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The Neuroscience of Regret

A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams.  ~John Barrymore 

We often associate regret with old age – the tragic image of an elderly person feeling regretful over opportunities forever missed. Now, groundbreaking new brain research shows how this stereotypemay be true, at least for a portion of the elderly who are depressed. On the other hand, healthy agingmay involve the ability to regulate regret in the brain, and move on emotionally when there is nothing more that can be done. If we can teach depressed, older people to think like their more optimistic peers, we may be able to help them let go of regret. Read on to find out how the human brain processes regret.

How Our Brains Process Regret

Studies have used functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to scan the brain in real time while participants performed computer tasks that asked them to choose between different options for investing money. When participants were shown how they could have done better with alternative strategies (to prime regret), there was decreased activity in the ventral striatum, an area associated with processing rewards. There was also increased activity in the amygdala, part of the brain’s limbic system that generates immediate emotional response to threat. Interestingly, when the experiment was done with a computer making all the choices, these regret patterns were not found, suggesting that a sense of personal accountability is necessary for regret

 

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Sin Vs Suffering comparing Karl Bath’s Dogmatics with Vissudhimaga

A usual observation is that comparison is the fundamental way to gain an understanding of anything. Succinctly, all knowledge is comparative. This dissertation illustrates, in an intentional and explicit way, this observation with the claim that comparative inquiry evinces insights and truths that non-comparative inquiry does not. The difficulty of this claim is twofold: first, it would be difficult, if possible, to study something non-comparatively with the purpose of showing what is not learned in the process. Thus there is no counterpoint against which to contrast the knowledge gained from this comparative study….

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Neuro-Physiological correlates of Altered states of Consciousness

One of the central problems of unconsciousness research is the lack of a taxonomy of consciousness. Freud’s two part division of consciousness into a) the conscious and b) the subconscious, besides its well-noted verbal confusion (viz., how could something subconscious ever be said to be conscious), is simply not an adequate conceptual device for handling all the various varieties of conscious states. Maslow’s two part division into..

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Spe Salvi Facti Sumus- Pope Benedict’s encyclical on hope

In the encyclical about hope running into about 75 pages, Pope Benedict is not proposing a facile hope in heaven undoing injustices of life on earth. Indeed, this is where he brings in Dostoyevsky. The Pope asserts that “the last Judgment is not primarily an image of terror, but an image of hope”. A world without God is a world without hope, and “God is justice”. only God can provide the justice that sustains hope in the better future—the eternal life—for one and all. “God is justice and creates justice. This is our consolation and our hope. And in his justice there is also grace. This we know by turning our gaze to the crucified and risen Christ. Both these things—justice and grace—must be seen in their correct inner relationship..

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Job Descriptions Manual for practitioners

An accurate job description, composed with clarity and brevity and based on the careful analysis of the tasks performed, is essential not only for the staffing process but for job evaluation and the full range of Human Resources functions. Without job description as a guideline, interviewing job candidates would be difficult, selecting the right person would be a gamble. Performance appraisals would be more guesswork, evaluations for promotions would be subject to personal rather than professional considerations, selecting for training would be haphazard, and comparison structure might be invalid. Having a set of job descriptions does not automatically solve all personnel problems. But considering how valuable and useful they are, it is surprising that many companies avoid them or are content to use that are too vague or too good to be meaningful….

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Eucharistic Consciousness

The Holy Eucharist is the oldest experience of Christian Worship as well as the most distinctive. Eucharist comes from the Greek word which means thanksgiving. In a particular sense, the word describes the most important form of the Church’s attitude toward all of life. The origin of the Eucharist is traced to the Last Supper at which Christ instructed His disciples to offer bread and wine in His memory. The Eucharist is the most distinctive event of Orthodox worship because in it the Church gathers to remember and celebrate the Life, Death, and Resurrection of Christ and, thereby, to participate in the mystery of Salvation.

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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Depression

 

In this age of advanced modern medicine, it is a depressing fact that not all people suffering with a depressive illness respond to antidepressants.

The mental health charity Mind UK recently highlighted their concern that there is a serious need for a range of therapies to be made available to depression sufferers.

According to the best psychological working practices, medication is now considered to be only one option for effectively treating the illness.

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Can Doodling Improve Memory and Concentration?

 

An experiment suggests doodling may be more than just a pleasant waste of time and paper.

All sorts of claims have been made for the power of doodling: from it being an entertaining or relaxing activity, right through to it aiding creativity, or even that you can read people’s personalities in their doodles.

