TheLivingShadow
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Good 'n Bad, Mammalian vs Reptilian Brain
Survival is about dog eat dog. When you're talking survival, it ain't pretty. The primal instinct to keep ourself alive is practical and opportunistic. It isn't civilized and certainly not principled. When we think of survival, we shouldn't be thinking about tents and energy bars, we should be thinking about barbarism, cannabalism, and/or lawlessness.
Survival is situated in the reptilian brain which is a part of all of us. All of us aren't alike in how (much) we access our reptilian brain, however. Conditioning, genetics, and habit all help determine how often we let our reptilian brain call the shots. Or, how often reason, principles, or empathy do,, situated in our mammalian brain.
Our reptilian brain is a necessary part of life but whether we call upon the barbaric, primal, opportunistic part of our brain in emergencies only, or daily, makes a big difference. We all use our reptilian brain but just because it's always there as an option doesn't make it a particularly good one for every day use.
It depends on the situation; if your foot is caught on something and not getting it free in time means losing it, your reptilian brain is essential in calling up the adrenalin you need and just getting done what needs to be done. Now! Your reptilian brain doesn't pussyfoot around and gets the job done asap. Humiliation, damage, or regret about what happened while the reptilian brain was in control will have to be dealt with later. First, we get that leg safe!
We need our reptilian brain. It is good. But it can also be the bodily source of evil...
Mammalian vs reptilian brain is where the newage "love vs fear" theme comes from: empathy, reason, and morals are things that come up in our mammalian brain, the biggest part or our grey matter that we 'humans' are so proud of possessing. Survival, primal instincts, and autonomic brain functions that couldn't give a hoot about other life-forms, are situated in our reptilian brain. It is gluttonous, obsessive, paranoid, self-centered, opportunistic, and authoritarian [we have the right to take whatever we can]. That's the part that's about US. One might say that while the mammalian brain is the part that makes us able to live well with others, in a civilized fashion, the reptilian brain keeps us alive at all.
When we're driven by fear,, for our survival, body, or station,, our reptilian brain rules. When empathy/'love', morals, or principles are what drive us, we're in our mammalian brain. 'Love vs fear' equals mammalian brain vs reptilian brain. It's not a fight between the two since both are inherently a part of us but it's about balance, conditioning, and priority. Some people might feel a situation warrants getting murderous, i.e. immoral and primal, over,, others consider options in that same situation that don't involve getting into survival mode. One person might choose to bring their reptilian brain into the equation while another might stay completely lucid and calm. In the same way, one and the same situation calls forth excuses for immoral behavior from the one, while the other sees no need to become uncivilized. In this way 'love vs fear' becomes 'good vs evil'; evil people are always simply the ones who find an excuse to go the immoral route and choose evil. In this light no one is inherently evil, there are no 'evil people'. On the other hand, there are people who find excuses to do evil rather more often than others. Therefore, these do rather run the risk of getting to be called "evil" in the long run.
There are very natural human situations that call forth the use of the reptilian brain. Besides very apparent life-threatening situations, there are other forms of stress. Consider sleep deprivation; the body can only deal with so much stress before it starts calling forth survival mode. That stress can be physical or psychological , doesn't matter. The body produces hormones to deal with stress, in the adrenals, and when these get taxed beyond their capabilities, a person's ability to deal with stress is severely impaired. Someone suffering from adrenal fatigue, for whatever reason, will be much more likely to fall back on the reptilian brain when faced with a stressful situation. So we can add physical well-being to the list of things that influence our choice to fall back on our reptilian brain.
Being a person with a mammalian brain to begin with adds another factor that can trigger a primal response, i.e. located in the reptilian brain; mammals are inherently social animals that function within groups. Each member of a group is genetically predisposed to caring for other members of the group. Each member is also genetically predisposed to desiring and expecting a certain amount of care from the group (that it's naturally speaking a part of). Peter Kropotkin's work on intra-species relationships makes that very clear [contrary to Darwin's INTER-species research; intra-species vs inter-species = support vs struggle].
The result of this genetic predisposition to giving and expecting care is that there is a (i.e. genetic) sense of fairness in every mammal. Kropotkin's research clearly shows that this tendency is at the root of our natural sense of, and demand for, what's fair. It also shows that when fairness is clearly lacking, we respond (quite naturally) with extreme prejudice.
This is not, and never should have been, an argument for 'communism'; 'fair' isn't about equal shares, as Kropotkin's research shows, it's about a fair share. Naturally speaking, fair is about having enough; as long as you have your loaf of bread, it doesn't matter to your mammalian sensibilities if your neighbor has 10 more loaves. Fair is then that you don't have to die while your neighbor is wallowing in luxury. Naturally speaking, again, as long as you enjoy the bare necessities of life, you'll not experience any excess amounts of stress because of how others are faring.
On the other hand, a murderous [no less] demand for fairness is called forth in the mammal that's faced with obvious unfairness. It's genetic. So that can also be added to the list of things that call forth a response from the reptilian brain:
- conditioning and psychological trauma
- genetics
- habit
- (adrenal) health
- (outrage due to) unfairness.
continue to part 2
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4/24/2011, 6:59 am
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TheLivingShadow
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part 2
It should be clear by now that there are endless excuses or triggers for falling back on the immoral reptilian brain. Society is filled with unfairness, stress, and individuals whose upbringing has predisposed them to primal fear-based responses.
