One of the great things about walking outdoors everyday is meeting people in the neighborhood, most of whom are walking dogs. Up until a few days ago I thought I got along fine with all but one of the dogs. Then I had an experience that made me rethink my own behavior and what I’m communicating to the various dogs of my acquaintance.
This particular Jack Russell terrier had been looking at me with what I interpreted as distrust and worry since I first started talking with his owner on my walks over the last few months. I thought it might have been because I took attention away from him. Then the other day a woman who obviously adored little dogs asked if she could say “hi” and when she stooped down he was so clearly delighted to meet her, licking her face and putting his front paws on her, I was amazed at the immediate bonding. I said something to his owner about Alyosha knowing a dog person when he saw one. He said, “He always knows” then added something about her getting down to his level. It took me a minute to digest this, but when we resumed our walk, I stopped and stooped down to greet him like she had done, and he immediately came over and licked my face like he was glad I’d finally gotten around to noticing him. I was pleased and touched by his generous welcome in the face of my months of bad behavior. By not going down to his level I was disrespecting him, maintaining my superior position and not recognizing him as a little being in his own right. To be “beneath notice” is painful and that was what I saw on this dignified little dog’s face. I realized that the looks I’d seen previous to this moment were his puzzlement at my lack of acknowledgment, which may even have hurt his feelings. I always said “Hi Alyosha” but a dog knows that’s not really taking him in. This is a big lesson. I can’t let my uneasiness around dogs make me impolite. These are behaviors associated with the cingulate cortex where social interaction is processed in all mammals. So it makes sense that the various ways we acknowledge and don’t acknowledge each other could communicate across species. It’s also is a reminder that this occurs preconsciously, but as humans, becoming conscious of it gives us a choice.
Though I may feel vulnerable getting down to eye level it communicates faith in the dog’s good intentions. And he was happy to come up to meet me. Face to face is where communication takes place. And Jack Russell’s are known to be particularly sensitive to facial expression and perhaps even more subtle social protocols.
Just like in my interactions with squirrels, I was inordinately pleased after finally meeting Alyosha. Communication is healing, and there’s a purity in the non-verbal exchange with friends from a different place on the animal spectrum. Interacting with animals is good for our health. An article in the mainstream health site WebMD cites studies showing that having pets reduces blood pressure and anxiety and boosts immunity. Relationships with animals are sensory, rich in touch, smell, vision and action that communicate with our right hemisphere and tune our own intuitive behavior. Because they’re not trying to name or symbolize and break down what they experience animals are better at seeing the meaning of the whole. They know when something’s wrong with the scene or out-of-synch with the pattern. So much of what we call intuition is the result of right hemisphere impressions of the whole picture unfolding in time and how it relates to us.
Like any good lesson, awareness of the implications of my behavior to animals gives me the chance to change a habitual pattern that was interfering with communication. Now I’ll be able to get to know them even better and enrich my perspective with their way of being.
Monday, December 12, 2011
Friday, November 11, 2011
Numbers
Numbers like 11-11-11 demand attention. It’s a visual alignment that seems to signify without us really knowing what. Advertisers play on it, movies are released, armistices have been signed (though without that final 11). Sure, it’s easy to remember if you’re scheduling an event, but myself, I’ve always found beauty in numerical arrangements, with particular appreciation for symmetry. A palindrome on my odometer is a small moment of grace, a glimpse of order happening by itself, reminding me of the many changes unfolding all around me, most hidden from perception. Repeated numbers convey a unison, all in accord, and though this is personal symbolism on my part, it has the concrete effect of Zen’s bell of mindfulness in meditation or daily life. It brings me back to the present and for the time the number is present with me, until 3:33 turns to 3:34, I stay right there.
