With primitive brain function, pain and pleasure can be burned into pathways that are easily accessed again and again. For example, if seeing fire is associated with painful heat, the animal will induce an immediate response to smoke or fire by turning on the fight or flight reaction and avoid the encounter. The more the association with pain, the more nerve paths/brain maps are created to elicit faster/powerful reaction. When the stimulus of fire is not experienced for a while, the learned paths are not erased.....they are just over taken by day-to-day experiences/paths. In 10-20 years, if the painful experience comes up again, out of the depths of the brain, the path/brain map is called on again to elicit the same learned reaction in efforts to keep the animal alive. Sports medicine docs/trainers refer to this as "engrams" that an athlete learns during practice to reproduce during competition. Mind body medicine docs like Richie Davidson out of University of Wisconsin/Madison refer to developing brain paths as "neuroplasticity". Dr Davidson has studied people like the Dali Lama and gone on to state the brain will actually make neurons/brain cells if a new activity is practiced/brain path is created.
The current argument is with contemplative science, if compassion/meditation is practiced daily for years, can the brain make nerves/paths/maps that can be re-accessed in a fraction of a second to elicit an animal response just as powerful as fight or flight. YES! His work as documented with multimillion dollar biomedical machines the same postulates that Herb Benson assumed in the 70's about relaxation bringing on some healthy response in the body. All this controversy and high-end research is being documented just to say to doctors and patients: "relaxation and meditative practice on a daily basis is associated with healthier lives and less need for pharmaceutical treatment". Duuhhhaa! It is a shame we have to prove this with expensive testing/randomized controlled trials but when a pharmaceutical company comes up with 100 pages of documentation by "their scientists" that this drug will help control symptoms of your disease, an equal and opposite force must be utilized to show doctors and patients on the fence that spending 10-30 minutes once to twice a day in mindfulness will extend your life and reverse symptoms of disease.
http://www.slideshare.net/DrSaguil/meditation-for-stress-slide-share
With direct to consumer advertising, a lot of people are placed "on the fence" with deciding what is good for health. The internet is a great vehicle to get information but it is likewise a great vehicle for spreading bad information. I empower my patients to be their own advocates for living long but always discuss the information they learn with a reliable person to sort out what should be applied and what should be avoided. Spending 1000.00$ on a slew of vitamins can be cut down so the extra money can be utilized to spend on massage, healing touch, a great anti-inflammatory meal, a vacation....all that will be just as impacting to health/feeling healthy.
Americans are not taught in school how to get in touch with nature or relax. It is usually assumed that alcohol, tobacco, marijuana or buying a big house/fast car/new purse is relaxing. These things may bring on an immediate sense of happiness but it only lasts until the next day when remorse sets in. As Herb Benson and Richie Davidson both point out, cultivating the relaxation response with regular meditative practice can help "neutralize" all the stress responses we go through in 24 hours.....emotion on the highway, emotion watching the news, emotion paying bills, emotion doing someone elses work, emotion watching Jersey Shore.
