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to, rewiring your brain for healing

0:29

and wellness, with Dr. Joe

0:31

Dispensa. Get access to the

0:33

Resilient Mind Journal by clicking the

0:35

link in the show notes. Enjoy. First

0:37

of all, I never planned on doing any

0:40

of this, to be really straight and

0:42

really honest. I had my own personal

0:44

injury, I don't know if I truck

0:46

and a trathlon broke six vertebra

0:48

in my spine. Typical surgery

0:51

is Harrington Rod surgery. I

0:53

was young, I was in my 20s,

0:55

I was athletic, I had a martial

0:57

arts studio, a yoga studio, I was

0:59

training for, you know, a lot of

1:02

different races, and I went

1:04

from 100 miles an hour to face

1:06

down, and in trouble. And I

1:08

couldn't imagine living my life

1:10

on addictive medications with Harrington rods

1:13

from the base of my neck

1:15

to the base of my spine.

1:17

It was a full, you know,

1:19

six compression fractures, it's a lot.

1:21

So I had bone fragments on the cord

1:24

and I had the neural arch broken, so

1:26

I was in a lot of trouble. So

1:28

I figured my mind is we'll see if

1:30

my mind can influence my body.

1:32

This was at age 20 something? 24, yeah.

1:35

And it worked. It really worked for me.

1:37

And when you go through that kind of

1:39

initiation, you can't go back to business

1:41

as usual. And it was a dark

1:43

night of the soul for me during that

1:46

time, because I couldn't get my mind

1:48

to do what I wanted it to

1:50

do. Because I think when you're faced

1:52

with crisis like that, we always

1:54

focus on what we don't want

1:56

to have happen instead of what

1:59

we do want to have happen.

2:01

So turning that battleship around for

2:03

me. a 24-year-old kid was an

2:05

enormous effort because I couldn't keep

2:07

my mind on the task. So

2:09

when I finally was able to

2:11

get back on my feet and

2:14

return back to my life, I

2:16

decided from that point that it

2:18

would be good to study other

2:20

people that may have had a

2:22

spontaneous remission mission from disease. where

2:24

we're treating conventionally and conventionally, they

2:26

were staying the same and getting

2:28

worse and all of a sudden

2:31

they were getting better. So I

2:33

traveled around the world, I traveled

2:35

to 17 different countries, interviewed a

2:37

lot of people. At age 28

2:39

now? I was probably 20, let's

2:41

see, I was probably 29. Yes,

2:43

so I wanted to see if

2:46

my mind could influence my body

2:48

and I decided two things. I

2:50

thought. God, there's an innate intelligence

2:52

within us that's giving us life.

2:54

It's keeping our heart beating, digesting

2:56

our food, all the way down

2:58

to the cellular level, organizing trillions

3:01

of functions in a cell every

3:03

second, correcting for mutations in the

3:05

DNA. So I had a respect

3:07

for that innate intelligence. And I

3:09

thought, well, it can heal to

3:11

a certain point. And it does.

3:13

And it is healing. But it's

3:16

trying. It's very best. With six

3:18

compression fractures, I thought. This has

3:20

got to be next level now.

3:22

You know this has got to

3:24

be next level. This is this

3:26

so I had to weigh what

3:28

I knew Against what I didn't

3:31

know well and and and so

3:33

For me I thought if I

3:35

could make contact With this intelligence

3:37

and give it a plan give

3:39

it a directive give it some

3:41

orders give it a template and

3:43

if I could do it really

3:46

well once I've had that that

3:48

that vision my in my mind

3:50

super clear I know that I

3:52

can't heal and I'm going to

3:54

surrender that vision to a greater

3:56

mind and see if it could

3:58

begin to work with me. Because

4:01

what I want to do is

4:03

I wanted to... influence it and

4:05

see if I could take it

4:07

to the next level. Because I

4:09

knew that, well, you know, the

4:11

compression fractures could heal, but I

4:13

would lose bone height. I still

4:16

have fragments on my cord. I

4:18

had motor function problems. I had

4:20

sensory function problems. I had an

4:22

enormous amount of pain. So this

4:24

was kind of next level for

4:26

me. And I think any time

4:28

you go against convention. Whether it's

4:31

social convention scientific convention religious convention

4:33

anytime you go against the current

4:35

belief systems You're always considered foolhardy

4:37

or insane, right? I mean you're

4:39

not my the four opinions I

4:41

had from four surgeons They all

4:43

thought I hit my head like

4:46

they were like, what do you

4:48

what do you know? What are

4:50

you thinking here? So but if

4:52

you pull it off in 1986

4:54

you didn't do that like I

4:56

was living in San Diego You

4:58

just didn't do that and and

5:01

and and I just figured God

5:03

if I have the Harrington Rod

5:05

surgery, I'm not going to be

5:07

the same guy. I won't be

5:09

able to do, I won't, I

5:11

won't be able to do anything,

5:13

like I, you know, what I

5:15

was doing. And so I was

5:18

willing to trust in, in, in

5:20

that process. I figured, if it

5:22

didn't work, I'm going to wind

5:24

up with surgery anyway, so I

5:26

might as well roll the dice.

