How do you feel?

An individual has feelings when an emotion cause affected their thinking processes.  It is all cause and effect.  Yes, we are emotional creatures that have to deal with our thoughts about those emotions. That is when feelings come into our reality.  Can we understand and control our feelings is the question that faces all of humankind.  We have not learned enough about ourselves and the way our minds work to understand these complex emotions. So let us ask ourselves the question, what is a feeling and how do feelings affect human behavior?

The definition of feeling is as follows:

“Feeling is the nominalization of the verb to feel. The word was first used in the English language to describe the physical sensation of touch through either experience or perception. The word is also used to describe experiences, other than the physical sensation of touch, such as "a feeling of warmth". [1] In psychology, the word is usually reserved for the conscious subjective experience of emotion. [2] Phenomenology and heterophenomenology are philosophical approaches that provide some basis for knowledge of feelings. Many schools of psychotherapy depend on the therapist achieving some kind of understanding of the client's feelings, for which methodologies exist. Some theories of interpersonal relationships also have a role for shared feelings or understanding of another person's feelings.

Perception of the physical world does not necessarily result in a universal reaction among receivers, but varies depending on one's tendency to handle the situation, how the situation relates to the receiver's past experiences, and any number of other factors. Feelings are also known as a state of consciousness, such as that resulting from emotions, sentiments or desires.”

This is the definition of feeling. However, it does not encompass the full and complete reason why we feel. We feel because of the emotions that we have. Emotions stem from our mind and they have learned behavior in some respects. The hypothalamus is a part of the brain in which emotions are formed. This is one of the first portions of the brain to have been developed in the early years of human beings. It is the foundation on which thought tends to arise. To further explain how these emotions came into being I will discuss further the many different aspects of the human brain and its functions.

For instance, the immune system, the body's front line of defense against disease; the cardiovascular system; the brain and nervous system—all have been explored independently. In recent years, however, neuroscientists working with psychologists and immunologists have forged a new scientific discipline with the tongue-twisting name of psychoneuroimmunology, or PNI, a field that explores the body's most subtle interconnections.

Much PNI research centers on a group of hormonal messengers called neuropeptides, which are secreted by the brain, by the immune system, and by the nerve cells and various other organs. What scientists have found is that the areas of the brain that control emotion are particularly rich in receptors for these chemicals. At the same time, the brain also has receptors sites for molecules produced by the immune system alone—the lymphokines and interleukins. What we see, then, is a rich and intricate to way communication system linking the mind, the immune system, and potentially all other systems, a pathway through which our emotions--our hopes and fears—can affect the body's ability to defend itself.

In the 1940s, Swiss psychologists and Nobel laureate Walter Hess experimented on the brain and discovered that he could produce two diametrically opposed energy states simply by stimulating different areas of the animal’s hypothalamus. One state was a kind of “passing gear" for heightened activity; the other was a state of very low energy expenditure characterized by deep rest and relaxation--the bodily equivalent of” neutral."

More recently, Dr. R Keith Wallace documented a similar state of profound rest in humans who practiced transcendental meditation.  Subsequent studies proved that this state could be elicited through any form of mental concentration that distracted the individual from the usual cares and concerns of the mind.  He termed this innate, hypothalamic mechanism the relaxation response.

When the relaxation response is called on, heart rate and blood pressure drop. Breathing rate and oxygen consumption declined because of the profound decrease in the need for energy. Brain waves shift from any alert beta rhythm to a relaxed alpha rhythm.  Blood flow to the muscle decreases, and instead, blood is sent to the brain and skin, producing a feeling of warmth and rested mental alertness.  It was by learning to induce the relaxation response that I began to reverse symptoms that were severe enough to send me to the emergency room.

How it was that stress was able to bring on these symptoms in the first place?  Scientists know that the relaxation response evolved as a means of protecting the organism from burnout.  Nature also provided the “passing gear" we called the fight-or-flight response.  I'm sure you felt it many times when you were suddenly afraid, when you were sure someone was breaking into the house, or when the plane you were on suddenly dropped as it hit a pocket of air.  Before you know it, you were breathing fast and shallow, your palms were sweaty, and your mouth was dry.  The fight-or-flight response means your heart is pounding, your blood pressure is up, your muscles are tense, your pupils are dilated, and your skin is covered with goosebumps.

This integrated response evolved millions of years ago because it ensured that the whole organism would be ready for action at the slightest hint of danger.  The response is still with us today, hardwired into the human body's communication system, and even though in our infinitely more complex world, danger can take the form of unpaid bills or boredom in a marriage or some unspoken dread produced entirely by the imagination.  Fighting and fleeing are not very useful options against such dangers. Nevertheless, through the fight-or-flight response, anxiety still has access to the pathway that elevates blood pressure and stress still activates pathways that lead to muscle tension and thereby to numerous aches, pains, and bodily disorders.

