I don’t know where I heard it for the first time but I’ve always been intrigued by the saying “zero points for knowing”. We all know a lot of things and yet, how often do we make decisions in direct defiance of that knowledge?
Is there any doubt that smokers know they shouldn’t smoke, that diabetics know they shouldn’t drink soda, that we should go to bed at 10 so we’re ready for that meeting in the am, but we stay up watching the movie until midnight anyway?
No news flash here, but there’s got to be something else other than knowledge 
driving our behavior and decisions; likely many things other than knowledge. One of my favorite motivational coaches is Tony Robbins. I’ve often heard him challenge the conventional saying that knowledge is power with his own more accurate version; knowledge isn’t power, its potential power. So how do we turn the potential power of knowledge into actual power?
I think knowledge only becomes power when we look at a situation from the perspective that allows for the knowledge to transform. As this is a health oriented blog, I’m going to apply my thoughts to the condition of Diabetes. Yesterday at the store, my friend and I were asked if we wanted to contribute $1.00 toward curing diabetes. Both of us looked at the clerk as if on cue and said, we know how to cure diabetes, change your lifestyle. Now that comment is not meant to offend and it’s certainly not applicable to Type I diabetics, it’s merely reflective of the facts that we know Type II diabetes is a lifestyle condition caused by too much of the wrong input.
We tend to look at Type II diabetes as if it’s some sort of disease or malfunction in the body. In fact, Type II Diabetes is the body doing exactly what it’s been programmed to do for thousands of years. In reality, your body is functioning as programmed. You, the patient, are providing your body with input. The body is responding to that input exactly as it was programmed, which means your body is functioning 100% according to plan. And, therefore, if your body is functioning 100% according to plan then there is nothing wrong with the programming and all we need do is change the input. There is no loss of function or anatomical condition that needs to be replaced or “fixed”.
Now here is a bold statement: there is no need for research into “curing” Type II Diabetes. Type II Diabetes is not a disease, it is a normal human response to too much of a specific stimuli – mainly sugar. That statement may upset some people, but it is meant to stimulate thought, not diminish or minimize the gravity of the diabetes condition in our society. In these days of limited funds, how much money could be directed to non-input related conditions like paralysis due to accidents, birth defects, etc. How much money can be directed toward non lifestyle conditions which can be resolved by changing lifestyle as opposed to replacing or suppressing some normal physiological function.
So I’m left with this question: would changing how a person views their diabetic status from a disease perspective to a normal function perspective help them change their knowledge of what’s appropriate input from potential power to actual power? The answer, in my experience, is a resounding YES! What other “normal” conditions could be changed if we modified our thinking to that of disease being a normal result of the environment in which the body exists? What conditions do you have that you think of as abnormal? Ask yourself: what if this uncomfortable reaction is normal and I can change the reaction if I change the input? What would you change?
Kenton Anderson, ND
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Credentials: ND