Introduction

We are mostly all familiar with the term Propaganda in the context of media or political influence, and this usually in a negative context. Applying this term to our own thought patterns is not common, but can, from my experience, help to understand the struggling with our own condition (e.g. regarding AFib, anxiety etc.) just as the mechanism of Propaganda and the generation of negative/positive thoughts by ourselves is somehow very similar. In my experience, our brains can quickly become our own Propaganda headquarters. I’ll come to why I believe this in detail a little bit later.

Instead of Propaganda the term Public Relations is nowadays often used, but regardless of which term you use, from my personal point of view, the wanted result is ultimately the same, it is about getting people (including ourselves) to act in a certain way.

Propaganda has not always had a fundamentally negative connotation; Edward Bernays e.g. argued in his works about Propaganda, that Propaganda (or Public Relations) can and should be only used for the benefit of people encouraging them to a behaviour that is beneficial to them. He even expressly advised against using Propaganda for the purpose of misguiding people to their own disadvantage.

My impression is that the pages in his book where Edward Bernays stated his warning about the misuse of Propagada, were not read, deliberately ignored or misunderstood by some of his “followers” at the time of the publication of his book “Propaganda” in 1928, which may have led to fatal negative consequences in history. Also, at that time the term propaganda in general already had a strongly negative connotation, which is why he later on established the term Public Relations instead of Propaganda.

Further on I will use the term positive and negative Propaganda to differentiate what I mean.

Self-Propaganda

What is this?

After a long period of serious illness in my search for healing of my body, mind and soul, especially regarding my AFib-Condition, after some time I repeatedly realised, how strongly my brain literally blocked myself leaving long-established paths. Worse still, “it” tried to sell me things as truths for which there was no plausible explanation at all from my todays (!) perspective or to be more precise: No more plausible as soon as I fundamentally changed my mindset.

Examples for such kind of thoughts: “I will never be healthy again. I have to stay on meds rest of my life. My condition will definitely get worse over time. etc., etc., etc. .”

Today, I call these thoughts negative Self-Propaganda and I distinguish it from the Classic-Propaganda we know from radio, television and social media, even as it has many in common.

It is precisely the Self-Propaganda that has kept me on this long-established path and the problematic thing about it is, that it has also blocked the path to healing.

In addition to many other aspects (e.g. various experiences/traumata over lifetime) from my point of view especially Western Medicine sadly often tends to convey to the patient that only it knows the universal truth, although objectively it cannot have it for 100% itself due to the complexity of the human organism in interaction with its environment. This is somehow negative Propaganda too in my eyes, because it is not in the best sense of the word for the patient.

My personal learning since the point in time to which I consciously perceived the negative Self-Propaganda mechanism was, that it is quite important to identify Propaganda as Propaganda and then, as a next step, it is crucial to find out whether it is negative self-damaging or self-supporting positive Propaganda. As I have introduced the term Propaganda at the beginning, Propaganda ist not good or bad in general, it depends on for what it is used.

As another example, positive Propaganda could come from those kind of friends and people that encourage you not to give up too early with some new approach you have started, supporting you in trying out alternatives/options that are putting your personal benefit and success into focus, or in other words people who don’t drag you down with their negative catastrophic/opportunistic thinking.

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Note: From my experience negative Self-Propaganda can be also intensified in combination with the negative Classic-Propaganda. Example: If you tell yourself your situation is lost and your doctors tell you the same stories as well as different evening soaps on television and influencers on social media, you might start to believe it and your body and soul will react accordingly. (These positive and negative effects are described very well in Joe Dispenza’s book – “You are the placebo”). Recognizing this self-reinforcing mechanism of negative “Propaganda” is a first step towards freeing oneself from it.

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How to identify (Self-)Propaganda?

A classic “tool” to find out whether something is Propaganda is questioning.

Examples for those Classic- and Self-Propaganda identifying questions are:

1. “Who gets what from whom out of what?“
   Negative Classic-Propaganda: “Is the person who suggests a solution to you really on your side or is he/she more influenced by his/her own opportunistic interests?”
   
   Negative Self-Propaganda: When it comes to Negative Self-Propaganda, we have to ask ourselves the honest question of what additional illness value, is maybe holding us captive. Do we really want to get healthy again, what kind of motivation is maybe blocking us to do so?
   
   My personal opinion (not a medical advice): The motivation of people is very often guided by their personal advantages. This is not unusual, but it can clash with our own interests as patients. Especially in medicine, it is often not easy to evaluate whether, for example a disease would have disappeared or not without treatment, which is why it is so important that conflicts of interest are correctly reported e.g. in medical studies. If you want to get a first impression of a person’s motivation, it often makes sense to ask who “pays” them. Remembering the saying: “Whose bread I eat, whose song I sing.”
2. “What was said to you and what was apparently explicitly left out?”
   Negative Classic-Propaganda: Negative Propaganda will NOT encourage you to think in options like: Is there maybe another way to reduce your blood pressure than to take these fancy new pills? Like Weight loss, Sports, Coffeine reduction, Healthy Hydration, etc. ?” or “Is lifelong pilltaking with all medical sideeffects and paying monthly bills of +/-700$ worth its benefits?
   
