CALCO

http://interviewproject.davidlynch.com/www/” title="interview">http://interviewproject.davidlynch.com/www/

http://www.kk.org/quantifiedself/2009/06/you-own-your-health-data.php

http://sharedsymbolicstorage.blogspot.com/2009/06/michael-tomasello-why-we-cooperate.html

http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/greatergoodscience/?p=535

What do you think?

Scot

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/200810/no-child-left-inside-example-the-wrong-way-solve-national-problem

What do you think?

scot

 

HERSHOCK:

 

“At the very least, it urges affirmation that health arises through open and properly aligned and balanced reciprocal interactions among physical, biological, cognitive, social, and cultural dimensions of human being. Health is not a state to be achieved and maintained-the model of homeostasis; it is a distinctly creative quality of interrelatedness.” P. 42

 

Solution-Based Relationships:

HERSHOCK:

“It means keen attunement to the dramatic forces shaping both present and historical situational dynamics.

“Going Crosswise” means breaking sufficiently with the patterns of value-intention-action that have occasioned present realities to improvise relational changes that will resolve the suffering and trouble entailed by these realities. It is going skillfully and deeply enough against the dramatic grain of troubled and troubling situations to effectively consolidate shared commitments for actively revising what they will come to mean.” p. 10

 

HERSHOCK

Colonization of Consciousness:

 

“Through the consumption of mass media (as well as other commodities), attention is systematically exported out of our immediate situation. This compromises relational depth and quality, effectively eroding presently obtaining patterns of mutual support and contribution, and triggers further and still more extensive commodity consumption. As this recursive process intensifies beyond the point at which all major subsistence needs have been commoditized, consciousness itself is effectively colonized. The relational capabilities of both persons and communities atrophy, situational diversity is converted into circumstantial variety, and the very resources needed to meaningfully respond to and resolve our suffering or troubles are systematically depleted.”

Hershock

 

“Allostasis refers to the process of maintaining stability in the course of responding to challenge and reflects an understanding of health as a capacity for adaptation. Allostatic load consists of the cumulative somatic and psychic burden of repeatedly responding to challenge. This includes not only the total effects of chronic stress but also the genetic, developmental, and environmental factors that condition the effectiveness of adaptive responses to challenge. A rapidly growing body of medical research now confirms the extent to which the capacity for adaptation is conditioned by the interdependence of experience mediated by the CNS, the endocrine system, and the immune system.” pg 42   

 

Hershock

 

“Allostasis refers to the process of maintaining stability in the course of responding to challenge and reflects an understanding of health as a capacity for adaptation. Allostatic load consists of the cumulative somatic and psychic burden of repeatedly responding to challenge. This includes not only the total effects of chronic stress but also the genetic, developmental, and environmental factors that condition the effectiveness of adaptive responses to challenge. A rapidly growing body of medical research now confirms the extent to which the capacity for adaptation is conditioned by the interdependence of experience mediated by the CNS, the endocrine system, and the immune system.” pg 42   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

http://www.bfi.org/node

 

“Ninety-nine percent of who you are is invisible and untouchable.”

 

“There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it’s going to be a butterfly.”

 

“Integrity is the essence of everything successful.”

 

“The end move in politics is always to pick up a gun.”

 

“Out of my general world-pattern-trend studies there now comes strong evidence that nothing is going to be quite so surprising and abrupt in the future history of man as the forward evolution in the educational process.”

 

“You have to decide whether you want to make money or make sense, because the two are mutually exclusive.”

 

 

 

Richard Buckminster Fuller 

“Content is King: A Great Fallacy!”

The primary organizer of the complex grandiosity of life is the body-mind; aka the soma.

Just look at this complexity. Self organizing

http://integrallife.com/node/36238

This is right on!

Thoughts?

Scot

Somatic Leadership

Lets us assume that the Western Psyche is maturing into a perspective of interdependence. This interdependence is seen in multiple dynamic contexts from the personal to the communal. Change within this maturing perspective needs a new form of leadership with a very different orientation marked by ones ability to feel, see, and relate to how the personal and the communal are woven and thus participate with this present time dynamic in such a way as to foster this very orientation and awareness in others. This begins through Leadership practices that illuminate our own personal values-intentions-actions and how these are embodied actions that are either in line with the communal or in discord with the communal. Through Somatic Leadership processes we discover and practice present time dynamics that create and generate our mutual interdependent experience of reality.