At the grocery store the other day the woman exclaimed “Four Forty-four” as she handed me the receipt. The correspondence gets our attention whether we ascribe meaning to it or not. And she was smiling. As visual form there’s a beauty that’s enhanced by its unlikeliness. If the receipt said, “forty-four, forty-four” it would be even more noteworthy. That underlying sense of the probability factor is the only real connection with mathematics itself, which often finds the right solution by its elegance. We experience our awareness of probabilities when we notice the rare coordinance of numbers or planets. And with both numbers and planets we know it will happen again, the numbers on the clock will do the same thing tomorrow and for the most part we don’t notice, but when we do it’s like we’re in alignment too and in that moment of awareness our perpetual motion, mind and body, slows down. Manmade patterns are built on the cyclic patterns of nature and like the pleasure of all beauty; it’s a pleasure of connection.
In the case of accidental alignments there’s also a sense of personal discovery.
As hard as it may be to believe, I just walked into the kitchen and the clock over the stove said 11:11. So it was 11:11, 11-11-11. So cool. I experience these moments as little blessings, am always surprised, so maybe my pleasure is not just the endorphins from beauty but also the dopamine of the unexpected. In any case the delight is a temporary release from the things that wear us down.
At the grocery store the other day the woman exclaimed “Four Forty-four” as she handed me the receipt. The correspondence gets our attention whether we ascribe meaning to it or not. And she was smiling. As visual form there’s a beauty that’s enhanced by its unlikeliness. If the receipt said, “forty-four, forty-four” it would be even more noteworthy. That underlying sense of the probability factor is the only real connection with mathematics itself, which often finds the right solution by its elegance. We experience our awareness of probabilities when we notice the rare coordinance of numbers or planets. And with both numbers and planets we know it will happen again, the numbers on the clock will do the same thing tomorrow and for the most part we don’t notice, but when we do it’s like we’re in alignment too and in that moment of awareness our perpetual motion, mind and body, slows down. Manmade patterns are built on the cyclic patterns of nature and like the pleasure of all beauty; it’s a pleasure of connection.
In the case of accidental alignments there’s also a sense of personal discovery.
As hard as it may be to believe, I just walked into the kitchen and the clock over the stove said 11:11. So it was 11:11, 11-11-11. So cool. I experience these moments as little blessings, am always surprised, so maybe my pleasure is not just the endorphins from beauty but also the dopamine of the unexpected. In any case the delight is a temporary release from the things that wear us down.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
The Personal Map
From the beginning, reading “Infinite Jest”, I’ve been fascinated by David Foster Wallace’s use of the phrase, “ eliminate his/her/your map” to refer to death. At first it seemed like a kind of slang- the obscure phrase that a particular in-group will use to define themselves with private language. But the more I thought of it, particularly in relation to all of the brain science I’ve read, the more it seemed like he had struck upon the one truly unique feature of every human being’s individual self. From the beginning we create our own inner map of the world that includes not just all we’ve done and experienced but also how we feel about it. And what we recognize in our surroundings, spring from memories seen in the places of our lives, which clarify the meaning of the experience that’s conveyed by the feeling. We map not just where we are, but all we know in time and space. Since my father’s lost so much of his memory, I’ve found that when we do discover remembered areas it’s always in relation to places. Talking this week about weddings, he couldn’t remember my brother’s until I mentioned Hiss Avenue. The reception was in the back yard of my sister-in-law’s childhood home and given the scene Dad’s memory came drifting back to what a great guy her Dad was and the boat her brother Woody built and their fish pond. This place in his map still had its connection to the sights, sensations and feelings of his past experience and I could tell he enjoyed remembering and re-experiencing his connection to life. He got his mind moving by finding a way into his map.
This map, primarily in the hippocampus, but riding up against the parietal lobes (where we are in space) on one side and the feeling centers on the other, establishes our sense of ourselves in space/time and personal meaning. Where we are forms the core of who we are. The brain is full of maps that correlate one kind of experience with another. The map is the hub of what we know, the hippocampus the trigger point of all the rich associations spread throughout the brain.
