A man is but the product of his thoughts what he thinks, he becomes. --Mahatma Gandhi

In my last post I wrote about a memory I had and about how it made me think about the powers of the mind. I am not alone in experiences like this. Is it intuition? Premonitions? Inspiration? Coincidence?

I personally feel we have yet to harness the real power of the mind. My question now is can the mind heal the body? And if the mind can heal the body...can it also make the body sick?

There are myths and urban legends that suggest this. There are also scientific studies about placebos and how if the mind thinks it is getting better, the body responds. And this article from Time magazine tells that it has been scientifically demonstrated that if a child younger than 11 has a finger sliced off, if nothing is done to it medically, it will grow back on it's own.

Is this because a child under 11 would believe that it is possible? Or is it because they are growing so quickly that there body just has that capability at younger ages. As we enter the teenage years do our experiences in life cause us to become jaded and disbelieving, thus making healing more difficult? Is faith the real secret to our health, for better or worse?

Can a conscious belief that we are healthy, cause a body to heal itself? And if that is true, how does one with illness come to fully believe they can return to full health? Just some thoughts from my wandering mind...

HEALTH UPDATE: Feeling terrific, and I've got some good news! More on that next post.