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Negative and Positive Energy?
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| Theresa |
So... I am sure plenty of you have seen "What the Bleep do we Know", and may remember this clip:
Excerpt from "What the bleep do we know":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_dmYT83ZKY
I found this 'experiment' incredibly interesting, and I found the take-home message to be rather powerful. Being the skeptical person I often am however, I did a lot of research trying to find things "de-bunking" Emoto's work. I found another experiment he did:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xO25wNYohtw
Then I found copycats testing the same experiment:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTz-cYk9Wu4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66JnNWbAiXs
I found some journal articles discussing Emoto's work, and a lot of it criticizes his methods, the sterilization, and of course, it seems rather fishy that he wont publicly reveal his methods or all of his work. Unfortunately though, I have not found anything that re-creates his work in a controlled setting to definitively rule it out as a possibility.
With all of that being said however, I still feel like the take-home message is powerful, and still holds a lot of truth and value. As I am sure most of you know, even if you have only taken a basic Psychology course, the more we do/say/think/etc. something, the stronger and larger the connected pathways in the brain become. Naturally, if they are larger and stronger, they are more likely to fire off. So if we as people are being negative, thinking negative things, watching negative shows/movies, listening to negative music, we enforce the pathways in our brains that enable negativity, and we are more likely to have negative dispositions, and the same goes with positivity.
This of course also contributes to the chemicals released in the brain. Positive behaviours etc. will encourage the release of serotonin, dopamine and all the other "feel-good" chemicals, or with negative behaviours, will inhibit those chemicals production, and will release chemicals like cortisol that occur during stress etc. Even if you don't 'feel it', simply smiling for long enough releases the chemicals in your brain that make you feel happy, and they say laughter is the best medicine.
I have been a believer of "garbage in, garbage out" for a long time; it's one of the major reasons I stopped watching TV. I wont watch violent/horror movies and I avoid the news for the most part. I also prefer music that is upbeat and 'happy', and make an effort to surround myself with people who have positive energies.
However, these things alone aren't enough in my opinion. In order to embrace this idea entirely, the way that I think needs to change too. I need to think of things in a positive way, and react in a positive way. Obviously this isn't always easy and I know there are areas I need to work on.
I am curious to know what other people think about the entire idea, including Emoto's work. Does anyone else try to apply this to their lives? I personally think there are a lot of people who could benefit from it. I think there are a lot of people who create their own unhappiness and could easily escape it if they cut out the negative sources in their lives.
c0r version - if you surround yourself with positivity, you will be positive. If you surround yourself with negativity, you will be negative. |
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| Scoops |
| GONE: Getting Over Negative Energy |
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| Silky Johnson |
It's only garbage out if you can't digest information using critical analysis/judgment. I don't buy that argument, because it basically means you're saying "I'm too stupid to discern what is crap from what isn't."
Just saying. :p
But to be on point for a second...optimism in a way is an inherited trait. That is, things that contribute to one's ability to deal with things in a positive light (physiological stress responses, proneness to anxiety, etc) are things that can be passed on from your parents and thereby perpetuate negative coping styles. Furthermore, research also shows that people also tend to seek out situations that reinforce their attitudes ( the gene-something hypothesis - I can't remember what this is called atm, and I loaned my ab. psych book to someone for the semester) whether they are conscious of it or not.
So yeah, my point is really that there's a lot more to negativity than simply choosing such a disposition, and fixing it often requires more intensive types of therapies - cognitive therapies, etc. Merely just surrounding oneself with positive things might not be enough. |
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| igottaknow |
I'm so sure you're wrong...
wait for it...
I'm HIV positive. |
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| Meat187 |
| c0r version: People need to listen to more upliftig Trance. |
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| Vernon Wanderer |
| quote: | Originally posted by Meat187
c0r version: |
Thank you. |
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| Theresa |
| quote: | Originally posted by Miss Pie
It's only garbage out if you can't digest information using critical analysis/judgment. I don't buy that argument, because it basically means you're saying "I'm too stupid to discern what is crap from what isn't."
