New Information
Here is something I hadn't heard or read about before that I feel is extremely important to keep me dedicated to the right direction:
From the book "The Alcohol & Addiction Cure" by Pax and Chris Prentiss, founders of a Holistic Treatment Center called Passages Malibu.
(Starting on Page 162) In the center of your brain is an amazing gland called the hypothalamus. It is the greatest chemical factory on the planet. Among its other functions, it produces peptides, which are short-chained amino acids, the building blocks of proteins. The type of peptide it produces is primarily determined by what you think and feel. The hypothalamus produces peptides that duplicate every emotion you experience, from anger, hate, sadness, frustration, and depression to joy, enthusiasm, and happiness.
The peptides are channeled to the pituitary gland and then into the bloodstream, where they visit all twenty to thirty trillion cells in your body. Every cell in your body has as many as millions of "receptors" on its face, and each cell has perhaps seventy different types of receptors.
(Page 163, By Dr. Candice Pert who wrote "The Molecules of Emotion"): "The life of a cell, what it is up to at any moment, is determined by which receptors are on its surface, and whether those receptors are occupied by ligands or not." a ligand is a small molecule that binds itself to a cellular receptor. There are three chemical types of ligands: neurotransmitters, steroids, and the ones we're most interested in right now, the peptides. --- as many as 95 percent of all ligands may be peptides. When the peptides dock onto the receptors, they take control of all the cell's activities, including, among other things, commanding whether it will divide or not and the composition of new cells.
(Page 164 Next: Dr. Joseph Dispenza, from the 2004 film "What the Bleep Do We Know!?) explains that when a new cell is produced, it isn't always a clone of the old cell but a cell that contains more receptors for whatever peptide it had received that caused it to split. If the cell received peptides produced by emotions of depression, the new cell will have more receptors for depression and fewer receptors to receive feel-good peptides.
An estimated 300 million cell divisions occur every minute to replace cells that die. Each day, 2 percent of our blood cells die and are replaced by new ones. Every two months, you have an entirely new blood supply. --- you can see the chain of events that takes place as new cells are created according to what you think and feel. If you feel depressed for an hour, you've produced approximately eighteen billion new cells that have more receptors calling out for depressed-type peptides and fewer calling out for feeling-good peptides. It's as if trillions and trillions of receptors are all cupping their little hands around their mouths like tiny megaphones shouting "Send us more depression!"
Thinking gloomy thoughts creates a body that is more able to feel gloominess than joyfulness. It also creates the need for more gloomy thoughts. You become addicted to gloominess. You know where that leads because you've been there: dependency.
So that's what I wanted to share for Christmas. Not only can depressed thoughts and feelings of fear create cells that want and demand those thoughts and feelings......it means that judicious thinking and feeling can control what receptors I am creating and want MORE OF in the future!!! There could be a noticible change in 60 days, two months, if my entire blood supply has been changed, and if I don't relapse to my same dependent thoughts and feelings.
It helps ME to know what the withdrawal symptoms are all about as I try to change, so I can adjust my mind to the positive outcome for continuing to have fewer and fewer dependency cells to keep me depressed, hopeless, shy, etc.; and in order to identify and resist relapse urges and habits. I mean...this is GOOD NEWS to me. I intend to start developing new consciousness habits now. Simple visualizations in the morning, and meditation at night, in order to calm my mind, are just a start. Nothing crazy,or intense, just calm and happiness; optimism even. That whatever I am trying now to change, whether it is behaviors, feelings, or thoughts, the changes will have beneficial results in the future, even if I start small and slow. It doesn't "have to" be fast and quick, and it doesn't "have to" be perfect.
I LIKE it!!!
Another thing I picked-up on without it being plainly said is that "spirituality" is about self-care: 1) physical self-care through movement, action or activity (exercise, moderate) and self-care for my body through nutrition. 2) Next is mental self-care, through thought-awareness and feeling/sensation-awareness. 3) and spiritual self-care, through visualization and meditation for what my true-self needs and wants; which is for me to nourish my soul, its purpose for this Journey and its path. Spirituality is about learning to care for myself, and stop depending on someone else, or something else, or blaming them, for my care and needs, in order to be myself.
