But even though current research can’t yet shine a light on those bigger truths about the inner workings of our minds, learning how to tune into your thoughts could help you on an individual level. Meanwhile, progress in neuroscience research remained frustratingly slow as the brain remained in its lofty and boney chamber, isolated, often ravaged by disease and largely untreated.

Then groups and systems of cells can be studied so the means by which they interact can be better understood. Suddenly the very working of the brain can be observed at a cellular systems level and scientists have insight into how whole brain components have a functional output. Famira Racy, co-ordinator of the Inner Speech Lab at Mount Royal University, Canada, and her colleagues recently used a method called thought listing – which, unsurprisingly, involves getting participants to list their thoughts at certain times – to take a broader look at why and when people use inner speech, as well as what they say to themselves. For instance, you can take your body for a run in the morning, even though the weather is cold and the bed is so cozy and warm: this is how your mind influences your body. A failure of these pumps alters the excitability of the cells and allows them to discharge their impulses to neighbouring cells and promote seizures more broadly in the brain.If I were a young clinician or scientist wondering which area of research to enter there would be no hesitation – the mysteries of our most complex organ and the seat of the soul await. That’s the dangerous part… you start to believe your thoughts are real and not just mere thoughts, they become something they’re not – facts. Thoughts like this would constantly drift around inside my head until I truly started to believe them.

Finally, today, how can you start mastering the four voices? How can you start mastering those four voices right now? In the handout that you’ve been given today, the third question has a list of some different situations in which you might find yourself and there’s a simple exercise there. We’ll do some other exercises. This just is really to get you started and the idea is to figure out what is your normal state of mind in these different situations? Are you mad, glad, sad, bad? Do you feel like you’re underappreciated, appreciated, loved, unloved? Like my friend, do you feel like nobody really cares about you on a personal basis? How is it that you feel?

Have you ever wondered what is going on inside your head? Well, there’s a bunch of nerves, ganglia, neurons, and synapses that exchange various signals to make us react to the environment and move around. There’s a lot going on inside my head at any given moment. I’m constantly thinking about what I need to do next, worrying about things that could go wrong, and trying to come up with ideas. It can be tough to keep everything straight, but that’s just how my mind works. Where will it end? My view is that we’re at the beginning of an even more wonderful period of the flowering of the neurosciences.

For example, the left and right frontal lobes govern many crucial aspects of personality. There was a very famous case that highlighted this particular connection to neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers. So multitasking doesn’t make us happy, faster or more efficient; instead, it makes us stressed and more prone to errors. Any of the above is a passive reaction to the negative thought, hence making you feel the negative feelings that follow, which doesn’t help at all. So replace the bad thought on the spot.There are bits and pieces of the song that I could connect to. Like I said, I’m a words-of-affirmation guy, so I do want to know what’s going on inside your head. I want to hear words. I want to hear what you’re feeling and what emotions [you’re feeling]. But yes, I think it is a full-circle moment for me when it comes to the Chris Stapleton [connection]. I think his music is so pure. And I just think that he’s himself in his own realm, and he’s absolutely amazing. So, I think, too, when I’m looking for outside songs, what could make sense for this overall arching theme of all these songs on this album about girls? And ‘Inside Your Head’ was the only one that really stood out to me. And I’m always up for a challenge. Cognition happens through thoughts, experiences, and senses. It involves attention, memory, language comprehension, knowledge, reasoning, judging, problem-solving, and decision making.

I have to actually boss my brain sometimes – tell myself that I am in control of what goes on inside my head.In DES, you carry around a device as you go about your normal day-to-day activities. When it beeps, you tune into what was going on in your mind right before the sound. At the end of the day, you debrief with a psychologist who asks questions to get at exactly what was in your head in that moment, and what form it took: words, pictures, an emotion, a physical sensation, or something else. Romans 8:5, if you have a Bible, you might want to look at this. “Those who live according to the flesh, have their minds set on what the flesh desires. But those who live in accordance with the spirit, have their minds set on what the spirit desires. The mind governed or the narrative governed by the flesh is death. Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.” Well, how does the voice of the flesh work? Well, it might be in a very personal relationship, like a marriage.