February 19, 2015: Sky Schultz: Finding God in Nature, Science and Mystical Poetry.

     ANNOUNCEMENT from Sky Schultz: On Friday night this week: ie February 20, 2015 I will be presenting a talk/dialog in which he will summarize the universe and other matters. The talk is called: "Finding God in Nature, Science, and Mystical Poetry." (It might be useful to you if you happen to have misplaced God 'He/She/It' and need to get in touch with To Whom it may concern.)
     Why should you come? The room will be warm. There will be snacks. You will meet wonderful people, if anybody comes. There will be quotes from the world's greatest spiritual teachers. And, of course, my world-class humor and magic. Play a trick on your friends: invite them.
     Friday February 20/ 7:00 to 8:00 PM, Schlitz Audobon Nature Center. This program is handicap accessible. Preregistration is required. To register call 414-352-2880.  Member: $10 Non/Member $15.
     If you can't make it, and if you have a good excuse, you might invite me to your house, church, synagogue, or community for this delightful and profound talk; the cost is $0.15. ( I am sort of like Mark Twain's preacher who charged nothing for his sermons, and they were worth it.)
     By the way, I'm just setting up a new blog with my film, "Common Miracles," featured on the site...http://skyschultz.blogspot.com/


     Sky presented the above talk and led the discussion at today's Spirit Mind Body meeting. The presentation is full of laughs, wonderful photos, and very profound quotes which smashed us in the brain, one after the other. It was a great spiritual time! I will post more about this morning's talk later. Sky plans to send some of the quotes so that I can post them accurately. I highly recommend attending his performance tomorrow night, at Schlitz Audobon Center.

    Sky told us that he was going to give us a little talk about nothing. However, space is not nothing. In fact space is full of stuff.  The Hubble Space Telescope photos interposed with many quotes from famous personalities indeed showed that space is not nothing. Certainly we can be amazed at our universe from the galaxies spanning light years down to the amazing smallest creature in pond water. One example of such a creature, the tardigrades, commonly known as water bears, a primitive arthropod which can tolerate complete desiccation for almost an infinite period of time, only to be able to come back to life when rehydrated in pond water. These creatures can survive at temperatures from -273 degrees to 475 degrees Fahrenheit.

D. H. Lawrence:  "All that we know is nothing; we are merely crammed wastepaper baskets, unless we are in touch with that which laughs at all our knowing."

In the Bhagavad Gita:"In the minds of those who are too attached to sense enjoyment and material opulence, and who are bewildered by such things, the resolute determination of devotional service to the Supreme Lord does not take place."

Colin Drake said: "The mind when not engaged creates problems."

Some deep quotes attributed to Lao Tzu:  "Kindness in words creates confidence; Kindness in thinking creates profundity; Kindness in giving creates love.     To the mind that is still, the whole universe surrenders.   Stop trying to leave, and you will arrive, Stop seeking, and you will see. Stop running away, and you will be found.   If you are depressed, you are living in the past; If you are anxious, you are living in the future; If you are at peace, you are living in the present.   The Journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.     Those who know do not speak; those who speak do not know.   The truth is not always beautiful, nor beautiful words the truth."    Well, in looking up some of these quotes, I could go on and on. These sayings attributed to Lao Tzu are wonderful.   

Albert Einstein said: " There are only two ways to live: one is as though nothing is a miracle; the other way is as though everything is a miracle."   "I never made one of my discoveries through the process of rational thinking."   "Ego equals 1 divided by knowledge."

     Niels Bohr said: "The opposite of a truth is another profound truth."

     Georgia O'Keefe:  "It take a long time to see a flower."
 
Alan Watts:  "We must see that consciousness is neither an isolate soul nor the mere function of a single nervous system, but of that totality of interrelated stars and galaxies that makes a nervous system possible."

Thich Nhat Hanh:  On the concept of Inter-Being: The idea of “Interbeing” – introduced by Thich Nhat Hanh into the North American Buddhist vocabulary – may be viewed as a formulation of the doctrine of  “dependant co-arising” in the Paticca-samuppada-vibhanga Sutta.
In the Heart of Understanding – Thay’s commentary on the Heart of the Prajnaparamita Sutra – he writes:

If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud, there will be no rain; without rain, the trees cannot grow; and without trees, we cannot make paper. The cloud is essential for the paper to exist. If the cloud is not here, the sheet of paper cannot be here either. So we can say that the cloud and the paper inter-are. “Interbeing” is a word that is not in the dictionary yet, but if we combine the prefix “inter-“ with the verb “to be,” we have a new verb, inter-be.

