Owen Phillips: http://www.googleplussuomi.com/

Remember being told to avoid using gerunds (verbs ending in …ing) and the passive voice?

An article in the New York Times warns us against the use of “Zombie Nouns” in our writing (nouns that suck the life from other parts of speech: eg: “what the country needs is a new state of calmity.” You know what I mean, but it would be far more correct to say “the country needs to calm down.)

But just because grammar is correct doesn’t mean it’s good for your brain, or your deeper sense of learning. If you’ve ever had that experience of a book that “changed your life,” you might recall that part of its power had to do with the fact that you found it challenging to your world-view.

Milton Erikson, the father of hypnotherapy, believed that if a person allowed even a fraction of a second to knock out habitual thoughts with a radically different frame of reference — something that surprised or shocked them so much that their previous patterns of association had to leave their body and mind completely — that this moment of “pure awareness” and fascination could result in something new: an opportunity for a shift in perspective.

Recent studies in neuroscience seem to be supporting this idea. And Shakespeare — who in spite of his reputation for being difficult has been changing lives since 1603 — is interesting to consider in this regard.

 In an article called “The Shakespeared Brain,” a team of cross-curricular researchers from the University of Liverpool found that reading Shakespeare has a dramatic effect on the human brain.

One of Shakespeare’s stylistic feats is his ability to create sentences in which parts of speech are scrambled or used in ways that defy the rules of grammar — he loved Zombifying grammar. For example, “he childed as I fathered” — a line from King Lear in which nouns “child, father” act like verbs. 

What the researchers realized is that when people read, nouns and verbs are processed in different parts of their brain. So when a person reads sentences that messes with their order, the brain has to fire extra neurons to measure and process the confusion.

Those extra neurons result in what they call a “P600 surge”— meaning that when our brains encounter difficulty or confusion it has to work a little harder to fit what is difficult into what we already know. Think of this like a jazz quartet — you’ve got the bass player keeping the background beat going, while the pianist pushes the melody towards ever more complex vibrations and syncopations.

This movement of mind (and its subsequent re-kindling into new learnings) involves experiencing change in a way that re-configures our deeply held beliefs about self and world.

So if you’re writing articles for the New York Times, please mind your grammar. 

But if you’re looking to blow your mind, Zombify! 

Here’s an amazing Radiolab episode on this topic: http://www.radiolab.org/2007/sep/24/

And here’s a new book out by Clark Coolidge, king of Zombienounification: http://www.fenceportal.org/?page_id=4679

Traditionally, the mysterious and often unreadable scrawl that occurs during automatic writing is thought to be the work of spirits communicating through the writing hand of a medium. And if the medium continues the practice of automatic writing every day for a period of time, often coherent sentences and concepts will begin to emerge – usually beyond the conscious scope of the writer.

Whether you believe that automatic writing is the manifestation of spirits or the unconscious mind of the writer tapping into some larger source, there is no doubt but that the process is mysterious.

And this study articulates what indeed does seem a part of the ether into which the unknown blows:

The parts of the brain that are active during “normal” writing states are quiet when an experienced automatic writer (medium) is at work.

Which means that Automatic Writing is not actually “writing.” So what is it?

Amazingly, this study expands that time-old question:

What is the connection between the mysteries of consciousness and the grey, mushy, matter that sits between our ears?

I’m in the midst of writing a longer piece about this, but in the meantime why not try it out for yourself?

Download (for $2.99) my 23 minute hypnotic sound-scape for Automatic Writing (produced in collaboration with Ambrose Bye). And then email me your answer to this question:

What do you think happens when you practice automatic writing (or not-writing)?

So this year I’m going to start with all that is opposite and see what happens.

a nonvenomous Banded Water Snake [Nerodia fasciata fasciata]

But since they are the metaphor for 2013, I will embrace  the spirit of going with the flow of opposites and hope that this year brings us all that water snakes have to offer: no lethal bites, beautiful colors, graceful meandering, and ecosystem (body and mind) nourishment.

Happy swimming!

Only to find that stress never really passes – or if it does, you no longer feel the same urgency or commitment to make the change?

Until, as poet John Ashbery writes in the poem “Varient”

“the whole thing overflows like a silver
Wedding cake or Christmas tree, in a cascade of tears.”

Here are three good reasons to cascade the change you want to make in your life not into tears, but into a path that has already begun to form, one day at a time.

1. New Year’s Resolutions Don’t Work…

…unless, of course, you have a steel resolve and the unflinching willpower to maintain your initial burst of enthusiasm. What does work is to set realistic goals and take small steps on a daily basis towards those making those goals a reality. So if you start now, by the time the new year rolls around you’ll be on the right track.

Laying down the seeds to get yourself started might not be as hard as you think.

For example, if weight loss is your goal, what if you made the commitment now to eat 1/2 your usual plate of Thanksgiving dinner (and every meal thereafter) savoring every bite? If you’re trying to stop smoking, how about spending the month of December smoking 1/3 fewer cigarettes, becoming more aware of your cravings and drinking a glass of water instead of smoking?

