You have most likely read the latest news of the study at UCLA linking good gut health, including eating yogurt with probiotics daily, to affect brain functioning and to have positive effects upon mental health (study was with women). For some time, scientist have understood how the head brain effects the gut in development. As early as the 1830’s, William Beaumont, an army surgeon who is known now as the “Father of Gastric Physiology", found an association between changing moods and gastric secretions. The classical view of top-down control with the head brain’s ability to control gut function has been supported by evidence revealing that the brain influences body systems, like the gastro intestinal tract, particularly when the person is under stress. Now there is new evidence to show also a bottom-up control with the gut, the microbiota in the gastro-intestinal tract, can influence head brain functioning and is linked to behavior, depression, stress, and stress-related diseases. Neuroscientists are now evaluating the role of gut microbiota modulation on emotional processing in the brain and its functioning. This “good” bacteria, the “good” flora in your gut, may be instrumental in how your brain develops, you behave, and react to stress.
We propose that there is much more you can do in addition to
building up the good flora in your body to assure good gut health that effects
positive mental health. Based on our clinical studies and research findings, we propose that the more a person uses the
Somatic Reflection Process on gut feelings and unites body-mind, the happier
their gut is, the more positive signals will flow from gut to head brain, and
the person’s mental health will be vastly improved, as well as a stress
reduction that has positive effects upon the physical body and the elimination of dis-ease. It seems sensible that if we have a gut knot, a feeling of tenseness in our gut, we are cutting off the flow of vitality from our gut that we depend upon for health and well-being.
A wise doctor once said that "if your eyes can not cry, then your gut will". He was describing the reason your gut might be in pain physically in relation to emotional pain of which your head is in denial. Your head and even your heart may be in denial, but your gut can't be. That you can count on! Seems that we all have had the experience of laughing or crying until our gut feels it. But if our thinking brain and our heart are in denial of our feelings and needs as human beings, our gut will cry or signal us (ie, irritable bowel syndrome, stomach pains, dis-ease, etc) like a red flag to be aware of ourselves and our instinctual human needs of freedom and acceptance until our thinking brain gets the communication. We have found that the Somatic Reflection Process on gut feelings is vital for improving the emotional immune system and mental health, as well as developing gut feeling awareness to follow in healthy decision-making. We recommend it's use daily along with any probiotic diet plan to work hand-in-hand. Make your gut happy with both good bacteria and gut feeling awareness to send the maximum signals of happiness to the thinking brain.
A wise doctor once said that "if your eyes can not cry, then your gut will". He was describing the reason your gut might be in pain physically in relation to emotional pain of which your head is in denial. Your head and even your heart may be in denial, but your gut can't be. That you can count on! Seems that we all have had the experience of laughing or crying until our gut feels it. But if our thinking brain and our heart are in denial of our feelings and needs as human beings, our gut will cry or signal us (ie, irritable bowel syndrome, stomach pains, dis-ease, etc) like a red flag to be aware of ourselves and our instinctual human needs of freedom and acceptance until our thinking brain gets the communication. We have found that the Somatic Reflection Process on gut feelings is vital for improving the emotional immune system and mental health, as well as developing gut feeling awareness to follow in healthy decision-making. We recommend it's use daily along with any probiotic diet plan to work hand-in-hand. Make your gut happy with both good bacteria and gut feeling awareness to send the maximum signals of happiness to the thinking brain.
In our book What’s Behind Your Belly Button? A Psychological Perspective of the Intelligence of Human Nature and Gut Instinct we have included a protocol for the Somatic Reflection Process on gut feelings
and a number of verbatim counseling sessions using it. We hope you will make
daily use of the protocol included in the book and ask yourself the questions
outlined to help you get in touch with your own gut feelings and feel back in time
to reassess your stored feeling memories into positive influences upon your
mental health. We do hope UCLA and other research centers studying the head-gut connection and the affect of the gut on childhood development and on both mental and physical health, will look at the psychological needs that our gut feelings monitor and gauge for us through our gut feelings, and then will collaborate a combination of medical and psychological approaches to gut health.
