Suffering = Pain x Resistance

This is a formula developed by Buddhist teacher Shinzen Young to describe how our suffering is not caused by the pain (physical, emotional, or psychological) we experience, but by our resistance of it. In other words, suffering is not caused by the actual events that we experience, but by our reaction to them. When we struggle against our experiences, we suffer for it. The path to eliminating suffering is to fully accept our experiences.

While this concept of suffering has its origins in Buddhism, it is not exclusively Buddhist. Many therapists in the West have embraced the philosophy of acceptance. Indeed, research into acceptance based therapies has shown them to be as effective, or more effective, than traditional therapies for some mental conditions, such as anxiety, depression, borderline personality disorder, and others.

But you don’t have to be diagnosed with a mental condition to benefit from acceptance. Learning to accept your experiences is also a key part of learning and growing from them.

But how can accepting a bad experience be a good thing?

In order to understand how acceptance works, its important to differentiate between suffering and pain. According to the philosophy, pain itself is not subjective. Its part of the reality of experience. If you hit your thumb with a hammer, it hurts. If you break up with your partner, it hurts. If a loved one dies, it hurts. There is no avoiding that pain. However, you can choose how you relate to that pain. The way you relate to the reality of pain determines how much you suffer because of it.

This may seem like a crazy notion to many, particularly those of us from Western cultures, where we are taught from birth that pain is something to be avoided or limited. But when you consider that pain is almost always accompanied by emotion, it begins to make sense (at least I think it does;) ). If you can think of a time when you were in pain, and allowed your emotions to run wild, versus another time when you were in pain, but were able to keep a cooler head, you may find that your suffering (not your pain) was less when you were in control.

This is an example of how pain and suffering are not the same thing. In fact, martial artists, athletes, and the military train to separate the pain from the suffering to enable them to push beyond normal physical and emotional limits. Marathon runners learn to live with the physical and psychological pain of running 24 miles. There are countless stories of how military members in combat continue to fight on despite horrific wounds. Holocaust victims and prisoners of war report that their ability to accept their situations and remove themselves from the pain they experienced enabled them to survive and even thrive during their captivity.

These are all examples of how changing the way we relate to pain changes the way we experience it. By doing so we not only eliminate suffering, but can also have a great influence the world around us.

The paradox… and how it works

After reading that last sentence, you may have thought, “Hold on! Wait a minute! How can I accept what is going on and change it?” This is the paradox of acceptance.

Think about a time when you were really – and I mean really – attached to an idea or particular way of doing something; e.g. you were being really really stubborn. Maybe somebody you knew or worked with had a different idea than yours. If you were dead set on your own idea, how would you react to the other person’s idea? If you are like most people, you would probably fight for your own point of view even if all evidence showed you were wrong, and maybe even get a bit emotional about it. You may not even realize that the other person’s way of doing the thing – whatever it is – could be a better way. By being unable to consider the other’s point of view, you eliminate the chance of creating a better outcome.

If we become wedded to a particular way of doing something, and continue to try and do it the same way over and over even though it does not work well – or at all – we forfeit the possibility that we can actually change the situation.

Both of these are examples of how not accepting reality – that someone may have a better idea, or that the way we are doing something does not work – causes suffering and prohibits us from being able to change it.

On the other hand, if we could remove emotion and look at reality in an unfiltered way – in other words if we could accept reality for what it is – we put ourselves in a position to expand our awareness, use our creativity, and consciously respond to the situation instead of simply reacting to it emotionally. In this way we have much more ability to influence reality.

Acceptance and personal growth

Acceptance greatly increases your ability to grow as a person. In fact, personal growth is impossible without it. A key element of personal growth is the ability to self reflect, or to see ourselves for who we really are, and who we could become. If we are unable to accept our flaws, weakness, or shortcomings, we cannot hope to ever overcome them.

This is the same paradox discussed above. By not accepting ourselves for who we are, we may be tempted to fight against our flaws, creating greater suffering and actually deepening the flaws by obsessing over them. But, if we can look at ourselves, and acknowledge that we have flaws, and look at these flaws non-judgmentally, and accept them, then we unblock our ability to improve ourselves.

