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CONSCIOUSNESS SHIFTS THE WAY THE BRAIN
PROCESSES INFORMATION
During sessions with clients hooked up to an EEG, what we typically see at
the start of a session is a lot of high beta, indicating worry and stress. There’s
little alpha, gamma, or theta. The absence of alpha means clients are unable to
bridge their conscious minds (beta) and their creativity, intuition, and connection
to the universal field (theta and delta).
As clients experience flashes of insight, we see large flares of alpha in both
the left and the right hemispheres of the brain. During Anise’s aha moment of
realizing that her tormentor had never become anything like as successful as she
was, her alpha flared out so wide that it exceeded the measuring capability of our
device.
By the end of the session, we saw the typical Awakened Mind pattern in
Anise’s brain. She had a small amount of high beta, indicating that her critical
thinking capacities were online. But she had more SMR (low beta), showing that
she was in touch with her body. She had large amounts of theta and an even
greater amplitude of delta, showing a connection with her creativity, intuition,
and the universal information field. Her gamma had increased, demonstrating a
greater ability to make connections between disparate parts of the brain and
process information in an integrated way.
While her psychological breakthroughs were profound, her physiological
functioning as diagrammed on her EEG readouts showed real-time brain
changes. She wasn’t simply experiencing a psychological change; the way her
brain organized information was shifting too.
This is more than simply a change in the mind. This is a change in the brain
itself, as new neural bundles wire themselves together. New neural bundles are
constantly being formed and old ones pruned throughout our lives (Restak,
2001).
2001).
When we meditate, tap, use another form of energy psychology, or otherwise
shift our consciousness, the brain changes quickly. The brain can be
intentionally changed by the mind, especially by what is known as attention
training (Schwartz & Begley, 2002). True transformation repatterns neural
pathways. Eventually, the entire state of the brain shifts and establishes a new
and healthy level of homeostasis.
One research team notes that “an accelerating number of studies in the
neuroimaging literature significantly support the thesis that . . . with appropriate
training and effort, people can systematically alter neural circuitry associated
with a variety of mental and physical states that are frankly pathological”
(Schwartz, Stapp, & Beauregard, 2005). We can take our dysfunctional brain
networks and alter them with our minds.
It’s not just mystics and healers who produce large alpha bridges and theta
flares when they’re in ecstatic states. Groups for whom high performance is
critical are finding that tuning the brain in this way produces big leaps in
achievement. U.S. Navy SEALs need to operate effectively in rapidly changing
combat conditions. Using millions of dollars of advanced EEG equipment in a
“Mind Gym” specially constructed in Norfolk, Virginia, they learn to enter a
state they call ecstasis (Cohen, 2017). Once they “flip the switch” into ecstasis,
their brains are in a state of flow, an altered reality in which super-performance
becomes possible. Other peak performers, such as elite courtroom lawyers,
Olympic athletes, and Google executives, also train themselves to enter ecstasis.
The characteristics of these flow states are described in the book
Stealing Fire
(Kotler & Wheal, 2017). Among them are selflessness and timelessness. People
in ecstasis transcend the boundaries of local mind. EEG readings show that the
prefrontal cortex of their brains, the seat of a sense of self, shuts down. Beta-
wave mental chatter ceases. They gain distance from the anxious obsessions of
local mind. Their internal chemistry changes as “feel-good” neurotransmitters
like serotonin, dopamine, anandamide, and oxytocin flood their brains.
In this state they gain a nonlocal perspective. They are open to an infinite
range of possible options and outcomes. The self, rather than being trapped in a
limited fixed local reality, is able to try on different possibilities. This “knocks
out filters we normally apply to incoming information,” leading to associative
leaps that facilitate problem solving and super-creativity. Kotler and Wheal
(2017) review the research on the performance gains produced by these brain
wave states. These include a 490 percent improvement in mental focus, a
doubling of creativity, and a 500 percent increase in productivity.
During ecstasis, whether found in the ancient accounts of Tukaram or the
modern experiences of Julie and the Navy SEALs, people have common
experiences. These are linked to neurotransmitters: entering a state of bliss
(anandamide), a sense of detachment from the body that encapsulates the local
self (endorphins), local self bonding with the nonlocal universe (oxytocin),
serenity (serotonin), and the reward of being changed by the experience
(dopamine).
These are the characteristics of upgraded minds, and we now have EEGs and
neurotransmitter assays to measure the changes they produce in matter. In the
past, ecstatic states were attainable only by mystics, and it took decades of study,
rigorous practice, ascetic discipline, and spiritual initiation. Today, “we now
know the precise adjustments to body and brain that let us recreate them for
ourselves” at will; technology is providing us with “a Cliff Notes version of . . .
how to encounter the divine” (Kotler & Wheal, 2017). Today, the highest-
performing humans in the fields of sports, business, combat, science, meditation,
and art are inducing them routinely. Tomorrow, as we map the physiology of
these states and turn ecstasis into a learnable skill, they will be available to
everyone.
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