I became involved with Neuroplasticity when I was recovering from a traumatic brain injury.
After the surgery, certain functions, such as sense of taste and sense of smell were lost. Further to this, I was told that due to glial scarring, I would likely not retain certain abilities including language, memory, movement and drawing capabilities.
The first thing that astounded me is how easily the brain can develop new neural connections to compensate for circuits that have been disrupted or injured.
The second thing that amazed me is how limited current scientific acceptance is of these in-built healing capacities.
Norman Doidge wrote a book called The Brain that Heals Itself, and in this book he provides multiple examples of people who took healing into their own hands and defied doctors' prognoses of their illness.
The book focusses on the tendency of the brain to strengthen frequently used neural connections, and prune connections that are not consistently engaged. This phenomenon is known as Hebbian firing, after the neuroscientist who first published on the occurrence.
In short, Neuroplasticity can be summarised as "neurons that fire together, wire together."
But Neuroplasticity goes further than this. If we imagine the brain's neural circuitry as a series of highways running from sensory input, to rational analysis, to motor cortex, to muscle fibres, and this highway is severed due to an earthquake, we can imagine that our ability to see a ball approaching, deduce that it is a soft ball and not a sea urchin, lift our arm and open our hand to catch the ball, any one of these steps not being completed would lead to that ball hitting us in the face.
Every highway in the human body has a service road.
This service road is not as wide as the highway, and logic would tell us that less traffic is able to travel along this road.
For some reason, the recovered sense is no less strong when taking the alternative nerve pathway.
Some Neuroplasticity occurs when instead of taking a secondary circuit pathway, the brain piggy-backs on another sense's nerve connection.
Amazingly, this also results in no diminution to either sense.
When it comes to the human brain, where there is a will, there is a way. Sometimes we need a little guidance and sometimes just a small amount of encouragement will suffice.
You can heal. You can really think your way through any situation.
Sometimes, as in the case of Epilepsy, we have overactive brain circuits that fire uncontrollably and generate tonic-clonic grand mal seizures. In these cases, rather than increasing neural connections to generate more signals, we need to quieten certain circuits, or entire areas of the brain.
This can take time, or it can happen very quickly. It really depends on how open you are to a change of lifestyle.
Not external living circumstances, but internal living thought patterns.
Trying to navigate this territory on your own is nothing short of a nightmare. I did it this way, and I would not wish anybody else to need to do so.
If somebody else is available to show you which changes to make and how long to adhere to a new activity, it would have my life much easier, less unpredictable, and more peaceful.
External lifestyle changes do result from changing internal thoughts. New types of thoughts become available, and in time new thought patterns become habitual.
The person you were becomes a personality you no longer wish to associate with.
These behavioural changes are important to maintain. The behaviour is the guide to your new neural firing configuration. This new configuration is enabling you to live without the symptoms you previously experienced.
Neuroplasticity is a rewiring of the brain, a reorganisation of thoughts, a redefinition of personality.
Neuroplasticity will enable you to become who you need to become to make the most of this life.
Work with us access your healing potential.
New neural connections form more readily when stimulated from both ends of the new circuit. As a brain specialist, it is possible to combine awareness with light touch to enhance the body's natural healing mechanisms.