Fear and anxiety thrive when we imagine the worst. Breathing is the short circuit for anxiety. Focus on inner peace and stillness.
Seek becoming greater aware.
AWARE an acronym:
A: Accept the anxiety. Don’t try to fight it.
W: Watch the anxiety. Just watch it like it is being projected onto a screen, and when you notice it, scale your level of fear and start to breathe longer on the out-breath.
A: Act normally. Carry on talking or behaving as if nothing is different. This sends a powerful signal to your unconscious mind that its over-dramatic response is actually not needed because nothing that unusual is going on.
R: Repeat the above steps in your mind if necessary. Repeat until the fear is not stressful and until you feel relaxed about whatever you choose to do next.
E: Expect the best. One of the greatest feelings in life is the realization that you can control fear much more than you thought possible.
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Most people are often in a state being preoccupied… forgetful of inner peace (true self); not really present at least during some of their time. Is your mind caught-up sometimes by worries, fears, by regrets, anger, by obsession? That is the state of “being forgetfulness” — here but, not here…. Caught-up by being preoccupied.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EDMR)
The Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense issued clinical practice guidelines that recommend EDMR for the treatment of PTSD. Perhaps, the rapid eye movement allows the patient less opportunity to consciously react to the distress that they are reviewing. The brain’s information processing system naturally moves toward mental health. Positive controlled outcome studies demonstrate that >80% of single-trauma victims no longer have post-traumatic stress after only three 90-minute sessions. Reportedly, Kaiser Permanente, found that 100% of the single-trauma victims and 77% of multiple trauma victims no longer suffer with PTSD after only six 50-minute sessions. EMDR Institute, Inc. reported that 77% of combat veterans were free of PTSD in 12 sessions.
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Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EDMR) 20/20 Report
. Francine Shapiro is the originator and developer of EMDR.
In 1987, she made the chance observation that moving her eyes from side to side appeared to reduce the disturbance of negative thoughts and memories. This experience led her to examine this phenomenon more systematically. Working with approximately 70 volunteers, she developed standardized procedures to maximize therapeutic outcomes, conducted additional research and a published randomized controlled study with trauma victims. After further research and elaboration of the methodology, she published a textbook in 1995 detailing the eight phases of this form of psychotherapy. EMDR is now recommended as an effective treatment for trauma in numerous international practice guidelines, including those of the American Psychiatric Association and the Department of Defense.
Dr. Shapiro is a Senior Research Fellow Emeritus at the Mental Research Institute in Palo Alto, California, Executive Director of the EMDR Institute in Watsonville, CA, and founder and President Emeritus of the EMDR Humanitarian Assistance Programs, a non-profit organization that coordinates disaster response and low fee training worldwide. see also: https://www.emdr.com/
This time, I want to share a video that delves into what people are saying about their progress of evolving by meditations – it ought probably give us a sense that meditation is a system, sure; beneficial too, yes; but also that meditating is very personally experienced.
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Meditation and the Power of the Mind – YouTube Published on May 2, 2012 A documentary that explores the practice of meditation and it’s effect on the mind and body.
So, I want to recall the most important contribution that I think I found about the truth. Meditation promotes well-being by reducing stress, depression, anxiety, blood pressure, addiction, by boosting immune systems and by improving our memory.
Forty years ago,Matthieu Ricard, a French genetic scientist left an intellectual life, moved to India and took up a study of Buddhism. He is now a western scholar of religion and he was recently claimed by brain research scientists to be the happiest man on the planet.
His daily routine of meditation made possible amazing brain scans demonstrate that if he is meditating on compassion, Ricard’s brain produces a level of gamma waves never before reported within neuroscience literature.
While his is the pinnacle of measures, you to may change your brain. You have the capacity to heal including all of your emotional confusions. If you set out to accomplish this, you can gradually increase your awareness and your inner peace by mindfulness. You can transform your brain, create new neural circuits and change the way your brain neurons more efficiently will communicate with each other.
Program Description
If happiness is an inner state, influenced by external conditions but not dependent on them, how can we achieve it? Matthieu Ricard presents factors that generally may increase or decrease well-being, happiness, authenticity, compassion, peace, and joy.
Happiness and joy may stimulate compassion and compassion may stimulate happiness and joy. This is ideal. This may then be noticed to be increasing positive energy, empathy, pro-social behavior, and the change within may serve as the kernel of an evolving moral-ethical framework.
