Brain vs. Mind

While we are on the topic of body, lets discuss some interesting stuff about the most interesting and mysterious organ in the body - the brain. As usual, I won't attempt to conclude too much and will leave the file open, since it is beyond my pay grade to talk on this fascinating subject. All I can do is, if you give me some statements about the brain, I can find out if they make sense based on my own experience and a bit of logical and critical thinking. I can also theorize about it but it may not be the whole truth. But I can surely dislodge some beliefs and take you to the stage of uncertainty - the "I don't know" stage, where all the real answers lie.

The Living Dead

We have seen that how the concept of death is only a concept, an illusion. Somehow death refuses to die. We will venture into some controversial cases of death-like experiences and un-dead people. I don't intend to settle the case of death and close the file. I'll just throw opinions, as these experiences are of others, not my own and are mostly subjective.

The Illusion of Death

No one has witnessed their own death, however almost all of us are totally convinced that we will die someday. Without a direct experience of death, one can say that that death is only a belief. Of course we see many others who die every day, its all very common and obvious. What's not so obvious is that we see only their bodies dropping dead. The rest is mere extrapolation of same event in our own case.

Fantasies of Death

We see that a body is destroyed after death, and we actually ensure that it is destroyed by cremating it. So it is fair to conclude that our own body will be destroyed, and since our body is no different than all those dead bodies, there is no reason to conclude otherwise. Anyhow one cannot witness the destruction of one’s own body. It is just an assumption.

The Dreaded Four Ds

Disease

The body being a structure, an object, is subjected to impermanence and decay. In addition to the gradual weathering (aging, as discussed), a body suffers damages suddenly due to various agencies and reasons. The harm can come from external agents such as microbes or from internal causes such as organ failures or from mental influences such as stress and anxiety.

These days it is easy to cure the diseases caused by external agencies, because of their purely physical nature. There is a good understanding about the nature of microbes and medicines that kill them. Still people die from pathogenic infections in millions. The reasons are social and Egoic, not a lack of knowledge and resources. Anyhow the progress in this regard is extraordinary, when you compare the situation today with ancient days, when an infection meant a certain death. The body has built in defences against microbes, else it wouldn't survive for even one day, but sometimes the pathogens find a way in. Needless to say that it is of prime importance to keep this immune system in good shape, all one needs to do is not to damage it intentionally. One can damage it by the means of substance abuse or a shabby and unhygienic lifestyle or by maintaining too much cleanliness. By too much cleanliness, I mean the indiscriminate use of chemicals that kill microbes inside or outside the body. Immune system constantly needs stimulants in order to maintain its defences, and in the absence of any microbes it becomes inactive. So a good rule of thumb is to avoid dirty surroundings, stale food, harmful substances and operation theater quality cleanliness.

Bodies and their Drivers

By H R Giger

We talked about this weird thing called body that possesses us and we are seemingly incapable of controlling it much. However we do perceive ourselves as drivers of this biomechanical biodegradable monkey suit. It seems, that we can command it and it takes us wherever we want. In return it demands fuel and rest. It comes with an auto pilot installed - the Ego, which takes care of most of the driving tasks. Its so efficient that people are hardly aware of it and think they are doing all the driving, because it fools us into thinking we are the Ego. The huge colony of cells takes care of most of its functions from growth, repair and fighting invasion of other colonies of cells. The auto pilot ensures preservation, defence and copying of it. The higher mental functions provide it an overall direction. The journey of a body is presented to the Self in its full glory and with all the bells and whistles in Technicolor 3D. The Self merely witnesses this experience, that we call a human experience.

The Experience of a Body

By Alex Grey

We will descend down into a body and its experience. This article presents a crazy perspective on it. This is intentional and brutally honest, just because normal is boring.

The waking body

The body is a structure that appears on the screen of the Self just like any other structure. The mental patterns and the world also appear on the same screen. In the state of deep sleep, all these disappear. In the state of dreaming or imagination, a different body or different worlds may appear. In some exotic states of the Mind, the corresponding bodies and worlds may appear as solid and real as those of normal waking state. That’s all I can say about the body as far as my experience goes. Anyhow I will go ahead and note some details about the body and try to draw some clear inferences, whenever possible. In this article we will discuss the body that we experience during waking state of the Mind. This is the most frequent of my experience and hopefully yours too.

Afflictions of the Ego : Part - 3

11. Love and Hate
 
First of all, we have nebulous terms here, so let’s define them. Love and hate are emotions, i.e. internal actions. The internal act that simulates pleasure and security is seen and felt as love, and the internal act that simulates pain and insecurity is hate. Love results in external actions that show attraction or attachment towards the agent causing love, while hate results in repulsion or fear or anger and ultimately in violence. So we can base them on the now familiar pleasure/pain and reward/punishment mechanisms of the Mind. The actions originating from love or hate aid in survival and also add spice to the human experience. All actions of love and hate are perfect, nothing needs to be done about them, however, if one wants to lessen the suffering they eventually cause, one needs to know them intimately. These, like other Egoic tendencies, can turn into afflictions when not controlled consciously. There is no doubt about extreme hate being an affliction of the Ego, but some people may not like to call extreme love an affliction because of it being a positive emotion. Note that any activity of the Ego can go out of hand and become an affliction, including positive ones.

Afflictions of the Ego : Part - 2

Sathariel, Angel of Deception - by Peter Mohrbacher

5.    Sloth

The Mind often tries to save energy and effort by instructing the organism to relax or sleep. This tendency is also seen in humans as an Egoic process. Whenever there is no need to act, no urgency or threat, a slowness takes over the mind and the person loses all desire to act. This is laziness or sloth. Such a person is letting his primitive energy saving programs to take over him. It is alright once in a while, we all need downtime once in a while, but soon this becomes a problem as it becomes a habit. The laziness starts showing up in everyday acts.

A lazy person often covers up this behaviour by making up excuses and sometimes lying. Needless to say, the inactivity and intentional avoidance of actions results in failure to accomplish anything significant. A lazy person achieves nothing most of the time. This has a secondary effect of throwing the person into depression. Sloth makes a person suffer sooner or later. Not only the person suffers himself but also makes others suffer, especially when others depend on him for work, such as his employer.