Thoughts?

Scot

 

Taking the speed out of speed reading through mindful embodiment and the spirit of exploratory reading. Have the intention of curiosity or openness, a level of inquiry and utilizing consciousness we can absorb the word pictures as a “felt sense”. With practice we can absorb content with our whole mind (the brain-body). This kind of reading a level of service and joy!

I was just reading an article on boosting brain power with the body, that I found through my twitter account. The article discusses how to improve memory by physical training, but not just any sort of training, its brain games while biking on the Brain Center America’s NeuroActive Bike. As much as I find this an interesting approach to learning, that is just barely cutting edge, it continues the fallacy that we need to add something new to our lives to improve our intelligence. Buy something to be better, but really we are absolutely filled to the brim with all that we need. We are a highly evolved mammal, who have forgotten to practice evolution, through growing, learning, and focused attention. How about this for boosting brain-body power. Learn to read with your body. First let me explain my thinking. There is no brain. Absurd? Well only marginally. We do have a brain, but research galore is revealing that the demarcation between brain and body is shrinking. If this is the case than simply through developing awareness, skills, focus, and intention we can integrate and unify our intelligence. Much like any sum who is greater than the parts, we have a habit of being hyper focused on the brain, yet ignore and marginalize how the brain actually is nested, or part of the body, the tool, the instrument of receptivity. What is your T.V. with out the cable? I go as far to suggest we actually have five brains: a left hemisphere, a right hemisphere, a heart brain, a gut brain, and finally our skin, which is part of the ectoderm during our fetal development, which also makes the brain. Cognition is not king and as long as we orient ourselves in this way, we as a society will never advance the mystery of our ever evolving, adapting, species. Okay with that being said lets talk about speed reading with the body.

Regular 2D reading is where we subvocalize the words with the voice in our neocortical brain. This is the way we have been taught as a culture to experience ourselves, not bad, not good, just who we are and have been when it comes to reading. A fairly efficient way to process information. Reading from the gut is allowing our attentional field to open up beyond subvocalization. Through slowing the breathe to soothe the autonomic nervous system and placing attention in the gut brain we can then open our whole somatic brain to read. At first the practice is slow, so taking time to just feel the state of openness, smooth breathe, and anchored attention is the first phase. Get a “felt sense” of this in the body brain and spend time in this state several times a day, looking around, slowing the internal biology down and opening up. This grounds the body’s electricity to be able to pattern recognize the reading. When our body is in a hyper aroused state or sympathetically activated our consciousness becomes myopic, as it should, yet in our times, we are in this state often and need to practice new states in order to have a greater range of choices to a rapidly changing world. Imagine two attentional streams that are mutually exclusive currents, myopic sympathetic can not simultaneously run with a relaxed openness. Each attentional stream has it uses and we can practice and master these attentional streams through body awareness. Awareness is like massaging the nerves endings of the brain-body.

With practice we can all speed read through our right brain (to be addressed in future articles) attentional channels and respond to the rapidly changing environment in ways that create and support change that is creative rather than destructive.

Share thoughts

Scot

 

http://bookvideos.tv/videoid/1294

From A General Theory of Love

“Within the effulgence of their new brain, mammals developed a capacity we call limbic resonance-a symphony of mutual exchange and internal adaption whereby two mammal become attuned to each others internal states. It is limibic resonance that makes looking into the face of another emotionally responsive creature a multi-layered experience. Instead of seeing a pair of eyes as two bespeckled buttons, when we look into the ocular portals to the limbic brain our vision goes deep: the sensations multiply, just as two mirros placed in opposition create a shimmering ricochet of reflections whose depth recedes into infinity. Eye contact, although it occurs over a gap of yards, is not a metaphor. When we meet the gaze of another, two nervous systems achive a palpable and intimate apposition.”

