When I was training to become a physician, the rules of the broken, outdated, patriarchal medical system were made clear to me. They went something like this. As your doctor, I will sacrifice everything in my personal life in order to fix what is broken in you. I will stay awake when I’m exhausted, cross my legs when I have to pee, ignore my stomach when it growls, neglect my partner and children when they need me, allow my health to decline, and read all my medical journals so I can stay up to date on the latest in modern science. I will show up sick to work, endure unspeakable traumas in or ..read more

When I was working on my New York Times bestseller Mind Over Medicine, a friend of mine wrote to me right after leaving her doctor’s office. With her permission, I published her letter in Mind Over Medicine. She wrote: Lissa, if this doctor robs me as I leave the building, I won’t be able to confirm it was him, as I don’t think he looked at me once. From the nurse intake to the actual exam room, both practitioners faced AWAY from me, toward their computer terminals, while they asked me questions and clicked away at the keyboard. The computer fed him my new prescription, and he never even disc ..read more

When we’re going through hell, it can be strangely comforting to hear or read the story of someone who has endured something similar. Women who lose a baby are comforted by other women who have miscarried or had a baby die or been forced to put a baby up for adoption. People who lose a spouse too young find healing in the stories of how others have survived that kind of devastating heartbreak. Those who suffer from medical conditions find solace in the stories of others with similar conditions. People who have been betrayed by cult leaders, cheating spouses, exploitative bosses, con artists ..read more

*Photo credit Monique Feil It’s hard to believe it’s been four years since the world stopped. I’ll never forget the terror I felt when I saw the spooky, surreal, apocalyptic images of Times Square completely empty. I remember vividly the tears that flowed when the strictest part of San Francisco’s early lockdown first eased up, and I went to the San Rafael farmer’s market with a mask on, expecting to buy some produce. That’s when I really got how much the world had changed while I’d been holed up in West Marin in our sheltered little coastal village. There was hardly anyone at the fa ..read more

I want to talk to you all about something I rarely talk about these days- ART. I want to talk about it because I used to teach encaustic art classes while also practicing medicine. But I quit teaching art after I left the hospital and started a full-time writing and teaching career. The only art classes I taught once I left the hospital were with Shiloh Sophia, the founder of Intentional Creativity. And now Shiloh and I are collaborating alongside our partners in a new class INSPIRED: A Trauma-Inspired Approach To Self-Healing. We’ll be painting and practicing Intentional Creativity, in addit ..read more

In this series, I’m reviewing the Cliff Notes of everything I should have learned in medical school, but didn’t- and everything I’ve learned since I finished my medical training about healing from my own research and self-study. If you haven’t yet read the first 10 revelations about healing that I didn’t learn in medical school, please read Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here,Part 4 here, Part 5 here and Part 6 here.  Learn more and register for INSPIRED here. 42. The placebo effect still works. Scientists have known about the powerful but mysterious “placebo effect” since evidence-bas ..read more

In this series, I’m reviewing the Cliff Notes of everything I should have learned in medical school, but didn’t- and everything I’ve learned since I finished my medical training about healing from my own research and self-study. If you haven’t yet read the first 10 revelations about healing that I didn’t learn in medical school, please read Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here, Part 4 here and Part 5 here.  Learn more and register for INSPIRED here. 35. Spirituality can facilitate healing, but “spiritual bypassing” impedes it.  Healing requires contained but free expressi ..read more

In this series, I’m reviewing the Cliff Notes of everything I should have learned in medical school, but didn’t- and everything I’ve learned since I finished my medical training about healing from my own research and self-study. If you haven’t yet read the first 10 revelations about healing that I didn’t learn in medical school, please read Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here and Part 4 here. Early Bird Special: Register by February 9th and save $100. Learn more and register for INSPIRED here. 29. We have to unconditionally love all our parts in order to truly heal.  As children, we al ..read more

In this series, I’m reviewing the Cliff Notes of everything I should have learned in medical school, but didn’t- and everything I’ve learned since I finished my medical training about healing from my own research and self-study. If you haven’t yet read the first 10 revelations about healing that I didn’t learn in medical school, please read Part 1 here, Part 2 here and Part 3 here. Early Bird Special: Register by February 9th and save $100. Learn more and register for INSPIRED here. 20. Cure the whole system, rather than reducing treatment to isolated body parts. The human body is not a car ..read more

As I watch the primaries unfold, I suspect I’m not the only one having flashbacks. Not only am I flashing back to the utter horror of 2016, when the gloves came off and all the sexist, racist, homophobic, xenophobic Americans got full permission to stop pretending to care about equal human rights for all and just got outright abusive. I’m flashing back to feeling like I don’t belong in my own country anymore, that I might need to become a political refugee and escape to a safer country. I’m flashing back to the awareness that as I am feeling that way, I’m also nearly at the top of the privile ..read more