Radiant People

By Richard Hart, PhD, at http://residentialcarefortwo.blogspot.com 21 November 2017

I first encountered “radiant people” when my wife and I became residents at Provision Living at Columbia, Missouri. Over the past two years, I have been of the opinion that these people were just lucky in picking their parents.

A new book by the two people who struggled over 40 years to make meditation a mainline scientific study adds another side to the bicameral/introspective mind story. Goleman, Daniel, and Davidson, Richard J., 2017. Altered Traits: Science Reveals How Meditation Changes Your Mind, Brain, and Body Kindle edition. ISBN: 9780399184406

The transformation from the bicameral to the introspective mind did not require the brain to evolve (to change over a short period of time, 1,000 years). But these two people found that, as a state, it does change in as little as 5 minutes, and as a trait about 10 years. Environment affects gene expression.

The activities director has held meditation classes 2-3 times a week for the past few months. A bit of meditation is also included in chair yoga and tic chi. The difference between real and symbolic views becomes apparent: breathing into your elbow.

The first classes were puzzling. What am I doing? Why am I doing this? Where am I going? Is this safe? Will I get lost and never return?

On about the fifth session, a tap on the shoulder brought me back to reality at the end of the class. So relax. Just follow the instructions. This is closely related to hypnotism and the powers of suggestion (external and internal).

The authors downplay the effect of meditation on health and promote the development of the brain (and mind) beyond our current culture and education system. A healthy fully developed brain may result in better health.

Meditation is a way of developing control over one’s attention that then increases empathy (awareness) and then doing something positive about it (compassion). This is the behavior of a radiant person!

At some point, meditation results in uncoupling of the automatic responses to observed threats. Instead of people suffering burnout or “going to pieces” with knee deep water in some areas of the December 2016 flood of the building, they can calmly see the situation for what it is and take well practiced action. 

The original flight or fight responses and the “voices from God” intercepted by the last Old Testament prophets, that served us well in the past, to get us to the present, can get us in trouble now.

The constant stream of thoughts in our minds, that each trigger an unnecessary response (that we actually do not act on), have now been found to be debilitating. We really do not need them.

[I have yet to figure out how this stream of stressful thoughts is related to the “voices from God” generated under stressful conditions in Old Testament times (and by everyone earlier in bicameral times).] 

Our fitness classes include body (strength, balance, yoga, and tai chi) and mind (meditation). Meditation results in changes in attitude and behavior.

The health effects of meditation are a bit tricky. First, meditation cannot fix the biology related to the problem. Second, the placebo effect can be as strong as the treatment effect. Any new thing that promises relief will have some effect because the patient wants to believe it will have an effect.

I have now been through several cycles of: new exercise, marked relief, and then over a month, the pain returns in the same or another place. I am now ready to explore meditation seriously without worrying about it covering up a biological problem.

Serious means to not only attend the classes but to do daily meditations. The one I have selected is easy to do. The expected result from scientific studies, not from popularized hype, Is the uncoupling of automatic responses to the stream of thoughts spontaneously generated in my mind for all 24 hours in the day.

Scientific results show that the more time spent in meditation, the more the brain develops the ability to remain on task, attention, and to not ignore everything else, but to unconsciously sort through it, just incase there is something of interest: like an eureka event, for example. This situation is also related to a positive, sharing attitude.

How to:

1.    Sit up straight to prepare for staying in that position during the meditation period (5 minutes or more).

2.    Eyes closed.

3.    Count your breaths:            in            out

        1                      2

        3             4

        5             6

        7             8

        9            10

      4.  Start over if you error in your count and when you make it to 10.

      5.  Record your meditation time.

      6.  Breath normally or hold your breath after breathing in and/or breathing out. This develops fuller, deeper, slower, breathing.

What is happening:

1.    A count error indicates that your attention to counting was distracted. A change from breathing in on an odd count rather than in on an even count indicates you were distracted without being aware of the distraction.

2.    When you can sense the counting error as it happens you are then aware of your counting of things to be counted (being aware of being aware).

3.    Repetitive counts to ten show you have good control of attention.

4.    With more practice, you can recognize stray thoughts, evaluate, and dismiss them without your body reacting to them.

5.    In time your conscious mind becomes clearer and your unconscious mind is free, even during your sleep, of stray thoughts.

6.    You can expect to be become more emphatic, compassionate, sharing, happy, and perhaps healthier: a radiant person.

This is in contrast to the white nationalist, the rage that plagues black students, and the behavior of difficult persons.

It appears that meditation is a way of extending the development of the brain beyond introspective to that “naturally” designed for how it needs to work in the current cultural environment. The remaining scientific questions are related to how much meditation is needed, what kinds, and at what age should meditation be a normal part of pubic education?

I have noticed that I am more tolerant of people and conditions here at Provision Living than I have been. That has not made me less aware or blindly accepting of  this place (We often run out of ice cream).

After 3 years since we first surveyed residential care, we need to do the survey again, primarily because of changes in our extended family and in the health care industry. Third hand tobacco smoke is still an issue.