We have submitted a complete protocol in our book for the purposes of individual use as well as further research on gut health. As you use it, you will see that we started from the gut in our exploration of intelligence rather than from the head, a bottom-up approach to counseling and healing, and found the gut feeling memory to hold the record of the impact of life upon the person. We found that the awareness of this impact through gut or somatic reflection is the key to positive development and both physical and mental health and well-being. In fact, we have theorized that just as the body repairs cells during deep sleep, the Somatic Reflection Process centering on gut feelings has the same cell repair possibility as REM sleep or at the least enhances this process to occur. Our research (evaluated in out book) at SSU found that participants, with whom we used the Somatic Reflection Process, reported sleeping better after the process, felt less stress that reduced the gut knot feeling, and experienced a renewed clarity of thought, hope, decision-making, and somatic awareness.
We have submitted a complete protocol in our book for the purposes of individual use as well as further research on gut health. As you use it, you will see that we started from the gut in our exploration of intelligence rather than from the head, a bottom-up approach to counseling and healing, and found the gut feeling memory to hold the record of the impact of life upon the person. We found that the awareness of this impact through gut or somatic reflection is the key to positive development and both physical and mental health and well-being. In fact, we have theorized that just as the body repairs cells during deep sleep, the Somatic Reflection Process centering on gut feelings has the same cell repair possibility as REM sleep or at the least enhances this process to occur. Our research (evaluated in out book) at SSU found that participants, with whom we used the Somatic Reflection Process, reported sleeping better after the process, felt less stress that reduced the gut knot feeling, and experienced a renewed clarity of thought, hope, decision-making, and somatic awareness.
Here is a short excerpt from chapter eleven of our book What’s Behind Your Belly Button? on the importance of using the Somatic Reflection
Process on gut feelings as a medical intervention to effect both positive physical
and mental health with an integrative approach:
The Somatic Reflection Process as a Medical Intervention
“Twentieth century medicine led with the philosophical idea
of the organ system model of dis-ease and diagnosis; and this lead to
increasing specialization and breakthroughs in imaging processes, as well as
complex biochemical pathway advances. However, by the end of the 20th century,
systems oriented life science emerged in the forethought of modern medical
thought. And with this new growing orientation toward the non-linear in both
physics and medicine, physicians using an integrative, functional medicine
paradigm are now struggling in science to embrace the uncertainly that goes
with it. Both the doctor-patient relationship and communication is changing to
utilize heuristics of a healing partnership when time and information on
dis-ease are limited and when the outcome of treatment is uncertain.”
“The Institute for Functional Medicine (IFM)5 describes the
basic principles of their integrative model as using a patient-centered rather
than dis-ease-centered approach to treatment with an interest in the web-like
interconnections of internal physiological factors and the identity of health
as a positive vitality. This approach views the human organism as a whole with
countless points of access to affect the organism and, thus, makes intervention
at any one point as possibly having a beneficial influence over the entire
system. For instance, increasing the T cell lymphocyte levels has been found to
beneficially influence the immune system, as we previously discussed, and
stress reduction can reduce the cortisol levels, reducing the risk of cancer
cell growth. With this 21st Century model of medicine and healing, we have the
opportunity to move toward an integrative approach that views the imbalance of
the mind-body integration as one of the pathways of disease.”
“Besides bringing psychotherapists and other somatic
practitioners on board with the medical team to apply integrative mind-body
therapies, physicians embracing the integrative approach are employing some of
the mind-body techniques in the doctor-patient communication and as a
diagnostic tool. Successful results are being reported by physicians,
particularly in finding the trigger or circumstance at the beginning point of
the illness. The Institute for Functional Medicine relates a success story with
a patient who had a gastrointestinal disorder. This story serves as an example
of their use of a mind-body reflection technique that asks the patient to
center on the feeling in her gut to find the time she did not have her “gut
problem’ as the patient called it and what circumstances she experienced during
the first appearance of the problem. The IFM reports that the patient was able
to find the experience in her past when she first started having pain in her
gut region, and it began when she lied to her mother who asked her if she had
been sexually abused by her father, saying that she had not. Because this was
the first time that she realized the emotional origin of her dis-ease, it was
considered by her medical team as an “aha” moment and insight for her that was
an initial experience of healing her GI by bringing the split between her body
and mind in balance.”