Matthieu Ricard is a scientist turned Buddhist monk and a best selling author, translator, and photographer. He has lived and studied in the Himalayas for more than 35 years.
This recording is from Google Tech Talks in March of 2007
60 minutes Youtube watch?v=L_30JzRGDHI
A wellness approach in learning: act as though we don’t yet know anything more important — eliminate the inner ego voice from learning.
I pray to be released from any responsibility for making judgments and to learn as though this is all new to me. Later, I’ll review the important lesson again. Always when material is important in my life, I review the material many times.
Starting off into a new day, there is something to learn and something to share — what that is comes to me with my morning meditation — I don’t really even think about it until it comes — I remind myself, “This is my wonderful journey of self discovery. Love envelopes me and the gentle waves of peaceful waters and the light shine from my mind into the world around me.” As I face myself in honesty, open to guiding spirit, I turn my life over to God and I ask Him to allow me to do whatever I may to do His will — Thy Will, not mine be done.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama says “in today’s secular world, religion alone is no longer adequate as a basis for ethics… any religion-based answer to the problem of our neglect of inner values can never be universal, and so will be inadequate.” My religion practice is rooted in utmost fondness and enthusiasm in me. I love Jesus and being Christian. I also love all others as best I am able and this is certainly a growing condition in me, prompted by my love of Jesus’s words that make clear that we are to love God with all of our being and also love others as we would be loved. I realize that my world around me is a secular world where my religion is separate from societal norms and therefore that I must involve myself with others in ways that make me attractive; not by promoting my religion. I am to be a channel for love.
I hope that this lesson is helpful for you in your life of spiritual enlightenment — awakening the skill to foster well-being and for freedom, mastery of living in moments of serenity, inner peacefulness, joyfulness, and of course for sharing happiness.
Wellcasters relax! Too much stress in your life causes headaches, high blood pressure, tummy aches, memory loss and all other kinds of nasty stuff. But, how can you tell if you are showing stress symptoms? Check out our video for advice on how to tell when you’re stressed out and simple tips to relieve tension quickly. From little things you can do everyday to promote relaxation to strategies to cool off when you’re in the heat of the moment, we’ve got advice on the best ways to sit back and relax!
Multitasking is what culture demands of us… most of us stress out just simply because we aren’t naturally ready for intense multitasking… let’s look at how mindfulness allows us to manage thinking and stress; to maintain health and well-being.
Mindfulness Practices to Improve Well Being
with Larry Berkelhammer, PhD
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Program Description This presentation was given at Marin Center for Independent Living in 2013. It describes how and why mindfulness practice has the power to improve health and well-being. Mindfulness practice allows us to live fully in the moment, which allows us to liberate ourselves from rumination and anxiety. For more articles and talks on How to Live Well With Chronic Illness, visit http://www.larryberkelhammer.com
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I know I need certain simple techniques to get higher return from mindfulness. After all, I was practically an old man before I began. In fact, regrading multitasking — actually I am improved. However, it is because I focus more on the prsent one thing that I am better able to multitask. .
Greater self-awareness leads to greater options. Preface each behavior with “I am choosing.” By announcing to yourself that you are about to engage in a behavior, you create greater self-awareness.
Here are some examples:
I’m choosing to walk across the room.
I’m choosing to stop at the red light.
I’m choosing to stop eating before finishing what’s on my plate.
You can do this with simple behaviors or complex ones. The point is that announcing each behavior reduces automatic behaviors that we normally perform each day without any conscious awareness. This practice is a great antidote to the feelings of powerlessness that often accompany life with a chronic illness.
It is valuable for a number of reasons:
It serves as a mindfulness practice, making us fully aware of our behavior.
It serves to replace automatic behavior with conscious intention.
For those of us living with chronic illness, it serves to return a sense of mastery — a sense that we are in control of our lives.
It serves to continually remind us that we can choose our behavior in every moment of the day.
I’ll begin with a short story that Eckhart Tolle likes to tell:
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Two Zen monks, Tanzan and Ekido, were walking along a country road that had become extremely wet with mud and deep puddles after heavy rains. .
Near a village, they came upon a girl who was trying to cross the road, but the mud was so deep. it would have ruined the silk kimono she was wearing. Tanzan at once picked her up and carried her to the other side. .
The monks walked on in silence. Five hours later, as they were approaching the lodging temple, Ekido couldn’t restrain himself any longer. He finally snapped, “Tanzan, why did you carry that girl across the road? We monks are not supposed to hold girls like that.” .
