from our preformed attitudes and beliefs about health, illness, and healing, to the way we interact with health professionals and support people, to skills such as relaxation and imagery that can have specific effects on our physiologic states. Many approaches to working with the mind/body have been shown useful since the late 1960s, with many derived from ancient meditative and healing traditions from the orient.

Imagery, which is simply thinking in sensory terms, has a long and varied history in the healing traditions of mankind. Imagery is a central and omnipresent component of all healing experiences when we consider the vital roles played by placebos, suggestion, and positive expectant faith. Many people are aware of the use of guided imagery to help people relax ( by imagining themselves in a relaxing place), to relieve pain or other symptoms ( by imagining in some way a healing or soothing action in the affected area), or to set goals, mentally rehearse, and provide motivation for action.