Italian psychologist  Dr. Roberto Assagioli left us two remarkable pieces of writing, Psychosynthesis and The Act of Will. In those books, Assagioli brought his remarkable intelligence to bear on the entire subject of human potential and human happiness. He studied the mind and personality for his entire lifetime, and he came up with several ideas that are profoundly simple and powerfully effective in helping you and me to lead happier, more satisfying lives. In The Act of Will, he laid out a series of psychological principles, or laws, that can be very helpful to you in understanding the way your mind works and how you can take control of it.

The third of Assagioli's laws is that images or pictures, either from within or from the outside, will trigger thoughts and feelings consistent with them. In turn, those thoughts and feelings will trigger behaviors that lead to the realization of the pictures. For example, when you become absolutely convinced that you are a total winner and you are meant to be a complete success in anything that you really want to do, every picture or image that you see that somehow represents winning to you will trigger thoughts of what you could do to achieve that same state. The picture will also trigger the feeling of excitement that will motivate you to take action.

Assagioli's fourth law is that thoughts, feelings and images trigger the words and actions consistent with them. This is another way of saying that your inner impressions will motivate you to pursue the outer activities that will move you toward the achievement of your goals.

Assagioli's fifth law is that your actions will trigger thoughts, emotions and images consistent with them. That has been referred to as the Law of Reversibility. It is one of the most important success principles ever discovered.

Mind influence on Physical Health

Sandra Donaldson clinical background is in kinesiology where she worked in orthopaedics for 5 years. She then crossed over to work in clinical research where she has been working for over 10 years. Sandra has worked at University Hospital (London), Princess Margaret and Women's College Hospitals. She is now working as a clinical research project manager in paediatric orthopaedic clinical trials in Toronto.

Anyone who wants to learn more about mind-body medicine, and other complementary and alternative health care, should check out the Integrative Health Institute (IHI) at Mount Royal College in Calgary.

The Institute opened on Feb. 2, 2005, and is Canada’s first post-secondary institute dedicated to advancing complementary and alternative health education and research, and integrating treatments into existing health practices.

Mind-body medicine uses the power of the mind to influence physical health. It’s not what you think. There are no granola-crunching hippies here. Researchers are confirming the beneficial effects of these healing practices, some that date back more than 2,000 years.

Mind-body medicine has had a positive influence on patients with heart attacks, cancer, insomnia, surgery, headaches and chronic low back pain. The goal of this alternative medicine is to complement conventional care, not replace it. Mind-body therapies include guided imagery, hypnosis, biofeedback, cognitive behavioral therapy and meditation.

In this 24-7 world, multi-tasking has become a way of life. In contrast, meditation focuses on simplicity, the here and now. The two most common types of meditation are transcendental, repeating a silent word, and mindfulness, observing thoughts and emotions as they arise.

A guru in this field, Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn PhD, has recently published Coming to Our Senses, Healing Ourselves and the World through Meditation. Kabat-Zinn emphasizes that lack of attention to the body’s signs and symptoms can lead to disease, or dis-ease. Meditation sessions frequently start with body scanning to identify areas of tension or pain, and use breathing exercises to bring relief.

Guided imagery uses visualization and imagination to produce a state of relaxation. Using as many senses as possible improves the effect. For example, picture yourself lying on a beach, feeling the warmth of the sun, listening to the waves as they wash ashore, the scent of cocoa butter sunscreen rising from your skin.

The mind responds to what it sees. In reality, you may be sitting at a computer in a windowless office. But if your mind truly believes you are on a beach somewhere, your body will respond, your heart rate will slow and breathing will deepen.

Hypnosis speaks to the sub-conscious and involves three stages:

* Absorption, or intense concentration on an object.
* Dissociation – experiences are interpreted outside the normal conscious awareness (due to absorption in first stage).
* Suggestibility, or accepting input from the therapist without censor or criticism.

Once under hypnosis, the therapist can suggest ways of achieving specific goals such as reducing anxiety or fear. Preliminary research on childbirth shows that hypnosis is useful in treating pain and reducing the length of labor.

Biofeedback uses devices that monitor physiologic response such as heart rate or muscle activity. While being guided through relaxation exercises, patients are able to monitor their progress visually or auditorily, using flashing lights or beeping sounds.

