Harnessing the placebo effect.

Is it possible?

Can we somehow over saturate our minds with positive thoughts of healing? and alter the outcome?
I'm talking about a daily commitment to thinking very positively about our hair.. imagining it breaking through the skin and flourishing into a beautiful terminal hair... imagining this in such detail, such realism which will eventually trick the mind into producing hair?

there are countless examples of the magic of the placebo it exists, and it's damn powerful. period why would we even measure drugs against the placebo effect? i feel it has been neglected by science because it might just be amazing... the body basically regenerates itself constantly. and that with us having incredibly stressfull lives, jobs, children, money to pay..... I'm sure some people can truly believe and convince their bodies to change certain things..

thinking this throughout the entire day.

The reason I'm saying this is because in the western world disease is rampant.. we have way to many conditions( chronic conditions) which simply doesn't make sense in a developed area, we have severe tooth decay( south Americans, and isolated tribesmen have way more hair and better teeth than many westerners), skin conditions, 1 in 3 will get cancer etcc.. wtf!?


the media constantly shows us really good looking people with great features and perfect body's, and this might just be slowly killing us because we feel less worthy and are always criticizing ourselves(subconciously) instead of loving ourselves, we constantly want to change things because we are exposed to these perfect, ideal features..

basically a completely different state of mind in which instead of stressing about whatever, we use our thoughts to aid in the regenerative process..

Worth a shot, the only side effects are happiness

I believe it works for many things, but not hair loss.

There is absolutely zero doubt for me that the mind has substantial effects on the body and that intent/purpose do literally alter the body's physiology.

If we're talking about the placebo effect, though, I think its important to be clear about the difference between this effect and conscious intent.

The nature of the placebo effect means that people experiencing it aren't being willful. They aren't consciously trying to generate their own belief or power of intent. They literally just believe they are getting a treatment they are not. There is no question for them. They are operating on a false belief, but one which they concretely believe to be true, i.e. no doubt to start with. They aren't having to delude themselves of a contradictory belief they aren't getting that treatment. For example, they aren't aware they are getting treatment B and having to tell themselves, "I'm not getting treatment B. I'm not getting treatment B. I'm getting treatment A".

Its the power of their belief in the reality of the placebo that creates the effect, i.e. the reality of things is just self-evident and doubtless. If I see the color red, I'm seeing red.

Things get hairier when we are conscious of conflicting beliefs. Cognitive dissonance usually resolves this, but this does not operate when we are using intent to try to change our beliefs. If you think you are seeing the color red, and you try to will yourself positively to see blue, its going to be difficult to really get the power of those affirmations because ITS INCREDIBLY DIFFICULT TO FOOL YOURSELF. That's the point of placebo...the subject is kept in the dark and the proctor is fooling them.

So it will always come down to which belief in the tug of war wins out for your better reasoning. But the brain - even though some people really try hard not to use it - is a reasoning machine. Beliefs are like a software downloaded into the brain. The one that gets run the most often tends to be the strongest belief, and its difficult to just will a new program in and oust the old one. Because consider all of the things that come together schematically for you to "lay that belief down" to begin with. When you form a belief its usually based on pieces of evidence, experiences that prove that belief correct, biases, etc. Installing a new belief requires that the new belief "win" the reasoning of your brain over (get past the guard, if you will), so you'd literally have to have a powerful form of evidence/experience that contradicts the existing belief in order to favor the new one, or no matter how much you try to convince yourself of the new belief, the old one will still be the one that predominates.

For example, if you believe you are seeing something in front of you, you believe it. Its right there. Its self-evident. Especially if you can reach out and touch that thing. You'd either feel its presence or its absence. And with this sensory information you form a a belief about the existence of this object in your universe. What would it take to refute that primal sensory information/memory? You probably couldn't.

So now start trying to convince yourself there is hair growing when you have no sensory information to support that, rather quite the opposite...you are constantly re-embedding the existing/opposite sensory memory every time you see it in the mirror, or reach up with your hands and feel its not there. Its fucking hard to trick the brain, unless someone else is doing it for you, or you're scared enough to see past contradictory evidence. Religion comes to mind for the latter.

But I don't think I'm doing the power of intent justice either. In the end I think it comes down to trust. With the placebo effect, the subject has a simple and pure trust that they are taking something they are not. That trust is what shapes the belief and the belief shapes the effect.

So it comes down to what you trust in the most. How much do you trust in your belief? Only you know the answer to that question.

If it were me attempting this, I would try to legitimize my belief in the process using something known to work. Build the foundation that way.

As an example, the phenomenon of the mind-muscle connection in body building is well documented in that community. The power of intent in muscle building is a powerful belief for many of those athletes. I've seen it myself. So start there. Start a workout regimen with the goal of building muscle and ALSO with the belief that your mind is going to give you an edge, that you are going to will yourself to build muscle. When you are working out, try to build that mind-muscle connection and focus on that intent. Tell your muscles to grow. Talk to them like CT Fletcher .

As you see your muscles grow you'll help strengthen your belief that you are able to exert effects on your own body through power of intent, and perhaps that could spill over into other aspects of your physiology. It will be difficult but belief is powerful.

Check out Dr Joe Dispenza.