Reconnecting with: "God".

[Kami]

Today I want to talk about how the brain is wired to have spiritual experiences or what appears to be spiritual.

What is God(?)

God was a voice in the head of men and women during the time when they did not identify with themselves the same way that we identify with ourselves today.

When someone heard a voice in their head as if someone was speaking to them in corporeal form over imaginary - they assumed it to be a God or a Demon or an Angel or a Spirit, So on and so forth.

Usually the voice(s) were commanding and depending on the health of the gifted person with this ability - the voice(s) that they heard were either intuitive or chaotic.

If the gifted person with this ability had a mental illness in their second brain; the gut brain, "The place where intuition comes from in the form of two emotions: 1.] Fear/Denial (&) 2.] Love/Acceptance" - Then that part of their unconscious that may be linked with the part of the brain that generates those involuntary auditory hallucinations causes that person to experience criticisms and negative opinions as well as irrational ideas.

Its the opposite if the gifted person's second brain/gut brain is healthy.

Why do we care whether or not God exists? And why do so many people believe? A new generation of neuroscientists is addressing those questions directly, with the ambitious goal of measuring what happens to the human brain during spiritual experiences. Dr. Andrew Newberg is the Director of Research at the Myrna Brind Center for Integrative Medicine and a pioneer in the field of neurotheology. Newberg doesn't identify with a particular religious group, but he's fascinated by the profound significance and persistence of human faith throughout history.

To measure the effects of trance states and ritual on the brain, he uses a technique called single photon emission computed tomography, in which subjects are injected with a chemical that emits gamma rays. A computer collects the information transmitted by the rays and constructs from it an image of the brain depicting blood flow to the various regions. The more blood flow to a particular region, the more brain activity. Using this method, Newberg has studied the brains of Franciscan nuns during prayer, Tibetan monks during meditation, and Pentecostals speaking in tongues.

What's the Significance?

What he's found is surprising: religious feeling is not invisible. The common thread among mystical and spiritual practices is that while people are engaged in them, the lobes of their brain can be seen working together to create a powerful emotional experience. "When we looked at [subjects'] brain scans, instead of the frontal lobes going up, the frontal lobes actually went down [in blood flow]. Which makes sense in the context of what they are describing is happening to them," Newberg explains. "They don't feel that they're purposely making it [happen]. They feel that they are being basically overcome by the experience."

He believes that what subjects describe as their interaction with God is a shutting down of their concentrative, willful attention in order to allow this experience of transcendence to happen. "For them it's the spirit of God which is moving through them. I can't prove that or disprove that on the basis of a brain scan, but I can see the changes that are going on in the brain while they're engaged in this very, very powerful and very deep spiritual practice... It certainly looks like the way the brain is put together makes it very easy for human beings to have religious and spiritual experiences."

The question, then, is not whether we're wired for what we've come to call spiritual experiences exist, but how a tendency towards the transcendent makes us better adapted to live and survive in the world around us. What is the evolutionary purpose of belief? 

A hint lies in the fact that it's likely the repetition rather than the content of a ritual that makes it effective. It doesn't seem to matter whether a person chants or recites a verse or thinks a specific thought; a transcendent or meditative state is achieved through practice, strengthening connections in the brain around a particular idea or task. Religious practices may in fact be useful in a secular context. Whatever they mean to you, there's evidence that simple rituals like breathing deeply when you're stressed can improve your mental health and help you cope with the world, even if you're skeptical about whether there's a divine plan behind it.

In the case of Adam and Eve and others as recorded in the bible, they had bicameral minds, a type of schizophrenia, and maybe as well as this other mental condition known as: "Object-Personification Synesthesia".

What is a bicameral mind?

American psychologist: "Julian Jaynes" uses governmental bicameralism as a metaphor to describe a mental state in which the experiences and memories of the right hemisphere of the brain are transmitted to the left hemisphere via auditory hallucinations. The metaphor is based on the idea of lateralization of brain function although each half of a normal human brain is constantly communicating with the other through the corpus callosum. The metaphor is not meant to imply that the two halves of the bicameral brain were "cut off" from each other but that the bicameral mind was experienced as a different, non-conscious mental schema wherein volition in the face of novel stimuli was mediated through a linguistic control mechanism and experienced as auditory verbal hallucination.

