Meditation and Orgasm feel the same to the brain

[NinaBrooke]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/0..._n_896692.html

Spiritual teachers have been on to this for years, but research is now showing that orgasm and meditation create much the same effect in our brains.

According to a recent article in Scientific American, both meditation and orgasm decrease our sense of self-awareness. Bliss, says author Nadia Webb, whether through the experience of meditative contemplation or through the bodily experience of sex, "shares the diminution of self-awareness, alterations in bodily perception and decreased sense of pain." In other words, both experiences lead to a temporary stoppage in the incessant flow of our internal commentary. Even if for only a few minutes, we are able to see ourselves as something other than the ego.

Mystics and gurus have long referred to the similarities between the two activities. Osho, the Indian spiritual teacher formerly known as Rajneesh, was famous for his acknowledgment of the mystical value of an orgasm. "The experience of orgasm itself is always nonsexual. Even though you have achieved it through sex, it itself has no sexuality in it," he once said. "And my own understanding is that meditation has grown out of the experience of orgasm."

The French term for orgasm is "le petite mort" or "the little death," in reference to the period of tranquility, crystalline awareness and transcendence experienced shortly after a peak sexual experience.

The esoteric Indian tradition of tantra purports to use sex as a way of eventually achieving enlightenment or total understanding of the universe.

Still, orgasm is no replacement for meditation.

Meditation and orgasm light up different parts of the brain. Meditation, various studies have shown, lights up the left prefrontal cortex -- an area associated with joy and happiness. But during an orgasm, the left cortex remains totally silent. Meditation has also been known to create lasting change in the brain through a thickening of the cortex.

What this perhaps means, in terms of strengthening our emotional wellness, is that while orgasm can make us hunger for the experience of sustained transcendence, meditation is the only path to actually achieving it.

Read Scientific American's original story here.

[Ed Highlight]

Originally Posted by ninasastri

...Meditation and orgasm light up different parts of the brain. Meditation, various studies have shown, lights up the left prefrontal cortex -- an area associated with joy and happiness. But during an orgasm, the left cortex remains totally silent. Meditation has also been known to create lasting change in the brain through a thickening of the cortex.....

Nina dear, I have been meditating about your orgasm for months and nothing lights up different parts of my.... ummmm...brain.....like you do!!!

[Marshall]

I thought people were only allowed to post the first paragraph of an article, not the whole article....wouldn't want to crash eccie.....

yawn.......

[John Bull]

Marshall, if you're going to try out for a mod position, the first thing you need to do is be correct about your observations. Just sayin'!

[mufflover]

I had a science teacher back in 8th grade talk about how valuable personal silent/thinking/meditation is for health. For some weird reason it resonated with me and I have attempted to keep that habit.

Kind of like Little River Band, Cool Change....longing for the peaceful time alone.

ML

[Ed Highlight]

Originally Posted by mufflover

I had a science teacher back in 8th grade talk about how valuable personal silent/thinking/meditation is for health. For some weird reason it resonated with me and I have attempted to keep that habit.

Kind of like Little River Band, Cool Change....longing for the peaceful time alone.

ML

ML, if Johnny Bull catches you quoting Little River Band you may get points.....be careful....go meditate!!

[Marshall]

Originally Posted by John Bull

Marshall, if you're going to try out for a mod position, the first thing you need to do is be correct about your observations. Just sayin'!

Me? Try out for mod?....... HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA!

I do know that part of being a moderator is instructing the posters about the rules. Kindly inform us what it is exactly about my observation that is incorrect.

According to PM's sent to me, articles are suppose to be first paragraph and link....Nina posted the whole HufPo article...anyone who hits the link can see that.....if complete articles are allowed to be posted, I got a lot of threads I'd like to start.......

[John Bull]

If Nina broke the rules, then Nina would have had a conversation with a mod that you would not have been privy too.
What is incorrect is you trying to act in a mod capacity and what is furthermore incorrect is you making a veiled threat to follow your former pattern of printing page after page after page of quotes.
If you continue to follow this pattern, I see points in your future. A word to the wise.

