Colours of Communication
| Colours of Communication | |
| Pages | 2 | 3 | MAP |
| Throughout history the study of emotions has been the province of philosophers rather than the scientific community which has treated them either as a trivial anomaly unresponsive to study, or something to be avoided at all costs. Gautama Buddha taught that peace could only be obtained when one had freed themselves of emotional influences; but surely, compassion is an emotional influence The absence of emotions would lead to lives without flavour. It has been left to the writers and artists to portray the great influences that our emotions have played in the shaping of our individual and racial histories. It is only during the past hundred years that scientific thinkers have acknowledged that emotions are central to our lives; even to our survival as a species. Problems that cannot be immediately solved give rise to some degree of anxiety within ourselves. Problems come in many guises, from the problem of a snarled fishing line to a problem in calculus to those of managing personal relationships; and the correct machinery for dealing with first order problems is the intellect. Emotions provide the motivating drive to solve them. Solving problems with nothing but intellectual determination can be a hard and joyless task. Emotions are the lubrication in the intellectual machinery but few pieces of machinery function at their best when wallowing in an oil bath. Once the emotional loading that is 'tied' to an event rises above its optimum level it starts to swamp the process and we become victims of an emotional hijacking. The only satisfactory means of defusing an emotional runaway is by dealing with it, then dealing with the problem that caused it. |
| The Emotional Brain, known as the Limbic System, is a grouping of related components surrounding the Brain-Stem and lying beneath the Neocortex. These ancillary artefacts include the Hypothalamus, the Amygdala, and the Hippocampus. Although certain activities and properties are centred in each part, it must be emphasised that although each of these artefacts are discrete constructions in themselves, they, as in all things in the natural world, act not in isolation but as part of an integrated system. The Hypothalamus triggers the physical manifestations such as the pounding heart and dry mouth that come with fear. The Hippocampus is responsible for our memories of incidents that carry a strong emotional flavour. The Amygdala influences the manners in which we behave when emotionally aroused. For example, laughing when happy, and crying when distressed. It is particularly active in emotional reactions associated with fear, anger, flight and defence. These parts of the brain are the hardware, the chemicals that they use as communicators may be considered as being our software. "Emotions are neuropeptides attaching to receptors and stimulating an electrical change on neurons. The mind exists not only in the brain. Neuropeptides are also produced by the spleen, thymus, bone marrow, lymph glands, and the dorsal horn of the spine. Neuropeptides produced by the brain, arriving to open receptors in the intestines, are the root of the expression 'gut feeling'." Candice Pert, Pharmacologist, a leading investigator into ways that the mind talks with the body. |
| So emotions are chemicals. I appreciate that many of us will not value the knowledge when told that the wondrous feelings of true love are down to a cascade of chemicals; the release of hormones into the blood stream, the pulse of electric currents along the neurones. But there is no longer any doubt that our basic emotions are hardwired into the human system. Consider the behaviour of babies and young children. They exhibit a whole range of emotions, from rage to pure pleasure, and while the activating cause of the emotion is often plainly seen, there is no evidence of reason - in the sense of conscious awareness - in their behaviour. Indeed, one commonly heard complaint is that children are unreasonable. The cultural rules of society condition us to control our emotions in ways that each society deems to acceptable. For a Japanese person to openly express anger would result in a loss of 'face', resulting in a diminished esteem in the eyes of his or her peer group. A case of the 'inscrutable oriental mask'. Yet among Italians, the opposite applies. Watch a group of Italian men across an open plaza as they discuss the relative merits of their football teams, and one can follow the flow of conversation by facial expressions and gestures alone. Emotions are a means of communication more persuasive than mere words. How easy it is to be buoyed by the happiness of others, to be infected by their anger, to feel weighed down by the burden of their sadness. |
| So does this all mean that we are helpless victims of our emotions and society's imposed conditioning in expressing them? By no means whatsoever! There are ways in which we can consciously 'plug in' to this communications network between the internal mechanisms. Consider the evidence to date: Level 1. In chapter 3 I related the story of the young woman who was enabled to tap into, and bring into consciousness, her body's memory of a lost earring.[Goto excerpt 1] Level 2. In the same chapter I told of the young man whose arm totally ignored the effect of being subjected to several gallons of boiling water.[Goto excerpt 2] Level 3. On my Introduction page, I recount the quite incredible narrative of a youngster who was able rewrite his own genetic recipe. These are clear examples of conscious management of the innermost workings of the human organism. A range of other examples are illustrated throughout the Charisma Texts.[e.g. Chapter 7] A critic may raise the point that each of these occurrences happened while the central figure was hypnotised. That is a true but mute point. The separation between a hypnotic trance and conscious awareness is only that of two short steps. As people can be hypnotised, so can they be taught auto-hypnosis. With auto-hypnosis we have the situation in which the central figure is in hypnosis without the involvement of any middle agent. They decide what it is that they wish to achieve, then tap into, and communicate with their body's other minds. Come up a level and we have people doing the same things whilst fully conscious and aware of their surroundings in the common reality. This is your basic imagery, by which means a person imagines something will happen then causes it to do so. In an earlier time in our history we would now be talking of magic; the ability to change reality at [by] will. No surprise then, that its practioners were slandered and slaughtered by the priesthood. |