“I put the girl down hours ago,” said Tanzan. “Are you still carrying her Ekido?” . .
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Sometime I just go with what the expert says. In this case, I have a few clarifying paragraphs.
The story that Tolle relates is used to illustrate a point that we have a vulnerability protection system. He calls it the ego.
I just want to clarify what happened (in this story).
First, the mind is not who we/you are. However, the body believes whatever thoughts that mind allows. Thus as the information is processed in the body, it actually changes subtly the body; the brain and molecules, etc… we know there are chemicals and brain waves and signals being transmitted throughout the brain-heart-gut-body (form, aka. mind-body, un-awakened consciousness). The information, together with form, is ever changing. Thinking, therefore, requiring time, occurs in form (as interpretations of information / consciousness) … not in a/the single unchanging mind (divine mind).
This is confusing and difficult when there is an upset.
In the story, Ekido believes that Tanzan did wrong by carrying the girl. The monks have been walking for a long time when Ekido finally tires of his burden. Ekido has been carrying his belief of the wrongness for hours. He’s been feeling upset. Finally, he relieves himself of this upset by confronting Tanzan rather than himself. He might have said right away to Tanzan, “I got uncomfortable with what happened. What is bothering me is my thinking that it was wrong. We are not supposed to hold women. Still, no harm came of it. She clearly needed some help. I ought to get over this.”
Instead, Ekido allows the disturbance to grow into greater discomfort. He begins to believe that Tanzan is the cause of his discomfort.
Negative thinking about it may have seemed to be the best thing. However, negativity attracts more negativity and the mind then is left feeling badly and having a pressing urge to find some relief. Typically, a person acts out when under this sort of pressure. If there is someone else that can be blamed, that seems the right thing then to do. The upset gets taken over by the body’s pain management system — the source of the pain being out there, Ekido accuses his friend of doing a wrong.
Ekido unknowingly was maintaining a separation from the present moment while he was feeling disturbed. This gets tiring. The disturbance feeds into a delusion that Tanzan is responsible for the upset. His mind is unable to break free of the discomfort while ruminating about the past event. Finally his mind then convinced him that the problem can be fixed by blaming Tanzan. Fortunately Tanzan feels free to accept that Ekido is needlessly upset and his reply is matter-of-fact rather than defensive. If Ekido wants to think excessively, he may. The thinking was tiring his mind. Since the incident is past and Tanzan was free of it when he put the girl down, Ekido wasted his time carrying the upset for miles.
There are two parts to Ekido’s problem. First off, he is excessively thinking.
. Here is a training video by Eckhart Tolle… “How do we break the habit of excessive thinking?”
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Eckhart explores excessive (addiction to) thinking, offering a handful of ways to put the stop to thoughts and to choose presence of now instead. When body sends a signal, mind gets a thought. You may allow this or you may choose to diminish the thought by coming back to the presence of now.
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A second problem for Ekido is that he didn’t have any control to change what upset him since the upset is about Tanzan’s action. The inner dialog lead to excessive thinking about something that was beyond his control. Some of us spend our time when dealing with people trying to change circumstance that are beyond our control. This is, it turns out, usually just a waste of time and energy.
We may even threaten, scold, manipulate, coerce, bully, plead, beg, shout, pout, bribe or try anything to make a situation go the “right” way — often, only to see things getting progressively worse before they get better. Since negativity attracts more negativity this is quite stressful and the mind-body then is left feeling badly.
Peace is my goal and tolerance, acceptance, compassion, genuine concern and loving presence is my way to get this. Getting better at this began for me with reducing stress and finding inner peace. I began to understand that I was reactive to the content of my life situations and that I was sacrificing sanity this way. Self-will was inadequate. Controlling my surroundings by exercising self-will was not healthy. I began to look for solutions and I found that there are hundreds of great ways to reduce stress and gain personal freedom. Today’s second video may help you to gain some peace of mind for dealing with stress.
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“How to live without Stress in your day-to-day life”
by Eckhart Tolle
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Learning how to achieve peaceful living may be much eased by knowing how to live without reacting to the “content” of our lives. There may be realization that the form of thought need not make a home in me as a lasting identity.
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I hope you find this training useful. I added some more in the comments section and there are additional related articles listed too.
Need help or want to collaborate with me?
e-mail me at thehunt4truth@yahoo.com
Bloggers, readers, meditation and mindful practice is AMAZING! Astounding!