For example, let’s say that I am horrible at math. If I deny that I am horrible at math, and refuse to accept that I am horrible at math, how can I ever hope to improve my math skills? If I don’t accept this flaw, I won’t feel compelled to study more, take a class, or find a tutor. Or, I may decide that math just isn’t important, and avoid the flaw altogether. Both situations are potentially very limiting.

But if I accept that I am horrible at math, and look at the flaw objectively (without judgment), then I open up the possibility of finding ways to improve my math skills. Doing so not only results in improving those skills, but also in self-awareness, which leads to personal growth.

Acceptance can be a difficult concept for many, particularly in Western societies where we are taught to not accept bad situations or imperfections. We are taught (or at least I was) that in order to change we never accept imperfections, and must fight against them. This sometimes works, but more often than not, is the source of great suffering – even if the outcome is eventually good.

Acceptance may also be misunderstood as pacifism. This is not the case. Acceptance really means accepting reality for what it is. In doing so, we are able to view that reality non-judgmentally, without emotion, and open up the possibility of responding to reality consciously, not instinctively. Conscious responses are always more effective than reactive responses, and give us much more flexibility to deal with and change our reality.

All of us have experienced that gut busting feeling after eating way too much, too fast. Most of the time when I’ve been in this situation, I look back on it and don’t even remember enjoying the culprit of my discomfort. I probably ate whatever it was so fast that it was just that much easier to shove more of it down my throat. The only thing that matters is filling the void and stopping my stomach from growling.

Now, before you judge, I believe that most of us eat this way. Sure, we have our favorite foods, and we may enjoy – to a certain degree – whatever we are eating. But, if we are honest, most of us will have to admit that many times our meals simply serve the purpose of comfort.

So before I go into what I mean by “mindful eating,” I’d like you to participate in an experiment. Think about your last meal. Now really describe it. Go ahead, write it down. Now look at what you wrote. How descriptive is it, actually? If your description is like most people’s, you will have written what it was that you ate, and how good it was. You may have even written down some general descriptions of how it tasted. But, these are most likely very general.

For example, a typical description may be something like:

• Hamburger, fries, and a chocolate milkshake.
• All were very good, but the fries were a little salty. The milkshake really filled me up; it was very thick.
• I really enjoyed the meal. I was in a hurry, it was quick, and it tasted good.
• I’m satisfied, but probably ate more than I should have.

But what does this actually tell you other than you ate a hamburger, fries, and a chocolate milkshake, it was “good,” and it filled you up. How mindful are you really being about what you ate?

What is mindful eating?

Mindful eating is attentive eating. This means actually paying attention to what, and how, you eat. It means being in the present moment when you eat. When you eat mindfully, you pay focus on the tastes and textures of the food you are eating. You also pay attention to the thoughts, reactions, and sensations you have to each bite or chew.

Mindful eating is actually meditative eating. It is about experiencing your meals, not simply consuming them.

How to eat mindfully

Eating mindfully can be challenging because its something that most of us never really considered, much less attempted. As I mentioned before, mindful eating is a form of meditation. Fundamentally, eating mindfully is about really paying attention to how you experience your meals.

To get started, find a piece of chocolate (not a bar of chocolate – just a piece). Now find someplace where you can concentrate on the experience of eating it. Notice how the chocolate feels in your hands, how it looks, how it smells.

Now, take a small bite of the chocolate. Notice the texture. Really think of how you would describe it. Same with the taste. Are there nuances? Is it dark, milky, nutty? Again, be specific. Really attempt to identify the tastes, textures and other descriptors of the chocolate. Take your time. If it helps, close your eyes.

As you are noticing how the chocolate feels and tastes, also notice how you are reacting to it. What are your thoughts, emotions, physical reactions? A really good piece of chocolate should evoke many of each! Notice how the chocolate feels as you swallow it.

Now repeat with every bite. Don’t gobble the chocolate down. Give yourself a chance to experience what it is like to really enjoy your food. Try writing down a description of this experience, and compare it to what you wrote before. I’ll bet you will see a big difference. I also bet you will feel more fulfilled.

