Every so often, I get overwhelmed by the myriad events of life. Those times, non-rational thoughts and feelings of victimization often arise, no doubt from the pre-reptilian part of my brain. Despite all the knowledge gained from readings in psychology, self-help, philosophy, tai chi, spirituality and meditation, it still takes me a lot of effort to stop myself and realize that those thoughts are just that--thoughts and not reality. No one is attacking me; my lot in life is not harder than anyone else's; and all I have to do is take a deep breath, notice what is happening, and I can settle myself down and devote my attention to what's needed. It sounds so easy, but I often forget, and find myself wasting energy tilting at windmills in my mind.
This week, I started listening to a book called "Emotional Alchemy" by Tara Bennett-Goleman. She applies Buddhist psychological principles of mindfulness to her practice as a therapist. We are to face life's crises with equanimity and serene composure. Being without reacting is a theme that comes up, again and again, which resonates with the principles of Taoism I've been reading about, for example verse 12 of the Tao Te Ching:
Colors blind the eye.
Sounds deafen the ear.
Flavors numb the taste.
Thoughts weaken the mind.
Desires wither the heart.
The Master observes the world
but trusts his inner vision.
He allows things to come and go.
His heart is open as the sky.
Our habits and thoughts actually become hard-wired into the neural pathways of our brain. To change, we have to practice new thoughts to lay down new pathways. Our pre-frontal cortex is the most recently evolved part of the brain and is what allows us to take all those chaotic feelings and emotions from the older, reptilian part of our brain, and act in ways that are appropriate.
This might sound mumbo-jumbo to some, but Bennett-Goleman cites the work of John Kabat-Zinn and Richard Davidson who have demonstrated the effects of meditation on the pre-frontal cortex. It turns out that mindfulness and meditation has a physical effect on our brains. The left pre-frontal cortex specifically generates positive feelings and dampens negative feelings. They looked at brain activity of those who practiced meditation and mindfulness and saw more activity in the left prefrontal cortex. The meditation actually made the subject stronger at controlling negative emotions.
A psychologist up the street at the Shambala Center in Washington, DC, told us in a meditation class recently, that it takes about 6 weeks for the beneficial effects of meditation to take effect, which coincidentally is how long it takes the average anti-depressant to take effect.
Which would you choose?
Showing posts with label anger. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anger. Show all posts
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Resting and Clearning
"Who can make muddy water clear? Let it be still, and it will gradually become clear. Who can secure the condition of rest? Let movement go on, and the condition of rest will gradually arise." (Tao Te Ching)
One of my goals for 2010 is to deepen my understanding of the philosophy behind Tai Chi. This is to help me become a better teacher of Tai Chi Chuan, of course, but it is also to help with my own personal development. This morning, my wife and I threw the oracle coins to do an I Ching reading. For more on what the I Ching is, click here to read the Wikipedia entry. Basically, it is one of the oldest texts that forms the basis of Taoist philosophy, in which Tai Chi Chuan has its roots. My coins resulted in the hexagram 29, "mastering pitfalls," with a moving line in the second position that results in an 8, "accord." I was surprised because their meanings seemed to mesh with my goal of personal development.
For many years, I have struggled with managing anger effectively. You name it, I've tried it: meditation, medication, yoga, swimming, deep breathing, and a host of other activities to try to reduce stress and make me a nicer person. I can, but won't, recount how I learned to express anger unhealthily. Suffice it to say that knowing the root cause didn't solve the problem, it only exacerbated it. Feeling victimized, powerless and resentful gave me the legitimacy to "dump" my anger on other people.
When writing down my goals for 2010, however, I saw how my anger was poisoning my relationships. And for the first time in my life, I had clarity around my anger. Perhaps it came from a line in one of the goal setting books I was reading. It basically said, "you are living the life that you have created or imagined. If you change how you think about your life, it will actually change what things will happen in your life." This is not so much different from what cognitive behavioral psychology or the new positive psychology movement tells us.
However, for some reason today it clicked. I realized that when I felt angry or put upon by someone, it was not because of what they were "doing to me," it was because I was projecting my unhappiness onto them. Moreover, I was seeing myself as an unhappy person. Believing my thoughts--that I was an unhappy person--would make me angry, and that would lead me to react in a negative way in my relationships. My personal development goals for 2010, especially around relationships, is to develop the talents and skills that I have (and do more of them) so I feel less angry and then stop blaming people around me for my unhappiness. It is about taking responsibility and being accountable for my own feelings and actions.
