33. HOW ABOUT THOSE PEPTIDES
Emotional intelligence (EQ) specialist, Joshua Freedman, in his Six Seconds at The Emotional Intelligence Network, tells us about Candace Pert and the physics of emotions.
Even before she was chief of brain biochemistry at the National Institutes of Health, Candace Pert made a breakthrough discovery that changed the way scientists understand the mind-body connection. She found the opiate receptor, the mechanism by which a class of chemicals (peptides) alters the mind and body. Her research led her to an understanding of the way emotions function as a regulatory system in the body. Since that discovery, she focused on developing an AIDS treatment using peptides, first at the University of Georgetown Medical Center, and then as scientific director of RAPID Pharmaceuticals.
Before she died in 2013, Freedman had this chat with Pert. Here are excerpts from that chat.
Said Pert, “We’re not just little hunks of meat. We’re vibrating like a tuning fork — we send out a vibration to other people. We broadcast and receive. Thus, the emotions orchestrate the interactions among all our organs and systems to control that.”
Back to Freedman: “As Pert explained in Molecules of Emotion, neurotransmitters called peptides carry emotional messages. ‘As our feelings change, this mixture of peptides travels throughout your body and your brain. And they’re literally changing the chemistry of every cell in your body. … Neurotransmitters are chemicals, but they carry an electrical charge. The electrical signals in our brains and bodies affect the way cells interact and function.’”
“Electrochemical messages are passed between brain cells. Similar signals are passed to every cell in the body. Each is studded with ‘receptor sites,’ a kind of ‘mail box’ for these electrochemical messengers.”
“Pert says that just as our individual cells carry an electrical charge, so does the body as a whole. Like an electromagnet generating a field, Pert says that people have a positive charge above their heads and a negative charge below. ‘So, we’re actually sending out various electrical signals — vibrations.’ … ‘You are connected to everybody else. Your emotions are key. And you are leaving a wake, changing the world around you in a huge way.’”
“The molecules of emotion, a kind of neuropeptide, change the chemistry and electricity of every cell in the body and mind. Feelings literally alter the electrical frequencies generated by our bodies producing a nonverbal communication.”
In Pert’s Everything You Need to Know to Feel Go(o)d, she makes an implicit link between feeling good and connecting to God. “Pert admits this is an unusual view for a hardcore scientist. ‘I’m mad at all these rabid atheist scientists who write books where they’re calling God a delusion. Any good scientist knows that it’s almost impossible to disprove anything. You can only prove something.’”
“At a neurological level, Pert continues, the feeling of being connected with God, of feeling blessed, is an important part of the brain. ‘Blessing and bliss come from the same root. We are hard wired to be in bliss. It’s normal and it’s natural. There is a straight evolutionary argument for this function — any creature that could not experience bliss would have just died and become extinct 200 million years ago.’”
“It’s like we’re designed to make choices around pleasure. The very highest, most intelligent part of our brain is drenched in receptors to make us use pleasure as a criterion for our decisions. So, it’s okay to feel good — God is good.”
“True bliss represents an optimal state of functioning. … ‘Most of us have lost touch with that reality. Most of us seem to be locked in a grim struggle constantly rushing off to the next thing. So, while it may be natural to be in bliss, we have to learn again to feel our natural state of bliss, to feel the spiritual nature of everything around us, every moment.’”
Q: To what extent do you experience bliss as your optimal state of functioning?
