If you have been struggling with mental or physical health problems and have tried everything, will a change in your attitude really make a difference? For years I have believed so, but now I greatly doubt it. For years I have been on the ‘Motivation band wagon’ ‘Be the best you!’ Be all that you can be!’ or whatever power-driven slogan takes your fancy. As you read this, I would like you to consider someone who has agoraphobia (fear of open spaces) and think about what might cause this irrational emotional response? How can the space outside of your house be life threatening? (Please forgive me if you live in a particular area where it may be truly life threatening).
Somehow your brain is storing information about the big bad world that scares you, so, we motivate you, we tell you that there is nothing bad out there, you feel strong, unstoppable! We open the door for you and bang!!! Your fight, flight, freeze system (FFFS) kicks in and overrides your conscious motivation, your smart brain functions close down, as the alarm is raised, and your primitive function takes over.
Where did our brave mental health hero disappear to?
This is the point Lisa and I were discussing this morning. If a person changes their attitude about or towards something or someone, that doesn’t automatically mean that their condition will improve. The FFFS is permanently scanning to ensure your survival, your systems decision to give you chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, chronic pain, to name but a few of the endless list of mental, emotional and physical health conditions, is in the hands of your below conscious, survival system. You are not broken, although you may feel it, your system is functioning beautifully to protect you from the threat. The only problem is the threat may have happened 30 or 40 years ago, still firing, having never been reset. This could explain why so many people are suffering, despite having a really positive attitude. We are further from addressing the cause of poor mental health than ever before and the condition just continues to spiral further and further out of control. No, matter how much you try to put a brave face on it and to change your attitude, your autonomic nervous system will close you down, every time. Survival is paramount, no matter how poor your quality of life.
‘I’ve lived through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened.’
Mark Twain
Finding the cause of poor mental, emotional and physical health
Over the past 20 years my work has gone in search of an answer to this question and now I believe we have found it. Science tells us that your brain raises the alarm whenever you go near to or consciously think about the stimulus. But what if the stimulus is stored outside of your body within an electromagnetic field, like a cloud storage system[i]. This could set a whole new area of research that would help us and future generations to lead lives with optimum mental wellness. Imagine that the horrors awaiting our agoraphobic on the other side of the door are actually emotional memory images (EMI) that are being downloaded directly to the brains defence system. The same response would happen over and over again. Now, transfer this thought to someone with Chronic fatigue, Chronic pain, etc, and bingo!
Have you cleared your cached emotional memory images?
If you were to think about this as searching on the internet. The next time you come to look at a website that you have seen in the past, your browser will show you the website without you needing to tap in the full address. This is a memory function that your computer has in order to save you time.
“Clear your browser cache” is the first response a tech person will give you when you are having browser problems. If you, like me, are a dinosaur when it comes to computers and you never clear your cache, then every time you want to see something new your computer will insist on showing you the last link you accessed. Could this be happening to you? What if your original experience is being generalised over and over, each time preventing you from accessing the here and now, current information, that could set you free and clear your cached memories…