Listen to Your Gut
there’s five minutes left in your exam
and you have to go back to those
questions you were debating if the
answer is
a or b it is one of those moments when
you’re taking an exam
and you’re trying to pitch what your
notes are saying and your gut is telling
you something differently
like most people i usually go against my
gut and later learn i got the answer
wrong
have you ever wondered why we get gut
feelings is there even a purpose to them
there is actually a science behind this
the human body speaks to us every day we
know when we are hungry
when we are tired when we are excited
and when we are scared
one method our body uses to communicate
to us is through our gut
otherwise known as our second brain sup
one of the three branches of our nervous
system called the enteric
nervous system recent studies in the
journal nature
support the evidence of the relationship
between higher cognitive functions and
gut brain crosstalk
these higher cognitive functions include
our intuitive decision making
known as gut feelings now i am
not alluding that when you were a baby
you had gut feelings about the people
you were around
google gaga is not short for hey mom i
do not like your friend
but our gut brain crosstalk began with a
very necessary task
of eating ghrelin is a hormone that
composes one of our signaling systems
between our brain and our gut
it is the responsible for the basic
emotion of hunger
next time you’re really craving that
cheeseburger just know that means your
body is releasing ghrelin
garlic contributes to the dopamine based
reward system in our bodies by
stimulating central dopamine
which is associated with the feeling of
happiness
this phenomenon is our first initial
gut-based response to stimuli
that stimuli being hunger which may also
form the foundation
for brain-based memories of basic
emotional states
these basic emotional states go on to
influence our gut feelings when it comes
to predicting the future
and our intuitive decision-making skills
data has also
suggested that predictions and
prediction errors are strongly
associated
with the part of our brain called the
amygdala which is responsible for
experiencing emotions
patients who have lesions in this brain
region have an impaired ability to make
adaptive decisions for the future
now why does this matter neurons are a
specialized cell in the brain that are
responsible for communicating to other
cells in our body
when you touch a hot stove sensory
neurons communicate to the rest of our
body creating that oh my gosh this is
how hot reaction
which causes you to immediately remove
your hand off the stove
evidence suggests that there’s a
specialized group of neurons located in
our gut
and that communicates with our brain
this evidence can go on to support how
basic emotional responses are influenced
by our gut
our brain and our gut are more highly
connected than we think
now what does this mean for you we have
all been in a situation where someone
has told us to make decisions that are
best for ourselves
which for some reason is not all that
simple
this is where people usually start to
overthink learning how to better
understand your own body’s intuitive
communication system will be a skill to
help
make decisions not only easier but also
better and healthier for you
how can this be achieved read your body
as a whole
do you feel spacious or compressed the
difference between spacious and
compressed is that spacious feels
powerful it feels exciting
think of that feeling after you get a
really good workout or when you can’t
wait to do something you love
even if these feelings are accompanied
with fear you’re ready to take on your
day and accomplish your task
all that good energy is reading in you
and out of you
compressed feelings are heavy they’re
tight you feel that flood of anxiety and
tightness in your chest
your jaw’s feeling clenched and your
body is hunched you just feel all around
uncomfortable when i was in college i
was one of those students who was
involved in everything
or at least i wanted to be i worked
part-time in a lab
volunteered while being a full-time stem
student
on top of that i was full-time
20-something-year-old
experiencing the greatness of this age
group or some may argue
it is not that great i was learning
about relationships
family struggles and life as an adult in
general
with that being said i was flooded with
many decisions that needed to be made
constantly learning how to listen to my
gut helped me make decisions that were
best for myself so i can
always put myself in situations that
made me feel spacious
i also learned the hard way when i
ignore my gut
especially when i came to exams i would
often get the answer wrong
this is where my relationship with
learning how to listen to my body
started
next time when you’re in a situation and
you have to make a decision
and you’re not too sure take a moment
and pause
listen to your gut more than likely you
will choose the right answer
thank you for listening