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The verdict is in: A more positive state of mind dramatically improves healing outcomes for a wide variety of conditions.
This is why researcher Judith Simon Prager travels around the world teaching “verbal first aid,” a practice in which an injured person is repeatedly reassured that “the worst is over” and they are safe.
This practice has been experimentally proven to improve healing outcomes, in part because people who have suffered trauma are in a highly suggestible state and are more prone to powerful placebo effects or stress responses.
Other studies have shown that practices such as Qi Gong, which teaches awareness and control of the body’s own stress responses, or self-awareness therapy (a more Western practice with similar goals) can reduce the pain or discomfort of fibromyalgia and also cure or reduce symptoms of health conditions as varied as heart disease, diabetes and even cancer.
On a different note, researchers have shown that having others around dramatically increases the rate of healing of physical wounds, compared to healing rates in social isolation.