The idea that doodling provides a window to the soul is probably wrong. It can seem intuitively attractive but it falls into the same category as graphology: it’s a pseudoscience (psychologists have found no connection between personality and handwriting).

Although it’s probably a waste of time trying to interpret a doodle, could the act of doodling itself still be a beneficial habit for attention and memory in certain circumstances?

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Neuroscience & Psychology
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Collective Consciousness


Introduction

Have you ever experienced a time when the collective enthusiasm of a large event seemed to rise to such a peak that you could almost feel a crackle in the air? Or felt a haunting sense in the air while visiting a place that caused sadness or suffering for thousands of people? Provocative evidence suggests that there are significant departures from chance expectation in the outputs of random number generators (electronic devices that produce truly random bits, or sequences of zeros and ones) during times of collective upheaval, global crises and major celebrations

This year, the Institute of Noetic Sciences, along with several collaborators, conducted an exploratory experiment at Black Rock City, the temporary city created each year in the Nevada desert for the festival known asBurning Man. Burning Man is a week-long event that attracts upwards of 50,000 people. It is unique in its concentrated intensity, isolation, and collective intention, culminating with the burning of a large man-shaped effigy at the center of Black Rock City on Saturday night. See this article in the Atlantic magazine to get a feeling for the event, or these pictures in Rolling Stonemagazine.


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8 Tips for Setting Nourishing New Year’s Resolutions

Most resolutions have a similar trajectory: kick off the first week of January and fade away in February. That’s because most resolutions also have a similar foundation: They start with a “should.”

Many of us set resolutions that we think we should. We should lose weight. We should diet. We should make more money. We should have a super clean, clutter-free home. We should strive for wanting less — or wanting more.

So it’s understandable why most resolutions stay unresolved. But by shifting how you view, and act, on resolutions and act on them, you can set goals that genuinely nourish you and contribute value to your life.

Below, two experts share eight suggestions for setting authentic and achievable resolutions.

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7 Tips To Boost Kids’ Confidence Back at School

As parents, we invest thousands upon thousands of dollars on providing our children with the latest video games, toys and computers. This year, why not take steps towards investing time into your child’s emotional development?

In today’s world, with instances of bullying occuring at all ages, healthy emotional development is critical to seeing our children become successful as preschool, elementary, middle school and high school students.

As a parent, I’m guilty of buying my children materialistic items. After all, I’m human and I want to give my children the best things in life. I’ve now realized that the best thing I can give my children is a good sense of self. When the latest video game becomes a fad, my children will still have their self-esteem.

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The Neuroscience of Regret

A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams.  ~John Barrymore 

We often associate regret with old age – the tragic image of an elderly person feeling regretful over opportunities forever missed. Now, groundbreaking new brain research shows how this stereotypemay be true, at least for a portion of the elderly who are depressed. On the other hand, healthy agingmay involve the ability to regulate regret in the brain, and move on emotionally when there is nothing more that can be done. If we can teach depressed, older people to think like their more optimistic peers, we may be able to help them let go of regret. Read on to find out how the human brain processes regret.

How Our Brains Process Regret

Studies have used functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to scan the brain in real time while participants performed computer tasks that asked them to choose between different options for investing money. When participants were shown how they could have done better with alternative strategies (to prime regret), there was decreased activity in the ventral striatum, an area associated with processing rewards. There was also increased activity in the amygdala, part of the brain’s limbic system that generates immediate emotional response to threat. Interestingly, when the experiment was done with a computer making all the choices, these regret patterns were not found, suggesting that a sense of personal accountability is necessary for regret

 

General Blog
— Leave a Comment

8 Tips for Setting Nourishing New Year’s Resolutions

Most resolutions have a similar trajectory: kick off the first week of January and fade away in February. That’s because most resolutions also have a similar foundation: They start with a “should.”

Many of us set resolutions that we think we should. We should lose weight. We should diet. We should make more money. We should have a super clean, clutter-free home. We should strive for wanting less — or wanting more.

So it’s understandable why most resolutions stay unresolved. But by shifting how you view, and act, on resolutions and act on them, you can set goals that genuinely nourish you and contribute value to your life.

Below, two experts share eight suggestions for setting authentic and achievable resolutions.

Click to read

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Do Your Fears Hold You Back? Three Simple Strategies to Ease Fear

Are you paralyzed at the thought of public speaking? Shaky in meetings with your boss, or find yourself tongue-tied in social situations?

