Mao
Do you use bio-feedback to control the electrical pathways emanating from your brain? Bio-feedback; A Case of Nerves
The autonomic nervous system(ANS) has fascinated me ever since I watched a psychology movie of a person controlling an HO electric train set with his brain. Without conscious effort, the ANS sends impulses to organs of the body, and controls such things as heart rate, breathing rate, blood pressure, body temperature and other instinctive activities that maintain equilibrium. In the train experiment the subject had probes placed on two fingers and was told to make each digit a different temperature. Most participants were eventually able to make the toy train move. What the researcher had designed was a vivid use of bio-feedback as a way to teach the brain to move blood.
The film made such an impression on me that I decided to turn the experiment into an exhibit at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry. A sound booth was built and placed adjacent to a circular HO train course. Visitors were directed to place two fingers on the temperature probes that were inside the glass booth that overlooked the course. Unfortunately, I was never successful in making the train move, perhaps because I did not spend enough time practicing. But I did observe others who were actually able to make one finger warmer than the other by directing different amounts of blood from their brain to each finger. Spectators were as amazed as I when the train started its slow journey around the track.
Commercial devices are now available that can translate the brain’s electrical patterns to make objects move, as well as alter sound waves. NeuroSky, a San Jose-based company, developed a toy that enables the player to turn the blades of an eight inch helicopter and make it soar. The participant experiences success by concentrating on a single thought, turning on electrical patterns inside his brain. The outcome not only makes the helicopter fly but changes his emotional state to produce a sense of calm and relaxation.
A number of years ago I observed a medical application of mind-body control being conducted in a Portland bio-feedback lab that helped those suffering from severe migraines. A patient was hooked up to electrical sensors and told to pay attention to the line on a monitor that responded to change in blood flow. The idea was to send the blood away from the head to body extremities such as hands or feet. With practice hot hands, as it is often called, can be an effective way to reduce headaches.
The Mayo clinic is one among many health centers active in training people to control such things as heartbeat, asthma, anxiety and muscles to reduce pain. Bio-feedback gives the patient power to control thoughts in mind and body in order to improve health and physical conditioning. Use of a bio-feedback machine does take time, however, and practice sessions may be costly. Relaxation techniques and meditation are a less expensive alternative.
Chemicals are more widely used to control parts of the brain. Everything from pain killers to sleeping aids are found in medicine cabinets throughout the country. In the 1960s and 70s my Boston friends were playing around with LSD. I remember one neighbor telling me that the idea behind acid was to gain insight into the brain’s possibilities so you could then work to achieve that state without drugs. The woman who spoke to me had experienced brilliant colors and sharp images while on an acid trip. She spent months afterwards meditating in order to relive the experience at will.
As an aside, I do not recommend that you try this chemically induced state. When I worked in a mental health center I observed patients who took LSD and could not come out of the experience. According to a 2013 Popular Science article, there is renewed interest among scientists in studying the use of pharmaceutical grade hallucinogenic drugs in psychiatry. Clinicians believe that it could help cure some of our most debilitating problems such as alcoholism, depression and PTSD. It will be interesting to see if their experiments turn out to be successful.
I have been meditating on and off for forty years and have found it to be most beneficial. Several years ago I had to undergo a series of operations and wanted to make sure that I would be a stress-free patient. Meditation did help me enter the hospital with a calmness of mind. Yogis say that once your realize that your body/mind is within you but you are not your body/mind everything changes.
Scientists have studied change by using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) on meditators while they practiced two forms of meditation, one non-directive and the other concentrative. In an article published in the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience researchers under the direction of Svend Davanger at the University of Oslo in Norway found “that when participants practiced non-directive meditation, they had higher brain activity in areas associated with processing self-related thoughts and feelings than when they were resting. But when subjects practiced concentrative meditation, their brain activity was nearly the same as when they were resting.”
Dr. Davanger suggests that non-directive meditation “allows for more room to process memories and emotions than during concentrated meditation.” He was also surprised to learn that “a mental task like non-directive meditation results in even higher activity in this network than regular rest.”
Many people ask me how I can carve out time to meditate in a busy schedule and my answer surprises them. For every minute I spend mediating I reduce my need for sleep an equal amount or more. Meditation puts my brain waves into a relaxed state, and it has a creepy-crawly effect that expands to fill my mind throughout the day.
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For more information about the autonomic nervous system:
http://training.seer.cancer.gov/anatomy/nervous/organization/pns.html- about the peripheral nervous
system.http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/01/21/263078049/brain-games-move-objects-with-your-mind-to-find-inner-calm – move objects with your brain.
http://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/biofeedback/basics/definition/prc-20020004- Bio-feedback and control of body functions.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19935987 – research on bio-feedback and migraines.
http://thelazyyogi.com/post/34377765370/meditation-why-what-and-how – about meditation.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/276959.php- article in Medical News about how the brain works during meditation, May 19, 2014
