Is Time Travel Real?

Is Time Travel Real? 

What are you doing when you aren’t doing anything at all?  If you said “nothing,” then you  just passed a test in logic, but  flunked a test in neuroscience about time travel.

So what about time travel? When people perform mental tasks–adding numbers, comparing shapes, identifying faces–different areas of their brains become active, and brain scans show these active areas as brightly colored squares on an otherwise dull gray background.

But researchers have recently discovered that when these areas of our brains light up, other areas go dark. This dark network (which comprises regions in the frontal, parietal and medial temporal lobes) is off when we seem to be on, and on when we seem to be off. And this seems to be the time travel connection.

If you climbed into an MRI machine and lay there quietly, waiting for instructions from a technician, the dark network would be as active as a beehive. But the moment your instructions arrived and your task began, the bees would freeze and the network would fall silent. When we appear to be doing nothing, we are clearly doing something. But what? Time travel.

The answer, it seems, is time travel occurs naturally in our brains.

The human body moves forward in time at the rate of one second per second whether we like it or not. But the human mind can move through time in any direction and at any speed it chooses. It seems to be able to trvel forward and backward through time.

Our ability to close our eyes and imagine the pleasures of Super Bowl Sunday or remember the excesses of New Year’s Eve is a fairly recent evolutionary development, and we think our talent for doing this is unparalleled in the animal kingdom.

We are a time travel race, unfettered by chronology and capable of visiting the future or revisiting the past whenever we wish. But if our neural time travel mental machines are damaged by illness, age or accident, we may become trapped in the present. Alzheimer’s disease, for instance, specifically attacks the dark network, stranding many of its victims in an endless now, unable to remember their yesterdays or envision their tomorrows.

Why did evolution design our brains for time travel?

Perhaps it’s because an experience is a terrible thing to waste. Moving around in the world exposes organisms to danger, so as a rule they should have as few experiences as possible and learn as much from each as they can.

Although some of life’s lessons are learned in the moment (“Don’t touch a hot stove”), others become apparent only after the fact (“Now I see why she was upset. I should have said something about her new dress”). Time travel allows us to pay for an experience once, and then have it again and again —  learning new lessons with each repetition. When we are busy having experiences–herding children, signing checks, battling traffic–the dark network is silent, but as soon as those experiences are over, the network is awakened, and we begin moving across the landscape of our history to see what we can learn via time travel.

Animals learn by trial and error, and the smarter they are, the fewer trials they need. Traveling backward buys us many trials for the price of one, but traveling forward allows us to dispense with trials entirely. Just as pilots practice flying in flight simulators, the rest of us practice living in life simulators, and our ability to simulate future courses of action and preview their consequences enables us to learn from mistakes without making them.

We don’t need to bake a liver cupcake to find out that it is a stunningly bad idea; simply imagining it is punishment enough. The same is true for insulting the boss and misplacing the children. We may not heed the warnings that prospection provides, but at least we aren’t surprised when we wake up with a hangover or when our waists and our inseams swap sizes.

The dark network allows us to time travel into the future, but not just any future. When we contemplate futures that don’t include us–Will the NASDAQ be up next week? Will Hillary run again?–the dark network is quiet. Only when we move time travel does it come alive.

Perhaps the most startling fact about the dark network isn’t what it does but how often it does it. Neuroscientists refer to it as the brain’s default mode, which is to say that we spend more of our time away from the present than in it.

People typically overestimate how often they are in the moment because they rarely take notice when they take leave. It is only when the environment demands our attention–a dog barks, a child cries, a telephone rings–that our mental time machines switch themselves off and deposit us with a bump in the here and now. We stay just long enough to take a message and then we slip off again to time travel to the land of Elsewhen, our dark networks awash in light.

Learn more about time travel here.

Posted by Jill Ammon-Wexler
Amazing Solutions

Why Emotional Pain Hurts

Ever wonder…

 why you feel emotional pain in your chest when  your feelings have been hurt?

Terms like “heartache” and “gut wrenching” are not just metaphors — they describe both physical and emotional pain.

If you feel heartache, for example, what you are experiencing is emotional stress and the resulting stress-induced sensations in your chest — muscle tightness, an increased heart rate, uncomfortable stomach activity, and shortness of breath.

Physical & emotional pain are connected

You may be a bit surprised to learn that emotional pain triggers the exact brain regions that physical pain lights up.

How do emotions trigger physical sensations? A 2009 study conducted at the University of Arizona and the University of Maryland found that activity in a brain region that regulates emotional reactions (the anterior cingulate cortex) helps explain how an emotional insult can trigger a biological cascade.

