We all experience stress from time to time. However prolonged or chronic stress (both biological and psychological) has a detrimental effect on our lives in so many ways. One of the worst physical side effects is the effect of high cortisol levels on the body (which is produced by the adrenal glands when we are under stress). It suppresses the immune system, leads to weight gain, reduces the amount of serotonin produced in the brain which can lead to depression, increases blood pressure, increases blood sugar so the pancreas has to release more insulin to deal with the increase in blood sugar and on and on.
Meditation has been scientifically proven to help with the effects of stress. Noticing our breath has an immediate calming effect on the body, it normalises the heart beat and increases feel good hormones and decreases the stress hormones. It also brings us into the present moment and out of the past and the future where many of our stressful feelings lie. Exercise is also essential, try and take a walk in the sunshine, vitamin D is essential for good health, especially in the winter when it can help in supporting our immune systems against colds and the flu. Eat well, unprocessed foods as close to their natural state as possible. Laugh, laughter really is a very good medicine!
And last but not least use EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) on the reasons and feelings causing your stress. Dissolve and collapse beliefs (which only affect us because they feel true) that no longer serve you with EFT.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Heart Meditation
The heart has an electromagnetic field 5,000 times stronger than the brain's electric field. Why is that? I don't think it is an accident. Life really is the best designer!
Author Iyanla Vanzant calls the heart 'your map' for your life. Meditating or even just putting your attention on your heart regulates and normalises the heart beat (and your breathing) and creates a calming effect on the body by raising levels of feel good hormones and lowering levels of stress hormones.
Sit quietly and breathe into your heart, follow your breath in and out of your heart or repeat a mantra. It doesn't matter, whatever you feel comfortable with. Do this for at least ten minutes. With regular and/or daily practice you will notice more peace and happiness in your life.
Author Iyanla Vanzant calls the heart 'your map' for your life. Meditating or even just putting your attention on your heart regulates and normalises the heart beat (and your breathing) and creates a calming effect on the body by raising levels of feel good hormones and lowering levels of stress hormones.
Sit quietly and breathe into your heart, follow your breath in and out of your heart or repeat a mantra. It doesn't matter, whatever you feel comfortable with. Do this for at least ten minutes. With regular and/or daily practice you will notice more peace and happiness in your life.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Dr Masaru Emoto - The Hidden Messages in Water
Dr Emoto has been conducting research on how molecules of water are affected by our thoughts, words, and feelings. He has also been photographing the evidence of this research. By exposing water to different words, the water produces differently shaped crystals accordingly. Words such as love and gratitude produce the most beautiful water crystals such as in the photograph above. This indicates that love and gratitude are essential to all life. Words such as anger and hate produce very irregular and murky coloured crystals. He has also conducted the experiments using music. Heavy metal music had the same effect on the crystals such as the words, hate and jealousy and produced irregular crystals, whereas classical music produced beautiful crystals.
Since our bodies are composed of 70 to 80% water the impact of this research on us cannot be underestimated. Our thoughts affect everything, even the water in our bodies, which is a carrier of information. Try writing something nice on a piece of paper and wearing it next to your skin. Try thinking thoughts of gratitude and love. Louise Hay says 'The universe loves grateful people'.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Your love is teaching me how to kneel
This is a line from the song 'Vertigo' by U2.
I love this line, I think its meaning is really beautiful. I think it means surrender your ego to Love. Forget about being right and open your heart.
This is an excerpt from The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran about Love which I think says basically the same thing:
When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you. Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth.
All these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets of your heart, and in that knowledge become a fragment of Life's heart.
I love this line, I think its meaning is really beautiful. I think it means surrender your ego to Love. Forget about being right and open your heart.
This is an excerpt from The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran about Love which I think says basically the same thing:
When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you. Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth.
All these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets of your heart, and in that knowledge become a fragment of Life's heart.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Learning, Rhythm and Feelings
This is an excerpt of a paper entitled 'Learning, Rhythm and Feelings' that I wrote for a research seminar in the Dublin Institute of Technology. One of the themes in the paper was that more efficient learning takes place when the learner is in a positive frame of mind and feels good. For example, when we recall a memory (usually triggered by the emotion that was encoded along with the memory in the brain) we also remember how we felt at the time of the memory (or event). This poses no problem for us when the emotion was a happy one. What EFT can do is help with the unhappy or uncomfortable emotions stored along with the memory of a particular event(s). We never forget the events but the emotional charge is dissolved. This is the beauty of EFT. This is also the reason why EFT is more effective when we are "tuned into" the emotion.
'Contrary to commonly held myths such as we only use ten percent of our brain, we now know that the brain functions (w)holistically, albeit in a more complex way than what was originally imagined and known. Imaging research has identified and nominated various regions in the brain where the processing, creation and storage of long-term memories occurs. The processing and subsequent storage of these memories is directly related to, and depends to a large extent, on the emotions and feelings present at the time of learning, both positive and negative. During PET scans, electrical activity in the amygdalae, and the presence of certain hormones, suggest that an emotional message is encoded when a memory is being processed for long-term storage. Memories are reconstructed during recall, so it stands to reason that the brain will later (re)construct and (re)call these memories with greater ease, if the memories have been presented for storage as an assortment of multi-modal material embedded with emotional messages.' - Noreen Barron.