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According to Ricard …
“In the Western world, meditation means sitting under a mango tree in a blissed out state. The prevailing idea is that you have to sit down and empty your mind. It’s not that at all. You have to clean up a bit. We have so many wandering and intrusive thoughts. So you have to be in control of your own mind. Meditation means inner freedom. Inner freedom doesn’t mean following every chain of thought. It’s like a sailor who takes the helm and decides where to sail instead of drifting with the current. If you want to generate particular state of mind, you do what it takes.”
“There was a lot of activity in his left prefrontal cortex which indicates a huge capacity for happiness; this man is very unlikely to be making negative choices about his experiences,” says Neuroscientist Richard Davidson
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“Meditation is not just blissing out under a mango tree but it completely changes your brain.”
The French genetic scientist left an intellectual life 40 years ago and moved to India to study Buddhism. He is now a western scholar of religion.
His daily routine of meditation made possible amazing brain scans that demonstrate that if he is meditating on compassion, Ricard’s brain produces a level of gamma waves never before reported within neuroscience literature.
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NOW, here begins the really amazing part Gamma brain wave production is associated with consciousness, attention, learning and memory. We want to train our brains to increase peace and serenity and this changes the brain — It’s like we come into unifying Loving Light… after time… the brain changes (maintenance required).
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FINDINGSHis skull was wired up with 256 sensors at the University of Wisconsin and its all been recorded — he’s got a happy and joyous mind — no doubt. Scans found excess activity in his brain’s left prefrontal cortex compared to its right counterpart, giving Ricard an abnormally large capacity for happiness.
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FINDINGSA larger volume of a specific brain structure generally increases the abilities to carry out specific functions associated with that structure. This is widely accepted based on the assumption that greater numbers of neurons will produce larger outputs and therefore may be more influential than smaller numbers of neurons.
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FINDINGS Researchers in neuroscience demonstrate that the prefrontal cortex plays a responsible role in forming of expectations based on actions and social control, predicting of outcomes, future consequences of activities, working toward goals, development of abilities to differentiate among conflicting thoughts, abilities to determine same and different and better and best. Abilities to suppress urges that may lead to socially unacceptable outcomes are developed by this area of the brain. Meditation boosts learning ability, improves brain functioning, and reduces stress!
Even people meditating for the first time will register a decrease in beta waves, a sign that the cortex is not processing information as actively as usual. After 20 minutes there is a huge decrease in beta activity — these brains are learning to be highly focused.
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Matthieu Ricard: “Compassion is not just some high-minded flaky concept that Buddhist monks and New Age hippies bandy about, it’s a very practical way to operate in a world that is incredibly stressful for just about everyone.”
FINDINGSMindfulness meditation, one type of meditation technique, has been shown to enhance emotional awareness and psychological flexibility as well as induce well-being and emotional balance. Scientists have also begun to examine how meditation may influence brain functions. This talk will examine the effect of mindfulness meditation practice on the brain systems in which psychological functions such as attention, emotional re-activity, emotion regulation, and self-view are instantiated. We will also discuss how different forms of meditation practices are being studied using neuroscientific technologies and are being integrated into clinical practice to address symptoms of anxiety, depression, and stress..
Share this one around… its time to change this world, one brain at a time… each to their own.
Let’s rid the world of social anxiety:
NOTE: Social anxiety is linked to anxiety, panic attacks, depression, psychosis (not otherwise specified), drug use, alcohol use, spontaneous violence, outbursts, character flaws, behavior problems, anger and rage; to name just a few dis-eases.
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Let’s work on it together… mindfulness is a tool for awakening mental health.
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FINDINGS Related to anxiety… this is empirical evidence… about Meditation benefits. These are FACTS: .
Personally, I am sure that practicing mindfulness meditation with some expert therapeutic guidance can speed healing of PTSD and possibly DID; maybe even NPD, BPD, and possibly even schizophrenia.
Meditation can speed recovery from grief.
It will probably heal some Anxiety NOS and episodic Depression.
Mindfulness can greatly decrease panic episodes… maybe cure it.
It can reduce Bipolar and Uni-polar disorder symptoms.
Mindfulness is a practice. It takes some time every day to build up mindfulness attention. With practice it really is beneficial and healthy; especially for the mind, of course. Mindfulness promotes overall good health as well as peace of mind.
