How Are The Mind & The Brain Different? A Neuroscientist Explains

mindbodygreen.com ^ | March 8, 2021 | Caroline Leaf, Communication Pathologist and Neuroscientist

[RoosterRedux]

For many people, the mind and brain are interchangeable. They use one word or the other to talk about the same thing: the organ in our skull that we use to think.

However, the mind and brain are actually two very different, but interconnected, entities. As a neuroscientist, this reality is the foundation of my life's research and work: The mind works through the brain but is separate from the brain.

What is the difference between the mind and the brain? So what exactly is the difference between the mind and the brain? Well, the mind is separate, yet inseparable from, the brain.

The mind uses the brain, and the brain responds to the mind. The mind also changes the brain. People choose their actions—their brains do not force them to do anything. Yes, there would be no conscious experience without the brain, but experience cannot be reduced to the brain's actions.

The mind is energy, and it generates energy through thinking, feeling, and choosing. It is our aliveness, without which, the physical brain and body would be useless. That means we are our mind, and mind-in-action is how we generate energy in the brain.

This is a major part of the activity we pick up with brain technology. When we generate this mind energy through thinking, feeling, and choosing, we build thoughts, which are physical structures in our brain made of proteins. This building of thoughts creates structural changes in the brain, called neuroplasticity1.

In my recent clinical trials, we saw how energy in the brain changed as the subject was thinking, stimulating neuroplasticity. The brain was responding to the person's stream-of-consciousness and nonconscious activity.

The mind is a stream of nonconscious and conscious activity when we're awake, and a stream of nonconscious activity when we're asleep. It's characterized by a triad of thinking, feeling, and choosing. When you think, you will feel, and when you think and feel, you will choose. These three aspects always work together.

So, how does this affect us?

The brain is an extremely complex neuroplastic responder. This essentially means, each time it's stimulated by your mind, it responds in various ways—including neurochemical, genetic, and electromagnetic changes. This, in turn, grows and changes structures in the brain, building or wiring new physical thoughts.

The brain is never the same because it changes with every experience you have, every moment of every day. In sum: Your mind is how you, uniquely, experience life. It's responsible for how you think, feel, and choose. And your physical brain merely responds to these unique experiences.

Knowing your mind and brain are separate puts you in the control seat because you can learn to manage your thoughts and actions. Ultimately, it means you can choose what you build into your brain and how you choose to change what's already built in.

When you learn how to manage your mind, you can make feelings of depression, stress, anger, and anxiety work for you instead of against you. You can bring balance back into your brain and life.

[cyberaxe]

there is only one way to develop a positive attitude...and that way is Jesus

…AMEN!!…

[FamiliarFace]

I am frustrated with this person. I think I could help, but the other doesn’t really want it. Always talks about it, but when it comes time for action, always chooses the opposite of the help. So things devolve quickly.

Sometimes I feel like I should stop trying. The other has to want to change. It must be nice enough in the mind hell prison they live in.

[RoosterRedux]

Let me add about the Jesus solution...there are 2 Jesuses.

There's the one you hear about from everyone else (an often kind of cheap, tacky rendition). And then there's the actual person you encounter when you seek him on your own.

The 2 persons are not remotely similar.

[FamiliarFace]

Yes, I know that Jesus. That’s the one I’d like this other person to get to know.

[tired&retired]

I’ve studied with Eric Kandel, a psychiatrist at Columbia University who received a Nobel Prize for his research on the biochemistry of memory storage, and with Joe LeDoux at NYU who wrote several textbooks on memory storage and retrieval.

I asked both of them where memories are stored. Both replied with similar answers, “In the synapses of the brain.”

I didn’t argue with them as I was with them to learn and held my own observations to myself.

When you have seen and heard a soul of a dead person move into and attach to another person, and communicate through their host’s voice, they have total memory recall of their own physical life experiences, but no physical body, you soon realize that memories are NOT STORED IN THE BRAIN. I’ve observed and experienced this many times.

The same is true for ghosts.

[RoosterRedux]

I had an old friend who suffered from depression. Was one of my best friends from high school.

He was an intellectual (and actually a very smart person).

He came to me for help because he knew that I had gone through a period of blinding depression and made it out the other side.

I told him that the real Jesus was nothing like his public image. I told him to ask him (Jesus) to talk to him. Call it prayer or just call it talking to him. But ask Jesus to come to you if he is real.

I explained that his depression was certainly biochemical but it was also a function of a hopeless outlook and there is no way to determine causality re: biochemical "disturbance" and outlook (i.e., which causes which).

