Nervous System Mastery: remember we literally sense pressure
I often write about the senses in some shape of form. We have trillions of electrochemical interactions, working non stop, with many other complex components and networks to produce our own individualised reality, enabling us to navigate the natural and manufactured world around us. Knowing this really helps me try to manage and support my own mental, emotional and physical wellness. It particularly helps me try to be more forgiving and kinder to myself.
Pressure from the outside world (news, social media, war, genocide, apartide, injustice, greed, consumption). Pressure from the internal world ( internal narrative, anxiety, depression, worthlessness). Pressure from the senses (too much /too little). Pressure from past. Pressure in the present. Pressure about the future. The biological and psychological systems that in effect make us who we are, are overloaded with pressure, anxiety. As a result rather than writing 301 million people globally have an anxiety disorder, lets rewrite 301 million individual and collective nervous systems are effectively communicating a really powerful message about the world we have created.
But lets take a closer look at pressure from a different angle with biology and a splash of physics in mind.
As mentioned previously we have many different kinds of senses ( such as exteroception, interoception and proprioception) classic examples are taste and smell. They were trailblazers. For example taste allowed ocean-loving bacteria to detect nutrients swimming toward them a couple of billion years ago. Taste and smell In effect sense ‘chemicals’. But humans and our predecessors have the ability to also sense ‘physics’ -i.e. pressure.
Imagine the bladder is full or our stomachs are full- how does this force get communicated? Well, Prof Patapoutian and his team at the Scripps Research Institute unravelled the mystery. After painstaking exploration they found a tiny molecule embedded in the cells membrane that triggers an electrical current, that ranges in significance depending upon the force being ‘felt’. The molecule was aptly named Piezo (Greek for pressure). It turns out that we have hundreds of thousands of Piezo molecules throughout our bodies, including our skin, interacting with many systems ranging from breathing, blood pressure through to our ability to touch.
Our nervous systems are sensing and interpreting all kinds of signals chemicals, pressure, light, even threat (from the past and present). The information has to be interpreted utilising our different memory components and the brains ability to predict often out of conscious awareness. Human complexity becomes even more mind boggling when we consider the variation in responses across our lifetime. For example during a very emotional distressing period the nervous system can ignore, in the moment, the signals from the Piezo molecules. Binge eating for example the stomach is too full but yet food continues to be consumed in a harmful way. Then in a different emotional situation the nervous system cannot ignore the message and stops in a timely and gentle manner.
Our sense of self is comprised of many, many parts. Atoms, molecules, cells, sensing, feeling, memories and so much more, create our own unique nervous system that relies on the synchronicity with other nervous systems. Celebrate YOUR ONE and try to treat it like a best friend!