What is Neuroplasticity?

Neuroplasticity: It’s not just a fancy word. It’s how science describes your brain, and its granted ability to change with time, consciousness, and experience. 

This is not just a trend, or a buzzword people are using to sound smart. Neuroplasticity is a fact we’ve proven through research, testing, and experience. 

It’s not always fun to have a human brain. Emotions are exhausting. Thinking makes us anxious. And it seems like it’s only easy to do the things we’ve done a thousand times before. 

But… if we can understand how the mind really works, we can work alongside it and achieve our true potential. This is something that is both possible and worth doing because of your brain’s innate neuroplasticity.

“We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.” — Aristotle 

Okay, So What Does The Word Neuroplasticity Mean? 

Human beings are stuck in our ways. Our minds are set up to best do the things they’ve done a thousand times before. The neurons in your brain make pathways and highway interchanges that could make Orlando blush. They’re expecting traffic in all the same old places, and any change in the pattern will present in our bodies as overwhelm.

The unconscious mind is so much more capable and vast than our conscious mind that it can be all too easy to get lost in auto-pilot. We do our familiar things in familiar places, and we’re all so comfortable that we’re living in familiar misery before we realize it.

The remarkable thing about the human brain is that being stuck in our ways does not mean we are permanently stuck.

Our brains are capable of changing.

That ability is called neuroplasticity.

How Does Neuroplasticity Affect Me? 

You are affected by neuroplasticity every day. Each time your neurons fire and your brain lights up with chemicals and electricity, they create new pathways that interact with one another in new ways. This is what neuroplasticity is: the brain’s capacity to change its neural pathways based on what it experiences.

We used to think that this was something we only experienced in childhood, but we’re learning now that it’s a lifelong process.

Our brains are not set in stone. They are like plastic; notably moldable to suit the situation they’re in. We are not set in stone. What does this mean?

• Your thoughts can change. That doesn’t mean you can simply think your way out of every mental health challenge. Instead, neuroplasticity is a comforting reality; a fact that we can return to when we need to remember that change is possible even at the cellular level. Our thinking is a conscious process, and that means if we start to think in a new way, our brain will make it feel more natural as we go. It’s a lot like building the muscles in your body. Instead, you are building the muscles in your brain and creating more resiliency. 

• Your feelings can change. Your feelings are worthy of care and priority. It should be your work to understand and cope with the feelings you’re working through in your body. But while we hold that truth in one hand, it’s important to hold another truth in the other: Your feelings are not immutable facts entirely beyond your conscious control. They are the results of our environment, thinking, and behavior. If we change our environment, if we change our thinking, if we change our behavior, then our feelings, too, will change with them.

• Your behavior can change. Our thoughts and feelings can become complicated in the haze of trauma, anxiety, and depression. Because our behavior is intimately tied to our thoughts and feelings, mental illness can impact our behavior in stressful, erratic, and unpredictable ways. However, because the human brain is impacted by its own activity, a change in behavior is one of the most powerful ways to change the mind. 

What Does Neuroplasticity Mean For Therapists? 

For therapists, neuroplasticity is one of the most hopeful ideas in modern neuroscience.

It gives us a scientific language for something therapists have observed for generations: people can change.

• Therapists can offer meaningful depression treatment. Suffering is not a lifetime diagnosis. You can be depressed and still live a life that is beautiful and meaningful to you. Even the physical symptoms of depression that we might have been coping with for our entire lives can be managed and lessened with the right support, lifestyle, and physical health. 

• The right therapy can provide lasting anxiety relief. Similarly, anxiety is not an incurable problem. Our minds and bodies hold anxiety because it serves an important function; we are supposed to be concerned with and care for the things in our lives. The years you have spent practicing this overwhelming concern have made it into an unconscious process. But in therapy, we can learn a healthier way to interface with the things that are most important to us and break patterns.

• Some therapies, like KAP, can heighten your neuroplasticity. This can help you make big changes that might not have felt possible beforehand. You may have spent years practicing numbness. Your patterns may be so deeply established that they feel beyond your control. But they are still patterns that can be interrupted and that can start to change with active practice. 

What Does Psychedelic Therapy Have To Do With Neuroplasticity? 

The idea isn’t that ketamine magically “rewires” your brain and solves everything for you.

Rather, a period of increased flexibility may create an opportunity to approach thoughts, emotions, memories, and behaviors from a different perspective.

That opportunity is important.

Because insight alone isn’t always enough.

The reality is that some patients do not achieve results through traditional talk therapy alone. Even psychiatric medicine, for all its miracles, is not a cure-all for mental illness. Some problems need a more powerful tool. 

At Integrative Counsel, we believe that psychedelic therapy can be that tool. 

