Substantiating Positive Psychology

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People who work sitting down get paid more than people who work standing up. ~ Ogden Nash

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[jimtzu]

 The medial orbitofrontal cortex (mOFC) appears thicker in those who can better control their emotional response to unpleasant memories. The relationship between the size of this brain structure and the ability to recover from traumatic experiences also may influence overall personality type, for it was found that those who exhibited better fear inhibition also score higher in measures of extraversion an energetic, outgoing personality.
 

so it may be beneficial to be thick headed?   

on the other hand it's been shown that extroverts are more easily hypnotized, lacking the inner discernment that makes it easy to use mind control, personal or cultural.

[Francis]

Inner conflict should have some mechanism that allows for the dissipation of the energy in a 'healthy' way. Chronic frustration, aggression, ptsd, depression are poor alternatives to artistic  expression. Inner conflict is a potent force for good, if it's properly expressed as art. What is inner conflict really but two or more competing powers that both want to be in the same place at the same time. Once we acknowledge both points of view as valid, we can at least avoid the worst types of debilitating effects, like chronic stress.

Inner conflict often arises when our worldview fails us. We get burned because we trusted a faulty map. We really get boxed in if we don't fix the map. The map represents our socially conditioned expectations.

The conditioning process starts early with our parents. Parental discipline instills within us a sense of right and wrong - what we can and can’t do. We aren’t taught to consciously decide for ourselves whether something is correct or incorrect, instead we are taught to fear the consequences of being wrong.
These are the laws as set down by our parents, very quickly we start believing that these laws are the only correct path for us to follow. The law of the state is molded under much the same concept; for example, compare how you feel about being caught breaking the law, to how you felt in your youngest memory of being caught doing something bad by your parent or your teacher. And I mean really think about it! Not in the third person manner. But in first person. How did you feel, and how do you feel about the law now? Remarkably similar isn’t it.
This process of black or white thinking, carries on into the school system, where we don’t really learn subjects as such - instead we are imprinted with a belief of how we should learn. In school we discover that we learn from being told, by being shown and from reading books. In other words we learn from authority.
We are taught the false notion that experience doesn’t really come into the matter - except for in a very precise way, and that is the experience of being either right or wrong. Of course, whether we are right or wrong is dependent upon our answer matching the established knowledge of authority. If our answer matches, then we experience being right. If it doesn’t match, then we experience being wrong.
Being correct establishes a reward and / or a sensation of well being. Being wrong establishes a contrasting lack of reward and the sensation of feeling outside the community. This is exactly how conditioning works when training animals…because animals do not have the ability to consciously choose correct or incorrect action. For humans it is a very black and white approach, a case of either / or - which becomes so ingrained into us that we carry it around with us for the rest of our lives.
The work environment continues this same process. Firstly because it is effective, and secondly because those running things were educated in the same manner and function under the same assumptions.
Society also functions in this way. The nightly news is a constant display of correct / incorrect action and resulting consequences.
Unsurprisingly this has a massive effect upon our psyche; it effectively causes us to operate with robot like behavior. Our inner thinking starts to work in a binary like manner, just like computer code - full of 1’s and 0’s. On or Off. Positive or Negative. Yes or No.
This clockwork-like mechanical thinking process begins to stumble every time we hit emotional issues or gray patches. “But what is the right answer?” We think.
But perhaps life was never meant to be viewed in such a clear cut way. When we begin to wake-up to ourselves and our awareness, it causes this binary conditioned programming to fail. It is when this happens that we truly open our eyes to the world for the first time since we were a young child. But it also brings with it the potential to generate a whole load of inner conflict.
There is no “correct” or “incorrect” action or thoughts. Things are simply how they are. We generate the idea of doing the “wrong thing” when we rely too much upon our inner programmed conditioning. We place high expectations upon ourselves, because we are conditioned with a sense of achieving and failure. We believe we are being selfish when we think of ourselves, because we are taught that others come first. The awareness of a mind waking-up is in direct conflict with the programmed sleep-mind. And this can become a very troubling time for people, especially if they have no understanding support around them. This ‘inner conflict’ arises due to so many reasons.
People often say they feel bad for thinking a certain thought or feeling a certain way. Yet we don’t choose our thoughts, and we are not our thoughts.
In a traditional definition of schizophrenia, it is stated that suffers associate with their thoughts too directly. A schizophrenic believes that reality matches whatever thoughts they are having. Oftentimes many of their thoughts conflict with each other - giving an extreme sense of confusion and disorientation. And yet we all associate with our thoughts in one way or another. We believe our thoughts define us…just as the schizophrenic believes their thoughts define reality.
This inner conflict is what makes the early phases of self development and awareness development such tough going. We end up with a conflict between our true inner-self and our programmed-self. There is also often conflict between our awareness of reality, and our conditioned belief of reality. It is very true to say that as a culture we have learnt to ignore what our senses report to us, because we believe in the higher power of authoritative-knowledge.
But perhaps we should feel some satisfaction to know that this inner conflict is very much the death throes of a dying machine, as our inner-self begins to emerge from deep within us like light from a dark cloud. The key is learning to have faith in your own conscious awareness. In understanding that just because the majority believe and act in a certain way - that doesn’t make it correct.
We can learn to identify less and less with our thoughts - and instead choose to consciously think and act. It is a process of true self-growth and for those who have found that path, it is a truly amazing experience.
http://www.thethoughts.co.uk/thoughts/inner-conflict/