My previous post on this subject was an in-depth exploration of the rippling effect (see: ripple-ing). In it, I wrote about my process — simplified for accepting reality and at the same time, how (as I believe) I affect reality — how subtly, I influence reality is more like it. In time this adds up.
Our thoughts confirm for us who we think that we are.
The process of rippling (correctly) has to do with being loving, compassionate, kindness and thus sharing this in our reality… This, in practice is truly beneficial for me and also for humanity. By rippling, I can apply mindful attention to sending loving compassion into the world. I had put it this way:
We may each send out Ripples of Blessings, Ripples of Social Justice, Ripples of Goodness, Ripples of Peace, and Ripples of Loving-Kindness — sending these past any barriers and over or around any boundaries to merge with the ripples of other waves of other positive ripples.
Some Buddhist monks are able to stay with a particular thought so completely that their body changes demonstrate this. I’ve watched many videos that demonstrate this. Let’s look at an example.
In fact, I’ve seen brain scans that demonstrate that monks are able to alter their brainwaves at will. I know by the medical reports and research — this is real and greatly beneficial… Is the brain spiritually wired?
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What might our thoughts be doing today? Without training, the ego runs the show and this is a frightening world often times then.
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If you didn’t read the original article, its written to summarize a practice for growth through mindfulness and peaceful serenity into a person with a very healthy outlook. The mindfulness of rippling is detailed in that previous article (ripple-ing).
If you are ready to learn more about the meditations, I have a simple mindfulness guided mediation for you today (or whenever you are ready):
Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them – that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.
– Lao Tzu
A poor man visited the temple daily.
Even after several years he found no change in his financial conditions. He was thus frustrated and one day, he complained to God for being unfair to him and not paying any heed to his needs.
He cried that he was not even in a position to buy a pair of sandals for himself.
He blamed God for not answering his prayers and vowed never to visit the temple again.
He left the temple in frustration, determined never to pray again. When he was halfway down the stairs, he saw a disabled man walking towards the temple. This man had lost one leg and was walking with the help of crutches.
The poor man could not control his curiosity and questioned the handicapped man, “Why do you come to the temple to pray when you have lost one leg?”
He was astonished to learn that the man had lost his leg in an accident just outside the temple.
He further questioned the man, “Don’t you feel cheated? Don’t you feel dejected that God has been unjust to you?”
The answer he received to this question transformed his thoughts.
The disabled man replied, “Look down my friend. Can you see the man who has lost both his legs? I am very lucky indeed. I met with an accident but lost only one leg. Parmatma (A Supreme Soul beyond knowledge and ignorance, devoid of all material attributes) has bestowed immense grace upon me due to which I still have the ability to walk and commute. The accident was so horrendous that it was impossible for me to survive. I too could have suffered from the same fate of being totally handicapped forever.”
The poor man who could not afford a pair of sandals was stunned at this response. He wondered to himself, this young man is leading a happy life even though he has lost one leg, and I am crying just for a pair of sandals? He is so grateful to God, as he has the ability to count his blessings. I am abled by all means, yet I am merely cursing my life. My greatest poverty is my disability to count my blessings!
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Comparing yourself
to more fortunate others
is a recipe for unhappiness
Counting on blessings that came to others may easily cause us to forget our own and this invites dejection. On the other hand comparing our situations and problems with those less privileged than us, makes us feel grateful and satisfied with what we have. How much we get, what we get, when we get blessings, how we get blessing is all due to our own process. Every individual binds different karma (the causality of future actions) and thus proceeds accordingly. However, we may as well choose how to percept situations fashioning these as the way we like; we can do so as we choose a reaction in every situation. Thus, while there may be no control in what passed, in a new moment, formation of concepts and stored emotion may be according to choice. No karma has the ability to determine our reaction and our perception if we set our precepts. Hence, we may strive to store even what is at first unpleasant as whenever we can and learn to accept whatever we cannot. Train your mind to avoid unhealthy comparison and unhealthy competition. Let’s be realistic — bad karma isn’t going to remove itself — it requires some action on our part. We have minds and hearts and mentors and all sort of Internet articles and so on — we are privileged and greatly blessed.
This actually arises in countless situations. For instance here is a humorous example:
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We are to learn to go with the flow. I have a perfect peaceful morning routine. One day my morning was disrupted. I felt some anger, frustration; Later, I felt disappointed because I didn’t get to do my morning routine. I was feeling stressed from changes to what I do usually. This was a disturbance that could ruin my day, keeping me frustrated for the rest of my the day. I became an observer of my thoughts; I became my self-examiner. I talked to myself. I changed my precept on this situation.
