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A Phenomenal Explanation of Mindfulness From a Stroke Sufferer
AllbuddhaBound
Veteran
This woman (Jill Bolte Taylor) so beautifully describes presence and being in the now because of her stroke. Any comments?
http://www.ted.com/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html
http://www.ted.com/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html
5
Comments
'The Rise of Consciousness As the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind'. There are many questions in Jill's comments. Questions that rise from Buddhist skills. When the chatter dies down and the light dawns, is that dawning simply the electric field of your mind which you are now not consuming with the constant chatter? I don't know. When you feel very large-like a giant walking through a smaller world-are you simply moved into your right hemisphere? I don't know. However, when the winds enter and dissolve in your central channel there is a lasting change that happens. When your heart chakra opens and you feel the instant connection between the self sacrifice or pain of others
transmitted to your tear ducts, that doesn't go away. You are better for these things.
Is it just physiology? I don't know. But, real changes happen and they stay with you.
That makes the effort worthwhile. Buddhism has helped me become a better, larger person and that has made it all worthwhile. Maybe I will discover the true source in the ground luminosity-some day. I hope so. But that is not really so important.
Thought is not awareness.
I enjoyed the video and Jill's account. Thank you for your gift. Best, Dennis
I can't remember who said it, no wait, I think it was either Rick Hanson PhD or Richard Mendius MD (a psychologist and a neurologist, both Buddhists) who likened the brain to a television set. Maybe the human brain is less specialized than that, more like a processor, and emptiness/awareness manifests through our brains "neurologically", according to the strengths, weaknesses, skills (like those obtained by meditation), and reflexive self-awareness (insight). Maybe the loud clattering and clamoring of the left hemisphere is like the squeaky wheel, our western culture(s) support the dominance of language and logic and other left brained things. Perhaps awareness/emptiness comes blaring through in the absence of left brain processes?
After I watched this video I went on an internet search specifically for opinions and ideas that were critical of Jill Bolte Taylor. All I found that I remember was some post on Quora stating that the left brain/right brain dichotomy is not that cut and dried. Memories are 'stored' throughout left and right cortex, as are many other functions, not strictly located ONLY in certain hemispheres.
What reassures me about JBT's experience is that it has been reproduced ad infinitum throughout human history, albeit not the way she experienced it. At least we can say for certain her experience was human and often known.
The niggling doubter within spoke up too, that like supposed 'near death experiences', phenomena caused by dying, hypoxic neurons, perhaps JBT's experience is reducible to a very massive, catastrophic brain fart. I won't go on and on about that because I don't believe it to be true, or true enough. This sounds like something the blind men feeling the elephant would come up with, IMO.
Gassho
would any of you voluntarily allow yourselves to experience what Jill Bolte Taylor experienced, without the harm or potential lasting effects of a stroke?
Think about it. If there was a way to devote a mere few hours - instead of days, weeks, months or longer working your way back to 'normalcy' - experiencing what she experienced; the ultimate connection to the universe, the bliss of feeling a part of every particle around you, until you are no longer 'you' but the universe itself... magical, majestic, magnificent... powerful, without limitations ... would you do it?
If your answer is "yes", or even "maybe"...
Now, maybe for the very first time, you can understand why some people do (certain) drugs and how the experience changes them forever.
This type of experience is exactly why drugs have played a role in cultures all over the world, since man first ate psychedelic mushrooms or so-called "poisonous" plants in earlier times....
This is why modern man (even scientists and great thinkers) took LSD, etc. This was their 'trip', as well.
In the ambulance, my heart had accelerated to the point where the medic thought he needed to stop my heart with medication and then get it going again. The doctor on the radio would not give him permission though. (The stroke occurred as a result of something called atrial fibrilation). I was not all that concerned. LOL
I also felt kind of dumb, numbed out, not quite with it. Understandable because I am accustomed to doing lots of thinking. Over-thinking I guess. My vocabulary had really shrunk down to yes and no. LOL