This is a concrete reality and not a metaphor, but as a metaphoric image it helps us comprehend the notion of an Akashic field, where all the information of all that’s happened and been thought continues to accumulate, enriched by our very own thoughts in the here and now. Though an ancient idea its appeal is growing. New experience adds to the field and enables us to tune to information already there. In a state of flow the field of information moves through us unobstructed, but filtered through our individual frequency. I used to resist the idea that what’s experienced by me as my mind is not necessarily all in my head. That the modification in my brain as I have new experience might be simply expanding the reception of my tuner. Like a radio filtering out a particular broadcast to pull in we receive information through our highly sophisticated personal brains. Likewise we send it out, add what we know to the field of information. This is the model proposed by Rupert Sheldrake. That even our own memories aren’t in our brains but are in the information field impressed with those experiences and the shape of the energy that rippled from it; this was an idea that was headbashingly difficult to take in when I first read it. In his book, “The Sense of Being Stared At,” Sheldrake writes, “Trying to understand minds without recognizing the extended fields on which they depend is like trying to understand the effects of magnets without acknowledging that they are surrounded by magnetic fields.” Broadening our idea of what constitutes mind will require images to shape a new model of how we conceive of it.
This map, primarily in the hippocampus, but riding up against the parietal lobes (where we are in space) on one side and the feeling centers on the other, establishes our sense of ourselves in space/time and personal meaning. Where we are forms the core of who we are. The brain is full of maps that correlate one kind of experience with another. The map is the hub of what we know, the hippocampus the trigger point of all the rich associations spread throughout the brain.
This is a concrete reality and not a metaphor, but as a metaphoric image it helps us comprehend the notion of an Akashic field, where all the information of all that’s happened and been thought continues to accumulate, enriched by our very own thoughts in the here and now. Though an ancient idea its appeal is growing. New experience adds to the field and enables us to tune to information already there. In a state of flow the field of information moves through us unobstructed, but filtered through our individual frequency. I used to resist the idea that what’s experienced by me as my mind is not necessarily all in my head. That the modification in my brain as I have new experience might be simply expanding the reception of my tuner. Like a radio filtering out a particular broadcast to pull in we receive information through our highly sophisticated personal brains. Likewise we send it out, add what we know to the field of information. This is the model proposed by Rupert Sheldrake. That even our own memories aren’t in our brains but are in the information field impressed with those experiences and the shape of the energy that rippled from it; this was an idea that was headbashingly difficult to take in when I first read it. In his book, “The Sense of Being Stared At,” Sheldrake writes, “Trying to understand minds without recognizing the extended fields on which they depend is like trying to understand the effects of magnets without acknowledging that they are surrounded by magnetic fields.” Broadening our idea of what constitutes mind will require images to shape a new model of how we conceive of it.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
To See Or Not To See
With seeing as the most common metaphor for understanding, it’s not surprising that there would also be many different metaphors that describe ignorance as what interferes with it.
Originally put on horses so things on the side of the road wouldn’t distract them, “blinkers” had a useful function. The metaphor “blinkered vision” could be seen as a positive, a focus on the goal that ignores everything else. It suited the verbal, linear, single cause and effect view within the twentieth century idea of progress and propelled its machine. With the field of variables pruned so far down, the illusion of control is created. But any realistic view of a situation includes variables in all directions. Though excluding things to learn more about a single area can have value, does what is learned have any meaning without the role of that area in a larger context?
My blog community (those that visit this site) is from all over the world, from the Ukraine to the Philippines, India and Germany, Sudan and China, people joined by ideas. And one of the central ideas that weaves through visual philosophy is the value of a bigger picture. A larger perspective is the route to the wisdom necessary to change the world. When the camera pans over the demonstrators on Wall St. there’s more variety of individuals than I’ve ever seen at a protest. Those interviewed all have different angles on what’s happening that give dimension to our understanding. So many kinds of lives have been damaged by the blinkered vision and unchecked greed that’s ruining this country. A few people hoarding all the money will lead us back into a technological feudalism. When work can be done anywhere we’re almost always working. Making profits as the only goal means not caring who gets trampled on the way. When we keep from seeing the impact of our actions we can convince ourselves we’re not responsible. Seeing changes our view. Tightly held views are threatened by the challenge of open eyes.
