Lama Mark Webber - on Neuroplasticity and Meditation

Lama Mark has been practicing, studying and teaching meditation for 35 years. His teaching is classically founded, but well integrated with science, art and nature. Besides an extensive training in meditation, Buddhist philosophy and other spiritual traditions, including considerable course work in psychoanalysis, Lama Mark is a practicing scientist; he is currently conducting ecological research on marine diatoms. As well, he is the author of 'Why Meditate? A Heart Song of Vast Release' (2001), and 'The Union of Loving-kindness and Emptiness' (2007); both are wonderful books that explore meditation practice, the spiritual path and liberation. Lama Mark’s style of teaching is non-sectarian and universal in nature, displaying for human beings the wondrous unity, uniqueness and intrinsic freedom of all life. He is the Resident Teacher for The Queenstown Dharma House in New Zealand and for Crystal Mountain - A Society for Eastern and Western Studies, based here on Galiano Island. His website is http://www.markwebber.org/

Lately Lama Mark's teaching has focused on the relationship between meditation practice and neuroplasticity. I asked him if he could explain a little more about this approach:

"Meditative traditions and modern research have clearly documented that the human nervous system is capable of enormous plasticity, transformation and experiences of freedom. So we might ask ourselves, "In what ways are we stimulating our brains?" Are we placing ‘grooves’ or ‘ruts’ in the brain that build negativity, hurt and pain, or grooves that support openness, clarity and compassion? Meditation is sustained interest on uncovering a continuum of calm, lucid, aware and loving mind states. Almost all of us have experienced beautiful natural states and feelings from time to time. Who told us that we cannot sustain and naturally function in these beautifully lucid states?

We start by building on our interest and focus, although extending our practice does require some training and study. Just as a person who has been injured or suffered a stroke needs to regain body, mental or speech functions, so, too, we need to recognize the hurtful or delusional states that are an accepted level of ‘illness’ in our society. And change. We do not have to accept this way of being.

We now know that regions of the brain will not lay dormant or empty. Certain areas, if not used, are quickly lost to other competing functions. So, why allow negative, hurtful or dysfunctional states to repeatedly take over, since we know that our brains are constantly evolving? Better to let go of this outdated idea; that the brain and body become fixed in puberty or early adulthood, and that we are then helpless to change the organization of nerve cells. In fact, plasticity of the brain is the normal condition. With confidence and patience we can unlearn these (and other) deeply held beliefs - ‘ruts’ and ‘grooves’ - that can be uncomfortable. And replace them with enriched environments that support and develop mind maps of compassionate clarity.'

This, then, is our reward - a genuine, natural happiness, often with physical bliss. We do this by 'growing' brains of awareness and compassion. The evidence has been around for centuries, present in meditative and spiritual traditions, East and West. And now modern neurophysiology is supporting these long-held observations."

Kanskje bare det å bevege seg i litt utfordrende terreng øker hjernens plastisitet også. En venninne hadde med sin autistiske 17-årige datter Birgitte på et Bjerga-familietreff forrige helg og vi måtte gå ca. 20 min i ulendt terreng, noe som var svært krevende for BIrgitte, men vi kunne omtrent fornemme hvordan hjernekapasiteten hennes vokste mens hun navigerte rundt hull og steiner. Noen ganger ble det for mye og hun satte seg bare rett ned, men etter en stund gikk hun videre. Helt fantastisk å oppleve. Det å bevege seg i terreng er jo det motsatte av stillesittende meditasjon, men jeg har aldri sett en så tydelig demonstasjon av plastisitetsarbeid som turene frem og tilbake med Birgitte.

takk forat du deler av din erfaring Dag
klem bast

Den opplevelsen var bare så utrolig vakker. Når vi kom frem til parkeringsplassen igjen tok Birgitte armen min og vi danset oss nedover til bilen av pur glede.

" The discovery of neuroplasticity, that our thoughts can change the structure and function of our brains, even into old age, is the most important breakthrough in our understanding of the brain in four hundred years. "

http://www.normandoidge.com/normandoidge/MAIN.html

Også V.S. Ramachandran, som har blitt nevnt her inne i forbindelse med speilnevronene, er opptatt av neuroplasticity, som etter hans mening forklarer fenomener som fantomsmerter. Her kan du høre han uttale seg om bl.a. phantom limbs og synestesi:

http://www.ted.com/talks/vilayanur_rama ... _mind.html


Mer om hva og hvordan: " Ramachandran suggests that the remapping of the somatosensory cortex leads to phantom limb "
http://www.sci.sdsu.edu/classes/psychol ... oplast.htm