If you think it, it is so

The crux of a lot of medicine and psuedo-medicine is, in part, based on how much you believe it will work, known as the placebo effect. There is a story, I believe from the second world war but don't quote me on it, where nurses had to use saline instead of morphine for soldiers when they ran out of the latter. The summation of the story is that the ruse, by and large, worked. The soldiers believed they were getting morphine and reacted as though they got morphine. This is not to say that placebos work as well as the morphine itself would have........but it worked a hell of a lot better than if they had informed the soldiers they were out of pain medication.

Unfortunately doctors cannot utilize the placebo effect. They are pinned to the wall of legality.......should they not pursue anything and everything to treat, they open themselves up to possible legal ramifications. So, the placebo effect lies largely in the hands of Naturopaths and analogs thereof. That isn't to say that none of their medications/treatments have proven effect, but it is to say that they do utilize in large part the belief that their treatments will cure to, well, cure.

Why do I mention this, well because I went to see a mental health professional today for stress and she used some rather, well, a little new age for my general tastes, techniques. I don't wish to cast dispersions on the practice because I know there are many fervent believers and a multiplicity of success stories. Much like religion, if you are a believer, everything sounds plausible, but if you aren't, it just all sounds a little crazy. However, I am going to try to suspend my disbelief for my three sessions and see. Maybe I will become a believer too.