[Jana]

Who knows how long this identity crisis will go on, perhaps for thousands of years. The fight between original sin and original blessing. The conditioned self can't help but use superstition, righteousness, rule of law, and guilty till proven innocent tactics in its push for power...because it doesn't have a leg...or rather a soul to stand on. As such soulful abundance is poisoned in the miserly use of energy, love and consciousness. This kind of social environment breeds sickness and crime. The main point is to not work or live in such a regressive social sphere, because everything you do in the way of generousity, creativity, initiative and innovation will be wasted, for shows of genuine spirit threaten the easily programmed bots who are not yet initiated into their deep self.

Consider that extraversion may be a defense mechanism against inner emptiness.

"Fake culture is a product of the ego, just as the ego is a product of fake culture. It is everything we do and create within the world as a reaction to enforcing the illusion of the collective ego of society. The false beliefs, the desire for power, politics, the media control, the hidden truths of the ages, the slow erosion of mysticism. Fake culture is what drives our societies need for materialism, because in materialistics and possessions we see something real and solid to which we can attach our ego." http://www.thethoughts.co.uk/thoughts/fake-culture-of-the-ego/#comment-1015

[Francis]

The main point is to not work or live in such a regressive social sphere, because everything you do in the way of generousity, creativity, initiative and innovation will be wasted, for shows of genuine spirit threaten the easily programmed bots who are not yet initiated into their deep self. ..Consider that extraversion may be a defense mechanism against inner emptiness.

Some extroverts might be expressing their inner wellspring of passion, while others might be acting out some needy, clingy escape mechanism. I'd like to think that I could tell the difference. What I'm saying is that if you find the inner wellspring of passion and tap into it, then you get a sense of satisfaction from the inside and it matters very little how people in general respond to it. Do we worry when the furniture does not respond to us?

I am, I said to no one there and no one heard at all, not even the chair. ~ Neil Diamond.

[Jana]

True, lets not beat up on extraverts, we need both intraverts and extraverts.

The "whole point" about being sovereign (self-sourced) is that it matters little what others think of us or how they respond. As long as our cup is half full and we are coming from a place of pronoia, original blessing, grace, peace, harmony...then we are immune to the degrading lower energies we may encounter and  can offer upliftment to the world.

Consider Nassim, 20 years ago he was affected by the closed mindedness and bullheadedness of the conventionalists, but he kept following his passion until now he is the one carrying the ball, and the hardnosed conservatives can only gap in wonderment as he transforms the universe around them.

Imagine bringing children into the world that are internally strong enough to follow their passion, and be so sure of themselves that opposition, ridicule, usury or sabotage would not bind or diminish their focus, but serve as proactive fuel for even greater heights.

This is what I do naturally in my own life, such that I tend to see myself as a societal composter. I can't wait for the day when the soil is ripe and I can actually grow something.