Words are blinkers. As we walk the street the word “beggar” keeps us from seeing the specific individual. The word “fool” or “dupe” keeps us from being the compassionate human we could. We find “enemies” to be responsible for our dissatisfactions and make demons and “bad guys” out of people who see the world with different blinkers. We build the words into creeds and the blinkers get bigger, enable more damage to be ignored, more people not to see, for the sake of a bunch of words.
Scientists suggest that blinking when lying represents a minute retreat from what’s about to be said. Finding this out made me start counting blinks when politicians were speaking on camera. In slow motion it was like some had their eyes shut the whole time. I started watching in slow motion after learning about Paul Ekman’s work on microexpression. He said we could control our primary facial expressions but that underlying motives and attitudes would show in the transitions between them. Watching presidential primary debates in slow motion showed an entirely new persona in some cases, underlying psychology that was sometimes scary in it’s zealotry or condescension. Without the words to distract me their stance toward the world and other people could be seen as far more complex and enlightening.
We can see more and better without the screen erected by verbal language. Turn off the sound and wipe it clean to perceive more of what counts.
Originally put on horses so things on the side of the road wouldn’t distract them, “blinkers” had a useful function. The metaphor “blinkered vision” could be seen as a positive, a focus on the goal that ignores everything else. It suited the verbal, linear, single cause and effect view within the twentieth century idea of progress and propelled its machine. With the field of variables pruned so far down, the illusion of control is created. But any realistic view of a situation includes variables in all directions. Though excluding things to learn more about a single area can have value, does what is learned have any meaning without the role of that area in a larger context?
My blog community (those that visit this site) is from all over the world, from the Ukraine to the Philippines, India and Germany, Sudan and China, people joined by ideas. And one of the central ideas that weaves through visual philosophy is the value of a bigger picture. A larger perspective is the route to the wisdom necessary to change the world. When the camera pans over the demonstrators on Wall St. there’s more variety of individuals than I’ve ever seen at a protest. Those interviewed all have different angles on what’s happening that give dimension to our understanding. So many kinds of lives have been damaged by the blinkered vision and unchecked greed that’s ruining this country. A few people hoarding all the money will lead us back into a technological feudalism. When work can be done anywhere we’re almost always working. Making profits as the only goal means not caring who gets trampled on the way. When we keep from seeing the impact of our actions we can convince ourselves we’re not responsible. Seeing changes our view. Tightly held views are threatened by the challenge of open eyes.
Words are blinkers. As we walk the street the word “beggar” keeps us from seeing the specific individual. The word “fool” or “dupe” keeps us from being the compassionate human we could. We find “enemies” to be responsible for our dissatisfactions and make demons and “bad guys” out of people who see the world with different blinkers. We build the words into creeds and the blinkers get bigger, enable more damage to be ignored, more people not to see, for the sake of a bunch of words.
Scientists suggest that blinking when lying represents a minute retreat from what’s about to be said. Finding this out made me start counting blinks when politicians were speaking on camera. In slow motion it was like some had their eyes shut the whole time. I started watching in slow motion after learning about Paul Ekman’s work on microexpression. He said we could control our primary facial expressions but that underlying motives and attitudes would show in the transitions between them. Watching presidential primary debates in slow motion showed an entirely new persona in some cases, underlying psychology that was sometimes scary in it’s zealotry or condescension. Without the words to distract me their stance toward the world and other people could be seen as far more complex and enlightening.
We can see more and better without the screen erected by verbal language. Turn off the sound and wipe it clean to perceive more of what counts.
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