Our bodies are made up of trillions of different specialised cells. Our nervous system cells are called neurons, their role is to carry messages, via an electrochemical process, along the central nervous system (brain and spinal cord) and throughout the peripheral nervous system (ganglia).
We have 3 types of neurons. Sensory neurons respond to touch, sound, light, smell and taste, sending signals to the spinal cord and brain. We have motor neurons that receive signals from the brain and spinal cord to cause muscle contraction and affect hormonal response. Connecting neurons together with other neurons are inter-neurons.
In most recent years there has been talk of our gut being our second brain. Neuroscience research has proven that we do, just like the brain within our skull, have a complex and functional neural network in our gut but also in our heart! Our gut and heart resembles the same characteristics of our head brain:
- Large number of neurons and ganglia, including sensory neurons and motor neurons.
- Neural cells with inter-neurons.
- Support cells and components such as glial cells, astrocytes, proteins, etc.
- Functional attributes: perceiving/assimilating information, processing information, memory storage and access, neural plasticity and adaptiveness.
- Able to mediate complex reflexes via an intrinsic nervous system (i.e. it doesn’t need the head brain to direct it, it functions even in the complete absence of the head brain).
- A chemical warehouse of neurotransmitters (those found in the head brain are also found in the gut and heart brains).
These complex neural networks display amazing levels of functional intelligence and there is a growing array of evidence that these brains are deeply involved in the control and processing of numerous functions and core behavioural competences.
Grant Soosalu and Marvin Oka studied well over 600 scientific research papers, articles and books; behaviour patterns associated with each of the 3 brains emerged. It was found that each brain has:
- Its own prime function.
- Fundamentally different form of intelligence.
- Utilise different language.
- Different goals and operate under different criteria.
Each neural network, your head, gut and heart brains, have different ways of processing the world, communicating, operating and addressing their own concerns and domains of expertise.
Heart brain prime functions (approximately 30-12,000 neurons):
- Emoting – emotional processing (eg angle, grief, hatred, joy, happiness etc).
- Relational affect – your felt connection with others (love/hate/indifference, compassion/uncaring, like/dislike etc).
- Values – processing what is important to you (and its relationship to the emotional strength of your inspirations, dreams, desires etc).
Gut/Enteric Brain prim functions (approximately 200-500 million neurons):
- Mobilization – motility, impulse for action, gutsy courage and the will to act.
- Self-preservation – protection of self, safety, boundaries, hungers and aversions.
- Core identity – a deep and visceral sense of core self, and determining at the deepest levels what is ‘self’ versus ‘not-self’.
Head/Cephalic brain prime functions (approximately 100 billion neurons):
- Cognitive perceptions – cognition, perception, pattern recognition etc.
- Thinking – reasoning, abstraction, meta-cognition etc.
- Making meaning – semantic processing, languaging, narrative, metaphor etc.
These prime functions are not just limited to the particular brain there associated with. The head brain having approxiamtely100 billion neurons is way more complex than either heart or gut brains and so would have some involvement in all functions. Each neural network is a key driver for its primary functions.
These prime functions can be seen in everyday expressions:
- Follow your heart
- Follow your gut
- Follow your instincts
- Use your head
- Use your intuition
- Trust your gut
- Be true to your heart
- Don’t let your emotions override your head
- Don’t lose your head, think it through
- Go with your gut response
So now knowing we have 3 separate but integrative centres of wisdom how can we make best use of this?
Grant Soosalu and Marvin Oka built upon their expertise in Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP - behaviour modelling with the use of thoughts and words) and developed multiple Brain Integration Technique (mBIT); the process of communicating with, aligning, and harnessing the intelligences of your multiple brains.
When you are putting the mBIT techniques into action you are mBraining. You are using your multiple brains coherently; you are aligning and integrating your multiple brains for specific outcomes.
Alignment of 3 brains for:
- Goal/outcome-setting
- Decision making
- Problem solving
- Motivation and action taking
- Harnessing your intuition
- Cultivating understanding and perspective
- Relationships
- Personal development, learning and behavioural change
- Health and wellbeing
Another important aspect of mBIT is the use of working with your breath to achieve a balanced and coherent Autonomic Nervous System. Balanced breathing reduces all forms of stress and realigns your 3 brain centres.
Signs and indicators you aren’t aligned:
- You experience internal conflict within yourself between your thoughts, feelings and actions
- You’ve not acted upon your dreams, goals and plans
- You do unwanted behaviours or habits and don’t know why or have difficulty stopping
- You find it difficult to make a decision(s)
- Something within you is making it difficult for you to motivate yourself to take action
- You sabotage yourself from achieving your goals
- You chronically experience disempowerment emotional states such as frustration, depression, anger, anxiety etc
mBIT massage is a hands on technique which will assist your body’s neurons to wire together so they can fire together throughout your multiple brains:
- Using your skin’s proprioceptors to send re-wiring information back to your Central Nervous System.
- Working with breath to achieve a balanced Autonomic Nervous System.
- Applying Neuro Linguistic Programming tools.
1 May 2016