[Francis]

Jana,

I’ve found the pronoia engine! That is, the thoughtform that that can give the required memetic power to the concept of pronoia. This is terribly exiting. See the quote below:

                                                         

The beauty of it is that it’s self-perpetuating and gathers speed as it goes. Once the vicious cycle of greed and endless taking is broken, kindness grows by itself. It has a life of its own. Random acts of kindness can have a butterfly effect; once a critical mass is reached, maybe, everyone will suddenly notice in most situations both sides can win, somehow, if you only take another step back and look at the problem in a non-competitive way. Play win-win, not win-lose. Wheel keeps turning and, if you open up and share, you will receive as well. As trite as it sounds, love and kindness, like information are things that can be passed on without loss; they multiply. You can have your cake and eat it too. It’s a hippie free lunch and it’s very satisfying. ~ Jurgen

The key is: when things go south, and bad things happen, do we default back to the paranoid or pronoid mindset? In other words, do we first try to cooperate or compete to solve problems? There is nothing wrong with competition per se, except when it goes ‘pathological’ and morphs into paranoia. How does this happen? Because the person forgets that competition can only work as an outgrowth of a more comprehensive cooperative scheme. Competition is always superimposed on a prior unity. When we forget that, we run the risk of degenerating into the paranoid mindset. The default must always be cooperation. Only after a baseline of cooperation is established can competition be activated without harm.

What do you think?

[Jana]

Yep...
Love is syntropy or increasing energy and consciousness, while antibiogenic ignorance (hate) is entropy or decreasing energy and consciousness. The cause of the collapse of civilizations or individuals is insanity, or the unsanitary convolution of the attainment of high vitality (ultra-biogenic) fundamental needs.

I/We "against" them or I/We "with" them, is the basic division between degrading systems (entropy) and creative systems (syntropy). In authoritarian systems, starting at the reptilian and mammalian level, we learn competition and exclusion in the fight for the basic needs on Maslow's triangle. Our power-over drive is a reflection of this basic chemistry of animal existence in the fight for survival.

Charles Eisenstein's books are a beautiful exposé of how we pathologically substitute one type of need for another when our fundamental needs are not met. For example we use food in replace of love. This replacement of basic needs with facsimiles of the real thing is the root cause of the collapse of our societal and individual health. We now have to learn or relearn what it takes to create a cosmically, naturally and essentially aligned community that fosters the true potential of our deep humanity. Consider how far off track we are that even the food we use to substitute for love is "fake" food! Thus when our true needs are frustrated and unmet at the most basic level we remain locked terminally into the animal power-over fight for survival. This is pure chemistry of life. There is no way around it. Not only do we have to learn what it is to be human and fulfill those needs "correctly" but we have to relearn what it is to be an animal, and to be a living creature. Thereby substantiating positive psychology through the fulfillment of basic needs.

[Francis]

Competitors and ‘enemies’ are seen as threats to the satisfaction of our Maslow needs. Allies are seen as supplying and aiding in securing the satisfaction of our Maslow needs. The engine is designed to co-opt potential competitors and turn them into allies as well as reassure allies that we are always ready to help them secure satisfaction of their needs. As such, it certainly needs refinement in order to maximize effectiveness. I’m not even sure that, in its current raw form, it is even ready to fledge.

But the germ it there; in Jurgen’s quote. Obviously, he drank the Kool-aid.

Critics charge that humans are naturally competitive animals -- after all, they evolved that way. To create a perfectly cooperative society, they charge, is both impossible and utopian. This is certainly true, but fortunately, there is a way around it. Competition for survival is only one of the many thousands of ways that humans compete. Humans also fulfill their desire to compete through games, sports, contests, social status, career status, academic status, even mating. Eliminating the need to compete for survival would hardly eliminate the countless other ways that humans compete. Competition could still be used to improve society, even a sustainable one.

~ http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-spectrumfive.htm

Deadly competition among humans for survival, or to satify other 'lower' needs, is an anachronistic human habit that by now surely deserves to be forever relagated to the dust-heap of history. Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines!

[jimtzu]

it's interesting to note that the original meaning of competition was to "strive together", the Greek olympics were about urging each other on to be the best that one could be, the win/win paradigm. somewhere along the line the word compete mutated into the win/lose game we now have ingrained in our psyche.  when and why did that happen?? 

[Francis]

Good point Jim. I think the answer lies in the Pearsall Rule of neural chain-of-command: Bad trumps good. When we feel threatened, the stress laden paranoid mindset hijacks the brain and wrests control of the nervous system. This happens so often that people, and now even the whole of society in general, never gets all the way back to the cooperative mindset. They are so absorbed in paranoid hyper-vigilance, they cannot even see the underlying cooperation that sustains them, so they cannot embrace it or help proliferate it. Perhaps the best analogy to illustrate the necessity of an underlying structure of cooperation is in sports; after each play (competition), the team huddles (cooperates). Without the huddle, the entire game degenerates into bedlam.

