the pale fox

the pale fox: June 2014

Friday, June 20, 2014

Healing is Belief


Its time we realize our thoughts are powerful, potent energy. You can use this energy to heal yourself and reach your fullest potential.

If you need proof this is so, consider the placebo effect.


 

The Power of Belief and the Placebo Effect

The belief that you are getting help, such as a treatment for depression or cancer, can actually cause your condition to improve. It might be easier to see how placebos influence depression with its more direct connection to thoughts, but it is also true that thoughts have an effect on something as concrete as the growth of cancer cells or blood pressure.  A review of relevant literature by Straus and von Ammon Cavanaugh (1996) show how placebo effects are widespread, known  in medication, psychotherapy and even surgery!

Interestingly, it is not only the patient’s but also of the physician’s belief that effects how well a treatment works. For instance, patients on placebo in the Coronary Drug Project (1980) with good relationships with their physician, (and who presumably believed in them), showed lower mortality rates.  Also, as discussed by Suedfeld (1984), a doctor with a pessimistic attitude may block the effects of real medication .

 

Are Alternative Remedies Just Placebos?

I have heard others criticize so called alternative remedies like acupuncture, stating that anyone who found any benefit was merely experiencing a placebo. I think many who make such statements do not fully appreciate what a placebo is. In medical and psychiatric journals they may refer to it as “non-specific effects” which is just a fancy way of saying “something worked but we don’t know what and we don’t know how.” Thus with no means to explain how acupuncture works within the framework of western medicine, any effects are attributed to placebo.

In the West, people are conditioned to believe that pills work, and as the placebo effect demonstrates, whether or not the pills are actual medicine, they do. Interestingly, there is growing mistrust in mainstream medicine and more and more people in the West are looking to traditional Eastern methodologies. The recent interest in medicinal practices like ancient Chinese medicine, acupuncture and Ayurveda as well as their reported effectiveness may be related to the doubts people hold in mainstream medicine and a growing faith in ancient wisdom to be more effective. For these people, alternative methods are as (and sometimes more) effective than mainstream westernized medicine.

So what is a placebo? Put simply, it is belief or the power of thought.

 

Harnessing the Power of Thought

The placebo effect should not be discounted, it is demonstrated proof our thoughts and beliefs have real measurable effects on our ability to heal ourselves.  If placebos work when the person is essentially tricked, imagine how powerful the conscious application of thoughts and beliefs could be for healing and realizing our full potential.   If we could learn to harness this potent energy, our potential may be limitless.


References:

Coronary Drug Project Group (1980).   The New England Journal of Medicine  303, 1038–104.

Straus, J.L., von Ammon Cavanaugh, S. (1996). Placebo effects: Issues for clinical practice in psychiatry and medicine. Psychosomatics 37, 315-326.

Suedfeld, P. (1984).  The subtractive expectancy placebo procedure: a measure of nonspecific factors in behavioural interventions.  Behaviour Research and Therapy 22, 159–164.

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Tuesday, June 10, 2014

The Power of Intention

My grandfather had this trick to getting up in the morning.  He believed you don't need an alarm clock.  It was my mother who told me about it.  She explained he used the power of his will alone to wake up every morning by repeating : "I'm going to get up at 7 o'clock, I'm going to get up at 7 o'clock...."  multiple times before he went to bed.  Then, he would go to sleep.  No back up method, nothing.  Apparently his method was fail safe and he never slept in when he didn't want to.

When my mother told me this, I was intrigued.  Being a really deep sleeper, I have always had a fear about sleeping in.  I cannot count how many nights I suffered, restlessly tossing and turning before important exams, job interviews, etc, worried about really falling asleep and missing my alarm.

Fed up with feeling a slave to my alarm clock,  one night I decided to try my Grandfather's trick.  To my astonishment it worked!  It worked really well. I have used it many times over the years and it has proven extremely valuable. The trick is to repeat your intention, focus and trust in it. 

But how did it work?  Especially when I usually need 3 different alarms and to hit the snooze a minimum of 10 times.  The answer eluded me until I started to learn more about the power of intention.

Your  intention is like a sculptor, collaborating with the universe in molding your future.  How defined your desired outcome is formed in future potential depends on how much you believe in your personal power when you form your intention.  I came to know this profound truth over time by studying the power of intention in individual as well as in our lives as a collective. 

