The Science of Why We Are Happy - the Work of Dan Gilbert

I want to talk to you now about the science of why we are happy.  This part of my program comes from the work of Dan Gilbert.  I have a video which I show each of my clients and most of what I’m about to write comes directly from this video.  What Dan says is so important, that I want you to get it here.  What he says can change your perception on happiness, and for those of you who are reading this blog, I really want you to have it in front of you so you can go back to it.  There's something about seeing what's been said in written words that allows us to really grasp an idea, and this idea is radical.  I want to thank Dan Gilbert for his inestimable work in this area.  He really shined a light for me when I needed it.  

Dan Gilbert is a Harvard psychologist and author of the New York Times best seller ‘Stumbling on Happiness.’  He believes that in our ardent pursuit of happiness, most of us have got the wrong road map.  He argues that our beliefs about what will make us happy are often wrong.  That our brains systematically misjudge what will make us happy, and his premise is supported by clinical research drawn from psychology and neuroscience.  He challenges the idea that we’ll be miserable if we don’t get what we want.  He proposes that our ‘psychological immune system’ lets us feel truly happy even when things don’t turned out as planned. 

So, why are we happy?  Well, about 300,000 years ago the human brain developed what is called the prefrontal cortex.  This makes us different from every other species on the planet in that it allows us to simulate and imagine.  This part of our brain is a simulator.  We can experience imagined experiences in the brain before they actually happen in life.  We can ‘test’ it out in our brains before we act it out in reality.  This is very similar to what a test pilot does in a flight simulator.  A pilot will practice flying in a simulator before he actually flies a plane.  He gets to experiment and work out all the mechanics of flying a plane in a simulator before he actually gets in a plane and takes off.  This same concept occurs in our brain when we imagine events in our lives which we would like to experience.  We imagine experiences in our mind before they actually happen. 

What the researchers have discovered is there is what’s called an ‘impact bias.’  What this means is that the simulator in our brain works badly.  Let me explain what I mean by this.  We would expect someone who has won the lottery to be happier than someone who becomes paraplegic.  When Dan Gilbert and his researchers examined this and tested out the happiness scale of people who won the lottery versus someone who’s become a paraplegic, what the data shows is that one year later, their happiness measures about the same.  They are equally happy with their lives.  So, this impact bias is a tendency to overrate the hedonic impact of future events.  ‘Hedonic’ meaning pleasure, feeling good, or happy.  Why is this true?  Because different outcomes are more different than they actually are.  

For example, whether a person wins or loses an election, or whether you have a relationship or not, or whether you get a promotion or you don’t get the promotion, all of these examples have a far less impact, less intensity, and much less duration than people expect them to have.  We would expect someone who won an election to be happier than someone who lost.  Well, a year later following the election, it turns out that their level of happiness is probably about the same.

Why is this true?  Because happiness can be synthesized.  What do I mean by synthesized?  What do I mean by synthetic happiness? 

Sir Thomas Browne, in 1642, in his work titled ‘Religio Medici’ wrote:

·       “I am the happiest man alive.  I have that in me that can convert poverty into riches, adversity to prosperity, and I am more invulnerable than Achilles, fortune hath not one place to hit me.”

What is he talking about?  Sir Thomas knew that we have this machine in our brain that converts negative experiences and events in our lives to something positive.  We human beings have what might be called a ‘psychological immune system’.  This is a system of cognitive processes, largely these are non-conscious cognitive processes that help us change the view of the world so that we can feel better about the world we find ourselves in. 

We synthesize happiness but ironically we think happiness is something not to be found.  Are there examples of people who have been able to find happiness after experiencing challenging and upsetting events in their lives?  Who were able to synthesize their happiness and turn lemons into lemonade? 

I’m going to share with you a few examples of people who have actually done this.  Jim Wright was a Democratic congressman in the 1990’s, he was chairman of the House of Representatives, and he resigned in disgrace after an up-and-coming Republican named Newt Gingrich found out he’d done this shady book deal.  As a consequence, Jim Wright lost everything – power, prestige, money – and he was the most powerful Democrat at that time.  What did Jim Wright, this disgraced congressman have to say about this years later.  He said:

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             “I am so much better off, physically, financially, mentally, and in almost every way.”

Here’s another example of a man who was able to synthesize his happiness after experiencing what many of us would consider a horrible tragedy.  A guy named Morese Bickham, spent 37 years in prison for a crime he didn't do.  After DNA evidence confirmed he was innocent, he was released from prison, at the age of 78.  Now, what did he have to say about his experience being wrongfully imprisoned for 37 years?  He said:

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                 “I don’t have one minute’s regret.  It was a glorious experience.”

He said it was glorious?!  How could he find being wrongfully imprisoned for a crime he didn't do a glorious experience?  To our minds, this is impossible to fathom, nevertheless, this was his experience.

Here’s another example:  Pete Best was the original drummer of the Beatles before they dropped him and picked up Ringo Starr and later became ‘The Beatles’.  He was interviewed in 1994; he was still a drummer, still a musician, still playing music.  What did he have to say?  He could have been a part of one of the most important bands of the 20^th Century!  He said:

·       “I’m happier than I would have been with The Beatles.”

Well, of course, we’re going to say ‘Yeah right.  Sure, ok.’  We smile at this and chuckle, and basically we deduce it in our minds that the person didn't really want that job, or you’re just trying to make a bad situation better, or you didn't really have that much in common with your ex-fiance and you figured that out just about the time she threw the ring back in your face!  But why do we smirk at other people’s ability to synthesize their happiness?  We smirk because we think that synthetic happiness is not of the same quality as what we would consider natural happiness. 