The bicameral mentality would be non-conscious in its inability to reason and articulate about mental contents through meta-reflection, reacting without explicitly realizing and without the meta-reflective ability to give an account of why one did so. The bicameral mind would thus lack metaconsciousness, autobiographical memory and the capacity for executive "ego functions" such as deliberate mind-wandering and conscious introspection of mental content. When bicamerality as a method of social control was no longer adaptive in complex civilizations, this mental model was replaced by the conscious mode of thought which, Jaynes argued, is grounded in the acquisition of metaphorical language learned by exposure to narrative practice.

According to Jaynes, ancient people in the bicameral state of mind would have experienced the world in a manner that has some similarities to that of a schizophrenic. Rather than making conscious evaluations in novel or unexpected situations, the person would hallucinate a voice or "god" giving admonitory advice or commands and obey without question: one would not be at all conscious of one's own thought processes per se. Research into "command hallucinations" that often direct the behavior of those labeled schizophrenic, as well as other voice hearers, supports Jaynes's predictions.

Jaynes built a case for this hypothesis that human brains existed in a bicameral state until as recently as 3000 years ago by citing evidence from many diverse sources including historical literature. He took an interdisciplinary approach, drawing data from many different fields.

Jaynes asserted that, until roughly the times written about in Homer's Iliad, humans did not generally have the self-awareness characteristic of consciousness as most people experience it today. Rather, the bicameral individual was guided by mental commands believed to be issued by external "gods" — commands which were recorded in ancient myths, legends and historical accounts. This is exemplified not only in the commands given to characters in ancient epics but also the very muses of Greek mythology which "sang" the poems: the ancients literally heard muses as the direct source of their music and poetry.

According to Jaynes, in the Iliad and sections of the Old Testament no mention is made of any kind of cognitive processes such as introspection, and there is no apparent indication that the writers were self-aware. Jaynes suggests, the older portions of the Old Testament (such as the Book of Amos) have few or none of the features of some later books of the Old Testament (such as Ecclesiastes) as well as later works such as Homer's Odyssey, which show indications of a profoundly different kind of mentality — an early form of consciousness.

In ancient times, Jaynes noted, gods were generally much more numerous and much more anthropomorphic than in modern times, and speculates that this was because each bicameral person had their own "god" who reflected their own desires and experiences. He also noted that in ancient societies the corpses of the dead were often treated as though still alive (being seated, dressed and even fed) as a form of ancestor worship, and Jaynes argued that the dead bodies were presumed to be still living and the source of auditory hallucinations. This adaptation to the village communities of 100 individuals or more formed the core of religion. Unlike today's hallucinations, the voices of ancient times were structured by cultural norms to produce a seamlessly functioning society. In Ancient Greek culture there is often mention of the Logos, which is a very similar concept. It was a type of guiding voice that was heard as from a seemingly external source.

Jaynes inferred that these "voices" came from the right brain counterparts of the left brain language centres—specifically, the counterparts to Wernicke's area and Broca's area. These regions are somewhat dormant in the right brains of most modern humans, but Jaynes noted that some studies show that auditory hallucinations correspond to increased activity in these areas of the brain.

Jaynes notes that even in modern times there is no consensus as to the cause or origins of schizophrenia. Jaynes argues that schizophrenia is a vestige of humanity's earlier bicameral state.

Recent evidence shows that many schizophrenics do not just hear random voices but experience "command hallucinations" instructing their behavior or urging them to commit certain acts. As support for Jaynes's argument, these command hallucinations are little different from the commands from gods which feature prominently in ancient stories. Indirect evidence supporting Jaynes's theory that hallucinations once played an important role in human mentality can be found in the recent book Muses, Madmen, and Prophets: Rethinking the History, Science, and Meaning of Auditory Hallucination by Daniel Smith.

What is object-personification synesthesia?

Personification-based synesthesia is a rare form of synesthesia that occurs when letters, numbers, objects and days are automatically associated with a specific personality or gender.

As stated above - I wanted to talk about this with y'all, because... I want to be able to have a bicameral mind like the people of the past and some today.