As I’ve mentioned before in previous posts, we all need to take time to unwind periodically. The daily challenges and frustrations we all face add stress and tension to our bodies and minds that can have serious effects on our physical and mental health.

Taking a few minutes each day to focus inwards and clear our minds and bodies of tension can help us be happier, healthier and more productive people.

This MP3 is a deep relaxation meditation that focuses on breathing and mental imagery to literally melt away the stress and tension from your body, and will leave you refreshed and relaxed. The exercise is designed to take 15 minutes, but can be done in as little as 7 or 8 and still have good benefits.

You can either listent to the MP3 online, or feel free to download it as well. Its free, and its yours to use whenever you like.

Try it! Let me know how you like it.

When most people think of psychology they think of a mentally ill person laying on a couch having his psyche dissected by Freudian-type person who asks a lot of questions about the patient’s mother.

Well, to be sure there is still some of that kind of therapy going on, but psychology has changed quite a bit since Freud and Jung. Much of the emphasis on modern psychology is still diagnosis and treatment of mental illness.

However, another approach that focuses less on treating mental illness, and more on improving healthy people’s lives, and keeping them healthy, is gaining popularity. This school of psychology is known as positive psychology.

If you have read much of my blog, or those of the hundreds of other personal development bloggers out there in the blogosphere, you have most likely been exposed to positive psychology. Indeed, if you have read any of the popular self-help books, you already know what positive psychology is about.

What are some examples of positive psychology?

Positive psychology is not just about making people “feel good,” (although I would argue there is some value in that alone). It is about preparing people mentally and emotionally to live happy, successful, and fulfilling lives.

A good example of positive psychology at work is teaching people the value of introspection, mindfulness, and reframing to enable them to react appropriately to life’s challenges, or to align their actions and values. Some of these same techniques are used to treat mental illness such as depression and anxiety, but can also be effectively applied to healthy people to help them better their lives.

Techniques such as NLP, hypnosis, and even clinical practices such as cognitive-behavioral therapies are also very useful when applied in the context of positive psychology.

Teaching people stress relief methods, or other forms of self-care such as the importance of exercise, relaxation, and a healthy diet are also forms of positive psychology. Other forms of positive psychology include helping people focus on their successes, teaching them to learn from failure, and how to make criticism work in their favor.

As you can see, the possibilities are limitless.

An emphasis on positive psychology can make serious improvements in your life, and in the lives of others around you. This does not mean that there is no place for other forms of psychology. The reality is that there is a lot of trauma out there in the real world, and modern psychology has developed some very effective treatments to help people overcome their challenges with mental illness. However, it’s important to realize that psychology is not just for the sick. It can benefit us all.

If you love learning you are in luck, because there is simply no way you can avoid learning, every day, all the time. You have no choice because life is learning.

How so? In the most basic sense, all of our actions are adaptive. In other words, we behave with intent, with motivation. This motivation may be conscious, or unconscious, but what we do is not random.

What are we adapting to? Simple, we are adapting to things that happen inside and around us. That may sound confusing, but to clarify, every perception we have is interpreted by our brain. This interpretation is complex as each piece of information we receive through our senses passes through many filters that have been created over our life through our own, unique subjective experiences.

So everything that has ever happened to us, is happening to us, and ever will happen to us, adds to our subjective experience, and helps to create the filters we use to receive and process all that happens around us.

In addition to strengthening our filters, or possibly creating new filters, our subjective experiences actually create our maps of reality. They literally shape how we view the world around us.

And our perceived reality is what we are constantly adapting to.

So what are you learning?

As you can see, you are constantly learning. Some of the lessons you learn consciously, such as when you study for a math exam, or realize that touching a hot stove is bad. Other lessons you learn passively.

Information and experiences that you may not even be aware of are adding to your unconscious mind’s body of knowledge, and in turn are building and strengthening filters, adding to your map, and shaping your reality.

Be an active participant in your learning

You may begin to understand why it is very important to pay attention to the subjective experiences you may be exposing yourself (or your kids!!!) to. It is equally important to process your experiences critically and mindfully to ensure you are learning the right lessons from them.

