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They
Stranger


Registered: 10/23/16
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Last seen: 7 years, 2 months
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Default Mode Network, Stilling the Mind, Common Ground Between Many Religions
#23788805 - 10/31/16 02:36 PM (7 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans pursue all these things, and your Heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Today has enough trouble of its own. - Matthew 6:31 - 34
Focus on especially the last part, in green. See how it speaks of being present, right here right now, and inhibiting competing thoughts about past and future. That's the first piece of the puzzle.
The second is knowledge of these two networks we have in our brains:
Default Mode Network (DMN) deals with past-future, plans worries regrets Task Positive Network (TPN) deals with present moment, right here right now
An overactive DMN is highly correlated with negative mood states and certain mental illnesses (depression for instance).
The TPN and DMN are mutually exclusive.
By activating the TPN we deactivate the DMN. Full article here.
For those interested in more, 30 min video here.
Should be quite obvious that the stuff mentioned here, being present and aware, here and now, is pretty much the Buddhist goal as well, the whole point of Buddhist meditative / contemplative practice. I'm not that skilled with words here, haven't read any Buddhist books nor do I plan to, I just went and put in those hundreds of meditation hours, many of them as Buddha recommended, in a forest, back to a tree (which turned out to have actual electrical reasons behind it) and following breath eyes closed, that then all can become clear. So I just wanted to point towards this common goal of at least parts of these religions, that in scientific terms what they are talking about is silencing the DMN and coming back to high TPN activity, being up-to-date with the present moment, so to speak, or "all here". Incidentally most of modern culture is a fantastic diversification of ways to distract oneself, avoid present moment awareness, formulate IMMENSE DMN loops in the head, and industries like big tobacco, much of big pharma, as well as alcohol industry, relies on an inability of their consumers to handle their own DMN / TPN ratio. I've put in a good couple of years of meditation (to me, that is mindful breathing with eyes closed, regardless of posture) and found that YES, it does work, it does deliver. One CAN get relaxed and chill in situations that would have others tapping their feet and fingers nervously, lose ability to breathe, generally "lose it". The training for this costs little or no money, but the benefits are immense, as one can simply do by breath and refocus, stuff that others would need alcohol, cigs or pharma pills for.
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skullpaint
painter in training



Registered: 10/28/16
Posts: 4
Loc: Finland
Last seen: 8 months, 29 days
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Re: Default Mode Network, Stilling the Mind, Common Ground Between Many Religions [Re: They] 1
#23789133 - 10/31/16 04:21 PM (7 years, 2 months ago) |
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Fascinating article. Thank you for sharing this. The task-positive network reminds me of the so-called "flow" state which many musicians and creative types strive to unlock, essentially becoming the thing they wish to explore, be it sound, visuals, words, ...just pure awareness, basically.
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beforethedawn
Registered: 06/19/16
Posts: 1,859
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Re: Default Mode Network, Stilling the Mind, Common Ground Between Many Religions [Re: skullpaint] 1
#23789165 - 10/31/16 04:35 PM (7 years, 2 months ago) |
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Interesting, good to see I'm not alone in some of my experiences.
-------------------- Hostile humankind Can't you see you're fucking blind?
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They
Stranger


Registered: 10/23/16
Posts: 146
Last seen: 7 years, 2 months
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Re: Default Mode Network, Stilling the Mind, Common Ground Between Many Religions [Re: skullpaint]
#23789231 - 10/31/16 05:03 PM (7 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
skullpaint said: Fascinating article. Thank you for sharing this. The task-positive network reminds me of the so-called "flow" state which many musicians and creative types strive to unlock, essentially becoming the thing they wish to explore, be it sound, visuals, words, ...just pure awareness, basically.

Absolutely they are related, in fact high activity in the TPN is connected to feelings of euphoria, joy, and specifically flow, optimal performance. THat sense of being here and having no place else to be right now, this is how perception expands, and so we get more attention and internal resources available, to solve this challenge at hand that we are being faced with
Very strong connection between learning, flow and high TPN approach to any situation. Even seemingly boring situations, if we approach them high TPN (like say, on psychedelics, or fresh out from longer meditation) we can MAKE flow, we can draw next level conclusions and insights and inferences from what we're presented with, by using more metaphor or linking to memory.
There's that sense that this thing here now (butterfly landing on flower) is like that thing then, that I was trying to solve but didn't know how. We're not "worrying in the DMN" about that problem there elsewhere, but it almost gets solved by itself, because we are so fully here.
I've known about these articles and videos for many months now, and have spent a lot of time correlating what I see outside with it, and also my own internal processes. I go into situations thinking "Ok bring more TPN to this problem than anyone here. No plan, just go there and shroom it "
Or something would happen and I notice I'm high DMN, I'm not here, worrying, planning, and knowing this theory I realize that's it, unless I get back to high TPN, I'm ineffective.
This goes VERY far if one looks at the work of Walter Russell, in the sense that we are all like a huge neural network, and the network works at its highest level of intelligence when all neurons are here and now, sync'ed to each other, to this beat or signal RIGHT NOW.
Going more DMN, in our heads, meaning we are using our own intelligence (The intelligence of one network node, one neuron) to plan what we want to happen. BUt as we do this, we are starting to miss more and more TPN present moment signals from rest of network, which works at infinitely higher level, of Network intelligence. Far beyond our own individual capacity to plan or understand, as we just feel and know our little slice. In a sense we're in an orchestra, and everyone is singing, the more TPN we are, the more we sing along and make epic improv magic happen.
The more we're in our heads planning what we'll do 5 drum beats from now, the more we open ourselves to being unable to respond spontaneously to any major changes from outside.
In effect it's like planning all evening how tomorrow's violin concerto will be, and then there's a spontaneous decision that hey, let's all bring drums and make a drum circle. Everyone who comes fresh (no plan) and just plays drums for fun, sounds awesome. Everyone who spent a ton of energy yesterday about planning the violin stuff, is now both bummed out that they planned all that for nothing, and they're also tired from no-sleep, planning while others were chilling having fun.
If you look at some of the P&M well-being threads, a ton of them speak of this inability to just let the future/past be, and chill right now, be at ease, know that tomorrow's drum concerto or violin concerto will be fun, will take care of itself, whatever it is.
So there's this deep deep wisdom in doing less, flowing in the Tao, letting the large network outside tell us what to do, when and how to do it.
See Tao Te Ching, all of it speaks of reducing DMN activity, just wingin'it from TPN. Also this was one of the main points of disagreement between Lao Tze and Confucius, that LT thought it's good to just chill and let things happen of their own accord, things WILL get done, whereas Confucius was planning the whole kingdom, rules and systems from the head, from DMN, reliable and safe but suffocating the fresh raw energy of the spontaneous
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They
Stranger


Registered: 10/23/16
Posts: 146
Last seen: 7 years, 2 months
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Re: Default Mode Network, Stilling the Mind, Common Ground Between Many Religions [Re: They]
#23789473 - 10/31/16 06:24 PM (7 years, 2 months ago) |
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Hmm, just found this short video explaining it, wish I had this on hand earlier 
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phio


Registered: 10/07/16
Posts: 369
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Re: Default Mode Network, Stilling the Mind, Common Ground Between Many Religions [Re: They] 1
#23789535 - 10/31/16 06:51 PM (7 years, 2 months ago) |
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Looks interesting... Not sure i buy the framework or the conclusion(s) but the technical bits are worthy of further investigation.
Thanks for the share OP.
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