Whatever your goal may be, chunk it down to what is possible and commit to that. It will be easier to achieve.

2. 12/21/2012

Its no longer prophesied to be the end of the world (whatever that even means considering the millions of lives have been uprooted or destroyed by wars and environmental disasters).

But this day is symbolic of the shift from a culture of rampant individualism to a culture of collective, multi-dimensional thinking. This is a shift of creativity in which large groups of people get together and turn their efforts outward towards “we, in common” as opposed to “I, alone.”

We’re all riding the wave of this shift – so whatever commitment you can make to improve your life will resonate with others who are feeling a similar urgency. Go for it. You’re not alone.

3. Holidays may compound stress, but procrastination makes it even worse.

A new year is a reminder of how time flies - Tempus fugit. Whatever it is that you’ve been meaning to can drag your energy down, making it a lot harder to commit to larger changes. So find six hours between now and the end of December and do what you need to do to get that “to do” list in motion.

If it’s something big – like writing a dissertation or starting a new business – then separate the forest into trees, and the trees into branches. Make the job smaller, and once you’ve got it started keep taking small steps until you’re on a roll.

Happy new year – every day, starting now.

P.S. If you’re worried about self-sabatoge, check out IQ Matrix’s cool mind map and tips for overcoming your worst inclinations.

In 1960 the poet Robert Duncan published a book of poetry called “The Opening of the Field” and when I work with clients who find sleeping difficult, I find myself returning again and again to these words:

Often I am permitted to return to a meadow
as if it were a scene made-up by the mind,
that is not mine, but is a made place…

created by light
wherefrom the shadows that are forms fall.

I find that when people have trouble sleeping it’s because they are paying way too much attention to themselves trying to fall asleep.

People will say: “I lay in bed, tossing and turning, thinking to myself I need to sleep! I am so tired! But then all sorts of thoughts start racing through my mind and then I’m up for hours.”

There are plenty of external reasons why sleeping can be difficult: noise, an uncomfortable bed, physical pain, and chocolate are a few that come to mind.

But in spite of all these diversions and distractions, there is a way you can get to sleep by opening the field – and to believe that you can find that “scene made up by the mind that is not mine” it’s useful to “not” think about it. How?

Well, if you’re “not” sleeping, it’s because you have a memory of what it feels like to sleep and you know that what you’re doing now (tossing and turning) is “not” that.

And it’s useful to know that whatever you’re doing that is “not” working means that you can do the opposite by asking yourself a few simple questions:

What’s everything else that I’m not thinking about while I lay here not sleeping?

What’s everything else that I’m not hearing while I lay here not sleeping?

What’s everything else that I’m not feeling in my body while I lay here not sleeping?

It’s possible that as you imagine everything else that you’re not thinking about right now that you’ll notice your body take a deep breath.

A breath that feels a little more like sleeping. And that’s a thought you can follow into the shadows where forms fall– forms of dreams, or your body finally resting.

I’ve been following the rise of placebo research coverage by mainstream news sources, and reader comments are always heated. People who have been taking medications for many years get very upset about  placebo coverage — a good example are the comments posted after this CBS interview between Lesley Stahl and Irving Kirsch (author of the controversial book The Emperor’s New Drugs: Exploding the Antidepressant Myth).

Personally, I don’t think that the placebo effect needs to be presented as some ultimate anti-thesis to prescription medication. If the drugs work, they work. Rather, I think the mental strategies that harness the placebo effect need to be taught as fundamental skills, as crucial to a person’s survival as looking both ways before crossing the street.

So, I wrote a book about how the mindbody connection works and how you can develop your awareness of it in order to survive. The placebo effect isn’t only a sugar pill or some kind of trick. I prefer to think of it more like a regimen of thought experiments that you can feel having an effect in your body.

The book is called “You, Resourceful: Return to Who You Want To Be.”

For a limited time you can get it directly from me and pay only $5.99 (plus $1.75 S&H) through Pay Pal.

And if you can post your comments to the book’s Amazon.com page, that would be terrific.

As health insurance rates continue to rise and more and more people are stuck with less-than-adequate coverage, I’m hopeful that seemingly radical but ancient understandings about how our minds and our bodies work together to activate powerful internal healing resources will finally become mainstream.

Thanks for reading.

Warmly, Kristin

You know about “breaking habits” and have probably heard that it takes 66 days for most people to be convinced that a habit is gone for good. Traumas get “released” and when we can’t “stand” it any longer, we work to “get over” people.

The words we use to describe these aspirations to “break,” “release,” and “get over” are themselves clues to how to do it. Melissa Tiers (The Anti-anxiety Toolkit) describes it as a two-step process: first transform the issue into a visual image; then use your creative mind to elaborate on the story.

For example, if you are trying to “move through a block” imagine the block as an actual object. Then figure out what you need to do to.

I see a wall and I’m breaking through it with a hammer; the pieces fly all over the place like confetti.

And what happens next?

The confetti turns into a light snow and covers the entire landscape.

And as you imangine that the rock has transformed into snow, what do you notice about the issue you were trying to “break through”?