Some ways to process your experiences are mediation, journaling, counseling, therapy, hypnosis, or simply discussing them with a friend or family member. All of these methods are great ways to increase awareness of the meanings your mind is assigning to your subjective experiences, and to possibly even change or reframe those meanings as appropriate.

By becoming an active participant in your life’s education you can direct your lessons, and create a map of reality that better serves your life’s purpose.

We all need an occasional mental vacation; a time where we can tune out, switch off, and simply not worry about the demands that pull our lives in a hundred different directions all at once. Without the occasional break, we run the risk of burnout, depression, or even physical illness. However, by making time to unplug we can actually improve our efficiency, performance, and live happier, healthier lives.

Here are a couple of ways to take a quick mental vacation

Deep breathing. Although we are rarely aware of it, breathing has a remarkable healing power. Simply taking the time out to consciously breath can immediately reduce stress, focus the mind, and help us effectively deal with immediate challenges. Back in April I shared a 10 second breathing exercise for regaining balance. I recommend that you complete this exercise several times each day, even when you are not stressed, to maintain an even keel. It can also be very helpful during stressful situations.

Another excellent breathing exercise to use in stressful situations is the Stop -> Breath -> Think -> Act method taught to Rescue Divers. I introduced this method on the blog back in August, 2009, so won’t repeat it here. Just follow the link.

Another excellent breathing exercise to gain calm and balance is the 10 Second Breath. I recommend using this method any time you are feeling stress build, or before you go into a stressful situation. Like the 10 seconds to perfect balance exercise, it can also be used for a quick mental vacation, and should be completed any time you want to simply relax.

The process is exactly what the name implies; simply take a slow, deep, 10 second breath. The 10 Second Breath can be done with eyes open or closed, sitting, lying or standing, or in just about any situation. Simply breathe in deeply, for a slow 5 seconds, then breath out slowly for another 5 seconds. Repeat as many times as necessary. I often use this method in preparation for meditation, repeating the process 3 or more times until I am relaxed and calm.

When you only have time for a quick mental vacation, any of these breathing methods will work wonders. If you have time for a longer vacation I find mental imagery makes for an excellent and relaxing trip.

Mental imagery. Mental imagery is a form of meditation that has many uses. Professional athletes use it to prepare for big events, business executives use it before going into important meetings, surgeons use it to visualize complex operations before actually having to perform them. In short, visual imagery can be and is used to enhance performance. It can also be very useful for gaining and maintaining balance, managing stress, and achieving general well-being.

To start your mental vacation, find a calm, quite, relaxing place. If you have it you may put on some soft, calming music, or even burn a candle or some incense to help set the mood. Get comfortable, close your eyes, and breathe deeply until you feel yourself starting to relax. The 10 Second Breath works great for this part. As you begin to feel calm, focus on your body, and allow your muscles to relax. Start with your head – your brow, eyes, jaw – and move downwards along your body – shoulders, arms, chest – all the way down to your toes, and spend a few moments on each area to notice how the muscles relax. Once you are relaxed, you are ready to begin your vacation…

Now imagine yourself in a relaxing, enjoyable, and serene place. Perhaps it’s a beach, or a glen. Maybe it’s someplace you have actually been, or someplace you create in your own mind. Wherever it is, make it perfect for your purposes in your own mind. Notice the details – the textures, sounds, smells, quality of the light and air – as you allow the place to form in your mind. Totally immerse yourself in the moment and place, and allow yourself to relax. You can remain in this place for as long as you like, and you can always come back after you leave.

When you are ready to come back from vacation, simply take a few deep breaths, slowly open your eyes, and feel totally relaxed and balanced.

One of the great things about your mental vacation is it doesn’t cost a thing! Only a few minutes a day. And since you are creating it, the vacation is perfectly custom made for you every time you go there.

I encourage you to visit often!

Empathy is an important part of any relationship. Being able to view things from another’s perspective, place yourself in their position, and feel what they feel makes forming very deep bonds possible. But too often, even the most compassionate people avoid opportunities to empathize and bond with those who should be closest to them.

Husbands and wives, parents and children, families and others sometimes get so preoccupied and “used to” each other that they simply stop making the effort, or worse, don’t realize an effort is needed. Usually, lack of empathy is not malicious, or even realized until the relationship splinters, and then there is surprise. The emotional bank account is empty.

