I CAN CHANGE MY BRAIN! Our brains are fascinating! We all know that a young child’s brain is extremely sensitive to new experiences. These new learning experiences help a child form new neuronal connections in his or her brain and begin to shape how the child processes and understands the world around him or her. The plasticity of the brain does not end at childhood. Our brains remain amazingly malleable throughout our lives. Growth and new neuronal connections slow as we age for many reasons. One of the reasons is new experiences need to compete against already formed beliefs and our habitual reactions to the world. We can rewire our brain through a mindful approach to life. It takes slowing down, recognizing some of the habitual responses, understanding the basics of how we function, acknowledging some of our emotions and the triggers which set them off. It would be impractical to monitor every one of our thoughts, feelings and behaviors. Our habits free up much of our psychic space so we can function smoothly. It is an amazing evolutionary design which allows us to function at a high level. Constantly questioning our own thinking would become a tedious practice and would nullify this tremendous ability we have to perform efficiently. Unfortunately some of these habitual thoughts, feelings and behaviors are subject to errors. Biases can invade these habitual functions. Our thinking can become skewed reflecting the errors of our own intuitive thoughts. We can experience emotional reactions which correspond more to our past than our present. While constant skepticism of every one of our thoughts, feelings and behaviors is not practical, blindly following them unquestioningly will prevent us from expanding our perceptions, and improving our response to the experiences that we encounter. The answer is finding a balance. A balance that allows us to enjoy the benefits of having a mind which can operate in different speeds. We can benefit greatly from the automatic fast processing of established neuronal connections, and we can encourage the processes of growth by occasionally slowing our life down with mindful thought, in so doing making new and better connections in our brain. I have found that concentrating on the habitual behaviors and painful emotions which in the past has led to difficulties and mistakes in is a great place to start. When we recognize the triggers in the environment which have set off a powerful emotional reaction, we can catch ourselves before habitually going through the same sequence of events which has led us down painful paths in the past. As we practice making emotionally intelligent responses to life, the hard-wiring of our brain begins to transform and we literally begin to think in a new way, thus we begin the process of becoming a new person. ~Troy Flourishing Life Society
Posted on: Sat, 14 Sep 2013 13:30:00 +0000
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