Why The Gut Is (Still) Not Smarter Than The Head

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[* 'The Crystal Ball' (1902, oil on canvas) by John William Waterhouse, courtesy wiki]

Because It Too Requires Training, That's Why
In the world of business, people give as much importance to the power of the brain as they do to their gut feeling. Is the person sitting across the table worthy of my trust to part my money with, never mind all the paperwork that is ready in the background and that will protect me from any fraud? Should I exercise a call or a put option in my favorite commodity in today's F&O market? Should I short-cover? Or should I sit quiet today and do nothing?



In the matter of relationships, it is nothing but the gut feeling that one relies upon - there is very little scope for the brain to give its opinion here. Is this the person I would like to have in my life? Is this the one I should be spending the rest of my life with? Or, in another realm, is my partner lying on me? Is there a whiff of betrayal in the air? Or am I only imagining things?



And when our decisions based on the gut feeling go for a toss, we lose faith in this ability. When we realize that the person who our hunch told us would be trustworthy didn't turn out to be so; when we realize that the put option actually wiped away the margin money kept with the broker and then some -- we feel cheated by our sense of self-interest.



When the decisions we make in the all-important aspect of relationships turn out to lead us up the garden path, we lose our confidence in our hunches. When the realization dawns that what we had thought would be bliss turned out to be disillusionment; when we realize that the suspicion we had about our partner or spouse turned out to be wrong -- we feel let down by our sense of self-preservation.



The reason why our gut feelings quite often let us down, is to my mind simply because we never pay any attention to training it. This most important faculty that we rely upon in crunch times -- tell me, did you ever seek to train or develop it properly? While there are established institutions to educate our brains to think logically and systematically and rationally, unfortunately there is no academy in this world which teaches us how to hone our gut instincts. And which conducts an examination at the end of the course and gives us a certificate to the effect that we passed.

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[* Largest flawless quartz sphere, weighing about 48 kg, with a diameter of about 13 inches, is displayed at National Museum of Natural History, DC, USA. Courtesy Sanjay Acharya, wiki.]

We train our muscles through exercising and gymming to get a better body. We train our brain cells through continuous practice of whatever concepts we are focused upon. We train our mind through meditation or positive self-affirmations. In the same way, we can train our gut instinct to give us better "hunch answers". But how?

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[* 'Consulting The Oracle' (1884), John William Waterhouse. Priestesses sitting in a 'Temple of Prophesy'.]

Googling on "psychic skills" throws up close to 300,000 web pages that claim to reveal techniques that can take you to instinct development. Howsoever elaborate and obscure and convoluted these techniques may prove to be, the first step begins with taking a stand that, one, it is indeed possible to develop it, and two, we have it in us to develop it. When the cynicism is left behind, when we get off our intellectual and rational high-horse, it automatically becomes easier to train oneself into anything. Belief is a basic prerequisite.



Like any other, the domain of "psychic skills" has its own set of keywords and terms. Open any book worth the salt on the subject, and the terms begin to absorb you within themselves. "Clearing or releasing negative energy", "enlightenment", "karma", "meditative states", "releasing the past", "chakras", "chakra cleaning"... you better get used to them fast.

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[* "Seven Chakras" by Pieter Weltevrede - courtesy sanatansociety.com.]
This is not to encourage anybody to become a clairvoyant or a "psychic medium" or healer, although it would help all of us if somebody tries and does become one. But we would be all very happy if this special training can help our own gut instinct become more perceptive enough and sharp enough to guide us in those decisive moments: whether to buy or to sell some stock or piece of property, whether to let that someone enter our heart or to keep the doors closed... If we can achieve this much, our life would be happier.

[While psychic skills are special techniques that require effort to developed, epiphanies seem to come out of thin air. And they come most unexpectedly, without rhyme or reason. What is so special about these moments when the epiphanies choose to pop into our mind? Here is one article that ponders this question: "Moments Of Epiphany - Be Alert When They Come".]