Merry Christmas! Ho ho, ho...... ;-)
From the book "The Alcohol & Addiction Cure" by Pax and Chris Prentiss, founders of a Holistic Treatment Center called Passages Malibu.
(Starting on Page 162) In the center of your brain is an amazing gland called the hypothalamus. It is the greatest chemical factory on the planet. Among its other functions, it produces peptides, which are short-chained amino acids, the building blocks of proteins. The type of peptide it produces is primarily determined by what you think and feel. The hypothalamus produces peptides that duplicate every emotion you experience, from anger, hate, sadness, frustration, and depression to joy, enthusiasm, and happiness.
The peptides are channeled to the pituitary gland and then into the bloodstream, where they visit all twenty to thirty trillion cells in your body. Every cell in your body has as many as millions of "receptors" on its face, and each cell has perhaps seventy different types of receptors.
(Page 163, By Dr. Candice Pert who wrote "The Molecules of Emotion"): "The life of a cell, what it is up to at any moment, is determined by which receptors are on its surface, and whether those receptors are occupied by ligands or not." a ligand is a small molecule that binds itself to a cellular receptor. There are three chemical types of ligands: neurotransmitters, steroids, and the ones we're most interested in right now, the peptides. --- as many as 95 percent of all ligands may be peptides. When the peptides dock onto the receptors, they take control of all the cell's activities, including, among other things, commanding whether it will divide or not and the composition of new cells.
(Page 164 Next: Dr. Joseph Dispenza, from the 2004 film "What the Bleep Do We Know!?) explains that when a new cell is produced, it isn't always a clone of the old cell but a cell that contains more receptors for whatever peptide it had received that caused it to split. If the cell received peptides produced by emotions of depression, the new cell will have more receptors for depression and fewer receptors to receive feel-good peptides.
An estimated 300 million cell divisions occur every minute to replace cells that die. Each day, 2 percent of our blood cells die and are replaced by new ones. Every two months, you have an entirely new blood supply. --- you can see the chain of events that takes place as new cells are created according to what you think and feel. If you feel depressed for an hour, you've produced approximately eighteen billion new cells that have more receptors calling out for depressed-type peptides and fewer calling out for feeling-good peptides. It's as if trillions and trillions of receptors are all cupping their little hands around their mouths like tiny megaphones shouting "Send us more depression!"
Thinking gloomy thoughts creates a body that is more able to feel gloominess than joyfulness. It also creates the need for more gloomy thoughts. You become addicted to gloominess. You know where that leads because you've been there: dependency.
So that's what I wanted to share for Christmas. Not only can depressed thoughts and feelings of fear create cells that want and demand those thoughts and feelings......it means that judicious thinking and feeling can control what receptors I am creating and want MORE OF in the future!!! There could be a noticible change in 60 days, two months, if my entire blood supply has been changed, and if I don't relapse to my same dependent thoughts and feelings.
It helps ME to know what the withdrawal symptoms are all about as I try to change, so I can adjust my mind to the positive outcome for continuing to have fewer and fewer dependency cells to keep me depressed, hopeless, shy, etc.; and in order to identify and resist relapse urges and habits. I mean...this is GOOD NEWS to me. I intend to start developing new consciousness habits now. Simple visualizations in the morning, and meditation at night, in order to calm my mind, are just a start. Nothing crazy,or intense, just calm and happiness; optimism even. That whatever I am trying now to change, whether it is behaviors, feelings, or thoughts, the changes will have beneficial results in the future, even if I start small and slow. It doesn't "have to" be fast and quick, and it doesn't "have to" be perfect.
I LIKE it!!!
Another thing I picked-up on without it being plainly said is that "spirituality" is about self-care: 1) physical self-care through movement, action or activity (exercise, moderate) and self-care for my body through nutrition. 2) Next is mental self-care, through thought-awareness and feeling/sensation-awareness. 3) and spiritual self-care, through visualization and meditation for what my true-self needs and wants; which is for me to nourish my soul, its purpose for this Journey and its path. Spirituality is about learning to care for myself, and stop depending on someone else, or something else, or blaming them, for my care and needs, in order to be myself.
