Wired for Political Healing

[Linnea]

Wired for Political Healing
by Patricia Taylor
Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 06:10:15 AM PDT

Last night I was perusing the news of the day on-line (my now usual mode of reading the news) and I happened across an essay in the Mental Health and Behavior section of the New York Times on-line entitled Friends for Life: An Emerging Biology of Emotional Healing.

*link

I am very interested in articles about healing and neuroscience these days, being a member of a cancer support group because of my husband's recent treatment for colorectal cancer. I've found that healing involves a whole lot more than simply finding the right drugs and doctors to fix you.

All of the convergent thought I'm reading these days triggered a series of reflections in me about how much of our lives should be involved in healing these days - healing in our politics, our health, our environment, our interpersonal and international relations, and even in our inner lives.

* Patricia Taylor's diary :: ::
*

The article I linked to above propelled me back onto Daily Kos, even if only for a few minutes, to share the idea with you all that this blog and others like it may well be used as a tool for connecting that which is being divided by our leaders, and a path towards healing rather than destruction. Perhaps if we all can begin to think about the many things that connect us - Republican and Democrat, rich and poor, whatever our nationality or spiritual belief system - and if we begin to use communication tools like the internet to break down the barriers of national, political, ethical, ethnic, and religious differences to speak person to person, we can achieve an empathic and respectful understanding of each other as similar individuals of the same species, sharing a fragile and crowded planet together.

I have been off-line, more or less, for several weeks now because I have become increasingly uncomfortable and disconnected from political attack practices being appropriated by people that I share political values with, on both a national and local level. I cannot reconcile myself to the idea that negative campaigning as it is being practiced now by liberal candidates and appropriation of Republican tactics towards a Democratic end are going to give us the leaders and representatives we need to adequately reform our political system.

I believe that we must figure out a way to practice our good values rather than appropriate questionable tactics in order to simply win. We truly risk becoming the thing that we oppose. I refuse to accept the idea that bad means gain a good end or that we must compartmentalize ourselves and our politics to the point that we can justify in ourselves the very things we object to in our political leaders in power now.

The most significant finding was the discovery of "mirror neurons," a widely dispersed class of brain cells that operate like neural WiFi. Mirror neurons track the emotional flow, movement and even intentions of the person we are with, and replicate this sensed state in our own brain by stirring in our brain the same areas active in the other person.

Mirror neurons offer a neural mechanism that explains emotional contagion, the tendency of one person to catch the feelings of another, particularly if strongly expressed. This brain-to-brain link may also account for feelings of rapport, which research finds depend in part on extremely rapid synchronization of people's posture, vocal pacing and movements as they interact. In short, these brain cells seem to allow the interpersonal orchestration of shifts in physiology.

In the same way this "brain-to-brain link" may be creating empathy and "orchestration of shifts" between individuals, I believe that the computer-to-computer link created by internet communication allows us, as individuals, to orchestrate shifts in cultural consciousness.

All of the corruption and deconstruction being practiced by our political leaders these days is merely a mirror and a microcosm of a broader cultural shift in America, I believe. We have chosen, as a people, leaders that personify the issues we are grappling with within our personal lives and so the divides, the connections, and the problems we are creating for ourselves and each other (within our families, our neighborhoods, our states, and our nations) are being played out as if on a stage in Washington D.C., Paris, Seoul, Moscow, Beijing, and London.

Perhaps it is a species awareness that drives us all on-line. For surely if we don't begin to work together as individuals, our survival as a species comes into question. Wouldn't it be interesting and wonderful if all the communication that's happening as a result of internet blogging, chatting, and commenting could become part of the process of connecting us to each other and creating a mutual understanding among us, as individuals and countries, rather than expanding the divide our leaders have been seeking to create between us in order to control us?

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/10/11/91015/834

[Waverider]

Excellent article.
More than interesting..
"Wouldn't it be interesting and wonderful if all the communication that's happening as a result of internet blogging, chatting, and commenting could become part of the process of connecting us to each other and creating a mutual understanding among us, as individuals and countries, rather than expanding the divide our leaders have been seeking to create between us in order to control us?"

I believe the shift is on... That's why the political atmosphere has become more intense.

The leadership in our own locals and states, and nation', is truly being questioned by more and more people.

People that have come to the realization that we must step in this arena and voice our concerns and point our political fingers at those that keep creating chaos and destruction.

We are looking closer at those people and want them in a non influential role', directing, and producing this division amongst us..

We will vote them out' of the power roles and install people of leadership that can and will bring this nation back to a stable, sane, and healthful condition.

This is my hope and I am sure it is yours also.

[Dale O Sea]

Yes, good article Linnea. Hate driven insults and mudslinging isn't a way to affect a positive change -- not on an Internet forum and definitely not in an election. Every time I hear one of those type of ads I change the channel or tune the radio to something else. I don't think anyone should be elected that can only point to the bad things their opponent does and not emphasize what they will bring to the office.

And this is the first I've heard of "mirror neurons" too..

thanks

[earthist]

Linnea said that Patricia Taylor said:

believe that we must figure out a way to practice our good values rather than appropriate questionable tactics in order to simply win. We truly risk becoming the thing that we oppose.

Wow, what a great insight! I can see that, "becoming the thing we oppose", happening literally everywhere.

Here's one of my own: "Never run from, always run to."