Scientists Say Bumblebees Can't Fly...

Thank God Scientists Don't Rule The World!

I guess it is in a way good that the bumblebees can't understand human language - especially the language spoken by us scientists. For they would have then known that what they do day-in and day-out - the act of flying, that is - is a logical impossibility! The bumblebees shouldn't be flying, how dare they!



The poor little things have just two pairs of wings, you see, out of which the rear pair is so small as to be quite ineffective. On top of that, the wings move together, and beat at the max rate of around 200 in one second. Compare this with the load of the rest of the body, and you see what I mean! Voila!



DDT is a great chemical, did you know? Look at those damned mosquitoes around you. Look at how the malaise of malaria and typhus has been wiped away by this particular insecticide. Mankind shall be ever grateful to the man who discovered how to effectively use it for combating the pesky arthropods!



So what if I got egg on my face when fellow scientist and writer Rachel Carson stopped me from singing hosannas about DDT?



What I, as a scientist, can measure using my five senses, is, according to me, is what exists. I refuse to believe in the possibility that there could be anything which is beyond the comprehension of the five senses. I take the nature's way of working as axiomatic, for granted. I try to hide behind bombastic-sounding theories that _describe_ events and even successfully _predict_ events, but without elaborating on the "why". I have devised the Nernst's postulate; I created the concept of Iota; when I am asked to measure the position and momentum of a particle, I try to escape by giving these two parameters a "range of probable values".



I know my limitations. I know that the way I am structured, I can measure nature using my five senses. At best, I can hypothesize in advance (like I did about the black holes), and then try to vindicate my hypotheses by inventing gadgets which act as extensions of my five senses. My programming makes me refuse to consider that which I cannot sense, my Nernst and iota and uncertainty principle not-withstanding.



It is not _my_ fault, is it, when people quote me when they want to derogate the possibilities of the sixth, the seventh, and the other senses of perception beyond? Or the other dimensions that might exist, but which I can't even fathom?



It is the same logic of the bumblebee's flight. Something will not cease to exist, just because I, a scientist, cannot discover or sense that thing!



Which brings me to the subject of this post. Believe this man, a member of my own tribe of scientists, who said - "...the cosmos reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection."



So, don't limit yourself to just the senses of your physical body. It is time to move beyond them. Takes some practice. But first, accept the notion that you are capable of perceiving much, much beyond what the bodily senses can ever reveal to you.

The Arrival Of Comet Holmes On The Horizon...

And The Powerful Portends That Are Being Attached To It

That the world around us is changing, and very significantly, there is no doubt about. Our universe, this galaxy, solar system, our planet earth, and our human civilization - we are all hurtling somewhere at a speed that seems to be subtly increasing every moment. But where are we hurtling to?



So humankind searches for clues, patterns or any insights that can give a hint of what exactly is going on. An event that has drawn attention for such searchers is the sudden brightening of the Comet Holmes during its return sojourn, which it does regularly once every 6.9 years.



Up until October 23, 2007, the comet was a non-entity. Just one among the billions of stellar bodies navigating the sky. Had things moved in the predictable direction, the comet would have passed by unnoticed, with hardly more than a few bytes worth of news in the media. But the comet had something else in mind. On that day, this creature kicked up a lot of dust from its surface, and the glint of the sun's reflecting rays suddenly made it appear very bright in the sky.




Now for the interesting part. There is a school of thought according to which Comet Holmes is said to represent the inner goddess within us - irrespective of our gender. The male's DNA has half its chromosomes coming from his mother's side, remember?



Comet Holmes is said to be "the driving force" behind the emergence of a feminine leadership that is more mature and spiritually-oriented than the present lot. It "seeks to question" the tenets of the Cult of Domesticity, redefine it perhaps, and push feminism and its corollaries to the forefront.



