| Dr. Jai Maharaj 2004-12-16, 9:20 am |
| Happiness And Optimism Can Change Your DNA
Forwarded message from "Ross Cannon" <ross.cann@juno.com>
[ Subject: Optimism
[ From: "Ross Cannon" <ross.cann@juno.com>
[ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 2004
Happiness And Optimism 'Can Change Your DNA'
Delving Into Mind Over Matter
By Claire Smith
The Scotsman - UK
Friday, December 3, 2004
IT WAS during a weekend of fire-walking in the Welsh hills that scientist
David Hamilton decided to change his life.
As an organic chemist with a major pharmaceutical company, he was on a good
salary, developing a new generation of drugs by synthesising molecules
found in nature. But Hamilton was never convinced that man could improve on
nature, and instead was becoming more and more fascinated by the potential
healing power of the mind. So, inspired by his body's ability to withstand
heat during fire-walking, he began a quest to investigate the mysteries of
the mind-body connection. It was the beginning of a journey which brought
him into contact with alternative therapists, spiritual teachers and faith
healers, and was to inspire him to try and fill Hampden stadium with
thousands of people all thinking positive thoughts.
He also began hosting seminars where he encouraged people to believe in the
power of their mind to positively improve their health.
Unlike many self-help gurus, Hamilton backs his arguments with scientific
research and combines his work with a post as a part-time lecturer in
chemistry at Glasgow University.
In his first book, It's The Thought That Counts, due to be published next
year, he will put forward the scientific arguments about the mysterious
mind-body connection and argue that powerful human states such as happiness
and optimism can actually change your DNA.
"I'm interested in the whole self-improvement thing but I am the only
scientist talking about it," he says.
His interest in the power of the human spirit began when he was working as
an organic chemist for a major pharmaceutical company. Put in the fast-
track by the company because of his skill in the field, Hamilton worked on
creating new drugs by re-creating molecular structures found in nature with
slight differences in order to develop new drugs. "You study nature's
molecules and re-create them slightly differently. You might make 10,000
versions of the same molecule and study the effects," he says. "The idea is
to take nature and improve on it."
However, he was not sure that was the right approach. He was also becoming
uneasy about the way pharmaceutical companies were operating, particularly
in the developing world, and became fascinated by the placebo effect, the
scientific principle which shows that in drug trials, people given sugar
pills often recover just as well as those on other medication. "On average,
placebo effects cure anything between 30 to 90 per cent. That has been
written up in many scientific journals. I thought, ‘Why not see if you
could extend it'," he says.
ON A WEEKEND retreat with Tony Robbins, the pioneer of fire-walking,
Hamilton decided it was time to change his course in life. "When you walk
on fire for the first time you feel incredibly euphoric. At the end of it I
felt like I could do anything, and, more specifically, that I could live my
dream."
He set up New Awakenings, giving talks and workshops about the power of the
mind over the body. While many new-age types talk about positive thinking,
Hamilton is different, in that he gives listeners a view based on the
latest developments in chemistry, biology and physics. By presenting
arguments backed by science, he hopes to motivate people to work on their
minds in order to improve their health: "With faith hope and determination
people can change the state of their health, life and world".
At the end of 2000, Hamilton set up Spirit Aid, with the actor David
Hayman, to stage a Live Aid-style event at Hampden stadium, Glasgow, where
inspirational spiritual teachers from different traditions would address
the crowd between musical acts.
The plan foundered after 18 months, leaving Hamilton in a perilous
financial state. Undeterred, he began work on a book - aiming to bring a
scientific approach to self-help.
"I have found around 500 scientific papers from mainstream academic
journals which directly talk about the effect that thought, feeling and
faith have on the body's systems," he says.
Recent research into spontaneous remissions from cancer found that a
radical change of belief system seemed to be a common factor. While few
would argue with the idea that a good attitude can speed the healing
process, Hamilton believes emotions, such as happiness, can change DNA.
What is surprising is that a growing body of scientific thought appears to
agree with him.
As an example, Hamilton quotes the work of Eric Kandel, joint winner of the
2000 Nobel prize for medicine, who carried out pioneering work into the way
genes can be switched on or off by social influences.
Kandel's conclusion is that many genetic differences between people are
influenced by society and conditioning, rather than incorporated in the
genetic makeup of the parents.
HAMILTON SAYS: "About 99.9 per cent of our genes are exactly the same. The
differences between us are determined by whether our genes are switched on
or off.
"There is a whole branch of medicine called psycho-neuro-immunology, which
studies the effect of thoughts and emotions on our biochemistry. The
biochemistry is intimately connected with the DNA, so if these
biologichemical components are affected by thoughts and emotions then
thoughts and emotions must also affect our DNA."
He also cites a well-known scientific study of rat pups which showed that
two separate growth hormones are switched off in those deprived of a
mother's touch. By pulling together the evidence that love and kindness can
have a positive effect on health, Hamilton hopes to make people more aware
of their own healing power.
The most common reaction to his seminars is to be told that people have
always believed in his message, but that he has given them more confidence
in their ideas. "I wrote the book to give scientific credibility to what
most people already know," he says. "The most powerful cure for anything is
faith, hope and determination."
o It's The Thought That Counts will be published by Hamilton Press next
year
http://news.scotsman.com/scitech.cfm?id=1386262004
- - -
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral,
begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing
evil, it multiplies it." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
End of forwarded message from "Ross Cannon" <ross.cann@juno.com>
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The terrorist mission of Jesus stated in the Christian bible:
"Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not so send
peace, but a sword.
"For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the
daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in
law.
"And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.
- Matthew 10:34-36.
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