Electrochemical Magic, Core Beliefs And The Wonder Of Memory!
Guest Post: Louise Spurgeon, Neuroscience Consultant, writes about memory types impacting our automatic reactions and making changes for better ones
I want to give a shout out to memory. The irony is it’s so easily forgotten when talking about mental health and wellness, yet it plays a crucial role.
Memory shows itself in so many guises.
I will lay out some relatable examples, all the while keeping in mind our neurobiology is made up of approximately 86 billion neurons (brain cells) and well over 100 trillions synapses.
In case you need a refresher, neurons use electrical and chemical signals to receive information from other neurons via synapses.
Synapses are the tiny gaps between neurons where magic happens. Each neuron can have thousands of synapses.
For a moment stop and dare to think of the neuronal connections and networks that are individual to you, that hold your personal story, in and out of conscious awareness!
Many kinds of memory
Let’s start with a simple example.
You recall going to a client’s office, a location you had not visited before. There was a really tricky set of steep stairs to navigate to get to the café nearby.
Now, neurons will be ‘chatting’ to other neurons (via synapses) to not only assemble this new experience, but also drawing from and updating old experiences about navigating the steep stairs.
Notice this is how we build out experience - as a two year old you would have faced a small step, that at the time would have felt and looked like a mountain!
This shows memory for movement (procedural memory), long term memory (episodic memory) and you felt safe in both a physical and psychological sense (implicit memory didn’t register anything to worry about).
Now you maybe thinking ‘yeah, yeah so what?’
The magic of biology means that when you were, say, sitting in the café and put your hand out, many times reaching for your cappuccino, each time potentially different groups of neurons produce the same action.
This is known as degeneracy, a universal phenomenon found across all biological systems. Its benefits mean we have a robust and adaptive system that provides us with multiple options.
But can you see how degeneracy could add to the complexity when we are dealing with challenging emotions, situations and environments, some of which we may not be consciously aware of?
Primarily because we are not just necessarily dealing with one network.
Data sets from our past and present to enable the prediction machine
Also now consider that, your body would have been primed for action to reach for the coffee cup before you were consciously aware of it.
This is the brain showing off its ‘prediction machine’ prowess.
It has learnt through experience, the hand reaches for the coffee, until the liquid has gone, pretty much. Such efficiency saves energy, which ultimately protects us and keeps us alive.
But this also can cause us problems, because we can all be triggered by our past, so we deploy behaviour, both in and out of conscious awareness, to avoid / protect in the present even though we can cognitively intellectualise we are under no threat.
Here is a more challenging example through the lens of mental health and wellness.
Uniting neuroscience and psychology
A new work colleague reminds you of a primary care giver who made you constantly feel inadequate and worthless (implicit memory has registered, and feels there is something to worry about).
This in turn triggers the stress mode because the prediction machine wants to protect you and it deploys the dissociate (go quiet, switch off) mode.
Remember the stress response is not intellectually consciously chosen.
Other options it can deploy are to fight, run away or even appease. This is where we can unite psychology with neuroscience as this is where core beliefs are being played out.
Core beliefs are underpinned by neuronal networks established during childhood by most importantly family but also school, friends and society at large.
In this case you were made to feel stupid and worthless, always being criticised, your efforts were never good enough.
Now this also plays into the human sense of rejection. Being rejected, or even perceived rejection can feel like a physical pain sensation and neuroscience has shown the brain responds in a similar way to physical pain sensation.
This is not just relationship rejection but rejection of things like your ideas, your work, your personality or the way you look.
So the prediction machine is also protecting against feeling pain:
“If I dissociate, maybe the comments will stop or I won’t hear the comments, so I won’t sense I am unworthy, I won’t feel the pain of rejection etc etc”.
The prediction machine has no interest in time, language and intellect, it just knows it has to protect, even though you are now a grown adult.
It is drawing on what is sensed and the environmental context.
But the beauty and wonder of the brain means our core beliefs are not hard wired.
Neuroplasticity means positive change is always possible, with time, a sense of safety in the right environment, allowing for the prediction machine to update its available options of response.
The new response in this scenario could be 'I am worthy, I do trust myself and I won't feel intimidated by this new colleague’.
Key takeaways
I have shown how memory is multifaceted and plays an integral role in our health and wellbeing.
Here are some key takeaways to keep in mind while supporting your own mental health and wellbeing:
Memory includes intellectual memory but more importantly embodied and emotional memory.
The brain's main role is to keep you alive in the most energy efficient way possible.
The brain acts as a prediction machine from previous experience. It does not factor in timelines, language and intellect.
Multiple neuronal networks hold our past and present experiences in electrochemical format.
These neuronal networks are not hard wired; they are completely open to changing when the environment is right.
Get friendly and curious with your nervous system.
Understanding it can have profound benefits in a personal and professional capacity.
Louise Spurgeon (ex HSBC, Lloyds, NatWest, Founder of Hutures (and a great friend!)) is passionate about understanding how the nervous system, mind and body interacts with the environment.
She combines her lived personal and professional experience with her academic studies in neuroscience and psychology at King's College London.
She explores how our nervous system is an interconnected complex system managing sensory data, emotional, physical and cognitive intelligence contributing to our decision making, behaviour, movement, feeling and thinking.
To continue the conversation, contact Louise: Louise@hutures.com
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I am SO grateful for neuroplasticity. It is the physical proof that we aren't doomed to live in our suffering: we can change. What a freakin' blessing!