Was the comet around, in the early 1900s, when Camilla Clifford won the "Gibson Girl" image contest? Camilla = Gibson Girl, this equation must have been forged in 1905/06 perhaps.



The Feminine Mystique - This novel written by Betty Friedan came out in 1963; coincided with Holmes' return in 1964?




According to the school of thought that links Comet Holmes with resurgent woman power, let's not be surprised therefore, to connect the recent political events with the celestial body:

Argentina - The General Election held on 28 October saw Cristina Fernandez win the polls, paving the way for her presidency. This coincided with the arrival on the horizon of the comet.




Pakistan - President Musharraf declared an emergency rule across Pakistan. A resurgent Benazir Bhutto shuttled in and out of the country. The coming months should reveal what impact the comet has on her career, if at all.




USA - Hillary Clinton won the 2000 NY Senate election, when the comet was very much present in the earth's vicinity. This year, looks like the comet is once again by her side to give her popularity that push that (may be) propels her to the White House?




Look around - for any signs of female resurgence. Now you know what is giving them the strength!

Whatever be our gender, so long as the comet is in our skies, it would be a great idea to delve inside and get in touch with the mother goddess in us. Make use of this CD if you want - http://www.short10.com/?c=sdb_hypno_tuneinuniv.



Who knows, one of us might be able to discern where we are all going?

Can You Read What Is Going On In Another's Mind?

And Don't You Wish You Could?

There are so many situations when we wish we could read exactly what is going on in the other person's mind.



The spouse coming in late at night. Or receiving phone calls at odd hours. Or finding strange entries in their credit card bill. And, _somehow_, we _know_ that there is a ring of untruth in whatever explanation is given to us...

The child behaving odd suddenly. As if there is something going on at school / college which he/she is reluctant to divulge to you. Again, the words coming from the mouth are at variance from the body language that is hinting at a different story...



A negotiation in progress with a labor union leader / take-over artist. We never know exactly what ace they hold up their sleeve, and how strong / weak the position is that they are talking from...

The dating has been steady for quite some time now. And, we are pretty sure that the person in our arms is the One. Or are we? Pretty sure, that is?



It is in these and similar circumstances that we really, really wish we could comprehend the thoughts flitting through the other person's mind.

Does reading a person's mind require that person's physical presence in our vicinity? Should we tune into the body language of the person, the way their facial expressions change, the way the tone of their voice dips and zigzags up and down... in order to "guess" their thoughts? Should we try to pick up clues from their body language?

And what if the person we are trying to read is a total stranger? It is a common observation that married couples begin getting cues about what the other is thinking as they spend more and more time together. This is true with close friends and even office colleagues. But what if you are meeting somebody for the first time?



At any instant of time, thousand-and-one thoughts pass through our mindscape. That is especially true for the "mentally" in-disciplined amongst us, those who are not trained to be mindfully aware through meditation. Hypothetically speaking, if somebody does develop the ability to tap into a subject's thoughts, he or she will likely get swamped and overwhelmed by the torrent of thoughts that the subject is thinking through! Sifting through the threads of thoughts in real-time, and latching on to that one single important thought (infidelity, lying, hiding something, ace-up-the-sleeve, etc, etc) - can be a challenging job! And if the subject simply doesn't dwell on the most important issue or subject that the mind-reader wants to know about - then unless the subject is consciously "reminded" about it through direct provocation or indirect cues, the only way I guess the mind-reader can find out what is going on is by sifting through the Akashic records!



Ah, well, we digress. We are making the subject more complicated than it already is. But I am sure you get the drift of some of the issues involved in mind-reading.

Coming back to the how-to of mind-reading, I have come across this very good course that gives a good breadth of treatment to a vast range of topics. The course claims to take you to the top in the world of psychics in six weeks flat. That is an exaggeration, of course. But their content is worth going through to some extent, and can be taken as starter guide towards the road to general development of psychic abilities, of which mind-reading is one aspect. Here is the URL - http://www.short10.com/?c=bpara-normal. Costs USD 99.95. So buy it if you are really serious about working on your sixth sense.

