A bit about the mind-body connection!

Let’s talk about our body and the physical health today! A bit about the mind-body connection. I’ve been going back and forth a lot on if I should include information related to how our body works in this blog. The more I see my friends and family around me struggling with different health conditions, or just the fact that we are in midst of a pandemic, I cannot not share this information and I do hope this would be useful to anyone who’s reading.

First, let’s take a moment to acknowledge how beautiful and intelligent our bodies are. Everything around us, let me rephrase, everything natural around us, from the sky, nature, to our bodies are designed in such a beautiful, incredibly meticulous manner. Everything in nature has a purpose and a role to play, so does each organ and every part of our body. It’s designed to heal itself!

We tend to forget or maybe we are unaware of how our bodies actually work. We are conditioned to rely on external help and guidance whenever we are injured or fall sick. We sometimes don’t take the time to understand or even be aware of how our mind and body work together as a whole. At the end of the day though, all we’ve got is our body and mind. So let’s remind ourselves to give It some care and attention. :)

All the organs in our body is controlled by our Autonomic Nervous System. Our mind pretty much directs our body to take action, and how to take action. Our autonomic nervous system comprises of two parts, Sympathetic Nervous System, and the Autonomic Nervous System.

Let’s take a look at the Sympathetic nervous system. This is Is also know as the fight/ flight response of our body, or the stress mode. This is activated when we are under emotional/physical/chemical stress.

*Something to remember, whether you’re stressed chemically, physically, or emotionally, the body reacts the same way.

How is the sympathetic nervous system activated?

Imagine you’re on a peaceful walk at a park minding your own business, enjoying nature, and you suddenly come face to face with a bear. At this point the amygdala in your brain assesses this situation to be of danger and sends a distress signal to the hypothalamus. Then the hypothalamus activates the Sympathetic response of the body.

Once your mind and body assumes danger, you panic, you have adrenaline kicking in and your body is in fight/flight mode activating the sympathetic nervous system. Your pupils are now dilated, your heart raises and you are breathing faster. This causes the lung passages to expand, and to ensure you’re getting enough oxygen to the muscles if you need to run, certain blood vessels will also be dilated. As the adrenaline increases your blood sugar increases to give you more energy. Cortisol which is the stress hormone of the body is released in this state, causing cholesterol levels to go up. Once the cholesterol and the blood sugar levels of the body are elevated, it causes the blood to thicken. In order to pump out this thickened blood and have a smooth blood flow, the blood pressure has to be increased.

As the priority of the body and mind at this stage is to help you survive, it’ll direct the blood flow into your arms and legs to help run when and if needed. This will also cause the blood supply to your gut, the digestive tract, digestion and other repair mechanisms in the body to be shut down as they are not really a priority at the moment since the body is preparing for battle. This all leads to weakening of the immune system as the repair mechanisms of the body is shut off in this state.

When in actual danger, this process is essential for you to survive. But if you’re under stress daily, and your body is constantly in this state, it cannot function regularly and tend to the repairing functions of the body, regeneration of the cells, etc.

Let’s take a look at the Parasympathetic nervous system.

This is the calm state of the body, where the body is in rest and digest mode. This is imperative for a good immune system and for our overall well being, mentally, and physically. In opposite to the sympathetic response, parasympathetic response ensures that the blood flow is being supplied smoothly to the digestive system helping with the digestion and to other repair mechanisms of the body. It stimulates the immune system, repairs tissues, and increases the blood supply to the gut and all repair mechanisms in the body. So the repair mechanisms of the body is regulated normally, and the cells are regenerated regularly.

So when we have any bacteria, viruses, pathogens, come in to our body, or if we’re emotionally stressed, or we have a strained ankle, all these things cause the body to activate the stress response. Once the stress mode is activated, body is preparing for battle, causing all what we discussed, which leads to inflammation of the body. The culprit of every disease is pretty much inflammation of the body.

If you’re struggling with any disease ranging from:

• Headaches

• Food sensitivities, Allergies

• Asthma

• Hair loss

• Mood swings

• Bloating and other Digestion issues

• Depression/Anxiety

• Thyroid Issues

• Cholesterol

• Diabetes

• Autoimmune diseases (Irritable bowel syndrome, Crohn’s Disease, etc.)

The physical root cause for all these is a weakened gut, inflammation, and a weakened immune system. Remember, what controls your gut and all the other organs is your Nervous System.

So coming back to the two states of our nervous system, if you are constantly in a stress state, the body will not be able to function as it's meant to and will cause more and more diseases. The word Disease itself Dis-ease, points out that the body is not at ease, in other words, stressed.

Just to give you an idea of what some of the stressors may look like;

What are emotional stressors?

Relationship problems

Financial difficulties

Medical Diagnosis

Mental abuse, neglect

What are physical stressors?

Trauma

Injuries, Infections, Surgeries

Foods that are harder for the body to digest (Gluten, dairy, Refined sugars, etc.)

Excess Alcohol

Extensive Physical labor

What are chemical stressors?

Chemical food additives, preservatives

Non organic food/ processed foods

Medicines

Vaccinations

If you can eliminate the stressors physical, emotional or chemical, and keep operating from the calm state (parasympathetic nervous system) as opposed to the stress state (sympathetic nervous system), you are directing your body to function regularly and it’ll take care of you!

So how do you activate the parasympathetic nervous system?

Being present, mindful.

Meditation

Breathing exercises

I’ll write more on how to eliminate the stressors, detox the body, and activate the parasympathetic nervous system, in the weeks to come. For now this is a mere introduction to how the body and mind work together. Hope you enjoyed the read! Feel free to leave a comment or message me if you have any questions, or would like more information. :)