You could be triggered to a reptilian-brain-response because you're a mammal and rile at some perceived unfairness, because you suffer from stress and (your mammalian brain) just can't take anymore, or because that's just the way you are accostumed to dealing with certain challenges. Yet, there are people who still don't resort to primal, immoral action despite rampant unfairness, stress, and cultural bias for violence.
We are more than a fixed set of responses that we are victim to. We also all DO have our mammalian brain, whether we choose to use it (much) or not. We also evolved as souls; we enter these bodily forms called "human" but each of us respond differently to our upbringing, surroundings, and suffering. Apparently, there are 'good' and 'bad' people, which is to say: there are people who find excuses to do bad all the time and there are people who don't play the victim like that at all.
It's important to note that working with the mammalian brain is inherently a very different thing than responding from the reptilian brain. If one works with the mammalian brain regularly, one can't but notice that actions stemming from working from the reptilian brain are immoral and often hurtful to others. The reptilian brain is selfish and ego-centered; it's actions can be appropriate in survival situations and very inappropriate in just about all others. One is inherently forced to choose: is functioning from within the reptilian brain okay as long as one has come up with a good excuse, or not? One road leads to being an asshole, the other to being moral, civilized, and sophisticated.
'Good' people don't accept being selfish as an option. 'Good' people regret having acted selfishly, repent, and don't repeat the same selfish act over and over again. 'Bad' people are simply fine with having a good excuse for whatever they do, no matter the result to others. So there's a road that leads in one direction and another leading in the opposite direction. That's why ones life's choices accumulate and make you the person that you just ARE: good or bad, one or the other.
The Celestine Prophecy [book or movie] does a good job in explaining what's also going on when it comes to choosing between 'good' and 'bad', giving or taking, doing what's nice or playing the victim. We're either getting our energy from each other in a calculated and manipulative game [drama] of give and take, or we're connecting to our Higher Selves, 'the Source', or whatever you want to call the endless sea of energy that we can all call upon as souls. The more you're addicted to energy from others, the more you'll have to call upon uncivilized tactics to get what you need in hard times. That means that you can be nice enough when your energy sources are sufficient but can become a decidedly different and vicious person when things aren't going your way. Such people give themselves away even when they're full of energy, because parasiting off of other people takes a different mindset than tapping into an endless energy source that's always accessible and sufficient. It's not just beady eyes always looking around for other prey; if you're used to giving energy to others, because you can always get more from the endless source, your whole outlook on energy is different from someone who has to rely on other people for energy.
'Good' people, people who don't rely on other people for their energy needs, just don't find a need to become vicious or greedy, even when they're in dire straights. Even when 'good' people have some ultimate excuse for parasiting off of others, they refrain from doing so. 'Good' people instinctively get (because their lives are centered around getting their energy from the endless source) that bad times are the best times for becoming more self-reliant. 'Good' people have learned from experience that giving in to any impulse to take advantage of others only leads to immorality and codependence and therefore they just don't go there, no matter how wonderful an excuse they have.
When the soul that embodied Jesus allowed parasites to torture and nail him to a cross, this was an ultimate example of someone with an excuse to trust his reptilian brain and accept the excuse that what was happening to him was too unfair, unsafe, and stupid to bear. He apparently believed that the endless energy source would see him through his ordeal, therefore it wasn't about suicide or playing marter. What he showed the masses with their endless excuses to do evil was that there ultimately are no excuses whatsoever; there's no limit to the endless source and life never has to be about taking energy. Life can be only about giving energy and letting the endless source feed you. Life then isn't about hanging on no matter who gets hurt, it's about experiencing more and more energy flowing through you. The more you experience, then, the more excuses you have to play victim and parasite off of others, the greater the opportunity to experience instead the limitless divine in your life. Experiencing good.
People who are focused on finding energy wherever they can get it are just as capable of tapping into this eternal endless energy source but their habits betray them. Their experience with endless energy is limited and their lives aren't about embracing it, they're about denying it. They can turn around any time but someone whose whole life has been about accumulating experiences of divine energy is in a very different place. We all have the choice to use our reptilian brain or the mammalian brain [a choice Reptilians don't have] and we all have the excuses to go either way. You choose, good or bad, but blaming your evil on circumstance is just about falling back on the opportunistic reptilian part of you; your being okay with being an asshole because you're human, stressed, or of poor stock is only you playing the drama of the 'poor me'.
Humans souls are the beings that are incarnated in a genetic spacesuit known as Earthling that are comfortable dealing with the mammalian brain. Reptilian souls have a mammalian brain, as Earthling, but constantly fall back on the reptilian brain. The planet is full of many different species of souls but there are basically only two strains of intelligence, hive-minded or individual-minded. The individual-minded species are comfortable using the mammalian brain, the others feel (more) comfortable falling back on the reptilian brain. Some souls will be in a cusp state, experimenting with the mammalian empathic condition, but in the end a choice has to be made because the two forms of intelligence are at odds with one another. When you're dealing with somebody it is clear soon enough whether they're commonly working from a survival/fear mode or from the heart.
Such observations are essential because we all need to realize, acknowledge, and accept that someone who's living in the reptilian brain is inherently lawless and paranoid, an opportunist and inherently violent/dangerous. Such a soul can't be converted or convinced that the individual-mindset is better; it's about the state of a soul's development and a change therein could take many lifetimes and is not a result of some random decision. You're either one or the other.
Jesus warned us of this other party, as well. Your own instincts, however, have been telling you that some people are always 'different' and others easy to deal and be with. For your survival it is essential to drop all culturally correct concepts pushing you to think little of all of this and allowing dangerous people into your life, especially with the violent times that are coming in mind.
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4/24/2011, 7:00 am
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