Ashok Gupta explains chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, and IBS as neuroimmune conditioned syndromes, where the brain's survival responses keep the sympathetic and immune systems stuck in overdrive. Understanding this model supports committing to retraining through meditation and gradual practice.
Hello, and welcome to today's session. I'm delighted that you can be with me here today for what will be an illuminating session on the explanation of your condition.
So how are you getting on with your meditations? I hope you're able to commit to them, as it's an important practice to incorporate into your recovery program. Now, obviously, if you're finding the meditation is a bit hard or they're increasing any anxiety or symptoms, then you can just focus on the main retraining that's coming up over the next few sessions, and then you can come back to the meditations a bit later. I want to make this as smooth as I can for you. You are unique, so you can tailor the program and the tools to what works for you.
You join me on top of the largest glacier in the Swiss Alps, the Aletsch Glacier, with this beautiful, white, pristine snow and ice. And that snow and ice will go down the valley, eventually, mixed with dirt and rubble, go through into a river. But eventually it will evaporate and come back in the cycle of life to become this white snow again. And in the same way we're like that white snow. Our bodies know how to be healthy and happy. And going through this cycle, we will return to full health. In today's session, we'll go through an explanation of of the condition. And many people find that they feel that sense of relief just by hearing it. You know, finally someone understands how I feel. You feel empowered. People breathe a sigh of relief because this explanation feels right to them. Now, why is this session so important right now? Because when we start the retraining, I want you to be able to commit 100% to it. And I know what it's like when you've got the condition, how important it is to understand what's actually caused it, so you feel comfortable with it. We'll address the underlying causes of the symptoms. Our minds can worry about so many things. We worry that perhaps it won't work. But when we hear the explanation and intuitively feel that it applies to us, it's easier to be fully involved in your recovery and stay committed to this retraining program.
What also helps is being part of our positive, Uplifting forum. If you've bought the program, you would have already received the details. As we go through today's session, feel free to pause the video to reflect or take a break every 20 minutes or so. You can breathe, refocus, and stretch to refresh yourself, or you may choose to do half a session at a time, depending on your levels of concentration.
Let's start with the biggest question of all. Why are we here? Now, I don't mean it from a philosophical perspective, but from a scientific perspective. We're here because over millions of years of evolution, Our bodies have evolved so we can survive in our environment. Our body's number one priority is survival, and there are threats that we face that can compromise our survival, and these can be of many different types.
If we face biological threats like bacteria and viruses, Then our immune system responds. That's when we feel that flu like feeling. We might have a high temperature or a headache, etc. If we have respiratory threats like toxins, smoke, then we can have an allergic response involving the respiratory system and activation of the immune system. If we have physical dangers, for instance a wild tiger running towards us, then that will trigger our fight or flight response. This is when we feel stressed, fearful, afraid, Our heart rate increases, our muscles tense up because of the stress hormones, and then we're ready to fight or flee, to run away.
In biology, it's called the sympathetic nervous system response. Now, that's not a great description. Is it a sympathetic response to describe a stress response? Well, that's just the way it is. And the opposite of the stress system. So the opposite of the sympathetic is called the parasympathetic nervous system. This is when the body calms down, heals, rests, and repairs itself. In the modern world, most of our threats are actually not physical, but more mental and emotional threats. But our bodies keep responding as if they're real physical threats. So as an example, rejection or separation, when we feel those emotions, we feel that stress in the body. And that makes sense from a place of evolution, because if we are separated or rejected by our tribe, this could compromise our survival.
There are other defense responses too, like pain responses. Where the brain focuses our attention on the source of that pain, Then it magnifies those pain signals and triggers aspects of the immune system. So our bodies create a unique pattern of defense response depending on the need of the situation. And it's all so that we can survive.
The reason why traditional medicine finds it hard to treat these conditions Is because traditional medicine separates these two branches of medicine. So we have a separate immunology department, a separate neurology department, and in fact, a separate psychology department. But the brain makes no difference between all of these different aspects of the body. The brain simply says, what do I have to do to survive? And then the body triggers a unique pattern of defense responses to ensure survival.
For instance, when we have flu, our immune system is triggered, but that also has an effect on our emotions and how we feel. We just feel like we want to take a rest. And biologically this is to ensure that healing occurs so that we survive.
So what does all of this have to do with me? Chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, chemical sensitivities, IBS and all the other related conditions that we're treating. Well, I believe that all of these conditions are caused by an overstimulation of of these survival responses, these defense responses. Just like that army which is traumatized and over defending the castle, the immune system, the sympathetic nervous system, is overstimulated and it all results in too much inflammation in the body. I call this large group of conditions neuroimmune conditioned syndromes or nics. Neuro because they involve the nervous system and the brain. Immune because we've got an over triggering of the immune system. Conditioned because the brain learns to overreact in this way. And syndrome because the resulting effect is a collection of symptoms that's unique to each person.
These defense responses are all over the body, but I believe that they start off in the brain. These conditions are real physical illnesses in the body and they're caused by the effects of a traumatic event on the brain. This causes the brain to to go into an extreme survival mode. The brain becomes hypersensitive and hyper reactive.
It's the brain which is over triggering the sympathetic nervous system and the immune system. And this is due to something called conditioning.
Now what is conditioning?
It's when our brains learn to do something new again and again.
In the brain. The conditioning may specifically occur in a part of the brain called the insula and the amygdala.
