NEUROBIOLOGY OF TIME AND HOMEOPATHY

The felt passage of time, a discernment of external clock in relation to inner is an estimation made by the brain to keep the consciousness rooted in environment. This time lapse judgement can be altered in some neurological conditions, with intense practice, meditation or even during heightened emotional states.

The following short discussion tries to connect neurological perspective to homeopathic symptomatology and unravel the mysteries of mind and time.

Time passes quickly- an underestimation of time

Time passes quickly- an underestimation of time happens when more time seems to have elapsed whence the person thinks only some time has passed, i.e., durations are judged as shorter than actual.

In conditions like Parkinson’s Disease patients generally show this duration underestimations. To them their movements seem to take the normal time while in actuality there has been a slowing of speed of motion i.e bradykinesia.

Medicines like COCCULUS INDICUS and THERIDION manifest this symptom during proving. These medicines also show affection for brain tissue in general and have many symptoms related to nervous system in their symptomatology.

Time passes slowly- an overestimation of time

On the other side of the coin, overestimation of time i.e too much time seems to have passed when only little time has passed.

Under normal conditions this happens during:

• Happening in extreme threatening situations, like accidents, people have been said to observe things in slow motion. They report having gone through their whole life like a movie vividly in matter of seconds or even less. This apparent perception may increase chances of survival in emergency situation by extreme focus of brains attention.
• Similar happens when you are very bored and are acutely aware of every passing second.
• Deep meditative state and the flow state of an athlete who has Intense concentration achieved continued, repetitive and gruelling training making his movements fluid and reflexive may be other examples where the time slows down.

Abnormal conditions are:

ADHD– This happens in children and adolescents with ADHD who tend to overestimate (i.e., durations are judged as longer than controls) the time lapse. In these conditions more sensory information is absorbed with passage of time. This too much information gathering, cognitive engagement and processing seems to stretch the time.

Medicines like AMBRA GRISEA, ARGENTUM NITRICUM, NUX MOSCHATA, CANNABIS SATIVA, CANNABIS INDICA, ANHALONIUM have states where the time seems to be too long and does not pass. These medicines should be thought of when considering the pathological development of sense of expansion of time.

The other pathologies such as schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s also alter the time keeping function of the brain in a different manner where the functions such as mental time travel and time rooting in reality are affected.

NB: this similarity is found only while studying the medicine from a pathological point of view. The confirmation can only be done by applying this knowledge in such a clinical condition in a patient.

This kind of approach is especially helpful when:

• The patient is not able to give refined symptoms and sensations
• One is not able to find any characteristic symptom or
• The attendants are not able to give one,

• There is time constraint or
• The physician has not seen the patient but has received a diagnosis from attendants.
• Pathology is advanced enough to wipe out the PQRS of the case.

The results in such prescriptions would nonetheless depend on the accuracy of diagnosis and its pathological similarity to chosen medicine.

(This post is for the practitioners of Homoeopathy and not for patients for diagnosis and treatment of the said entity.)

Aude Sapere

Shivangi Jain
BHMS, MD, PGDMLE, PGDHHM
drshivangijain79@gmail.com
https://drshivangihomoeopathy.com/