What is natural happiness?  Natural happiness is what we get when we get what we wanted.  Synthetic happiness is what we make when we don’t get what we wanted.  In our society we think that synthetic happiness is of an inferior quality to natural happiness.  Where does this belief come from?  Well, what kind of an economic engine that keeps churning over and over again, creating more and more consumers, how could that engine keep going if we believed that not getting what we wanted could make us just as happy as getting what we wanted!  Dan Gilbert suggests to us that synthetic happiness is every bit as real, enduring, and of the quality and kind of happiness that you get when you get what you are aiming for. 

This kind of happiness is about accepting the things that you cannot change, and having the wisdom to recognize that.  Here’s a bit of irony for you:  the freedom that we all cherish, the freedom to make up your mind and the ability to change your mind, which allows us to choose all these delicious, enticing futures that we have before us, it’s the friend of natural happiness, but it is the enemy to synthetic happiness.  Synthetic happiness works when we recognize there are certain things we simply cannot change!  Plato says, “What is once done, can never be undone.”  When we can finally accept that, we can engage the psychological immune system to convert that negative experience, that traumatic event, into something more palatable which enables us to gain a healthier perspective of our own lives, and find happiness where we are right now. 

This ‘psychological immune system’ works best when we are totally stuck, when we are totally trapped.  When we have no other choice but to keep moving forward.  We have to find a way to be happy within the given circumstances of our lives, otherwise we get imprisoned in the ‘what ifs’ or ‘I should have done this’ or ‘I’m a failure’, which only prevents us from activating the non-conscious cognitive processes innate to us which will bring us out of the past and into our present happiness.  This attribute that we have which is clinical verified is something that most people don’t know about themselves and this can work to our disadvantage. 

There was a study done by Dan Gilbert and his researchers at Harvard where they offered a photography course to the students in which they would take lots of pictures of Harvard, their ‘memories of Harvard’, and at the end of the course, the students would get the opportunity to select and keep one of their two best pictures they had photographed.  The purpose behind this study was to understand the psychology underlying the unanticipated joy of being totally stuck.  The students were asked to participate in this photography course and at the end of the course they were going to get to choose two of their best pictures, and one of them, they were going to get to keep, the other they would have to relinquish.  For half the class Dan and his group told the students they could change their mind, they had the freedom to change their mind, and they had up to 4 days to do that.  The other half of the class was told that once they chose the picture that was it.  The other picture was being sent away right after class, mailed off to England somewhere.  The students had no option to change their mind. 

So the decision was for half the class reversible, 4 days to make a swap, and the other half was irreversible, they could never swap.  The students were asked whether they could predict their satisfaction 3 days later or they could go away and report what their satisfaction was in 3 days and then again in 6 days.  What the results were was that those who could not change their minds really liked the picture that they chose.  This group’s satisfaction actually increased.  However, those students who had the option of deliberating, who had the freedom to choose, didn't like their picture.  ‘Is this the right one? Did I chose the right one?  I think I like the other one.  The other one was better.  Why did I pick this one?’  They had this constant turmoil going on in their minds as to which picture was better.  It made them not like the picture they chose, and even after the opportunity to swap the pictures expired; they still didn't like their picture!  Why?  This occurred because the reversible condition is not conducive to the synthesis of happiness! 

Dan and his researchers conducted another similar study on another group of Harvard students a little bit later and in this study they asked the students which photography course they would take: a course where the choice of their two best pictures at the end would be reversible or irreversible?  66% chose the reversible course, where they would have the option to deliberate on which of their two pictures they wanted to keep, not realizing of course, based on the previous study, they will ultimately be deeply dissatisfied with their picture!  Because they did not know the conditions under which synthetic happiness grows!

Shakespeare said this:  ‘Tis nothing good or bad, But thinking makes it so!’  Now wait a minute, is this really true?  Is nothing really good or bad?  Well Dan Gilbert makes a very salient point about this idea towards the end of this video which I share with you now.  He says that “yes, there are some things better than others, and we should have the preferences that lead us to one future or another, no question.  But when these preferences drive us too hard, or too fast, because we have overrated the differences between these two futures, we are at risk.  When our ambitions are bounded, it leads us to work joyfully.  And when our ambitions are unbounded, it leads us to lie, cheat, to steal, to hurt others, to sacrifice things of real value.  When our fears are bounded, we are prudent, cautious, thoughtful, considerate, and kind.  And yet, when our fears are un-bounded and overblown, we can be reckless and we can be cowardly.” 

Dan leaves us with a lesson to be gained at the end of this video, which I really want you to have.  He says, “Our longings and our worries are both to some degree overblown because we have within us the capacity to manufacture the very commodity we are constantly chasing when we choose experience.”  

What is important to take away from this blog?  Life sometimes gives us experiences that are a challenge to overcome.  When we refuse to take in these events and process them, and instead suppress them, it does major psychological, emotional, and spiritual damage to our beings.  With Post-Traumatic Soul Distress, Depression, and Trauma we are dealt a heavy hand.  Our souls are in trouble.  There’s a big gaping hole inside of us which paralyzes us and keeps us from finding a way to navigate out of the pain, and retrieve the joy of our own existence we once had.  But now we know from the work of Dan Gilbert we have a power within us that is able to convert those traumas in our lives and enable us to find the good, and thus, make peace with the past, which ultimately allows us to synthesize our happiness, so we can then build towards a better future.  We are able to do this through a ‘psychological immune system’ that is already built into us.  If we allow it to freely function without our interference, if we understand it and recognize its value in our lives, we can fundamentally change how we view the negative events that happened to us. 

