The third and final part of this series concerns the Reticular Activating System(RAS),the amygdalae and the adrenals. The RAS is a dense network of nerve cells that extend from the top of the brain stem through the spinal cord to the level of the heart that filters out or in what is or isn’t important to our survival or our desires. This system receives input from the nerve endings of the eyes, ears, nose, mouth, skin and internal organs. From there the information goes on to the cortex, or thinking part of our brain. The data that manages to get through the RAS hub moves on to our limbic system, the hippocampus and amygdala in particular, so that the new sensory information can be processed to determine what is of value on an emotional level (amygdalae) and how it fits into our past experiences (hippocampus).

It’s important to have both the RAS and the amygdalae on the same page in terms of less overreacting and more staying power, so that when one starts to feel anxiety about facing a pile of overdue bills, he or she can support their brain in taking the higher reflective road rather than the reactive one.

In the last exercise we finished with balancing the amygdalae with the hippocampus. Next we want to place one hand behind our head, cupping the indentations on either side of the trapezius muscle, at the base of the skull. Allow your head to sink into your hand for a minute or two. Then send calming energy upwards and towards the front of your skull, in alignment with the location of your hippos and amygdalae. You can even suggest to the RAS, which lies in the center of the dark purple below, that it doesn’t need to be on all the time. It could be at a 20 out of 100 vs 80 out of 100. If you can, palpate the quality of the nerve cells that make up the RAS. Do they feel spongy, hard, or soft? Do they feel excited or calm? Are they running hot or cold?

Notice how your body is already starting to relax. Next, while keeping your one hand behind your neck, put the other palm of your hand on your forehead, cupping your temples. Begin to imagine a flow, a continuity between the frontal cortex, the limbic and the RAS. It is quite amazing to feel a unification start to happen. A more communicative conversation between the thinking part of our brain and the more reactive parts. With the one hand still behind the neck, supporting the brain stem and spinal cord, put the other hand on the adrenals, which you can access just below the ribcage. You can talk the adrenals down as well, just by imagining them being more relaxed and not needing to charge at the first sign of overwhelm. This portion of the entire exercise I find to be really profound. The adrenals, our fight or flight glands, releases up to 30 hormones to deal with a potential threat. The hypothalamus is responsible for giving the ok to release the stress response for both the adrenals and the sympathetic nervous system, creating a tightening of the body and a surge of energy to flee or beat oneself up over the unruly paper scene.

The final portion of this exercise, after toning down the level of the fight or flight in the adrenals is to imagine all of the pieces we have worked with calmer, more in sync, and productive as a team. We want the frontal cortex, the hypothalamus, hippocampus, amygdalae, RAS and adrenals to feel steady, balanced and flexible and most importantly supportive of our efforts to stay focused and present in our bodies with the day to day tasks that aren’t always pleasant to deal with. Wether it is a 2 hour traffic jam, discarding old magazines that are just sitting around collecting dust, or going through photos for a deceased family member, staying grounded and anxiety free is the key.

Finally I have emerged from winter’s slumber with a renewed sense of hope and brain clarity. Part 2 of this series is a tale of two hippos (hippocampus) and the hypothalamus; both beautiful intricate webs of nuclei. The latter remind me of the antennae of butterflies, partly because of the stems connecting the hypothalamus to the pituitary gland, which sits behind the bridge of the nose, but mainly because of its external and internal sensory ability. It guides our bodies by shifting gears, both sensing, then regulating the comings and goings of neurohormones. To name a few, it controls the release of hormones by the pituitary gland, body temperature, the control of sexual behavior and reproduction, the intake of nutrition, and the cycles of ones circadian rhythm. I imagine the hypothalamus as the queue for proper uploading and downloading of our bodies blueprint for inherent health.

The other relics of the brain, the hippocampus, are sea horse shaped, shown in purple above. These stalwarts work round the clock turning short-term memory into long-term memory. They are also part of the limbic system, and are responsible for linking long term memories to our emotions. One step further down the road, those solidified links can then influence the amygdala and its response to outside stimuli- After that, oh what an emotional ride one might find themselves on. I recently learned that the hippocampus are involved in our navigation system as well.

In Part 1, the amygdalae, shown in red above, were brought to a calmer state by first tuning into them with conscious awareness, then bringing their agitation levels down with either value numbers or lowering the flame. The next step is having a conversation between the hypothalamus and the amygdalae. To start, your index fingers should be where you left off in the first exercise, in the small indentation in front of the ears and level with your eyes. Your awareness should be about 2 inches behind each eye and about an inch inward from the fingers position. The intersection of the two is where the amygdalae are located.

After restoring a more balanced equilibrium to each amygdala, it is time to move your ring fingers to where your index fingers are and while still holding that position, place your middle fingers just above the front lip of your external ears. Imagine moving inward toward the center of the brain where the hypothalamus are located. Once you locate them, notice how they feel and like the exercise with the amygdalae, bring them down to a more manageable level…let’s say a 30 or 40 out of 100.

