Science of the SpiritS


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

memory
© Yellow Hat
Atlanta -- Using imagery is an effective way to improve memory and decrease certain types of false memories, according to researchers at Georgia State University.

Their study examined how creating images affected the ability to accurately recall conceptually related word lists as well as rhyming word lists. People who were instructed to create images of the list words in their head were able to recall more words than people who didn't create images, and they didn't recall false memories as often. False memories occur when a person recalls something that didn't happen or remembers something inaccurately.

The findings are published in the Journal of General Psychology.

"Creating images improved participants' memories and helped them commit fewer errors, regardless of what kind of list we gave them," said Merrin Oliver, lead author of the study and a Ph.D. student in the educational psychology program in the College of Education & Human Development at Georgia State.

Comment: The information in the article speaks to the benefits of a more active type of thinking and remembering. Modern life, technology, entertainment, etc., have gotten people out of the habit of using their brains actively in favour of a more passive mode. The brain is like a muscle: the more you use it, the more it can do.


Heart

Life lessons learned from a near-death experience

woman on newspaper
© unknownAnita Moorjani
She was dying...

Anita Moorjani remembers feeling her spirit leave the bounds of her cancer-ridden body and drift into another dimension. All of her loved ones, including her husband, assumed she would take her last breath in moments.

As she drifted towards death, she experienced something magical: "I was engulfed in a total feeling of love," she explained. "I also experienced extreme clarity of why I had the cancer, why I had come into this life in the first place, what role everyone in my family played, and generally how life works."

"When I crossed over, I realized that I had been making decisions and living life from a place of fear rather than love. This approach to life had made me sick."

Comment: Who is making your decisions?


People 2

Caring too much about what others think of you could be holding you back

The eyes of others our prisons; their thoughts our cages. - Virginia Woolf
goldfish
Your mother has always said you are smart, but lack ambition.

A former boss once praised you for your creativity, but said you were too unorganized.

One of your college professors complimented you on your research skills, but criticized your "scatterbrained" writing style.

Each of those sets of comments contains what could be perceived as positive and negative feedback, if you evaluate them objectively.

Cassiopaea

Access your inner shaman: Using the universal life force to heal your body

We live in a sea of subtle energies. We can become conscious of them and learn to use them.
andromeda
Ancient cultures understood that we live in a vast sea of energy. They understood that the planets and stars are conscious beings who communicate with each other. They believed that the trees serve as antennas, which allow natural subtle energies and information to flow up from the Earth to the stars and planets, and from all other celestial bodies into the Earth. They taught that everything and every being has consciousness and channels this energy according to its capabilities, to help facilitate this essential cosmic dialogue. In fact, they understood that all matter, including the physical body, is a gathering of this universal energy. They recognized that our thoughts and emotions are a form of energy, and that when these are in harmony with the living universal energy field, we become clear channels. Then, the life force of the Earth and cosmos flows through us more smoothly and abundantly, guiding our evolution as new perspectives are revealed and advanced abilities are awakened within us. These abilities include heightened creativity, extrasensory perception and the ability to bring about dramatic physical healing. Shamans learn to feel, sense and use this energy without filtering or distorting it. They often refer to this process as becoming a "hollow bone".

Question

Why are the mysteries of the pineal gland ignored by mainstream media?

pineal gland
There is an endocrine gland within our bodies that, when unimpeded, receives more blood flow per cubic volume than almost any organ in the body, including the heart.[1][2] It has been written about in masked language, or painted in art throughout the ages, and represented in a staggering number of ways for thousands of years - yet modern medicine hasn't found it interesting enough to study clinically - or has it?

The pineal gland's true purpose is shrouded in mystery. Is this intentional?

Will it take an information coup to keep us from being estranged from the cosmic gifts which so many of our ancestors refer to as being locked within this tiny pine-cone shaped mass of cells, or is there modern, scientific corroboration for what the ancients called the Epicenter of Enlightenment just waiting for us to peruse?

Comment: For more on the pineal gland see:


Fire

Dr. Kelly Brogan: Sometimes suffering is inevitable

suffering
Challenges can be exactly what the doctor ordered. Sometimes even tragedy is part of our path.

Productivity. Certainty. Predictability. Consistency.

These words feel like a cozy blanket to our minds. And, at least since the Industrial Revolution, it has been a shared agreement that these values amplify and support the economy while also offering the average citizen an opportunity to opt into an illusion of safety. It is an illusion because there is no room for true individuality in a society that prizes a sense of safety over all else. There is no room for growth, there is no room for transformation, and there is no room for suffering. Writer and researcher Graham Hancock calls this the War on Consciousness, exacted through narrow definitions of permissible states of consciousness (and support of chemicals that suppress consciousness) in support of corporate and governmental control.

Perhaps this is the prison cell that we willingly walk into, sighing with relief as the door locks shut.

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Increase your dopamine levels and feel good naturally

brain firing
"Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that helps control the brain's reward and pleasure centers. Dopamine also helps regulate movement and emotional response, and it enables us not only to see rewards, but to take action to move toward them." - Psychology Today

There are a lot of articles on the internet about dopamine and how it affects your mood, behavior, energy, and focus. What's not commonly spoken about, however, is how dopamine is affected by your perception. Discussed more rarely still is the reason why your dopamine levels may be low. Below are 10 ways to increase your dopamine levels, courtesy of Power of Positivity, as well as my own observations regarding the underlying issues which may have led to each situation, and how to tackle them.

