There’s an old saying, ”The doctor dresses the wound, but God heals it.” No physician or surgeon claims that he healed the patient. The one healing power is called by many names --- God, Jesus Christ, Buddha, Life, Creative Intelligence, the Universal Mind, Allah…and many others.

To the doctor’s amazement, on the third day I came out of the coma. On the fourth day I was still being fed intravenously, but I was taken off the critical list. From somewhere deep within, I had begun to fight for life and was winning. I believe it was that competitive spirit I developed from sports that helped me refuse to give up on life.

In a Runner’s World magazine article, sports specialist Edward Coyle says that athletes retain some long-term psychological benefits from exercise even after training has ceased.

Doctors know from experience that a patient with a fighting spirit and a positive attitude seems to have a better chance of recovery than one who surrenders to their illness.

Norman Cousins, in his book “Anatomy of An Illness,” writes about having been told he had a disease of the spine. He was told he had one chance in 500 of surviving it and would probably never walk again.

Cousins had read Han’s Selye’s classic book “The Stress and Distress of Life,” in which Selye details the effects of negative emotions on body chemistry. He believed that if negative emotions produce negative chemical changes in the body, then positive emotions should produce positive chemical changes.

Cousins decided he was not going to give in to his disease. In hopes of healing himself, he ordered Marx Brothers movies and old “Candid Camera” episodes. What he discovered was laughter and a positive attitude enhanced his body’s ability to fight inflammation and set in motion the mechanisms of self-healing.