The observation that we “inter-are”, while true and poetic is not really the most important element of “Interbeing”. The important part is the realization that there is no independent self – that the perception of self, of “me”, of “mine” is an illusion.  Awareness that “I” am made of “non-I” elements leads to the understanding of non-self and it is the realization of non-self that brings an end to suffering.


 The Mirror of this World

Every particle of the world is a mirror,
In each atom lies the blazing light
of a thousand suns
Cleave the heart of a rain-drop,
a hundred pure oceans will flow forth.
Look closely at a grain of sand,
The seed of a thousand beings can be seen
The foot of an ant is larger than an elephant;
In essence, a drop of water
is no different than the Nile.
In the heart of a barley-corn
lies the fruit of a hundred harvests;
Within the pulp of a millet seed
an entire universe can be found.
In the wing of a fly, an ocean of wonder;
In the pupil of the eye, an endless heaven.
Though the inner chamber of the heart is small,
the Lord of both worlds
gladly makes his home there.

- Mahmud Shabestari
Reproduced from the blog of Eknath Easwaran, from Strength in the Storm, creating calm in difficult times.




Black Elk quotes:

And while I stood there
I saw more than I can tell
and I understood more than I saw;
for I was seeing in a sacred manner
the shapes of all things in the spirit,
and the shape of all shapes
as they must live together like one being.

     
All things are our relatives;
what we do to everything, we
do to ourselves. All is really One."

The first peace, which is the most important, is that which comes within the souls of people when they realize their relationship, their oneness with the universe and all its powers, and when they realize that at the center of the universe dwells the Great Spirit, and that this center is really everywhere, it is within each of us     Black Elk of the Oglala Lakota Sioux  (1863-1950)

Upcoming Schedule:

Upcoming Spirit Mind Body Group schedule:

Feb. 19  Sky  Finding God through Mystery, Nature and Poetry
Feb. 26  Lori  Responsive Art Therapy
March 5 Bake Off
March 12 Gary Neutral Monism

February 12: Words and Non-duality by John T.

     Today  John T,, a deep thinking member of our group (he would say, deep thinking? Ah, but thinking is the problem!), undertook to present some personal remembrances of his life of seeking spiritual truth.He chose the title "Words and Nonduality" for various reasons. Indeed, words have duality. Yet we try to use them to describe non-duality. Most of the time the words do not do a very good job in this function.

     John talked about his experience with words. As a young man, he thought written words had to be the truth. No one would ever write what is not true, especially a public person such as a public or a politician. That was his point of view at the time. But as the years of his life passed he realized that indeed the truth was often not in the words. And today, with the Internet, this is probably even more so. John compares this to "Alice in Wonderland" and going down the rabbit hole, where we are confronted by the rabbit who tells us that he makes up the words and they mean whatever he says they mean." But John says, "Beware, because the words don't usually mean what they seem to mean."

    John discussed his experience with "going to church." Even in such a rarefied atmosphere, as in the church, there was an inner part of him that thought there must be something more, some further truth. As he went about his seeking that truth, the answers often came from books. As the years passed, he read widely of traditional spiritual texts. After all, some of the first sacred texts date back to 1400s BC, and the Old Testament dates to 140 BC.

     John did put together something written for us today but he was unable to pull it up on his I-phone. He then spoke from his memory and from his heart, I might add. He wanted to add some humor and told us that he did check his writing out to make sure that it represented correctness and some degree of truth and wouldn't be offensive. He says he checked his writing out with the Ketchup Society of America. That group read his piece and told him that for the most part it was good and mostly unoffensive. But they prescribed an increase in his intake of Ketchup and through the natural processes in his body with the digestion of the Ketchup he would somehow become more mellow and even less likely to offend.

     Non-duality. What does it mean? If John would use one word to state the meaning of Non duality, it would be indivisibility. In the Sanskrit, it would be not two, but one. Other simple substitutions for Non duality commonly used might be: "That"; "I am"; The Absolute. Some people use the word "God." Many of these words have a lot of baggage. John likes the concise word and concept: The Absolute.

