Hardwired for Bliss

Okay, stay with me on this. We'll get practical and punchy and over-the-top, radically fun really soon! There is just so much great stuff out there to support the practice of telling a new story. I hardly know where to start!

In a previous era (waaaaaaay back in 1987, LOL) I was a Molecular Genetics major at the University of Rochester. I loved studying biochem and DNA and all that cutting-edge, medical, scientific research. I fully intended to get a dual degree as an MD/Phd and pursue a career in medical research. I had the lofty goal of finding a cure for cancer.

One beautiful day in 1989 I was sitting on the academic quad and I had an irresistible urge to change my major. Long story short -- I shifted my focus to psychology, education, and healing. Seems like a major shift eh? It certainly freaked out all my geeky science friends! And yet it has all come back around for me in my current passions.

It is very clear to me now, through my education and my own life experience, that the stories we tell ourselves impact us at every level of our being. But you don't have to take my word for it. The research shows it too.

I recently read the book Everything You Need to Know to Feel Go(o)d by Candace Pert . Dr Pert, a psychopharmacologist who has taught at Johns Hopkins and worked for NIH has shown that:

"...how you think and feel--your emotional state at any given moment--can actually impact the movement, division, and every other activity of your cells in much the same way as your internal juices and pharmaceutical drugs do. This is a central idea of my theory of emotions, that there's a physical substrate for your feelings, just as there is for the action of drugs and their effects in your body."

So, shifting how we feel about any given situation can have as much of an impact on our physical bodies as pharmaceuticals. Its just one more reason why telling a new story is such a fabulous idea!

The best part is that her research (including information in her other book Molecules of Emotion) shows that we are actually hardwired for bliss. Our brain is organized for pleasure. We are meant to feel go(o)d.

What story are you telling today?

PS -- Feeling good may very well be the cure for cancer. Seems like I've found it even in my new story :)