HOW BELIEF SHAPES OUR HEALTH AND LATER LIVES
In a recent conversation with a friend about health I said, “Belief is more important than science.” I meant it. My practices for later-life health are based on belief.
This doesn’t mean I don’t listen to scientific or medical advice or that studies about health don’t matter. It means I’ve chosen to follow practices that I believe will help me stay healthy and functional. Practices that I believe will help me live a long, healthy, vibrant, and vital later life. They are the ones that resonate with me. Belief is what gets me to keep working at them, not just willpower.
Belief comes from our unconscious mind. It is much more visceral and emotional, much more connected to the hidden physical world within me – the 90% of my mind that operates on its own without my conscious mind trying to control it. Our unconscious minds have been operating this way for millennia.
My unconscious mind knows how to keep me healthy. Sometimes I just need to listen to it, in the form of a new thought, insight, or inspiration that may spring from my beliefs.
This is a big subject, one that operates on many levels inside us. I will keep returning to it in these pages. My book, A Life Yet to Live, is filled with thoughts on this topic.
But you can start this journey NOW. Simply imagine what your health and later life have in store for you:
· How long do you expect to live?
· How do you believe you will spend those later-life years?
· How do you want to spend those years?
· How healthy and functional do you imagine you will be in your later life?
Our Parents and Childhood
For many of us, the first place we look to in answering these questions is our parents. How are they spending their later years, and how healthy are they? DNA is certainly a factor that will influence our later-life years, but staying healthy and functional in later in life goes deeper than that. Our parents were our first guides in life. Our survival depended on their care and approval. We still live with those influences inside us.
In my case, I adjusted my behavior and self-conception in childhood in ways I’m still coming to terms with now. Many of the unconscious beliefs I held would not have suited me well in experiencing a healthy later life. I’ve had to confront and change those beliefs or at least accept that they are inside me and can be an obstacle to what I want to achieve. This has been an important part of my journey.
Examples of better dynamics are the so-called Blue Zone areas, where longevity and health are built into the community’s system, passed onto younger family members as second nature. It’s all they have experienced in their lives.
Studies That Support This View
Belief plays an outsized role in our health that science and medicine generally frown upon. In her wonderful book, Cure: A Journey into the Science of Mind Over Body, Jo Marchant makes the case that belief (in the form of placebos and prayer) is sometimes a stronger factor than medical treatment in health. She writes that belief can operate positively and negatively on our health; it can cause as well as cure. She cites many studies of this subtle dance of mind and body that back up her claims.
I have also encountered many examples in my own studies that are cited in my book. One is a BBC/Oxford University placebo study in Blackpool, England, where nearly half the subjects with severe back pain and disability got better while taking placebos, thinking they were taking medication. One elderly man even got out of his wheelchair and began walking again. Science doesn’t have rational answers to these studies’ curious findings.
Another head-scratcher is a fascinating study conducted by Ellen Langer, an American psychologist. In this famous study cited in a New York Times article (link below) titled, “What if Age is Nothing but a Mind-set?”she placed several 70-ish year-old subjects in a 20-year-old “time warp” for several days. They dressed the way they did then; they only watched TV, news, and sports from 20 years before; they only read books and magazines from that era; and they were surrounded by furniture and appliances from that time. She asked the study’s participants to be self-sufficient and do everything for themselves as they would have then.
After just five days they all felt better and younger, they had more energy, and they stood up straighter. A few even ditched the canes they were using when they came in. To me, it’s clear that age truly is a mindset – a belief that we hold deep in our conscious or unconscious mind about whether we will (or will not) spend our later-life years being healthy and functional.
Self Belief
My own belief starts with me, my health, my being. I celebrate myself, the organism that is me. The wonder of my existence, and all of ours, is a project the universe has been working on for eons. It is a privilege to be alive and healthy – and to be me.
I didn’t always feel this way. I try to live my life with faith and belief that my body will support and teach me in my quest to live a long, healthy, vibrant, and vital later life.
What do YOU believe about your later-life years? I encourage you to take a moment to think deeply about these questions, clarify your beliefs, and choose practices that will help you stay healthy and functional in your later-life years:
· How long do you expect to live?
· How do you believe you will spend those later-life years?
· How do you want to spend those years?
· How healthy and functional do you imagine you will be in your later life?
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/26/magazine/what-if-age-is-nothing-but-a-mind-set.html
