Your Brain On God: The Neuroscience That Proves Faith Heals | Dr. Daniel Amen

0:00Hi, my name is Lewis Howes and welcome to the Daily Motivation Show.

0:11Have you followed up with people after you've scanned them who show a high connection with their faith and a high belief in God? Have you had a follow-up process with them to understand how they feel on a consistent basis and how their brain looks by having a consistent trust and belief in God? and do they have happier, more fulfilling lives or relationships or is that dependent on circumstance? What else have you noticed with people's brains? You get sick, you get better faster. So the scientist that has done the most work in this is at Duke. His name is Harold Koenig. I actually wrote this huge volume and looked at the neuroscience of prayer and looked at the health benefits of belief.

1:03And there are myriad that if you go to church on a regular basis, if you get sick, you get better faster. It lowers your risk of mental health issues. And obviously people who are Christian or Muslim or Jewish, they have mental health issues. But having the belief and the community associated with it is protective. Interesting. Would some people say, well, that's just the community and the ritual and the habit of having people around you? Or is it really? Maybe that's good for you. But also believing you're here for a purpose, believing you are wonderfully made, that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit that was given to you by God.

1:57They're neurotransmitter benefits to that belief. was there ever a time in your life where you didn't believe in god no really yeah there are times i was scared of god yeah i grew up roman catholic and uh i wrote a book i think you interviewed me for it on happiness and i start the book with happiness is a moral obligation which i got from my friend dennis prager and there was that was nowhere in my childhood it that happiness was a moral obligation it was more about long suffering um no i've always believed in god um when i was a young soldier uh so i was in the army for 16 years and we're a really cute company clerk and i'm like hey can i take you out and she goes will you take me to church and growing up catholic i was an altar boy like i can do church she took me to a pentecostal healing service.

2:54And they were speaking in tongues and screaming and crying and dancing. It was different. But she was cute. And I went back and I got connected to a group called Teen Challenge. It's a Christian group that deals with drug addicts. And I just fell more deeply in love with Jesus and helping these people. And when they went through the program, believe when they went through the program, they had a very high success rate because now it's not about them. It's about their relationship with God and with other people. Very powerful. And then I went to a Christian college and then I went to medical school at Oral Roberts University, learned medicine in the context of my faith.

3:48You've had a unique faith history then and a wide range of learning and different churches you've been through. Where is your faith now? And how does it serve your brain health and your overall soul? Well, for sure I don't believe this is it. And I believe I'm here for a purpose. And my purpose is to make a dent in the universe by getting people to love and care for their brains and to change my specialty, which I dearly love. But psychiatrists do not need to be the only medical specialists that never look at the organ they treat. And it drives me every day. and uh yeah and i just i feel incredibly blessed to be um part of the conversation and getting the world healthy through churches i don't know if we ever talked about mark hyman and i did the daniel plan with pastor rick warren so really what was that so in 2010 i just finished my second book on the connection between physical health and mental health change your brain change your body.

5:08And I went to my church in Newport beach, Mariner's church. And I walked by hundreds of donuts for sale. And it just pissed me off. I'm like, I'm going to get my soul fed. These people are trying to kill me. And I prayed that Sunday that God would use me to change the culture of food at church. Yeah. Which is usually not good food. It's not good food. Yeah. And I I haven't, well, you know me, I have sort of an attitude and I'm praying that. And I'm like, it's the dumbest prayer you've ever prayed. And I'm like, God, it's my prayer. You do with it, whatever you want. That's my prayer. Two weeks later, Rick Warren, the senior pastor at Saddleback Church, one of the largest churches in the world, called me and said, I'm fat.

5:53My church is fat. Will you help me? And I'd never met Pastor Warren. He sold like 30 million books or something crazy, right? 50 million. 50 million books for Purpose Driven Life? Purpose Driven Life. Yeah. And 15 ,000 people signed up the first week. The first year, they lost a quarter of a million pounds. And I was just so blessed, so honored to be part of it. And so I'm recreating it 15 years later from this whole four perspective. Because we get better together or we get sick together. In fact, just make a list of 10 of your friends. Your health is going to reflect their health.

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