It is a choice.  We have the free will to stay stuck, keep re-living the traumas over and over again in our minds, or we can take the time to transform them, and allow this built-in mechanism in our minds to convert that trauma, that pain, that suffering, into good.  We must recognize and own the power that we have within us to convert all of what has happened to us into fertilizer where we plant new seeds and grow into the people we are capable of becoming.  These traumas and pains can serve as fertilizer to being the best version of ourselves.  We must take the time necessary to cultivate this new self who is emerging by tending to our wounds and healing them.  We have the mechanism already built in to us if we will give ourselves the permission to tap into it.  It will synthesize those events for you and the feeling of happiness will replace all feelings of suffering.  Remember, nothing outside of you can give you what you already have.  You have it within you to be who it is you want to be.  When we are being who we want to be, the outside world will start to mirror that feeling and belief to us more and more.  Soon you will grow beyond the limitations that have been imposed upon you.  The traumas will continue to diminish in their power over you until they no longer hold sway over you and your right to be happy and free.  It’s time to empower yourselves.  Take in this information I am providing you, digest it, use it, and utilize it in your daily life.  You have the power within you to make the transformations in your life you so deeply long to have.  Begin the transformation today.

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Charlie Pacello is a PTSD, Depression, and Healing Trauma Recovery Expert and Life Coach, a former US Air Force Lieutenant, and creator of the program, 'Lt. Pacello's Life Training Program.'  He can be reached by visiting his website at www.charliepacello.com

The Technology of Emotion

In this blog, I want to discuss the technology of emotion.  In my program, there’s a video I share with my clients that was produced by Greg Braden.  For those of you who do not know who Greg Braden is, let me share with you a brief biography taken from his website.  He is a New York Times bestselling author and is internationally known as a pioneer in bridging science, spirituality, and the real world.  For more than 27 years Greg has explored high mountain villages, remote monasteries, and forgotten texts to merge their timeless secrets.  His discoveries are now shared in 33 countries and 38 languages through paradigm-shifting books such as: The God Code, The Divine Matrix, Fractal Time, and Deep Truth.  His 2007 best seller, The Divine Matrix is now a textbook for college level courses exploring new discoveries of science and our relationship to the world.  He is an active member of several leadership organizations, including the Evolutionary Leadership think tank founded by Deepak Chopra in 2008, and has received numerous awards in recognition of his insights and innovations.  Greg’s work has been shared on every continent in the world and in recent years, he has presented his seminars and trainings to Fortune 500 companies, the U.S. military, international businesses, and has been featured in media specials on the History channel, the Discovery channel, National Geographic, ABC, and NBC.

 

So, in this video Greg Braden shows us a film where cancer is actually being cured in less than 3 minutes using the language of emotion.  By using the language of emotion, which each and every one of us has inside of us, and mirroring that expectation to the field that surrounds us, we can make measurable and immediate changes to our world.  The key to accessing the power behind the language of emotion is you must feel the feeling as if it has already happened.

This was a presentation called “Language of the Divine Matrix” which was recorded in Italy on May 30^th, 2007.  In the video, Greg tells us, and before I go on I want to be clear that almost all of the information I am writing about today comes from the video, I’m going to give it to you all right here, so you have it.  It’s that important.  Greg begins by saying when we have a feeling in our hearts, we are creating these electrical and magnetic waves inside our bodies that extend beyond our bodies into the world around us.  The research shows these waves extend not just one or two meters but many kilometers beyond where our heart physically resides.  So right now, you are having an effect on the outside world, you are having an effect on the people around you, in your home, in your neighborhood, and ever further beyond where you are sitting right now.  Now when many people get together with just this one feeling of love, appreciation or peace, the collective energy emanating from their hearts can change the world.  We would consider this today to be a miracle.  And it remains a miracle until we understand the science behind it.  Once we understand the science behind it, it no longer is a miracle; it becomes a technology, a powerful technology that we can access anytime we want it.

The film that’s on the video was filmed in a medicine-less hospital in Beijing, China.  There’s no medicine in this hospital.  And the film shows a woman who’s been diagnosed with cancer in her bladder.  She has a 3-inch diameter cancer.  Western doctors told her there was nothing she could do about it.  They couldn't help her.  So, instead, she went to this clinic in Beijing, China where they think a little bit differently than we do.  At this particular clinic, they applied the technology we’re talking about, the technology of emotion, which for them comes from the ancient wisdom they have inherited in their culture.  What you see on the film is this:  there are three practitioners, three people trained to feel just the right feeling, the precise feeling in their hearts.  They create the feeling as if the woman is already healed.  We are witness to what is going on inside of her body through a sonogram, through an ultrasound, and as we’re looking into her body, we get to watch, in real time, her cancer disappear in three minutes.  And this occurs in the presence of the language that heals. 