After a certain number of sessions, the goal is for patients to achieve relaxation without the use of technology. For example, an EEG (electroencephalogram) monitors the brain waves associated with different mental states, such as restless sleep or deep sleep.

Cognitive behavioral therapy uses the cognitive process to shape experience. It implies that difficult emotions such as anxiety or depression are the result of faulty thinking. For example, patients with phobias believe they are in danger when they aren’t. A therapist would teach patients to restructure their fearful thought patterns, allowing them to see a less biased view of the world.

Use of several mind-body therapies to treat one condition is quite common and there tends to be overlap between the different therapies. Meditation can involve the use of guided imagery, or biofeedback training can include relaxation techniques. Regardless of the condition, a multi-therapy approach seems to provide the greatest benefit.

Heart attack patients experienced success using mind-body therapies, in combination with nutrition and exercise, as part of a cardiac rehabilitation program. Research involving over 12,000 patients focused on self-regulation skills such as relaxation and management of anger or hostility.

Over 6,000 cancer patients dealing with disease- and treatment-related symptoms showed positive results when using relaxation, hypnosis and supportive group therapy. These mind-body therapies improved mood, quality of life and coping skills.

Patients who are apprehensive about upcoming surgery can calm down. Mind-body therapies such as relaxation, guided imagery and instructional interventions can be used as part of presurgical preparation. These techniques were most effective in decreasing medication use, length of stay in hospital and recovery time.

Insomniacs can find relief through muscle relaxation and behavioural therapies, such as stimulus control. Mind-body therapies can also be helpful in late-life insomnia (difficulty staying asleep). A study found that cognitive-behavioural therapy reduced the number of awakenings and time spent awake. This therapy was more successful than medication, as the effects lasted up to two years following treatment.

Recurrent migraine headaches respond to a combination of relaxation and thermal biofeedback. Tension headaches benefit from relaxation or muscle biofeedback. These therapies can be combined with pain medication or work on their own.

Chronic low back pain works well with multi-component mind-body therapies such as stress management, coping skills or cognitive restructuring. Results on 1,300 patients support these therapies in combination with medical management.

Additional references:

Rational integration of pharmacologic, behavioural and rehabilitation strategies in the treatment of chronic pain by Gallagher RM. Am J Phys Med Rehabil. March 2005; 84(3Suppl):S64-76.

Integrative oncology: complementary therapies for pain, anxiety, and mood disturbance by Deng G, and Cassileth BR. CA Cancer J Clin. 2005 Mar-Apr; 55(2):109-16.

Mind-Body Medicine: state of the science, implications for practice by John A. Astin et al. J Am Board Fam Pract 16, 131-147 (2003).

Self-Motivation :

You Are The BEST...You Are Unique...You Are Different

All days are not same...some days are good and some are bad; All people are not the same...some appreciate and some criticize; All relatives are not the same...some love us and some hate us;

We give our best to all assignments...to all projects...to every thing that we do...to every moment of our life...to every minute of a day but the results are not same... sometimes we succeed and some time we fail.

There are also days of frustration and disappointments. There are also people who harm us, hurt us and criticize us. There are also people who accept us and others reject us.

Sometime the disappointment, frustration, fear, thought of failure and pain of rejection is too deep and it hurt our self-esteem and self-confidence. We feel useless, worthless and dejected.

Just during such days and such moments look into the mirror and tell your self, "I am the BEST". Why only during such times, everyday...once in a day you should tell yourself, "I am the best".

Doesn't matter what the situations are;
Doesn't matter what type of people are around you; Doesn't matter which phase of life...you are going through; You are THE BEST. You are Special. You are Unique. You are Different. You are Lovable.

Take positives from everything. Learn from your experience. Love yourself and love people around you. Respect yourself...for what you are and as you are.

Today might not be your day, but be hopeful, continue to dream...tomorrow will certainly be yours. Agreed that today is a bit dark, look the other side...some light is coming.

Be positive. Be thoughtful. Continue Your Learning. Love yourself. Don't let anything hurt you; Don't let people take away your self-esteem and self-pride;

Have a great day and fantastic week ahead. Take very good care of yourself...because you are the BEST...you are Special..you are Unique...you are Different...You are Lovable. With lots of love and care! Sanjeev Sharma (Blog: http://sanjeevhimachali.blogspot.com/)

Body's own immune system may help kill melanoma tumors Maria Cheng Globe&Mail

The body's own immune system can fight the deadly cancer melanoma if scientists can flip the system's “off” switch to “on,” two preliminary studies suggest.

