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Can the mind really heal the body?

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And if so, is there
any scientific evidence

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to convince skeptical physicians like me?

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These are the questions that fueled
the last few years of my research

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and what I discovered
is that the scientific community,

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the medical establishment,
has being proving for over 50 years,

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that the mind can heal the body.

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We call it the "placebo effect".

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And we've been trying
to outsmart it for decades.

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(Laughter)

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The placebo effect is a thorn in the side
of the medical establishment.

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It's an inconvenient truth,
that gets in between,

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trying to bring new treatments, new
surgeries into the medical establishment.

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So it's a problem!
Supposedly.

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But I actually think,
this is really good news!

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The placebo effect is excellent news!

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Because it's concrete evidence

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that the body holds within it
innate self-repair mechanisms

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that can make unthinkable
things happen to the body.

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So, if you find this surprising,

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if you have a hard time believing
that the body can heal itself,

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you need look no further than
The Spontaneous Remission Project,

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a database compiled
by the Institute of Noetic Sciences

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of over 3500 case studies
in the medical literature

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of patients who have gotten better
from seemingly "incurable" illnesses.

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You think there's such
a thing as an incurable illness?

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I swear, if you go look at this database,
it will blow your mind.

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Everything is in there.

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Stage 4 cancers that disappeared
without treatment.

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HIV positive patients,
that became HIV negative.

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Heart disease, kidney failure,
diabetes, high blood pressure,

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thyroid disease,
autoimmune diseases, gone.

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A great example of this
in the medical literature,

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is a case study from 1957 of Mr. Wright
who had advanced lymphosarcoma.

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So, things weren't going well for
Mr. Wright, time was really running out.

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He had tumors the size of oranges in his
armpits, neck, chest, abdomen.

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His liver and spleen were enlarged,

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and his lungs were filling up with
two quarts of milky fluid every day

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that have to be drained
in order for him to breathe.

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But Mr. Wright wasn't giving up hope.

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He had heard about
this wonder drug called Krebiozen,

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and he was begging his doctor,

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"Come on, just give me some of that
Krebiozen, it's all going to be good."

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Now, unfortunately the Krebiozen was
only available on a research protocol

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and the protocol required that the doctor
be able to make an assessment

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that says that this guy has
at least three months to live.

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And his doctor,
Dr. West just couldn't do that.

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But Mr. Wright was tenacious
and he didn't give up.

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He kept badgering his doctor,

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until finally his doctor was like,
"OK, fine I'll give you the Krebiozen."

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So he dosed him up on a Friday,

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not expecting that Mr. Wright
would make it through the weekend.

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But to his utter shock, when Dr. West
came in to do rounds on Monday,

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Mr. Wright was up,
walking around the wards,

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and his tumors had shrunk
to half of their original size.

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They had melted like
snowballs on a hot stove.

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And ten days after getting
the Krebiozen, they were gone.

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So Mr. Wright was up
rocking and rolling like praising

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Krebiozen as the miracle drug
he believed it to be, for two months,

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until the initial reports
came out about Krebiozen

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that said that it didn't really look like
Krebiozen was working so well.

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Mr. Wright fell into a deep depression
and his cancer came back.

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This time Dr. West decided to get sneaky,
and he told his patient, that,

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"You know that Krebiozen that you got,
that was a tainted version, not so good.

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But I got us some ultrapure
highly concentrated Krebiozen,

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This stuff's got it going on."

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He then injected Mr. Wright
with nothing but distilled water.

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And once again, the tumors disappeared,
the fluid in his lungs went away.

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Mr. Wright was up rocking and rolling
for another two months.

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And then the American
Medical Association blew it,

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by publishing a nationwide study

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that proved definitively
that Krebiozen was worthless.

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Two days later, Mr. Wright,
after hearing this news, died.

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Soon after that,
I came across another study

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in the medical literature
that was the stuff of fairy tales.

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Three baby girls were born,
delivered by a midwife,

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on Friday the 13th in the Okefenokee
Swamp, near the Georgia-Florida border.

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And the midwife pronounced
that these three babies,

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born on such a fateful day,
were all hexed.

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The first, she said, would die
before her 16th birthday.

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The second, before her 21st.

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The third, before her 23rd birthday.

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And as it turned out, the first girl died
the day before her 16th birthday,

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the second died the day
before her 21st birthday,

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and the third girl, who knew what
had happened to the other two,

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got wind of that, and the day
before her 23rd birthday,

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she showed at the hospital
hyperventilating,

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begging them,
to make sure she survived.

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She wound up dying that night.

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These two case studies are great
examples from the medical literature

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of the placebo effect, and
its opposite, the nocebo effect.

