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S3-11 Your TRIUNE Brain (cont) · Mental Health and the Mission of the Church

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: How's everybody doing this morning?
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh looking forward to touching base with you on a subject we started last week.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: In my journey, working with people, my own struggles, my own uh, you know, trying to get healthy and whole, uh trying to experience real freedom and lasting change, like we discussed last week.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um the journey, the where um I've studied lots of different things, but lately, meaning the last, I don't know, five, ten years, I've gotten really excited about studying the brain.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: And some people are a little creeped out by it because it doesn't feel spiritual.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, well, you know, I don't have time to convince you.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing, guys.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: Everything you think, remember our BTFA believe, think, feel, act.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: That determines the result you get.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Believe, think, feel, act.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: Well, guess what, guys?
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: Virtually all of that channels through this thing between your ears called a brain.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: God designed your brain, it is an amazing thing.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um, scientists, the people that research this kind of stuff, they don't understand it to this day, how it does what it does.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: And all I'm saying that for is to say this God, it's one of the greatest gifts, if you will, that God's given us.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: I have found that if you understand certain things about the brain, how it's designed and how it functions, it adds to all the other things, spiritual and otherwise, that we've learned.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: So, we're talking about your plastic brain, the fact that your brain can be changed, and we're talking about the triune brain.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: The it's helpful to think of your brain functionally as having three, I would put it this way, competing control centers.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason I say competing is depending on the situation, the the circumstances of that situation, the the uh the sense of danger, threat, pleasure, whatever, it awakens, triggers, and empowers, if you will, different parts of your brain.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: So, three parts of your brain.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: We're probably gonna take at least this week and next week to talk about what they are, what their jobs are, and why it matters.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: What are the implications of it?
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: Alright?
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: So last week we started a little bit, and the three parts are the reptilian brain, we typically call it the brain stem.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, second would be the emotional brain, and then third would be the rational brain.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: So for now, let's let's just dig into it.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: And here's the thing: in in inside your mother's womb, when you were developing, the first part of the brain that develops is that part they call the reptilian brain or the uh the brain stem.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: The second part of your brain that develops up through about six years old is your emotional brain.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: Now think about that.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Your brain is still developing that middle control center, if you will, the emotional center, uh, up until about six or so.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, your rational brain, this one ought to scare some of you, your rational brain is not fully developed, most researchers would say, until you're 25.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: Now, whatever, don't want to get into political stuff, but the bottom line is when we start talking about allowing three-year-olds, five-year-olds, ten-year-olds to make life-altering decisions, um, I don't know what playbook we're reading out of, but it isn't science.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: We can say we're gonna go with the science, but if we're gonna go with the science, a a child doesn't have the proper faculties online working to make those kinds of decisions early in life.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: And uh whatever, enough said.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: All right, the three parts of your brain and and the jobs that they do.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna hit them quickly for now, but next week we're gonna come back and talk about what are the implications of it.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: Why does this matter?
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll uh I'll interestingly, I just had someone text me, a dear friend of mine, Brandon Lake, if he doesn't mind me saying.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: And uh he and I talked about something having to do with the brain.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, gosh, it's probably been a year or two ago, that was really helpful to him.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: And he uh he wants to do a whatever you call it, some kind of Instagram live or something.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: Because it helped him.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: I believe this will help you if you can just kind of let it let it bounce on you, soak it in a little bit.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: Don't worry about understanding everything about the brain.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: But we'll we'll apply it as we get further.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: All right, so the reptilian brain, the brain stem, back here at the top of your spinal cord, the bottom of your head, top of your neck, um, develops inside your mother's womb.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: And its job is to manage, to monitor and manage what you might call all your life-sustaining functions: breathing, eating, sleeping, your wake and sleep cycles, crying, your your your um urination and you know, excretion, in other words, all your functions that are tied to survival.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: And that's gonna have an interesting twist here in a second.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: It it controls your energy levels, and there's a fancy word people in the science and research area call homeostasis.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: Homeostasis means to maintain a balance within a range that one has become accustomed to.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of like a thermostat.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: A thermostat on the wall.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: So the brainstem is kind of like a thermostat, and it keeps you in the range that feels normal to you.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: Going to be really important later.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: It keeps you in a range that's going to be normal to you.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: Important thought about this part of the brain.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's not in you're not in conscious awareness of it.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: You're not like telling it what to do.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: In a sense, it's telling you what to do.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: Because its programming started inside your mother's womb, and what it thinks is important, what it thinks is pleasurable, what it thinks is a threat, was developed, what we call pre-rational, or before you had words.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, it operates at a very deep instinctual level.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: And that's going to be important later.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: And you'll uh you'll see what I mean.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: When someone experiences trauma early in their life, this is the part of the brain that can be affected and tricky to work with later.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: All right, the second part of the brain is the emotional brain.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: This is where we you probably heard the word the limbic brain, and it's located above the reptilian or the the uh you know the survival center and kind of in the center, and it starts developing at birth, and it develops for about five, six-ish years, and what affects its development?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now think about when it's developing, zero to six.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: It depends on the genetics of the parents, it depends on the experiences the child has during those years, and it depends on the basic personality or temperament wired into that child, obviously, somewhat by genetics.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: So, really important thing to think about.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: So that emotional brain is developing during years that are really, really important.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, intense emotions activate the limbic system, intense emotions, or circumstances that it has experienced prior that triggered intense emotions are are stored, learned, and activated in this part of the brain.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: This is where you hear the word amygdala, fancy word.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: But it's this it's our fear center.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: So our fear center is located here in what we would call the limbic system.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: And when the fear center is triggered, it triggers stress hormones, releases nervous impulses, increases our heart rate, oxygen.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, that's when you start to feel all the things that you would say go along with stress, fight, flight, etc.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: Now, what's important at the moment is this is the emotional center of your brain.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: All right?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's going to become important later.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: They've also found connections to serotonin, and we'll talk more about that as we get into a little bit next week.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and then the third part of your brain is the rational brain, and it's the youngest or latest to develop.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: Human beings are the only ones that have that part of their brain.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's what separates us from pretty much all the other animals.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: And it's it's like an outer casing, you, if you will, on your brain.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and and what is its job?
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: Its job is planning, anticipating, perceiving time and context, inhibiting, inhibiting behavior.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, experience empathy toward other people.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: The the rational part of your brain functions very slowly compared to the other two, and it looks at something to decide is that the right thing to do right now?
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: Is that is that the smartest thing to do in light of what just happened, what I want, where I'm going.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: But remember, it's slow.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: Alright?
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: And it occupies about 30% of your brain.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: Alright?
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: So, what we're gonna do as we go forward is we're gonna talk about why, why do I need to know this stuff, dude?
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I we're Christians and God'll whatever.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: Well, God designed this thing, and He designed it in a way that it is changeable, meaning it can learn.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: But the thing I've learned, excuse me, over 40 years is this it ain't as easy as we preach it.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: Change preaches really good, but it lives harder than it preaches.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: And part of why I do this is I want you to have a lot of grace and a lot of truth in your life.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: What does that mean?
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to realize there's there's lots of reasons you battle with the issues, challenges, behaviors that you do.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: And one of them might be tied up in the construction of your brain and the experiences that have shaped it.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: So let's get into this, man.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Next week we're gonna talk about what why it matters.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: What is why why am I doing all this stuff about the brain?
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I think you're gonna like it.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: All right, later, man.