For centuries, Western science has kept mind and body in separate corners, treating them as distinct entities. But growing evidence suggests this division is artificial—your mental state directly influences your cellular environment through chemical signals that cascade throughout your body.
The mind-body connection operates through a straightforward mechanism: Your brain interprets experiences and releases neurochemicals that circulate through your bloodstream, creating the environment where your cells function. Learn more about the relationship between the mind and body, examples, and how mindbody disorders develop.
Table of Contents
How the Mind and Body Are Connected
The idea that thoughts can have a direct effect on the material world has been largely rejected in the scientific worldview since the 1600s, when French philosopher Descartes proposed that the mind and body are distinct realms. The suggestion that your beliefs can affect your body has typically been dismissed as magical thinking, and Bruce Lipton recounts facing such reactions himself in The Biology of Belief. But he says science now solidly confirms there is a mind-body connection that makes them inseparable.
Lipton explains that the mind-body dynamic works like this:
- Your mind perceives what’s happening around you.
- Your brain cells interpret that information and respond by secreting chemicals.
- Those chemicals circulate through your bloodstream to your whole body, becoming the environment in which all of your cells operate.
- How your cells operate in response to those chemical signals influences how you’ll behave and determines your overall health and well-being.
Lipton explains that the neurochemicals created in your brain are constantly affecting your cellular community. One of the ways this can negatively impact you is through the toxic chemical environment created by chronic stress.
Stress and Fear Create a Toxic Environment for Our Cells
Stress is the body’s response to any kind of threat, real or perceived. This means the stress response can be seen as a direct link between mind and body.
As Lipton describes, a threat is perceived and interpreted first by the mind, which then sends chemical signals to the body’s systems for a response. When the brain perceives any kind of threat, the hypothalamus, pituitary, and adrenal glands (“HPA axis”) secrete hormones, including cortisol. And the sustained release of cortisol throughout your body has damaging health consequences.
According to Lipton, when your body is flooded with cortisol on a sustained basis, your cells are constantly receiving messages that their environment is hostile. This changes the way the cells behave because they have to direct energy toward self-defense mechanisms rather than toward healthy function and growth. This is why chronic stress inhibits your immune system, for example. The body directs all its energy toward the threat response, leaving it depleted of energy for other functions.
The problem, Lipton explains, is that the “threats” we tend to perceive in the modern world are often not the kinds our bodies are evolved to deal with. What’s worse is that we’re usually not even consciously aware of what the problem is, or we’re not in a position to fix it—often because it’s a result of subconscious programming.
| Chronic Stress Is Killing Us Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers by Robert Sapolsky and When the Body Says No by Gabor Maté explore the connection between stress and disease. Both authors argue that chronic stress can have a devastating effect on our physical and mental health. Sapolsky explains that while animals like zebras experience acute stress in response to immediate threats, such as having to outrun a lion, humans in modern society tend to experience chronic stress from sources such as traffic or poverty. This chronic activation of the stress response can lead to a range of physical and mental afflictions, including depression, ulcers, colitis, heart disease, and more. Similarly, Maté argues that when we are unable or unwilling to say “no” to pressures in our life, our body may do it for us by creating illness. He suggests that many chronic illnesses are linked to stress caused by our modern lifestyles, our conditioning as children, and our psychological coping mechanisms. Both authors suggest that by being mindful of our thoughts and beliefs and finding ways to manage stress, we may be able to improve our physical health. |
The Mind-Body Connection Examples
In The Mindful Body, Ellen J. Langer supports the thesis on the connection between mind and body through many examples from medical and psychological research. Let’s take a look at two of these.
Example 1: The Role of the Mind in Placebo Treatments
According to the author, placebos are an important example of how psychological factors play a significant role in healing. A placebo is a treatment that has no active healing properties, but it can still have a healing effect. The effectiveness of a placebo is based on the recipient’s belief in it—if a patient thinks they’re getting a treatment that’ll help them, they’re likely to experience the benefit they expect to a certain degree. Sometimes, placebos are as beneficial—or more beneficial—than a true pharmaceutical treatment because they have no adverse side effects, while still providing both physiological and psychological benefits.
(Shortform note: While placebos can produce measurable benefits, their use can also present ethical and practical challenges. The effectiveness of placebos relies heavily on individual differences—not everyone responds equally. This variability in placebo response rates and the risk of delaying effective treatments raise serious questions about when and how these effects should be used in medical care. Additionally, the testing and use of placebos in clinical practice often involves deception at some level, which may violate informed consent and damage patient trust.)
Langer discusses several studies that demonstrate the placebo effect. One neuroscientific study measured the brain activity of participants who took a placebo pain reliever without realizing it. Through brain imaging, the researchers observed that after taking the placebo, patients had less activity in the parts of the brain sensitive to pain: the anterior cingulate cortex, thalamus, and insula.