Although this is a complex idea, I wanted to share my Grandfather's tick because its an easy way to illustrate the power of your intention, especially if you are somewhat skeptical.  So try it out!

I suggest you try it on a night you don't have to wake up for anything important.  For instance, don't rely on it for the first time after studying all night for an exam you have to take the next morning.  This is because you will likely sleep more naturally, deeply and without worrying, which I believe will help you gain trust in the method.

You are powerful, believe it and the universe will show you it's true :)

Namaste

 

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Thursday, June 5, 2014

Earth Consciousness

You may be aware there are different levels of consciousness and that consciousness evolves from lower to higher levels of awareness.  You may also know of the "universal consciousness" that connects and effects us all.  Did you also happen to know that planetary bodies have consciousness?  Ancient traditions the wold over were aware of this, which is why they assigned planets with  particular archetypal personalities, the remnants of these are still found in astrology.  I'd like to discuss our plant's consciousness evolution and what it means for us.

 

Properties of Consciousness

In the same way that your hand is a hand and also part your body, so consciousness consists of parts that are linked to the whole.  The consciousness that manifests in individual beings has particular goals and lessons it would like to learn.  Yet all  individual consciousnesses are connected.  The purpose of this complex interplay is to help the universe learn about itself.  You are like the eyes and ears of the universe, showing it different possibilities and aspects so it can learn and evolve.

The Earth is a Conscious Being

The earth, like all planets, is a conscious being.  The first goal of our earth was to use conscious intention to form minerals and these into rocks and crystals. Crystals are thus infused with particular perspectives and expressions and we can connect to these energetically.  It is almost as though the earth left us a scavenger hunt of billions of little crystal USB drives containing energetic messages like love or protection that we are able to "download."
Then the earth set out to create the conditions necessary to support more and more complex and diverse life forms, ultimately leading to the conditions right to support humanity. In this way our consciousness is connected to the earth, both influencing and supporting each other.

The Earth is Evolving in Consciousness

The earth is evolving in consciousness, which is related to and influences our conscious evolution.  Two features of this transition are the so called “quickening” of time and increased synchronicity.

The Quickening

Have you noticed time seems to be speeding up?  There is a purpose to this:  To make the consequences of our behavior more salient. Picture yourself in the middle ages writing a letter to family who live far away.  In your letter you convey some disappointing news that will ultimately change your family's lives forever.  Think about how long it would take for the letter to reach them and for you to hear back from them and experience the consequences of your letter.  Now flash forward to the present, in the same situation, distance does not have the same impact: You can chat online in real time with individuals practically anywhere and thus influence and effect one another across vast distances.  This is just one example but it is meant to illustrate the different significance time holds today.
The quickening of time ultimately shows us our individual effect on the greater whole.  For example, instantaneous news via the internet has allowed many to become aware of the consequences of things like unchecked capitalism and environmental destruction.  With the ability see and feel how our decisions affect the greater whole, we may chose to vote with our dollar, opting for sustainable, environmentally friendly options when possible.

Synchronicity

We can also expect to see increased synchronicity to  help us understand the divine connection of the events in our lives.  Synchronicity is the notion of seemingly unrelated things coming together in a way that holds great significance.  For example, have you ever had a thought, perhaps about things happening in your life, plans to take a trip or a goal you'd like to achieve, only to find later that day you overhear complete strangers discussing the vary thing you were thinking about and then maybe a TV show you watch that evening has to do with the very same thing as well?  This is synchronicity.  For many, the illusion our lives are composed of purely random "chance encounters" is evaporating.  This is meant to demonstrate  we are here for a reason, and nothing in your life is void of meaning.

These elements work to increase our awareness and facilitate higher consciousness.  There is nothing that occurs in isolation. What you do to and for yourself you literally do to all. If you let this guide you, you can be sure to evolve with the earth into higher states of awareness.


Information about earth consciousness informed by Indigo Adults by Kabir Jaffe: http://www.amazon.ca/Indigo-Adults-Kabir-Jaffe/dp/1601630670 
Image Credit: Alex Grey (http://alexgrey.com)

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