Most people have no idea how many
options they have for treating mental
illness and many people feel hopeless or
stuck in their anxiety or depression but
modern imaging technology is allowing
researchers to look into our brain in
ways that was never possible before and
they've been able to see that you can
actually change your brains structure
function and brain chemistry by changing
how you think and changing how you act
this is called neuroplasticity I feel
like it's really important to help
people access these mental health
resources and education so I made this
online course and it's about two and a
half hours long and it's on udemy.com
and it includes ten other principles at
10 other ways you can change a brain
chemistry other than medication and it's
based on the most current scientific
research so this is research backed ways
to change your brain without medication
now I'm not against medication I believe
it should be considered as a treatment
option I just know a lot of people want
to know what their alternatives are but
I wanted to make some of its information
more accessible to everyone
so I'm including a couple of chapters
from my course right here on YouTube for
free this first chapter that I'm going
to be sharing with you is on
neuroplasticity what that means and how
that applies to mental health if you
want to see the whole course it's on
udemy.com
and I'll include a link in the
description with a special coupon code
so it's $9.99 to take but in this
introductory video I'm gonna explain the
fundamentals of neuroplasticity which is
how you can change your brain its
physical structure and it's your brain
chemistry by changing how you think and
how you act so let's jump in
in the first segment of this course
we're going to talk about how changing
how you think actually changes the
chemistry structure and function of your
brain hi I'm Emma macadam and I'm a
licensed Marriage and Family Therapist
and I get really stoked about helping
people improve their lives I've been
working in this field since 2004 and
I've worked in a lot of different
settings like juvenile corrections
wilderness therapy residential treatment
outpatient treatment and I love the
change process and walking with people
as they're making these great changes to
their life I just love it when people
start to feel that excitement about how
good their life can be so let's jump
into this course and see what small
changes you can make in your life that
are gonna make a big difference this
course has nine simple not easy but at
least straightforward ways to change
your brain and one complicated one this
first segment is the most complicated
one and changing how we think is really
difficult now of necessity we have to
start with this one
because it lays the foundation for all
the changes that we're gonna make so
understanding how we can change our
biology by changing how we think is
really essential groundwork for
understanding how the other nine
principles can work so if this topic
seems a little overwhelming just stick
with the course because it gets easier
as we go on so let's jump in there are
two ideas in psychology that have been
proven wrong
the first one is that once we'd hit
adulthood our brains really don't change
much and the second one was that we can
separate the psychological disorders
these problems in the living from the
biological disorders this chemical
imbalance and so someone might have
depression and it's caused by a chemical
imbalance and the only way to treat that
is medication and someone else might
have depression which is caused by
choices they've made and the only way to
change that is by making them change
their behaviors so new research is
showing us that our brain chemistry does
impact how we think and how we feel but
how we think and how we feel changes our
brain chemistry
this gives us more power and more
influence over our lives to make them
happier and healthier so new imaging
technology has changed our understanding
of how our brain works and a new
research in the field of neuroplasticity
has shown us that our brains they don't
even stop laying down the hardware until
we're 25 but they can continue to change
and grow and develop our entire lives
and this is called neuroplasticity
meaning that our brain is moldable and
shapeable and changeable throughout our
entire life one of my favorite examples
of neuroplasticity is the stories of
people who are blind who have learned to
navigate using echolocation so they
developed the ability to locate objects
in their environment using sound waves
in the same way that bats do this is an
ability that their brains didn't have
but developed after they went blind if
you haven't seen the videos of these
people you should check it out it's
really inspiring to see how much our
brains can change and this applies as
well to people with anxiety or
depression or other difficulties that
thanks to our brains ability to grow
change and adapt throughout our life we
can improve our brain functioning and
abilities in really dramatic ways this
again I love this principle because it
gives us room to influence our life we
are the agents of our own lives and you
can create the changes that you want to
make in your life it's become
increasingly evident that biology
impacts thinking so this idea that you
know you have a chemical imbalance
that's causing depression that's true
that does happen but it's also become
more and more evident that the way we
think impacts our biology so if we
consistently think hopeless thoughts
then we're gonna be more likely to have
a biology of depression so we might have
what's considered a chemical imbalance
or we might have lower levels of
serotonin or dopamine when we have these
depressing or hopeless thoughts so to
understand what we're going to talk
about in this segment we need to do a
little bit of brains 101 so there's four
aspects of brain performance that we're
gonna talk about brain structure
chemistry function and genetics
the first one is brain structure there
are physical structures in our brain and
each
forms a specific function and we're not
gonna learn about all the parts of the