Breathe. When I feel myself getting angry or frustrated, I take a few deep breaths. This is an important step that allows me to get calm. Even to practice this by itself was years ago a great help for me.
Get a fresh perspective. This always helps me. I get upset over something happening and then I begin deep breaths, and take a step back. I focus away from the problem, until whatever happened doesn’t seem so important. Upon the upset of this day, I thought “Tomorrow or a week from now or a year from now, this disruption won’t matter a single bit. No one will care, not even me. So why remain upset about this? Just let it go, and soon it won’t be a big deal.”
Laugh.It helps me to see things as funny, rather than frustrating. I realize that its funny to act as though I am in control. Its hilarious. So, I bring myself to see the absurdity of acting as though I am being wronged. I can usually have things my way because I am accepting and peaceful and realistic. However, I cannot keep everything going my way just because I want to deserve this. I am a very small part in a vastly supermassive universe. I must change myself when things are beyond my control. Its either enjoy the ability to make choices about how I feel and think about some necessary changes or be upset. So, I laugh at myself.
Be reminded that this is perfection. The world is perfectly beautiful, as it is. Life is not static. There is a flow of change — things are never staying the same — perfection in our universe is moving from one moment to another moment — always — getting complex and more diverse and more beautiful. There is beauty in everything around me. So, I remember to see my life as perfect, just as it is — right now, in the flow. Recall, I already conditioned myself with the earlier relaxation breathing, thinking and laughing.
Accept what is beyond control and change what is not. It was my upset. I have the ability to do something to change my upsets. I cannot change the fact of what already happened. So, that day, I did what was best for me. I changed how I was thinking.
I go to a happy peaceful memory place in my head and then I get peaceful again and when I am calm and relaxed its much better for me and I can solve my problem without the ruin of my day. Sometimes, as with that day’s household problem, it involves getting an expert. Sometimes problems take days or weeks to get squared away. Some problems are longer lasting or even permanent or life threatening. Nonetheless, its my choice as to how I’ll either adapt or increase my suffering.
I’m working on reducing the suffering for me and for others — and for you.
Today’s Affirmation; I, Stephanie, (insert your name here if you like) have decided to enjoy whatever happens today as if it is exactly what I planned. I thrive when I live from love. I choose to see the innocent heart in every person, so that when they express the emotion they are living in the moment, I am able to empathize with them, comfort them and support them. I desire to share compassion, so that when I retire at night, I sleep sweetly. I am the person who is responsible for my attitude. My dreams manifest just as easily as a rose blossoms, because I am a human, here to co-create the world. I take great pleasure in trusting that every thought I think is powerful, so I choose my thoughts with forethought spending time with the productive thoughts, visualizing peaceful heartfelt connections happening the world over, which causes calmness…
“I believe that the very purpose of our life is to seek happiness. That is clear. Whether one believes in religion or not, whether one believes in this religion or that religion, we all are seeking something better in life. So, I think, the very motion of our life is towards happiness.”
Excerpt from a public talk The Way Toward Inner Peace
by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama
by FilmPRO, Italy
Organizer: Ven. Thamthog Rinpoche ~ Ghe Pel Ling
Director/Cinematographer: Matteo Passigato
Youtube watch?=-psluirNDJc
Program Description
Presented by Richard J. Davidson
In this talk, Richard J. Davidson explores scientific research on the neuroscience of positive human qualities and how they can be cultivated through contemplative practice. Distinctions among different forms of contemplative practices will be introduced and they will be shown to have different neural and behavioral consequences, as well as important consequences for physical health in both long-term and novice practitioners. New research also shows that meditation-based interventions delivered online can produce behavioral and neural changes. Collectively, this body of research indicates that we can cultivate adaptive neural changes and strengthen positive human qualities through systematic mental practice.
If happiness is an inner state, influenced by external conditions but not dependent on them, how can we achieve it? Matthieu Ricard presents factors that generally may increase or decrease well-being, happiness, authenticity, compassion, peace, and joy.
Happiness and joy may stimulate compassion and compassion may stimulate happiness and joy. This is ideal. This may then be noticed to be increasing positive energy, empathy, pro-social behavior, and the change within may serve as the kernel of an evolving moral-ethical framework.
Matthieu Ricard is a scientist turned Buddhist monk and a best selling author, translator, and photographer. He has lived and studied in the Himalayas for more than 35 years.
