Science of the SpiritS


Bulb

The drawing effect: Improve your memory by drawing pictures

girl with dragon
A recent study showed that drawing helps to create a more cohesive memory trace that better integrates visual, motor and semantic information and a significant recall advantage for words that were drawn as compared to those that were written.

From caffeine to specific herbs, memory can be enhanced in so many ways. However, drawing pictures of information that needs to be remembered has been found to be a strong and reliable strategy to enhance memory.

The study showed that drawing helps to create a more cohesive memory trace that better integrates visual, motor and semantic information.

Comment: See also:


Candle

How to perform a "despacho" ceremony: A portal to the soul of the world

Despacho Ceremony
When I stayed in a Q'eros village at 16,000 feet in the Andes last year, I was blessed to participate in several "despacho" blessings performed by the Q'eros shamans. To the Q'eros, the primary spiritual principle is one of "ayni," which refers to a sort of spiritual reciprocity. They believe that "Pachamama" (Mother Earth) is inherently nurturing when all is in balance. When things go awry and this reciprocity is not honored, Pachamama withholds her blessings and may even become hostile. The fields may not yield as many potatoes, and natural disasters may destroy their homes or their people.

No Entry

The importance of saying "No" in a healthy life

woman holding her hands up saying no
© www.annaaparicio.com
In the health and fitness arena, taglines often sell the idea of "accept no limits." After all, we're supposed to believe in ourselves, push through boundaries, improve exponentially and show them all, right? Dramatic images, big numbers and extreme makeovers get the spotlight. And when people work hard for what they achieve, I think it's great. My own primary focus on MDA is helping people live their best life with the least amount of pain, suffering and sacrifice possible. To that end, I offer ample positive advice for what to do. Inherent to the bigger picture, however, (and just as critical in my opinion) is the skill of discerning what not to do. Today I'm talking limits—and how knowing where to draw the line is essential to living an awesome life.

I know we all live in a culture of "more is better." At various points of my life I've been tempted by that siren song. (I am a former Cardio King after all.) And yet the last few decades have affirmed a very different truth for myself and for others I've observed.

Because of the work I do, I meet a lot of people who are motivated to live a healthier life. It's one of the things I love most about what I do in fact. And, yet, as a result I also see the full spectrum of behavior around "healthy" action.

Comment: Dr. Gabor Maté goes into an extensive study on what happens to people when they refuse to say no when they need to: in short, their body says "no" for them through illness and breaking down. Whether a person is pushing themselves too hard or feeling outside pressure to push past their limits and boundaries, eventually the body will say no. Pushing oneself to excel is certainly a good thing overall, but one must respect one's own limits and boundaries and find balance in their lives and their pursuits. For more information:


Rainbow

Remembering and savoring positive memories is a practical and effective way to lift your mood

happy memory, couple in love
The study examined how positive emotions can be used in the therapeutic process to aid healing.

Positive memories could be used as a way to help boost mental well-being, new research finds.

Therapists have traditionally focused on addressing negative emotions, as these are most pressing.

However, researchers are now looking at how positive emotions can be used in the therapeutic process to aid healing.

Hiliter

Drawing words or concepts is the best way to remember information

drawing to remember, see big picture
Need help in remembering a difficult concept? A solution may literally be at your fingertips as new research suggests drawing pictures of information that needs to be remembered enhances memory.

"We pitted drawing against a number of other known encoding strategies, but drawing always came out on top," said the study's lead author, Jeffrey Wammes, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Psychology at the University of Waterloo.

"We believe that the benefit arises because drawing helps to create a more cohesive memory trace that better integrates visual, motor, and semantic information."

Comment: Imagery effective way to enhance memory, reduce false memories, study finds


Monkey Wrench

The science of why you're so hard on yourself

falling

Most of us battle with an internal voice of self-criticism. A recent psychotherapy review sheds light on how to listen to your inner critic and respond.


This morning, I accidentally knocked over a can of food that splattered all over the floor. Instantly, a voice in my head rang, "Rina, how could you be so stupid? You've wasted food and time!"

Sound familiar?

This is the voice commonly referred to as our "inner critic." In ancient yoga philosophy the inner critic is considered a manifestation of the ego, or ahamkara. As much as ahamkara is involved with deceptively enjoyable vanity and conceit, it can also be the source of painful self-criticism. Peace of mind and self-love, yoga says, come when none of these "snares" of ego entrap us. According to yoga, it is then that we are truly free.