Scientists have long sought to rev up the disease-fighting cells of the immune system to fight melanoma. The new work addresses the other side of the coin, the regulatory cells that normally keep disease-fighting cells in check.

By shutting those inhibiting cells off, scientists hope to enable the disease-fighting cells to mount a continuous attack on the cancer. Two new studies of that strategy were reported this week in Prague at a European cancer research meeting.

“This is a fundamentally different approach to treating cancer,” said Dr. Alexander Eggermont, professor of surgical oncology at the University of Rotterdam, Netherlands, the conference's chairman. Dr. Eggermont was not connected to either of the skin cancer research papers.

Advanced melanoma is a devastating disease for which there is no effective treatment. The average life expectancy is about nine months, and less than 20 per cent of patients survive more than two years after diagnosis.

In one paper, Dr. Jason Chesney from the J.G. Brown Cancer Center in Louisville, Ky., reported that when patients with advanced melanoma were given a drug combination to knock out their T-regulatory cells, tumours shrank or remained stable in five of seven participants.

“This is a landmark study,” said Dr. Anna Pavlick, director of the melanoma program at New York University Medical Center's cancer institute, who was not involved in the study. “What it shows is that by suppressing T-regulatory cells, we can take the brakes off a patient's immune system.”

Though Dr. Pavlick says it's too early to change how patients are treated based on Dr. Chesney's study alone, she believes the research merits further study.

“It's like having permanent chemotherapy,” said Dr. Chesney. “You're inducing your own immune system to stick around and keep this cancer from growing.”

In another study presented Wednesday, Dr. Jeffrey Weber, a professor of medicine at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, described how he and colleagues were able to block a protein on the T-regulatory cells. That inhibited them enough for the immune system to attack cancer cells.

Out of 25 patients tested, 24 are alive after 17 months, and three are free of cancer.

Both Dr. Chesney and Dr. Weber say it will be years before their strategies are sufficiently tested to know if they work on a wide scale. But if their hypotheses prove correct, they could also be applied to other types of cancer in which T-regulatory cells are known to play a role, such as breast, kidney, or esophageal cancer.

Allowing the immune system to run wild does not come without risk; doctors admit it could lead to autoimmune diseases including hepatitis, colitis or dermatitis. Still, most say those conditions are manageable, and are outweighed by the prospect of beating melanoma

Insights of Dr. Deepak Chopra

And others on How & Why to unlock our mind/ body incredible self healing powers and much more!

Over the past ten years, mind body medicine has been revolutionizing the way we think about our health. Millions of people are discovering that their thoughts, their feelings, and their physical well being are intimately connected- and this is transforming the way we eat, exercise, work, and even relate to one another.

Since the time of the ancient Greeks, Western medicine has looked at the body from a materialistic perspective, and approached every problem with a material-based solution such as drugs and surgery.

But, through the insights of Dr. Deepak Chopra, David Simon, and other pioneers of mind body medicine, it’s become evident that if we want to change who we are, we need to simply move in new directions, open our experiences to new interpretations, and awaken our senses to the new perceptions that await us.

Most of us tend to assume that body and spirit are at opposite ends of the spectrum. But according to the discoveries of quantum physics, the body is actually a swirling mass of constantly changing energy. It has more in common with what we think of as “spirit” than what we think of as matter.

Dr. Chopra merges modern science with spirituality to demonstrate how verifiable scientific evidence closely supports ancient metaphysical traditions. And how applying this knowledge can impact all areas of your life. He believes that you can align the energy of your physical body with the energy of the universe, and that by doing this you tap into an infinite reservoir of intelligence.

The Case of One who Did & One that Did Not!

This Case Study Summary is of two men who were born on the same day and city. One, the son of an Industrialist and the other the son of an employee of the Industrialist. They met when they were in Kindergarten and immediately became inseparable friends & soul mates. Much to the displeasure of the Industrialist who saw that the activities they were into, had a real passion for and derived great joy & happiness, did not fit his plans of grooming his son to one day take over his empire. That by grade 3 he put his son in a Private School to minimize as much as possible the "Bad Influences" & the "Useless Activities" he enjoyed so much with his friend. His son did graduate from a prestigious business school that had prepared him to take over the business one day. However he did so without much joy or sense of accomplishment. It was just a Mechanical thing to do to please his father! He always felt to be in the shadows of others and never the self esteem joy of feeling really good about himself like when he and his childhood friend did things that made them feel really special.