     Over the years, certain teachers have shown John some truth, but sometimes John would not recognize that truth until 40 years later. One teacher said: When one can see oneself in all other beings, and all other beings are in oneself, that is a liberation. One important teacher for John has been Francis Lucille, a Frenchman of the Advaita Vedanta lineage. His teacher was Jean Klein who also led spiritually in this tradition, directly out of India.

     John T. attended a week long retreat with Francis Lucille in the last few weeks in Florida. The retreat included meditation, dialogue, and yoga and very profound teachings. Francis is now 70 years old. His approach is somewhat different and he succeeds to draw the students in and seems to enable them to get in touch with The Absolute. One half of the retreat group were MDs, psychologists, and such. Francis himself is a mathematician and physicist and he is still involved in that world to some degree.

     Advaita in Sanskrit means not two. The meaning does not in turn mean one, but rather not two. And this is non-duality. There is no separation between me and the rest of the universe. Consciousness is defined as pure being which is aware of the words right now.

     Another teacher that John likes is Robert Wolf. His website is: LivingNonduality.org. On that site is an excerpt from his book, "Living Nonduality". Chapter One: Living is an Enigma.  Multiple writers have made attempts to put The Absolute into more words, to describe it. Words like boundless, infinity, omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, infinite, eternal, free of causation. Basically it is ineffable. There are no words to describe it. We can only know that it is not the relative world that we live in. Rather it is the underlying essence of all. Truth appears as false, and that which appears as false is true.  It is unthinkable. It is experiential. Someone asked John if he ever experiences being even momentarily in touch with this Absolute. John describes moments where all attachments drop out. He has experienced one or more profound times where everything is love. He feels then that everything in creation comes from love.

     When John worked at Pabst and was seeking and reading a lot about these topics, he was looking for someone to bounce this spiritual idea off of. He found this Christian bishop. They had several deep discussions. But the bishop said that if John had brought these ideas up to a parish priest, that priest would have been scared to death by them. Indeed, the ego has an investment in not recognizing the non duality just as different religions also do. Therefore the ego fights these ideas and fights attempts to engage in non duality.

     One of the wonderful ideas that John has developed has been discussed in our meetings before, and that is the universality of these non dual ideas. They are present in so many of the common and uncommon world spiritual traditions. The following are brief words that various traditions use that express this non-duality. "Be still and know that I am."   "The word is God."  Oooom meaning home in Sanskrit is often thought of as the first word. Buddha-consciousness, Christ-consciousness. Jesus said: "I and the father are one."  The Gospel of Thomas was written expressing some of Jesus ideas perhaps closer to his actual life and teachings. It seems in that Gospel that indeed Jesus teachings are non dual. But a couple centuries later the currently used Gospels according to Matthew, Mark and Luke are dualistic -- me and God are two different things. To read in detail or to just scroll through a bunch of references to nondualism to see how it enters into the traditions of almost every spiritual tradition throughout history and around the world, just Google nondualism and look at the Wikepedia article. It is interesting that on Wikipedia there are so many incomplete stubs, but here on this esoteric topic, the random writers have produced a huge and thorough piece of writing. It is truly amazing.

      In my searches on the Internet, here is another site that gives some insight into nondualism, which is a dialogue with John Foster.
http://www.lifewithoutacentre.com/essays-transcripts/what-is-nonduality/

      IN ADDITION, I thank John T. for posting his writing on our email site. I have copied his references below as well. I think our membership will have plenty to keep us busy researching nondualism until our meeting next week.

Hello All,

I want to thank everyone who was present Feb. 13th for their support and patience.

Here are the links to the Nonduality information resource pieces I made reference to and from in sharing about the topic of Nonduality with Body, Mind, and Spirit Group Thursday morning.

There are many great definitions of nonduality.  The first one (The Absolute Enigma) I have on the list is one of my personal favorites. Which is an excerpt from Robert Wolfe's book entitled "Living Nonduality". I have always thought a through reading of this piece could be analogous to "the taking of the Red Pill" as in the movie "Matrix". In my recent readings on nonduality I came across a written piece by Jerry Katz from his (website nonduality.com), which is a replica of the same image I experienced. I think it is an excellent piece to use as a precursor to read before one takes the Red Pill/reads the "The Absolute Enigma". So, I also offer it here.

