In this video, David Brimacombe draws on his personal experience of seven concussions over twenty years to explain how the way you identify yourself can dramatically influence the course of post‑concussion syndrome (PCS) recovery. He introduces the concept of self‑verification – the brain’s tendency to seek evidence that confirms the identity you repeatedly tell yourself – and links it to the reticular activating system (RAS), the brain’s filter that highlights information matching your focus. Brimacombe argues that constantly labeling oneself as “someone with PCS” primes the RAS to notice setbacks, fatigue, and symptoms, reinforcing a negative recovery trajectory. He proposes a deliberate shift in narrative: redefining the self from a symptom‑focused identity to a growth‑oriented one (e.g., “I’m working through brain fog” or “I’m making small steps”). Using analogies like a camera viewfinder, he offers practical mindset‑reframing tools, including three repeatable positive statements, a two‑step thought‑replacement process (acknowledge the negative thought, then consciously insert a constructive one), and the habit of focusing on gratitude and small wins. Brimacombe emphasizes that while symptoms may persist, changing the internal story can alter perception, reduce the impact of setbacks, and enable functional living despite lingering issues. The video ends with an encouraging reminder to consistently affirm recovery.
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One of the most powerful psychological forces is self-verification. See, your brain is constantly seeking to affirm the identity that you continue to tell yourself. Now, why is this important in your PCS recovery journey? Because if you are looking for setbacks, you will find them. If you are looking for signs of healing, you can find those as well. Hi and welcome to the PCS Resilience Collective. My name is David Brimacombe, and after seven concussions over twenty years, I learned a lot about how the identity I form about myself helps determine my recovery trajectory. Let's begin. Now you might be asking, what does identity have to do with how I'm healing? Healing seems to be something that either is either going to happen. Or not. But understand this, your brain has a powerful filtering system called the reticular activating system. The reticular activating system has a job of filtering in what you want to see. Okay? So if I am constantly thinking of points of gratitude, if I'm constantly thinking of how I'm going to improve and how I'm better today than I was last week, it's going to see the small improvements, the resilience, the benefits of what I'm doing in my protocol. On the other side, if my brain is constantly scanning the environment for— as someone who is struggling with PCS, who at the moment's notice is going to be symptomatic and feel tired and fatigued, I will find that too. Okay? Your perception is your reality, and your perception can be changed if you change your mindset. Now the important part. What can I do about this? Now, you might already know, am I someone who looks and strives for the good in my recovery? I'm going to see this, the minor wins, or I'm going to see how I progress from week to week. Or am I someone who's always going to dwell on the negatives? Now, we all have a natural inclination, okay? We're going to be more pessimistic or optimistic. Now, that is something that can be changed. It's a skill like anything else, but we all have that natural Inclination. So understanding is the first part. Understanding how you view yourself is an important first step in our recovery journey. Now, if you are constantly referring to yourself as someone who has PCS, if someone asks, you know, some important details about you, one of the first things you say is, I have post-concussion syndrome. That might be true, but if you're constantly telling yourself that, that is something that is on top of mind. Your RAS is always going to be scanning the environment. Okay, it's going to be scanning your internal system to see what are some symptoms, what are some, some setbacks that I'm feeling, to reaffirm that identity. Because that identity, you hold true to yourself. It's how you view yourself in the world. You view yourself as someone who is struggling with post-concussion syndrome, which could be true, but you don't have to necessarily make that part of your identity. Now, for the longest time, I would always tell myself Yes, I was someone with PCS. It was an easy way to fall back and say, you know what, I don't feel like doing this. I don't feel like doing my routines today, doing my breathwork, going to therapy, whatever it was. I, I had an easy fallback option. So I would say, you know what, I have PCS, I'm tired and fatigued, I need a break, I need to rest. Okay, and this is not to say that rest sometimes isn't good, isn't beneficial, but If that is your standard get-out-of-jail card, do you think you're going to heal? Now, again, it's a hard conversation to have with yourself, but sometimes in order to improve, you have to show yourself a new identity. Tell yourself that this is possible. Tell yourself that I can be a better version of myself. So instead of telling people I have PCS, It could be something like, I'm currently struggling with anxiety. I'm currently struggling with some light and sound sensitivity. I'm now disassociating myself from the syndrome, from the symptoms. It is now only a small portion of me. It is now no longer a large majority of who I am and how I behave. You see, this is something that will take time to alter your beliefs and your actions, but over time If you continue to change the narrative, change how you view yourself, you are no longer someone who is stuck in recovery. You are someone who is on an upward trajectory, even though you might have setbacks. But those setbacks aren't going to define you because you're not looking at them. You're looking the other direction. Okay, you see on this side the setbacks, the signs, all the negativity. Over here you see all the progress. You're putting blinders on this left side. You're not even looking over here. You are looking at all the benefits. I'm looking into the future, where I've— how far I've come, where I'm going. That perspective is going to alter how you see your recovery, how you see the world. Okay? So again, we talked about that reticular activating system. That is a filter you can change. You can consciously input different ideas and concepts. I always think of the viewfinder. This is kind of dating myself, but ever remember the viewfinder? You put those circular discs in. And you could flip it and you'd have a different vision to look through. Okay? So instead of putting the viewfinder in of, you know, your anxiety, your brain fog, your cognitive delay, you're gonna put in the positive viewfinder. Okay? You're gonna talk about the gratitude, being able to walk in nature, hang out with your friends, go to work on a limited basis, whatever it is. You're changing that viewfinder. Therefore, you're changing your trajectory of your recovery. You're walking down a different path. This path is no longer walking to where the storm is, it's walking to where the sunshine is. Okay, it takes time, but it's definitely possible. Now, if you've been thinking this way for a while, it's going to be hard to switch, change that narrative in your mind. But there are ways to do this. I would think of 3 sayings that you're going to repeat multiple times during the day. Whenever you have one of those negative thoughts enter your mind, just Acknowledge that it's there. You don't have to try to block it. You can always change that second thought. That first thought, okay, we always can't stop it. It's just going to come in. But you can always alter and change that second thought or add that second thought in that you are consciously aware of. So comes in, ah, it's PCS again. I can't do this. The brain fog. I feel tired. I feel fatigued. Okay, you're switching it. I'm someone who is working through brain fog. I'm someone who is taking small steps in my recovery. You're just altering the language. You're altering the narrative in your story. And when you alter the narrative in your story, the character, in this case you, the main character, starts to see the world around it differently. It starts to feel like things are working in their favor. You'll start to see positive signs of luck and of transformation, of good fortune Because that's what you're looking for. You might ignore the signs and the symptoms, but that's okay because again, I've mentioned this before on this channel, that is not a sign that your brain is broken or that your body's in shambles. Okay, you can live with those. You get to a great point in your recovery when you can live with the symptoms and still function. Okay, still function. So you're changing the narrative. You're changing your identity, and therefore you're changing how your body views your recovery. Thank you very much for watching to the end. I hope you have yourself a great day. Don't forget to remind yourself that you are recovering.