The employee of the Industrialist on the other hand, by accident or design, did not discourage but encouraged these activities that brought so much self esteem happiness to his son. His father was just happy to see his son happy at whatever he did! In University he did not take a rigid program that would lead to a specific career opportunity. He took courses for the pure pleasure of acquiring knowledge in things he found interesting. Upon graduating his father got him an entry level position were he worked and his childhood friend, that he had hardly seen since then, was already a VP. Within months his immediate supervisors began to really value his contribution with promotions. The Aura of being very happy in who he was, without ego. The power to have people really listen, appreciate and happily follow what he had to say! The knack to make people feel important and work together to solve problems!

Within a few years the Industrialist realized that his son's childhood activities he stopped and the forced separation of his son from his childhood soul mate was a mistake. He promoted his son friend to VP with instruction to work very close with his son. Hoping to rekindle those activities they so joyously shared in childhood.

Mind/Body Communication
Our thoughts and feelings influence the body via two kinds of mechanisms: the nervous system and the circulatory system. These are the pathways of communication between the brain and the rest of the body.

The brain reaches into the body via the nervous system. This allows it to send nerve impulses into all the body's tissues and influence their behavior. The brain can thus affect the behavior of the immune system with its nerve endings extending into the bone marrow (the birthplace of all white cells), the thymus, the spleen, and the lymph nodes.

It also reaches into all the glands of the endocrine system, all the bones, muscles, all the internal organs, and even the walls of veins and arteries. It can influence the behavior of the heart with its nerves penetrating the heart tissue, affecting heart rate and other aspects of the heart's functioning. The entire body is literally "wired" by the brain.

The brain is also a gland. It manufactures thousands of different kinds of chemicals and releases them into the bloodstream. These chemicals circulate throughout the body and influence the activity and behavior of all the body's tissues. The brain could be described as the ultimate apothecary, producing many more drugs than science has ever invented.

The cells of the body have receptors on their surfaces that function somewhat like satellite dishes. These receptors receive the chemical messages being released by the brain and respond accordingly.

Finally, the mind/body connection is a two-way street. In addition to sending messages into the body's tissues, it also receives feedback, both in the form of nerve impulses and its own receptors that sense what chemicals are being released by other tissues in the body.

Research into how the brain can influence immune responses has given rise to the new field called psycho-neuro-immunology (PNI). Findings in this field have brought great hope to people dealing with such difficult illnesses as cancer, AIDS, CFIDS (chronic fatigue immune dysfunction syndrome), and other immune-related diseases.

It is only a matter of time before similar acronyms are defined for other fields such as psycho-neuro-cardiology (PNC), the study of the mind-heart connection, or psycho-neuro-hematology (PNH), the study of how the mind can influence bloodrelated disorders, such as clotting problems in hemophilia.

The Power of the Mind/Body Connection
One of the most stirring stories about the power of the mind/body connection concerns a man diagnosed with terminal cancer. Reported by Dr. Bruno Klopfer in the Journal of Projective Techniques in 1957, it involved a man with metastatic cancer and tumors that had spread throughout his body. The patient had tried every available form of medicine and his condition had hopelessly deteriorated to the point where he was bedridden and gasping for air. His doctors agreed that he had only a few days to live. Then the man heard about an experimental drug called Krebiozen, which was in the process of being tested. He insisted on being included in the experimental trials. His doctors, feeling he had nothing to lose and would soon be dead anyway, out of compassion agreed to give him the experimental drug. To their amazement, the man's tumors soon began to shrink dramatically and he was discharged from the hospital.

Two months later, the man read news accounts of the research on Krebiozen that reported serious doubts with the drug. Within a matter of days, the man's tumors had returned and were again threatening his life. His doctor cleverly convinced him that new and more potent shipment had been received and proceeded to give him injections of plain water. His tumors once again began to shrink dramatically. He remained healthy for seven more months until another news report declared "Nationwide AMA Tests Show Krebiozen to Be Worthless as a Cancer Treatment." The man died within two days.

The Stress Response
The stress response is a set of changes in the body that result when the person experiences what they perceive to be a challenging or threatening situation. This matter of perceived threat is important because the effects of the stress response on the body are the same whether the threat is real or just imagined in the mind.