-  The word nonduality is a “red pill.” Recall that in the movie The Matrix, Neo was offered either a blue pill or a red pill. The blue pill would have returned Neo back to his dream world whose unreality he sensed but did not understand. The red pill would have awakened him to who he really was, which would have begun his journey through life and to the source. 

The word nonduality could work as a red pill if you value its meaning enough to follow it as deeply as you can. When Neo was being given his choice of pills, his teacher and mentor Morpheus explained to him:

This is your last chance. After this there is no turning back. You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes…. Remember, all I’m offering is the truth, nothing more….

http://www.livingnonduality.org/absolute-enigma.htm

If one wants to explore nonduality further, here are some additional links to written pieces or videos I have found useful.

Francis Lucille - Buddha at the Gas Pump Interview - YouTube: 

                                   https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FUdfaVDckkw

Science and Non Duality Conference, with Francis Lucille doing a Q&A On free will, emotions, freedom and more - YouTube:  https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=68yRlexJTJs

Robert Wolfe Interview:             http://livingnonduality.org/

Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi. - YouTube :  https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=weXKuURMgMs

And one other piece I referenced from Thursday: The Nonduality Highlights, #3665

                                                                  http://www.nonduality.com/hl3665.htm#_ednref3

All of these links can lead one to many other useful resources to further explore the topic of Nonduality if one is so inclined.

May peace be with you,

John T.

  

February 5, 2015: Bake Off

     Scatology 101:     At the beginning of this meeting, we made a round of the group to see if anyone had anything that they wanted to announce, any question to ask, or pearl that they wanted to share, albeit briefly. Sky was the first person, and he asked the question that has been bothering him for sometime now -- that relates to a concern about his daughter who has cystic fibrosis and great difficulty having normal bowel movements. He was shocked to read and learn all we know and all we don't know medically about the bacteria growing in the bowel. He informed us that there are at least 1500 species of bacteria that live normally in the bowel. And he particularly has questions about using Miralax as a treatment for intractable constipation.  Unfortunately or fortunately, this question led to basically scatological comments which continued through fully 1/2 of the circle of the group. Who would have thought that consideration of shitting would have led to so many wise and pithy statements? Unfortunately I didn't write the pith down, so you all will have to rely on your own memories for this topic.

      Meredith did try to broaden the topic asking us to consider the Great Amazon Basin as a huge digestive organ for the planet Earth. There are more species there than in any other habitat including the human bowel. But we humans are in the process of destroying this habitat, by logging it, burning what remains, farming this land for a while and then when it ceases to bear fruit well, moving on to more land and logging it, continuing the cycle. In a like manner in our own systems, natural substances often helped control our various functions but we are destroying those natural substances, such as herbs. We replace these natural products with medications. But often these medications have unintended consequences that could not have been foreseen.

     Mary recommended at book she is reading called "The Afterlife of Billy Fingers."

     Sharleen recommended the movie, entitled "The Painter" now playing probably at the Downer.

     The second half of the round table recalled some of the discussion during the previous week's meeting with Dr. Prosen and his work on empathy. Many members of the group had been stimulated by some of Dr. Prosen's discussion of this topic, an area that he was interested in during his entire career both in the psychiatric treatment of human beings and then in the treatment of primates particularly bonobos. I think Dr. Prosen also learned a lot about empathy from the zoo animals, and from their keepers and the researchers at the zoo.

     Comments suggested that the word empathy is a relatively new word just arising about 100 years ago. Actually the word began to be used in about 1850 but that is relatively recently. It is based on the Greek word: empatheia which means passion. It is basically em+pathos which means feelings or emotions. Further, the word was actually coined in 1858 by German philosopher Rudolf Lotze (1817-1881) as a translation of Greek empatheia. There are two definitions of empathy. the first and most often use means a direct identification with, understanding of, and vicarious experience of another person's situation, feelings, and motives. The second use defines empathy as the projection of one's own feelings or emotional state onto an object or animal. This is the way that the word is used in art appreciation. One member of our group has studied art appreciation and recognizes this use of the word, but has difficulty understanding how art can communicate a feeling to the observer without being that feeling. Art therapy is used to help people, but it seems to work best when the art is used with movement. A study was cited from the Scientific American, where a drug addict has to push a bar away when the addict has a craving for the drug. The group that was required and complied with this pushing the bar away had a better success rate at addiction cure. There was something about the kinesthetic act of pushing that bar coincident with the craving.

