The Mind and the Brain
What They Are, How They Differ & Why It Matters
What you think about HOW you think … might be altering how you see yourself, your reality and how you engage in it.
In This Article:
The “mind” is spiritual, the “brain” is physical
The mind controls and directs the brain—except for when it doesn’t
The brain responds to the mind’s direction—except for when that direction is missing or conflicting
Key Application:
It doesn’t get any simpler than this: Start noticing your thoughts
This is a topic few people have ever considered. It’s something the Bible has always supported (and modern science is now beginning to admit1): Our spiritual “mind” is distinct from our physical “brain.”
This article is a follow-on from a Thanksgiving-themed post, where I introduced this mind-brain idea:
Here’s what I said in that article:
What’s important to know is that the mind and the brain are NOT the same thing. The mind is spiritual, the brain is physical. The mind is the part of your spirit/soul that believes, knows, feels and chooses. The brain is the physical cells (neurons), synapses, neurotransmitters, etc. that store and transfer thoughts, sensory input and memories as electrical impulses.
Here are a few key points we need to understand:
Our mind’s thoughts exist in the spiritual realm, while our brain’s thoughts exist as energy in our physical brain.
Our (spiritual) mind controls our (physical) brain, and the brain responds to the mind’s direction. (Think: Our mind is the driver, and our brain is the car.)
Our mind can give up control and instead follow our brain’s thoughts. (Think: The driver lets the car drive autonomously.)
Our brain captures and processes all our experiences and thoughts—good and bad, healthy and unhealthy—and is always working to coherently sort them out.
One reality of that last bullet is that there will always be unhealthy thoughts in our physical brain. It’s easy to assume these thoughts are valid and trustworthy—simply because they exist in our physical brain. And if these unhealthy/inaccurate thoughts aren’t intentionally processed, our mind can embrace them as truth … and then act on them.
Let’s unpack work through this to understand A) the major implication, and B) what we can do about it.
The Spiritual Mind, The Physical Brain
You are more than just physical. You are a living, spirit and soul that is distinct from (and functions inside of) your physical body. In the same way, your mind is distinct from (and operates inside of) your physical brain.
Your mind is that part of your spirit/soul that believes, understands, evaluates, thinks, reasons, decides, feels and chooses. It’s the part of you that knows you are a unique living being, the part that connects relationally to God and other people at a spiritual level.
Your brain is the physical container for your mind—the environment your mind operates in. It is all the cells (neurons), the synapses that connect them, and the neurotransmitters, hormones, etc. that support physical brain activity.
A Way to Think About This
The mind-brain distinction means that the mind must operate inside the constraints and limitations of our physical brain. One way to illustrate this is to see the mind as the driver and the brain as the car.
If I want to drive to the airport, I decide when to leave, what road to take, when to change lanes, etc. The car executes my decisions and does the physical work to travel. But I have to operate within the car’s limitations. It can’t fly. It can’t travel in a straight line, go 300 miles per hour or teleport me. But it can respond to my inputs on the controls, traveling where and how I direct it to.
The mind and the brain work in much the same way. The mind directs, and the brain responds to the mind’s inputs. If the mind focuses on a certain topic or directs a particular physical activity, the brain responds by (literally) remaking itself. It builds new physical structure to accommodate the mind’s thinking, using a process called neuroplasticity.
All of this is happening in both our mind AND our brain. Though there are two separate entities, it feels like one system because it operates virtually seamlessly.
Much of the time.
This is where it gets interesting …
Giving and Taking Control
Living in an age where cars drive themselves makes the illustration even more relevant. It’s no longer futuristic to imagine being a passenger in a car that takes your instructions and drives you to your destination without needing much input.
But what happens if the car’s programming has a glitch in it? Or when there are potholes or debris that the car’s tech can’t interpret? What happens when its sensors break?
Even more seriously, what happens if you say to your car, “I don’t care … YOU decide where to drive.”
This last point is the most concerning, because—unbeknownst to us—that’s exactly what’s happening to us. It’s becoming our default thinking behavior.
