How using your mind can increase your health and beauty
In this article, we present to you an
overview of the evidence that the mind and body are closely
connected, allowing you to develop an understanding of how
this can increase your health and beauty.
Traditionally medicine, psychology and
science in the Western world have tended to see the body
as being separate from the mind. As a result, our cultural
model of the world sees mind and body as disconnected, indeed
it is only recently that the medical and science establishments
have begun to look into the idea that our state of mind
influences our body and our health and beauty. In contrast,
in Asia, the prevailing wisdom has always been that mind
is intimately connected to the functioning of the body.
As a result, many Asian medics have studied Eastern medicine
alongside Western medicine, to use the best of both systems
and have a much stronger system for using the two together.
This is shown in many of the 'holistic' therapies used to
resolve health problems, which have their roots in Eastern
philosophies like Ayurveda. These have been carried into
the west through the work of people like Dr Deepak Chopra
who is a leader in the field of mind-body interaction.
There are a number of arguments about
how the mind affects the body, and in turn its health and
beauty, all of which have merit:
The Stress Response
There is a very clear and acknowledged link between stress
and ahd health (Click
here to find out more), and hence on the body's appearance
and biological age, i.e. your beauty. What is less well
known is that the mind controls what is allowed to trigger
the stress response. Quite simply, an event that triggers
a strong stress response for some people will not trigger
a stress response in others. It is possible to teach the
mind to change its responses to certain events, thereby
reducing stress. Stress is also reduced by regular relaxation
as demonstrated by research showing that meditators have
a biological age (the age of their bodies based on various
criteria) between five and twelve years younger than their
chronological age (the number of years since birth).
Muscular armouring
This is an idea based on work by the psychotherapist Wilhelm
Reich. When a person experiences undesired emotion, one
of the ways they control it is to tense their muscles. This
stops the emotion being experienced. As an example, if you
try to stop yourself from crying, you will tense the muscles
in your throat. If this is repeated often enough, the tension
becomes habitual and the muscle remains permanently tense.
Inevitably other muscles compensate and so the overall posture
of the individual is affected. Hence you can actually see
the nature of historical problems based on peoples' posture.
There are a number of massage and other forms of bodywork,
which aim to free up the muscles, releasing the emotions
and allowing the person to become more authentically themselves.
Click
here for more information.
Belief
This mechanism for physical change is the most at odds with
our western way of thinking, albeit there is strong evidence
for it's effect on our bodies, not least the new medical
field of Psychoneuroimmunology which is predicated around
the idea that we can use our minds to recover from illness,
and avoid it in the first place. In his excellent book Ageless
Body, Timeless Mind, Deepak Chopra describes several
rigorous experiments showing how people's biological age
(how old their bodies are) is influenced by their psychological
age (how old they feel). Quite simply, if people feel young,
then their bodies will get younger. Another area of research
relates to the use of hypnosis. There have been numerous
studies on the effects of hypnosis on the body. In the area
of breast growth, studies recorded an average of 1.5 inches
increase in breast circumference from six academic studies
(Murphy,
1992, pp336-337). Perhaps the most intriguing examples of
belief affecting the body are the amazingly well documented
examples of spiritual healings at Lourdes. These are examined
in detail by a committee of experienced doctors. There have
been numerous examples of inexplicable and spontaneous cures
for ailments including blindness, paralysis, cancer, multiple
sclerosis and gangrene. (Murphy
1992, pp267-272). If you'd like to read further about the
documented evidence for the effect of the mind on the body's
capabilities, the evidence is presented in Michael Murphy's
book, The
Future of the Body.
Being Young and
Beautiful Again
You may be wondering how one can actually get younger and
improve your health and beauty. It is useful to remember
that the cells of your body are constantly renewing themselves,
the skin cells replace themselves once a month, the liver
every six weeks, and the skeleton every three months. Deepak
Chopra suggests that the cells have a type of memory, which
stores emotion and other events in your life. Dying cells
are able to pass on this information to the new cells. The
mechanism for this, messenger molecules called Neuropeptides,
was discovered by Candace Pert, and is described in her
book Molecules
of Emotion. By releasing repressed emotions and changing
your beliefs about yourself, you can influence your old
cells to pass on information that will cause totally healthy
new cells to be created. Our CDs make use of these findings
in the suggestions they make about enhancing your health
and beauty.
Reference
Murphy, M (1992),
The Future of the Body, Tarcher/Putnam, New York
Ian Gregory, 2004
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