What you see in the video is this woman is awake, she is conscious, she’s not under any anesthetic, and the critical factor to get is she believes in the process.  She believes in what is happening.  And the 3 practitioners are trained to create this feeling in their bodies as if the woman is already healed.  On the video you see a computer screen, which has two images.  The one image is before the healing, it’s on the left side of the computer screen, and then the other image is next to it on the right, and it is occurring in actual time, in real time, so we can see the healing happen.  Now when the healing is happening, you are hearing these practitioners chanting a word.  But this word is just an ordinary word, it could be any word, there’s no magic in this word.  The word is the word that they chose which re-enforces it for them; it connects them to that feeling.  This is something the practitioners have agreed upon that is the word that would create the feeling in them.  But, I really want you to understand that it could be any word. 

As the film begins, we see the two images side by side.  Then we hear this chant: ‘Wa-sa, wa-sa, wa-sa.’  As they say this chant, they gradually increase the speed of this chant as we watch on the video the cancer disappearing.  She’s awake through it all, she’s conscious, the practitioners are behind her, and on the video you can easily see where the tumor is on the bladder.  You see the black emptiness of where her bladder is and then where the tumor is at, a white circular blob on the bottom right of the bladder.  They take a snap shot of the tumor for a reference, and this is the image posted on the left hand side of the computer screen.  The image to the right of it, as I've described before, is in actual time, and as they chant the tumor disappears.  And all of this happens in 2 minutes, 40 seconds. 

When the procedure is done, you see the image on the left hand side, the snap shot of what the bladder looked like before with the tumor, and then you see the image on the right hand side of the bladder without the tumor, which is the one in actual time.  In our Western way of thinking, in modern science, this would be considered a miracle because they don’t understand the field that connects everything together.  And they don’t understand the language which speaks to this field.  Once we begin to understand the language and learn how to access this field, it is no longer going to be considered a miracle, but it will become a technology. 

I want to go back to the meaning of the word in the chant.  The practitioners chant this word – ‘Wa-sa, wa-sa, wa-sa’ – over and over again.  The word that they are using, loosely translated means ‘already happened.’  It’s already done, dispersed, gone.  Her healing is already done.  They believe it whole-heartedly, convincingly.  It’s already done.  In their minds and in their hearts they are coming from a place that the healing has already happened.  Not that it’s going to happen, not that it’s about to happen or that it is a long, slow happening, but that it has already happened.  Why is this important?  This is important because the field of energy which I am about to discuss with you is a mirror.  It’s a mirror that reflects our feeling of what we are going to experience in the moment. 

So, if our belief is that our healing is about to happen, or that our perfect relationship will come to us someday in the future, or that our abundance in the bank will happen for us someday in the future, guess what this field will keep reflecting?  It will keep reflecting someday, someday, and someday.  Why?  Because it’s open-ended, there’s no outcome, and there’s no conclusion.  This energy field I’m talking about is very subtle, it’s very powerful, and we must learn how this field works.  This field is called ‘The Divine Matrix.’  It is a field that mirrors now.  It’s not in the past, it’s not in the future; it’s right now, this moment.  This is what I really want you to get.  If you don’t get anything else from what I’m writing about today, this is the most important part.  What we choose to experience in our lives we must feel in our hearts as if it has already happened.

The cancer healing that we are witness to on the video happens all the time in this part of the world.  It not just a one-time thing, they do it all the time here.  But the Western scientists see this and it makes no sense because they can’t understand it.  This is because Western science says that our beliefs, our feelings, and our emotions have no effect on the world outside of our bodies.  However, as we are learning more and more every day, this is just simply not true.

When I talk about ‘The Divine Matrix’, I’m talking about Max Plank’s Matrix.  Max Plank, for those of you who don’t know, is the father of quantum theory.  He was a German theoretical physicist who originated quantum theory.  This theory revolutionized human understanding of atomic and subatomic processes, just as Albert Einstein’s theory of Relativity revolutionized the understanding of space and time.  Basically what Max Plank’s matrix is: it’s the Mind as matrix.  Here are his words:

• “All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together.  We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind.  The mind is the matrix of all matter.”

There have been experiments done that show human DNA has a direct effect on the physical world, and that human emotion changes the DNA that is changing our physical world.  The reason this is happening is because of this field, this matrix that connects everything together.  It’s Max Plank’s Matrix that is the conduit that allows these results that we see in those experiments. 

The idea that all matter is connected through a net of energy is a very old idea, and was popular in the late 1800’s.  In science, there was a belief there was an invisible web of energy that connects everything, and the scientists of that time were in a very heated debate as to whether or not this field actually exists.  There was a famous experiment done to determine the existence of this field.  At the time the web of creation was named the “ether” or the “ether/aether” field.  The “ether” has been talked about and is found in many ancient books and texts from our collective past, however, the scientist wanted to prove scientifically the existence of this field.  So, in 1887, the famous Michelson-Morley experiment attempted to prove once and for all the existence of the ether.  It was a good experiment but they interpreted it badly.  Basically, they were unable to find the existence of the ether and therefore concluded it did not exist.  The field, they concluded, wasn't there. 