The good news is that there are ways to ensure that the emotional bank account stays in the green. I’ve listed some of these ways in a previous post, so won’t repeat them here. Instead, I’m going to focus on building emotional connections. And the best way to do this is to become a collector of emotional moments.

What does it mean to be a collector of emotional moments?

When I talk about becoming a collector of emotional moments, what I mean is looking for opportunities to connect emotionally with others. And when those opportunities arise, never miss them, and always celebrate them. As you take the opportunity to recognize, celebrate and collect these emotional moments, your relationships leave the mundane and practical, and become emotional themselves. In other words, they deepen on an empathic level.

Dr. John Gottman talks about these special emotional moments being like pearls in a string of pearls. Each pearl is unique and represents a time when each person is fully present in the moment with the other, and connecting on a deep level. As this string of pearls gets longer, the relationship deepens and the emotional bank account grows. As it does, each partner in the relationship becomes more mindful of the other, and better able to be empathic towards the other, even in difficult times. The relationship grows beyond superficial and can withstand the inevitable disagreements and challenges every relationship faces.

How do you start?

The first step in becoming a collector of emotional moments is to make a determination that the relationship is worth deepening, because like most things, developing the necessary skills takes time and effort. Once you have made the decision to deepen the relationship, then you begin to look for these moments. This requires that you be present, and attuned, to your partner.

Notice when he expresses himself emotionally, and recognize the emotional expression as a bid for connection, even if it may not seem so. Facial expressions, tones, body language are all clues to your partner’s emotional state. Look for when they are happy, sad, angry, fearful, or in any other emotional state and be present, unconditionally. Let her know that you recognize and understand their emotions with your own expressions, words and gestures. Its that simple. Mere acknowledgement and understanding, without argument or excuses, build emotional connections, and the emotional bank account.

The challenge and the payoff

The challenge in becoming a collector of emotional moments is usually that doing so requires significant changes in relationship habits. To be a good collector, you have to proactively look for and seize on opportunities to connect with others. You have to be present and mindful, and you have to sometimes put yourself at risk of your partner’s anger or even contempt, without reacting defensively or arguing… even when you are convinced you are right. You just have to believe that at some point you will have the opportunity to share your point of view when it can be heard by your partner. This takes courage and faith.

But, the payoffs are tremendous, and if you have the faith and courage to become a collector, your relationships will reach new levels of meaningfulness.

To learn more about deepening your relationships, and becoming a collector of emotional moments, order a copy of Dr. Gottman’s book, The Relationship Cure.

Grounding is a way of detaching yourself from an emotionally painful situation. Although it is a form of distraction to remove yourself emotionally from a situation, it is not the same as avoidance. The difference between grounding and avoidance is that grounding is used to create space between yourself and the emotion or event. Once you are detached from the event or emotion you are better able to deal with or process it. Avoidance is simply running away from the emotion or event without any attempt to deal with it. Grounding is healthy and avoidance is not.

How to use grounding

You can use grounding any time and anywhere, without anybody needing to know about it. The process is best used when you first start to notice unwanted emotions. If you wait too long to ground yourself, it may be more difficult as powerful emotions take over.

When grounding it is important to return to the present moment, and avoid dwelling about the past or the future. Also, avoid judgmental thinking. Try to remain detached from the emotion or situation. I find it useful to literally try to witness the situation as a third person in my own mind.

A good way to start is to use the “10 seconds to perfect balance” method I wrote about previously. The method is a great way to return to the present moment very quickly, and gain distance from the situation.

The 3 ways of grounding

There are 3 basic ways of grounding: mental, physical, and self-soothing.

Mental grounding involves refocusing your mind. You can visualize a calming or joyous event or experience, recall and mentally describe a past event or place in detail, focus your mind on a song, or anything else that requires your complete mental attention. Remember, the goal is to distract yourself from the unwanted emotion or events that are causing it. So, it is best to mentally ground to something that is unrelated.