5:28

And so, number one was make

5:30

contact with that intelligence, I'm not

5:33

going to be the same by

5:35

me. So mystical means unknown. That's

5:37

what the word means. So I

5:39

was willing to trust If this

5:41

could work now little background I

5:43

had I had studied hypnosis a

5:45

lot I saw the power the

5:48

subconscious mind. I knew I saw

5:50

you know amazing things and then

5:52

I did have this kind of

5:54

crazy moment where I was leaving

5:56

for graduate school in My best

5:58

friend's father gave me a book,

6:00

Autobiography of Yogi, and I was

6:03

reading this book in a... I

6:05

was like, God, if that is

6:07

actually the truth, then I am

6:09

unaware of a lot. And I

6:11

read that book and scrutinized it

6:13

and threw it across the room

6:15

and wrestled with it. But I

6:18

had kind of this kind of

6:20

idea that I was willing to

6:22

take that risk because I had

6:24

the time. I went from 100

6:26

miles an hour in my life

6:28

to laying face down. So I

6:30

knew enough about the spine. I

6:33

knew enough about the body. and

6:35

in the first six and a

6:37

half weeks was misery. It was

6:39

it was really really a dark

6:41

night of the soul because I

6:43

could not. I was I was

6:45

wrestling with my own belief in

6:48

my own self-doubt and my inability

6:50

to be able to control my

6:52

mind when you're out of balance.

6:54

So the first six and a

6:56

half weeks it took me three

6:58

hours to go through that inward

7:00

process and when I was done

7:03

I wasn't satisfied. But after that's

7:05

six and a half weeks, what

7:07

took me three hours, three and

7:09

a half, sometimes four hours to

7:11

do, because the moment I started

7:13

thinking, should I sell my practice?

7:15

Should I sell my home? I'm

7:18

going to be living in a

7:20

wheelchair. The moment I was, my

7:22

mind left the present moment, and

7:24

I went off that, I started

7:26

all over again. I'd start out,

7:28

so it was a very... Very

7:30

deliberate, but very very difficult process

7:33

because if you get frustrated It's

7:35

going to get worse So I

7:37

had to like all had to

7:39

move through all this muck. Yeah,

7:41

and in six and a half

7:43

weeks all of a sudden something

7:45

clicked It was like I had

7:48

a golf ball right in the

7:50

sweet spot. I had a tennis

7:52

ball just right something clicked for

7:54

me and all of a sudden

7:56

from that point forward It got

7:58

easier and And what took me

8:00

three and a half hours, three

8:03

hours to I was doing in

8:05

much less time. And I didn't

8:07

know it at the time, but

8:09

I was really mad. Mastering the

8:11

ability to pay attention and to

8:13

be present because every time you

8:15

you catch yourself defaulting and you're

8:17

going unconscious The only way you

8:20

become conscious is you catch yourself

8:22

going unconscious and you become conscious

8:24

again That's the moment to celebrate

8:26

right that's and most people say

8:28

why I can't do it and

8:30

I was doing that but really

8:32

that's a victory Yeah, that's the

8:35

only way yes, you're actually stop

8:37

yourself from going on a conscious.

8:39

I was pruning connections and I

8:41

was pruning Kind of a new

8:43

mind. And at that moment, Michael,

8:45

I noticed like the dramatic reduction

8:47

in my pain. And I was

8:50

getting sensory, feeling back, and motor

8:52

feel, and then my toes, and

8:54

I was just like, okay, whatever

8:56

you're doing is working, so keep

8:58

doing it. And your belief at

9:00

that point goes from here to

9:02

here, right? It just, it just

9:05

catapults because you're seeing the effect

9:07

of you would cause, right? Right?

9:09

So for me, I was back

9:11

on my feet in 10 and

9:13

a half weeks. They wanted me

9:15

to put me in this huge

9:17

body cast. I was better. I

9:20

was done. So I couldn't go

9:22

back to business as usual because

9:24

I was initiated. I have a

9:26

very scientific mind, so I just

9:28

kind of sold everything and left

9:30

and went to the Northwest and

9:32

started over again. And I wanted

9:35

to take some time for myself

9:37

and ask the big questions. If

9:39

that truly happened, how did that

9:41

happen? And is there anybody else?

