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Video about the Integrative Learning Center

Blog

 

Find your vagel brake and turn it off and on....at will?

14 Jun

Polyvagal

 

A few weeks ago I excitedly opened my new copy and started wading through The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, Self-Regulation by Stephen W. Porges.  Wading because I am not a neuro scientist so the vocabulary in the first half is a bit daunting.  However, the second half is creating a resounding YES! in my experience of my own life and those I work with.

I believe this work will rock the world of Behavioral Psychology in particular. From this new, comprehensive look a the autonomic nervous system, we may see the merging of the best of what psychology, somatic approaches, physical therapy and occupational therapy have to offer.  It will of course, take time, because we will all need to get better at regulating our vagal brakes to feel safe enough and to have enough skills to be in relationship with each other in a way that truly allows that level of collaboration and outside outside of the current box thinking to emerge. :-)

Here is an easy to digest radio interview.  

Shrink Rap Radio Interview

Really listen--I think you will enjoy it.

 

submitted by Cynthia Allen

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Too Good to Pass Up | Paraplegic Man StandsMoves Legs Voluntarily #physicaltherapy #feldenkrais #paralysis

21 May
 
ScienceDaily (2011-05-20) -- Researchers have used a stimulating electrode array to assist a paralyzed man to stand, step on a treadmill with assistance, and, over time, to regain voluntary movements of his limbs. The electrical signals provided by the array, the researchers have found, stimulate the spinal cord's own neural network so that it can use the sensory input derived from the legs to direct muscle and joint movements.
 

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Musicians' Brains Highly Developed #integral #learning #brainscience

17 May
Brain_activity

Monday, we posted on the importance of rhythm in gait and engagement with the world. You might have even watched the video of African musicians playing drums balanced on the head and marching and singing.

Here is scientific evidence on how music affects the brain.  Musicians experience increased capacity to create see the whole as well as the details.  They are ready for action with minimal preparation.  And perhaps most interesting--moral reasoning also measured higher.   

Musicians' Brains Highly Developed

There is even increasing evidence that musical experience in childhood might extend benefits through a lifetime.

 Childhood Music Lessons May Provide Lifelong Boost in Brain Functioning

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Self Comes To Mind #consciousness #damasio

13 May
In Part 1, leading scientist, Antonio Damasio says he had been waiting until he had enough new information on the neurology of conscious--to start over. He is no longer satisfied with some of what he has said in the past.  His newest book is Self comes to Mind: Constructing the Conscious Brain.   He has a nice You Tube series out on a few aspects.
 
Here is the link to Part 3: What is this thing called Mind? which is quite a bit more meaty in its entirety.  My favorite snippet.
 
"Practically everything that we do, if we are really thinking beings and if we live some kind of life examined, everything we do is filtered through what we have been, what has happened to us--sometimes in the distant past, and even unconsciously sometimes in the few close past. And it is also filtered by what we want to do.  So all that complexity of past and future contributes to this self, which is in fact, as far as I can see, uniquely human."
 
Note the "which is in fact, as far as I can see, uniquely human."
 
He is himself demonstrating an incredible feature of the human mind.  To accept that he knows more today that he used to know and that this current understanding is still less than and could be wrong. 
 
The entire series is worthy perusing.

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Improve Memory and Increase Brain Power By Walking #antiaging #droz

9 Apr

Think about this: Exercise does for your brain what trading in your old PC for a speedy new model does for your output -- you get a bigger, stronger, smarter network inside your noggin. Annoying glitches (forgetting your new neighbor's name, misplacing the electric bill) fade away. Information processing (balancing the checkbook, planning that vacation) gets smoother. And here's the really cool part: You can get this mental upgrade just by taking regular walks.  

To read more->  Improve Memory and Increase Brain Power By Walking

 

 

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#Brain politics - Can our political persuasion be predicted by functional MRI?

9 Apr
 
If the Republican and Democratic parties have been diminished to the point that one is a group of people who live more in fear and reactivity and the other is a group that experiences possibility and expansion with relatively little fear, these findings make perfect sense.

 

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The human brain receives over 11 mil bits of info/sec. How many does your conscious mind interpret? #feldenkrais

7 Apr

Why do somatic education approaches such as The Feldenkrais Method or Bones for Life believe they can use movement and sensation to talk to the subconscious brain and make phenomenal changes?  In part it is because the human brain receives over 11 million bits of information per second, but the conscious mind can only interpret 200.

How does this funnel down to 200 bits?  Some scientists believe the brain is making gross associations with prior experience to give quick outcomes for survival. It is precisely because of this capacity for the mind to draw connections to prior experiences that the Feldenkrais Method purposely often evokes the feeling of "that makes no sense" or of "the mysterious."  In Feldenkrais, there is often a circuitous route taken so that the brain cannot easily make a prior association.  When the brain fails to find an easy way to categorize the experience, it becomes available to truly learn something new. 

Because we are only conscious of the conscious mind, we erroneously believe that the work of living and learning is being done with  that rather small aspect of our brain. But in a way that is only the surface output. 

What percentage is 200 bits out of 11 million? It is so small it is hardly worth quantifying.  So using a somatic approach to speak to the brain that is behind the scenes might be quite useful.   

http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/series/explorer/4094/Overview#tab-Videos/07395_00
 

Reference
The National Geographic
Inside LSD

 

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