An example of mental grounding is recounted by prisoners of war who survived for years under the most awful conditions imaginable by focusing their mental attention on reciting poetry, or visualizing themselves in a different place. Meditation is a very powerful way of sharpening your mental grounding skills.

Physical grounding is about focusing your senses and becoming fully aware of your surroundings. You may notice details such as designs on a chair, or the colors of a painting. You can also focus on any sounds, particularly those that are soothing. The goal is to become completely attuned to and aware of your environment as it is in the present moment. A good way of diverting attention from painful emotions is to take a cool shower. You can also go to the gym, or go for a run. Walking meditation is another good activity for physical grounding, as is breathing meditation.

Self-soothing is the third basic way of grounding yourself. This technique is closely related to cognitive therapy, where people are taught to recognize their self-talk, and change it so that it is less hostile or negative. Do this by thinking kind, uplifting, or soothing thoughts about yourself, others, or the situation. Instead of thinking, “there is no way I can do this!” think, “this is really difficult, but I’ve done things that are more difficult and I’m sure Ill get through this.” Focus on the positives of a situation, or people around you. Most importantly, think about yourself in kind and nonjudgmental ways.

Grounding may be very difficult as you are starting to learn and use the techniques. You are, after all, retraining yourself to break emotional habits. However, as you continue to persevere these techniques will become natural and require less effort. Learning to ground yourself can change your life forever. By doing so you will have better relationships, improved health, and a new perspective on life.

The tip is the conscious mind; or the part of the mind that is responsible for our every day thoughts. It evaluates, judges, assesses, makes decisions, and rarely rests, except maybe when we are asleep.

There is a much larger part of the mind below the surface; this is the unconscious mind. Although we are not actively aware of it, the unconscious mind is vastly larger than the conscious mind. It is responsible for processing information, making snap decisions, governing emotions, controlling our nervous system, storing and recovering memories, and much, much more…

It is the unconscious part of the mind that stores our potential to learn and grow. It is the part of the mind that truly defines who we are. This is the part of the mind where our values… our real values… reside. These values are often not the same values that our conscious mind espouses.

The values of the unconscious mind are the ones that actually govern our actions. For instance, our conscious mind may tell us, and the world, that we value honesty above all else… yet our actions may contradict the message.

Often times our conscious mind will view the world in “black and white,” or “right and wrong.” Yet, we may find justifications for when we violate what our conscious mind says is wrong. Why? Because our unconscious mind recognizes that the world is not digital, it’s not “0 or 1.” It is infinity. It is not “black and white,” but rather shades of gray. Our conscious mind creates reality from our experiences and cultural upbringing, whereas our unconscious mind recognizes reality for what it is… a mere creation of the conscious mind. A false representation constructed through our senses, which are by definition detached from the physical world around us.

Think about this: Your eyes, ears, nose, skin… all of your sensory paraphernalia… really just collect signals that are then sent via neuropathways to your brain, which is encased in a perfectly dark, soundless, sterile environment totally separated from the outside world. And when the signals arrive, they are then passed through a number of cognitive filters that are created by your experiences, beliefs, and (conscious) values, before they are used to create your map of reality.

In other words, the signals your brain receives are used to create and add to your existing model of the world. In most cases they are made to fit that model. Information that does not fit is either manipulated to conform to your model of reality, or discarded entirely. (Actually, the unconscious mind discards nothing, which as we will see later, is extremely important). This is the basis of what psychologists call confirmation bias, and it is why people can have the exact same experiences, at the same time, and have entirely different recollections and interpretations of those experiences. It is also why people with strong beliefs find it so difficult to view the world in any other way than they have grown to accept it.

The only way to make a real impact on your reality is to access the unconscious mind and unlock alternative interpretations of your sensory inputs. There are a couple of ways to do this. You can do so willingly, through hypnosis, meditation, or some other deep reflective practice. Or, you can be forced to re-assess your conscious interpretations through intense or ongoing traumatic experience. Such experiences create what is known as cognitive dissonance, which makes the false interpretations of the conscious mind so unavoidable and transparent that they must be re-evaluated. In doing so, the unconscious is activated and the process of re-evaluation and growth occurs.

Obviously, the voluntary option is normally much less painful. But even trauma may have its positive effects.