9:43

Has that happened to anybody else?

9:45

So I had to start studying

9:47

epigenetics and neuroplasticity and psychoneurimionology and

9:50

electromagnetism, quantum physics, and it just

9:52

was this kind of exploration for

9:54

me. And I started getting closer

9:56

to the understanding. And then when

9:58

I started interviewing people. that had

10:00

spontaneous remissions from diseases that were

10:02

treating conventionally or unconventional, staying the

10:05

same and all of a sudden

10:07

got better. Once I study... found

10:09

the commonalities amongst these people and

10:11

it was really about the mind.

10:13

It was really about breaking the

10:15

habit of being themselves, their old

10:17

self, and reinventing a new self.

10:20

The other thing was that they,

10:22

in their inward process, of really

10:24

deciding who they no longer wanted

10:26

to be. Like if I really

10:28

could live my life again and

10:30

live again, how would I live

10:32

differently? Do I really want to

10:35

be an attorney? I hate my

10:37

job. I don't want to be

10:39

an attorney, I want to be

10:41

an artist, right? So you see

10:43

these people make the transition by

10:45

choice to stop being one person,

10:47

start being another person. And in

10:50

their inward process of thinking about

10:52

how they do want to think,

10:54

how they do want to act,

10:56

how they do want to feel

10:58

in their new life, they had

11:00

long moments where they lost track

11:02

of space and time. Their inward

11:05

experience became more real than their

11:07

outer experience. And it caused me

11:09

to spend a lot of time

11:11

studying the frontal lobe, which is

11:13

kind of the workshop of the

11:15

brain. So where we focus, where

11:17

we have intention, so we have

11:19

attentions, where we have free will,

11:22

we restrain our behaviors, you know.

11:24

Judgment, reason. We vent, we speculate,

11:26

it's the creative center, right? And

11:28

so, so, and then that fourth

11:30

thing was that they believed there

11:32

was an intelligence that was giving

11:34

them life that they would trust

11:37

and surrender to. happening in kind

11:39

of, I'll say scientifically, the autonomic

11:41

nervous system, the limit brain, right,

11:43

is the seat of the, of

11:45

all of those biological functions that

11:47

keeps us in homeostasis and balance,

11:49

right? The neocortes, the thinking brain

11:52

is the analytical mind and a

11:54

lot of times that's what kind

11:56

of gets us in trouble, right?

11:58

So they had a belief, and

12:00

independent of religion, that there was

12:02

some intelligence that was giving them

12:04

life that could help them in

12:07

their healing process. Now, there was

12:09

a spectrum involved in that, but

12:11

the similar... was that there was,

12:13

it was within them. So there

12:15

came a period of time where

12:17

I was in a documentary and

12:19

the documentary became really popular and

12:22

people started asking, well how do

12:24

you do it? Like I think

12:26

this is a time in history

12:28

where it's not enough to know,

12:30

I think it's a time in

12:32

history where it's not enough to

12:34

know, I think it's a time

12:37

in history to know how, right?

12:39

So I thought okay, I studied

12:41

all these things, I went back

12:43

to school and went to a

12:45

science and just got really into

12:47

it, and out come. And so

12:49

for the first couple of years,

12:52

we didn't really see much. It

12:54

was doing these one-day courses and

12:56

two-day courses, and people were feeling

12:58

better at the end of the

13:00

weekend, but no real big changes.

13:02

Then all of a sudden, it

13:04

just started happening. We started seeing

13:07

the most amazing changes in people's

13:09

health that really challenged my belief.