Next, lay the tips of your index fingers down next to the middle fingers across the top of the ears. You are now in contact with your temporal lobes. The hippocampus and the amygdala are in line with one another, so one can sort of imagine your fingers getting longer energetically, cupping both the amygdalae and the hippocampus together. With intention, ask for a softening, balance and connectivity between all three nuclei, as your fingers continue to support this process. You can do this if you are a visual person by seeing them all connected by energy lines running at the same frequency, or if you are more of a feeler, by imbibing a certain tone to the tissue, a soft yet flexible quality to all three components.

I often find a stillness that happens when making the connections to each part, followed by a deep intake of air or sigh accompanied by a feeling of expansion or release of tension. Congratulations! You have successfully helped yourself in beginning to retrain a habitual response that affects your fight or flight (amygdala), memory (hippocampus), and hormonal fear response (hypothalamus), in relation to a trigger. Doing this two or three times repeatedly, depending on the level of activation, can be so helpful to our ability to concentrate longer on a paper or organizing project, and create new pathways in the brain that contain less fear and more clarity.

If you want to learn more, check out Sue Hoveland’s work and her article “Releasing Trauma from the Brain.“

I was recently introduced to a new technique that I have found to be so beneficial for helping with trauma release for the brain. I want to share it because it has also been helpful for people with ADHD or PTSD. I thought I would offer it in a 3 part series as it isn’t necessarily a lengthy technique to practice on yourself, but there is a lot of cool information that I want to hand off that would be too much for one blog. So check back in next month!

The first structure of the brain that I wanted to focus on is the amygdalae. Anyone who has done any reading on ADHD or PTSD has probably heard of them. They are two walnut sized collections of nerve nuclei deep in the temporal lobes. When faced with threats, these two clusters coordinate the body’s hormonal, behavioral, and neural responses. They also hold emotional memory from the past.

In a recent session I had with a cranial sacral therapist, I was able to locate them with in myself and start to pay attention to how they respond to my thoughts, outside noises, and feelings coming from within and the world around me. What I learned from the experience is that our amygdalae aren’t always in sync. For me, the right one, as Daniel Goleman shares in his book, “Emotional Intelligence“, gets “hijacked“. I could feel how the left was steady and strong while the one on the more emotionally sensitive side of my brain is prone to going offline when overwhelmed or fires up and has no brakes.

Certain memories or triggers can kick the amygdalae into high gear causing people with emotional trauma to become hyper aroused or hyper vigilant, looking for cues at a faster and faster rate to prevent harm from happening to them. Because these emotional centers are linked so intricately with the hippocampus, hijackings can cause periods of forgetfulness when upset or scared, doubling the disorientation and fears of being hurt or anxious.

When it comes to working with ones paper clutter, I have found that an underlying fear can trip up our emotional processing center in a split second, leaving a person unable to focus and follow through with an office organizing project or worse, causing one’s brain circuitry to trip up every time they walk by their piles. Going straight to the source of the misfiring by tuning into one’s amygdalae is a relatively simple exercise with sound results.

Get comfortable by settling into a chair or wherever you like to go for a time out, making sure no one can bother you for about 15 minutes. Take a couple of deep breaths and when you feel ready, put your index fingers slightly in front of  your ears.  There is a small indentation in line with your eyes. Settle your finger softly on the tissue, then bringing your attention to the pupils of your eyes, begin to settle your awareness back 2 inches, at the same time, drawing the attention of your index fingers in to meet them. Sink into the tissue and bone until you can feel  your amygdalae. Once you sense them, back off about a half an inch, softening your gaze.  Notice how they feel. You can tune in one at a time or both at once. What is the quality of the tissue? How do they compare to one another? Is one more resistant to having a conversation with you? Do they feel full? hot? dry? tender? scared? stiff?  Notice how other parts of your body are responding or how you react to outside sounds.

See if you can put a number to the rate at which either amygdala are responding to outside sounds or inside thoughts or feelings. 100 would constitute being in high speed and  10-30 going at a relaxed pace, not to concerned with what is happening in your environment. If one is higher than the other, keeping your attention on them with your soft awareness, ask the one that is higher if it can slow down at 10 degree increments. Set your intention that you would like for the two of them to work together. When you feel they have softened enough to continue to the next lower level, imagine the new number or imagine a burner, and lower  the flame. Keep doing this until they are in alignment and at the lowest level of attention you feel comfortable with.

Practicing this 3 times a day at first can be so beneficial for ones awareness, sense of calm, and ability to see and relax into the future and settle into the now. I find when I use this technique while working on this blog, for example, I move into hyper perfection mode much less than I might otherwise, and when I do, it is for shorter periods of time and my amygdalae and hippocampus stay online!

If you want to delve in deeper now, check out Sue Hoveland’s work and her article “Releasing Trauma from the Brain.“