Monday Muse-Letter: 2025 Belief Systems Shattered or Validated?

The Great Medical Awakening: When Beliefs Meet Reality

Something fascinating is happening in healthcare. 2025 isn't just bringing change, it's bringing revelation. The walls between conventional and functional medicine are finally starting to crack.

Remember when questioning Big Pharma or traditional medical practices was practically heretical? I do. As someone who's taught functional medicine for over a decade, I've faced my share of skeptics. They'd sit in my lectures, arms crossed, muttering "quack" under their breath. Honestly? I kind of loved it. Those challenges made the conversations richer.

But the tide is turning. Today, those same conversations that once sparked controversy are happening openly in clinics, pharmacies, and with our patients and clients. Pharmacists—traditionally the gatekeepers of conventional medicine—are increasingly curious about functional approaches. They're asking questions. Good ones. I am seen a tremendous increase in interest to my training programs.

This shift isn't happening in a vacuum. With Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s appointment and the growth of health advocacy movements such as #maha, we're seeing a fundamental restructuring of American healthcare. It's not just about insurance coverage anymore—it's about questioning everything we thought we knew.

Take vaccines, for instance. This isn't about being anti-vax—it's about being pro-information, anti-mandate. I've lost two jobs over my stance: one for declining to become a vaccinating pharmacist, another for refusing the COVID vaccine. These were not difficult decisions, although came with difficult impact, but they stemmed from a simple belief: people deserve complete information to make their own health choices. Mandates without education is not healthcare—it’s coercion.

The pharmacy world is changing too. We're likely heading toward a major contraction: fewer traditional pharmacies, different responsibilities, new ways of thinking about health. Some see this as their belief systems being challenged. I see it differently—for many, it's validation of what they've suspected all along.

A colleague recently shared some thought-provoking questions: “How far would someone go to follow orders? How long would they stay silent witnessing injustice? How deeply can fear grip a population?”  While these questions stretch beyond healthcare, they cut to the heart of our current medical paradigm shift.

As we move through 2025, we're all facing a choice: Will we cling to comfortable beliefs, or will we have the courage to examine them? Will we demand better evidence, ask harder questions, and seek deeper understanding? The answers might shatter some beliefs and validate others, but that's how progress happens.

The real question isn't whether your beliefs will be challenged this year—they will be. The question is: Are you ready to grow with them?