13:11

And so when we started seeing

13:13

people have remissions from very serious

13:15

stage four cancers cancers for cancers

13:17

and... Parkinson's disease and MS and

13:19

ALS and spinal cord injuries and

13:22

all kinds of crazy things. That's

13:24

when I knew it was time

13:26

to measure. And so we organized

13:28

a group of scientists and now

13:30

I work with University of California,

13:32

San Diego. And so when I

13:34

started seeing the outcomes, Michael, and

13:37

they were unbelievable. Literally unbelievable to

13:39

me. Like I was shaking my

13:41

head, like I cannot believe what

13:43

I'm seeing. And I knew that

13:45

when a person has an inward

13:47

experience, where they're in a certain

13:49

health condition, and then after, we

13:52

use meditation as, and we'll talk

13:54

about that, demystifying meditation in a

13:56

way, that allows a person to

13:58

learn how to make an inward

14:00

experience. Really really real and so

14:02

I knew that when a person's

14:04

got up of a wheelchair with

14:06

MS right in front of me,

14:09

like something was happening in there,

14:11

something was happening inside of them

14:13

that was very profound and very

14:15

real, right? And it was an

14:17

experience, right? So we organized, we've

14:19

got over 20,000 brain scans, we

14:21

have, we've measured thousands and thousands

14:24

of HRV measurements, we've measured gene

14:26

expression, we've measured microbiome. We've measured

14:28

2,880 metabolites and blood. We've measured

14:30

immune regulation. We've measured tears. We've

14:32

measured breast milk. We've measured everything

14:34

you can possibly imagine. And the

14:36

idea is what happens when a

14:39

person completely immerses themselves in a

14:41

community that's interested in change and

14:43

transformation. And that's what we teach.

14:45

We teach the process of change.

14:47

We use meditation, not to heal.

14:49

Use meditation to change when you

14:51

change a heel, right? So So

14:54

the science has been so compelling

14:56

because you can't call it pseudoscience

14:58

anymore The data is so profound

15:00

that it shows that as an

15:02

example The studies that we've done

15:04

demonstrate that the human nervous system

15:06

manufactures a pharmacy of chemicals that

15:09

works sometimes better than any drug,

15:11

and it's within you. And is

15:13

it possible then to upregulate genes

15:15

for health and downregulate the genes

15:17

for disease? And if you teach

15:19

people in a very simple way,

15:21

the philosophy, the theory, the information,

15:24

the knowledge, and they can learn

15:26

that information, learning is making new

15:28

connections in the brain, as you

15:30

know, but the research also shows

15:32

that if you don't review it,

15:34

if you don't repeat it, If

15:36

you don't think about it over

15:39

and over again, those circuits prune

15:41

apart within hours or days. So

15:43

we set up these large events

15:45

with thousands of... people from all

15:47

over the world and the information

15:49

is so tantamount for them because

15:51

it's what they're going to do

15:54

with it. They got to do

15:56

something with it. So when they

15:58

learn the information, then they have

16:00

to teach it back to the

16:02

person next to them. They have

16:04

to be able to explain it.

16:06

And if they can't explain it,

16:09

it's not wired in their brains.

16:11

Because they remind themselves what they

16:13

learn, they're reproducing that same level

16:15

of mind. And nerve cells that

16:17

fire together, wire together. And the

16:19

more you understand what you understand

16:21

what you're doing. And the more

16:24

you understand why you're doing it,

16:26

the how gets easier. Because you

16:28

can assign meaning to the task.

16:30

And when you assign meaning to

16:32

the task, you turn on that

16:34

prefrontal cortex and it wants an

16:36

outcome. Right? So they're installing their

16:39

neurological hardware and their brain in

16:41

preparation for the event. So if

16:43

you can set up the conditions

16:45

in the environment and give people

16:47

the proper instructions and they get

16:49

their behaviors to match their intentions,

16:51

their actions equal to their thoughts,

16:54

they get their mind and body

16:56

working together and initiate that knowledge.

16:58

They should have an experience, right?

17:00

And the experience then enriches the

17:02

circuitry in the brain, but the

17:04

end product of the experience is

17:06

called an emotion. And when you

17:08

feel unlimited or you feel grateful

17:11

or you feel empowered, now you're

17:13

teaching your body chemically to understand

17:15

what your mind is intellectually understood.

17:17

So the information is no longer

17:19

on the brain. Now the information's

17:21

in the body, right? So the

17:23

person's embodying the truth of that

17:26

philosophy. So this is kind of...

17:28

The journey what we do is

17:30

so then we're measuring We're measuring

17:32

what's taking place inwardly now if

17:34

you can go for seven days

17:36

and keep reproducing the experience Neologically

17:38

and chemically neurochemically you're conditioning the

17:41

mind and body to begin to

17:43

work as one And when the

17:45

body now knows how to do

17:47

it better than the mind, now

17:49

it's, you know, implicit. It's innate,

17:51

it's automatic, it's easy, it's familiar,

17:53

we've become that knowledge, right? And

17:56

so the person's in a different

17:58

state of being. So we have

18:00

to go from philosopher to initiate

18:02

to master, you know, from knowledge

18:04

to experience to wisdom, from mind,

18:06

the body to... soul from thinking

18:08

to doing to being, learning with

18:11

your head, applying with your hands,

18:13

knowing up by heart. And we

18:15

discovered that it's the overcoming process,

18:17

that is the becoming process, because

18:19

95% of who we are, by

18:21

the time we're in the middle

18:23

of our life, are set of

18:26

memorized, hardwired. attitudes, beliefs, and perceptions,

18:28

you know, the automatic and unconscious

18:30

habits and behaviors and reflexive emotional

18:32

responses. So it's that un learning

18:34

process, that 95% of being unconscious,

18:36

getting conscious, and if persons able

18:38

to do that, if they're able

18:41

to reconstruct and reinvent a new

18:43

way of thinking, a new way

18:45

of behaving, a new way of

18:47

feeling, will it be reflected in

18:49

their biology? And we've discovered that.