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When Mr. Wright got that distilled
water and his tumors melted away,

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that's a great example
of the placebo effect.

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When you get a seemingly
inert treatment

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and yet something is happening
physiologically in the body,

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such that the disease goes away.

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The nocebo effect is the opposite.

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So the three hexed girls are
an example of the nocebo effect.

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When the mind's belief that something
bad is going to happen in the body

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then it comes to manifest.

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So the scientific literature,
medical journals

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like the New England Journal of Medicine

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and the Journal of the American
Medical Association,

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these scientific journals are
full of evidence that the placebo effect,

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and the nocebo effect
are incredibly powerful.

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We've known this since the 1950s,

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and we've seen countless case studies

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that show that in almost
everything you study,

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if you give people
a fake treatment, a sugar pill

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a saline injection, or most effectively,
a fake surgery,

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(Laughter)
- yeah, really -

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18-80% of the time, people get better.

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And it's not just in their mind,
that's what I thought in the beginning,

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like "Oh! They're just feeling better,
they're thinking better."

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But is not.
It's actually in their physiology.

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This is measurable.

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You can actually see
what happens to the body.

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So for example patients getting placebos

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were found to have ulcers that healed,

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colons that became less inflamed,
bronchi that dilated,

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warts that disappeared, cells
looked different under the microscope.

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It's provable, it's happening in the body,

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even though it's initiated by the mind.

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So, when you look at these,
some of the studies are just amazing.

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I love the Rogain studies.

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You get a bunch of bald men,
you give them placebos.

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They grow hair!
(Laughter)

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The opposite is also true,
so if you give people a placebo

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and you tell them it's chemotherapy,

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they vomit, and they lose their hair.

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So this is really happening in the body.

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My question was,

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Is it just the mind's positive belief
that's making this happen?

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Not according to Harvard
researcher Ted Kaptchuk.

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According to him, he thinks
that the most essential part

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is actually the nurturing care
of a healthcare provider,

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more so even than the mind's
positive belief

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that some of the studies actually say
that the doctor is the placebo or can be.

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So Ted Kaptchuk wanted to study this,

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and he did a great study
looking at patients

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that were getting placebos for an illness,

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for treatment of an illness
and he told them,

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"You're getting a placebo,
there's nothing in here,

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inert ingredients, nothing active."
They still got better.

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Most likely, Kaptchuk postulated,
because they felt tended, nurtured,

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they felt like they were doing something,
they felt like somebody cared.

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So to say that you can heal yourself
is sort of a misnomer.

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You know, the body can heal itself.

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The body has these innate
natural self repair mechanisms,

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but the scientific data
proves that you need

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the tending nurturing care of a healthcare
provider, of some sort, of a healer,

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to facilitate that process.

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It's not an easy process
to go through alone,

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so it makes a big difference

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if somebody else is holding
that positive belief with you.

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But the problem is while
the doctor can be the placebo,

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the doctor can also be the nocebo.

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So, what patients need from us,
as healthcare providers,

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they need us to be forces of healing,
not forces of fear or pessimism.

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So every time your doctor tells you,
"You have an incurable illness,

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you're going to have to take that
medication for the rest of your life,"

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or God forbid,
you get cancer and they say,

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"You've got a 5% five-year survival rate,"

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it's really no different that when
that midwife told those three baby girls

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that they were hexed.

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It's a form of medical hexing
that's so prevalent.

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As doctors, we think
we're being realistic, you know?

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We're giving people
the kind of information

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we think they need to know,

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but we actually can be harming them.

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Instead we need be more
like Dr. West. You know?

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Taking that distilled water,
"Really Mr.Wright,

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I promise, this is going to
do it for you."

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But do we have to count on
our doctors to dupe us?

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Do we have to get fake surgeries
and fake drugs,

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and wind up in clinical trials?

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This is what led
the next phase of my research.

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So in my last TEDx talk, l talked about

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a new wellness model that I developed,

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called the Whole Health Cairn,

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and this came about
as part of my research,

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trying to find how else can
we harness this mind's power

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that's clearly evidenced by
the placebo effect and the nocebo effect,

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can we do something without
being in a clinical trial?

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And my hypothesis was
that in order to heal ourselves,

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in order to be optimally healthy,

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we need more than just a good diet,
regular exercise program,

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getting enough sleep, taking your
vitamins, following your doctor's orders.

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Those things all are great,
and critical and important.

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But I also came to believe that
we need healthy relationships,

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a healthy professional life,
a healthy creative life,

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a healthy spiritual life,
a healthy sex life,

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a healthy financial life,
a healthy environment.

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In essence, we need a healthy mind.

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So I wanted to try to prove this, and
I went into the medical literature

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and the copious data that I found,

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proving that all of those things
are essential, really blew my mind.

