Your Brain On Exercise

Serotonin, dopamine, epinephrine these are all different chemicals that are going to change the way that you think and feel. For example, epinephrine is going to cause you to feel excited and energetic, but possibly may be the cause of excess stress.

The brain works off of a few different things: there is cognitive functioning of the brain; your ability to control your thoughts through focus, and there is chemical functioning of the brain; the chemical components that create the thoughts and synapse throughout the brain. Every idea, emotion, thought, and experience recorded in the brain is going to be a simple bolt of electricity shot through a network of neurons.

People who are presumed to have chemical imbalance are often prescribed medications to offset the imbalance and hopefully create a feeling of homeostasis. Every brain on earth is going to be a little different than the next one, so essentially there is no brain that is in balance.

Studies have shown that physical exercise actually will regulate the chemicals in the brain just as much as prescription medication. However, using exercise to modify the brains chemical balance doesn't have any disadvantageous effects.

Serotonin is a very popular chemical in the brain, probably the most widely known out of all of them. That is because of its unique function, which is to promote sense of happiness and, in excess, euphoria.

People with bi-polar disease usually go back and forth from creating mass amounts of serotonin and being euphoric, gregarious party animals to producing very much too little and being depressive. During exercise your body actually kicks into high gear and starts pumping this chemical throughout the entire brain.

That is where common phrases like "runners high" come from. Because during the extensive run the body is fighting to maintain energy and nature has shown a very good way to do this is through positive emotion, so the body instinctively creates that chemical to promote good feelings.

Along with that good chemical serotonin, the body also creates a large amount of epinephrine. Now it was mentioned earlier that epinephrine is created through stress, so over stress could be from epinephrine.

However, exercise actually strains excess epinephrine as it produces epinephrine. Different exercise are going to strain more than it creates, thus earning the title of "relieving exercises" such as yoga and Pilates.

Though, this particular substance is extremely beneficial to lifters and body builders. Once they are charged with a good punch from the adrenal glands their energy levels can double their strength up to two times greater than regular relaxed performance.

So if you are about to get in a tussle with someone, the best defense would to try and excite yourself. That would also be the best offense too.

Destry Masterson is an author who has written hundreds of articles. She publishes articles for http://www.nordictrack.com and recommends them for treadmills. Contact Info: Destry Masterson - MyOnlineArticleWriting@gmail.com - Twitter: @DestryMasterson