Placebo meanings

Jerusalem is one of my favorite places. I hope to live there some day. Whenever I visit, I meet people who say they moved there from across the world because of the power of that place. They all say “it has an energy” and “you can feel it”, as if it’s an objective fact.

I’ve been to Bethlehem, the Temple Mount, and walked the Via Dolorosa. I’ve touched the Wailing Wall and the stones that held up Jesus’ cross. I find them fascinating, but still just rocks — rocks with lots of meaning to other people. I feel no special energy.

But yet, when I’m in London, Manhattan, or Los Angeles, I feel that power they describe. (Feel free to tease me for this.) These places charge me, inspire me, and have real effects on my actions, maybe because my heroes created their greatest works there. So the power comes not from the place itself, but the meaning we give it.

This applies to anything. Meanings are entirely in your mind. But their effect on you is real. Like a placebo. It actually works.

So the reverse applies as well. If a meaning is holding you back, you can actively doubt it, question it, and find evidence against it, to stop believing it. Then it loses its power.