If you consider it's believed that the average person has over 6,000 thoughts per day & possibly 80% of them are negative... and if you were to realise how big an effect thoughts have on your physiology, brain, pain & body, you'd probably want to priortise working to improve the state of your thoughts.
Our thoughts in our brain create a cascading soup of chemical messengers & hormones and stimulate a plethora of neural circuits that can effectively "flush" to & affect every cell of our brain & body. And the study of epigenetics tells us that cells respond & function according to those messages & molecules delivered to them in their local environment.
"It's the environment, stupid!"
These are the words that cell biologist, Bruce Lipton, exclaimed to himself back in 1967 when he finally realised what was causing his 3 Petri dishes of initially identical stem cells sitting in 3 different medium cultures to differentiate into 3 different cell types: muscle, bone or fat. It was the cells' local environment/culture medium that created the differentiation.
In other words, the particular environmental "soup" in which a cell exists controls the expression of the cell's genes & thus its growth & function. And it's well accepted now that the effect of feeling chronically stressed, with its persisting negative thoughts & flushing of stress hormones throughout the body, may eventually disregulate genes, disrupt the immune system leading to illness & sensitise pain producing nerve circuitry.
So, as our thoughts & responses to life's stressors are contributors to the formation of that environmental soup, we want to do our best to regain some control over them - and that can feel really hard to do.
First step is building up our awareness
Although approximately 95% of our brain's activity is unconscious, we also have a large capacity for self-awareness. So, with practice, we can learn to become aware of our thoughts. Giving ourself a regular allocated time each day for quiet repose/meditation allows us the opportunity to build our capacity for this key practice.
Thoughts do not equal facts
Then it's really important to acknowledge that just because we've had a thought it doesn't mean it's a fact. So in becoming aware of our thoughts, we can remind ourself it is only a thought & learn to let it pass without giving it more attention. I like to imagine putting it on an imaginary cloud and seeing it float far away.
Freedom From Pain
Looking at ways we can reduce life's stressors and change our thoughts & responses to stress is a key step in my Freedom from Pain programme. To find out more, please pop back to the main website: www.CatherinePollitt.co.uk.