Well, walking through a light snow is certainly easier than running into walls.

How about giving it a try? Think about about something that you would like to “get over.”

Get over, like what? Make it into an image.

Now imagine that wall, river, ocean, canyon (whatever it is) and think about what you will need to “get over” it. A rope to cross the river, a magical power to part the ocean, a hang-glider to make it across the canyon.

Then imagine yourself doing just that and notice how you can begin to get some perspective on the issue.

Butterflies in your stomach? Jello in your legs? Cotton in your mouth?

Lingering, hovering, hanging out, causing you to feel a certain way. And when you imagine those butterflies flying in formation or that jello turning into something solid, you can begin to feel better. Or at least be in a better position to channel insight and inner resources to solve an issue or glean some insight.

So, what’s happening as you take a moment to check in with your metaphors and transform them?

Like Wallace Stevens does all the time:

You like it under the trees in autumn,
Because everything is half dead.
The wind moves like a cripple among the leaves
And repeats words without meaning.

In the same way, you were happy in spring,
With the half colors of quarter-things,
The slightly brighter sky, the melting clouds,
The single bird, the obscure moon—

- from “The Motive For Metaphor“

A good example is Power Up Your Brain: The Neuroscience of Enlightnment (Perlmutter and Villoldo) — an interesting conversation between neuroscience and shamanic practices. I wanted to share a couple ideas from this book that I think really clarify the work we are doing with hypnotherapy and other kinds of mental healing work. The first is the idea that:

Your limbic brain (which operates by influencing the endocrine system and the autonomic nervous system) cannot distinguish between a painful event that occurred 20 years ago and the memory of that event triggered by a similar situation today. This means that unless we do something to convince the brain that it doesn’t need to constantly keep referring back to that old response, we’re going to continue to experience our lives as an infuriating series of patterns and habits.

The second idea is that:

Visualizations allow you to pave the way for new neural pathways that can allow you to perceive people and situations in a new way.

So guided visualizations are rewiring those old responses by inviting your creative mind and all the images, colors, shapes, and ideas that it holds to come forward. When this happens, the normal chatter of everyday life (which often includes a lot of unproductive self-talk) eases into focused awareness, a kind of expansion of perspective that, when put into action, can lead to powerful insight and the potential for change. And your body relaxes, which allows healing to happen at both the cellular and the mental level.

So as you practice interrupting habitual thoughts with visualizations and breathing throughout the day, keep in mind that you’re doing more than just imagining yourself swimming in that ocean or walking through that amazing landscape. You’re communicating to your brain that you’re safe and in a different place in your life — so there’s no need to conjure up that old response any more.

Happy rewiring…

(Imagine your own neural pathways firing and clustering like a cascade of matches — not into a dangerous fire… 

but into a silent luminosity… )

Lasercut of Upset Stomach by Laurie Frick

Two weeks ago I attended the conference in Amsterdam  of a new movement in healthcare called “Quantified Self” whose logo is  ”Self Knowledge Through Numbers.” It’s a provocative notion — that we can take control of our health care by tracking data on a daily basis, and analyzing that data over a period of time in order to make adjustments and figure out ourselves what is working, and what isn’t.

I was most interested in the  presentations around behavior modification and “mood tracking.” As a hypnotherapist,  my work  is more in keeping with healing traditions that bring unquantifiable but real awareness of unconscious and intuitive insight to behavioral change. And yet, I was struck with the possibility that data-tracking (although it might not be useful to everyone) gives people access to a similar kind of expanded awareness, although through a different channel.

I co-presented a session with my partner Richard Ryan who is obsessively tracking his insomnia with a Zeo, while at the same time using hypnotherapy and acupuncture. My question for this movement is: What makes the change? Is it the data, or the fact that tracking interrupts a habitual pattern? Or the fascinating simultaneity of the two, in rare collaboration and synergy.

Here are a few resources in case any of you are interested in experimenting with self-tracking.

I’ve been experimenting with  Moodscope and Moodjam, two sites that track fluctuations in mood over time. Moodscope allows you to  write a few sentences about what influences are contributing to a particular mood. It’s a great way to track mental strategies like self-hypnosis or EFT. Moodjam gives you a beautiful, color-coded chart. For a beautiful example of data in action, check out visual artist Laurie Frick who synthesizes art, neuroscience, and moodjam data.

The health-care system is so demoralizing, but CureTogether is a really great site that puts symptoms and diagnosis in perspective and allows you to be pro-active in relation to your own health — in part because you are able to see your condition in relation to other people who are suffering from the same set of symptoms.

If you’re interested in all this there are QS meetups all over the world where people are presenting very creative and innovative approaches to self-tracking (not all are tech-centric.)

My Zone A (flood zone) apartment in Brooklyn has a nice view of the East River, and there’s a part of me that wishes I could have stayed to watch as Hurricane Irene sent surges up and down the streets that meet the river’s shore. But this thrill-seeking urge was put into perspective when my downstairs neighbor’s ceiling collapsed and the antique store next door flooded; when I heard and read the reports of hard-hit areas upstate and in other states.