     The group discussed the difference or lack of difference between the meaning of the words empathy and compassion. One of the ideas most expressed about empathy is that it lacks any judgement. For example, one would have difficulty understanding a child abuser if you judge him as sick or evil.

     We also always must remember that these definitions depend on our perception of the words and of the world. And often with perception there is deception. Not only must we always be aware that how we perceive the world is almost always wrong. In addition, language is often inaccurate. Paul cautioned us that in Buddhist thought empathy and compassion would be equal and nearly the same. There is no judgement with either one. Think of the specific Buddhist practice of tonglen meditation which extends compassion to others from those closest to us and even ourselves, to inclusively the whole world of sentient beings. The word sympathy also entered the discussion. But it was felt that sympathy means having a "feeling for" whereas empathy or compassion means having a "feeling with or even feeling into."  The idea of pity also came up. In Buddhist thought pity should be regarded as the enemy of empathy. Again language creates some of the problems we have in understanding these definition differences. Language is the stuff of dualities. Many of our neuroses may be related to language. But we really don't have other effective ways to communicate to the degree that our human lives seem to require. We just must remember the inaccuracies in language and in perception and how they can complicate our human relationships.     
 

January 29, 2015: Dr. Harry Prosen: Bonobos and Empathy.

   Our Spirit Mind Body Group had the unique and enjoyable opportunity to hear Professor Harry Prosen, Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Medicine, Medical College of Wisconsin, and former Chief of the Department, and formerly Professor of Psychiatry, University of Manitoba, Canada and chief of the Psychiatry Department there.  Dr. Prosen has a multitude of other roles in his past academic career and even currently, but perhaps what he is most known for by non medical people at least on the Internet is his behavioral consultant work to the Milwaukee Zoo on bonobos. Since his work in this capacity he has received calls from all over the world about psychological and some medical problems with the great primates. In addition to his medical leadership roles as past President of the Canadian Psychiatric Association, and leadership roles in the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, and the American Psychiatric Association, he is currently head consultant for the Bonobo Species Preservation Society.

     Dr. Prosen first told us how he became a psychiatric consultant for bonobos. The story involves Brian, a young bonobo male who was sent from Yerkes Primate Research Center in Atlanta, where he had been housed with a male bonobo alone, not as normal which would be with his mother. Brian was very psychiatrically ill for a bonobo and was totally dysfunctional. He was engaging in a juvenile masturbation activity called fisting, in addition to other behavioral defects. With zookeepers, and administrators, various plans were outlined to try to help Brian. Eventually he was put into the enclosure with several females but they recognized his behavioral problems and were beating up on him. After much work and various brainstorming sessions, finally an older male, Lody and a very nurturing blind female, Kitty, were able to help Brian and his behavior slowly normalized. I had heard this story before, but didn't know the outcome. I was happy to learn that Brian is now the alpha male of the bonobo group at the Milwaukee County Zoo.

     Bonobos are very threatened in the wild. There may be only a couple thousand left in the Congo, where they reside on one side of the Congo River, the chimpanzees on the other side. Bonobos are matriarchal at least in the breeding colony. When males reach young adulthood they are chased out of the colony by the females and must join another colony or build one from scratch. The bonobos are considered to be one of the most empathic of all creatures and their society is characterized by much physical contact. It has been observed that bonobos solve most threatening problems by everyone having sex with everyone else. Then they see what is left that is threatening after a period of this sexual behavior. Milwaukee has the biggest bonobo colony in North America. Also Antwerp, Belgium has a large colony. Due to Dr. Prosen's observations and experience, Milwaukee Zoo is now considered an expert location for bonobos. However, Dr. Prosen reports that his tasks have not been easy. Like any other large organization, people at the Zoo have had their own ideas. Sometimes the keepers understand the animals better, but the researchers are in charge and don't always have an open mind. Many of the consultations that Dr. Prosen has received from around the world are done confidentially because some of the young caretakers are afraid to counter the researchers or the administration, or representatives of the philanthropic wing of the zoological park.

