Category Archives: articles

Occupy Wall Street: No Demand is Big Enough | AlterNet

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Occupy Wall Street: No Demand is Big Enough | | AlterNet.

It is important to read this for an expanded idea of what the Occupy movement is about.

Believe it or not, it’s about love and being part of the 100%. It’s a revolution in consciousness.

The author is Charles Eisenstein. You can find his website at http://www.ascentofhumanity.blogspot.com. He has made his book, The Ascent of Humanity, available online. You can pay what you wish.

Thanks to Bryan Williams for sharing this link on Facebook.

We look to a different kind of revolution. At risk of revealing the stars in my eyes, let me call it a revolution of love.

What else but love would motivate any person to abandon the quest to maximize rational self-interest? Love, the felt experience of connection to other beings, contradicts the laws of economics as we know them. Ultimately, we want to create a money system, and an economy, that is the ally not the enemy of love. We don’t want to forever fight the money power to create good in the world; we want to change the money power so that we don’t need to fight it. I will not in this essay describe my vision — one of many — of a money system aligned with the good in all of us. I will only say that such a shift can only happen atop an even deeper shift, a transformation of human consciousness. Happily, just such a transformation is underway today.

There’s more, lots more. Read it.

A Sister’s Eulogy for Steve Jobs | NYTimes.com

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A Sister’s Eulogy for Steve Jobs – NYTimes.com.

Moving story about Steve told by someone who met him as an adult and was close to him the rest of his life, Mona Simpson, his sister, who’s a novelist.

This is a great character sketch of someone mainly presented to us through the media. Fascinating individual.

The Economics of Happiness | Project Syndicate

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The Economics of Happiness – Jeffrey D. Sachs – Project Syndicate.

A professor of economics from Columbia University reports on a conference in Bhutan to check on how well “Gross National Happiness” as a measure of the collective well-being of nations compares to Gross National Product.

All agreed that it was more important to pursue happiness than income. How to do it? They came up with five conclusions.

What Kind of Buddhist was Steve Jobs, Really? | NeuroTribes

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What Kind of Buddhist was Steve Jobs, Really? | NeuroTribes.

Great article by Steve Silberman (I have subscribed to his blog and follow him on Twitter — great find). I like reading about Steve Jobs, but even better is this simple, clear description of why we meditate:

Why would a former phone phreak who perseverated over the design of motherboards be interested in doing that? Using the mind to watch the mind, and ultimately to change how the mind works, is known in cognitive psychology as metacognition. Beneath the poetic cultural trappings of Buddhism, what intensive meditation offers to long-term practitioners is a kind of metacognitive hack of the human operating system (a metaphor that probably crossed Jobs’ mind at some point.) Sitting zazen offered Jobs a practical technique for upgrading the motherboard in his head.

The classic Buddhist image of this hack is that thoughts are like clouds passing through a spacious blue sky. All your life, you’ve been convinced that this succession of clouds comprises a stable, enduring identity — a “self.” But Buddhists believe this self this is an illusion that causes unnecessary suffering as you inevitably face change, loss, disease, old age, and death. One aim of practice is to reveal the gaps or discontinuities — the glimpses of blue sky —between the thoughts, so you’re not so taken in by the illusion, but instead learn to identify with the panoramic awareness in which the clouds arise and disappear.

Wheat belly

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Modern wheat is not good for anyone, according to Dr. William Davis, author of Wheat Belly, a new book that differentiates the wheat of today from the wheat of yesterday.

In this article on BoingBoing, Davis outlines how modern wheat has been genetically modified even since 1960 into a product that may be the real cause of the surge in obesity and diabetes.

He recommends that not just people with celiac, gluten-intolerance, and wheat sensitivity give up wheat. He recommends that everyone do so. If you’re wondering why you can’t lose weight, look at your wheat consumption. Rather than being a “healthy whole grain,” it might be working against your health instead of for it.