In this morning's I Ching reading, Hexagram 28, "mastering pitfalls," seems especially apt. Now that I know what my pitfalls are around anger, I can go about overcoming them. Doing that internal work will allow me to improve my relationship with others. I can't be an effective Tai Chi Chuan teacher if I haven't mastered the form and understood the philosophy behind it. As I improve myself, it will improve my relationships with others and result in the "accord" of Hexagram 8.
I like the quotes at the beginning from the Tao Te Ching. You can't force clarity. You have to be still and meditate and practice improving yourself. Only then will the natural forces be allowed to operate and we will understand.
How many people have written about having revelations, finding the answer to a problem, or coming up with a great idea only after they stopped thinking about it and let their mind work it out on its own? These people have done the ground work and been self-disciplined enough to study the problem, but the "aha" moment comes when they got out of the way. We need to balance the inward with the outward. We need to live in harmony with nature. When we impose our wills too much or make others the excuse for justifying our own behavior, well, we end up with a world like we're living in right now: terrorism, global warming, pollution, poverty, ignorance and needless suffering.
Tai Chi Chuan is an inward, soft martial art with a strong meditative component. It is all about bettering oneself and beginning a dialogue with one's body. It will lead us to find peace within ourselves, which is the only way we will ever find peace with those around us.
One of my goals for 2010 is to deepen my understanding of the philosophy behind Tai Chi. This is to help me become a better teacher of Tai Chi Chuan, of course, but it is also to help with my own personal development. This morning, my wife and I threw the oracle coins to do an I Ching reading. For more on what the I Ching is, click here to read the Wikipedia entry. Basically, it is one of the oldest texts that forms the basis of Taoist philosophy, in which Tai Chi Chuan has its roots. My coins resulted in the hexagram 29, "mastering pitfalls," with a moving line in the second position that results in an 8, "accord." I was surprised because their meanings seemed to mesh with my goal of personal development.
For many years, I have struggled with managing anger effectively. You name it, I've tried it: meditation, medication, yoga, swimming, deep breathing, and a host of other activities to try to reduce stress and make me a nicer person. I can, but won't, recount how I learned to express anger unhealthily. Suffice it to say that knowing the root cause didn't solve the problem, it only exacerbated it. Feeling victimized, powerless and resentful gave me the legitimacy to "dump" my anger on other people.
When writing down my goals for 2010, however, I saw how my anger was poisoning my relationships. And for the first time in my life, I had clarity around my anger. Perhaps it came from a line in one of the goal setting books I was reading. It basically said, "you are living the life that you have created or imagined. If you change how you think about your life, it will actually change what things will happen in your life." This is not so much different from what cognitive behavioral psychology or the new positive psychology movement tells us.
However, for some reason today it clicked. I realized that when I felt angry or put upon by someone, it was not because of what they were "doing to me," it was because I was projecting my unhappiness onto them. Moreover, I was seeing myself as an unhappy person. Believing my thoughts--that I was an unhappy person--would make me angry, and that would lead me to react in a negative way in my relationships. My personal development goals for 2010, especially around relationships, is to develop the talents and skills that I have (and do more of them) so I feel less angry and then stop blaming people around me for my unhappiness. It is about taking responsibility and being accountable for my own feelings and actions.
In this morning's I Ching reading, Hexagram 28, "mastering pitfalls," seems especially apt. Now that I know what my pitfalls are around anger, I can go about overcoming them. Doing that internal work will allow me to improve my relationship with others. I can't be an effective Tai Chi Chuan teacher if I haven't mastered the form and understood the philosophy behind it. As I improve myself, it will improve my relationships with others and result in the "accord" of Hexagram 8.
I like the quotes at the beginning from the Tao Te Ching. You can't force clarity. You have to be still and meditate and practice improving yourself. Only then will the natural forces be allowed to operate and we will understand.
How many people have written about having revelations, finding the answer to a problem, or coming up with a great idea only after they stopped thinking about it and let their mind work it out on its own? These people have done the ground work and been self-disciplined enough to study the problem, but the "aha" moment comes when they got out of the way. We need to balance the inward with the outward. We need to live in harmony with nature. When we impose our wills too much or make others the excuse for justifying our own behavior, well, we end up with a world like we're living in right now: terrorism, global warming, pollution, poverty, ignorance and needless suffering.
Tai Chi Chuan is an inward, soft martial art with a strong meditative component. It is all about bettering oneself and beginning a dialogue with one's body. It will lead us to find peace within ourselves, which is the only way we will ever find peace with those around us.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)