Merry Christmas! Ho ho, ho...... ;-)
Replies
I told my friend I have a full-time job taking care of me, myself and I.
Not egotistically speaking, but, spiritually speaking!
My Trinity: Me, Myself and I!
Thanks for the hug! Sending you one also!
Happy New Beginniings....We continually \"die to the old\" to make room for \"the new!\"
I gave a talk one time, and said we would like to think getting this \"spirituality thing\" is like driving up to McDonald\'s and getting an order to go and THAT IT IS!\" Wish it were that easy....For me, getting Principle was the easy part! Putting it to use \"is the challenge!\' Just when I think \"I got it (whatever it is) another opportunity to \"get it\" arrives! Un-learning is a challenge for me; yet, at the same time is an opportunity to SEE things differently!
Have a blessed day and as the New Year approaches, many NEW BEGINNINGS!
Yay!!! Thanks Vicki!
I added this comment to my previous Journal entry so it will not be missed (That, and I\'m too lazy to rewrite it).
As far as fear, yes; I\'m learning that getting over the fear in order to learn the lesson behind the fear is what is needed. And all the lessons are for my benefit; there is some good in all the things and events that I \'judge\' \"BAD\", past and present. They keep returning until I learn whatever lesson is there to overcome. (You can\'t get stronger by NOT lifting heavier weights or exercising (practicing)).
I\'m still looking for the \"hook\", or addictive behavior, the feeling behind it, and the thought-that-keeps-creating-it-that-needs-to-be-corrected-and-understood for my continued growth. By becoming more and more able to feel my feelings I am becoming more able to \'track\' my true feelings back to the source belief error, or denied/repressed trauma. And I\'m getting closer. My soul has been damaged by a misunderstood event that my ego keeps trying to learn but can\'t because it is too afraid. I must be willing to overcome my own imagination in order to face that fear. The important point is that the fear is imagined, not real. I cannot predict the future; and when my entire prediction is that whatever I change will lead to disaster, pain, and catastrophe, I am really wanting to avoid that prediction; AND THAT prediction is a chosen imagination. My next lesson is to live in the now in order to control my imagination. As a creative type, with success in visualization ability, I can day-dream lucidly with the best of them, and imagine all sorts of objects and how they go together; as I did in years in construction when I\'m building things in my mind\'s vision, before I start cutting and assembling. It is that same talent for imagination that I use to forecast the future negatively; the \"what if...?\" visualizing, which is usually based on the fear of some repressed or denied old memory. (In construction I used it to avoid costly mistakes about what is needed next after each element is prepared for the next operation until the work is completed correctly. I had to know how all the pieces fit from beginning to end.) I can choose to look for the benefit of whatever is coming, or I can just as easily choose to look for the worst. It\'s my mind, my imagination, and I\'m the one not being responsible for its activity. I\'m constantly looking for trouble to avoid, and when I\'m using my imagination for that I can guarantee I\'ll find something to imagine to be feared! The whole point is where does that habit of imagining the worse come from? To be that traumatized to be on guard so often in dealing with people? Concerned about their feelings or actions. Where does that come from. I\'ll have to wait for an answer, and I\'m open to finding it. What event started the addictive habit? (Humm...construction. I \"had to...\" know it all. mistakes were not allowed, or I was publicly embarrassed for not knowing something I was not taught yet. Yes, I can see that now. I believed I had no defense. I could not say \"I didn\'t know\" (or: \"I forgot\"), when \'everyone else\' did seem to know, as though it was common knowledge to all humans, or people in that fiels of work. I didn\'t get angry for being accused for such a stupid accusation, for fear of talking back to an authority-figue, boss, teacher; and fear being embarrassed for getting fired and \'losing\' my job or sent to the principal\'s office, for defending myself. Defending myself has always been invalidated. I take the punishment instead of fight back to assert my right to be mistaken and ignorant of some things I\'ve either never been taught or experienced. Instead I withdraw, without expressing how I feel, genuinely. I DON\'T LIKE BEING SEEN (FELT) AS STUPID, SO EVEN IF I\'M RIGHT I WON\'T STAND MY GROUND TO STATE HOW STUPID MY ACCUSER IS; I PROTECT THEIR FEELINGS ABOUT BEING INCORRECT AND IGNORANT TOO: THAT I CAN\'T KNOW WHAT I DON\'T KNOW NO MATTER HOW MUCH \"THEY\" WANT ME TO KNOW IT OR EXPECT ME TO KNOW IT!
