Mind-Body Connection
Anecdotal evidence for seemingly anomalous miracle cures and faith healings have been reported for years and anthropologists have collected data on the healing rituals and practices associated with them that seem to be a mixture of herbal and faith healing. Psychologists have assembled empirical evidence pointing to the role of mind and belief in achieving these healing effects, for which there has been no systematic scientific explanation. Recent immunological research, however, has created an unprecedented bridge between mind and body: Experimental research demonstrates that by behavioral conditioning we can inhibit or enhance our immune system response; that is, we are capable of making ourselves sick as well as making ourselves well.
The fact that there is communication between our mind and our body is no longer in dispute, even though no one has yet figured out what the mind really is. Some say it is all contained within our neural circuitry while those more metaphysically inclined think it must be something beyond our mere physical being. Whatever it actually is, however, is of no great importance for our health interests. The fact that it can interfere, positively and negatively, with our well being is all we need to know. The further fact that somehow we are able to direct our mind so that our thoughts, moods, behaviors and beliefs are more conducive to a state of wellness is paramount in significance for anyone wanting wellness and longevity. Spontaneous healing occurs not only with psychological problems and psychosomatic illnesses but even in cases of the severest of diseases, like cancer and MS, when the mental condition is appropriate. Our mind does indeed have the ability to facilitate healing at the cellular and biochemical level, yet it seems like it will take several decades, if not centuries, for most people to understand and use their mental healing ability. This section will look at
- the psychobiological cause of disease,
- the psychobiological cause of healing, and
- how to access your mental healing faculty.
1. Psychobiological Cause of Disease
The lower structures of our brain, below the cerebral hemispheres, are involved with the regulation of emotions and body physiology. The region that lies on the border between the cerebral cortex and the lower brain structures is called the limbic area, since "limbic" means border. There is a ganglion in this limbic region that has nuclei or nerve centers that act as receiving stations to pick up information about the internal environment from the blood and cerebral spinal fluid and about the external environment from the sense organs. This ganglion is not a discrete, easily identifiable organ as are the heart, the lungs, or the cerebral hemispheres. Rather, it is a locus of tissue with seemingly vague boundaries at the base of the forebrain. It is only about the size of a pea and weighs but a few grams. This ganglionic organ is called the hypothalamus. In response to the information picked up by its nuclei, it secrets hormonal messenger molecules that regulate our internal environment through the autonomic, endocrine, immune and neuropeptide systems. Selye discovered that mental as well as physical stress transduces into psychosomatic problems by the hormones of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis of the endocrine system. We see, then, that the hypothalamus is able to function as a molecular information transducer between mind and body.
There are two systems for regulating our body functions. One is fast acting and is by direct stimulation by the release neurotransmitters at the nerve endings of the sympathetic nervous system, which acts on the major organs of the endocrine system. Although fast acting, this stimulation does not last as long as the slower but longer lasting effects afforded by the humoral control of the limbic-hypothalamic system. Humoral control relates to the regulation of the level of ions, hormones and other factors in our body fluids that affect blood flow and other physiological functions (hunger, thirst, sex, temperature, heart rate, blood pressure, etc). When this longer lasting humoral mechanism gets out of control it leads to excess and continued stress, eventually resulting in the psychosomatic problems associated with what Selye called the General Adaptation Syndrome. The limbic hypothalamic system is the major center for humoral control and for integrating sensory information with the processes of mind and then transducing this newly integrated information to the pituitary, which in turn regulates all the other organs of the endocrine system.
It has been determined that disease is primarily caused by stress. Under "mental stress," the limbic-hypothalamic system in the brain converts the neural messages of mind into the neurohormonal "messenger molecules" of the body. These, in turn, can direct the endocrine system to produce steroid hormones that can reach into the nucleus of different cells of the body to modulate the expression of genes. These genes then direct the cells to produce the various molecules that will regulate metabolism, growth, activity level, sexuality, and the immune response in sickness and health. There really is a mind-gene connection! Mind ultimately does modulate the creation and expression of the molecules of life! Mind modulates the biochemical functions within the cells of all the major organ systems and tissues of the body via the autonomic nervous system.