(Lewis, Amini, & Lannon, 2000; p. 63)

Imagine being a powerful leader, teacher, or learner. What do you see? Is it the classic model of stoic strength and disseminator of information? Or is the leader, teacher, or learner that is CONNECTED to others, themselves and the environment? The latter is being seen as the more successful in a host of research from Scientific America to obscure studies found in universities across America. What do we do though with this knowledge? And how do we develop this CONNECTED leadership style?

“Our culture has forgotten that primordial knowledge buried underneath an impenetrable layer of lectures and instructional video tapes. Relationships have taken on the status of weather-everyone talks about them, but who knows what to do?"(Lewis, Amini, & Lannon, 2000; p. 66)

It begins by using your WHOLE brain. Notice this brain is show with the brain stem all the way down the spine. This is the whole brain! We are receiving and transmitting information constantly and what gives it organization is the meaning and purpose that directs your attention. So open up your attention, get CURIOUS! Listen with a bigger ear than just your ears, make some contact with your environment and with your self. Learning isn’t content, but effect use of your most integral intelligent processes.

Learning Design and Creating A Learning Culture

We are at a crux time where the directions we go will decide the outcome of our future. This is a great time to share and voluntarily evolve or learn through growth and development, through the open exchange of innovative discoveries about ourselves in relation to each other and to the world, and to cultivate a culture of learning. At CALCO we are promoting learning as conscious engagement in growing and maturing our deepest most human attributes, skills, and talents and in designing curriculum for the future. For so long we have limited learning to contents, bits, and invention, all of which are profound tools, yet when used alone they are limited. These tools, used in a great Learning Design, are accentuated and enhanced. Learning design is the process of shaping the nature of the learning experience. For instance adding the body into the learning design can support optimal brain functioning by keeping our whole experience alive and purposeful. This could look like adding play, imagination, movement, rest, and relationship into a learning context. The context could be a school, a business, a family, or an organization. We are always learning about how to be in the world with its rapid changes, adaptions, and complexity. We would like to share new design discoveries across the domains of specialty and culture and move into the shared human experience. As a species we are in need of the new and shared learning creates a culture of exchange and in turn evolves our work. Much like the Flickr phenomenon, which has reduced the time certain photo processes and software can be used from the time of introduction to the peoples hands. What once took ten months for a group of professional photographers to learn can now be done in three, through Flickr’s platform. See: www.flickr.com For more research on the research done on this phenomenon see: www.herecomeseverybody.org

Another interesting read is on Social Software .

Inquire into CALCO and share in an experiment to Evolve our experience, our learning, and ourselves.

Thanks

Executive Director of CALCO

Scot Nichols

We live in  radically different world from just a few years ago and much like any other time, these changes take time to see and to understand.  Learning is a gateway to growth and a rapid response to participate in a new way in todays world .  Our mind or more likely our consciousness is capable of attentional telescoping .  Looking at the discoveries of molecular biology, Bruce Lipton’s work, or the current understanding of the design of the universe, the work of George Moot, we find here that our course of study has been to explore the edges.  Attentional Telescoping is something we do everyday, but implicitly.  Developing implicit embodied right brain talents, are essential to creating and participating in a present minded changing world.  Learning to work with our other hemisphere will only aid us in having a range of tools to respond rather than react to the change in the world, be it personal, family, or work.  

The link below is to a new TED video by George Smoot.  This video presents a radically sophisticated, well researched model of space, galaxies, dark matter, and more.  What is important is the way it moved my thinking about out world.  The implications of his presentations are vast in understanding how our own experience is shaped.  I learned a lot from this video and it has stimulated thoughts of new ways to design experiences for people to support the best of our human talents.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/george_smoot_on_the_design_of_the_universe.html

 

I am curious to here your thoughts posted in the comments about George Smoot’s TED presentation and Attentional Telescoping

