Posted by JohnD
Sat, 26 Jul 2008 16:35:00 GMT
Some Rights Reserved by absolutwade at Flickr
The story of her stroke and remarkable recovery are now well-known, through her book, My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey
, through the remarkable 18-minute video of her TED talk and through multiple interviews and articles in national media. Though Jill Bolte Taylor emphasizes her professional experience as a neuroanatomist, she has become a star not of science but of a kind of humanist spirituality. She passionately pleads for a shift of humanity toward the intuitive side of life and the dwelling in a state of peace achieved by apprehension of the union of all things through a powerful energy or life force. That is the state she came to by the impact of a stroke that stripped away all other mental functioning, including the understanding and speaking of language, as well as the command of her own body.
At one point in the TED video, she refers to the “nirvana” she reached through physical disaster. Her description of this state of oneness with things is remarkable and matches those of others who have achieved such experience through spiritual discipline, mystical encounters or an altered consciousness assisted by hallucinogenic drugs. But this is no momentary vision. It was what she had left of her mind, her awareness, her functional capacities in the aftermath of the stroke. And it is the state she says is accessible to her whenever she becomes oppressed by the tensions and depression that can be brought on by excessive dwelling in the analytic, verbal, organizing part of her mind.
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Posted in Explanations, Fighting Depression, Spirituality and Depression | Tags brain, christian, depression, Jill Bolte Taylor, language, mind, mystic, neuroscience, oneness, peace, peacefulness, spirituality, Thomas Merton, vision | 1 comment
Posted by JohnD
Thu, 26 Jun 2008 03:45:00 GMT
Some rights reserved by Derrick T at Flickr
Please note that this post has been revised to reflect commentary on Jill Bolte Taylor’s reliance on the right brain—left brain model. See the note at the end of this post.
If you have any interest at all in the relationship between the brain and your awareness of who you are, please go straight to this site. Read the excerpt from Jill Bolte Taylor’s book, My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey. Then listen to the podcast of Terry Gross’s interview with the author on Fresh Air. I heard it this morning on the radio, and it’s provided more insight about the human power to heal than all the books and articles I’ve read to date.
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Posted in Connecting, Fighting Depression, Spirituality and Depression | Tags analytical thinking, associational thinking, brain, euphoria, healing, intuition, Jill Bolte Taylor, neuroscience, recovery, religion, spirituality | no comments