As a consequence, for over a hundred years our science has been based on the belief that it’s not there, however, this belief was later proven incorrect.  In 1986, the United States Air Force repeated this experiment, the Michelson-Morley experiment, and they published the results in the prestigious scientific journal ‘Nature.’  What they found was that when they repeated the experiment with the more sensitive equipment and technology that we have today, they ended up discovering the field actually exists, just as it was predicted in 1887 by Michelson and Morley.  It was there!  This report is by E.W. Silvertooth, titled ‘Special Relativity,’ Nature, vol. 322 (August 1986): p. 590.  Of course, I wanted to verify this, so I looked it up, and there it was.  The date of the publication is actually August 14, 1986.  It’s a short little article, and at the time the Air Force was having some difficulties with their GPS satellite systems, and they were talking about conducting the Michelson/Morley experiment in space to see “about the effects of standing waves in rotating and translational motion of optical apparatus.”  This quote is from the article.  Without going into all the details of the article, at the very end it says, “If present findings are sustained, it may not be necessary to extend the Michelson-Morley tests into outer space in order to obtain positive, as opposed to null, results in interferometric tests of linear motion.”  There was no reason for them to continue with the tests in outer space because they had already found it.  The field was there. 

So, not only did they find the field, but it measured precisely as Michelson and Morley had predicted 100 years earlier – they just didn't have the sensitive equipment to work all this out.  Why don’t we know about this?  You would think this would have been major news.  Well, the reason we don’t know about it is because it changes everything for the scientists.  All the textbooks say the field is not there, entire careers are built on the field not being there, but the field is there. 

What does all this mean for us?  We have to create that feeling in our hearts that what we want to be is already.  We have to believe that our healing has already happened.  Not that it’s going to happen, or it’s about to happen in any moment or that it’s close to happening, it has happened.  And this goes for every aspect of your life.  Whether it’s healing and recovering from PTSD, depression, or trauma, whether it’s having that relationship that you want, or having that job you want, it comes down to believing it has already happened.  This field is a mirror and will reflect back to us our beliefs.  And when you believe with your whole heart, in every cell of your being that it has already happened, and you connect to this Divine Matrix, (it’s there, believe it), the universe will bend to your will.

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Charlie Pacello is a PTSD, Depression, and Healing Trauma Recovery Expert and Life Coach, a former US Air Force Lieutenant, and creator of the program, 'Lt. Pacello's Life Training Program.'  He can be reached by visiting his website at www.charliepacello.com

The Science Behind the Heart

The Science behind the Heart 

The heart is something that is important to all of us.  It is the seat of our souls; it is the seat of all of our dreams, hopes and aspirations for life.  It’s the seat of our most cherished emotions and feelings, and our connection to the world.  The information that I’m about to share with you is amazing.  It will open your mind to unimagined possibilities we could never have thought possible because we didn't understand the power and magnitude the heart has on the quality of our lives.  The people over at HeartMath, led by Howard Martin, are discovering things scientifically about the heart that is mind-boggling.  I've included this in my program and I’m going to share with you everything that’s in this video, because I want you to have it.  This information is so important to get out and it could be the key ingredient to open your mind up to new possibilities and new ways of experiencing your life. 

How do you go about activating your own heart’s intelligence?  Your heart has intelligence, and we’re going to learn this as we go on, but first, what are some of the qualities we typically associate with the heart?  First, it’s the core of our essential and authentic self.  We reach for our heart whenever were really trying to communicate with someone and reach them on a deep, meaningful level.  It’s the source of our most revered emotions: love, compassion, care, appreciation, gratitude, joy, and peace.  All this resides in the area of the heart.  When we are in touch with our hearts, really in touch, we have a greater discernment of the world around us; we have an intuitive clarity that enables us to live in the world without being of this world.  We have a deeper connection, not only with ourselves but with all others that cross our path, and with all of life.  When we act from our hearts, we have this incredible ability to overcome all obstacles in our way, it gives us the courage to see the obstacles and not be daunted by the challenges they present, and combined with desire and determination, we are able to overcome these barriers.  This is the birthplace of the hero.  The hero within each and every one of you is located in your heart. 

Life is about continuous growth.  It’s about service to others.  This is so critical for you to get.  It’s the master key to making your life work.  We, as a society, have reached a critical juncture in our evolution.  As Howard Martin states in the video, “Humanity has reached a critical juncture.  We are on the threshold of a new stage of social, spiritual, and cultural evolution.”  What does this mean for us?  All of the old ways of doing things, whether it’s our political systems, economic systems, social systems, are not working anymore; the models themselves are not producing the desired effects their implementation had intended.  The economic disparity between the very rich and everyone else is far too wide and only the few have access to living abundantly; the political system is driving us away from each other, keeping us divided, and is being held at the mercy of corporations, banks, and special interests; our educational system is not educating our children to be free, independent thinkers and creators, and is de-geniusing them; these are just a few examples of what is happening in our society.  However, what is so exciting is that there are so many new ideas percolating up from the groundswell of motivated people seeking solutions to the problems we have.  Ironically, science and spirituality are merging together, verifying the foundational principles of universal spiritual truths with actual, physical evidence.  And, as more and more people become aware of these astonishing discoveries, eventually, we will reach a critical mass where there will be a huge shift in consciousness on a global level, and people from all walks of life will demand changes to be implemented that coincide with this new awareness, and as a consequence, a better, happier, more harmonious and peaceful world will be established.  This is the threshold we all now stand on.

Let’s get back to the heart and the work of Howard Martin and the scientists and researchers at HeartMath.  Your heart is a source of wisdom and intelligence, very subtle, and its high speed.  It’s a place you go to when you need some self-security; that sacred place when you really need to find the answers.  When all others have failed you or life has brought disaster upon you, this is the part where you sink into within yourself during the great crises of your lives.  Your heart is your own best friend.  It’s your own personal guide who guides you towards making the decisions in your life, regardless of whether they are big or small.  When you access this wisdom and intelligence within your heart, you are gifted with a greater discrimination of things and acquire a new ability to see yourself, people, places, things, and events that occur in your world.