Anxiety has still other ways of making us more prone to illness.  In laboratory experiments, we've learned that stress, whether acute or chronic, releases a whole array of hormones that provide quick energy.  Two of these hormones--adrenaline and cortisol—are also potent inhibitors of the immune system.

Why should stress sometimes decrease immunity?  Some scientists find an explanation by once again looking back in evolutionary history to the most stressful event in an animal's life—the danger of a bloody attack by a predator.  The reason that damaged tissue from a man or woman could be mistaken by the immune system as foreign cells, resulting in an immunology: catastrophe--an immune reaction launched against the self.  In anticipation of trauma, then, the stressed immune system takes a temporary dip.

A fascinating psychological twist to this phenomenon came to light in a study of dental students at Myrin.  Dr. John Jemmott, Dr. David McClelland, Dr. Herbert Benson and others discovered that the stress of examination periods reduces the level of a particular antibody in saliva, and anti-body that is part of the first line of defense against colds.  Exam time is typically when students are most likely to catch colds, but the more important finding for their work was that the students who in psychological testing showed the greatest need for power were the ones with the greatest drop in antibodies!  The exams were much more a threat to them than to students with a more easy-going approach to life.

Other studies at Ohio State medical school done by Dr. Janice Kibcolt-Glaser and her husband, Dr. Ronald Glaser showed that exam stress decreased the function of an important type of lymphocyte called the natural killer cell.  These cells are responsible for patrolling the body and destroying virus-infected cells as well as cancer cells.  Exam stress also caused a precipitous decline in the production of interferon, a molecule that boost the function of natural killer cells and other types of immune cells.

Disease, however, is rarely a simple matter of isolated cause and effect.  While stress and helplessness can depress immune function, clearly we don't get sick each time we are stressed. It's far more reasonable to consider stress as one of the many factors that may tip the balance towards illness.

Each of the mechanisms discussed the hormonal messengers linking the brain and the immune system, the fight-or-flight response, immunosuppression, and the relaxation response—function in bodies subject to three other important determinants of well-being: heredity, environment, and behavior.

Some people are continuously lucky; their genes are programmed for health and longevity. Others, less fortunate, are genetically predisposed to high blood pressure, diabetes, or multiple sclerosis.  Even so, many people with the possible genetically linked disease stay well.

The one factor that has links to every determinant of health, other than hard-wired genetic constitution, is, of course, behaviors. We decide about our health habits—whether we exercise, what we eat, whether we smoke or drink. Just as important, our minds have the ability to spend our endless imaginings that are quite real to the body, imaginings that unleashed the hormones and neuropeptides that tell the body what to do.  Most of us are unable to control even those negative mental fantasies of which we are conscious.  Worse still, we're often unaware of what is going through our minds.  In the essays that will follow, you will learn how the mind works and how to control it in a way that maximizes your health.

Every time you miss your exit on the highway because you are daydreaming, then" wake up" to discover yourself miles farther down the road, you are demonstrating the power of the unconscious mind.  Once something is learned, we don't have to think about it consciously. The task simply repeats itself as soon as we initiate the program—in this case, by putting the keys in the ignition.  The rest of driving is second nature because our nervous system has been conditioned--or imprinted—with the driving pattern.

The same thing occurs in the subconscious mind with regards to prior learned and programmed feelings to situations that you may have encountered as a child or while growing up or simply in your past at some point. The subconscious mind is pre-programed from past learned responses that you have learned from your parents, teachers, social media, friends, family, and many other influential individuals that you encountered and held in high esteem at the time. The responses that you have learned are then programmed into your subconscious mind to be accessed when you need them. This is why you react to things that happen to you without thinking at times.

The conscious mind has been found not to exist in the human brain, but are just different areas of the human brain communicating with each other to form what we think of as our conscious mind.  The human brain gets certain information from the subconscious mind to react to every thought that you have, Cause and effect are key elements in the way in which the mind reacts to the world around it.  Example: (If you say or do something to me, I will respond with the information that I have stored in my subconscious memory tapes.) The neuroscience of how the human brain functions is undisputed and growing every day. We continue to discover how we think and feel the way we do and why. The “Theories of Human Development,” I believe will continue to enlighten us in the future.

So you can see that understanding feelings, emotions, changing attitudes; and the ways we live and interact with each other is a demanding process, and while the techniques are simple, the issues are subtle and complex.