Fear can occur in any number of situations. It can be both effective — for instance, when it compels us to run from a burning building — and a blockade that can keep us from living our lives fully.

In a recent article in GQ Magazine, behavioral neuroscientist Mona Lisa Shultz, PhD, describes illogical fear — that is fear of things that are not a threat to our lives or well-being — as a “corrupted file that you downloaded by accident that keeps coming up.”

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Collective Consciousness

Introduction

Have you ever experienced a time when the collective enthusiasm of a large event seemed to rise to such a peak that you could almost feel a crackle in the air? Or felt a haunting sense in the air while visiting a place that caused sadness or suffering for thousands of people? Provocative evidence suggests that there are significant departures from chance expectation in the outputs of random number generators (electronic devices that produce truly random bits, or sequences of zeros and ones) during times of collective upheaval, global crises and major celebrations

This year, the Institute of Noetic Sciences, along with several collaborators, conducted an exploratory experiment at Black Rock City, the temporary city created each year in the Nevada desert for the festival known asBurning Man. Burning Man is a week-long event that attracts upwards of 50,000 people. It is unique in its concentrated intensity, isolation, and collective intention, culminating with the burning of a large man-shaped effigy at the center of Black Rock City on Saturday night. See this article in the Atlantic magazine to get a feeling for the event, or these pictures in Rolling Stonemagazine.

Click to read

Neuroscience & Psychology
— Leave a Comment

7 Tips To Boost Kids’ Confidence Back at School

As parents, we invest thousands upon thousands of dollars on providing our children with the latest video games, toys and computers. This year, why not take steps towards investing time into your child’s emotional development?

In today’s world, with instances of bullying occuring at all ages, healthy emotional development is critical to seeing our children become successful as preschool, elementary, middle school and high school students.

As a parent, I’m guilty of buying my children materialistic items. After all, I’m human and I want to give my children the best things in life. I’ve now realized that the best thing I can give my children is a good sense of self. When the latest video game becomes a fad, my children will still have their self-esteem.

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A Quantum Hologram of Christ’s Resurrection?

Dame Piczek explains the complicated physics behind the image on the Shroud: “As quantum time collapses to absolute zero (time stopped moving) in the tomb of Christ, the two event horizons (one stopping events from above and the other stop-ping the events from below at the moment of the zero time col-lapse) going through the body get infinitely close to each other and eliminate each other (causing the image to print itself on the two sides of the Shroud).

In general relativity, an event horizon is a boundary in space-time, most often an area surrounding a black hole, beyond which events cannot affect an outside observer. Light emitted from beyond the horizon can never reach the observer, and anything that passes through the horizon from the ob-server’s side appears to freeze in place.

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The Anxiety of Awareness

matthew.crompton's avatarGoing Around Places

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“Being awake in a condition such that your conscious awareness does not often lapse, perhaps the most natural reaction is also the most paradoxical: anxiety, verging onto moments of near-panic. To be temporarily lost in the contents of consciousness is really just a kind of comfort blanket, allowing you to forget your true identity, and thereby freeing you from the responsibilities of high consciousness itself. As Soren Kierkegaard observed, this is a natural reaction to the initial realization of freedom. The antidote, if practiced diligently, is quite useful: Simply remember to keep breathing.”

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Energy Psychology: The Future of Therapy?

Modern psychotherapy’s enfant terrible, Energy Psychology, has been alternately praised and ridiculed, extolled and rebuked. EP modalities have been called “a major breakthrough,” “the power therapies for the twenty-first century,” and “the most significant development in personal growth since the Buddha taught meditation.” Critics have labeled these modalities a “sham,” “therapeutic snake oil,” and worse. One skeptic wrote, “Any purported effects attributable to EP are likely due to features it shares with more traditional therapies.” Some practitioners practice EP “in the closet,” refraining from telling colleagues what they’re doing out of fear of censure. The American Psychological Association has taken the unusual step of refusing to grant CE credits for EP trainings.

The term energy psychology describes a new field of innovative interventions that balance, restore, and enhance human functioning by stimulating the human subtle energy system. These techniques have spread throughout the world—largely via the Internet—and have been observed to catalyze rapid, dramatic, and lasting changes in feelings, beliefs, mental states, and behaviors. Just as we have a physical anatomy—consisting of our skeleton, organs and glands, muscles and connective tissue—we also have an energetic anatomy—consisting of the acupuncture meridian system, chakras and nadis (energy centers and channels), and the human biofield/s. The common denominator underlying EP techniques involves stimulating energy, whether by tapping, touching, or intention.

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