Keleman (2007), who is in the domain of Somatic Psychology in his article “Biological vision” is one who clearly can articulate what I am getting at. In this article Keleman is laying the foundational thinking for his development of his somatic psychology model called Formative Psychology. This psychology came out of his realization that not only are we psychological processes, but foundationally we are biological processes that expressed through the body. Through a life time an individual will have many different stages and evolutions, that are expressed though “shapes” within the body. These shapes can sometimes get stuck, but what Keleman brings to the field is that the shapes are “more plastic, mobile, and remoldable than we had been taught to believe”. (Keleman, 2007,p11) These thoughts and clinical observations led Keleman to see that through volunteers action an individual could deeply influence the shapes with in their biological process. Keleman says: “More importantly he would be able to shape both himself and the situation, to make his world.” Further on Keleman’s idea is that by utilizing the felt sense of the shape that is alive in the client, by feeling into the shape and its edges, one could begin to influence it by entering it deeper. This process of entering deeper is at the heart of the work as an individual moves more from their core of what moves them and excites them about being. Keleman clarifies this process: “When we say bodily, we don’t mean to reduce the person to the materialistic, mechanistic body implied by contemporary science. Neither do we imply occult vaporization. We mean the concrete experience of one’s existence. We work on the ground floor of the instinctual life, where there is no division between biology and personality.” (Keleman, 2007,p13) I see this article and Keleman’s Formative psychology as being a powerful addition to the field of Somatic Psychology for two reasons. The first is that he is clarifying the adaptive capability for any person to rally resources to their somatic aid through the basic biological function of growth, pleasure, and formation. Secondly he is adding to the clarity of language and thought that will be necessary to give Somatic Psychology a powerful stance in both clinical and academic applications.

 

 

Keleman, S. (2007). A Biological Vision. The USA Body Psychotherapy Journal , 6 (1), 10-19.

Honesty. What is the depth to which we employ honesty?

As we become adults, it grows ever easier to be honest about things like receiving too much change at the grocery store. Or, who was first in line at the coffee shop.

But there is a depth and breadth to honesty which we all experience, consciously or unconsciously, that rests at the core of our very being. Dictating our responses and behaviors in situations where our mettle is tested. Which leads to the question:

What does honesty mean to each of us? And are we honest in what is, arguably, the most essential way: with ourselves?

How are we, as humans, ever to be at peace if we cannot accept our humanity?

It is the thief and the rapist and the philanderer and the vagrant and the miscreant in all of us, however small, that needs to be recognized and thusly stripped of its power by our tacit acceptance of their existence.

I have the most peace, albeit not without difficulty, when I am the most honest with myself. When I am the witness to my life. Not simply as a passive observer, but an active participant; watching my responses to life and then consciously, and continually, shaping my existence based on what feels right.

And when I am listening, really listening, to what feels right and I have developed the capacity to change and love whoever I am--it is then, that I am whole.

I think that Education is a very important matter: in today’s world there seems to be more emphasis on testing  than on actual learning. Education should be about learning. People should be constantly exposed to new ideas and resources. Then, they should be taking these things back into their lives and applying them: making it relevant to them. Instead people are just being bombarded by facts that they are supposed to be able to regurgitate at a later date. I feel that education needs to take a step back to the basics.

I will be following the exploits of what what goes on in my pre-school classroom. I will recount what is being done and how this is part of the learning process. I will take things that happen in this early Education set-up and talk about ways in which it will be able to be applied into any classroom or environment where learning can be done. Making learning a part of your every day life is not difficult to do. It is worth doing too, since the whole process of learning is what makes life so interesting. 

 

“As a clinician-scientist, the practical applications of regulation theory are of great personal interest. In this volume I will cite an extremely large body of interdisciplinary data which suggests that the self organization of the developing brain occurs in the context of a relationship with another self, another brain. This primordial relational context can be growth-facilitating or growth inhibiting, and so it imprints into the early developing right brain either a resilience against or a vulnerability to later forming psychiatric disorders.” (Schore, 2003, p. xv)