I don’t know the science and haven’t read the book, but I gave up wheat about four years ago, and I can tell you that it’s getting easier as more people jump on the no-wheat bandwagon. More restaurants offer gluten-free menus, and grocery stores offer more gluten-free foods. Gluten-free bakeries are even opening and doing well. Bakers and chefs are experimenting with alternatives to wheat flour and creating good new recipes.

Here’s what Davis says:

It is therefore my contention that eliminating all wheat from the diet is a good idea not just for people with gluten sensitivity; it’s a smart decision for everybody. I have experience in my heart disease prevention practice, as well as my online program for heart disease prevention and reversal, with several thousand people who have done just that and the results are nothing short of astounding. Weight loss of 30, 50, even 70 pounds or more within the first six months; reversal of diabetes and pre-diabetic conditions; relief from edema, sinus congestion, and asthma; disappearance of acid reflux, irritable bowel syndrome symptoms; increased energy, happier mood, better sleep. People feel better, look better, eat fewer calories, feel less hungry, are able to discontinue use of many medications — just by eliminating one food from their diet — ironically a food that they’ve been told to eat more of.

Davis recommends going without wheat for four weeks:

If the health benefits of a wheat-free diet sound hard to believe, why not conduct your own little experiment and see for yourself: simply eliminate all things made of wheat for four weeks — no bread, bagels, pizza, pretzels, rolls, donuts, breakfast cereals, pancakes, waffles, pasta, noodles, or processed foods containing wheat (and do be careful to read labels, as food manufacturers love to slip a little wheat gliadin into your food every chance they get to stimulate your appetite). That’s a lot to cut out, true, but there’s still plenty of real, nutrient-dense foods like vegetables, fruit, nuts, cheese and dairy products, meat, fish, soy foods, legumes, oils like olive oil, avocados, even dark chocolate that you can eat in their place. If after that 4-week period you discover new mental clarity, better sleep, relief from joint pain, happier intestines, and a looser waistband, you will have your answer.

How are you doing at stress management? Here’s a quiz.

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I included some of this in my earlier post and then decided it needed to be a post on its own.

I picked up a copy of Scientific American Mind from a newsstand recently because of the cover articles on stress. (In fact, it is probably still on newsstands.) If you read this blog, you’ll know I’m very interested in stress management and health and well-being.

I read in the article Fight the Frazzled Mind that very few people know how to be productive when they are not being pushed by stressors — but it can be done. The author of the article, Robert Epstein, says it is possible to perform well when relaxed. Epstein says:

That should be the goal, in my opinion: a life that is productive but also virtually stress-free.

I can go along with that. In fact, that is a fabulous goal to have, in my opinion! (He says to think of kung fu masters. I think of the hypnotized guy in Office Space. My hero!)

When I realized that I wanted to do the kind of work that I would love doing even if I didn’t get paid for it, I set myself on that path.

Epstein, former editor-in-chief of Psychology Today, says research suggests there are at least four broad, trainable skill sets that people can use to manage stress in a healthy, effective manner:

  1. source management (reducing or eliminating sources of stress)
  2. relaxation (breathing, meditation, yoga)
  3. thought management (interpreting events in ways that don’t hurt you)
  4. prevention (avoiding stress before it happens)

The article has a 16-question quiz designed to help you discover where you are competent and where you can improve. He says if you score under 12, you might want to consider taking a stress-management course. (Or you could come to me for relaxation coaching…just saying!)

The full 28-question version of his stress management test is online. I took it, and my best areas were relaxation and prevention. My worst area was thought management — probably because the test presupposes that irrational beliefs are stressful. I actually enjoy uncovering my irrational beliefs and have fun with them. I don’t allow them to stress me, and I don’t believe that irrationality per se equates with stress.

I find right-brain irrationality to be less stress-producing than left-brain rationality. People have a lot of irrational beliefs that are very comforting. Think about life-after-death beliefs. Rationally, it’s a huge unknown and very stressful. Anything else is irrational — and hopefully gives your life solace and meaning.

By the way: If your irrational beliefs are stressful, find a way to question, deflate, or replace them with non-stressful, positive beliefs. Byron Katie’s The Work is simply the best tool out there, in my opinion and that of many others.