The magnitude of these changes is influenced by how serious the person thinks the situation is and what they think about their ability to handle the threat effectively (their appraisal of their ability to respond). Of course, the more confident the person is in their ability to handle a challenge easily, the less stress is involved. The more the person appraises the challenge as a threat—even at the subconscious level—the more intense will be the stress response.

Commonly called the fight-or-flight reaction, the stress response has the beneficial effect of preparing the body to function at a higher level of efficiency, which of course enhances the likelihood of survival. The physiological changes include:

* Increased blood pressure
* Increased respiratory rate
* Increased heart rate
* Increased oxygen consumption (burning of fuel)
* Increased blood flow to skeletal muscles
* Increased perspiration
* Increased muscle tone

While all these changes clearly contribute to one's ability to fight or flee in an emergency, they also have a downside. If the person is experiencing the stress response regularly and for extended periods of time, these physiological changes have the effect of weakening the body's resistance to illness and lowering the effectiveness of its mechanisms of self-repair.

The Relaxation Response
Another key principle is the relaxation response, which was discovered and named by Herbert Benson, M.D., and his colleagues in 1974.7,8 They were studying a pattern of physiological changes that occurs in people practicing transcendental meditation (TM).

This pattern of changes has been found to represent a very beneficial state, one that is virtually a mirror image of the stress response. The relaxation response includes the following changes:

* Reduced blood pressure
* Reduced respiratory rate
* Reduced heart rate
* Reduced oxygen consumption (burning of fuel)
* Reduced blood flow to skeletal muscles
* Reduced perspiration
* Reduced muscle tension

The relaxation response is an antidote to the effects of the stress response and it has also been found to enhance the effectiveness of the body's defenses and self-repair mechanisms. Regular practice of techniques that elicit this response also brings improved emotional well-being and better handling of stressful life events.

The relaxation response is a physiological state, not a technique as such. As we shall see later, there are many techniques that can be used to produce it and, indeed, learning to do this is at the heart of mind/body medicine.

Coping, Emotions, and Health
Researchers have identified how the ways we cope with emotions and stressful situations—our coping styles—can influence our physical health. Most firmly established are the links between coronary heart disease and the Type A behavior pattern. Type A is a way of coping characterized by constant hurriedness, intense competitiveness, and free-floating hostility.

A more recent concept is the Type C pattern, which in many ways is the polar opposite of Type A. It involves the non-expression of anger and other unpleasant emotions such as fear and sadness, unassertive and overly appeasing behavior in relationships with others, and a preoccupation with meeting the needs of others, often to the point of extreme self-sacrifice. The theory of the Type C pattern was put forward by Lydia Temoshok, Ph.D., a leading health psychologist and PNI researcher. She has found compelling evidence for a link between emotional expressiveness and the progression of cancer.

The middle ground, or Type B. is considered a more balanced way of coping that involves appropriate expression of all emotions and the ability to meet one's own needs while responding to those of others. People who cope in this more balanced way tend to be less at risk for serious illness. The cultivation of these behaviors is often a goal in mind/body medicine programs, especially for heart disease and cancer.

Lifestyle Change
The use of mind/body medicine takes place within a broader context of changing one's lifestyle to promote health. Making a daily practice of mind/body techniques is but one of several areas of lifestyle change that work together in a synergistic way. Other areas include proper diet, exercise, and social support.

While the health benefits of diet and exercise are obvious, there is a growing body of research now indicating that supportive interpersonal relationships are strongly associated with better health. They seem to ameliorate or buffer the harmful effects of stress on the body.

Turning Down the Pressure
Alice, suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), undertook a two-week intensive treatment of intravenous Acyclovir therapy in the hospital. Acyclovir is a drug that inhibits the reproduction of herpes viruses, a family of viruses thought to be cofactors in CFS. One of the side effects of this therapy is elevated blood pressure, which needs to be closely monitored.

Alice was about halfway through her treatment protocol when she enrolled in a group mind/body medicine program. She brought her stainless steel drip apparatus with her from the hospital and stood it up beside her in the circle with the other patients and their spouses.

The first day involved a series of relaxation and deep breathing exercises. The next day Alice returned to the group bubbling with excitement. She reported that the previous evening her blood pressure had returned to normal. The nursing staff were mystified and wanted to know how she had done it

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