The scientific research is now verifying and validating everything we've always known about the heart.  The heart is so much more than just a blood pump.  It actually sends communication out to the other parts of the body; it is a powerful communicator.  The heart sends out commands all the time out to the brain and body, and it does this in four different ways.  The first way is through neurological communication.  There are so many nerves which surround the heart.  Through these neurological connections, the heart sends out messages all the way to the brain, and the brain sends messages back to the heart, and what is evident is there is actually this communication happening between the heart and brain.  What’s really interesting is when researchers map out this neurological communication going on between the brain and the heart, what they discovered is there is more information being sent from the heart to the brain than the brain to the heart.  The heart actually sends out more information than it gets. 

Another way in which the heart communicates is through the blood pressure wave.  The blood pressure wave is that pulse you feel when you place your fingers on your wrist or any place on your body where a pulse can be felt.  What you are feeling is this wave of energy being created by the heart while it is squeezing blood through the arteries, veins, and capillaries throughout the body.  Now this wave, this blood pressure wave of energy is traveling through the entire body and it’s influencing every part of you, including your brain function. 

Your heart also communicates with the body through the release of hormones.  Back in 1983, the heart got reclassified as being a part of the hormonal system because what they discovered was that the heart was producing some very important hormones to regulate bodily functions and states.  For example, the heart produces a hormone called atrial peptide.  One of this hormone’s primary functions is to reduce the release of cortisol, which is a stress hormone.  The heart is actually sending out a hormone to reduce stress and back off a stress hormone.  Does this sound like just an ordinary blood pump to you?

Lastly, it communicates through an electromagnetic field, recognized by the people at HeartMath as the “electrical heart.”  Howard Martin states, “The heart radiates an electromagnetic field that energetically affects each other’s moods, attitudes, and feelings.”  Your heart, among all these other functions which I've just described for you, is also an electrical organ!  The heart, by far, produces the strongest source of bioelectrical energy in the entire body.  It is up to 40 to 60 times stronger than the second most powerful source which is your brain!  This electrical energy that is being produced by the heart permeates through every part of your body, through every cell, and it because it is so strong, it actually radiates outside of the skin and out into the world.  And this field is all around you.  It envelopes you, like you are encapsulated in a sphere, and this radiation, this electromagnetic field stretches out beyond you and can be measured 3 – 4 feet outside of your body.  What’s really fascinating is this electromagnetic energy will change depending upon what your emotional state is.

So, for example, if you are feeling a lot of strong, negative emotions like anger, guilt, shame, fear, hatred, or resentment, what it ends up producing is this incoherent spectra in the electromagnetic field.  On the flip side, if you are experiencing a lot of the positive emotions that we typically associate with the heart, love, compassion, appreciation, gratitude, hope, kindness, what ends up happening is it produces this beautiful coherent spectra in the electromagnetic field.  What does this information tell you?  You are broadcasting this electromagnetic energy not only to every cell in your body, but you are broadcasting it outside of yourself and into the world around you.  You are actually communicating what you are feeling and what your emotions are to every single person outside of you whether you vocalize it or not.  And they pick up on these emotion and feelings once you cross over into their electromagnetic field, and visa versa.  Now, we’re moving into the realm of physics.  

If my field crosses your field, my field is going to be affected by your field and your field is going to be affected by my field, because our individual fields stretch out beyond our bodies anywhere from 3-4 feet.  The moment you or I get within that space, our fields will cross and interact with each other.  We will be non-verbally and energetically influenced by the electromagnetic energy emanating from our hearts.  Multiply this now with a room full of people; take the next step, and multiply it with the number of people in an auditorium; a city; a whole nation. 

When you think about this new information you have of the heart the next logical step is to examine how does the collective field relate?   The implications of what this scientifically verified knowledge could potentially have would be profound.  It would impact significantly the ways in which we interact with each other because we would have a greater understanding of the collective influence the heart’s electromagnetic energy has on the society as a whole. First, though, the folks at HeartMath had to figure out a way to measure this.  Their solution to this was to measure heart rhythms.  This is different than your heart rate.  Your heart rhythm is the timing between heartbeats.  This timing changes between every single heartbeat, and as they started mapping this out, what they discovered was some very complex patterns began to emerge.  What these patterns show is a lot of what is going on in a person’s body, their overall physical health, and about the quality of communication going on between the brain and the heart. 

For example, if you’re feeling frustrated, you have this feeling of frustration, what they can measure is your heart rhythm patterns.  What they notice when they map out your heart rhythm patterns is it becomes very jagged and irregular, and you can see the graph of this on the video.  Whenever this pattern shows up in your life, it’s not very good for your health, and, the heart actually sends signals to your brain to shut down your higher perceptual centers, which is called corticol inhibition.  As a consequence, you do not have access to those areas in your brain which allows you to solve your problems and to think things through clearly. 