So that’s my one quibble with this research, and it’s probably just semantic.

I can definitely work on source management: getting more organized with things, tasks, space, and time. I do okay but could do better.

Before doing the research, Epstein thought that relaxation and thought management — the focus of most stress reduction efforts — would be most effective at helping people reduce stress, be happier, and more successful personally and professionally.

Instead, he found that prevention is by far the most helpful competency when it comes to managing stress. Prevention includes:

  • every morning, spend a little time planning your day
  • identify and then reduce or eliminate stressors
  • stay on top of things by keeping an updated to-do list
  • have a clear plan of how you’d like your life to proceed over the next few years

In addition to these strategies, he adds two more for fighting stress before it starts:

  • commit to replacing self-destructive ways of managing stress with healthful ways; for instance, take a yoga class instead of going to happy hour
  • immunize yourself from stress using exercise, thought management, and relaxation techniques

Epstein found that on average, people scored 55 out of 100 on a test of simple stress management techniques. That means people are failing — badly — at managing their stress levels.

He also states that the new study found a high positive relationship between test scores and the overall level of happiness people reported, personal success, and professional success. Nearly 25 percent of the happiness we experience in life is related to — and maybe even the result of — our ability to manage stress.

That’s significant. Would you like to be 25 percent happier?

The best news is that stress management is trainable, with the greatest benefits reaped from prevention.

This is work worth doing.

Lovely sweet rain, a morning meditation, and MONEY!

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I am adoring my experience of a lengthy, soaking RAIN here in drought-stricken Austin, Texas — off and on yesterday, seemingly all night, and most of this Sunday morning. I’m guessing maybe two inches of precious rain has fallen. Feels like such a blessing.

We (people, air, plants, wildlife, soil, streams, lakes, roads) need this so badly. There are cracks an inch wide in the soil under my trailer and under the dead grass. The only green grass around is under trees that got watered in an effort to keep them alive, and around the new trees I planted starting in late August. They’re drinking it up.

I love being inside my trailer in the rain. The sound of rain on the roof is divine.

And it’s Sunday. Sleeping in (well, to 8 am) to the sound of rain feels wonderfully precious. I’m undecided whether to go out to ecstatic dance, the farmer’s market, the Austin Yoga Festival, or to stay blissfully inside on this wet fall day — I have reading to catch up on, videos to watch, a cat to play with, food to cook, or maybe I’ll mix it up spontaneously.

~~

I just did a 35-minute meditation session. When my attention was focused, it went to body awareness and to hearing. My body awareness has deepened since I started massage school in June, of course. Understanding my hands as antennas, feeling layers of tissues down to the bone, and experiencing others touching me with various levels of connection, compassion, and presence have been quite an education.

Hearing while on the cushion a mockingbird and other birds, rain noises, traffic on wet pavement, my cat rustling in a cabinet, I notice I’m accustomed to picking out single sounds. It’s a nice stretch to take it all in, and like a symphony, to go back and forth between individual sounds and the whole cacophony, like zooming in and out with a camera, only with my sense of hearing. That reminds me, I’m leading my adventurous Fourth Way book group through the 12 states of attention on Tuesday.

~~

Yesterday I was fortunate enough to be able to attend a workshop, Metaphors of Money, taught by Charles Faulkner, an NLP trainer, trader, writer, and researcher. Given that metaphors, conscious and unconscious, underlie our experience (the map is not the territory; a map is a metaphor for metaphors), we examined our metaphors around money.

I personify money. I like it, and I want it to like me. I know money likes me when people write checks out to me and give/mail them to me or hand me cash! Also, when I look at my bank balance and it feels good, I know money likes me. When it doesn’t feel good, I feel pressed, and I take steps to bring more in.

I noticed that as the workshop progressed, every time I heard the word “money,” its visual representation in my mind (cash, dollar sign, checks, bank balance) looked brighter and more vivid. By the end, “money” was glowing with white light!

If this workshop is offered again, you can find out by subscribing to NLP Resources Austin‘s email list. (You don’t have to be trained in NLP to participate.) They have a lot of other cool stuff coming up too.