A wellness approach in learning: act as though we don’t yet know anything more important — eliminate the inner ego voice from learning.
I pray to be released from any responsibility for making judgments and to learn as though this is all new to me. Later, I’ll review the important lesson again. Always when material is important in my life, I review the material many times.
Starting off into a new day, there is something to learn and something to share — what that is comes to me with my morning meditation — I don’t really even think about it until it comes — I remind myself, “This is my wonderful journey of self discovery. Love envelopes me and the gentle waves of peaceful waters and the light shine from my mind into the world around me.” As I face myself in honesty, open to guiding spirit, I turn my life over to God and I ask Him to allow me to do whatever I may to do His will — Thy Will, not mine be done.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama says “in today’s secular world, religion alone is no longer adequate as a basis for ethics… any religion-based answer to the problem of our neglect of inner values can never be universal, and so will be inadequate.” My religion practice is rooted in utmost fondness and enthusiasm in me. I love Jesus and being Christian. I also love all others as best I am able and this is certainly a growing condition in me, prompted by my love of Jesus’s words that make clear that we are to love God with all of our being and also love others as we would be loved. I realize that my world around me is a secular world where my religion is separate from societal norms and therefore that I must involve myself with others in ways that make me attractive; not by promoting my religion. I am to be a channel for love.
I hope that this lesson is helpful for you in your life of spiritual enlightenment — awakening the skill to foster well-being and for freedom, mastery of living in moments of serenity, inner peacefulness, joyfulness, and of course for sharing happiness.
Oh yes, I’m back on happiness and changing your DNA and your brain chemistry too; and so I’m taking a closer look with my new friend Matthieu Ricard from his Google Tech Talks in 2007 at how to re-program brains. His lecture is stored in the Youtube video library (its so nice to browse Youtube occasionally–well, actually, I do daily).
A healthy mind should act like a mirror – faces can be reflected in a glass but none of them stick. Use the same technique with thoughts – let them pass through your mind but don’t dwell.
It’s impossible to stop thoughts from coming but focusing on a particular sound or the breath going in and out calms the mind, giving greater clarity. Controlling the mind is not about reducing your freedom, it’s about not being a slave to your thoughts. Think of it as directing your mind like a boat rather than drifting.
Be mindful – pay attention to the sensations of your breath going in and out. If you notice your mind wandering simply bring it back to focusing on your breath. This is known as mindfulness. You can apply it to other sensations to bring you into the ‘now’ rather than dwelling on the past or future. You could focus instead on heat, cold and sounds that you hear.
Once you’ve achieved some skill in this you can use that to cultivate qualities such as kindness, or dealing with disturbing emotions. He says everyone has felt all-consuming love but usually it lasts for about 15 seconds, but you can hold on and nurture this vivid feeling by focusing on it in meditation. If you feel it becoming vague you can consciously revive it.
Like when playing the piano, practicing the feeling for 20minutes has a far greater impact over time than a few seconds. Regular practice is also needed like watering a plant.
You can then use meditation to gain some space from negative emotions. Ricard says: ‘You can look at your experience like a fire that burns. If you are aware of anger you are not angry you are aware. Being aware of anxiety is not being anxious it is being aware.’ By being aware of these emotions you are no longer adding fuel to their fire and they will burn down.
You will see benefits in stress levels and general wellbeing as well as brain changes with regular practice in a month. Those who say they don’t have enough time to meditate should look at the benefits: ‘If it gives you the resources to deal with everything else during the other 23 hours and 30minutes, it seems a worthy way of spending 20 minutes,’ Ricard says.
A friend wants to know if I’m still Christian. YES, I am. Everything that I’m referring to from science and new age and Buddhist teachers is complimentary with Jesus’s teachings. I posted a couple of the most important Christian practices–in my opinion, 1 John (NIV) and the Our Father prayer are essential in Christian belief.
This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Soninto the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
In the Western world, meditation means sitting under a mango tree in a blissed out state. The prevailing idea is that you have to sit down and empty you mind. It’s not that at all. You have to clean up a bit. We have so many wandering and intrusive thoughts. So you have to be in control of your own mind. Inner freedom doesn’t mean following every chain of thought. It’s like a sailor who takes the helm and decides where to sail instead of drifting with the current. If you want to generate particular state of mind, you do what it takes.