     It should be noted that the story of Brian and the story of where his initial consultation took Dr. Prosen is told in more detail in the Atlantic Monthly, of June, 2014. Here is a link.
 http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/06/brian-the-mentally-ill-bonobo-and-how-he-healed/372596/

You may also learn more about Dr. Prosen. There is a nice Wikipedia article that is fairly thorough.

    Laurel Braitmans also tells Brian's story in her book: "Animal Madness: How anxious dogs, compulsive parrots, and elephants in recovery help us understand ourselves, a survey of mental illness in animals and its relationship to our own problems."  

     Dr. Prosen had done research in empathy and particularly in family relationships, looking at non verbal communication, and utilizing facial movements to communicate. This basis of study was a perfect baseline of knowledge from which Dr. Prosen could serve in such an expert way for the bonobos. Likewise and in the reverse, his work with these primates and for that matter a few other species of animals helped him to even further understand human empathy. A quote on empathy by Dr. Prosen: "Empathy knows no country, no species, is universal and has always been available. I discovered after arriving at the zoo that it belonged to the bonobos long before us."

     Dr. Prosen has written over 70 books, monographs, and articles, reviewed over 30 books and  delivered over 60 presentations at various conferences.

     Most recently Dr. Prosen has served as an advocate for Australian biologist Jeremy Griffith, whose several books on the human condition have led to Dr. Griffith founding a movement called the World Transformation Movement, or WTM. The most complete Griffith book on this topic has been rewritten and is now entitled "Freedom", and has an introduction by Dr. Harry Prosen. Also Dr. Prosen has worked in depth with Dr. Griffith on a planned documentary to explain the human condition in detail. I believe there is slow movement toward the production of this documentary film. The problem is that Griffith has alienated some people in high places in the religious community in Australia and that may have slowed the documentary process. I'm not going to go into the WTM in great detail here, but basically Dr. Griffith feels he has sorted out why human beings act the way they do, in so many ways contributing to the suffering of their fellow human beings.  The book explains why there seems to be evil in the world and why we cannot live in peace. I suggest starting with the Wikipedia article on the WTM and take it from there.

     Our group members seemed particularly interested in empathy and what it is, how it can be defined, how it differs from sympathy and from compassion, whether it can be taught or learned, and how we can practice more empathy in daily life.The group felt that empathy can be taught or is learned. But there is a difference between compassion and empathy though the difference is slight. It also depends on our perception and how the word compassion is being used. We all have empathy but the amount varies. Recent imaging studies have shown in which areas of the brain empathy arises. There are certainly inborn aspects of empathy. And the presence of empathy is tied up with the human condition. In the beginning, we may have empathy. Studies of infants have shown this. But in some of us as our lives are built we displace the empathy. Projection seems like empathy but it is not. For the psychiatrist, transference and countertransference are also involved. There was a general consensus that the group could spend another session discussing empathy. That may take place in the future.

     Again the group would wholeheartedly like to thank Dr. Prosen. He also offered to come back sometime and go into more detail about empathy and his areas of study.

January 22, 2015: Color Therapy by Mary R.

          Mary R., a regular attendee, at our meetings is a nurse who now practices acupuncture. She has been training herself in auricular acupuncture or auricular therapy, and has been trying to earn a certification in this area of treatment. But recently she became interested in color therapy. Mary was able to do some research from several books in order to present to us a summary of color therapy. These books were: 1) Discover Color Therapy: A First Step Handbook to Better Health by Helen Graham; 2) Colour Therapy: the Use of Colour for Health and Healing by Pauline Wills; and The Secret language of Color by Joann Eckstut and Arielle Eckstut.

     Mary related to us some of the fascinating things she learned about color, starting with how we see color with the eye and its rods and cones. She was surprised to learn that under water the number of colors visible gradually declines. For example at 30 feet below sea level, one can see yellow and blue, but as one goes deeper, only blue can be seen. Surprisingly a peacock shrimp has the most color receptors in its eyes. And yet human beings can see 10 million shades of color. Nocturnal animals have fewer photo receptors. Bats see only shades of grey, and no color. Dogs can't see green and red, but only in the yellow and blue range. To them grass is probably blue. Butterflies have more photo receptors than humans. Birds see all the colors but less so for blue. Snakes can see infra red.

