Does the Brain Filter out a Wider Awareness?

February 21, 2022 by Nā Hālau ʻĀha Hūi Lanakila in Energywork, EOGD, Gnosticism, Hermetic Alchemy, Kaballah, Newsletter | Leave a comment

By Marjorie Woollacott, contributor, neuroscientist, professor and author

The human brain has amazing capacities. It contains billions of neurons, allowing it to process vast quantities of information so that we can function effectively. But can we have too much information? Yes, and, in fact, filtering information is one of the brain’s most important functions. Brain filtering is an adaptive strategy and ensures that only the information relevant to our goals is allowed into our consciousness. This keeps us from being flooded with irrelevancies that might distract us.

To introduce brain filtering to my neuroscience students, I show them a video of two teams throwing a ball back and forth, and instruct them to track how many times each team gets the ball. After the students give their answers, I ask if they noticed anything unusual during the video. Typically, they say no. I then tell them a man in a gorilla costume walked across the court during the play. When they watch the video again, they see the gorilla. This is a classical case of the brain filtering out information (the gorilla) irrelevant to the task (counting).

Filtering of information through the attentional pathways of our brain was brought to wide acceptance in the 1950s through the work of psychologist Donald Broadbent. There is still debate regarding where in the brain this filtering takes place, but it is known that the two sides of the brain filter information differently. The left controls information important for language abilities and goal-directed actions. The right controls a broader visual-spatial attention that allows us to take in new experiences on the boundaries of our awareness.

In her book, My Stroke of Insight, neuroanatomist Jill Bolte Taylor describes changes in her attention following a stroke to the left side of her brain. Immediately after the stroke, she found it exhausting to focus on what someone was saying. Once she allowed herself to rest in the experience of her right brain, however, she was only aware of the present moment. She says:

In this altered state of being, my mind was no longer preoccupied with the billions of details that my brain routinely used to define and conduct my life …. As my consciousness slipped into a state of peaceful grace, I felt ethereal.

Taylor says that the greatest benefit she received from the experience was an understanding that a “deep internal peace is accessible to anyone at any time.” Taylor’s experience is similar to that reported by many meditators and suggests that reducing the activity of attentional areas in the left side of the brain diminishes one filter on our awareness–and, thus, allows us to experience an expanded consciousness.

Many people’s experiences of this wider awareness have been published over the years. During near-death experiences, for instance, subjects have described perceiving their awareness leave their body and observe details of the attempts being made to resuscitate them. People also report moments when they are aware of something happening to someone many miles away. When they come back to their normal consciousness, these people sometimes ask, “Was it real? Or was it a hallucination?” Is it possible that in these moments the normal filtering mechanisms of the brain are reduced and this reduction allows the experience of expanded consciousness? Perhaps the brain’s filtering mechanisms screen out more than just sensory information.

Current research offers additional information on attentional processing and supports Taylor’s experience that the left side of the brain may selectively filter and, thus, limit access to this broader awareness. Research also shows that training can expand the way we perceive the world. Long-term meditation training, for instance, increases right hemisphere activity, and opens our awareness to a vaster field. Another brain area that is highly activated in meditators and that actually grows larger with meditative practice, is the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). The ACC is also active during such practices as hypnosis and energy healing, allowing a more expanded consciousness to modulate the activity of the brain and body.

Is it possible that reducing the dominance of the left hemisphere and modulating the activity in the ACC might minimize the brain’s filter? Could minimizing the filter explain the mystical experiences of meditators and the “paranormal” phenomena reported during near-death experiences? This might indicate that there actually is an expanded level of consciousness that is accessible to our awareness. Is it also possible that, in addition to filtering out certain sensory information, the brain also blocks our awareness of this expanded level of consciousness?

William James, considered the father of psychology, made a bold proposal about this function of the brain at the turn of the 19th century, saying that the brain filters our access to a vast consciousness, which extends beyond the limits of neural activity. James proposed that the brain acts as a partial barrier and gives us only the surface of what is possible for us to perceive. The process James described so many years ago is, of course, the filter theory, and he said that what the brain filters out is consciousness itself — a supremely expanded consciousness. Not surprisingly, scientists during James’ time were polarized in their views about the proposal that a vast consciousness is filtered from our awareness by our own brain.