I told him that ultimately if he couldn't understand enough about existence to find meaning in it and thereby develop a positive outlook, any solution to depression would merely be a bandaid.

He agreed with everything I said...but he refused to call on Jesus.

Eventually, he ate a bullet.

[cyberaxe]

…I truly understand your frustration…

…I have it with myself as well as with love ones…

…never give up on them or yourself…

…but take solace in knowing that…

…we only interact act with other souls through the hardware and software…

…only God truly knows the operator…

…and God is good🙏🏻…

[RoosterRedux]

It brightens my morning to hear that you know him.:-)

[FamiliarFace]

Sadly, I think this person is trying to kill herself, but very slowly. She just doesn’t care about living, and I can’t change that. She is very stubborn about Jesus.

[FamiliarFace]

Thanks for inspiration!

God is good…all the time!

[tired&retired]

I do a demonstration with groups to show how prayer is a process that raises the frequency of your consciousness above the lower frequencies of fear and worry.

Part of it I have a person pull in the worst traumatic memory they ever experienced in their life. Often they start crying and/or shaking it’s so traumatic.

I then anchor it on their forearm while they are remembering it.

Next I have them say a silent prayer to themselves and I anchor it on the same location on their forearm.

I ask them to count from 5 down to 1 to clear their thoughts.

Next I ask them to recall the traumatic memory.

About 40% cannot even remember what the traumatic memory was. The remaining 60% remember it, but there is no negative emotion attached to it. They say it’s like they are watching it on tv and it happened to someone else.

I explain that they did all the work, not me. All I did was connect their prayerful thought to the trauma memory. They can do what I did with their other hand and they don’t need me.

Prayer is powerful.

This is not temporary. The trauma is healed permanently.

Often, I will actually touch the trauma prior to the prayer and it knocks them over, even though I’m many feet away from them. After the prayer, I touch the same location in their soul and show them it’s no longer there.

The trick to it is that they must tap their forearm until the memory anchor point in their body moves to their forearm, from wherever it was previously attached. This is very true when there were physical injuries associated with the trauma.

I did this demonstration at the Divinity School for a large group to show them how prayer worked, and why it sometimes doesn’t.

One other thing, people on medications like SSRI’s can pray for an hour and they cannot raise the frequency of their consciousness as there is a disconnect created by the drugs. This is why they often have a flat affect when on medications.

Pharma has a non spiritual evil use in that it blocks people from growing closer to God. However, it is sometimes necessary temporarily as it can save lives too.

[RoosterRedux]

One of the things that has worked for some people is to explain to them that "everything works for good in the life of the believer"...even the most painful things (including the very deepest depression) will somehow work for good.

My own personal depression (which was incredibly debilitating for many years) worked for my good. Among other things, it burned away my pettiness and gave me a very big picture view of existence. In fact, I think it is safe to say that without my depression, I wouldn't have the maturity and wisdom that came from it.

I just wanted to toss that out there. It might help for people who are really suffering to see that much good can come from their suffering.

In fact, it seems that all the really good wisdom comes from suffering. But to get that wisdom, you have to let go of the bitterness about the suffering. You have to develop a philosophical attitude about it...and that takes Jesus.

[cuban leaf]

When you have seen and heard a soul of a dead person move into and attach to another person, and communicate through their host’s voice, they have total memory recall of their own physical life experiences, but no physical body, you soon realize that memories are NOT STORED IN THE BRAIN.

---

What? You’ve never heard of BlueTooth?🤣 I’m joking, of course, but you get my drift...

BTW, I see dreams as your body’s memory storage defragging every night. And your mind sort of picks up random memories (and memories of thoughts/ideas) and builds a coherent (or less so) story from it.

[cyberaxe]

…amen, modern day example of Romans 5:3-5…

[RoosterRedux]

That is one of the things that I find so amazing about the Bible. When you put it into practice, it proves its authenticity and its truth by the outcome.

The people who refuse to put the Bible (or Jesus) to the test are like spoiled children. Their answer is "no," whatever the question is.

When you say "yes" to Jesus, you pretty quickly see why he is the only answer and the only path.

[tired&retired]

That’s exactly what dreams are.

Communications from your own higher self.

[FamiliarFace]

Thank you for your input, and yes, this person is on SSRIs, and has been for many, many years. You can always tell when she hasn’t taken them or is changing doses. She might think she’s ok, but everyone else walks around on eggshells. It’s like walking through a minefield. You never know when you make a “misstep” around her, and she suddenly blows up or goes into a depression series.