Another study from 2009 looked at a man who had cancerous tumors throughout his body. According to his doctors, he was close to death—but when he began taking a new experimental drug, his tumors disappeared. This drug was later determined to be ineffective, and when the doctors informed him of this, his tumors returned. Then, he was given a placebo that researchers told him was twice as strong as the first medication. The tumors vanished again. But when they told him that he’d been taking a placebo, he passed away soon after. Thus, the treatments were only effective when he believed in them.
Langer states that there are two important things to keep in mind when using placebos. First, the placebo treatment must not cause any harm. Second, the placebo itself isn’t what’s healing the patient; rather, it’s the patient’s mind that’s doing the healing. The placebo is only there to prompt the mind to do what it’s already capable of.
| Additional Supporting Evidence and Guidelines for Using Placebos In addition to the three areas Langer mentions, another part of the brain that becomes active when patients receive placebo treatments for pain is the prefrontal cortex (PFC). This region processes contextual information such as the doctor’s professional appearance or the physical sensation of receiving treatment. This enhanced prefrontal activity triggers a cascade of neurochemical responses in other parts of the brain: Information from the PFC can stimulate the production of naturally occurring pleasure and pain-relief compounds, including dopamine, oxytocin, and the body’s own opioids. The periaqueductal gray region amplifies this effect by generating additional opioids that provide pain relief. Though placebos have a well-supported effect on pain, research on their benefits for more serious illnesses, such as cancer, is inconclusive. Despite promising anecdotal evidence, like the 2009 study Langer mentions, some experts question the methodology of many placebo cancer treatment studies. In studies that were done with best-practice methods, placebos rarely had a positive effect on tumors. However, the placebos did help with pain and appetite in cancer patients. In addition to Langer’s warnings, according to American Medical Association guidelines, providers should ask for the patient’s cooperation and consent before using placebos. This protects the patient’s autonomy and creates trust in the patient/provider relationship. Doctors also shouldn’t give placebos when they’re unnecessary. For example, if the patient is concerned or distressed and requests a placebo to help, providers should instead calm them through support and reassurance. |
Example 2: The Role of the Mind in Aging
Another facet of mind-body health that Langer discusses is aging. Through her research, she’s found that mindset plays a large role in how aging manifests in the body. Her findings suggest that the health difficulties we typically consider to be inevitable aspects of aging, such as vision and hearing loss, can be improved when people feel younger. Therefore, we have some control over how we age and how much it affects us physically.
(Shortform note: You can also help mitigate age-related vision and hearing loss by maintaining healthy habits. First, it’s important to stay up-to-date on your check-ups and bring any questions or concerns to your doctor. To protect your eyes, wear sun protection such as sunglasses and hats, exercise regularly, and take breaks from screens to prevent eye strain. To prevent hearing loss, avoid prolonged exposure to loud noises, wear ear protection if you work in a loud environment, and keep up with your vaccinations for diseases that can cause hearing loss, such as shingles.)
In her first study on the role of the mind in aging, Langer and her fellow researchers set up a week-long retreat for a group of elderly men. The aim of the study was to test whether having the men believe they were in a previous time would make their bodies respond as if they were actually younger. To start, the researchers measured a collection of baseline biological markers in each of the men. Then, participants entered a retreat, which researchers designed to look and feel like it was from 20 years in the past by altering the following:
- The physical environment, such as furniture and decor
- The media participants consumed, such as the news they watched and the music they listened to
One group was told to talk about their surroundings and the media they were exposed to as if everything around them belonged in the present. A control group lived in the same environment, but they were instructed to discuss the setting in the past tense when speaking to each other. When the retreat ended, the researchers measured the same biological markers they’d collected at the beginning.
Langer and her team discovered that physical and psychological measures improved for both groups after they spent time in the constructed environment. This suggests that just being in an environment that looked and felt like the past made their bodies respond as if they were physically younger. Participants showed improvements in memory, grip strength, and hearing.