Einstein

Mathematical ability revealed in brain scans

Mathematical problems
© Christian ChanHow your brain processes complex mathematical problems is very different from how it processes language.
Albert Einstein once said that his mathematical genius had nothing to do with language: "Words and language, whether written or spoken, do not seem to play any part in my thought processes."

And now high-definition brain scans prove he had a point. The ways that the brain processes language and complex mathematical concepts are quite different, according to a new study.

The notion that humans first developed mathematical abilities as an offshoot of early forms of language has been a long-standing hypothesis, according to the study authors. And some studies have suggested that the way the brain wrangles abstract math concepts has more in common with language processing than it does with simple number recognition and formula computing.

But this idea has opponents — including many mathematicians, the researchers noted — who argue that understanding complex math involves perception pathways that differ greatly from those that untangle words.

To find out which idea held true, researchers turned to a type of noninvasive scan called fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging), which creates high-resolution images that can map changes in neural activity triggered by blood flow. In that way, researchers would be able to see which parts of the brain lit up during different types of tasks.

For the experiments in the study, the scientists selected 15 subjects who were trained mathematicians and 15 subjects who were well educated but did not specialize in math. The researchers posed a series of statements to each subject on a range of topics — math and nonmath — which participants were asked to identify as "true," "false" or "meaningless."

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Our neuroplastic brains can adapt to change and evolve at any age

neuroplasticity, brain
Yes, you can teach an old brain new tricks! Neuroplasticity is a fancy term that describes this phenomena but you may be wondering why this is important. Most people enjoy the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality but increasingly, everywhere you look, the world is changing at an unprecedented pace. It is never pleasant to see or be around people who clutch for control and remain rigid when the winds of change blow. Here are some interesting facts about what science is learning about our brains ability to adapt and evolve at any age.
A thin tall grass grows around a tall, strong tree that has a thick trunk and giant branches. When heavy winds come, the thin grasses flex and bend effortlessly and remain standing in the morning. The tree will lose many limbs and possibly blow over and become uprooted. -Zen Proverb
What is Neuroplasticity?

Neuroplasticity is defined as the brains ability to adapt, re-wire, and re-organize by creating new neural pathways. Neurons (nerve cells) can compensate as needed, either through consciously creating new habits, or in the case of injury and disease. This means that our environment and life's circumstances literally change the structure of our brains!

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Green Light

Research shows that breathing alters perception

Breathe!
Breath is the only critical physiological function that operates unconsciously, but can, also, be directed consciously. While regulated by very complex chemical sensors in multiple places, it is, also, tied to specific activities, perceptions and emotions. The complexity of the neural circuits is breathtaking. While regulation of breath is critical to basic physiological survival, it is also used for stress reduction including mental relaxation and alteration of perceptions in meditation.

Now, research shows that neuronal circuits related to breathing rhythm synchronize oscillations with sensory brain circuits to determine perceptions. This is similar to brain waves (γ-rhythms) being tied to specific senses and the cortex. Synchronous oscillations between regions can provide a diagram that neuronal circuits are later built upon. Perceptions are very complex and mostly determined top down from the cortex, not simply by analysis of incoming sensory information. A previous post observed that self-observation alters perceptions. The fact that breathing rates are also able to alter perceptions may be the basis of powerful meditation techniques using self-observation of the breath. Only recently is it becoming clear how breathing alters perception.

This intriguing new research in animals shows that breathing rates bind together different senses through synchronization of brain circuits, and is critical in the integration of perception.

The brain mechanisms controlling breathing are so complex that they are only now being brought into focus. While breathing is tightly regulated by the amount of carbon dioxide, pH and oxygen through feed back loops related to blood sensors, there are many other factors and brain regions that impact on breathing. Breathing involves complex muscular events controlled by the vagus nerve and the motor cortex. As well as unconscious chemical regulation, it is also clear that emotions, stress and perceptions have a major impact on breathing rate. While fear and stress increase the breathing rate, conscious control of breathing is effective in stress reduction, relaxation and meditation.

Brain Centers Communicate with Synchronized Oscillations

The mechanism where breathing rates synchronize with sensory circuits is similar to other recent findings of brain wave synchronization. It has been demonstrated that gamma oscillations align major sensory input in the thalamus and the cortex. This, also, connects different sensory signals into a perception. Other studies have shown that synchronous waves form between the frontal cortex and the visual centers during very difficult tasks.

Very recently, synchronous oscillations from groups of neurons have been shown to correlate with quickly changing mental states, such as absorbing and analyzing new information. Two different regions involved with learning — the pre frontal cortex for executive control and striatum for habit learning — synchronize brain waves, which help to create new neuronal circuits. The other forms of neuroplasticity are too slow for many of the new connections that are formed.

Comment: Soothe your mind, body and spirit with the breath focused meditation of the Eiriu Eolas program.

Éiriú Eolas - Irish Gaelic for "Growth of Knowledge"

Éiriú Eolas Stress Control, Healing and Rejuvenation Program is the modern revival of an ancient breathing and meditation program which is being acclaimed around the world as THE TOOL that will help you to:
  • Relax from the stresses of everyday life
  • Gently work your way through past emotional and psychological trauma
  • Release repressed emotions and mental blockages
  • Rejuvenate and Detoxify your body and mind
Éiriú Eolas removes the barriers that stand between you and True Peace, Happiness, and ultimately a successful, fulfilling life.

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