18:51

The majority of people that go

18:53

through a week-long event, it's not

18:56

like a small percentage, there's a

18:58

community effect that's taking place. I

19:00

think when we're brought to our

19:02

lowest denominator, whether it's crisis, disease,

19:04

diagnosis, loss, betrayal, it doesn't matter.

19:06

You reach this lowest denominator where

19:08

nothing is making that feeling go

19:11

away. No vacation. No TV show,

19:13

no friend, where that thing is

19:15

making that feeling go away. And

19:17

this is, I think this is

19:19

a really important moment for people

19:21

because they don't feel like themselves.

19:23

Nothing in their environment, in their

19:26

outer world, is making this feeling

19:28

go away. And this is where

19:30

they start, for the first time,

19:32

observing themselves, that idea of metacognition.

19:34

They feel so different than the

19:36

way they normally feel that they

19:38

can view themselves through the eyes

19:41

of someone else. This is the

19:43

moment where they can all of

19:45

a sudden go, oh my God,

19:47

look at the way you've been

19:49

thinking. You've been saying, I can,

19:51

it's too hard, I hate this

19:53

person. Those thoughts of constant... You

19:56

can say, oh my God, you've

19:58

been complaining, blaming, you've been a

20:00

victim, you've been in, you know,

20:02

you've been judging, making excuses, feeling

20:04

sorry for yourself. Oh my God,

20:06

look at you. Like it's that

20:08

lighting the match in the dark

20:10

place. And then you can say,

20:13

oh my God, I live the

20:15

majority of my life in hatred

20:17

and anger and fear. Oh my God,

20:19

that's not loving to me. But no

20:21

one is going to tell, no one,

20:23

you're not going to listen to anybody

20:25

when they tell you that you're going

20:28

to bump them off, right? But this

20:30

is kind of on the soul kind

20:32

of kind of, kind of, I don't

20:34

give you a little nudge, like this

20:36

is your moment, right? And so I'm

20:38

curious. We see that the brain changes

20:40

the most when you get beyond I

20:43

can't. I'm too tired. I don't feel

20:45

like it. I don't feel like want to

20:47

quit. This is too hard. What's on the

20:49

other side of that thought they're stepping into

20:51

the unknown? A person who says, oh my

20:53

God, I want to be happy, why am

20:56

I spending the majority of my day

20:58

complaining? Complaining is not going to make

21:00

me happy, it's going to make me

21:02

unhappy. And then, oh my God, this emotion

21:05

that I live by every day, emotions are

21:07

just a chemical record of the

21:09

past, right? So a person feels

21:11

frustration because of an experience that

21:13

happens or has a series of

21:16

experiences that happen in their life.

21:18

The stronger the emotion that we

21:20

have to some experience in our

21:22

life, the more altered we are

21:24

inside of us, the disruption in

21:26

our chemical continuity, causes the brain

21:29

to freeze a frame and take

21:31

a snapshot or a series of snapshots,

21:33

and that's called the long-term memory.

21:35

So the memory is embossed in the

21:37

brain, right? So if it happens a

21:40

few times, and then you review the

21:42

event, you keep remembering the event. You're

21:45

producing the same chemistry in the brain

21:47

and body as if the event was

21:49

occurring. And the body is so objective,

21:51

it's the unconscious mind, that it

21:53

does not know the difference within

21:55

the real life experience that's creating

21:57

that emotion. And the emotion that...

22:00

since fabricating by memory alone to

22:02

the body is exactly the same. So

22:04

the body is reliving the trauma 50

22:06

to 100 times a day. So it's

22:08

a thought and a feeling. It's an

22:11

image and an emotion or a memory

22:13

and emotion. It's a stimulus and response

22:15

and you're conditioning the body become the

22:18

mind of that emotion. So now the

22:20

body, the servant, is now the master.

22:22

So the body has learned it and

22:25

it's automatic. And so you're sweeping your

22:27

environment just to look for something. This

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