brain for this course but we're gonna
talk about a couple of them
our brains are made up of distinct
structures that change and adapt based
on how we use them for example there's
two structures in our brain that are
impacted by depression the amygdala is
the part of the brain that processes
fear and the fight flight freeze
response and in people with depression
the amygdala has been shown to be larger
and more active another part of our
brain that's impacted by depression is
the hippocampus the hippocampus
processes emotions and it's been shown
that in people with depression the
hippocampus is actually smaller it
shrinks when people are experiencing
depression the the really cool thing is
that some recent research and multiple
studies have shown that the hippocampus
has the ability to regain its size after
a bout of depression
so in in patients who were experiencing
depression they attend eight weeks of
therapy and their hippocampus was
measured before and it was shown to be
smaller and then after therapy was
measured and shown to be larger so the
hippocampus can can change its size just
based on something like talking with
another person who's helping you change
how you think when it comes to brain
chemistry our brain uses chemicals to
communicate and these are called
neurotransmitters the main ones we're
going to be talking about in this course
are serotonin which has to do with
confidence and Happiness dopamine which
is kind of the reward chemical and
pleasing chemical norepinephrine which
has to do with decreased pain
sensitivity and feelings of elation
oxytocin which has to do with bonding
and love and GABA which is associated
with anxiety and stress medication is
not the only way to treat a chemical
imbalance so while depression or anxiety
can be seen on a chemical level inside
the brain that doesn't mean that your
only option is to change those chemicals
by adding chemicals to your body like
medication now again I'm not against
medication I often recommend that my
clients go to see a doctor to
some some medication options however
it's not the only way to impact our
brain chemistry so cognitive behavioral
therapy changing how we think and act
has been shown to be as effective as
medication as a treatment for mental
health disorders like depression and
anxiety how we think affects our brain
chemistry so here's an example if we
interpret a situation like a work
assignment as being threatening or
impossible or overwhelming then our
brain releases chemicals like adrenaline
and cortisol now people with depression
and anxiety have higher levels of
adrenaline and cortisol in their brains
and this this creates a heightened
stress response so a cycle of being
stressed out about being stressed out
and they tend to get more stressed out
than the average brain then a person who
doesn't have depression it has been
proven that with many people if they are
taught how to think differently about a
situation how to interpret that work
assignment as not being stressful or
overwhelming then the brain releases
less cortisol and is less flooded with
adrenaline and therefore creates a more
healthy balance of chemicals inside of
it so we can actually change those
stress chemicals we can decrease the
level of the stress chemicals in our
brain by changing how we think the third
aspect of our brain that we're going to
talk about very briefly in this course
is brain function how we think changes
our neural pathways so we think along
these little neural channels and they're
like roads and the ones we use the most
become broad like highways the ones that
we rarely use are narrow and thin and
when we don't use them at all they get
trimmed off because the brain likes
efficiency so when we start thinking
negative thoughts like this is hopeless
or I'm no good or nobody's gonna like me
then those pathways become thicker and
broader and easier for the brain to send
signals on we become habitual in
thinking that way and that shows up in
our in our biology but when we change
how we think and we start thinking
hopeful thoughts like I can do hard
things or I can reach out and love other
people and they're gonna respond with
love to me
and those neural pathways become broader
and wider and those physical structures
in our brain actually change the last
aspect that we're just going to talk
about briefly is our genes now we know
there's a genetic aspect to mental
health and mental illness so depression
tends to run in families and anxiety
tends to run in families for many people
this feels like we're predestined to
feel the way we feel now there's some
recent research that's coming out that's
really exciting that has shown that we
have the ability to influence which of
our genes get turned on and which of our
genes get passed on to our descendants
based on the experiences that we have so
how we respond to our experiences and
how we think can impact which genes get
turned off and this emerging field is
called epigenetics it gives us some
degree of influence over a very
impactful part of our mental health our
genes so therapy isn't the only way to
change our thinking it's just the one
that has the most research behind it so
cognitive behavioral therapy has lots of
research showing that it's effective for
65 or 70 percent of people when it comes
to improving their symptoms of
depression and anxiety and we know that
it works because it not only changes how
we think but it changes the biology
that's going on in our brains there are
other ways to change how we think things
like self help and courses and seminars
books and and new experiences can all
change how we think cognitive behavioral
therapy is just one way that's been
refined down to a skill that is a very
efficient way to help people change
their brain chemistry now I realize that
this segment has kind of been more of an
overview and if you'd like to learn one
specific way to change how you think
check out this video I made on black and
white thinking when we resolve black and
white thinking we increase our brains
ability to be healthy and happy so if
you want to change your brain chemistry
start changing how you think
