How many brains do human beings have? What kind of a question is that? All of us are born with one brain unless it is a quirk of nature. Isn’t it?
If you thought that you have only one brain that is encased in your head, you are in for a shock!
If you have only one brain, you would think only through that brain. But, when some of your thoughts emanate from other sources, it should make us think: Do I really have only one brain? If that is so, where is this thought coming from?
Well, we may have only one physical brain but we have at least two more parts in our body which influence our thinking. Those are: the heart and the gut.
Most of our thoughts originate in the brain that is located inside our head. This brain controls almost 90% of our thoughts and our subconscious mind. This brain is associated with logic.
But, in matters of love and hate, it is the heart that dominates our thought process. You may be surprised to know that there are more neural pathways that run from the heart to the brain in our head than from the head brain to the heart! So, that is our brain number two! In other words, your heart is your emotional brain that may even overrule your logical brain lodged in your head.
Then there are times when you disregard logic because you have a gut feeling about something. Scientifically, 90% of the body’s serotonin that is involved in your mood management is produced in the gut or the stomach. Therefore, this is our brain number three! The gut sends signals to the logical brain when one is hungry or thirsty. The gut sends out signals to the logical brain when one is nervous because the stomach starts churning and producing acidic substances which are indicative of stress. So, that is our brain number three. In other words, it is our physical brain.
The heart and the gut have intricate networks of neurons, hormones and neurotransmitters that communicate with our brain and affect our perceptions, mental processes and feelings.
In a nutshell, our head houses our logical brain; our heart houses our emotional brain; and, our stomach houses our physical brain.
The point to note is: though our main brain is physically lodged in our head, it is the stomach which sends out signals of physical comfort and discomfort to our logical brain which is lodged in our head. In that sense, it works as the physical brain in our body.
