It’s quite amazing when you think of it. You and your body are wired to work together to spark neurochemical changes in your brain in the direction of your highest good and happiness. Certain learned neural patterns of thinking, however, interfere with these natural impulses.
Toxic thinking is a protective strategy that unnecessarily activates the body’s survival response. Though well-meaning, essentially, it’s an ineffective way of dealing with painful feelings, such as not feeling “good enough,” deserving enough” or “having enough” in relation to others, all of which are a natural part of dealing with life or relationship issues, and other stress situations.
Based on recent decades of neuroscience findings, it appears, to the extent you become a conscious participant in these processes, you can more effectively direct the changes and parts of you involved in change. In other words, your success in changing any interfering behavior or thought patterns depends on … conscious you.
As suggested in Part 1, your brain and body are a complex communication network, and what influences change is a flow of information from a combination of sources, both conscious and subconscious, hard- and soft-wired.
Information that is soft-wired has been learned, and thus can be unlearned or changed. Your thoughts and beliefs fall in this category; you have learned them, either consciously or subconsciously, from the time you were first exposed to language.
In contrast, information that is hard-wired consists of unalterable laws that govern the operation and life of your body, such as inborn drives to survive (physical and psychological self) and thrive (self in meaningful connection).
This means you can change your soft-wiring (thoughts, beliefs, etc), however, any change must necessarily occur within a framework of unchangeable laws that govern how your brain adapts to change and certain aspects of your nature as a human being.
read full article by Athena Staik, Ph.D.