   My personal opinion (not a medical advice): It’s not so easy to find out what you haven’t been told, it takes some experience and preparation, you have to put yourself in the role of a detective (or a mother – what would he/she have asked) and not just follow the line of the narrator. In the case of medical interventions (especially unnecessary ones), it can be helpful to ask whether it is possible to talk personally to those affected who have already had this procedure carried out and how the overall success statistics look like and who raised them.
3. “Is fear, emotional, time or social pressure used to push me into a specific direction of making my decisions, except from a pragmatic argumentation?”
   Negative Classic Propaganda: Some of us will remember talks with their doctors like this: “If you don’t take this pills or agree to the suggested measures, you will die!”
   
   Negative Self-Propaganda: “Whenever we are more concerned about what others think about us than about what is right for ourselves (or people for whom we are responsible – e.g. children), then it is very likely negative (Self-)Propaganda, maybe also in combination with negative Classic-Propaganda. (Example: “No I can`t do an interval training between my meetings now to stop my AFib-Episode, all my colleagues, … will think I am crazy!”)
   
   My personal opinion (not a medical advice): Whenever time, fear, emotional or social pressure is used to bring about a decision, caution is advised, especially if it is presented to us as having no alternative. We already know this from used car dealers: “If you wait any longer, this unique car offer may be sold out!” In medicine, it is even more perfidious, but today if a doctor treats me like a child by telling me I have no alternative choice to his suggestions, then my trust in him drops rapidly. Because we always have a choice. As always and also in Western Medicine it is not uncommon for there to be gentler methods existing than those that are offered to a patient first (closely linked to question 1). I experienced this myself with gallstones and then opted for an ERCP instead of gallbladder removal.
   
   This question is very closely connected to the first question: “Who gets what from whom out of what?“
4. “Is there some statement repeated again and again, without any deeper explanation why it is really senseful?
   Positive and negative Classic-/Self-Propaganda: Propaganda loves repeating. Repeating phrases as much as possible, until people believe in their truth (even when they are not true) is one of the basic techniques of Propaganda. Watch out for those loops of repeated phrases and break out. Most of the time, such phrases can be easily undermined by getting to the core of the phrase e.g. with a few “why”-questions or by a contradictory self-experience. When your own brain starts to tell you the same stories again and again, be sceptic too – Dont believe in everything you think!
   
   My personal opinion (not a medical advice): Constantly repeating something does not make it more correct. Things become more right or wrong by checking them, subjecting them to critical questions and trying out different solutions in practice, thinking them through. It is also good to listen to different opinions (although it is important not to only include people with the same mindset). The “crazy ones” in particular can give you new ideas.
5. “Why I am told that I can do nothing myself at all?”
   Classic Negative Propaganda: A key component of the Negative Propaganda- or Public Relations strategy can be to keep the customer/patient dependent on their “supplier”. Here it can be helpful to persuade the customer/patient that they cannot change their situation themselves, as they always need a “highly qualified” expert.
   
   My personal opinion (not a medical advice): Find out what you can do yourself. Very often much more is possible than other people (can) tell you. Look, e.g. at my “Back-To-Sinus”-Procedure , no expert has ever told me, that it is possible to stop AFib Episodes by this self invented prodcedure. Another example: I once took my caravan to a garage, the mechanic told me I could throw the caravan away, the repair would be many times the value. Good thing I didn’t do it! I then repaired it myself for 350$, it was worth about 25 times as much, as it turned out later. The same applies to ourselves: Don’t throw yourself away just because a doctor tells you that you’ll have this or that forever, maybe he’s a relative of the mechanic who gave me the wrong advice back then.
6. “Why is a well-known and popular actor/sports star, … telling me to use a certain product/service/mindset… , even though he doesn’t need it himself and is definitely not an expert in this field?“
   Negative and positive Classic-/Self-Propaganda: This is an old trick that is nowadays called influencing. Familiar and popular faces convey a feeling of trust and if “he/she” says something like that then it must be true. Here it is important to ask yourself is the person trustworthy and competent in the field they are talking about (Please also see the publications of “Stephen Covey – The Speed of Trust”)? The same problem occurs with negative Self-Propaganda. Even though self-confidence is a good thing, also consider that you maybe have not seen all the possible options yourself until now.
   
   My personal opinion (not a medical advice): If you have a really serious problem in your life, start your journey NOW and become a solution expert for that specific problem yourself, but keep in mind that especially real experts incorporate different opinions and approaches to solutions in their concepts and sometimes consult other experts who do things for them that they can’t do themselves!
   
   This question is very close connected to the questions 1, 2, 3 and 4.

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