The Cat Who Can Sense Impending Death

Wish I Could Learn From The Cat!

The scene is Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, Rhode Island.



The third floor of the center houses the Dementia Unit. Doctors and nurses make their usual rounds, busy doing whatever it is that they do. It is a very normal scene, with the air filled with the aroma of medicines and the Spartan environs befitting a nursing center where Alzheimer's and Dementia patients in their late stages come with the hope to convalesce.

Except, that there is a cat which is making waves in the hospice. Not that this particular cat is the only pet prowling around in the building. The hospital boasts of Cadbury, an adorable bunny, Tilly, the noisy parakeet, and Maxine, the hospital's guard dog amongst the pets it looks after. What makes Oscar - the cat - special is his ability to sense death.




Very uncannily, and this has been vouched for by people who are now actually keeping a scientific track of this cat's movements, this feline curls up near the bedside of a patient who has less than two hours to go. It has come to such a stage, that when these people see Oscar do this for a patient, they pick up the phone to call up the patient's kith and kin, and ask them to come over, since "the end is near".

Oscar's prediction skills are more accurate than the entire skills of medicine and science and technology put together.

The cat generally stays aloof, and is not very friendly. He seems to be quite satisfied with the food served during the day at fixed hours. And all day long, he does his rounds, prowling and sniffing, prowling and sniffing.




How does he manage to sense impending death? Does he "see" "it" in the room? Does he "smell" the deathly scent in the patient? Does he "hear" the final, bidding-adieu, song or hymn coming from the patient? Do his feline hairs rise in a special way at some special vibrations around the patient, which hints at the last moment? Of course, he has not been observed "licking" anything, so this fifth sense is ruled out.

And, very importantly, why does he feel obliged to be by the deathbed? Is it some sort of protocol that he is following? A "courtesy-demands-that-you-be-near-to-the-dying-person" kind of obligation that binds us all together, irrespective of whether we are humans or animals? After sensing the death, he could have simply walked away, couldn't he? He wouldn't have owed anything to the dying patient or their relatives anything, would he have? Heck, nobody would have even bothered to look at him while they were moving around in the hospice!




Still, our Oscar feels obliged to be by the deathbed, after so accurately sensing coming death.

Both these aspects - that there is a special sensory function which tells him of death, and that he curls up next to the patient in their final moments - are intriguing.

I wonder what Oscar's behavior would be if he were shifted to a neonatal hospital. Would he predict the exact moment when a baby will be born in cases of natural labor? Or would he predict still-born cases / infant deaths? Is he a harbinger of good news also? Or is his expertise limited to gloom alone?




Ah. I wish I could hone my own skills too and bring them to Oscar's level.

Learning To Listen To Your Intuition

The world is full of seances who claim to be in touch with their psychic powers, and can predict when and where the earthquake will strike next; or who the next head of state of country X-Y-Zee will be; or which way the price of oil will swing the next week.





And then there is this body of skeptics who dismiss these seances as charlatans who are out to get your money as well as hog some undeserved limelight.





So who should one believe?

My answer would be: believe in yourself. Believe in your intuition. Those gut feelings that act as your very own advance guidance system. That tell you very subtly that the guy sweet-talking before you is not _the_ one; whatever his flashy smile and tuxedo shoes and debonair style might be telling you. Or that the businessperson who is sounding so terribly self-confident is not the right company to venture your capital in. Or...



There is this package that helps you on the road to honing your intuition further. Though it claims (as all marketing guys are prone to claim) to take you to the road to crystal-ball-gazing in _just_ six weeks... I would advice pragmatism, and pace it out. Depending on your present level of advancement on the road to self-realization, and depending on how serious and sensitive you are about yourself, it could take anywhere between six weeks to ... six years, or even sixty.



Here is the URL: http://www.short10.com/?c=bpara-normal. Costs USD 99.95.