On the opposite end, if you are experiencing feelings of appreciation, gratitude, and love, when they've mapped this out, it is a very smooth sine wave-like pattern.  This is indicative of high performance.  There is a high quality of communication going on between the heart and the brain.  This is really good for your health.  You’re not tense, or stressed, or anxious, and thus, the heart is able to function smoothly and effortlessly.  When you’re in this state of high performance, the heart is actually sending messages and signals to your brain to open up and activate the higher perceptual centers.  This is called corticol facilitation.  When you have access to these higher perceptual centers, to your higher thinking capacity, you are able to solve your problems.  You’re not stuck in the mire of being in the problem and entangled in all the emotional turmoil associated with the trauma; you’re able to stand up above the problem.  You can look at the situation from above the battlefield because you are not in the battlefield.  You stand on higher ground, able to look and assess the situation from a higher point of view, which gives you the clarity you need to find the right solutions to bring resolution to the problems you face.

All of this relates to the changes in the heart.  It’s not just the brain you have to work on by changing your thoughts; you also have to work on clearing up the emotions clogging up your hearts, these toxic emotions that build up over time, that prevent you from experiencing life on an emotional and feeling level the way it was intended to be experienced.  This information provided to us by the wonderful scientists and researchers from HeartMath gives a whole new context and meaning to the old adage ‘A change of heart changes everything.’  What you change in your heart – if you focus on something that you love, if you focus on gratitude, if you focus on appreciation, if you focus on kindness, if you focus on forgiveness – you can change the way your brain functions.  If you can change the way your brain functions, you can not only change the effect on the brain, but as a happy consequence, you can change the world around you because your thoughts, feelings, and emotions will be in alignment with bringing out the greatest good for yourself and for others. 

Every one of you has this power.  Start today to cultivate this power within you.  Break away from the addiction to your negative emotions, implant in your heart the desire to feel and experience love, appreciation, gratitude, joy, hope, faith, and make it a regular practice to check in on yourself to see if you are setting your hearts free, or keeping it chained by the toxic, negative emotions corroding your authentic connection to your world.   It is impossible to feel a positive emotion and a negative emotion at the same time; they cannot occupy the same space.  One emotion will dominate.  You have the choice as to how you want to be in this world.  The one thing for which you have absolute and unquestioned authority over is your thoughts.  Therefore, choose your thoughts wisely.  Decide, once and for all, to cultivate the emotions of the heart in your life.  Stay consistent.  Eventually, with continued practice, this will become your habit, and your habits become your character.  Remember: you are the change you wish to see in the world, it all starts with you!      

Exercises to activate your heart’s intelligence:  

So how do you go about finding this in your own life?  You begin by first learning how to appreciate yourself and others.  Think about someone you love, picture them in your mind right now, see them, and reflect for a moment what it is that you appreciate about them?  What about them makes you smile or laugh?  Take some time to write these thoughts down, and reflect on them.  The next step, is to find out what it is you appreciate about yourself?  What do you love about yourself?  What qualities do you possess that stand out?  Take a moment to reflect on this, write them down, and put these exercises in a folder or binder so you can reference them when needed.

Another way to do this is to create for yourself a gratitude journal.  Every day, for the next month, write down 5 things for which you are grateful for and 3 things for which you are grateful for not.  Examples might be: I am grateful for the morning; I am grateful for the bed I sleep on; I am grateful for the cup of coffee I have when I wake up; I am grateful for the shoes on my feet; I am grateful for the food I have to eat.  Examples of what you are grateful for not would be:  I am grateful for not being in a war zone; I am grateful for not being terminally ill; I am grateful for not living in abject poverty.  Taking inventory of all the things for which you are grateful for and grateful for not allows you to see how much you take for granted and it connects you to your heart instantaneously.  Start your day out this way, connected to your heart, and you begin to cultivate the emotions of the heart in your life on a daily basis.  Try it!  After a month of daily inscriptions, I promise you will find your days to be much happier and filled with appreciation and gratitude.

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Charlie Pacello is a PTSD, Depression, and Healing Trauma Recovery Expert and Life Coach, a former US Air Force Lieutenant, and creator of the program, 'Lt. Pacello's Life Training Program.'  He can be reached by visiting his website at www.charliepacello.com

                                                                  

                  

Finding the Hero in Your Story

One of the most influential teachers in my recovery was Joseph Campbell.  Often cited as his best book, The Hero with a Thousand Faces is a one of those books I read whenever I’m searching for inspiration, guidance, and wisdom from the mythological heritage of our ancestors.  It’s one of the most important books I've ever read.  For those of you who haven’t read Joseph Campbell or are unfamiliar with his works, he was the preeminent scholar on the mythological tradition found in every culture in every civilization throughout history.  He states, in the first chapter of his book, “It would not be too much to say that myth is the secret opening through which the inexhaustible energies of the cosmos pour into human cultural manifestation.” [1] All of our religions, philosophies, art forms, the first discoveries in science and technology, the social forms of early and historic man, all come up from this place called myth. 

Myths have a primary function to supply us with the rites and symbols to carry the human spirit forward. In this book, Campbell talks about the many myths throughout mankind’s history, up to and including the modern day (watch the movie Star Wars), which have an archetypal hero who embarks on a transformational journey, filled with danger, trials, and tribulations, all of which brings him to the point where he must confront the Supreme Ordeal of his life, and if successful, return back to the temporal world (the world in which we all live) with the elixir he or she set out to find.  He calls this, the hero’s journey.  Myths help to guide us through the transitions and passages of our lives.  When we identify ourselves as the hero of our own life, we begin to connect to the inestimable psychic power contained within the mythic tradition.  