“This clinical experience is comparable to the experiences
that we have had with clients using the Somatic Reflection Process to bring
awareness and resolution to a current unresolved issue that was causing the
patient confusion, stress, lack of energy, and sometimes medical physical
symptoms. One such client sticks out in our minds. A middle aged man we were
both counseling in a Behavioral Science Class (BE 100), a mandatory group
encounter college orientation class in the 70’s at Santa FE Community College,
was complaining of low energy due to his lack of sleep. The feeling that he got
in touch with around the issue was fear and he said it related to a reoccurring
nightmare that was keeping him from sleeping night after night and had for some
time, although it had gotten more intense since he returned to college as an
adult student.”
“When asked to tell the dream, he began to express that he
was afraid and there was a large lady in the dream that was coming toward him.
After having him get in touch with how he felt as he looked at the large lady
in the dream, we had him trace the feeling of fear he expressed back to an
early time when he felt that way before. He was surprised to find that he found
a direct link in his feelings to coming home on the ship while he was serving
in the Armed Forces in World War 2 and seeing the Statue of Liberty. He had an
‘aha’ moment as he felt the link of the fear in the dream to returning home and
to our knowledge, he did not have the nightmare again. After further sessions
of the Somatic Reflection Process, the body-mind connection he made opened a
door of further somatic reflection in which he was able to understand the
difficulties he was having dealing with the loss of the war heroes he served
with and in integrating back into society as a vet with this personal loss.
Many of the same issues he faced returning home after war were similar to what
he was now experiencing returning to school as an adult college student. He was
able to deal with these issues with far less fear and far more effectively
having sorted the past from the present impact of his experiences. His vitality
also returned and we often wondered if this therapy evaded further medical
problems for him had this stress been allowed to continue and sleep deprivation
continued.”
“We bring these two stories to the reader’s attention in
order to demonstrate how doctors who use an integrative model in the diagnostic
and healing process can successfully employ the Somatic Reflection Process. “
If you have found the above excerpt meaningful and would like to order our
book, please see:
What's Behind Your Belly Button? A Psychological Perspective of the Intelligence of Human Nature and Gut Instinct by Martha Char Love and Robert W. Sterling available though Amazon on both the Amazon USA and Amazon UK.
Also you may want to read some of our other posts on gut health:
1. What are the Instinctual Needs That are Often Confused for the Need of Food in Gut Feelings of Emptiness and Fullness?
1. What are the Instinctual Needs That are Often Confused for the Need of Food in Gut Feelings of Emptiness and Fullness?
MARCH 27, 2013
http://instinctualgutfeelings.blogspot.com/2013/03/what-are-instinctual-needs-that-are.html
2. Why Is Reflecting Upon Our Gut Feelings So Important to Our Immune System and Well Being— Distinguishing the "You" and "Not Truly You" for Excellent Mental and Physical Health!
2. Why Is Reflecting Upon Our Gut Feelings So Important to Our Immune System and Well Being— Distinguishing the "You" and "Not Truly You" for Excellent Mental and Physical Health!
SEPTEMBER 1, 2012
http://instinctualgutfeelings.blogspot.com/2012/09/why-is-reflecting-upon-our-gut-feelings.html
or go here to view a list of all our older post on gut intelligence and read more excerpts from our book to learn more about the Somatic Reflection Process technique:
http://instinctualgutfeelings.blogspot.com/2013/04/most-viewed-blog-posts-on-exploring-gut.html
or go here to view a list of all our older post on gut intelligence and read more excerpts from our book to learn more about the Somatic Reflection Process technique:
http://instinctualgutfeelings.blogspot.com/2013/04/most-viewed-blog-posts-on-exploring-gut.html
Click on one of our book covers below to go to Amazon:
"Increasing Intuitional Intelligence" is available on Amazon USA and Amazon UK
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