Honoring Your Gut's Intelligence
As you know, your gastrointestinal tract (we will call it “gut” for short) is a long tube that runs from your mouth to your anus. However, did you know that your gut's unique nervous system, called the the Enteric Nervous System, is known as "the second brain”? This is because the Enteric Nervous System has neural circuits that enable it to function locally and independently as well as communicate with your central nervous system, the autonomic nervous system, and more.
Your enteric nervous system is quite talented. It constantly monitors and gathers information on the the condition of your gut. In coordination with your endocrine and immune systems, it regulates gut movement, fluid exchange and local blood flow. It also controls digestion.
In addition, since your Enteric Nervous System connects with the limbic part of your central nervous system (your emotional brain), your gut is particularly susceptible to emotional and physical stressors and trauma. Your gut responds to how you "take in" what is going on in your outer world. For example, do you feel safe or stressed or threatened; do you feel loved and cared for; do you feel tension or calm; do you approach or withdraw? Through its nervous system, the tissues of your gut can store experiences and your perceptions of such events (old or current, acute or long term) as tension in the memory of its cells. Over time, this tension can build up and lead to restrictions within and between your gut's tissue layers and can disrupt physiological processes like slowing local defender cell response to bacteria and viruses, which might otherwise be fast and fierce. Eventually, these strain patterns may evolve into larger systemic problems and can stimulate dysfunction, such as the familiar irritable bowel syndrome.
Thus, your gut and its nervous system are very special and wise and worthy of your loving attention and care. Advanced CranioSacral Therapy can support your gut’s health by facilitating release of tissue strain, encouraging more space, fluid flow, and ease of function, inviting your deeper self awareness, and supporting you in acknowledging and processing unexpressed emotions long held deep within its layers.*
If you want to fly, you have to give up the things that weigh you down.
~Toni Morrison
*The tissue based therapeutic process of SomatoEmotional Release is not psychotherapy or psychiatry. It is, however, a wonderful complement and support for your process and progress through such other therapies.