I have thought about creating thought forms that had their own personality abd voice and gender and purpose for therapy reasons.

But because of fear of losing my mind - I don't dabble in that area.

I know that if I stay up for three days or think right before I fall asleep - I can hear my thoughts as clear as a someone talking to me.

That's what I am after.

The schizophrenic experience.

I want to have that voice in my head that guides me.

That voice that makes me laugh when others put me down.

The voice that makes me feel not alone and safe.

That voice that makes me feel I can go anywhere inthe world and not be afraid because it will be there for me.

I am really intrigued by the schizophrenic or bicameral mind experience.

The voice(s) are definitely involuntary which means it is your unconscious and subconscious that you are communicating with as one entity.

I don't know how to get back in touch with that part of my brain...

And I was wondering if y'all knew of any methods or anything that could do that for me?

I want to abandon my individuality (to some degree) and upgrade myself with new personalities.

How does one intentionally disassociate from themselves to produce the effect that they're not in control?

I want to give a personality to each of my emotions and feelings, but first I want to begin with anger.

What if we all did this?

What would happen if we decided to abandon the personality, and replace it with a multiple personality complex?

The schizophrenic experience:

[Kami]

Sorry people, I didn't post this here for any answers here.

I am on my phone and I couldn't post this anywhere on facebook to do it being very long.

I need this to be here so I can make it fit in the comment section of the facebook post I made.

So don't waste your time replying unless you're going to be serious and supportive.

If I find any good answers I'll note them down and share them *with your permission* on my fb post regarding this threads subject.

[inMalkuth]

Hi. First of all I want to say that what your thread is about people who have a relationship with a "god". These people have well defined personality traits for this deity and the voices in their head represent this personality.

It is possible to hear the authentic God speak. What these people hear most likely is their imagined relationship with a God (whether it was initiated by God or not, I cannot say).

As far as what you are asking about schizophrenic mind I would say that this is not actually what you are after. Schizophrenic mind is disorganized, unbalanced ideas that cause a person to act irrationally in an extreme way.

What you want to do, I believe, is take control of your thoughts. This I can help you with.

Its a simple matter to just pick a word that you want to think about, preferably one that you think would be good to inspire your activity and thought process. Essentially I want you to choose how you want to think.

With this word, you compare all that you know about it from external representations of it (books, conversations, movies) and what you really believe it to be. Once you have developed a comfortable definition of this world re-evaluate: ask yourself "Do I want this idea to govern how I think?" If the answer is yes, then you need to examine your choices; past, present and future, in light of this word or idea. Compare everything with this vision of how you want to view the world. By doing this you start to hear your mind think. Now that you hear this voice, what you are doing is training it to think a certain way. This way is defined by the idea or word you chose to examine.

Soon your inner mind will think for you, and ideas will come to you about what to do, how to act, what to create.

Hope that helps you.

[Kami]

Hi. First of all I want to say that what your thread is about people who have a relationship with a "god". These people have well defined personality traits for this deity and the voices in their head represent this personality.

It is possible to hear the authentic God speak. What these people hear most likely is their imagined relationship with a God (whether it was initiated by God or not, I cannot say).

As far as what you are asking about schizophrenic mind I would say that this is not actually what you are after. Schizophrenic mind is disorganized, unbalanced ideas that cause a person to act irrationally in an extreme way.

What you want to do, I believe, is take control of your thoughts. This I can help you with.

Its a simple matter to just pick a word that you want to think about, preferably one that you think would be good to inspire your activity and thought process. Essentially I want you to choose how you want to think.

With this word, you compare all that you know about it from external representations of it (books, conversations, movies) and what you really believe it to be. Once you have developed a comfortable definition of this world re-evaluate: ask yourself "Do I want this idea to govern how I think?" If the answer is yes, then you need to examine your choices; past, present and future, in light of this word or idea. Compare everything with this vision of how you want to view the world. By doing this you start to hear your mind think. Now that you hear this voice, what you are doing is training it to think a certain way. This way is defined by the idea or word you chose to examine.

Soon your inner mind will think for you, and ideas will come to you about what to do, how to act, what to create.

Hope that helps you.

Great advice!

I also believe it is possible for an energy being that may exist as a form of e.m. waves or within that spectrum to influence our moods and thoughts in order to communicate.

