Thomas Carlyle said, “He who has health, has hope; and he who has hope has everything.” And Jim Rohn said, “Take care of your body. It’s the only place you have to live.”
Every day, we are faced with the decision of how to take care of ourselves. It can be a difficult choice, but it is important to remember that our body is all we have in this life. Whether you’re trying to get back into shape or maintain healthy habits like eating right and exercising.
My guest today is Dr. Emeran Mayer, one of the distinguished healthcare experts on the gut-brain connection. His 40 years of research provided groundbreaking evidence of the critical connection between the brain and the gut.
In this episode, we discuss what the mind actually is, the effects of religion and finding a higher purpose have on your mind, the biggest breakthroughs during Dr. Mayer’s 40 years of research, why Dr. Mayer wants the world to stop using the word “placebo,” the effects that stress has on your immune system, the key changes to make today to improve your health, and so much more!
Who Is Dr. Emeran Mayer?
Dr. Emeran Mayer is a highly respected neuroscientist and gastroenterologist with decades of experience in the study of neurobiological and clinical aspects of the interaction between the digestive system and the nervous system in disease and health. He has received numerous awards, including the 2017 Distinguished Mentor Award from the American Gastroenterological Association, and the Ismar Boas medal from the German Society for Gastroenterology and Metabolic Disease.
Dr. Mayer is a well-respected research professor in the Department of Medicine and in the Department of Physiology and Psychiatry at the University of California Los Angeles David Geffen School of Medicine. He is also the Executive Director of the G. Oppenheimer Center for Neurobiology of Stress and Resilience, and co-director of CURE: Digestive Diseases Research Center at UCLA.
Dr. Emeran Mayer is one of the top gut-brain-connection experts in the world. His latest research shows the link between changes in our diet, the gut microbiome, gut health, and the increased prevalence of many chronic diseases like diabetes, heart disease, and cancer, and susceptibility to infectious diseases like Covid-19.
As if all that weren’t enough, Dr. Mayer is also an author of the book The Gut-Immune Connection, in which he proposed a more radical paradigm shift about the brain-gut microbiome system, being at the center of the majority of chronic diseases that define our 21st-century public health crisis. It also showed that we can effectively treat these diseases through a gut microbiome-targeted diet.
His other book, The Mind Gut Connection, was a bestseller in Gastroenterology and translated into 14 languages. It offered groundbreaking evidence of the critical role of the microbiome in cognitive and neurological health, proving once and for all the legitimacy and power of the “mind-body connection.”Considering the critical role of our mind, let’s talk about what the mind really is…
What Is the Mind?
The mind is the one thing that holds everything together. It’s not just a physical part of your body. It contains every single memory and feeling you’ve ever experienced. At its core, it is something that connects us with our thoughts and memories. Our minds are what make us human beings, which means they’re an integral part of who we are.
The mind also governs all sorts of autonomic functions in the body like breathing, heart rate, and blood pressure. Keeping it healthy can have some pretty important benefits! Let’s dig deeper into this fascinating topic by asking our special guest for more insights about the mind.
“Every complex system ultimately develops a mind.” – Dr. Emeran Mayer
We should stop looking at our brain as just an electrochemical organ with one hundred billion nerve cells called neurons, and understand it as a “mind-brain,” where the processes of the brain are somehow identical to the processes of the mind. Your brain is a part of you, but it’s also an extension of the world around you. The brain develops the mind. Likewise, the gut and the body develop the mind.
“It’s not all the same, but they have their minds. … There’s a hierarchy of these minds based on the complexity of these systems. … We are connected in some ways; our microbes in the gut connect with the microbes in the soil, microbes in the air and water. … So the universe has aligned to the mind.” – Dr. Emeran Mayer
Our mind connects us with the world around us — with the environment and the universe. It also connects us with a higher being. Our brain can be stimulated neurologically, which in turn connects with a spiritual realm. This connection allows individuals to access different insights and guidance from this “higher being.”
There are individuals who are more spiritually connected than others, and they tend to live longer and happier lives. Does this mean, therefore, that our minds are connected with religion? Let’s find out what Dr. Mayer has to say about this.