In research terms, the inner critic is defined as a "well-integrated system of critical and negative thoughts and attitudes of the self that interferes with the individual's organismic experiencing process." In other words, it is the criticism we hear in our minds that gets in the way of life enjoyment.

Comment: 4 crucial steps to silencing toxic self-talk


Smiley

Facial expression: How the brain identifies others' feelings

facial expressions
© Ohio State UniversityTest subjects in an Ohio State University study were shown a series of photographs of different facial expressions. Researchers pinpointed an area of the brain that is specifically attuned to picking up key muscle movements (here, labeled AU for 'action units') that combine to express emotion.
One area of the brain appears to be responsible for recognizing facial expressions, a new study finds. Ohio State University researchers monitored the brain activity of 10 college students as they were shown more than 1,000 photographs of people making different facial expressions. The expressions fell into several categories: disgusted, happily surprised, happily disgusted, angrily surprised, fearfully surprised, sadly fearful, and fearfully disgusted. The experiments revealed that the area responsible for recognizing facial expressions seems to be on the right side of the brain behind the ear. The area is called the posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS).

The researchers also found that nerve patterns within the pSTS seem to be programmed to recognize movement in certain areas of the face. For example, one neural pattern identifies a furrowed brow and another detects the upturned lips of a smile, the researchers said. "That suggests that our brains decode facial expressions by adding up sets of key muscle movements in the face of the person we are looking at," study author Aleix Martinez said in a university news release. Martinez is a cognitive scientist and professor of electrical and computer engineering at Ohio State.

Cell Phone

How to talk to someone with a terminal illness

sick woman with friend
© Photographee.eu, Shutterstock.com
If someone is facing a health emergency or terminal illness, it can be difficult to know the right thing to say. Do you tell them everything will be OK? Change the subject? Share the story of your Aunt Sally, who died of cancer 10 years ago?

The best response is something along the lines of, "I'm so sorry to hear the news. I'll be here to support you in any way I can," sociologists told Live Science. But you'd be smart to tweak this message on a person-by-person basis.

"There are no easy answers to what you should say or what you should do," said Amanda Gengler, an assistant professor of sociology at Wake Forest University in North Carolina.

Comment: Related article:

  • Successful dying: researchers define the elements of a 'good death'



Life Preserver

Tripoli women lean towards yoga to escape Libya tensions, near-constant unrest

Yoga in Tripoli
© AFP Photo/Mahmud TurkiaBreathing easy: women escape the realities of conflict-torn Libya at a seaside yoga session on a beach in Tripoli
Mats rolled tightly under their arms, a group of women walk to a secluded Tripoli beach for a seaside yoga session to escape tensions in conflict-stricken Libya.

Under the watch of a solitary police car, each Thursday the 25 aspiring yogis begin limbering up, their bright gym attire outlined against the crumbling concrete security compound that forms the backdrop to their open-air studio.

Comment: Ancient healing traditions: Science finally proves meridians exist


Info

Brain circuit for adaptability fades with age, study finds

Challenged senior
© Getty ImagesLearning new strategies for everyday goals can become more difficult as we age.
People often find it harder to adapt to new situations as they age and now a new mouse study may have shed light on why.

A study published today in the journal Neuron has described, for the first time, how activity in a key brain circuit that allows mammals to adapt to change fades with age.

The circuit is critical to developing new strategies to meet goals, said senior author Dr J. Bertran-Gonzalez, a neuroscientist at the Queensland Brain Institute

He and colleagues hypothesised that older mammals find it harder to adapt because of natural deterioration in this brain circuit involving neurones in the striatum, which is located in the brain's core.

To test their ideas, Dr Bertran-Gonzalez and colleagues set up an experiment in which mice were trained to press levers to obtain food pellets.

One lever gave them access to grain-tasting pellets, while the other gave them access to sweet pellets. After training, the animals were then given just one type of pellet to eat, before again being given a choice of pellets.

Because mice prefer variety in their diet, after having gorged on one type of pellet they chose the lever that would give them the other type of pellet.

But then the researchers switched the levers so the lever that used to deliver grain-flavoured pellets now delivered sweet pellets and vice versa.

The younger mice in the group quickly learned which lever to press to get the pellets they wanted, but the older mice repeatedly pressed both levers, apparently confused about what to do.

Further experiments showed the brains of the older mice had less activity in the neurones of the striatum previously identified as being critical to the ability to adapt.

Finally, the study found that young mice in which this brain circuit had been deactivated, were just as confused as the older normal mice when the levers were switched. This confirmed that deterioration in the striatum circuit was responsible for a failure to adapt to change.