     Color used as therapy is often called chromotherapy. It is thought that healing with color depends on the vibrational energy of the light waves in the various colors. In this practice, the New Agers utilize the chakras from ancient Hindu tradition but the New Age has applied colors to these chakras and this combination of color and traditional chakra practice are used together. 

     In color therapy, an analysis is done sometimes with a so called dousing utensil to determine what color a patient or client might need to improve their situation. Then the color that is needed is applied to the skin, sometimes over the wrist. This color's complementary color is also used. Sometimes colored silk is used and applied to the skin. Some therapist use a round lantern slide through which a light is passed. Those who write about color therapy state that the client's pulse responds to the colors that are correct for a person's therapy. There are also general rules for using color as therapy by these alternative practitioners. Red is the most commonly used. Orange seems to treat depression, gallbladder stones and muscle cramps. Green is used for detoxification, infection. Turquoise boosts the immune system. A typical prescription advises which colors to use and instructs the client to hold the color to the wrist under a light bulb, 2 times a day for perhaps 15 minutes for a period of 3 months.

     It should be noted that the use of color therapy or chromotherapy as it is sometimes called is a pseudoscience. There is no evidence of the type that medicine usually uses, for example double blind studies that show that any of these uses of color do anything to heal or treat disease. However, interior decorators have long thought that certain colors in our environment whether paint on the wall or rug on the floor or bursts of bright color within a more neutral room can have varying degrees of affect on emotions, state of relaxation or anxiety, and mood.

     The author questioned what the expectations of clients of color therapy were. I postulated that perhaps some of these clients are frustrated and have tried multiple different therapies without satisfaction. They may expect that some of the alternative types of treatment may have an effect. We also know that the so called placebo affect is very real and can be very strong. It is estimated that 30 to 40% of people can be subject to a relatively strong placebo affect.  John commented that studies have shown that people have a remarkable ability to self heal. A study suggested that healing of a medical problem starts even before the patient sees the doctor, once the patient has made the decision to seek care, suggesting that the patient starts to get better when they have given themselves permission to let self healing take place. As an MD, my view is that as long as alternative therapies do not hinder or delay standard medical treatment, there is no preclusion to using them. In other words if they help without side affects, let's use them. Of course the problem with any of these alternative treatment modalities which are unproven is the presence of charlatans who can do great harm of a financial kind as well as emotional damage. There is a need for careful scientific blinded studies to learn more about colors to justify the use of an alternative treatment like color therapy.

     Some members of the audience suggested that the use and success of these alternative therapies depends on perception. Indeed all our brains confabulate to make up for lacks in our sensory organs and their ability to perceive the world. Vision for example has been studied in detail and the presence of this confabulation in our brain to make up for imperfect and incomplete visualizations of the visual field has been proven.

     With further questioning, Mary did briefly talk about auricular therapy which she is trying to learn at this time. Briefly this is the application of needles or in some cases glass or metal rods to areas of the ear which correspond to ailing areas of the entire human body. Again I am not sure of the evidence for this type of treatment either, though traditional Chinese acupuncture seems to have some benefit for many people, though that benefit is poorly understood.

     Mary led us in an exercise during which we first practiced some guided relaxation techniques. Then we were asked to imagine a butterfly and to concentrate on its colors, then to imagine it flying to a place and to recall the color or colors of that place. Mary then said that the books she studied gave interpretations of the colors seen in this imagination exercise. Mary admitted that in the first case she did not like the predictions as applied to herself. She did not think that they applied well to her. In a second similar exercise she felt more accepting of the resultant interpretations.

     In my own research, I did find this Internet site. If you are interested in a much more thorough consideration of chromotherapy, access this site from the Journal of Evidence Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1297510/


     In addition, a lot of research has been done in the last 2 decades about the affect of color on circadian rhythm and other physiological processes. I found this interesting article about research on blue light. As you can tell by perusing this site, a lot of complex research has been done in this area. Therefore it is not as far fetched to believe that other colors as well have affects on human behavior though perhaps not as intense an affect as blue.

 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2831986/

January 15, 2015: Meredith: Photo Dance

https://www4.uwm.edu/sarup/news/washingtonpark2014.cfm  This is a link to the announcement of the unique Dec 13 UWM Dance Performances held in the Washington Park Area. It is a good introduction to our presentation today by Meridith Watts.