Severe stress invariably causes an altered state, identifiable as a form of spontaneous hypnosis, which encodes state-bound problems and symptoms. Memory is dependent upon and limited to the state in which it was acquired. Since the limbic-hypothalamic system is in a process of constantly shifting psycho-neuro-physiological states, all learning associated with it is, of necessity, state-dependent. What we usually experience as our ordinary everyday state of awareness or consciousness is actually habitual patterns of state-dependent memories, associations, and behaviors. Psychosomatic problems can be most adequately conceptualized as dysfunctions encoded within the state-dependent learning of the limbic-hypothalamic system of mind-body information transduction. They are expressions of the state bound patterns of information that have become disassociated from each other. Therapy is achieved by facilitating information transduction between these state bound patterns. Here is a simple and common example of such a state bound psychosomatic reaction. When our emotional state is optimal, we are usually are not aware of the enteric system’s automatic activity. When we are emotionally upset, however, the entire gastrointestinal tract can express our discomfort. This sensitivity of the gastrointestinal tract to mental stress is one of the most widely recognized manifestations of psychosomatic problems.
This state-dependent theory of mind-body communication and healing can be expressed as four integrated hypotheses:
- The connection between mind and body occurs via the limbic-hypothalamic system.
- Information transduction between mind and body is done by the limbic- hypothalamic encoding of information into state dependent memories, learning and behavior.
- All healing methods of mind and body function by accessing and reframing these state dependent memories and behaviors that encode symptoms and problems.
- Psychological and physiological healing is accomplished by accessing the state dependent encoding of mind-body symptoms and problems. The placebo response is a synergistic interaction of both healing methods.
The major thrust of these hypotheses is that (1) the mind-body information transduction and (2) the state-dependent memory, learning, and behavior, both of which are mediated by the limbic-hypothalamic system, are the two fundamental processes of mind-body communication and healing. Medical science specializes in the anatomical, physiological, and pharmacological methods of accessing and facilitating healing; that is, it focuses almost exclusively on the body side of the mind-body equation. It is evident that psychobiology is able to show the actual biochemical steps by which mind can modulate molecules at the cellular and genetic levels. There is now an experimentally based psychophysiological rationale for understanding how psychological factors can make us ill and facilitate healing as well.
2. Psychobiological Cause of Healing
Obviously, if healing is to be accomplished, the immune sysem must be called into play. There must be a mind link to accomplish this. Only recently has the immune system been recognized as the third major regulatory system of the body. The other two are the endocrine and the autonomic nervous systems. Our immune system functions like a sense organ. When it senses non-cognitive stimuli, such as bacteria, tumors, viruses and toxins, it signals the central nervous system which releases endorphin neuropeptides that regulate all the major body systems. At least one-third of the population, a "55% placebo connection" is a consistent healing factor operative with many different drugs, therapeutic procedures, and psychophysiological symptoms and problems. The consistency of this healing response across so many different conditions suggests that it is mediated by a common mechanism or communication link between mind and body.
There are six types of experimental data that document mind modulating influences on the immune system:
- There are direct nerve and neruochemical connections with the cells of the lymphatic system. As we have seen, mind can access this neural system and thus affect the immune system. Ongoing research is clarifying the precise pathways by which these messenger molecules are mediating the mind-gene connection that is the ultimate basis of most processes of mind-body healing.
- The hypothalamus can be stimulated to affect the immune system and the immune response affects the hypothalamus. Mind has been shown to affect the hypothalamus.
- Mind has been shown to affect the immune system by interacting with the autonomic system and T- and B-lymphocytes of the immunes system have receptors that are affected by hormones of the endocrine system, neurotransmitters of the autonomic system, and immno transmitters of the immune system.
- Neurotransmitter and hormone function can be changed to alter the immune system and, vice versa, the immune response changes the level of neurotransmitters and hormones.
- Immune function can be changed by changes in behavior. There are many indirect ways in which mind can modulate the immune response due to changes in behavior. These include altered diet, circadian rhythms, sleep-wake cycles, body temperature, blood volume, and local vascular relations. The immune system can also be influenced by mind methods with appropriate education and training.