“Meditation is not just blissing out under a mango tree but it completely changes your brain.” The French genetic scientist left an intellectual life 40 years ago and moved to India to study Buddhism. His daily routine of meditation made possible amazing brain scans that demonstrate that if he’s meditating on compassion, Ricard’s brain produces a level of gamma waves never before ever reported within neuroscience literature. NOTE: gamma brain wave production is associated with consciousness, attention, learning and memory.
His skull was wired up with 256 sensors at the University of Wisconsin and its all been recorded — he’s got a happy and joyous mind — no doubt. Scans found excess activity in his brain’s left prefrontal cortex compared to its right counterpart, giving Ricard an abnormally large capacity for happiness.
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A larger volume of a specific brain structure generally increases the abilities to carry out specific functions associated with that structure. This is widely accepted based on the assumption that greater numbers of neurons will produce larger outputs and therefore may be more influential than smaller numbers of neurons.
Researchers in neuroscience demonstrate that the prefrontal cortex plays a responsible role in forming of expectations based on actions and social control, predicting of outcomes, future consequences of activities, working toward goals, development of abilities to differentiate among conflicting thoughts, abilities to determine same and different and better and best. Abilities to suppress urges that may lead to socially unacceptable outcomes are developed by this area of the brain.
Many experts say that meditation early in the morning, before starting your day is best. This method is going to place positive energy into your mind and once it’s a habit it is positive energy that will normally last throughout the entire day.
1. Upon waking or after basic bathroom duties, place positive thoughts into your mind. Keep it simple, especially at first. Here are some examples:
I am a peaceful and relaxed person and I choose to be.
A top priority today is to develop a positive outlook and a peaceful mind.
I plan to radiate peace outwards from my heart for every person that I come into contact with.
Begin with one and then another and the last meditation phrase. Add others, that is fine. The objective is simple enough. You want to make sure that in ten or fifteen minutes from when you get started that you feel relaxed and in touch with a lasting positive and peaceful inner feeling.
Consider a good book on positive meditations. Pick up a simple book like this one:
I heard sound without sound.
2. Seek the experience of the stillness of mind and of being with a peaceful heart. If other thoughts emerge do not judge or focus on them, but do repeat:
I __your name__ seek peaceful relaxation. I am a peaceful soul… I am peaceful… I enjoy peaceful energy.
My mind is filling with peace… I can radiate peace into the world… I am a source of peace and happiness.
I feel gentle waves of peace flowing throughout my mind… I enjoy bringing peace and comfort into my day.
I felt my soul upon my reflection.
3. Feel stillness and silence envelope your mind. Imagine that you are now covered in a warm light as if from the sun. It is comforting and you may repeat:
I am the peaceful soul… I am a peaceful, loving soul.
My mind feels light and free of worry… I realize my nature is peace.
Peace of mind is my true nature.
A gentle kiss I placed upon the deep.
4. Peaceful thoughts flow through your mind just as a small branch’s single leaf kisses the still water. You feel the still waters gently move as you repeat:
I am a spirit of light and peace and I move gently on the peaceful waters of my mind. I feel gentle and peaceful.
I radiate peace and light to the world like a warm and gentle star… I radiate peace into the world as my mind fills with love and light.
The light and love envelopes me and the gentle waves of peaceful waters and the light shine from my mind into the world around me.
A gentle breeze my heart did make.
5. A gentle breeze is blowing and you feel the warmth of the sun and the stars now and as you begin to feel light and gentle you repeat:
I see on the screen of my mind a radiant light and this light feels gentle and soothing.
I am at peace with myself; this stillness of mind enables me to feel content and complete.
This is my wonderful journey of self discovery.
Peace of mind through meditation is a process. Radiant peace involves time and patience. Gentleness (as a reward) comes along in time with practice of peacefulness meditations. The outcome for you is that your energy increases as radiant peacefulness day by day increases in you. The benefit extends to others and comes back around to you again as others look upon what you radiate as attractive and appealing.
I certainly enjoy being attractive, empathetic and compassionate. It sometimes comes back around in just subtle ways. In certain circumstances, it calls me by voice of others to step forward. Humility too became genuine and attractive in me.
Let me know how this practice works out for you.
Thanks for reading (spiritual topics in a secular world),
Eric
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Meditation Increases Empathy(Christopher Rivas: lifestyledezine.com) research summary: Richard Davidson, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Focus on inner peace and stillness.
Eric
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He blamed God for not answering his prayers and vowed never to visit the temple again.
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