One model that paints a clear picture of Somatic learning is Fenwick’s (2003) work.This work is focused on a framework that encompasses and expands Somatic learning, Experiential learning, and Complexity science. It is in this work that I find the most somatic resonance with. Fenwick’s model essentially encompasses the experiences that I have in effective therapy and in effective education that are somatically based. Utilizing many arguments in support of re-embodying the work of experiential learning, Fenwick brings us to complexity science, as a way to create and understand learning contexts. The first idea is that both person and context within a system are inseparable, woven into a single fabric of complex, dynamic, and adaptive interaction. The second idea is that by fiddling with both person and context in such a way as to add to the system, the system becomes triggered to bring about excitation and this “creates a new transcendent unity of action and identities that could not have been achieved independently”, thus stimulating change (p.7). Fenwick goes on to explain that humans are part of systems and will reflect the nature of the system in themselves. We as humans behave as systems do, and using complexity science we can see that whether small-scale or large-scale collective interaction from the autonomic nervous system, as a system within the body to people within families, we operate within a series of relative complex situations with in a series of relating interactions between systems. The result of such dynamic interactions is “unpredictable and inventive” (p. 8). In order for a system to be optimal it needs to able to creatively change to various conditions, both internally and externally, as well as having “diversity among its parts, whose interactions form their own patterns.” (p. 8). In order to facilitate learning, child and adult education must include this systemic model for learning to contain robust effect. Fenwick defines learning: “Learning is cast as continuous invention and exploration, produced through the relations among consciousness, identity, action, and interaction, objects and structural dynamics of complex systems. New possibilities for action are constantly emerging among interactions of complex systems, and cognition occurs in the possibility for unpredictable shared action. Knowledge cannot be contained in any one element or dimension of a system, for knowledge is constantly emerging and spilling into other systems” (p.131). Somatic learning when framed in the context of complexity science reveals many parallels between somatic education and somatic psychology. For instance returning the authoritative power of growth back to the individuals lived experience(Aposhyan, 2004). Also seeing how the mind is essentially a reflection of its interaction with its environment or its system (Siegel, 2001). Fenwick’s thinking and model is an integral idea that could describe an interface between both somatics and education. Looking at Fenwick’s definition of learning, I find a living language that can grasp and explain the complex nature of the lived experience within a series of systems, thus he captures a meta-process that can contain dynamic interactions within multiple complex systems. This could explain how both somatics and education could be used to implement innovative forms of learning, which for instance could utilize embodied pulsation (expansion and contraction) and social engagement as core principles in the design.

Aposhyan, S. (2004). Body-Mind Psychotherapy. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Co.

Fenwick, T. (2003). Reclaiming and re-embodying experiential learning through complexity science. Studies in the education of adults , 35 (2), 123-141.

Siegel, D. (2001). Toward an interpersonal neurobiology of the developing mind: atachment relationships. “mindsight” and neural integration. Infant Mental Health Journal , 22 (1-2), 67-94.

 

 

As I study the latest edges of psychobiological development via Neurobiology, I am taken to see that we are imprinted with the dyadic impressions of our earliest interactions with our primary care givers. As infants we grow through the experience dominant right brain, as the left comes fully online from two years old onward. Taking this idea through the life time of development, I am wondering if we are imprinted continually throughout all ages. So during the teen years we are imprinted by the complex weaving of our deep intersubjective core self and the socialization process of attaching to adolescent peers, subculture identities, music, etc. Further into our twenties we are again imprinted by leaving the family to create our autonomy. These imprints are deep unconscious, right brain, implicit forces that effect our deeper emotional life. Leading us to live out in a variety of ways, with a variety of choices all governed by the implicit impressions of our emergence from infancy to adulthood and onward. Without Somatic awakening these deeper implicit forces will make choices through us as core reactions and hungers. What I am thinking is that without self knowledge in the form of an ever increasing felt sense through the introception of the nerves of our internal physical life, we are at the whims of impressions and culture. Thus the way to autonomous interdependency, full human-hood, loving and deeply gratified beings, is to fully process these impressions. I think these deep impressions are most likely a cause of deep dissociation and muscular numbness, which leads us to collectively believe we are our thoughts and superficial identities. Yet lying underneath this superficial self is the deep fulfillment of living in our core perceptual truth of deep embodiment. What seems to prevent the full expression of this core self is both social forces ruling the impressions through absurd and unspoken taboos and a deep fear of loosing the identity that we do have. The fear of loosing this identity is wrapped up with the deep fear of feeling our most deepest emotions: grief, terror, shame, and oddly enough pleasure. This collective quagmire is promoted and supported by most of us. I would like to support an inner-revolution, not based on a switch of power structures, or financial, or philosophical ideas, but rather an emotional freedom to feel as a sentient aware conscious being

Thoughts

Scot 

 

 

 

 

“There is no need to education. It is not that you read a book, pass an examination, and finish with education. The whole of life, from the moment you are born to the moment you die, is a process of learning.”

j krishnamurti

 

Patterns of Interaction

 

 

Much like this flower expresses a consistent rich complexity, we to express a similar pattern. There is a theme in parenting, in relationships, and in developmental psychology around this complex pattern being consistent for the formation of healthy interaction.  The theme for this post is object constancy, patterns of interaction and interactive repair.  Interactive repair is a powerful to support bonding in familys and organization.

