Harnessing the Brain’s Healing Power Using Mindfulness
I’m here to tell you that mindfulness is more than the buzzword you’re seeing everywhere—living mindfully is a way of life that focuses on existing in the present moment and taking the world on without judgement, self-criticism, or angst. In its simplest terms, mindfulness is a way of being aware of the “now,”—what’s happening right now in this moment, instead of looking to the past or worrying about the future. Sounds great, but maybe a little bit idealistic. It may sound like an impossible life, because maybe racing thoughts, shaking legs, a speeding heart, or fear are keeping you from being present. What if I told you that mindfulness can change your brain?
Mindfulness is a simple concept capable of revolutionary change. I incorporate a great deal of mindfulness into trauma therapy, because it can turn up the dial and make our work more effective. Mindfulness can be powerful in combating unhelpful thought patterns, self-blame, shame, and irrational feelings of guilt. Mindfulness is also a powerful tool for symptom management and building emotional stability and regulation, making it a powerful tool to connect with when healing our mental health.
“If it’s out of your hands, it deserves freedom from your mind too.”
-Ivan Nuru
There’s a few different avenues our work can take together, including participation in guided imagery and other mindfulness activities in-session, as well as learning mindfulness skills and implementing them in meaningful parts of your life.
Mindfulness practices can be used to soothe a distressed nervous system, as well as to build insight. Utilizing elements from vipassana meditation invites us to build insight through our awareness, with the target of building balance and readiness to cope with life’s stresses. Some mindfulness practice may incorporate practices such as using a lovingkindness meditation to reconnect and recenter with our experience of love and compassion, and then intentionally spread that outwards.
Brain imaging studies are showing that the practice of mindfulness can change your brain!!! A substantial list of brain regions are being studied as being involved with mindfulness, including the medial prefrontal cortex and the amygdala—two regions I’m going to chat with you a little more about as they relate to healing from trauma.
The amygdala works as our threat detector and when a potentially dangerous threat is identified, takes over and we may feel fearful, reactive, or on ‘high-alert.’ See here for a helpful infographic about the ‘hand model,’ of the brain—in this example your thumb is representative of your amygdala. After surviving trauma, the amygdala may kick into a bit of an overdrive leading to overactivation of experiences of fear, stress, and vigilance and reduced access to other, more helpful or adaptive areas of our brain. In this example, consider your amygdala like your own personal security system—after trauma, it may be more likely to fire “false alarms,” and through building awareness, honoring our experience, and nourishing our nervous system through mindfulness we can work to retrain the amygdala to recognize and respond to credible threats. The medial prefrontal cortex is considered essential when we are unlearning fear responses. It is suggested that, through brain imaging studies, trauma survivors may exhibit reduced activation in this brain region.
So now we ask the question—how can mindfulness “help” me if I’m a trauma survivor? Through exploring and implementing mindfulness practices, you are also bringing the opportunity to invite your amygdala into another process—storing new memories to help us recall them later. It has been proposed that the amygdala may “tag” memory to help create memories which we may describe as “stronger” or more easily remembered. The amygdala has also been discussed as something to help our brains in a type of focus—helping us figure out where to divert resources and focus attention to build additional memories we can later learn and pull from. Mindfulness can help you if you’re a trauma survivor from a couple different paths—
ONE. In the moment symptom relief—mindfulness techniques can be powerful and effective at quieting racing thoughts, calming nervous system arousal, and reconnecting from dissociation.
TWO. Lasting change—When we continue to practice mindfulness, we continue to train our brain. Mindfulness speaks the language of the brain, connecting “thinking” and “feeling,” and helping to build lasting change through unlearning unhelpful patterns and learning new ones.
“Mindfulness—The change in our lives begins with a change in our minds. Destiny grows where your focus flows.”
Starting a mindfulness practice does not have to be a big time commitment. Mindfulness can be practiced in a number of ways, including through listening to guided meditations, such as those from Meditation Oasis (as of this blog post, the podcasts and the Meditation RX app are all available for free). You can also build intention around connecting with your senses and practice mindfulness more informally, for example—
While washing the dishes—connect with the feeling of the water and the suds. Is the water warm or cool? What does it sound like coming out of the faucet? What colors do you see? How do the bubbles transform throughout your washing?
While in the shower—close your eyes and take a few deep breaths, in through your nose and out through your mouth with a longer exhale than inhale. Notice the sensation of the water over different parts of your body. What’s the temperature like? Perhaps add a couple drops of an essential oil and breathe in some serenity or peace.
There are also a number of apps, spiritually-based practices, and more! If you want to learn more, I invite you to do some research and see what’s out there—let me know what you find! If you’re wanting to build a mindfulness practice for yourself as relief from mental health symptoms, chronic illness, chronic pain, or to support you in your trauma healing, let’s connect for a consultation and see if we might be a good fit!