Anyone who has suffered from PTSD intuitively knows in order to get to the other side you have to go through the transformation, you have to let go of the old self, the old self has to die psychically, for the new self to emerge.  The hero’s journey provides the rites and symbols one must travel through for one to be reborn, returning to the world transfigured – perfected, eternal, universal – and then teach the lessons he or she has learned of a life renewed. 

Now, I believe we are all on our own hero’s journey.  Every single one of you is capable of being the hero in your own life.  When you see yourself as the hero of your story, you can see where you are on the path in relation to this archetypal journey found in all the traditions and cultures of any age throughout the world.  This is empowering.  We want to find out where you are on your own journey, so that you don’t remain stuck, so that you know your story continues on, and when you connect to this absolute truth, as a consequence, you begin to embody the energy of the hero in your story.    

There are several steps of the hero’s journey which I will illustrate for you briefly.  As you are reading this, think about your own life, and identify where you think you are in the adventure story of the hero.  With honest and deep reflection, you will be able to see where you are, which will give you the knowledge, wisdom, and courage to continue on and face within you all that needs to be faced.

 

The Hero’s Adventure

• The ordinary world – this is where you are introduced to the audience.  You don’t know what you’re potential or calling is yet.  You are innocent, naive, and unprepared for what is coming.  
• The call to adventure – this is the point in your life, when you are given notice, that something, everything, is going to change, whether you notice it or not.  The call rings up the curtain; the familiar life one has grown accustomed too has been outgrown; old beliefs, emotional patterns, ideals, no longer fit or work; and the time for crossing the threshold is close at hand.
• Refusal of the call – this is often when the future hero, which is you, refuses to heed it.  This comes about from a sense of duty and obligation to a way of life, fear, insecurity, a sense of inadequacy, or an array of reasons that keep you locked in your present circumstances.  This refusal is essentially a refusal to give up what one thinks as one’s own best interests.
• Encounter with the wise mentor – once the hero has committed to the quest, whether consciously or unconsciously, he meets with a wise mentor signifying support of our conscious personalities by the other, larger system of the unconscious as the hero prepares for the journey.
• Crossing of the first Threshold – it’s a point of no return; it’s where you cross into the field of adventure, which is your life.  You leave the known limits of your world, and venture into an unknown and dangerous realm, where the rules and limits are not known.  In this realm there are tests, there are allies, and there are enemies.  The road of trials that you go through are a series of tests, tasks, and ordeals, which are all brought to you and must undergo for you to initiate your transformation.  Often the person is going to fail one of these tests or more, and they often occur in threes.  
• The Supreme Ordeal – this is described as a person’s lowest point or darkest moment.  You have made a complete separation from the old world and your old self, and are at the cusp of a new world and a new self.  When you enter this stage, you are demonstrating to the universe you are willing to make a change, to die (the ego self) and become a new person (ego and spirit united).  I know exactly when this moment occurred in my life. 
• Revisiting the mentor – you revisit the teachings of an old mentor, or you meet someone new, and you learn from this mentor, and then you return to the path you originally set out on
• Return with New Knowledge – the trick is you must return while retaining the wisdom you gained on the quest.  You must find a way to integrate it in your human life, and maybe figure out how to share this wisdom with the rest of the world.  This is usually extremely difficult.  Just as you needed guides and assistants to get you out on the quest, often times you are going to need powerful guides to get you back to everyday life, especially if you’ve been wounded or weakened by the experience. 
• Seizing the Sword or the Prize – this is where the hero, you, confronts and defeats all the old enemies, whether they are without, or more importantly, within.  With this new power and knowledge gained, you are able to overthrow and defeat this opponent.
• Resurrection – The old self dies physically or spiritually and moves beyond the normal human state.  It’s a god-like state, where you acknowledge your new stature.  It is often experienced as a period of rest, peace, and fulfillment prior to the hero’s return.
• Coming back with the Elixir – this is the achievement of the goal of the quest.  It’s what you went out on the journey to get.  All the previous steps prepared you to purify you for this final step.  In many myths, the elixir is like a plant, or a magic potion, a medicine, which supplies the hero with immortality.  What does that mean for us?  For a human, it means achieving a balance between the material and spiritual worlds.  That is the freedom we seek.  To live and be free from the fear of death, and that is sometimes described as ‘living in the moment.’

You all have the capacity to be the heroes in the stories of your own lives.  You need to find out where you are on this quest.  Are you returning with the elixir?  Are you at the supreme ordeal of your life?  If you are at the supreme ordeal of your life, all that means is that you are on the verge of transformation, if you will allow it and give yourselves permission to undergo the process.  This program enables you to do it.

 

Exercise:

Identify what stage you are in in the hero’s journey.  You are the hero of the story of your life, claim it, and once you've identified where you are, write out what this means to you?  Are you at the beginning, middle, or end?  If you’re just past the first threshold, how can you embolden yourself to keep pressing forward undaunted by the challenges you may face knowing this is part of the journey?  What resources could you access (mentors, books, support groups) to give you the keys to making it to the next level?  Who are your mentors and guides?  What are the obstacles and challenges you must face to effect the transformation in your life?  Answers to these questions can help to re-contextualize your experiences, place them in a broader perspective, and help you to understand the process of transformation going on within you on a psychic level.

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Charlie Pacello is a PTSD, Depression, and Healing Trauma Recovery Expert and Life Coach, a former US Air Force Lieutenant, and creator of the program, 'Lt. Pacello's Life Training Program.'  He can be reached by visiting his website at www.charliepacello.com