 

 Object constancy is “the capacity to recognize and tolerate loving and hostile feelings toward the same object; the capacity to keep feelings centered on a specific object; and the capacity to value an object for attributes other than its function of satisfying needs.” from http://www.sonoma.edu/users/d/daniels/objectrelations.html

 

This is important in the development and creation of a secure sense of self. As children mature, they need constancy to trust the repair-ability of life, with out repair or more specifically interactive repair life can essentially be seen-perceived as a terrifying place. “Its all broken”, “Its hopeless”, I am not enough”, and “the world is unjust.” Fostering hope, inner security, and ambition can be done in every relationship:relationship with self-other-community. Here is what HH Almas says about object constancy:

 

Object Constancy

 

The separation-individuation process leads ultimately to the development of the ego as a structure. Its final phase is that of object constancy, when the ego is formed and established as a permanent existence, separate from the environment (mother), and other people are seen to have separate existences. Finally, the ego is structured and developed, and the child permanently experiences himself as having a separate identity. (Essence, pg 160)

 

 

Object constancy is usually defined as the capacity to see and relate to the other as a person in his or her own right. This capacity is part of the quality of the Personal Essence, of being personal and able to make direct personal contact. (The Pearl Beyond Price)

 

Object relations theory contends that object love, which is love for a separate and differentiated human person, does not develop until object constancy is attained. In fact, it is part of the definition of object constancy that when it is achieved the individual has the capacity to love another as an individual in his or her own right. (The Pearl Beyond Price)

 

from: http://www.ahalmaas.com/glossary/o/object_constancy.htm

 

 

 

So what would this look like in practical action?

Regular patterns of interaction are:

• Emotional availability

• Nurturance/empathy

• Protection

• Comforting

• Teaching

• Play

• Willingness to repair

• Mutual self reflection

• Respect of developmental edges

 

These are only a few that are implicit, but when brought to the for of interaction with all of life, they are elucidated and become explicit. This will support the development of connection, team building, partnerships, social relationships etc. Try some of these out and comment below or feel free to share these with others.

Thanks

Scot

 

 

INTUITIVE FOCUSING

There are several well developed methods that have been seeds off of Eugene T. Gendlin’s work called: FOCUSING He started researching what “really” works in therapy. What he found is that when people get a felt sense, stay with that felt sense, and open to the felt sense that therapy actually works. This is truly a clear and well researched method of maintaining contact with ones bodily experience. The work of Focusing has been applied to many fields: management, listening, relationships, learning, a.d.d, lawyers, and so much more. Its also a great process to do with oneself as a tool to increase intuitive, sensory, intelligence. This is classic Right brain work.

The basic method:
1. Clearing a space: Tuning in and listening to your body, just being with what is, breath, feeling of chair, etc. Ask this, settled in space, what is between you and feeling good. Or ask another question that has relevance for you.

2.Felt Sensing: Feeling, slowing, and deep listening. The inner felt sense can be a range of sensations, images, emotions, words. (if you move into left brain thinking and figuring out, drop deeper into slow breath, and deep listening.)

3.Getting a Handle: When you find a “felt sense” that has a lingering, “hey this is it” feeling, open to images, words, or feelings to get a handle of what this piece of felt sensing is about for you.

4.Resonating: Test the image, word, or feeling with your deeper felt sense, is this accurate?

5.Asking: This could also be called searching, or opening, to the newness, or freshness that is emerging out of the resonating theme. Whats next as this intuitive felt sensing emerges? This is a process!

6. Receiving: Stay with the newness, the freshness, and open to recieve the felt sense, listening as your body’s wisdom, the intelligence of being whole, contextualizes the felt sense.