This skepticism persists, despite growing evidence that there are certain circumstances that allow us to experience this expanded consciousness. Research studies indicate that these experiences occur when the brain is inactive or minimally active, as occurs in near-death experiences, energy healing, or deep meditative states. At such times, the filter becomes thinner, and we can experience the expanded consciousness that is usually blocked. If these studies are valid, and I believe they are, we are faced with the paradoxical effects of the filtering process of the brain. The brain’s amazing capacity to filter sensory information is critical to forming coherent perceptions of the world. However, one consequence of this amazing capacity is to limit our direct access to the vast consciousness of which we are a part.

Sound Meditation | Beautiful Awaken/Open Your Third Eye (Goddess Song)

February 17, 2022 by Nā Hālau ʻĀha Hūi Lanakila in Energywork, Healing, Meditation, Newsletter | Leave a comment

I personally love this music/video. “Goddess Song” (Awaken/Open Your Third Eye/Ajna/Brow Chakra 1 hour Stimulation/Meditation). In its softness, there is subtle yet extreme power. Stimulate the feminine energy, the divine female in you. Primarily for women, but it does work for men as well.

Great visual and audio meditation. See deeper into the world you live in and walk upon. The Third Eye closes over time if not used. Everything from the day-to-day stress of life, pressure from others that do not walk the same path, distractions such as media, developmental stages and the traps and basically data overload from all of the information we are barraged with on a daily basis. Billboards, cars passing us or us passing them, colors, sound, smells, they all are recorded in the vast database we call our brain.

The Third Eye allows us to see deeper into everything and gives us a deeper understanding of what we are seeing. It is a conduit to “the source,” or “the universe.” The ancient being that you are is accessible only through this portal. We lose connection to this ancient self, that is us, as we grow into young children and start mimicking what we see and hear, and over time, the years of our youth and sometimes beyond, we close that eye that allows us to look deep inward, and without even noticing, we begin to only see outwards.

But, there are those of us who seek to see clearly, and have understanding for the self and the world. Opening the third eye once again, and allowing once again the magic and curiosity that once was part of our lives and is vital to us all.

The “third eye,” or pineal gland, is located at the center of our mind, and can be activated by certain frequencies, and that is the foundation of this music/soundscape; that particular frequency. I have studied the effects of different frequencies on our bodies and minds for over thirty years and have found that sound waves of certain frequencies can alter the frequency patterns in our brains. Patterns caused mostly by external stimuli, can shift into “not so healthy” frequencies and cause depression, lethargy, etc.. Opening/stimulating the “third eye” can allow us to see much deeper into the world around us, and give us far more understanding of it. It can enhance empathy, compassion and understanding. With no one else around, relax, dim the lights, and listen to and watch this video (preferably with headphones). Watch it more than once, watch it daily over a period of a week and you will start to see different patterns in the visuals. The patterns are along the same lines as “The Rorschach test” (inkblot test) which is a psychological test in which subjects’ perceptions of inkblots are recorded and then analyzed. You can understand a lot about an individual, or yourself, based on the perception you have of the inkblot imagery. Same with the imagery in this video; what do you see, what images dominate, stand out? This can give you an understanding of your perception of the world you live in. Perception creates attitude, attitude becomes character. Who you are is based firmly in how you perceive the world around you. By opening/stimulating the third eye, you can look deeper into yourself and your world.

(excerpt from Wiki) | The third eye (the inner eye) is a mystical and esoteric concept referring to eye which provides perception beyond ordinary sight. In certain dharmic spiritual traditions such as Hinduism, the third eye refers to the ajna, or brow, chakra. In Theosophy it is related to the pineal gland. The third eye refers to the gate that leads to inner realms and spaces of higher consciousness. In New Age spirituality, the third eye often symbolizes a state of enlightenment or the evocation of mental images having deeply personal spiritual or psychological significance. The third eye is often associated with religious visions, clairvoyance, the ability to observe chakras and auras, precognition, and out-of-body experiences. People who are claimed to have the capacity to utilize their third eyes are sometimes known as seers.

Daily Meditation Technique: Open Your Third Eye in 1 hour.