So there\'s another example of tracking my feelings to their source. Not talking back to wrong authority figures. Where\'d I get THAT? (And I don\'t like being punished, so I don\'t punish others, even in self-defense. Hummm...; so I don\'t learn from my lessons of failure to defend my soul. That makes me feel angry; at myself and my perpetrator. I can see the horizzon getting lighter; anger, repressed anger and pain is behind this. And worst of all, I was taught that anger was a forbidden feeling to express. Hummm.....)
I\'ll keep you posted...
My fear would be of being punished for expressing my anger. Also the imagined harm and injury \'catastrophe\' if I did \"let go\" how I REALLY felt. So...that must be where i learned to lie about my true feelings, I was punished for losing my temper....but my dad wasn\'t. Hummm....I wasn\'t supposed to remember that, That would exacerbate an already volatile and terrifying situation. Him 6\' - 200 lbs; me 3\' - 65 lbs. Odds of me winning that argument ranged from slim to none, or at least that\'s what I concluded on the spot each time it happened. The logic behind his anger is what really pissed me off; he was displacing some other emotional problem onto me, usually. Maybe I spoke too loud or something. His stupid reaction was way past appropriate...waaaaay past.
Tuesday 27th: I\'m feeling better than usual. No \"have to\'s\" this morning. I\'m ready to start facing reality and the opportunities to grow. Guarding my imagination helps. By guarding I mean it may be a good habit to be aware of when I am \'rehearsing\' in order to avoid feelings by distracting myself through imagination. If I\'m imagining I\'m not here now; so what\'s the escape about? What\'s the feeling of anxiety about. More back-tracking practice; to go further into the task of finding myself through my feelings and what I want. My feelings seem quiet at the moment.
Hi Rich,
First, thank you for the gift in your original entry. If that does not give rise to hope, I do not know what would. To think that in 2 months we can change our own physical selves for the better, by feeding ourselves the \"good stuff\", especially thoughts and emotions, wow! That is quite a gift.
I like what Vicki said about using/applying the knowledge. That seems to be a rather large stumbling block for some of us (like me).
I remember hearing once that the two people which have the most impact on us for life are our parents. It is no wonder, really. We start off so innocent with no preconceived ideas about anything and we are taught, formally and by experience about things like fear and anger. If someone is angry at us inappropriately, we cope by learning skills to minimize it. Somehow we start believing that we are to blame, when we are not and that we can somehow control the universe. Even if we do not verbalize this, and our logical part tells us differently, inside we might be acting on a belief that is not true. Rich, your introspection always seems to help me identify my issues, too. Thank you. It seems like you are really making progress in getting to the roots of the matter.
Keep the Faith!
Shar
Thanks Shar. And Vicki, I glossed over something important you said: \" ---we would like to think getting this \"spirituality thing\" is like driving up to McDonald\'s and getting an order to go and THAT IT IS!\" That\'s the strange part, IT IS that easy, it\'s about changing our minds; only we can do that!!! And once you know what the problem is, as stated in the original entry above, you find that you are able to change your mind and your body. OBVIOUSLY! That\'s what the peptides are: mind and body changers, and we change them with our thoughts and feeling peptides, and our choices. It only feels difficult when you don\'t know what to do or is causing the problem. The peptides are causing the problem, our imagination, our thoughts, imagination, memories, emotions, and interpretations of incoming sensations.
Like Shar said: Not knowing any better, we were taught to fear and be anxious about our control as though WE\'RE the guilty party for not controlling making someone feel fear or anger. No we\'re NOT!!! We were infants and children who were taught we were to blame for everything that went wrong (that\'s an obvious exaggeration, now; and it sounds about right for a child\'s mind, that\'s why I leave it in).
It would probably help if we paid more attention to feeling when we are using our child\'s mind and emotions, in order to change it with our wiser adult minds now.
I will start another entry now. There\'s something else important to relay.
;-)