I feel as though they can alter our brains to speakthrough our thought forms.

So I believe we can hear the voice of the pne true god - but I wouldn't count on it.

I will take your advice into account.

I think I know what you're getting at.

Instead of hearing voices in my ears guiding me - perhaps I should create beliefs/spirits/personalities that serve me through their context?

[Kami]

Another perception of God:

I always wondered about God.

You know? Like - what is a God?

How does it work?

I don't know when or where but all of a sudden something clicked in me.

All of a sudden - I began to associate the bible with a dream book.

I said to myself: "What if God is just a creature? What if we live in its mind?" - "That would explain what Jesus is, and everything he can do." - "Jesus is God's residual self image or perhaps just a random dream character it decided to use as a vessel in order to interact with its dream world." - "We must be God's dream characters."

I had a conversation with myself about the bible and God.

It only made sense to me in that context.

I held onto that belief for a while and still am.

The reason why I associate the bible with a dream book is because everything God can do - I can do as well; but only within the context of my dreamality.

When I am dreaming - I have a vessel that I inhabit.

Sometimes it's me and sometimes it isn't.

I have had dreams of doing what Gods do, flying off of the earth to another one, commanding the clouds and the sun, shaking the sky with my voice, becoming a ghost, moving things with my mind, transforming one object into another; alchemy, healing the wounded, coming back from the dead, levitating/flying, shape shifting, so on and so forth.

That's just the beginning of all the crazy crap I dream about... : p

Anyways, if God can do it - I can do it.

So then from there I began to think about the universe.

They say that this universe contains about 100 billion galaxies.

They also say that we have about 100 billion neurons in our brain.

I began to put two and two together and then I realized that maybe I too as well have 100 billion galaxies in the universe of my mind that I have been conditioned to call a dream world.

I say that when I am not dreaming - the only way the universe within my mind survives independent of my observation is by merely existing within my subconscious mind.

That prompted me to think that maybe the galaxies in this universe are synchronized with God's neurons.

More than just that, the fabric of reality itself is linked to God's neuronal activity.

Therefore if that is true - then that helps me understand how the laws of nature aren't fixed but more like habits, they can change with time.

What I am getting at here is that our brains are programmable.

For example:

Do you have a bad habit of smoking cigarettes?

You could always quit.

The first step is to not smoke for at least a week.

Let's say you do stop smoking for a week.

Because of that - you created within your brain a disruption of your smoking habit and now your brain is wired to not smoke for an entire week.

Of course you can kill that disruption by returning to your smoking habit, but lets say that you didn't kill the disruption of your week of not smoking cigs.

The longer you don't smoke - the easier it becomes for you NOT to smoke - Because you're strengthening your neural connections around that idea, to not smoke.

Habits can be altered through repetition.

That's the idea Rupert Sheldrake is trying to bring to light.

He believes that nature's gifts may be manipulated/influenced.

Which brings me back to what I was talking about earlier; If we do live within a creature's mind who's external body we cannot know - that would explain why nature is habitual.

If God is real - it must have a mind.

If it has a mind - it must have a brain.

If it has a brain - it must have a body.

If it has a body - it must have an environment.

If it has a body and an environment - it too must be living within another mind greater than it.

Point I'm trying to make here is that if we live in God's mind - then that means neuroplasticity applies to God as well.

Which insinuates that what god thinks and feels has an effect on our reality.

But also that if we change something in this reality - we're rewiring God's brain.

Morphic resonance is a process whereby self-organising systems inherit a memory from previous similar systems.

The idea I am trying to put out there is that what if the morphic fields are merely just God's long-term neural activity?

[inMalkuth]

Thats a very insightful observation. Ive concluded such things myself, but not in the way you came to it.
One thing that i recognize in your premis is that we are a reflection of the extetnal world in which God (and therefor we) exist. Essentially the realm God lives in is no Heaven, then, or at least not as perfect as we would imagine.
Imagine too, that you are a God with little people inside of you that respond and interact the same as you see us doing this with God.

Thank you for sharing your view. Id like to caution you in doing so on this and other forums, for there are many people who seem to live for tearing down those with genuine and thoughtful insights.