Skip to main content

Thinking differently

Neuroscience is an interesting subject, and for me came to the fore a few weeks ago when I was asked to have an MRI scan to check out a series of pretty 'gnarly' headaches that I have been experiencing for a while... I turned up for the scan which went well (apart from the poor lady doing it having to deal with a broken air conditioning unit half way through which stopped the machine..) and I was given a DVD to bring home which I promptly popped into my laptop to watch ...

Wow! It is quite remarkable to behold what is up there within the old 'grey matter'.. A spaghetti mix of blood vessels weaving in and out of brain matter, and that is it. Nothing more, nothing less. Having watched it, I felt quite enlightened to know that (a) there is nothing wrong with my brain and (b) that we are such simple beings. I began to think very differently about myself, how I think, and what I do. I realized that worry really is simply a process our minds go through, which often simply wastes energy. I realized why our heads get so hot (there is a lot of blood up there being pumped around!). Since then, I have been refocused on the power of now, the present and the fact that we are given all the physical tools within our heads to decide how we want to feel and what we want to do - now. I am not entirely sure why, but I have a feeling it is the result of a medical procedure, the MRI scan, reminding me that life is often not as complicated as you at first think. Yes, the human brain is remarkable, but in the end it is actually quite a simple concept of chemical and electrical interactions.

It is amazing to think that we all have the same physical make up, something so complex and yet so simple and we are all empowered to make choices about how we use it. Having an MRI really emphasized this for me, and as a result I am thinking differently.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Wow, pretty nice article. Where can I get this RSS?

Kate Stepman
spy source

Popular posts from this blog

Fear

It challenges us all. We all face up to it. We all tackle it. We all shy away from it. More important than that is how we face up to ourselves. Being honest with yourself is not as easy as it sounds, and it is often the cause of significant angst and negativity. It is always easier to blame someone else...rather than be honest about what we have committed ourselves to doing. Trouble is, it is a slippery slope!So, maybe the answer is to yield - to accept ourselves for who we are, and act accordingly. We make mistakes, we make the wrong decisions - the important thing is to be totally honest with ourselves and others and accept that sometimes, we have to admit that we have taken a wrong turn or made the wrong decision. Hiding from that is not good, it cuts across our ability to love ourselves for who we are.

The simple things

It is Easter and I am sitting in the Old Post Office B & B in Paparoa, a village of a few thousand (max) people in the heart of the Kaipara District of New Zealand. It is quiet, there is a full moon, and Amelie my 3 year old princess has just run into the sitting room and said N Niiiight, kissed me on the cheek, given me a hug and bounced off to her bedroom for a story ... She gets distracted by the pieces on a chess board as she goes, 'this one here, that one there' .... Ammeeeliiee, her mum calls - oh oh she says and toddles off to hear the story. There is a clock ticking close by, the lighting in the sitting room is soft, it is peaceful. How lucky to be here - how lucky to have the simple things in life laid out before me, no hassle, no complexity, no need to think, no need to relax, I can just be. We do make our lives complicated sometimes don't we - more often than not because we desire or want something, or someone to do what we want them to do, or maybe thi...

Call me a cynic, but are we all being fooled?

As the 21st century continues on it’s merry way, life and how we live it continues to change. The rich are now obscenely so, and we ask ourselves ‘who really needs to be a billionaire’? The corporate juggernaut Goliath barrels its way along the highway, smashing any who look anything like David with his slingshot, worried of the impact on their mission for global domination. The average wage for the average Joe Worker doing a 40 hour week, (packing more in now than ever before thanks to the wonders of the internet) is not a lot. We travel faster, we receive information and send information.. faster, we do more in less time. Is the average Joe Worker better off for living the dream and buying their first car, or saving for their first house with all the furniture and trimmings…(noting the fact that it is likely that a significant proportion of their deposit will come from their parents, who now provide some 40% of the lending to newbie owners).. The issue isn’t just confined to families...