Just saying. :p
But to be on point for a second...optimism in a way is an inherited trait. That is, things that contribute to one's ability to deal with things in a positive light (physiological stress responses, proneness to anxiety, etc) are things that can be passed on from your parents and thereby perpetuate negative coping styles. Furthermore, research also shows that people also tend to seek out situations that reinforce their attitudes ( the gene-something hypothesis - I can't remember what this is called atm, and I loaned my ab. psych book to someone for the semester) whether they are conscious of it or not.
So yeah, my point is really that there's a lot more to negativity than simply choosing such a disposition, and fixing it often requires more intensive types of therapies - cognitive therapies, etc. Merely just surrounding oneself with positive things might not be enough. |
When you read about a murder etc., a natural response is to have a negative emotion toward it. That negative emotion creates a pathway in the brain. If you expose yourself to that over and over again, it gets reinforced and becomes more likely to fire. So while you may know that the horror scene in the movie isn't real, it still (at least for most people), invokes a negative physiological response.
You are right about the rest of what you said however, I think that this is a very basic thing that needs to be addressed as well. For example, my half-brother struggles with depression. He also listens to a lot of really angry/scary/sad music and posts up pictures of bands called "hammer smashed face" (which you are right to assume is rather gross and unpleasant). He "likes [his] music" and he says it makes him happy, yet he has a generally negative disposition. Arguably, surrounding himself with music and images that promote hatred, death, anger etc. etc. is not conducive to promoting a happier disposition. I would suspect that if he were to make an effort to remove those stimuli and replace them with positive messages, and images, he would begin to feel at least a bit better. |
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| Silky Johnson |
| What good are the new (positive) messages if one hasn't got the training/cognitive ability to interpret them as such? That's the point I'm trying to make. A light doesn't just switch on with people simply because the sun suddenly shines all the time. |
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| Theresa |
| quote: | Originally posted by Miss Pie
What good are the new (positive) messages if one hasn't got the training/cognitive ability to interpret them as such? That's the point I'm trying to make. A light doesn't just switch on with people. |
I understand what you're saying and I don't disagree. However, I think you are considering someone with Major Depression or something to that extreme. I am referring to the general population who do have the ability to interpret a positive stimuli positively etc.
Studies show that even looking at an individual who is smiling fires off the same response in our brains, and the same goes for sad expressions etc. We are easily influenced by the input that we receive (whether we like to think we are or not). |
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| Lira |
| quote: | Originally posted by Theresa
I am curious to know what other people think about the entire idea, including Emoto's work. |
I hate it with a linguistic passion.
Bloody Emoto is just trying to give all the kotodama nonsense some scientific credibility.
Actually, this thread reminds me that I want to make a similar blind test with my gullible mother who believes this stuff passionately. For example, she sent me once the picture of two "sealed" bottles of rice: In one of them the word "Love" was written on a label, and the other bottle had the word "Hate" on it. Thanks to the almighty power of energy, the rice in the hate bottle was full of fungi, whereas the love bottle was white and clean (which means to me that life develops on hate, but she sort of reached a different conclusion).
I proposed to make a blind test in which I'd give her 6 bottles, 6 words in Japanese (which she doesn't understand) with the words "Love", "Hate", "Life", "Death", "Rice" and "Horse" so she could fill the bottles with rice, seal them and then - as she wished - apply the label randomly to the bottles (as she doesn't understand what the funny drawings are all about anyway).
Actually, I should print the labels already...
Edit: If you're wondering why I'm so passionate about this, it's because my hippy mother raised me on homoeopathy instead of giving me proper medicine when I was growing up, which had several consequences (thankfully, they're all aesthetic). |
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| MrJiveBoJingles |
| Cynical or depressed people will just dismiss those who want to talk about sunshine and puppies all the time as self-deluded, shallow, clueless, or boring. |
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| Capitalizt |
| The "science" in that film is utter BS. There is no evidence for mystical/supernatural forms of "energy"..anywhere. I don't doubt however the other things you said..about attitudes..behavioral conditioning, etc effecting the brain. We are dealing with reality there..real pathways in the brain that change over time. This is scientifically proven. It happens every time you learn something, and every time you repeat a task. The pathways dealing with that task strengthen and your mind gets better and better at it over time. I suppose if you make a practice of doing positive/happy things, you will develop a more positive personality..but there is no magical "energy" or karma involved. It's neurobiology. |
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