Rewiring Your Brain for Health

How to Detox Your Brain

What goes on in your brain profoundly impacts your body. And it’s no “Jedi mind trick!”

Incredibly, scientists and medical doctors explain that “75-95% of the illnesses that plague us today are a direct result of our thought life.”[1]

The use of placebos (a harmless, drugless pill) provides powerful evidence that the thoughts in the brain can supersede what the body is experiencing. In many cases, a placebo works as well as the so-called “real” medication or surgery.[2] Time after time, placebos work because people believe they work.

Dawson Church, author of The Genie in Your Genes explains, “Each of us holds the keys to a pharmacy containing a dazzling array of healing compounds: our own brain…Our brains are themselves generating drugs similar to those that the doctor is prescribing for us.”[3]

The Power of the Brain

The human brain processes 400 billion actions per second! We’re told that our brains hold the capacity for storing three million years’ worth of data—something none of us will ever begin to approach.[4]

We are constantly developing and cultivating our minds every moment of the day, building new synapses and creating physical connections in the brain. Scientists refer to this growth as “the magic trees of our mind.” Our thoughts are the stuff from which these “trees” grow and develop.[5]

Healthy thoughts produce healthy trees and unhealthy thoughts spawn unhealthy trees. These unhealthy thoughts not only affect our emotions, minds and relationships, but also profoundly impact our physical health.[6] Good trees produce good fruit; bad trees produce bad fruit.

One of the big deceptions of the day is that we are victims of our circumstances. We develop a disease or ailment and blame our ethnicity, our genetic disposition, or a host of environmental factors. But medical science is demonstrating the fallacy of this thinking.

Remember, a victim is always a victim; meaning that a victim can never rise above their circumstances or situation. To do so requires right thinking. A victim is always a slave to their circumstances. Only when a victim sees themselves as victor can they conquer those circumstances. This is true whether we’re talking about a social ill or a physical one.

We often feel like victims of our genetic heritage. But as it turns out, there is a determining factor even stronger than genes. It’s called epigenomes. And epigenomes can change your genes. What are epigenomes? Essentially, epigenomes are your thoughts. Your thoughts can change your brain’s structure and how it works. This process is called neuroplasticity.[7]

Brain Toxicity

What we’re saying is that a toxic brain will produce toxicity in the body (and in all other areas of our lives as well). Below are some of the most common toxic thoughts that lead to brain toxicity. See if you recognize any of these:

• “Would’ve, could’ve, should’ve” thoughts
• “If only I had…”
• Replaying old, toxic tapes in our minds from a caustic conversation
• Creating bad hypothetical situations in the future
• Stress (this is a huge problem)
• Passivity
• Dishonesty
• Lack of forgiveness
• Anger
• Fear
• Hate
• Jealousy
• Envy
• Discontent
• Allowing a situation or illness define you: “my cancer,” “my heart problems,” “my back,” “my disability,” etc.
• Negative statements like: “Nothing ever goes right for me!” “I can’t do anything right!” “I just knew things wouldn’t work out!” “I’ll never be able to…!”

If any of these thoughts are common for you, you need to detox your brain, because more than likely those thoughts are affecting your physical health too.

Thoughts are not harmless, but cause us to grow “branches” (synapses) in the brain. These branches determine patterns that result in actions. [8]

When we think bad or negative thoughts and begin to hold onto them, physical changes occur in our brain. We are allowing those toxic thoughts to hijack our brain. Click to Tweet.

These toxic thoughts can cause illnesses such as: diabetes, cancer, asthma, skin disorders, allergies, and high blood pressure.[9] When Proverbs declares, “A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones,” we can take that literally.[10]

In terms of these trees in our brains, whatever we feed grows. If we feed and nurture negative and toxic thoughts, we are cultivating a toxic forest in our brains that will poison our bodies, minds, emotions, and relationships.

For example, toxic thoughts like fear or stress cause physical reactions in the brain involving 1400 different chemicals and more than 30 hormones and these alter the brain and impact the body.[11] As a result, stress-related disorders have risen in epidemic proportions including: depression, anxiety, autism, attention deficit disorder, memory problems, and dementia, all of which are making pharmaceutical companies very profitable.[12]

“Americans live on caffeine and Prozac. We use substances to manage our moods. In fact, the four top-selling items in grocery stores are all drugs that we use to manage our mood and energy: caffeine, sugar, alcohol, and nicotine.”[13]

Dr. Lissa Rankin, MD, writes, “As an integrative medicine doctor in posh Marin County, Calif., I never understood how my patients – all health nuts, eating vegan diets or juicing, working out with personal trainers or taking supplements, and sleeping eight hours a night – could be some of the sickest people I’ve ever met. But after my research, I had an epiphany: My patients were sick because they were in chronic repetitive stress response.”[14]

Hans Selye, MD, who coined the word “stress” and first mapped out its biological effects, wrote, “The modern physician should know as much about emotions and thoughts as about disease symptoms and drugs. This approach would appear to hold more promise of cure than anything medicine has given us to date.”[15]

All of this points to the fact that our thoughts exert a profound impact on our brains and subsequently on our physical, emotional, spiritual, and relational well-being.[16]

Our thought life even determines how well a medication will work on us! Click to Tweet. 

