How do you create a life that combines neuroscience with social activism?

 

Well, our next guest Dr. Peter Sterling has written the playbook on it. From being a Freedom Rider and getting arrested for social justice to seeing the connection between discrimination and brain stress, Dr. Sterling started to see a connection between wellbeing, brain science and overall health in marginalized communities.

 

He also shows how this affects our Intercultural Creativity®.

 

Working in communities of color, Dr. Sterling observed high rates of strokes from hypertension and began to explore its neural basis. He soon realized that it was not primarily a problem of the body or genes (as the medical textbooks still claim) but rather chronic stress mediated by the brain to the body (blood vessels, heart, and kidney). What caused this effect?

 

Discrimination and lack of belonging.

 

He began to publish articles on this topic, beginning in 1977, and what he learned about the brain-body connection ultimately developed into two books, 'Principles of Neural Design' and 'What is Health? Allostasis and the Evolution of Human Design' (2020).

 

Join us as we jump into the intersection of well-being, the mental and creative effects of being excluded and how art is an important component for our mental health.