Heartbreak beat

       

Heartbreak Beat~Psychedelic Furs

Most children I see with dyslexia don’t have problems with vision. What they have is a slight gap somewhere in their auditory system, or sense of hearing. They cannot translate the word they see on the page to the sound of a word in memory. Until they can do that .. it’s hard for them to recognize the word as something they’ve heard before. I have a theory. I believe that the first language we learn is the sound of our mother’s heart beat. It serves as an internal metronome ..setting the tempo that helps us follow the sound of speech. It marks the onset of phonemes and syllables, which then helps us identify words and sentences. Dr Oliver tells me that his stroke patients who lose their ability to speak can still sing. When they begin putting their words into a melody ..they can express themselves fluently. My friend Levi has MS. He uses music as a prosthesis. He my not be able to walk the same as he used to, but he can dance every bit as good. He thanks his early years spent at Grateful Dead concerts for that. What this suggests to me is that ‘keeping the beat’ may be a more fundamental process than learning to read or understand speech. So I’ve been pushing the envelope of my heartbeat theory ..to the annoyance of those around me. I’ve come to believe that the heartbeat we hear in the womb sets up an internal rhythm that helps us follow events for the rest of our lives. Without it ..everything we hear and see would simply appear as though they were coming out of nowhere ..then vanish into nowhere ..without coherence ..nothing helping us string them together.

Anti-anxiety

The complaint I most frequently hear from former pot smokers of my generation (those who came-of-age during the 60’s and 70’s) ..is that smoking marijuana makes them feel nervous. Some describe it as so intense, it borders on paranoia. Consequently they quit and never came back. In the day, little was known about cultivating for the psychoactive effects of marijuana.

The times they are a’ changing. A new breed of cultivator has revolutionized the field. They can grow sophisticated varietals with a range of psychoactive properties. “The THC component is the same ..it is the mixture of other elements that play a vital role in changing the psychoactive effect.” Two decades ago, most marijuana smokers bought whatever their dealer had. It was illegal even for research purposes. Consequently nothing was known about marijuana other than its THC content.

One of these newly found elements is a compound called Cannabidoil or CBD. It’s responsible for the calming and pain relieving effects found in medicinal marijuana. Takes the buzz off THC so to speak. CBD is also helpful in treating a range of problems, including arthritis, the side effects of chemotherapy, asthma, sleep disorders and post-traumatic stress disorder [ link ]. CBD is measured in grams. Your local dispensary should carry varieties containing different amounts of CBD .. 0.35 grams being considered ‘good’.

The bell jar

Conscious experience is a bell jar shaped by historical and environmental forces. What we call ‘ordinary experience’ is fashioned by exposure during early childhood and a sensory-network that has evolved over eons of earthly habitation. Recent findings published in the journal Proceeding of the Academy of Sciences help support my bell jar theory. They show that the sensory world is tuned by exposure early in life. Children growing up in cultures where their diets don’t offer much in the way of sugar, eventually lose the taste-receptor for it [ link ]. In the same way, children growing up in cultures where their language doesn’t include sounds found in other cultures eventually lose the receptor sites for them [ link ]. The neuro-pathways for discerning phonemes that are not available in the child’s early environment get ‘pruned away’. For example, children in Asian cultures that don’t have phonemes for the English ‘L’ and ‘R’ lose the ability to hear any difference between them.

Rhythm of the senses

The way information flows through the brain mediates the way we perceive the world. And an important property of information transmission is rhythm. Like a metronome, nerve cells in the brain display rhythmic activity. If one area changes it’s beat, in response to variations in external conditions, other areas adapt by changing their beat as well. This helps explains how perception changes faster than nerve signals change pathways [ link ].

Message of a thousand years

A study, published in the journal PLoS Computational Biology, suggests our brains subconsciously use a simplistic strategy in order to filter out options when faced with a complex decision. However, the research highlights how this strategy can lead to poor choices [ link ].

Message: “..a thousand years ago a massive earthquake and tsunami had all but wiped out Murohama, a fishing village on an island off the coast of Japan. The residents, knowing they were going to be inundated, sought safety on the village's closest hill. But they had entered a trap. A second wave, which had reached the interior of the island through an inlet, was speeding over the rice paddies from the opposite direction. The waves collided at the hill and killed those who had taken refuge there. To signify their grief and to advise future generations, the survivors erected a shrine ..a simple clearing by the side of a hillside road, with stone tablets and roughly made figures.”

This shrine continues to serve as a warning of where not to go in the event of an earthquake. On March 11, 2011 ..the locals heard the echoes of that message. “We all know the story about the two tsunami waves that collided at the shrine.” Instead of taking refuge on the closest hill, the one with the shrine, they took the time to get to high ground farther away. From the safety of their vantage point they saw two tsunami waves colliding at the hill with the shrine, as they did long ago. A message sent by ancestors over 1,000 years ago, traveled the distance and saved their children.

Going native

Economists tell me I make optimal decisions based on the best information available. They call this the ‘rational’ model of man. Neuroscience tells me my perception is selective, memory is faulty and decisions are mostly visceral. They call this the ‘somatic’ model of man. I think I’ll go with that. Without instinct, I’d never finish deciding what to eat or what to wear. I buy clothes that’ll make me look cool and acceptable to the people I hang with. I look for approval from my mother/dietician/checkout-girl whenever I buy groceries. I blow them off when I’m feeling rebellious. I make financial decisions fearing I’ll disappoint my father. I only bookmark pages I feel comfortable putting on facebook. I practice the ‘disarming smile’ out of fear of looking like a menace. I practice yoga to improve my posture and not come across looking like a slouch. I chose my words very carefully out of fear of looking foolish. Damn right my decisions are visceral. Appetite and desire for social approval guide my decisions just as much as any contributions from the rational side.