A Walk in the Black Forest

Our ability to detect what's safe versus what's threatening is lost, and we can come to mistrust our own experience. EXTEROCEPTIVE AND INTEROCEPTIVE SENSATIONS There are two kinds of sensations especially relevant to understanding trauma: exteroceptive and interoceptive sensations. Exteroceptors, as they're called, are nerves related to the five senses of touch, taste, smell, sight, and hearing. We use exteroceptive sensations to gather information about the temperature of a bathtub by placing our hand in the water, for example. Interoceptive sensations, meanwhile, aid our perception of what's happening inside our bodies. Interoceptors are nerves that relate to what is happening for us internally, helping provide us with an embodied sense of self. Our guts, especially, provide us with tremendous amounts of interoceptive information that influence our entire organism. Tom Moegele HOW Yogan WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE Most of us aim to avoid stress, anger, and conflict. This is completely understandable because stress blocks the flow of life energy and our energy level drops; The good news is that you can take advantage of the stress you face when, for example, someone is furious with you. Instead of dismissing the stress as something negative, you can simply see it as a form of energy that's available to you. Let's say your boss is taking out their moods on you. Instead of letting them break your nerves and steal your energy in the process, you can use the tools and practices presented in this article to ensure that they don't succeed in getting you down; It's a win-win situation - the boss also benefits as they'll cast off some of their own blocks, and their energy level will also increase. To accomplish this, you'll need to switch to what we call the `G4 consciousness,' and the following articles will describe how this works. And for me, the stupa is the place that works. When people say, pain is all in the brain, they are correct.

When you slice your finger, it is your brain, and not your finger, that creates the appropriate response to tell you that something is wrong with your finger and you should do something about it. Generally, the brain is doing its job when it causes pain to send a signal that something is amiss. But about 10 percent of the time, even after the danger has passed and the injury has healed, the pain persists. The tissue has healed as much as it's going to, but the nervous system has developed what is called feedback loops, where the brain keeps firing as if the body is injured, whereas it is not. In this case, pain becomes a terrifying disease in itself. One of my favorite fellows who reminds me of this fact is a hilarious Australian clinical neuroscientist and physical therapist, Dr Lorimer Moseley, who talks about pain biology and the science of how nerve fibers conduct sensations. He writes about how, normally, you scrape your hand and the nerves collect data, they send info to your spine, which sends it on to the primary sensory cortex--the thalamus--and then your brain figures out the best reaction, and so on and so forth. But here's the kicker: Once you've been in pain for a day or so, your nervous system physiologically changes. There's more! The more you drive the better you get at it, just like when you were younger. Not necessarily. Plasticity is different than neuron growth in a normal adolescent's brain. Basically, a teenager may not have to contend with regrowth, but new growth. Stroke recovery is a slow process. Much like the teen driver, your entire attention must be focused on driving. It may be frightening to steer, watch your speed, notice and react to other cars, pedestrians, and objects around you, while, at the same time, follow traffic rules and remember where you're going. Unlike the teenage driver, reaction times may be stilted and/or half the vision of both eyes may be impaired necessitating turning our heads--if we remember to do so. Other medical conditions can add to the difficulties of multitasking. The lungs then have an opportunity to clean this blood, not only of acid and carbon dioxide but also of clots and bubbles that may have formed. It is much better that this occurs in the lungs, since like a delta of a river there is plenty of collateral flow that means that a small clot that becomes lodged is unlikely to cause a problem.

Compare this with blood flow into the brain, kidney or even the coronary arteries from the left side of the heart, where a clot would form an `attack' of some form. Obviously there are limits as to what size clots the lungs can deal with. Large clots, which block pulmonary arteries, will cause breathlessness and are known as pulmonary emboli. This action of the lungs on blood intimately links the lungs to the heart. In Chinese medicine the Heart is seen as the Emperor, the Supreme Controller, and the Lungs are seen as its Minister. The Minister acts to protect the Emperor and regulate his actions. An Emperor that is out of control will ravage his empire and lead to its destruction. The Minister's job is to protect the Emperor from himself and to filter what he receives from his subjects. He touched me. He said he liked me. No-one had ever said that before. And I wanted it. I wanted the attention. I wanted the sweets. It was my fault. The therapist straightens herself and her neck clicks so loudly that I can hear it. It reminds me, for a moment, that she is here, and it reminds me, for a moment, that she is real. Because everything has gone faint, like diluted pastels, watery and thin. The following examples illustrate how parental figures can cause certain schemas to develop in their children. Daniel's father routinely criticizes and punishes him severely.

When Daniel works beside his dad on a project, his father explodes when Daniel makes the slightest mistake. He yells, How can you be so stupid and clumsy? Daniel grows up believing that he's inherently inadequate to deal with challenges when they arise. He develops a schema of inferiority. Accordingly, he responds to school assignments with little effort because he doesn't believe in his ability to succeed. His schema of inferiority continues to grow as he performs poorly in school. Anna's father, on the other hand, routinely praises Anna for good work and corrects her without undue harshness. When she asks for help with schoolwork, Anna's father encourages her to find her own answers, but he does patiently explain the difficult concepts. I remember being laughed at constantly by the other kids. Oh, to learn English faster so I don't keep getting scolded by the teachers. Oh, to learn English faster to comprehend what these hellions are saying. I remember their faces hovering and swimming over me. I fainted frequently. Kindergarten was traumatic for me and affected me very deeply. I would do anything to avoid the repercussions of my teachers. I'd get lost in reverie when I was in school, thinking about being at home with my articles and my imaginary toys and friends. I heard radio stations in my head. These radio stations played music, announcements, and even advertisements. In other words, you become their bit. Remember: what others can give you can also take away.

If they can lift you, they can also push you down. And, what if you seek someone's approval but refuse it? So, what do you do to work harder? Does it feel like bullshit? If someone does not accept your identity or does not want to treat you the way they want, please let them go. Say goodbye to bad garbage. False Time Limit The wrong time limit often puts you under pressure and leaves you no time to think. The neural network in the intestines, for instance, houses over 500 million neurons, helping to explain the terms gut feeling or gut instinct. Ideally, we're able to integrate exteroceptive and interoceptive sensations. Our internal experience lines up with our external experience, allowing us to make effective decisions about our behavior. We look out at a beautiful sunset and notice our chest warming and expanding, and in feeling this decide to take an extra minute to stop and watch it. Or we might have an uneasy feeling in our stomach when a friend walks in the room, prompting us to check in with them about their day. We depend on exteroceptive and interoceptive sensations to maneuver through the world. With trauma, the integration between intero- and exteroceptors can go awry. Years after a traumatic event, interoceptors continue signaling that danger is forthcoming, even if exteroceptors don't reveal any source of threat. Gina's case is one example. Although information from her exteroceptors suggested her environment was harmless (eg, no visual or auditory indications of threat), her interoceptors told her something was wrong (eg, her stomach doing barrel rolls). But first, I'd like to give you an idea of how, when you're in G4, you can trigger another person's block in everyday life `as if by chance' and contribute to its resolution. When I fly I often wear a very casual outfit, and on a recent trip to Berlin, despite traveling business class, I was dressed in shorts, a T-shirt with holes, and running shoes.