Here are some great resources for this work:
http://www.focusing.org/

http://www.cefocusing.com/index.php
http://www.vegsource.com/biospirituality/main.html

Thoughts have quite a bit of power. In both Cognitive psychotherapy and in Somatic therapy thoughts can change our physical organization and how we relate to any particular dynamic. Imagine designing learning and transformative events with experientials that put us into direct contact with the power of thought. See below for some of the latest science on thoughts and intention.  The Intention Experiment:  Results of the first three experiments The Intention Experiment has run six intention experiments so far – with extraordinary results about the power of intention. We’ve demonstrated that intention from a group scattered around the globe can affect living light — in everything from algae and leaves to human beings.  see: http://www.theintentionexperiment.com/ also see: http://oneminuteshift.com/videos/lynne_mctaggart_video/can_intention_change_the_world

"And as Shakespeare says in Hamlet: To thine own self be true, then as surely as night follows day, thou canst to no man be false. The journey shows you that from this inner dedication you can reconstruct your own values and action. You develop from your own self-compassion a great compassion for others. You are no longer caught in the false game of judgment, comparison and assumption. More naked now than ever, you begin to feel truly alive. You begin to trust the music of your own soul; you have inherited treasure that no one will ever be able to take from you. At the deepest level, this adventure of growth is in fact a transfigurative conversation with your own death. And when the time comes for you to leave, the view from your death bed will show a life of growth that gladdens the heart and takes away all fear.” -John O’Donohue- How do we begin the life of belonging? Belonging to ourselves, our bodies, our earth, our communities, etc.? It is here that we must search, but this journey begins by using a level of experience that we have marginalized, that of the right brain. Its like our collective culture has been ignoring this side of our life for so long that it is not there any more.  "The main theme to emerge… is that there appear to be two modes of thinking, verbal and nonverbal, represented rather separately in left and right hemispheres respectively and that our education system, as well as science in general, tends to neglect the nonverbal form of intellect. What it comes down to is that modern society discriminates against the right hemisphere." -Roger Sperry (1973) from: http://www.viewzone.com/bicam.html How do we begin a journey when we have been mistaking the map for the territory? Thoughts? Questions? Thanks Scot more links: http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/229 http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22556281-661,00.html http://www.danpink.com/wnm.html

LOVE: What is the force of love? Are we able to choose brain states? What brain do you live in most of the time? How is it for you to be generous? How do we actually love? Some suggest that its good for your health, check out the following quote and link to learn about research being done on love. Leave comments, thoughts, stories, etc.
Thanks
Scot

“The evidence to be accumulated herein supports the following hypothesis: One of the
healthiest things a person can do is to step back from self-preoccupation and self-worry, as well
as from hostile and bitter emotions, and there is no more obvious way of doing this than focusing
attention on helping others. This transformation of being and of doing seems to promote
emotional and physical well-being, and odds are, will add some years to life."Stephen G. Post, Ph.D. Download this article from:

http://www.unlimitedloveinstitute.org/publications/goodtobegood.html

The future of our transformation will include a deep education of collaboration and supporting humans through synergy. Like plants need sun to grow, we need a force, an energy, a motivation to grow and develop. The following themes can easily be integrated into designing human gatherings, meetings, classes, conventions, families, schools, and more. How would you use this information?

The Driving Force - values and quality of life

An Application of Synergic Power: Ten Principles of Human Development

1. The principle of free existence. [choice]
2. The quality of perception principle. [vision]
3. The strength of identity principle. [confidence]
4. The principle of competence. [diversity]
5. The principle of authentic and intense commitment. [participation]
6. The principle of suspension and risk. [courage]
7. The principle of bridging the distance. [mutuality]
8. The principle of self-confirmation and self-transcendence. [respect]
9. The principle of dialectic leading to synergy. [balance]
10. The principle of feedback ordered into complexity. [development]

Charles Hampden-Turner, Radical Man, 1971 in N. Arthur Coulter, Human Synergetics, 1976, Chapter 17

from: http://www.calresco.org/wp/synergy.htm

http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/229

This video really captures the two functions of our brain.  I have been using this to teach the two experiential functions of the brain and what can occur with the power of training to work in symphony with both brains.  What are your thoughts on this video?