In: Categories » Health » Elder care » The Mind to Body connection
| Recently, I had a chance to speak about the mind- body connection before a group of people who came from non- medical professions. At the beginning of my presentation, I asked my audience a couple of questions. Do you believe in the mind/ body connection? Do you know how the connection works? The third question was tricky: From my personal point of view, generally speaking, people believe in the mind/body connection, but actually don’t know how it works, which is not a bad thing. The bad thing is that only 30% of the attendants believe in the possibility of changing their mental approach. In everyday life, 70% of these people strongly believe in the statement that they cannot change their mental nature, which is incorrect. How wrong they are! If you belong to that 70% of people who don’t believe in changing their mental approach, please take a little time and read this article. Maybe you will change your way of thinking. Now, I may have a hard time to convince you in believing in the neural/immune connection. There is no doubt that the state of one’s mind influences health and plays a huge role in physical illness, making us sick, helping us to recovery, or enabling us to live well .We have known this much from the time of the ancient Greeks. Or, more accurately, we knew it, but we didn’t use it for a long time. Alas! To continue in the same vein, I’ll give you the next fact: The human brain and the human immune system work together, signaling each other along the same pathways. Now, you know why one’s state of mind influences one’s health. For 60 % of my audience, I need to explain that communication between the brain and the body is by chemicals, communicating on the molecular level. This is a two way route. Chemicals, produced by the brain, send signals to the body (immune system) and, at the same time, chemicals from the immune system communicate with the brain. The same signals affect behavior and stress response. This is a pure biochemical connection. For many years we have known about interactions between the mind (nervous system) and the body (immune system) along with the effects of these interactions on diseases. It’s a proven fact that the immune system is a target of signals from the brain and the endocrine system. Therefore, our experience, behavior, way of thinking and believing has a huge impact on the body and vice versa. In essence, our immune system is listening to our mental talk. When we are happy, our body is happy. When we are angry, our entire body is angry. Next time, when you are under stress or are angry or worry too much, think about it. Stress hormones can change immune cell behavior and activity of the immune system. As we know, this is a two -way street: our behavior can change immune functions and immune response can modulate our behavior. I don’t blame people who don’t believe in the mind/body connection. For many years, even scientific authorities were very skeptical. Actually, this is very understandable. The scientific approach depends on measurable evidence, such as abnormality of anatomy or physiology or any other visible evidence. Now, we have molecular and pharmacological tools in our hands, including neuroimaging , with which to observe the living human brain with the nerve cells’ function. We can “see” biochemistry at work, or the nerve chemicals, including the electrical activity in the brain. Measurable proof is there and we can see it and believe it. Imbalance in neurotransmitters is real and measurable and results in disease caused by emotions. We can observe and explore sick emotions. Isn’t it amazing? My intention in writing this article is to explain how strong the connection between our emotions (mind) and our body (immune system) is and how important it is to take care of our way of thinking. The failure to stop being an obsessive “what if” thinker, or a depressed, angry or anxious person, leads to chronic tension in our mind and makes us really physically sick. As I already said, our immune system is listening to our mental talk. Jahiel Yasha Kamhi Jahiel- Yasha- Kamhi holds a degree in Biochemistry and a Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry.
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