[John Bull]

Originally Posted by Ed Highlight

ML, if Johnny Bull catches you quoting Little River Band you may get points.....be careful....go meditate!!

It would probably be more valuable for you to "go meditate" than to give a member improper advice.

[Marshall]

Originally Posted by John Bull

If Nina broke the rules, then Nina would have had a conversation with a mod that you would not have been privy too.
What is incorrect is you trying to act in a mod capacity and what is furthermore incorrect is you making a veiled threat to follow your former pattern of printing page after page after page of quotes.
If you continue to follow this pattern, I see points in your future. A word to the wise.

so my observation was correct.....

I believe I indicated that I wanted to know if the rules changed.......I want to know the status of what the unwritten rules are because I always do my best to comply....why would my posting be a threat? My posts created a lot of positive group participation....

[John Bull]

Marshall, you've been given what you need. If you need anything further, use the PM system.

[NinaBrooke]

Hello all,
I was honestly not aware of this new rule! I have been in Portugal since a while now, only rarely checking on eccie, and i haven`t been seing that this is not allowed anymore. Nothing i did was on purpose or to intentionally break any rules, i was not aware of it.

I think its good to not quote whole articles and just only the first paragraph or a summary. Makes perfect sense. Posting a link only might not trigger enough interest and posting whole articles is simply too exhaustive and demanding. So i think its a great rule!

For the future a question to you mods: If there are any changes in rules - is there no system of mass mails so everyone gets it? Because how would i have known about it if i did not check back to eccie regularly? And right now i am very irregularly on here :-).

ps: if you let me edit the original post i can correct the mistake, but its not to be edited anymore :-(.

[Marshall]

Originally Posted by ninasastri

For the future a question to you mods: If there are any changes in rules - is there no system of mass mails so everyone gets it? Because how would i have known about it if i did not check back to eccie regularly? And right now i am very irregularly on here :-).

Nobody PM'd you about posting the complete article?

[Marshall]

Originally Posted by ninasastri

I was honestly not aware of this new rule!

Nina, the copy/paste rule was posted at the top of this forum just this morning...it is:

Articles of more than one paragraph, at the discretion of the Mod Staff, will not be copy/pasted into threads. Instead, copy the link.

There is no way for me to determine how the discretion will be exercised, so I would recommend you PM a moderator for an explanation. When you get one, PM me and tell me what it is. Thank you.

[WTF]

Originally Posted by ninasastri

I think its good to not quote whole articles and just only the first paragraph or a summary. Makes perfect sense. Posting a link only might not trigger enough interest and posting whole articles is simply too exhaustive and demanding. So i think its a great rule!

:-(.

Hi nina, great article. Learning how the brain works will be a very interesting affair in the next century. Below is a book that may perk your interest. It centers around the theory that we form beliefs first and then shape our thoughts around those beliefs despite reality/science proving otherwise.



http://www.michaelshermer.com/the-be...brain/excerpt/

Skeptic magazine entitled “Science Education is No Guarantee of Skepticism,” presented the results of a study that found no correlation between science knowledge (facts about the world) and paranormal beliefs. The authors, W. Richard Walker, Steven J. Hoekstra, and Rodney J. Vogl, concluded: “Students that scored well on these [science knowledge] tests were no more or less skeptical of pseudoscientific claims than students that scored very poorly. Apparently, the students were not able to apply their scientific knowledge to evaluate these pseudoscientific claims. We suggest that this inability stems in part from the way that science is traditionally presented to students: Students are taught what to think but not how to think.”7 The scientific method is a teachable concept, as evidenced in the NSF study that found that 53% of Americans with a high level of science education (nine or more high school and college science/math courses) understand the scientific process, compared to 38% with a middle level (six to eight such courses) of science education, and 17% with a low level (less than five such courses) of science education. So maybe the key to attenuating superstition and belief in the supernatural is in teaching how science works, not just what science has discovered