How to Detox Your Brain

According to Dr. Caroline Leaf, “Medical research increasingly points to the fact that thinking and consciously controlling your thought life is one of the best ways, if not the best way of detoxing your brain. It allows you to get rid of those toxic thoughts and emotions that can consume and control your mind.”[17]

Dr. Leaf explains that changing your thinking is essential to detoxing the brain. If we allow negative or toxic thoughts free-reign they will dominate our thoughts and our lives and wreak havoc with our health. To counter this, we need to learn to engage our thoughts and evaluate whether a thought is harmful or healthy and whether we should accept or reject it.[18]

We do this by analyzing our mental processes. Old patterns are often difficult to break. If over the years, we’ve cultivated a forest of toxic thinking, we need to actively engage in rooting out those toxic trees and “reforest” our brains with healthy trees.

God designed us with the amazing ability to change our brains. Like no other creature, we have the capacity to stand back and evaluate our thinking processes. We can determine for instance that by holding a grudge against someone who harmed us in the past we have built a hedge of thorns in our minds and relationships.

That grudge is producing toxicity in our brains and impacting our physical health. As a result, we may get sick more often, suffer from chronic upset stomach, experience headaches, high blood pressure, and even skin rashes.

The antidote is to genuinely forgive that individual. When we choose to forgive, not only are we extending mercy and love to that individual, but we are freeing ourselves from the awful burden of bearing that grudge. In place of that pit in our stomach we now feel peace.

In order to rewire our brains, we must take our toxic thoughts captive in our conscious mind and decide to no longer feed them. We determine to root them out of our lives. Recognize that thoughts of fear, anxiety, anger, jealousy, hate, and others like them control us when we yield to them in our thoughts. Instead, we must replace them with positive, wholesome thoughts.

As a result, chronic pain can go away after resolving hatred; hives and skin rashes can disappear when we stop being anxious; an eating disorder can end after coming to grips with our stress; and high blood pressure can return to normal when we stop imagining problems.

Dr. Hyman tells of a man who, after losing his wife, developed heart failure. Instead of prescribing medications, he urged his patient to attend to his strong feelings of grief. The man followed his advice and dramatically recovered.[19]

We can rewire our brains to a great extent in as few as 21 days, but it takes conscious, active participation on our part.[20] We must identify and root out the caustic, negative, toxic thoughts and replace them with good, pure, wholesome ones.

There’s an amazing example of this process in the New Testament. In his letter to the church in Philippi, Paul was writing from prison in Rome. He was an old man when he wrote this letter and had suffered incredible physical and emotional trauma for his faith in Christ.

If anyone had the “right” to entertain thoughts of bitterness, anger, regret, anxiety, and discontent it was Paul in his current situation. Yet, in spite of his circumstances, here’s what he wrote:

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!  Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near.  Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. 

I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.  I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.  I can do all this through him [Christ] who gives me strength.[21]

Choose to replace anxiety with joy; anger with gentleness; lies with truth; what is dark and ugly with light and beauty. Choose to rewire your brain for health!

As important as a nutritious diet and regular exercise are to our health, the thoughts we entertain each day may be even more significant predictors of our health, longevity and quality of life. And that’s something to think about!

If you liked this article, then you’ll love these:

• The 2 Week Healthy Skin Cleanse
• 3 Ways That God Heals Us
• If I Only Had A Brain: Proven Formula To Keep Your Brain and Life in Tiptop Condition

Sources:
[1] Dr. Caroline Leaf, MD, “Toxic Thoughts,” 2015, http://drleaf.com/about/toxic-thoughts/.
[2] Jeremy D. Safran, PhD, “It’s All in Your Head, Or Is It?” Psychology Today, January 7, 2014, https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/straight-talk/201401/its-all-in-your-head-or-is-it.
[3] Bella Dodds, “Science Proves Your Mind Can Heal Your Body,” nd, http://belladodds.com/how-your-mind-can-heal-your-body-a-bonus-magic-trick-showing-you-the-power-of-your-mind-in-30-seconds/.
[4] Dr. Caroline Leaf, “How to Rewire Your Brain,” It’s Supernatural with Sid Roth, February 28, 2011, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xnw9vO8nhM.
[5] Dr. Caroline Leaf, “How to Rewire Your Brain.”
[6] Dr. Caroline Leaf, “How to Rewire Your Brain.”
[7] Dr. Caroline Leaf, “How to Rewire Your Brain.”
[8] Dr. Caroline Leaf, “How to Rewire Your Brain.”
[9] Dr. Caroline Leaf, MD, “Toxic Thoughts.”
[10] Proverbs 14:30, Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
[11] Dr. Caroline Leaf, MD, “Toxic Thoughts.”
[12] Dr. Mark Hyman, MD, “Stress Tips: Calm Your Mind, Heal Your Body,” April 25, 2013, http://drhyman.com/blog/2010/05/19/stress-tips-calm-your-mind-heal-your-body/#openModal.
[13] Dr. Mark Hyman, MD.
[14] Dr. Lisa Rankin, MD, “Mind Over Medicine: Hot to Help Your Body Heal Itself,” NextAvenue.org, August 26, 2013, http://www.nextavenue.org/mind-over-medicine-how-help-your-body-heal-itself/.
[15] Dr. Mark Hyman, MD.
[16] Dr. Caroline Leaf, “How to Rewire Your Brain.”
[17] Dr. Caroline Leaf, MD, “Toxic Thoughts.”
[18] Dr. Caroline Leaf, MD, “Toxic Thoughts.”
[19] Dr. Mark Hyman, MD.
[20] Dr. Caroline Leaf, “How to Rewire Your Brain.”
[21] Philippians 4:4-8; 11-13, NIV.