The experimental group that discussed the retreat setting in the present tense showed additional improvements, indicating that there was a further psychological and physical benefit to fully immersing their minds and behaviors in the past. They outpaced the control group in areas such as joint flexibility, manual dexterity, and vision. Years later, Langer and her students replicated the same study and achieved comparable results.
| How Nostalgia and Attitudes Toward Aging Affect Health Outcomes Further research supports the findings of Langer’s age studies. Rather than constructing an entire past-inspired environment, several studies examined the effects of nostalgia on feelings of youthfulness and health outcomes. They wanted to see if nostalgic memories would make participants feel more youthful than regular, autobiographical memories. Additionally, they tested whether or not nostalgia-motivated feelings of youthfulness led to participants’ increased beliefs in their physical abilities and health. Adults over 40 participated, and they were asked to recall either a nostalgic memory from high school or a normal, everyday memory from high school. The participants who thought of a nostalgic memory showed increased feelings of youthfulness. Additionally, the youthful feelings these participants experienced as a result of their nostalgic memories increased their perception of their current healthiness, belief in their future health, and confidence in their physical abilities. Feeling younger isn’t the only age-related way to achieve better health outcomes, though—your attitude about getting older can also potentially change how long you live. Research conducted at Harvard involving 14,000 people aged 50 and above revealed significant mortality differences based on participants’ attitudes toward getting older. Those expressing the greatest contentment with their aging experience showed a 43% reduction in death rates from all causes during the four-year study period, compared to participants reporting the lowest levels of aging satisfaction. Individuals who embraced the aging process experienced health advantages in addition to those demonstrated in Langer’s studies. These included reduced incidence of major diseases like diabetes, cardiovascular disease, stroke, and cancer. These participants also showed better mental acuity, maintained higher levels of physical exercise, and experienced improved sleep quality. From a psychological standpoint, these participants reported decreased feelings of isolation and depression while displaying greater hopefulness and a stronger sense of purpose. |
How Mindbody Disorders Develop
Some medical conditions are psychologically created, says John Sarno’s The Mindbody Prescription. These disorders exist because of the deep connection between your mind and your body. In simple terms, your mental health and physical health are intrinsically linked—therefore, if one suffers, the other will too.
(Shortform note: Sarno’s assertion that there’s a connection between your mind and your body is not a new idea. For example, mindfulness practitioners teach that every emotion creates certain physical responses, like how anger makes you tense your muscles and joy causes you to smile. In many cases, by carefully observing what your body is doing at a particular moment, you can identify thoughts and feelings that you weren’t consciously aware of. Also, the mind-body connection works both ways, meaning you can also change your emotions (to an extent) through physical actions; for instance, you can genuinely improve your mood by faking laughter.)
We’ll discuss Sarno’s theory of how mindbody disorders develop, and how Sigmund Freud’s ideas laid the foundation for Sarno’s work today.
How Mindbody Disorders Develop
According to Sarno, repressed stress and unconscious emotional factors like anger, anxiety, or trauma can lead to physical symptoms through the following process:
First, the mind tries to repress or suppress deep-seated emotional issues and stressors that are difficult to face consciously, which creates a state of unconscious emotional tension. In fact, that’s why Sarno titled this book The Divided Mind: He says that mindbody disorders originate from the conscious and unconscious parts of your mind working against each other.
To distract from this underlying tension, the brain produces physiological symptoms—for example, reduced blood flow, oxygen deprivation, or muscle spasms. These physiological changes manifest as pain, headaches, gastrointestinal problems, fatigue, and other symptoms.
According to Sarno, when you suffer from these symptoms and seek medical help, you’re usually diagnosed with some kind of physical illness and treated accordingly. However, since the root cause is psychological, such treatment doesn’t solve the underlying problem, and the symptoms inevitably come back.
Therefore, Sarno criticizes contemporary medicine for overemphasizing physical abnormalities as the root causes of pain. He argues that neglecting people’s underlying psychology often leads to unnecessary medical treatments and surgeries, which could be avoided with a better understanding of mindbody disorders.
The Freudian Roots of Mindbody Theory: Hysterical Disorders
Sarno credits Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, as one of the earliest thinkers to recognize the connection between the mind and physical symptoms that had no discernible structural or biological cause.
Freud believed that many of his patients’ complaints like paralysis, pain, and sensory loss were actually “conversion symptoms,” meaning psychological distress converted into physical symptoms. He labeled these conditions as hysterical disorders, and theorized that they stemmed from subconscious psychological conflicts and repressed emotions.
(Shortform note: Though he may have been the first to connect it to physical symptoms, Freud didn’t coin the term “hysterical disorder.” In fact, the word hysteria appears in medical texts dating back to the early 19th century, describing a neurotic condition that was believed to be unique to women (it comes from the Greek hystera, meaning womb). However, by the mid-19th century the definition of hysteria had broadened to mean a sense of overexcitement, losing its gendered subtext.)
In Freud’s work, Sarno saw parallels with his own theory of how repressed emotions can unconsciously trigger physiological changes and pain. He built upon Freud’s early insights about psychosomatic disorders and applied them specifically to chronic pain issues like back problems, migraines, and repetitive strain injuries. This culminated in Sarno’s concept of Tension Myositis Syndrome.
Dive Deeper
If you want to learn more about the mind-body connection, check out the full guides to the books mentioned throughout this article:
