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Hello everyone,

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Did you know that each of us has two brains?

If you’ve ever puzzled over human behavior (your own or others’), it may be helpful to explain this concept.

There is a part of our brain that is a mystery to us. Most of the time, we go about our daily tasks, blissfully ignorant of its existence. Then suddenly, we become enraged (way too enraged) with the guy who cuts us off in traffic. Or make a dumb mistake that sets us way back in our schedule. Or maybe we blame our husband for misplacing our favorite pan for cooking lunch—when I was the one who put it somewhere different than usual (like I almost did this morning).

As much as we try to keep it under control, there is a deep part of our brain that is more involved with survival and raw emotion than our conscious, thinking and planning brain. (This therapist does a great job of giving a basic explanation of the different parts of our brain.)

Regardless of the exact anatomy of the various parts of the brain, one can simplify by considering the conscious and subconscious parts of the brain. The conscious brain can reason, plan for the future, delay gratification, and make informed decisions. Only human beings have this type of brain. On the other hand, the subconscious parts of the brain are more concerned with survival, biological drives, and belonging to a group. We share these more primal brain structures with reptiles and other mammals.

So, if you’ve ever overreacted while reading a news article or having a disagreement with your spouse, you can be sure that this subconscious side of your brain took over for a moment (at least)—it interpreted the situation as a threat to your survival.

Our subconscious brain can really cause us to feel some painful emotions or perhaps act in socially unacceptable ways. So, most of us are very careful about keeping this side of ourselves under control. We exert this control both consciously and unconsciously.

An example of conscious control is trying to cool off if you’re feeling emotionally stressed or upset (so you don’t take it out on the people around you).

Unconsciously, as it turns out, our brain decides for us to create pain in our bodies, rather than let us feel the emotions. The emotions are interpreted as being dangerous, and your subconscious (for some of us) tries to protect us from them, creating pain or perhaps even other illnesses in our bodies.

This is called psychosomatic illness—and even though it’s not widely recognized as a cause of illness according to today’s medical opinion, we have seen this mechanism at play in our practice.

I will offer the example of the patient who comes to us with a chronic problem that starts to resolve with nutritional therapy…but mysteriously stops responding. Or the person who has one severe symptom improve…only to develop something else! (It turns out there is a subconscious mechanism called the “symptom imperative”—the suppressed emotions must be experienced as pain in the body—they are perceived as being that threatening by the subconscious mind.)

If you’re interested in learning more about psychosomatic illness, we recommend reading The Divided Mind by Dr. John Sarno.

​Here’s a link to a simple exercise based on Dr. Sarno’s books, that just might help you if you’re seeking solutions to pain or other physical disorders.

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Sincerely yours,

Dr. Keith and Laura Sheehan

PS-if you’re wondering if stress between your two brains is causing your symptoms, just ask yourself “is stress either causing or magnifying my symptom?” You answer yes to this, then yes, it is! If that’s the case, just click on the link above to see what you can do about it!

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