[FamiliarFace]

*** In fact, it seems that all the really good wisdom comes from suffering. But to get that wisdom, you have to let go of the bitterness about the suffering. You have to develop a philosophical attitude about it...and that takes Jesus. ***

That reminds me of what some saints have said. They have let go of the bitterness.

[Ezekiel]

Thank you very much for the article.

Warning: the following post is from Ezekiel so heads up. That way most can just do the mental eye roll thing and scroll on past already. (You're welcome.)

Knowing your mind and brain are separate puts you in the control seat because you can learn to manage your thoughts and actions. Ultimately, it means you can choose what you build into your brain and how you choose to change what's already built in.

When you learn how to manage your mind, you can make feelings of depression, stress, anger, and anxiety work for you instead of against you. You can bring balance back into your brain and life.

During the high Holy Days (currently) the focus is on repentance. Teshuvah -- rooted in turning and returning:

Commonly translated as "repentance," teshuvah literally means "return." Teshuvah is the soul's capacity to return to its original state, to its pristine core. As we pass through life, we are invariably coarsened and sullied by our errors and misjudgments, or simply by the travails of physical life; but our innermost self, the "veritable part of G-d" that is the essence of our soul -- remains untouched. Teshuvah is the G-d-given ability to access and reconnect to that untouched self, reestablish our lives upon its foundation, and even redefine a negative past in its purifying light.

Teshuvah: The Art of Return

I ran an English-Hebrew Google Translate search for "mind" -- just that lone word, without any context phrasing that would narrow down a sense or part of speech.

Thus the "return" search was filled with many Hebrew words with their definitions and hence connotations. For those familiar even with a few of them (e.g. from Biblical studies/locations of use, Jewish tradition, Kabbalah..), it's immediately apparent that there's an awful lot packed in there.

I observe the world from the outside looking in, to see what there is to see. (There's always something to study, learn and understand.)

Rosh Hashanah is the traditional date for the dove's third mission, the one where she didn't return. This year on that date, Ingenuity only hovered over the surface of Jezero ("lake") crater for Flight 59, yet marked a new altitude record (66 ft.)

"When the dove did not return, Noah knew that the Flood's waters had completely drained from the earth."

Why do we read the Book of Jonah on Yom Kippur?

You are Jonah. The real you, for "Jonah"-- in Kabbalistic parlance -- is another name for the soul. Hence, the story of Jonah is the story of a soul's journey here on earth. Thus, on Yom Kippur, as we examine our lives and consider our purpose in this world, we remember the historical Jonah whose real-life narrative symbolizes our spiritual odyssey.

Your story begins at birth. A soul from on high is plunged into an earthly body...

The Story of Your Life

(At least for me, a message box pops up on Chabad for their "stay connected" email sign-up option. It depicts a dove carrying a letter, an open envelope.)

Now this is where I invariably lose people if I haven't already. It's as if they look at me like I have four heads, but hey that *is* the story of my life, so with this highly coordinated timing, I'll carry on anyway:

The Talmud compares the spirit of God hovering over the waters to a dove that hovers over her young.[12][13][14]

In post-biblical Judaism, souls are envisioned as bird-like (Bahir 119), a concept that may be derived from the Biblical notion that dead spirits "chirp" (Isa. 29:4). The Guf, or Treasury of Souls, is sometimes described as a columbarium, a dove cote. This connects it to a related legend: the "Palace of the Bird's Nest", the dwelling place of the Messiah's soul until his advent (Zohar II: 8a-9a). The Vilna Gaon explicitly declares that a dove is a symbol of the human soul (Commentary to Jonah, 1). The dove is also a symbol of the people Israel (Song of Songs Rabbah 2:14), an image frequently repeated in Midrash.

Doves as symbols

The name Jonah means "dove", the same as "Columbia", the female national personification of America.

Jonah is a small book with 4 chapters -- 688 words (as far as the count goes in the particular program I am using) and 2700 letters. For comparison:

Essay length guidelines
Type of essay Average word count range

High school essay 300-1000 words
College admission essay 200-650 words
Undergraduate college essay 1500-5000 words
Graduate school admission essay 500-1000 words

https://www.scribbr.com/academic-essay/length/

essay: a short piece of writing on a particular subject.

You are Jonah. The real you, for "Jonah"-- in Kabbalistic parlance -- is another name for the soul. Hence, the story of Jonah is the story of a soul's journey here on earth.

Thus the little book of Jonah is -- in the simplest of descriptions -- the "you" essay.