New discovery about connective tissue

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One of my wonderful student massage clients, perhaps triggered by me saying something about fascia (connective tissue), told me about and later sent me a link to this fascinating article, How Pig Guts Became the Next Bright Hope for Regenerating Human Limbs, about how extracellular matrix (ECM), formerly thought to be a kind of structural scaffolding, is actually

primarily a collection of signaling proteins and information that is held within the structural molecules.

ECM can be inserted where tissue has been damaged and destroyed, and somehow it manages to recruit the body’s own stem cells to rebuild nerve, muscle, and other tissues.

It holds promise for regenerating tissues in damaged limbs, preventing the need for amputation, and healing serious wounds without scar tissue.

Thanks, Bruce and Discover magazine.

Why meditators are happier

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A very interesting article that fits in well with this blog, Eat, Smoke, Meditate: Why Your Brain Cares How You Cope was published recently in Forbes, the business magazine — an unlikely place for an article about meditation but a good sign, meaning that this kind of information is reaching the conservative mainstream business audience.

The article, by health writer Alice G. Walton, states that for millenia people have turned to different activities to cope with life’s stresses: going for a walk, taking a deep breath, eating, drinking, smoking, praying, taking drugs, running, meditating.

She adds that most people would agree that the mind’s annoying chatter is a major source of unhappiness. It’s the obsessing, worrying, drifting, fearful mind that creates feelings of unhappiness. (We meditators know it as monkey mind.)

This internal chatter and the unpleasant emotions that accompany its thoughts are really what people are trying to get away from. A Harvard study done last year confirmed that mind wandering and unhappiness are clearly connected. That study found that when people are awake, their minds are wandering about half the time.

Another study found that mind wandering is linked to a network of brain cells called the default mode network (DMN for short). This network is only active when we are flitting from one life-worry to the next.

Meditation is about quieting the mind, facing, and then relinquishing those unhappy, stress-inducing thoughts.

New research from Yale has found that the DMN in experienced meditators is markedly less linked to other regions of the brain. And…when the brain’s “me centers” (areas governing thoughts about the self, such as the DMN) are activated, meditators also activated brain areas for self-monitoring and cognitive control.

They did this automatically, even when not being told to do anything in particular.

This implies that experienced meditators habitually monitor their thoughts and control them — a skill learned during meditation. When the mind wanders — when meditating and at other times — experienced meditators bring it back to the present moment.

Could this be the primary benefit of meditation, that you learn to monitor and control your thoughts, and therefore you feel happier?

The article suggests that meditators actually create a new default mode that is more present-centered and less “me”-centered.

The writer wonders whether happiness is really about shifting our tendency away from focusing on ourselves. Another study found that in praying nuns and meditating monks, brain areas for concentration and attention became activated, while areas that govern how a person relates to the world deactivated.

The author states that this suggests that the focus becomes less on the person being a distinct entity from the external world and more on the connection between the person and the external world.

Separation and oneness, away from and toward. Aha!

The article continues, stating that other tools to relieve stress like cigarettes, food, or alcohol actually end up making the users unhappier. Addictions create negative feedback loops that include craving and relief, followed by craving and relief, et cetera.

She concludes:

 Addressing the process itself with other methods (like meditation), which allow you to ride out the craving/unhappiness by attending to it and accepting it, and then letting it go, has been more successful, because it actually breaks the cycle rather than masks it.

Suggestions to relieve insomnia and get to sleep

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A couple of months ago, I blogged about some exciting new research about insomnia. It seems that when we lie awake at night, unable to fall asleep, it’s because our brains are overheating. They tend to generate more warmth during the day and cool down at night.

So something happens that moves us out of this biorhythm and into the minor hell of insomnia (or major, if it goes on long enough). When you would like to be sleeping, the monkey mind grabs onto thoughts and won’t let go — generating heat in the brain and preventing sleep.

The researcher experimented with a cooling cap. It seemed to me that there were alternatives that were much simpler and more accessible.