   Meridith Watts, who is a member of our group, has been involved in an ongoing educational project involving three departments at UWM:  architecture, dance, and public art. The project involved several steps. Part I involved preliminary meetings which included walkabouts in the Washington Park area of Milwaukee, near Lisbon and 33rd Street. Members of these three departments walked around this neighborhood to find spaces where public art could be displayed, where public dance performances could be staged in the outdoors and in certain available indoor spaces, and where architecture contributed to the space involved. During these walkabouts, ideas for these spaces were charted and later the GPS readings for the final choices were mapped and could be found on a phone app. Part II involved some trial performances and setting up the script and the plans for these performances. This occurred in November 2014. The planned dance performances were done in December 2015. The plan still includes a Part IV where some of these dance performances will be done in more typical urban performance sites including UWM.
     During the development of these performances, it was known that often non traditional spaces would be "refunctioned" for the purpose. Great effort was made to understand the space and to use a sensitivity, and in some case improvisational flexibility in the scripting of the art and movements depending on the audience environment. There would be some audience performer separation which would be porous borders but separation of function. This would not be a flash mob type of performance but it would be more planned and in a different kind of space, not a crowded public space. It also would not be a "block party" event where the audience becomes totally participatory with unplanned sequences, more in the line of a celebration.
     In the development of these presentations, scripts and sequences were tried out, trying to find what would fit in the space chosen. Generally, this would require small movements, not the large expansive moves. The Neighborhood Interventions part of the project were performed at Amaranth Cafe, near Lisbon and Washington Park, the Koenig House garden on 33rd St, a vacant lot, and the Rosalind Cox house on 33rd and Galena as well as an empty house due to be rejuvenated. The audience achieved at this event consisted of a mixed group of students and some people who were picked up along the way.  Meredith told of one audience member who said: "You know, your dancers are good,, but they are not into the 4th dimension enough!". Wow. Reportedly the dancers are still thinking about that comment.
     The actual performances after the several months of preparation were at the Amaranth Cafe, Rosalind Cox house, and other outdoor spaces, as well as the Express Yourself Milwaukee Community Art Center which is located close to the Amaranth Cafe. These areas form kind of a social and service vortex for the area. Brochures were prepared that listed the sites and expected times of performance so that an audience could catch up with the tour wherever they wished. It is estimated that a hundred to a couple hundred people were able to view at least portions of the performances. Just driving through this neighborhood one does not see or expect anything like this. But every space belongs to someone and has character and many of these spaces attracted the students to take advantage of their unique characteristics. Two of the student dancers were residents of the Washington Park area and could provide much information to enable the remainder of the troop to understand the neighborhood better. Forty students participated along with at least 3 photographers. Several credits were given to the organizers of this event. There also is some public art space at 33rd St and Lisbon across from the Amaranth Cafe.
     It should be noted that the performances did not represent the stories of any people. There was not a specific narrative. The performances were movement oriented, movements in the space. They were usually designed to be 15 minutes long. For a narrative, one usually needs a longer time and more space. Also more writing and planning would be required.   Aritjii Sen, one of the organizers believes the architecture matters; the space matters. Interestingly during the neighborhood walkabout preparations, architecture students walked geometrically around blocks looking for spaces, while the dancers followed the flower gardens.
     Spiritually, several things happened during this project. Some of the students, dancers, and even with architect students, some had foregone feelings about the Washington Park neighborhood, perhaps sometimes based on the police blotter. Some felt the same after the performances but many were transformed. Then the whole project became spiritual. The dancers did receive various dance instructions, such as "raise your chest"; "open your back"; lift", "open your heart".  Whereas typical dance training for Martha Graham modern dance often instructed the dancers to move with their pelvis to ground themselves, these instructions seemed to involve more upward motion, more lifting, and opening.
     The project will continue with performances to be done in more traditional urban show spaces. Meredith showed us many photos of the spaces, the dancers, a video of the dancing in the various spaces as well as a photo of some of the public art which is still on display in the area.

     There is some background on the selection of this area for these three UWM departments to use as a space for performance and art. The UWM Department of Architecture had a project to investigate the Washington Park area and write about what moved them about the spaces seen here. Read about the history of the area and multiple pieces written by the UWM students as part of the educational project by the students of architecture.  Google [Washington Park Stories] or use this link: http://arch302.weebly.com/urban-park-spaces.html