Mind- Body Medicine

Excerpt from James Gordon, MD, at the Feb 17-19, 2022 Integrative Healthcare Symposium in New York City. Gordon, who is founder and executive director of The Center for Mind-Body Medicine in Washington D.C., defines mind-body medicine as grounded in the scientific understanding of the complete interpenetration of mind and body. It incorporates tools and techniques of self-care.

“We are a human community and a community of healers,” said Gordon, “… this is also an invitation to find out more about this community of healers…you can integrate this work into your practice as it suits you, and as it moves you, and reach out to the larger community”.
Mind-body medicine enables us to enter the constant communication that is going on among all our organs and to affect in a positive way every aspect of our physical and psychological functioning.
The other part of mind-body medicine, since there is omnidirectional communication between the organs and cells in our body, is that it is possible to enter the conversation that is going on in a powerful and therapeutic way with biological measures, thoughts and feelings, the way we relate to people.
Self-care is critical to this work, Dr. Gordon said. There is a shift from a system that is dominated by professionals and that relies on almost exclusively on professionals telling people what to do and doing it for them, to a system where self-care is crucial. It challenges everything from the power structure in medicine to the therapeutics that are used to the economic structure.