- Experimental and clinical studies show that psychological causes such as depression and stress can cause disease. Well documented research concerning the influence of psychosocial factors, mood, and belief systems on illness, disease, and healing clearly indicates that the mind is continually modulating the immune system. Another complex mind-body relationship concerns the role of the central nervous system, early life experience, emotions, and learning in modulating the immune system.
Direct psychological modulation of the immune system is possible. That this can be intentionally and voluntarily accomplished is of great importance. Work on the mind modulation of the immune system via hypnosis, placebos, and behavioral conditioning demonstrated that mind-body healing processes could be activated by outside influences and now it has been shown that humans can train themselves to facilitate their own inner mind-body healing processes. It will be recalled that neutrophils comprise almost two-thirds of the body's innate immunity of white blood cell defenses. Any means of potentiating their function would surely be a significant step in combating disease. A program designed to enhance relaxation by biofeedback found that while the number of neutrophils remained the same, they were found to function significantly better with successful relaxation training. Belief and imagery training was used to explore the relationship between imagination and the immune system. Students who believed they could consciously control their own immune system were first given information about how white blood cells functioned and shown microscopic slides of actual neutrophils, which were to be incorporated into their imagery training. They then listened to an audiotape with suggestions for relaxation and imagery. They practiced imaging and drawing pictures of their imagery, which were later objectively scored. After six sessions of such training, it was found that subjects could greatly increase or decrease the number of circulating neutrophils in their bloodstream. A highly selective subject could use meditation or self-hypnosis to modulate her immune response.
Mind-body communication and healing are mediated by the "body image." The raw body image is an organization of visual imagery that apparently is constructed in the fronto-limbic system, particularly with the help of the right cerebral hemisphere. This raw imagery tends to be facilitated during sleep, dreaming, muscular relaxation, free association, mind wandering and under the effects of certain drugs that block inter-hemispheric communication. When the cerebral hemispheres are in good communication, however, the raw imagery of the right hemisphere is "cooked" or transduced by the left hemisphere. The basic hypothesis that has emerged is that the right hemisphere's modes of information transduction are more closely associated with the limbic-hypothalamic system and mind-body communication in the placebo response in therapeutic hypnosis. Virtually all modern approaches to mind-body communication attempt to facilitate the process of converting words, images, sensations, ideas, beliefs, and expectations into the healing, physiological processes of the body.
State-dependent memory, learning, and behavioral phenomena bridge the gap between mind and body; they explain the mysteries of spontaneous healing, the placebo response, and so-called miracle cures; and they are the common denominator between traditional Western medicine, and all the holistic, shamanistic, and spiritualistic approaches to healing that depend upon highly specialized cultural belief systems, worldviews, and frames of reference.3. Accessing Your Healing Faculty
We have now presented the empirical argument for how our healing and immune mechanism functions. The fact that stress is so significant tells us this is the number one factor in staying healthy. Anything and everything we can do to relieve stress will aid our recovery and basically remove a primary cause of disease. Just as the alarm response has a deleterious effect on our health, so does the relaxation response have a beneficent effect. Stress, therefore, weakens our immune system, whereas relaxation augments it. The stress or relaxation may be mental, psychological, energetical or physical as each cause affects the immune function accordingly. Our autonomous system manages this balancing act pretty well, but by excessive or unrelenting stress we overburden the system. By altering our behavior in any of these categories we can intentionally and voluntarily strengthen our immune system. We choose wellness or illness by our behavior mentally, psychologically, energetically and physically. That is significant! If this is the route to wellness, then all healing techniques are valid, both conventional and alternative, so long as they bring us back to this state of wholeness. If we allow our unconscious, through our autonomous creative process, to construct our future, then we have sealed our own fate. But we have a relationship with these autonomous processes; we have a say in the construction of our future. It is by inner work. Your fundamental task is to learn how to access and utilize your own unique psychobiological resources that can affect biochemical processes within your cells.
You can't just let someone else fix you. You must be pro-active and involved in your own health and healing. There are three things you can do to maximize the healing effect you get from the treatment you are receiving, or just for the life you are living. The preceding pages have many more suggestions; however, these are primary:
- Balance your neurotransmitters
- Be friends with your problems
- Fix your ultradian disruptions