Rashi* compares the spirit of God hovering over the waters to a dove (Gen 1:2)

As I've posted on previous occasions, the sum of 1776 first appears in the Torah on the very first Day. It's doubled and overlapping, following right after the hovering dove in verse 2:

Genesis 1
3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

"And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good " = 1776
"And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness" = 1776

If the Torah were set up like a spreadsheet 1776 columns wide, one letter per cell, the top right corner (the beginning in the beginning) would look like this:

ש	א	ר	ב
ש	ד	ק	י
א	ה	ר	מ
ד	ל	ת	ו

Locations of the text (line beginnings, R to L):

Line 1 (Gen 1:1)
Line 2 (Gen 2:3)
Line 3 (Gen 3:13)

Narrowed down to the square of 9 in red, the letters spell a variety of interesting messages, such as

דבר אמריקה: D'var America
המקרא דיבר: HaMikra diber ("the Bible spoke")

The Mikra is another name for the Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible (which begins where this little letter square begins). The word is based on the root q-r-a (to call out, name), which first appears when the light is named (called) "Day" (Gen 1:5)

"Mikra" is literally that which is read aloud.

"Why do we read the Book of Jonah on Yom Kippur?"

It's the... You Essay! You Essay! You Essay! (repeat for all the souls on their journeys, gathered together in one place. Yom Kippur -- the one day when everyone goes to shul.)

Compare:

1. Dvar Torah (meaning "A Word of Torah" in Hebrew) is an essay based on the weekly portion of the Hebrew Bible.
2. A mikra is also a legend, key (of a map)

The mind uses the brain, and the brain responds to the mind. The mind also changes the brain.

That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.

Teshuvah is the soul's capacity to return to its original state, to its pristine core.

Back to the beginning, making music with my friends:

The tenth song, known as Shir haGeula, the song of the redemption, or Shir haMoshiach, the song of the Messiah, has yet to be sung.

King David rejoices as the Ark is returned to the Temple. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

https://www.israel365news.com/309148/biblical-song-well-sing-messiah-arrives/

YMMV, but an interesting detail regarding the Hebrew acronym/abbreviation for the United States is that the same construction pattern would make the same abbreviation for the Ark of the Covenant. Of course who would do that... because then people would see the acronym for 'Ark of the Covenant' and automatically think it was the United States... stashed 'deep cover' in a US government warehouse.

The name right on the crate.

United States: Artzot HaBrit [ארצות הברית], ארה"ב
Ark of the Covenant: Aron HaBrit [ארון הברית], ארה"ב

If you had not have fallen, I would not have found you..

Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground

Willie singing his "signature song", insisting that the world keep turning our way, and our way, is on the road again:

The Highwaymen - On the Road Again (American Outlaws: Live at Nassau Coliseum, 1990)

When you learn how to manage your mind...

Willie Nelson - Always On My Mind (Official Video)

Willie Nelson? Seriously? Who would pay any serious mind to anything he's had to say.

"Pay heed, and disbelieve":

Willie Nelson - I Never Cared For You (Live)

  *Rashi [רש"י], "Acclaimed for his ability to present the basic meaning of the text in a concise and lucid fashion" ("peshuta shel mikra", sourced from his commentary on Gen 3:8)...

"but I have come only [to teach] the simple meaning of the Scripture and such Aggadah that clarifies **the words of the verses**, each word in its proper way."

" וַאֲנִי לֹא בָאתִי אֶלָּא לִפְשׁוּטוֹ שֶׁל מִקְרָא וּלְאַגָּדָה הַמְיַשֶּׁבֶת **דִּבְרֵי הַמִּקְרָא** דָבָר דָּבוּר עַל אֳפַנָּיו:"

as if there aren't enough word plays in this wheel already, his name-acronym permutes a shir, song (masc.)

The first nine Biblical songs are referred to as shirah, which is the grammatically feminine Hebrew word for song. According to classical Jewish Bible scholars, this is because, just as women give birth to future generations, the first nine Biblical songs were followed by significant events.

The Song of the Messiah, which will be sung after the final salvation, represents the end of every ordeal of Jewish history. Therefore, it is referred to as a shir, which is the grammatically masculine Hebrew word for song.

So, how does this affect US?

I'll take 'simple meanings' for 1000, Alex.
It's the Daily Double! 🙄

[cyberaxe]

…so true…

…sometimes it’s just hard for an old “set in his way” redneck curmudgeon like me…

…to let go, and let Him…

…but there’s always, hope faith, etc…

…(but those bring up dozens more analogies 🤣)…