What is the collective unconscious?
Carl Jung, perhaps the second most famous name in pscychology after Freud, coined the phrase “collective unconscious” in his 1939 work, “The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious.” He suggested that, in addition to the personal consciousness we are part of a greater, shared consciousness of humanity. This collective unconscious accounts for values and concepts that are shared among all human kind. Unlike the personal conscious, which is developed from our personal experience, the collective unconscious is inherited from our ancestors. In other words, it is part of our innate being. It is not learned through individual experience.

While some people, even a handful of pscyhiatrists and psychologists, may view the idea of a collective consciousness as so much hippie, new age, nonsense, genetic research and neuroscience is now providing a basis for the concept.

Even the most skeptical psychologists and scientists accept that personality is influenced by a combination of genetic and environmental factors. The implication of this acknowledgement is that, to some degree, personality characteristics are passed down from generation to generation through genetic code. We also generally accept that our personality influences the way we view and interpret the world around us. In other words, these codes may influence our values.


What about choice?
The notion that we may effectively be born with predispositions to particular ways of viewing the world does not necessarily mean that we are predestined to do so. Just as scientists are discovering the influence of genetics on our personalities and values, they are also discovering that environmental factors influence our genes. In other words, we may have genetic predispositions to certain ways of viewing our world, but these genes are activated by our experiences. Hence, when we say our values are passed down from our parents, what we mean is that the environment we grow up in and the people we grow up around actually influence and activate our genes.

Sounds pretty far out there, I admit, but there is a growing body of scientific evidence that supports this theory.

Human connections
One possible way that our interactions with other people may act on our genes may be explained by recent discoveries in neuroscience. These discoveries seem to support the theory that human beings form mind-to-mind connections with each other on a neurological level. These connections happen unconsciously and automatically in virtually every encounter we have.

The facilitators of these connections are called mirror neurons. And we humans have a lot of them, which is a good thing, because mirror neurons are essential to learning and empathy. Mirror neurons work just as their name implies. They mirror in ourselves, on a neurological level, what we witness others experience. In other words, when we see another person eating a banana, mirror neurons fire in the same area of the brain that is responsible for eating a banana ourselves. Likewise, if we watch another person swing a baseball bat, we actually experience on a neurological level what it is like to swing the bat. In this way we learn by watching others. In fact, neuroscientists believe that mirror neurons are essential for learning, especially in infants and children.

Similarly, when we think about doing something, or rehearse it in our mind, as we may do during visualization, the very same neurons that would fire if we were actually doing the event fire when we are just imagining it. This is why meditation and guided visualization are such powerful learning tools.

Realizing the importance of mirror transmitters helps us understand why it is that moods are contagious as well. When we observe someone else in any given mood we receive cues from that person that we may not even be consciously aware of. Although science has not mapped out precisely how this works, I speculate that these cues are then processed and mimicked in our own minds by mirror neurons, which generate the same feelings, moods, etc. that we detect in the other person. This mechanism would also explain the workings of empathy, or how we can immediately interpret other’s facial expressions, etc.

So why is this important?
Recognizing that we share a collective consciousness is valuable on both philosophical and practical levels. Philosophically, this realization should reinforce our sense of community, and make us want to understand the actions of others without judging them. This in itself would go a long way in resolving conflicts between people, and even nations.

On a practical level, recognizing our abilities to spread our moods and energy to others is extremely valuable. When we understand the effect our moods may have on others we can become more conscious of how we are feeling to create moods that are desirable in other people. Imagine a platoon sergeant that is leading his men into a dangerous mission. He knows from his training and experience that if he shows fear, his men will be afraid and this may put them and the mission in danger. So he composes himself prior to briefing his men and prior to going on the mission. His men draw courage and confidence from his demeanor. A less extreme example commonly occurs with parents and their children. If Mom or Dad view going to the dentist with dread, so will the kids. But if Mom and Dad adopt a positive attitude to going, then kids will be less fearful.

The lesson from this is that we are all connected on a neurological level, and have tremendous ability to affect others and the world around us without even realizing it. So it is important to be aware of your moods, states, and attitudes. They are contagious.