Content Library Articles ULTRAMIND®: Key #6 Boost Energy Metabolism

ULTRAMIND®: Key #6 Boost Energy Metabolism

August 31, 2010

WELCOME BACK TO my series of blogs on The UltraMind Solution. You can download a free sneak preview of the book by going here: www.ultramind.com.

Now for today’s blog …

Do you want more energy? Do you feel like your brain (and the rest of you) is losing energy?

If so you aren’t alone.

We all want more energy. We need it. We lose it. And we try to get it back until finally we can’t make energy anymore. That’s called death!

Most of us don’t think much about where our energy comes from, why sometimes we have more or less of it, how it might affect our brain, or even the whole process of aging.

But, in fact, everything we have explored in the other 6 keys influences our health directly through energy.

Enough energy means a happy, healthy, focused, and sharp brain. Lack of energy means slowed mental function, autism, mood disorders like depression, and ultimately Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and dementia.

I have seen this over and over. When you don’t have enough energy, your brain breaks.

So in this blog I want to teach you a bit about where your energy comes from, how you can protect the little energy-making factories in your cells, and how you can get a metabolic tune-up. I also want to take a moment to explain my position on medication and psychotherapy, since they are the standard treatments that so many people receive to heal their broken brains.

But first, let’s talk a little more about energy.

Where Does Energy Come From and How Can We Get More of It? How do we get energy?

Actually, it is a fairly straightforward biochemical process. We take oxygen from the air we breathe and the food we eat and burn it in the little energy factories in our cells called mitochondria. Our mitochondria keep us energetic and alive. As we get older, we get fewer of them and they don’t work as well, so we run out of energy.

But now we know how to prevent that energy drain.

First, you have to understand that those little energy factories are very sensitive to insult and injury from any kind of stress—toxins, allergens, infections, or a junk food diet that has no antioxidants to protect those energy factories.

In other words, if you get the other 6 keys to an UltraMind in balance, your mitochondria will be happy.

When our mitochondria are damaged, the resultant loss of energy can often show up as a broken brain—fatigue, brain fog, depression, dementia, autism, and more. I have seen this over and over. When you don’t have enough energy, your brain breaks.

In fact, research shows that the brains of autistic children are very low on energy because of all sorts of toxins,  infections, and immune stress. When you remove these stressors their energy improves and they wake up from their silent worlds.

So the key to getting more energy is to remove the agents that are harming your mitochondria. Then you can enhance this process even further by giving yourself a “metabolic tune-up.”

Getting a Metabolic Tune-up

Did you know you can give yourself a metabolic tune-up? To do this, you use special “neuro-nutrients” to help your cells make more energy.

Here’s what you can use to do that:

• Acetyl-L-carnitine
• Alpha-lipoic acid
• Coenzyme Q10
• D-ribose
• NADH
• B-complex vitamins, including niacin and riboflavin

We need support for our energy system—and we all need a metabolic tune-up because we are all losing it. But even as we are learning how mitochondrial injury is a final common pathway in so many neurological and psychiatric disorders, we are also learning how to protect and defend ourselves.

Getting a metabolic tune-up is not only possible, but necessary for most of us. Thankfully, by eating a plant-based diet, reducing toxic exposures, and supplementing with mitochondria-protective and antioxidant compounds we can protect and restore our energy metabolism to optimal function.

This is an essential part of The UltraMind Solution.

Now it’s time for that discussion about the role of therapy and medication I mentioned at the beginning of this blog. After all, if the source of your brain problems is really found in your body, where do therapy and medication fit in to this picture?

Isn’t Therapy Important to Get Your Head Straight?

Isn’t psychotherapy or behavioral therapy helpful for improving your mood and brain function, or finding the meaning and purpose of your heart and soul? What about a spiritual life for becoming whole?

These can be essential parts of gaining an UltraMind.

But trust me, it is a lot harder to work through old mental patterns or connect with your soul if you are poisoned with mercury, or suffering from vitamin D or B12 deficiency, or struggling against a thyroid gland that isn’t working, or if your brain is inflamed with a virus or a reaction to something you are eating.

Heal your broken brain by fixing your body first. Then you will find it a lot easier to get the help you need with psychotherapy and find it easier to connect with your heart and soul when you are not fighting through brain fog.

When You Need Medication

As a former emergency room physician, I recognize that extreme times call for extreme measures. I use and support the intelligent, appropriate use of medication, including psychotropic medications, like antidepressants, when needed. They can often be helpful as a bridge to recovery from all the stresses and toxins that affect your brain and mind.

It may take months or years to rebuild damage that has occurred over a lifetime using The UltraMind Solution (although most people see remarkable results in 6 weeks).

In extreme cases, the damage may be so deep that full recovery is not possible. But combining medication with the tools of The UltraMind Solution can give people their lives back. Working with an experienced psychopharmacologist who welcomes the integration of nutrition, supplements, exercise, and mind-body therapies is sometimes a necessary step to recovering a whole life.

Many times, medications can be reduced or eliminated after applying the principles found in The UltraMind Solution. I would caution you that psychotropic medications offer only partial solutions, often packaged with side effects.

Tread intelligently, expect bumps on the road, and seek to find the causes of your suffering – which may be found in the stories of your life, on your plate, in your lifestyle, or in your toxic environment. You will rarely find a single solution to your problems in a prescription bottle.

If you need to, however, use medication without guilt just as you would use any other tool to rebuild your life. And do not be afraid to put it down when you have rebuilt your health and your world.

Now I want to remind you that you can get more information about how to boost your energy metabolism and heal the other 6 keys to an UltraMind in my book The UltraMind Solution.

You have now learned all the ways in which the body affects the mind. In The UltraMind Solution: Key #7 I speak about how your mind influences your body—and how calming your mind calms your body.

Remember, the communication is bidirectional: top down and bottom up. The body affects the mind AND the mind affects the body. Thoughts, feelings, beliefs, attitudes, and life traumas can all trigger damage to the brain. This brain damage occurs because stress itself causes depletion of nutrients from the body, changes our hormones, creates inflammation, damages the gut, has direct toxic effects, and increases oxidative stress.

Wow, all that just from negative thoughts. You’ll learn more in The UltraMind Solution: Key #7.

Now I’d like to hear from you …

What makes you feel most energetic?

Do you plan on getting a metabolic tune-up?

Have you tried medication and therapy for your broken brain?

Please share your thoughts by leaving a comment below.

To your good health,

Mark Hyman, MD