Neuroscience Says 'Living In The Moment' May Not Be That Great After All.
The future
I can't recall the number of books I've read on mindfulness. Hundreds. As well as Steeming on, I do 20 minutes candle meditation daily too. But one of the great finds of neuroscience is that humans have a key feature over all the other species on earth: they can plan and try to see into the future.
Dean Buonomano, a neuroscience Professor at UCLA has recently published the book 'Your Brain Is A Time Machine'. In this book Buonomano says that humans have the ability to step outside both space and time with their brains, and thus are able to span both future and past.
The 'wise men' brain
Humans are different from animals in the sense that they can 'time travel' mentally within their own brains.
There are some instincts that are hard wired like sex for example. This can indeed have future consequences, and sometimes we engage in this without caring as to what will happen in nine months time.
Even the word homo-sapien means 'wise men' in Latin, so being able to plan for the future is definitely an inherent human skill.
Neuroscience is not quite sure where this planning goes on in the brain, but we know that the pre-frontal cortex is involved in this higher cortex function
One of the downsides of all this time travelling is that it can be tiring. Revisiting a broken heart for example can be very tiring indeed. Even the loss of a loved one can also keep us trapped in the past.
Mindfulness allow us a break from this time travelling, as we disengage from the world for 10 or 15 minutes. We essentially close the book of our mind for a rest. This helps boost our overall mental health, and it stops us from truly monkeying around. But failing to ever see the future would not be human so it seems mindfulness can only ever give us so much.
Happy meditations :)
Well said mindhunter!
Society in general is trapped in their "monkeymind". It is the ultimate challenge for is humans to beak from the matrix, or the seemingly security of the cage of our minds. I'm somewhat agnostic, but to me the most pertinent part of the Christ story is the line in the bible - (societies voice) "...give us Barabbas!". We unconsciously choose the status quo.
Excellent comment @mainline2u - stay out of that monkey brain Matrix!! :)
Really interesting post, thanks. I wish I could dedicate 10-15 minutes to meditation every day but lack the discipline.
It does take an iron discipline, but once you get into a routine it's actually fine @fleur :D
wow, nice post!
Don't worry Lena were well ahead in the future on the blockchain ... unlike the rest of Germany and the UK :)
:) :) thanks for motivation !
No charge Lena. Welcome to the future ....
This post has been ranked within the top 50 most undervalued posts in the second half of May 14. We estimate that this post is undervalued by $11.53 as compared to a scenario in which every voter had an equal say.
See the full rankings and details in The Daily Tribune: May 14 - Part II. You can also read about some of our methodology, data analysis and technical details in our initial post.
If you are the author and would prefer not to receive these comments, simply reply "Stop" to this comment.
[Insert future here!]