[Jana]

In unpacking our systems failure we need to take the widest anthropogenic view possible to get to the root cause of the problem.

Stressed systems and systems of stress leads to contraction, armor and competition. This is the essence of dysfunctional societies, families and individuals. Excess cortisol degrades the collagen and nerve structures of the body and interferes with healthy hormonal and immune function. As the body collapses under the corrosive effects of excess cortisol this generates even more negative coping mechanisms and dysfunctional behavior, which in turn creates more stress and more damage to the bodymind and relationships. As such the "oppressive force of dysfunctional authoritarianism" self perpetuates itself over generations and millennia.

Consider that on a cooked diet our intestinal bacteria fail to produce adequate B Vitamins to protect and produce a healthy nervous system. The decline in silicon in our diet degrades the entire physical structure of the body’s collagen system. Failure to get adequate minerals and phytochemicals means both structure, function and protection of the bodymind is failing. Meat eating has interfered with our cell membrane gluconutrient communication systems. We have forgotten how to be a high integrity ape, let alone how to be a high integrity human.

[jimtzu]

where along the lines in the 2000 years or so when the definition of competition change did it become a zero sum game?  or is it a cultural expression of the ego mindset, east(societal)/west(individualistic)?

[Jana]

It is basically a question of numbers, survival stress and holding capacity of the land...cooperation/competition is something we have been playing with for millions of years.

John Lamb Lash points to the increase of narcissism associated with the rise of the patriarchy as being rooted in the dissociation from Gaia, the body and healthy pleasure. With the contorting of the wisdom inherent in pleasure, a fundamental conflict of being arises that we describe as second nature, the ego, neuroticism, or narcissism. Where the individual is bound up and knotted in self-referential anguish unable to truly be, and thus performs a facsimile of a human, as learned by rote from the community or humanity they are exposed to. This is the shell or conditioned self—that entity we are now trying to dissolve and emerge from in an attempt to be truly human and sovereign. There is no maturity in any meaningful sense of the word, without this next evolutionary stage to the sovereign individual.

Cosmic-ananda (Eros) is the energy of individuation and creation that breaks through our culturally conditioned resistance to enlightenment. What we normally think of as human sexuality is only a small component of this larger energy of Eros—or the energy of expanding bliss, love-consciousness and vital health (connection). It is this powerful energy of evolution that is seeking to crack through the closure and limitation of our neurotic narcissistic shell. We must therefore be hormonally, enzymatically and neurologically alive in order to come into an experience of ourselves that is larger than what culture has made of us—culture that seeks to suppress and use us rather than actualize us.

No-one else can do this opening for us. We must choose to break away and break opening—during our one time of experiencing life—it is up to us to be all that we can be. Breaking open with the applied use of the energy of the Muse/Eros requires “holding-with ones sexual tension rather than dissipating it in low conscious forms of release, or sabotaging our energy with life depleting addictions. We also have to tolerate the “upheaval” our powerful ascending energy can create in others as well.

[Francis]

When a desire becomes an obsession, we call it a ‘need’, as a way to justify our selfish obsessions. What we call needs are just selfish obsessions. The obsessed are always desperate. Needs are petrified desires; desires that are worshiped as gods. Is it ‘selfish’ to have an obsessive desire or ‘need’ to survive? Yes, of course. Society has created this concept of ‘need’ in order to obscure and justify the desperate and selfish pursuit of our desires.

Society has managed to convince us that our desire to live should be felt as a need to survive at all cost. The cost has been a general deterioration in our quality of life. Our perceived needs are now relentlessly driving us into a collective paranoid delusion.

When the desire to live becomes the need to survive, we open the door to paranoia. When the desire to live becomes gratitude for being alive, we open the door to pronoia.

“Slow down, you’re not going anywhere because you’re already there.” ~ Alan Watts

[Jana]

Nope, I think we are more dissociated than that. This pleasure principle thing is a convoluted maze.

I think we are not even in touch with the need to survive...it is more like the need to maintain our addictions which we use as consolation prizes for not really being alive. Spirit knows there is something more to life than being a rat in a cage fighting after the last breadcrumb. For our survival, we now need to step out of our survivalist mindset and get more into the art of life. Which means drawing on our genius and that which transcends the culture that made us. The brave are making the leap into self origination. Pretty soon the rest will follow and we will leave degenerousy and disease behind us.

There is a pill now extracted from Astragalus that stops telomeres from shortening...that is an interesting experiment.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=anti-aging-pill-targets-telomeres