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It seems emotional integration is spontaneous with aging. Fusion of five shen is attempt to speed up the process. Seems when they all live in the same body-mind together they eventually learn to get along….
michaelTHE BRAIN GETS ‘MELLOW’ WITH AGE
BBC News
June 16, 2006http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/5080978.stm
People become more “mellow” in response to negative emotions over their
lifetime, research suggests.A brain imaging study in individuals aged 12 to 79 found that emotional
stability continues to improve, even into the seventh decade.And older people were found to be less neurotic than teenagers.
The results published in the Journal of Neuroscience combat negative beliefs
that brain function declines with age, say the Sydney University
researchers.A total of 242 healthy men and women were assessed for the study using
emotional well-being questionnaires.Neurotic traits were found to decrease with advancing age — with the 12 to
19 year age group being the most neurotic and the 50 to 79 year age group
being the least neurotic.Researchers then used MRI scanning and measurements of electrical activity
to monitor brain responses while subjects viewed facial expressions of
emotions.When shown images of faces expressing emotion, younger age groups were
significantly better at recognising fear but less accurate when it came to
identifying happiness.Brain scans also showed that in older people the medial prefrontal area of
the brain was more active when processing negative emotions than positive
ones.The results indicate that older people have better control over brain
responses to negative emotions than younger people.Emotional wellbeing
Writing in the journal, Dr Leanne Williams and colleagues at the Brain
Dynamics Centre, Westmead Millennium Institute in Sydney, Australia
concluded: “These findings provide new evidence that emotional wellbeing
improves over seven decades of the human lifespan.“We propose that life experience and changing motivational goals may drive
plasticity in the medial prefrontal brain to increase selective control over
the balance of negative and positive emotion.”They added that with predictions one in three people will be over age 60 by
2150, researchers should draw on positive changes in emotional brain
function to help find interventions to address age-related decline in
cognitive function.Professor Helen Fisher, an expert in human emotion at Rutgers University in
New Jersey said: “Hopefully, these findings will begin to usher in a new and
more positive understanding of the aging process.”Dr Simon Surguladze, deputy head of the department of neuroscience and
emotion at King’s College London said the control over negative emotions in
older people was likely to be an evolutionary trait.“In my opinion people have acquired this over hundreds of years of evolution
— so that in growing old, the brain selects positive reinforcement more
easily to balance losses in life and mental health.“The brains are adjusted so people are not going into depression — there is
a balance in the control of emotion.”Fusion is very similar to a technique many therapists use called Parts Therapy… The best technique I’ve found is one that is outlined in NLP… the only thing is that rather than having 5 seperate parts with individual aims, there is no pre-supposed structure… you have as many parts as come up for you…
One technique within NLP-based Parts Therapy is Parts Integration… say a part of you wants to lose weight, but another part of you wants to eat – this internal struggle creates negative tension and you end up exerting all your energy on this internal battle.
The first step is to identify the parts… the ‘lose weight’ part and the ‘eat more’ part – you establish their kinesthetic structure (how and where you can feel each of these parts in your body) then you give them a colour and maybe shape and imagine one part in one palm and the other part in the other palm.
It is presupposed that each part has a positive intention for you, and all you need to do is find it… so you ask the part ‘what is important about what you’re trying to achieve for me?’… you get the answer (‘I want to feel calmer, by eating food’ or ‘I want to be healthier by losing weight’) then you ask it the same question… ‘what’s important about feeling calmer? or being healthier?’ and you get an answer… you ask it again and again untill you reach a point of absolute certainty… you do this for each part, and most likely you’ll arrive at exactly the same answer for both the parts (e.g. ‘I want to be happy’). When you arrive at this shared, ultimate goal, often the colour/shape in each hand will transform… at this point you bring your palms together and join the two parts together and then put them back in your body… then you ask yourself – ‘are there any other parts that disagree with this unification?’ and if there are then you go through the same process untill there is absolutely no resistance…
this technique often has very profound results.
I’ve been toying with the idea of using some of this process within Fusion to make it more powerfull. (It seems that the process of moving up the values hierarchy is a very profoundly effective aspect).
any tips and ideas on how this could work together with Fusion… or should the two just be kept separate?
P.S. Good to see you back, Michael!
Great question, freeform. Got deep into a retreat at Dao Mtn. and was a bit slow in anwering.
Many NLP practitioners came into the healing tao back in the 80’s, including gunther weil and steven josephs, who was a top trainer in New England NLP school at the time.
The similarities and overlaps between the methods of healing tao and NLP were noted. The consensus them was that NLP was limited by its fundamentally “manipulative” stance, i.e. there was no practice of cultivating a true inner self/immortal self, but simply methods for imporving the effectiveness of getting what the personality wanted. Essentially, NLP id not posit the existence of any pre-natal or pre-existing virtues/spiritual powers to be cultivated, only methods to get whatever you wanted, even if it was evil or selfish.
I don’t know if that evolved since then in the NLP schools.
I think the NLP methods could help people clarify what they are doing in fusion. But since the 80’s, I also developed my understanding of five shen theory, which are not really parts in the sense of objects, but streams of innate consciousness that thus require perhaps a more permanent relational approach than simply temporary “thiings” / desires I want at this moment.
In the system of taoist correspondences, the five shen are multi-dimensional, i.e. not simply a momentary desire or part that will disappear, but are linked to ancestral, soul/karmic/astrological and universal dynemics at higher octraves.
Theoretically, I don’t see why the NLP method could not be adapted to resolve into higher octaves of self once those are recognized, but think the issue of centrality, i.e. who is resolving the parts, might need to be addressed, and its relationship to the parts as living aspects of the core self.
hope this is useful as a starting point.
michael
Thanks Michael for this comment.
I respectfully agree with the need for the wider perspective. I use the astrology wheel and simply ask (shen) what needs to be balanced to the centre in relation to a particular issue, feeling, problem, transit. I’m sure this is common to many on the list. One useful bit from the world of hypnotherapy is handling memories accross time – and this sits nicely with the cycles of time in the astrology wheel. For example when something is really jammed up and one cannot dissolve it I find some exploration across time can help. eg stuff that comes down the line from ancestors. By getting a wider view of time and the origins of emotional states held in the unconscious/deep mind/water it becomes easier to accept and heal. I have not yet done greatest Kan/Li so maybe its all in there. Certainly find the principles of fusion helps with what comes up. Currently with Saturn (form) opposite Neptune (oneness/dissolving)there will be plenty of opportunity to practice dissolving rigidities arising from past conditioning and enjoy the result.
Thanks again,
R
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