At one extreme, there is a belief that it really does not matter what we eat or drink, only what we think and believe. This is mind-body medicine in the extreme. It has lots of evidence supporting it. Dr. Deepak Chopra, for example, writes abundantly on this subject, pointing out how thoughts and intentions can change physiology at the subatomic level. That this is possible certainly calls into question the value of diet at all, especially specific diets that attempt to control so many physiological processes.

It also calls into question the value of nutrition and herbal medicine since the real healing seems to happen fastest at the level of thought.

On this note, there is a personal experience I shall share. My wife had purchased some pH level testing tape and was testing her saliva to determine where she was. She follows a good diet and for the most part, she was quite alkaline and really just kept it around for curiosity's sake.

One day she approached me and handed me a piece of the tape and said, "Let me see what your pH is."

I put the tape in my mouth and in a few seconds had the results of this test of my saliva (which, presumably, also indicates my blood pH). I was about neutral at that moment.

I asked her to come back and test me again in 45 seconds. During that time I did some positive self-talk, which included primarily my sincere expression of gratitude for my Higher Power, the Earth, plants, animals and humans that had contributed to my life experience.

When she came back, she tested my saliva with the pH paper again and found that my saliva had moved four shades more alkaline on the pH testing chart, in 45 seconds!

Clearly, there is an immense amount of power in the mind and emotions to change the physiology spontaneously. This makes a pretty good argument for the mind-body position in healing and health.

The other side of the coin is body-mind healing. To open this discussion, I shall paraphrase a Dr. John R. Christopher story.