Book excerpt: Is it possible to heal by thought alone—without drugs or surgery? The truth is that it happens more often than you might expect. In You Are the Placebo, best-selling author, international speaker, chiropractor, and renowned researcher of epigenetics, quantum physics, & neuroscience, Dr. Joe Dispenza shares numerous documented cases of those who reversed cancer, heart disease, depression, crippling arthritis, and even the tremors of Parkinson’s disease by believing in a placebo. Similarly, Dr. Joe tells of how others have gotten sick and even died the victims of a hex or voodoo curse—or after being misdiagnosed with a fatal illness. Belief can be so strong that pharmaceutical companies use double- and triple-blind randomized studies to try to exclude the power of the mind over the body when evaluating new drugs. “In his paradigm-altering book, You Are the Placebo, Dr. Joe Dispenza catapults us beyond thinking of the placebo effect as an anomaly. Through 12 concise chapters that read like a true-life scientific thriller, Dispenza gives us rock-solid reasons to accept the game-changer of our lives: that the placebo effect is actually us, proving to ourselves the greatest possibilities of healing, miracles, and longevity! I love this book and look forward to a world where the secret of the placebo is the foundation of everyday life.” — Gregg Braden, New York Times best-selling author of Deep Truth and The Divine Matrix Chapters Include: Foreward by Dawson Church, Ph.D. Part I. Is It Possible? A Brief History of the Placebo The Placebo Effect in the Brain The Placebo Effect in the Body How Thoughts Change the Brain and the Body Suggestibility Attitudes, Beliefs, and Perceptions The Quantum Mind Three Stories of Personal Transformation Information to Transformation: Proof That You Are the Placebo Part II: Transformation Meditation Preparation Changing Beliefs and Perceptions Meditation Becoming Supernatural Dr. Joe does more than simply explore the history and the physiology of the placebo effect. He asks the question: "Is it possible to teach the principles of the placebo, and without relying on any external substance, produce the same internal changes in a person’s health and ultimately in his or her life?" Then he shares scientific evidence (including color brain scans) of amazing healings from his workshops, in which participants learn his consciousness shifting model of personal transformation, based on practical applications of the so-called placebo effect. The book ends with a "how-to" calming meditation for changing limiting beliefs and mental perceptions that hold us back—the first step in healing. You Are the Placebo combines the latest research in neuroscience, biology, psychology, hypnosis, behavioral conditioning, and quantum physics to demystify the workings of the placebo effect . . . and show how the seemingly impossible can become possible. “I discovered that if I could teach people the scientific model of transformation (bringing in a little quantum physics to help them understand the science of possibility); combine it with the latest information in neuroscience, neuroendocrinology, epigenetics, and psychoneuroimmunology; give them the right kind of instruction; and provide the opportunity to apply that information, then they would experience a transformation... This book is about: empowering you to realize that you have all the biological and neurological machinery to do exactly that. My goal is to demystify these concepts with the new science of the way things really are so that it is within the reach of more people to change their internal states in order to create positive changes in their health and in their external world.” — Dr. Joe Dispenza