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I compiled them all into my upcoming book,

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"Mind Over Medicine: Scientific
Proof You Can Heal Yourself".

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But I want to give you a few highlights
about what this is all about.

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So you can see from
the Whole Health Cairn,

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that all this facets are built upon
a foundation stone

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that I call your Inner Pilot Light.

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And for me that's the essential
authentic part of you,

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that knows what's true for you.

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That's willing to tell you the truth

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about maybe what's out
of alignment in your life,

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what stones in your Whole Health Cairn
might be out of balance.

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And as you see I've put the body,
physical health,

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on the top of the Whole Health Cairn

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because it's the most fragile,
the most precarious,

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and the most easy to kind
of fall out of balance

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if other things in your life
aren't going so well.

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So what I found in the medical data
is that relationships matter.

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People that have a strong social network
have half the rate of heart disease

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compared to those who are lonely.

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Married people are twice as likely
to live long lives than unmarried people.

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In fact, curing your loneliness may be

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the most important measure of prevention
you can enact upon your body.

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More so than quitting smoking
or starting to exercise.

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Your spiritual life matters.

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Those who attend religious services
live up to fourteen years longer.

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Your professional life matters.

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You really can work yourself to death.
In Japan they call it karoshi.

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Death by overwork, and the survivors
of those who die of karoshi,

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can actually apply for workman's
comp-like benefits in Japan.

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But it's not just Japan, it's actually
happening even more in the United States,

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we just don't get benefits here.

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So one study found that people
that fail to take their vacation,

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are actually a third more likely
to get heart disease.

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Your attitude really matters.

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Ηappy people live 7 to 10 years
longer than unhappy people,

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and optimists are 77% less likely
to get heart disease than pessimists.

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So how does this happen?

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What is happening in the brain
that is making the body change?

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This is what was fascinating to me.

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I found that the brain communicates
with all the cells in the body

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via hormones and neurotransmitters.

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So, for example, if you have
a negative thought, belief

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or feeling in the brain,
your brain triggers this as a threat.

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Something's wrong.

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If you feel lonely or pessimistic,
things are bad at work,

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you are in a toxic relationship,
the amygdala says, "Τhreat! Τhreat!"

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and it turns on the hypothalamus,
that talks to the pituitary gland,

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that communicates with the adrenal gland
and the adrenal gland start spitting out

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stress hormones like cortisol,
norepinephrine, epinephrine.

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Ιt turns on what Walter Cannon
at Harvard called the stress response,

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that triggers the sympathetic
nervous system,

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and puts you into that
fight or flight mode, which is adaptive,

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it's protective if you are running away
from a mountain lion,

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but in every day life, you're supposed
to have that quick stress response

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if there is a threat and then
it's supposed to switch right off.

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This isn't what happens
in our regular lives these days.

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But fortunately there is
a counter balancing relaxation response

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that Herbert Benson at Harvard described.

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And when this comes about,
the stress response turns off,

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the parasympathetic nervous system
turns on,

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and healing hormones like oxytocin,
dopamine, nitric oxide, endorphins

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fill the body and bathe
every cell in the body.

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What I found the most amazing about this

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is that those natural self-repair
mechanisms that we all have,

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they only flip on when
the nervous system is relaxed.

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So when you're having stress responses,

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all those natural self-repair
mechanisms get flipped off.

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The body is too busy trying to fight
or flee, in order to heal itself.

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So, when you think about this,
you have to start to wonder like,

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How can I possibly start to change
the balance in my own body?

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So one study showed
that on average we have

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more than 50 stress responses per day.

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And if you're lonely, or depressed
or pessimistic or unhappy at work

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or in a miserable relationship that number
is going to be more than twice as many.

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Now this relaxation response
is what researchers think

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explains the placebo effect.

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00:14:30,822 --> 00:14:34,569
So when you're going to get supposedly
maybe a new wonder drug -

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you don't know whether you're getting
the placebo or not -

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it triggers that relaxation response,

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that combination of the mind's
positive belief

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and the nurturing care
of a healthcare provider

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relaxes the nervous system.

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And then all those natural self repair
mechanisms can come into play.

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Fortunately though you don't have
to be in a clinical trial

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to turn on your relaxation responses.

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There are lots of simple
pleasurable activities

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that turn on the relaxation responses

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and these have been proven
in the medical literature.

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So you can meditate,
you can express yourself creatively,

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you can get a massage,
do yoga or tai chi,

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00:15:09,293 --> 00:15:12,743
you can go out with your friends,
you can do work that you love,

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you can have sex, you can laugh,
exercise, you can play with animals.