Detoxing
One reality of living in a fallen world is that our brains store all sorts of unhealthy thoughts, painful memories and traumatic experiences. Most of these are stored unconsciously in our brains (specifically in our right hemisphere—see this article for more detail). Many aren’t ever brought into conscious awareness. But they are influencing us in ways we don’t recognize.
You can think of these thoughts as “toxic” to the brain, much in the same way that asbestos is toxic to our lungs. These toxic thoughts prevent the brain from operating as it’s designed: In a state of peace, alignment and coherence.
These toxic thoughts could be anything. They might be minor, like a self-critical perspective, a bias, grudge, jealously, fixed mindset, apprehension or insecurity. Or they might be major: self-judgment, anxiety, unforgiveness, judgment, pride, prejudice, addiction, mindset or fear.
Whatever they are, toxic thoughts almost always overlap. They’re more like a plate of spaghetti than a single meatball.
Because they’re unhealthy, the brain is constantly trying to detox itself. It does this by bringing a thought, memory, perception, emotion, etc. to your conscious attention. Sometimes it’s our conscience speaking to us. It’s the brain’s way of alerting us that something needs attention, sort of like an indicator light on our dashboard.
How we respond to the indicator light makes all the difference …
The Impact
The detox process involves capturing the thought to explore its origin and contrast it with what we know to be true in our mind (e.g. our values, beliefs, etc.). This processes the thought and resolves it, putting our brain in a state of functional coherence—peace, and rest.
If we don’t detox, the brain can’t resolve the thought. The unresolved thought actually gets validated and becomes stronger, and starts driving the car. Eventually, we give up control, accepting the thought simply because it’s in our brain. Consider how easily our brains can convince us that:
We need to dominate and outperform everyone else to be significant.
We’re a failure because someone laughs at our idea.
We should avoid thinking about that thing we’re afraid of, because it’s too scary.
We’re justified in looking at pornography (again) because our spouse isn’t showing any intimacy to us.
Withholding forgiveness is right, because forgiving that person rewards their offense and makes me permanently the victim.
The toxic thought feels like truth, though it’s not. This results in, at best, conflicted, competing thoughts and double-mindedness. At worst we surrender control and end up as passengers, being taken for a ride to wherever our brains decide to travel.
Consider Paul’s message to the Ephesian church:
So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the [unbelieving] Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking.2 They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed. (Eph. 4.17-19, NIV)
Notice the progression of their faulty mental process and what it results in:
Mind futility leads to limited understanding of reality and how to operate effectively.
This lack of sound thinking creates a calloused insensitivity toward God.
The lack of awareness of God diminishes the ability to understand him, and ultimately blocks connecting to him, his will and how he’s working.
Lack of sensitivity toward morality and conscience leads to being spiritually adrift, lacking personal restraint.
The lack of restraint frees the brain to chase after the thoughts and desires that lead to satisfaction and pleasure.
The final expression of an unmanaged, self-driving brain is an insatiable desire for more and the self-dependence to attain it. In other words, greed—which is idolatry (Eph. 5.5).
In a leadership context, does letting your brain drive your mind make you a better leader? How can you become more of a servant leader (like Jesus) when you’re given over to self-interests?
It’s a virtual guarantee that if your mind is NOT intentionally in the driver’s seat, then your brain is driving your thoughts—and will likely be driving you further away from the truth and from connection with God.
So What?
The solution to surrendering control to our brains is to renew our thinking (see Eph 4.23, Rom 12.2). This begins with the uberly simple step of noticing what indicator lights are turning on in your thoughts.
When we seek the Lord, he begins to reveal the toxic thoughts in our brains that need to be processed. The more we capture these toxic thoughts and replace them with truth, the more our brain is renewed and the more we can understand our identity and God’s will for our lives. Using reflection as a regular, disciplined practice is a great way to apply this.
First things first: Remember that just because you have a thought in your brain doesn’t mean it’s legit—even when it feels like it is.
Peace be with you!
Got a thought? A question?
Let’s talk about it…
This would include names like Jeffrey Schwartz, Caroline Leaf, Antonio Damasio, Christof Koch, Jaak Panksepp, Mark Solms and Roger Penrose.
In the original Greek, the literal word for “thinking” here is, in fact, “mind.”