Disidentify with your thoughts

First of all, disidentifying with your thoughts is a useful skill anyone can learn with a little practice. Thinking is what the mind does. It serves a purpose. It is not inherently bad.

The question is whether thinking is appropriate when you want to be sleeping. There’s thinking, and then there’s mind-running-amok.

To disidentify with those thoughts, you simply choose to focus your attention on your breath, or on sounds, sensations, rhythms, your weight against the sheets and pillow, a chakra, your whole body, a state of wonder, an image — find something that works for you. (All this stuff is happening all the time. “Life is what happens to you when you’re busy making other plans,” right?)

Notice that your thoughts are often about something that’s neither here nor now — they’re in the past or future. Bring your attention into the present moment. What are you actually experiencing?

Your mind may interrupt, but as you continue to focus on your present experience, it will interrupt less and less often, and you will fall asleep.

Also, notice whether that thing your monkey mind won’t let go of is something you have any control over. If you can’t influence it, give it up. Trickster is having fun with you. Just plain let go and hand it over to God, the Universe, Spirit (GUS will take care of it). Now go to sleep.

If you can influence it, unless it’s truly life-or-death, sleep on it and see what option comes to mind when you wake in the morning. In other words, pose the question “How can I influence this for the good of all involved?” Let your unconscious mind work and play with the situation while your conscious mind takes the restful break of sleep. When you wake, notice what comes to mind.

You may want to do some journaling.

Drink some cool, clear water

Drink a glass, or half a glass if your bladder wakes you up early, of water that is between room temperature and cool. Ice isn’t necessary — some people believe that ice is too cooling and not good for the human digestive system’s operations. After all, the human race has done pretty well without iced drinks for millenia upon millenia.

Take a mouthful of cool water, close your mouth, hold it for a bit, and then swallow.

You can also put a cool compress of a wrung-out washcloth on your forehead. Do both!

And, while you’re doing these things, think about the cowboy song Cool, Clear Water while you do this! Let water represent the sleep you want to experience.

Here’s a video of the original by the Sons of the Pioneers. Maybe you have a favorite version.

Yawn and open your mouth when you lie down to sleep

Since it’s currently believed that the purpose of yawning is to cool the overheated brain, yawn several times when you are ready to go to sleep.

Also, you can open your mouth just wide enough to let air (cooler than your body, of course) circulate in your oral cavity and cool the adjacent brain. Try parting your teeth half a finger-width.

Continue to breathe through your nose, not your mouth, unless you have nasal congestion.

Use acupressure to reduce heat

I shared this with my bodyworker/acupuncturist Patrice Sullivan, who got excited and shared with me some of the pressure points that reduce heat, because in Chinese medicine’s understanding of health, the body can get out of balance and have too much heat — and of course this can affect the brain.

Press into pressure points with a fingertip or pencil eraser to stimulate them, unblock meridians, and release heat. Press briefly and see what happens. Then try pressing steadily for 30 second to 2 minutes.

The list below includes the poetic names of the points for fun. You may want to google each point to view a graphic with more precision about the location.

  • Gallbladder 42 and 43, Earth Fivefold Convergence and Clamped Stream, are on the foot between the fourth and fifth metatarsals.
  • Liver 2, Moving Between, is on the top of the foot between the first and second toes before the webbing starts.
  • Gallbladder 34, Yang Hill Spring, is outside the knee, in a depression just below the head of the fibula (smaller lower leg bone) toward the front.
  • Heart 7, Spirit Gate, is on the hand on the crease of the wrist closest to the hand, in line with the ring finger.
  • Large Intestine 11, Crooked Pond, is located at the end of the outer elbow crease.
  • Governing Vessel 20, Hundred Convergences, is at the crown of the head.

Report back so others may benefit

I’d love to be wrong about this, but in my opinion, Big Science is probably not going to fund research on simple, effective ways to relieve insomnia unless they can make money off it by selling you something they’ve patented. So it’s up to us to figure out what works and let others know.

Please feel free to try any or all of these methods to relieve insomnia and please report back on what worked and didn’t work for you in the comments for this post.

Thank you.