Your two brains

Patches, my cat.

Did you know you have two brains?

Back in the caveman days, we had to fight for survival. We had to work hard for food and shelter. Nothing came easy, not much about life at that time was about routine or patterns. We spent a lot of our time in a ready-set position, ready to fight and defend ourselves, ready to hunt so that we had food to eat.

Fast forward to our current times and food isn't as scarce. We can go to the grocery store any time we want and grab nutritious food off the shelf. We have appliances to cook and store our food so that it doesn't go bad and in some cases (think twinkies), packaging and preservatives that provide an almost unlimited shelf life. Shelter is not as scarce either, most of us have a dependable roof over our head with little thought of our safe place being invaded or having harm come our way. Life is, in some ways, simpler when it comes to basic survival.

As time has evolved and the basic life necessities have become more readily available, our brain has not evolved, it has stayed the exact same. Our brain back in the caveman days is the same as our brain in this modern day.

The brains job is to make our life easy and create patterns and short-cuts to preserve energy. The problem is, sometimes short-cuts and patterns don't serve us well. Now that we aren't fighing for survival like we had to do all those years ago, our current times have shifted and we don't always need those short-cuts and patterns. We don't need our brain to be on auto-pilot. And so we have to stop and pause, learn to question our brain. We have to learn and begin to question what our brain is telling us because sometimes it doesn't know what it's talking about.

We have two brains, our lower/reptilian brain and our pre-frontal cortex.

The lower/reptilian brain is industrial -think of the I Love Lucy episode clip where Lucy and Laverne are working on a conveyer belt (all while sneaking chocolates). The lower brain works great on repeat where there are no decisions to be made, no processing, no evaluating. It's job is to preserve energy (so that you can hunt, seek good shelter, etc.).

Then you have the prefrontal cortex, the higher brain. The higher brain helps us differentiate the past and present. This brain is meant to evaluate and process and this brain is what differentiates us from all other animals. This is the brain we have to learn to tap into more. Now that we aren't fighting for our literal survival, we have the time and leisure to begin questioning our higher brain. Maybe there is a certain pattern of behavior your lower brain is going to tell you is essential, while your higher brain, the executive function brain, is going to tell you to break the pattern. Learning how to question your lower brain is a skill that takes time to develop.

Let's take alcohol for example. You're lower brain is going to tell you it feels good and you get a dopamine release when you have a drink or two. Your higher brain, when you question the reality and necessity of a few drinks will tell you that you don't need alcohol, it's just your body wanting that dopamine hit. You don't need it. But if you don't know you have two brains, it's much easier to give in to the lower brain, where your desire comes from.

It's been said that your brain is like a 2-year old, weilding a knife. Learning how to recognize some of the self-destructive behavior of your lower brain is the challenge. Understanding desire and dopamine helps you differentiate between true need (shelter, inherent safety) and desire.

Learn to question your brain, because it doesn't always tell you the truth. Don't believe everything it tells you, take charge of your brain and be the boss.