Wait, Does Integrative Counsel Do Psychedelic Therapy? 

Yes!

Integrative Counsel offers Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy in St. Petersburg, FL in partnership with Journey Clinical. Integrative Counsel provides the psychotherapy, preparation, support, and integration portions of the experience, while Journey Clinical’s medical team handles medical eligibility, prescribing, and medical follow-up.

This distinction matters.

KAP isn’t simply “taking ketamine.”

The therapeutic relationship is just as vital to your healing.

• Human therapy for human patients. At Integrative Counsel, you’re working with another human being who is dedicated to your wellness. You’re not pouring your heart out to a chatbot, you’re being guided through a transformative experience from someone who cares and understands.

• Time-honored wisdom with evidence-based solutions. Integrative Counsel offers science-backed tools through the lens of art, philosophy, and ancient wisdom. Older than money, paper, and agriculture, psychedelic medicine has been practiced by human beings for millennia. Science is just starting to comprehend what ancient humans knew through tradition: Psychedelics can help us interface with the most difficult-to-access corridors of the mind. 

• Support that meets you where you are. The medical industrial complex is a public hazard to mental health. Wasting time on the phone with health insurances, doctors, or even debt collectors is an accepted part of the health care system in America. And that’s when you’re talking with a real person in a call center and not a chatbot rotely telling you bad news. Psychedelic therapy at Integrative Counsel meets you where you are instead of where we want you to be.

How Does KAP Work In Florida? 

KAP at Integrative Counsel is designed as a process rather than a single psychedelic experience.

First, you have a medical consultation with Journey Clinical. The medical team reviews your medical and psychiatric history, determines whether ketamine treatment is appropriate, and develops a treatment plan if you are eligible.

You then work with a therapist at Integrative Counsel to prepare for the experience.

Preparation gives you an opportunity to ask questions, become familiar with what the experience may feel like, and establish intentions for the session. It also gives your therapist an opportunity to understand what you hope to explore and what kind of support you may need.

We take pride in being a psychedelic therapy resource for patients and therapists. These are some of the questions people often have about ketamine therapy, with accompanying resources to answer your most burning questions. 

• What Does KAP Feel Like? You may have heard descriptions of ketamine therapy that range from peaceful and introspective to strange and emotionally intense. What does a KAP session actually feel like from the inside? What happens to your sense of time, your body, your emotions, and your ordinary way of thinking? And perhaps most importantly, what can you expect when you are experiencing something that is unfamiliar to you?
• Will I Be Judged For Doing Psychedelic Therapy? Psychedelic therapy can still carry a certain amount of stigma, even as research and clinical applications become more widely discussed. What if your friends or family don’t understand why you’re doing it? What if you worry that your therapist, doctor, or other people in your life will think differently of you? And what does it mean to choose a treatment that may look unconventional while still taking your mental health seriously?

• How Does Ketamine Therapy Interact With Chronic Pain? Mental health and physical health are not neatly separated from one another. Chronic pain can affect mood, sleep, relationships, and your sense of possibility, while emotional distress can make living with pain even more difficult. So what does ketamine therapy mean for someone who is living with chronic pain? How might the experience intersect with the emotional and psychological dimensions of pain? And what should someone with chronic pain consider when deciding whether KAP is an appropriate part of their treatment?

Your Brain Is Not Finished

There is something profoundly hopeful about learning that your brain is capable of change.

You are not simply the collection of every habit you’ve ever developed.

You are not permanently defined by the worst thing that happened to you.

This is the path you have walked, but not the one you need to continue along. 

That grand highway in your brain is good for a lot of things. It takes you to work. It plainly remembers how to do important things like walk and talk and swim and paddle a canoe. 

On that grand highway made of neurons, electricity, and mostly water, do not get too comfortable. Always have an eye for the exits, and what lays beyond then. Listen to the traffic reports on the radio, and do not get caught between the many drivers too comfortable to leave that grand and terrible place behind. 

And remember, there is no highway too grand or too terrible to be rebuilt, even when it comes to the mind. 

If you’re feeling stuck on your healing journey, you don’t have to navigate it alone. Our intake specialist will take the time to understand your needs and connect you with a therapist who is the right fit. Schedule your free 15-minute consultation.

Sunny Ebsary is an educator, multi-modal artist, and writer specializing in the intersection of myth and mental health. Sunny’s writing walks the line between poetic and logical, giving readers a chance to interface with the mind and imagination. Sunny’s been putting pen to paper since he was a child, writing everything from albums, novels, and plays, to essays, interactive games, and of course, many articles! While studying both psychology and writing, he realized his real passion in life was helping others unlock their creative spark. Whether he’s leading a D&D game, directing a production, or diving deep into the brain, you can be sure Sunny will be ushering you toward finding meaning in your life.