During a stressful experience your brain’s anterior cingulate cortex increases the activity of your Vagus nerve. This huge nerve is the pathway connecting your brain stem to your neck, chest and abdomen.

When this nerve is over stimulated, it can cause pain, abdominal “butterflies,” and even nausea.

Heartache is not the only way emotional pain and physical pain intersect in our brain.

Other studies show that even feeling emotional pain on behalf of another person — that is, having empathy for that person — can also influence your pain perception. And this effect is NOT limited to humans. A recent paper published in Science Magazine revealed that when a mouse sees its cage mate in agony, that mouse’s sensitivity to physical pain increases. But when it comes into close contact with a friendly, unharmed mouse, its sensitivity to pain is reduced. 

A recent brain scan study of humans supported the finding in mice — showing that simple acts of social kindness, such as holding hands, can blunt the brain’s response to threats of physical pain, and thus actually lessen the pain.

The author of this post, Dr. Jill Ammon-Wexler, has developed a remarkable downloadable program that reaches right to the core to eliminates emotional pain=> You CAN overcome emotional pain!

The SELF GROWTH PLANET. A huge collection of the best personal development tools available on the web — period! Come experience the BEST OF YOURSELF for $1=> MORE INFO!

Posted by Jill Ammon-Wexler
Amazing Solutions

Got Dangerous Stress Levels?

Stress…stress…stress.

Stress is an intimate part of our lives today — there’s no getting around it.

Stress in and of itself is not bad. Stress is to the human condition what tension is to the violin string: too little and the music is dull and raspy; too much and the music is shrill or the string snaps. Excess stress is blamed for many serious physical illnesses ranging from heart disease, early aging, and even Alzheimer’s disease.

Myth: No symptoms = no stress.

An absence of symptoms does not mean the absence of stress. In fact, camouflaging symptoms with medications could deprive you of the signals you need to reducing the strain on your body and mind.

Many of us experience symptoms of stress in a very physical way, even though stress is a psychological effect. Feeling anxious, shortness of breath, or simply feeling run down all the time can all be physical signs of stress. Feeling overwhelmed, disorganized and having difficulty concentrating are common mental signs of stress.

Myth: Only major symptoms of stress require attention.

This myth assumes that the minor symptoms of stress, like headaches or stomach acid, may be safely ignored. But these minor symptoms of stress are actually early warning signs that your life is getting out of hand, and that you need to do a better job of managing stress.

Myth: Stress is just all in your head.

Stress is NOT just imagination – it is what happens to you, it is a psychophysical reaction that occurs in your brain. The resulting chemical and hormonal changes then affect every single organ of your body.
– Forty-three percent of all adults suffer adverse health effects from stress.
– 75 to 90 percent of all physician office visits are for stress-related ailments and complaints.
– Stress is linked to the six leading causes of death–heart disease, cancer, lung ailments, accidents, cirrhosis of the liver, and suicide.

A STRESS TEST

Are you moving toward dangerous levels of stress? Here’s a short self-test to help you answer that question:

Just answer each of the following questions with a True or False

1. I often have migraine, tension or painful headaches.

2. I have not taken any time off in a long time.

3. I am often concerned about financial issues.

4. I have too little time with my friends and things I enjoy.

5. I often have a hard time going to sleep, and cannot shut off my mind.

6. I often feel distracted and forget what I was doing.

7. I seem to be losing or gaining weight.

8. I have chronic, ongoing pain.

9. I feel like my life has no purpose.

10. I never seem to reach my goals or achieve my dreams.

11. I often skip meals because I am too busy.

12. I don’t have any family or friends to turn to.

13. I don’t exercise or walk regularly.

14. I take medication for depression or anxiety.

15. My intimate life is not satisfying, or I have performance issues.

Count the number of True’s, and assign one point for each.

Here’s how to assess your stress level:

(a)  Less than 5 points: Well managed low stress level.

(b)  5 – 6 points: Moderate stress.

(c)  7-9 points: High stress levels.

(d)  10 – 15 points: An exceptionally high level of stress.

Here’s a way to instantly  manage any level of stress=> Instant Stress Reduction

Disclaimer: This information is educational only. It is not a substitute for professional medical advice. Consult your medical professional if you have concerns about your stress symptoms.

Ensure Healthy Longevity

There’s more to healthy longevity than physical exercise and a healthy diet. The deeper issues are maintaining mental agility, and human growth hormone (HgH) production. HgH is naturally produced by our brain, but production tapers off as we pass age 30. Decreased HgH leads to skin aging, weakened bones, lessened sexual performance, and a less reliable immune system. Read More Here!

Posted by Jill Ammon-Wexler
Amazing Solutions

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