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00:15:18,840 --> 00:15:22,154
So I ask you to consider
the Whole Health Cairn in your own life.

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Which stones in your Whole Health Cairn
might be out of balance?

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Each of these stones can be a factor

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for creating stress responses
or relaxation responses.

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How might you turn on more
relaxation responses in your body?

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And most importantly,

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00:15:38,144 --> 00:15:40,782
what does your body
need in order to heal?

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00:15:40,782 --> 00:15:43,503
What prescription do you need
to write for yourself?

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And are you going to be brave enough

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to take action on the truth of what
your inner pilot light already knows?

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I believe our healthcare system
is badly broken,

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and it's largely because
we've lost respect

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for the body's ability to heal itself.

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The medical establishment
has gotten arrogant.

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We've come to think
that with all of our modern technology,

305
00:16:03,416 --> 00:16:05,655
and all that we've learned
in the past century,

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00:16:05,655 --> 00:16:10,167
that we've mastered nature,
and we find it repelling

307
00:16:10,167 --> 00:16:14,256
to think that maybe nature could
be better than we are sometimes.

308
00:16:14,256 --> 00:16:19,177
And yet, spontaneous remissions
from incurable diseases are proof

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00:16:19,177 --> 00:16:22,200
that sometimes nature
is just better than we are.

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00:16:22,020 --> 00:16:23,963
It's a narcisitic wound for physicians.

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We don't know what to do with that.

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00:16:25,819 --> 00:16:28,397
It makes us feel helpless
and hopeless and useless.

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00:16:28,397 --> 00:16:30,968
But fortunately, we're needed.

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The physician and all the other
healthcare providers

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00:16:33,781 --> 00:16:36,297
are absolutely essential to this process.

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00:16:36,297 --> 00:16:38,030
We need to embrace this.

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00:16:38,030 --> 00:16:41,010
And patients need to change
their outlooks on this as well.

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00:16:41,010 --> 00:16:42,475
It is not just doctors.

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00:16:42,475 --> 00:16:45,909
We need patients to stop thinking
that your body is not your business,

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00:16:45,909 --> 00:16:49,237
taking your power and handing it
over to other healthcare providers.

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00:16:49,237 --> 00:16:53,749
Your body is your business,
and your mind has tremendous power

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00:16:53,749 --> 00:16:59,354
to communicate with your body,
such that your body can heal itself.

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00:16:59,354 --> 00:17:03,405
So I once had a dream,
and in my dream I was standing there,

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00:17:03,405 --> 00:17:06,532
looking at these mountainsides,
full of millions of people

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00:17:06,532 --> 00:17:08,585
that were standing shoulder to shoulder,

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00:17:08,585 --> 00:17:11,868
and they were all facing due north,
dressed in all these tribal garbs,

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00:17:11,868 --> 00:17:14,915
beautiful colors covering
the mountainsides like a quilt.

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00:17:14,915 --> 00:17:18,238
And there was a bright
streaming light on their face

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00:17:18,238 --> 00:17:21,517
and everyone was facing this light,

330
00:17:21,517 --> 00:17:24,174
and that's what I think of,
when I think of healthcare.

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00:17:24,174 --> 00:17:26,960
I think of all of us, standing up,
and facing the light.

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00:17:26,960 --> 00:17:29,569
So please stand with me for a moment.

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00:17:29,569 --> 00:17:31,692
It's going to take all of us.

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00:17:31,692 --> 00:17:36,368
Just because things have gotten bad
doesn't mean they can't get better.

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00:17:36,368 --> 00:17:40,369
I believe that just like there are
no incurable illnesses

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00:17:40,369 --> 00:17:42,113
there are no incurable systems.

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00:17:42,113 --> 00:17:46,226
But it's going to take all of us, needing
to open our heart and our minds,

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00:17:46,226 --> 00:17:48,567
and bring care back to healthcare.

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00:17:48,567 --> 00:17:50,891
So please hold hands
with your fellow neighbor

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00:17:50,891 --> 00:17:53,308
and let's just set
the intention right here,

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00:17:53,308 --> 00:17:56,706
that things are going to be
different from now on,

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00:17:56,706 --> 00:18:01,610
that we can start this grassroots effort
that it all starts with you.

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00:18:01,610 --> 00:18:05,086
Be the love that you want to
see in healthcare,

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00:18:05,086 --> 00:18:07,532
and I believe miracles can happen.

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00:18:07,532 --> 00:18:13,560
As we do this you're releasing oxytocin,
dopamine, you start to heal yourself

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00:18:13,056 --> 00:18:15,563
and as we do so we can heal healthcare.

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00:18:15,563 --> 00:18:17,398
Thank you.

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00:18:17,398 --> 00:18:22,295
(Applause)