How does your brain controls everything
And why is it important to control your thoughts
Our brain is one of the most vital organs of our body. It is an amazing organ that controls all functions of the body, it interprets information from the outside world, and embodies the essence of mind and soul. Intelligence, creativity, emotion, and memory are a few things governed by the brain. The brain receives information through our five senses: sight, smell, touch, taste, and hearing — often many at one time.
It assembles the messages in a way that has meaning for us, and can store that information in our memory. It also controls our thoughts, memory and speech, movement of the arms and legs, and the function of many organs within our body.
So, just imagine that you are in the middle of a meeting at work or you are listening to a person talking to you about a very important thing, but your mind keeps drifting to some conference that you have tonight…and the parcel that you have to pick up at the shop on the way home…and how you wish you hadn’t skipped lunch because the rumbling in your stomach is driving you nuts. Then, suddenly, you’re back in the moment, hoping nobody noticed your brief “departure”. It may seem as if your brain is always on the go. And it is.
The brain not only controls what you think and feel, how you learn and remember, but also many things you’re less aware of, such as the beating of your heart, the digestion of your food, and yes, even the amount of stress you feel. Cause like you, your brain is quiet the juggler too.
If you think of the brain as a central computer that controls all bodily functions, then the nervous system is like a network that relays messages back and forth from the brain to different parts of the body. When a message comes into the brain from anywhere in the body, the brain tells the body how to react.
For example, if you accidentally touch a hot stove, the nerves in your skin shoot a message of pain to your brain. The brain then sends a message back telling the muscles in your hand to pull away. Luckily, this neurological relay race takes a lot less time than it just took to read about it. Considering everything it does, the human brain is incredibly compact, weighing just 3 pounds.
There are six primary emotions in a human being. They are — Happiness, Fear, Sadness, Disgust, Anger and Surprise. “Somebody woke up on the wrong side of bed this morning.” You know that comment; the one that rarely makes you feel any more gracious towards the world or the person saying it. At the other times you might feel particularly gracious and sunny, for no reason at all.
Our mood is a transient frame of mind that influences how we think and view the world. It is influenced by events in our lives, the amount of sleep we get, hormones, even the weather. But what does the brain play in shaping our mood?
Many regions fundamental to mood buries deep in the most primordial parts of the brain; that is, they are thought to have been among the first to develop in the human species. This is probably because mood is evolutionarily important.
The limbic system is the major primordial brain network underpinning mood. It’s a network of regions that work together to process and make sense of the world. Neurotransmitters, such as serotonin and dopamine, are used as chemical messengers to send signals across the network. Brain regions receive these signals, which results in us recognizing objects and situations, assigning them an emotional value to guide behavior and making reward assessments.
And the hippocampus, meanwhile, reminds us which courses of action are congruent with our mood. For instance, if you feel great you might like to walk down a path fringed with daffodils. If you feel crap, you may instead be drawn to listen to a melancholy album. The hippocampus has been shown to be shrunken in people with chronic depression.
So, we all have a silent voice in our head, that heart-pounding anxiety, those worried thoughts that morph into frightening scenarios and terrifying visions stuck in your head that wont go away.
Negative thoughts are unpleasant, scary, and the cause of anxiety. They are also the destructor of a happy life. No matter what your thought processing style is, no one escapes the curse of negative thinking. And it just begins with one little thought. It’s a trigger that sets off an explosion, like a tiny pebble breaking away on a snowy mountainside crumbling into an avalanche, tumbling out of control. And in a flash, you are buried underneath and can’t get out.
Negative thoughts have no boundaries. Swirling out of your control, there is no end to their vicious cycle. But somehow, negative thoughts are beneficial too because they give you a chance to prove to yourself just how strong you really are. Everyday is filled with many opportunities to let negative thinking rule your life and destroy your happiness. But, taking control of your thoughts is a skill you must develop if you want a happy life.
Just picture a rose bush in full bloom. What did you notice first: the roses or the thorns? A rose bush has plenty of both. But if you focused on the roses and overlooked the thorns, you were thinking positive. Thinking positive is a choice.
It’s a decision to appreciate the roses in your life (loved ones, favourite activities, and relaxing moments) while letting go of the thorns(stresses, disappointments, and losses). But, positive thinking doesn’t mean that you keep your head in the sand and ignore life’s less pleasant situations. Positive thinking just means that you approach unpleasantness in a more positive way. You should think that the best is going to happen, and not the worst.
Were you encouraged to “see the glass as half full’ when faced with a grim situation? Did that prompt help? When we feel at the end of our tether, such motivational words may not seem useful. We often want practical solutions or a helping hand. But what if the solution (or a part of it) was internal? And that internal solution can be ‘having a positive attitude.’
Positive thinking often starts with self-talk. A Self-talk is the endless stream of unspoken thoughts that run through your head. These automatic thoughts can be positive or negative. And if the thoughts that run through your head are mostly negative, then your outlook on life is more likely pessimistic. And if your thoughts are mostly positive, then you’re likely an optimist — someone who practices positive thinking.
There are many benefits of a positive attitude. Like, it can help in getting a better heart health, as our positive or negative thoughts can impact on our heart. When we have a positive attitude towards life, we become more receptive towards new information and we also enjoy trying out new things without the fear of failure which results to have an active and curious mind.
Researchers have also proven that individuals with positive thinking are more productive than their peers, therefore while approaching a new task, they positively reinforce themselves, thereby increasing their self-confidence and chances at success. It also helps us to think big.
At last, we can conclude that it is very important to have a control on our thoughts as everything in our life is dependent on what and how we think.
Every positive thought is a silent prayer which will change your life.-Bryant McGill