'Contrary to commonly held myths such as we only use ten percent of our brain, we now know that the brain functions (w)holistically, albeit in a more complex way than what was originally imagined and known. Imaging research has identified and nominated various regions in the brain where the processing, creation and storage of long-term memories occurs. The processing and subsequent storage of these memories is directly related to, and depends to a large extent, on the emotions and feelings present at the time of learning, both positive and negative. During PET scans, electrical activity in the amygdalae, and the presence of certain hormones, suggest that an emotional message is encoded when a memory is being processed for long-term storage. Memories are reconstructed during recall, so it stands to reason that the brain will later (re)construct and (re)call these memories with greater ease, if the memories have been presented for storage as an assortment of multi-modal material embedded with emotional messages.' - Noreen Barron.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
WHY TAPPING WORKS: Speculations from the Observable Brain
WHY TAPPING WORKS: Speculations from the Observable Brain
by Ronald A. Ruden, M.D., Ph.D.
ABSTRACT
A new therapy for phobias, PTSD, addictive behaviors and other psychological issues was first described by Dr. Roger Callahan and involves thought activation of the problem followed by tapping on certain acupoints in a specific sequence. For most cases, the problems were reportedly cured in a matter of minutes. We speculate on a neuroanatomical and neurophysiological mechanism for this technique. We propose that tapping and other sensory stimulation increase serotonin in both the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala. The success of this technique requires that glutamate be first increased in the circuit by activating affect. We suggest the name 'Affect Activation/Sensory Stimulation' to encompass this general approach. AA/SS represents a paradigm shift for the treatment of these problems. Read on
by Ronald A. Ruden, M.D., Ph.D.
ABSTRACT
A new therapy for phobias, PTSD, addictive behaviors and other psychological issues was first described by Dr. Roger Callahan and involves thought activation of the problem followed by tapping on certain acupoints in a specific sequence. For most cases, the problems were reportedly cured in a matter of minutes. We speculate on a neuroanatomical and neurophysiological mechanism for this technique. We propose that tapping and other sensory stimulation increase serotonin in both the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala. The success of this technique requires that glutamate be first increased in the circuit by activating affect. We suggest the name 'Affect Activation/Sensory Stimulation' to encompass this general approach. AA/SS represents a paradigm shift for the treatment of these problems. Read on
My ideas on what Psychological Reversal is
Any feeling or emotion that is not Creative, Kind, Loving, Beautiful, Expansive, Abundant and Receptive leads to psychological reversal. Psychological reversal, in energy terms, literally means a reversal of our energy system, so things feel "out of whack" with energy flowing the "wrong" way or becoming stuck and stagnating. As a result we feel depressed, stressed out, angry and generally not happy.
We emanated from Intention. Intention intended us here. If the seven faces of Intention are Creative, Kind, Loving, Beautiful, Expansive, Abundant and Receptive. We are also those seven faces.
What stops us from knowing that we are these seven faces of intention are false beliefs about who we really are. The beliefs don't feel false of course, they feel very true. We think these beliefs are who we are. Beliefs such as: I'm not good enough, I'm a bad person or I'm not lovable and so on. Sometimes this PR is referred to as secondary gain. For example we say we want to give up smoking and after testing, we find we are psychologically reversed. We actually don't want to give up cigarettes. Well maybe we really do want to stop smoking but the real issue could be we are afraid of what 'not smoking' will bring up, all the fears and anxieties that smoking sedates and that we have been avoiding facing. Wayne Dyer has written a book called There is a Spiritual Solution to Every Problem. This is so true, because no matter what our background or what we have been through, the truth remains that we emanated from love, so we are love. Isn't this what we are all searching for? Knowing that we are loved and lovable?
We emanated from Intention. Intention intended us here. If the seven faces of Intention are Creative, Kind, Loving, Beautiful, Expansive, Abundant and Receptive. We are also those seven faces.
What stops us from knowing that we are these seven faces of intention are false beliefs about who we really are. The beliefs don't feel false of course, they feel very true. We think these beliefs are who we are. Beliefs such as: I'm not good enough, I'm a bad person or I'm not lovable and so on. Sometimes this PR is referred to as secondary gain. For example we say we want to give up smoking and after testing, we find we are psychologically reversed. We actually don't want to give up cigarettes. Well maybe we really do want to stop smoking but the real issue could be we are afraid of what 'not smoking' will bring up, all the fears and anxieties that smoking sedates and that we have been avoiding facing. Wayne Dyer has written a book called There is a Spiritual Solution to Every Problem. This is so true, because no matter what our background or what we have been through, the truth remains that we emanated from love, so we are love. Isn't this what we are all searching for? Knowing that we are loved and lovable?
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
St Teresa Of Avila
This magnificent refuge is inside you. Enter. Shatter the darkness that shrouds the doorway. Be bold. Be humble. Put away the incense and forget the incantations they taught you. Ask no permission from the authorities. Close your eyes and follow your breath to the still place that leads to the invisible path that leads you home.
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