Finding Peace in the Storm: Using Meditation to Cope with Cancer

Through the ages it has become more and more apparent that the mind has a huge influence over the body's general state of health.

In the last century, Emile Coue was a famous pharmacist who was responsible for thousands of remarkable documented healings of the bubonic plague at the beginning of the 20th century.

He did this by simply instilling a powerful belief within his patients and also making them recite a powerful healing affirmation - "every day, in every way, I am getting better and better", which was later used in the 70's in the lyrics of one of John Lennon's songs.

Doctors and oncologists over the past 30 years have made huge inroads, such as when Dr. Carl Simonton who had remarkable results with patients many years back, through his use of visualization, relaxation and from having instilled a firm belief within the minds of his patients that they would get well.

He mentioned that the very first two AIDS patients he treated in the early 1980's got well, as they knew nothing about the disease and were not conditioned to think about AIDS as being 'terminal'. This demonstrates just how much stress and fearful thoughts can have a detrimental effect upon our recovery.

Now an avalanche of research shows stress to be a major cause of illness - recently the Garvan Institute discovered how stress causes a hormone to be released into the bloodstream which inhibits the immune system and makes people more susceptible to getting sick.

The subconscious controls the functioning of all your vital organs and processes, such as keeping your heart pumping, your breathing regular, your circulation constant, cell regeneration, and countless others - and most importantly, your immune system.

Your powerful immune system contains almost every chemical you will find in a drug store or pharmacy, and when given the correct instructions by your subconscious, releases natural healing chemicals (in the correct dose) into the bloodstream to boost your body's overall levels of health.

The body even contains the most powerful painkiller, commonly used in hospitals - a completely natural form of morphine, to reduce or completely numb all pain. 

This is often the body's automatic reaction if someone suffers a major bodily injury.  This is a form of automatic, instinctive protection the subconscious provides us - protection we never need to even think about consciously.

Importantly, your immune system also contains the powerful T cell which was designed by the body to travel through the blood and fight cancer cells and other foreign cells within the body.

The immune system possesses the ability to dramatically increase the number of T cells to fight such diseases within the body.

Highlighting the existence and presence of these T cells was a regular part of Dr. Simonton's method of increasing his patient's belief that their bodies were defending themselves internally, by attacking the cancer cells.

Belief has shown to have some powerful effects.  For instance, under hypnosis, a person who is instructed that they are being touched by a red-hot object, will often instantly produce a burn blister, even though the object touching him was actually at room temperature.

The “placebo effect is another example of how the mind/body connection works in healing - when a patient believes something will relieve pain, the body actually releases chemical endorphins that do so.

Mental Techniques to Facilitate Healing

There is also increasing evidence also that negative thoughts and emotions can be harmful to the body - and stress is now known to be a contributing factor in heart disease, headaches, asthma and many other illnesses, and many more will be revealed in future.

This also shows that on the flip side, positive and upbeat thoughts - or the ultimate, happiness or joy (if they can be generated, by focusing on all the positives rather than the downsides) - can have a positive effect upon immune system and health.

There is also growing clinical evidence that among many mental techniques - mental imagery, or visualization, is beneficial as a complementary therapy which goes hand in hand with all existing treatments.

For instance, Dr Simonton was also renowned for getting his patients to mentally imagine, or visualize, armies of their powerful T cells gobbling up and defeating the weak cancer cells, in an imaginary internal war - and his results showed that this may have certainly had a positive effect.

Other mental techniques such as relaxation, meditation, hypnosis and affirmations have also shown to boost the body's immune system as well.

These help to remove stress and accelerate the body's natural healing processes which, vitally for sufferers, are completely non-invasive methods, and complementary to any existing treatments they may be on.

From the work I did while teaching meditation to patients at the hospitals, I quickly discovered the major issues and concerns many of the patients had.

Many felt that all they ever seemed to hear people talking about in reference to their condition was 'doom and gloom' talk - and that they rarely got to hear positive or encouraging words that could make them feel positive - or even dare to feel hopeful about their condition.

Needless to say, we do not recommend anyone use this as an alternative treatment to those prescribed by a doctor or oncologist, but as a supplementary or complementary treatment to help your immune system strengthen - which is often much-needed during the course of heavy treatments.

Benefits of Meditation / Visualization

• Deep Relaxation Boosts The Immune System - your mind is guided down into relaxation, which reduces stress and improves the activity of your immune system, which accelerates and escalates your body's chances of healing.

• Powerful Hypnotic Suggestions - the hypnotic suggestions instruct the subconscious mind to activate and accelerate the healing process through the body's immune system.

• Numerous Health Benefits - the long-term health benefits of regular meditation are well documented, which impact upon every area of your body.

• Hypnosis is a completely non-invasive, safe, natural, drug-free, relaxing and convenient complementary treatment - without any effects upon any existing treatments you may be on.