On the Mystery of the Unconscious Part 1/2

There are two new and very important research studies that I will discuss that helps clarify what our consciousness is all about; and more, what access to deeper levels of consciousness mean. This is part one. Tomorrow part 2.

There is a scientific piece by a group of Finnish scientists on how consciousness emerges. Here is what they did: they took twenty healthy volunteers and gave them drugs that made them unconscious. Drugs similar to what Michael Jackson got(Propofol). Then they measured them with brain measurements (PET scans), and watched what brains were active as they woke up and came out of unconsciousness. You would think it would be the higher level (consciously/aware)neocortex (1). But no. What seemed to happen is that we come out of unconsciousness as the brain evolved. Deep brain, brainstem, then limbic system, then top level cortical areas. These brain structures. Brainstem, (1)thalamus and hypothalamus (2) were activated first. We start with the most ancient phylogenetic structures first, then limbic second; no different, by the way, from how we come into and out of primals. We call it, the 1,2,3 hierarchy; and coming in—the 3,2,1 hierarchy. The point is that there is a neuro-biologic schedule for going in and out of consciousness, and it must not be abrogated for convenience. And that is how we know we are getting proper primal therapy. There is specific hierarchy for feelings and they follow evolution, of course. They follow how we became feeling then thinking human beings millions of years ago in evolution. And that structure dictates life and above all, dictates how psychotherapy works. There is an order to how we become unconscious and conscious; an order to how we descend into the deep reaches of the brain in therapy and how we ascend back up to the top. So when someone tells you, as in EMDR, that you can access feelings through thoughts and ideas, with a current focus, they defy human evolution; when they say we can access the limbic areas without ceding top level consciousness they misread science. You cannot be on the top level and in lower level feelings at the same time. They are two different universes; two different brain regions; two different brain tissues.

On the contrary, when we plunge patients into deep brain structures with LSD or rebirthing we get overload and often delusions—“cosmic consciousness, at one with the world,” etc. We have defied evolution and we arrive at mental illness. No mystery, the top level is overloaded by the lower levels and it is all too much. It can well be a description of psychosis. When we first wake up in the morning we are briefly in touch with our deep brain (brainstem). And we briefly feel what is there; a stab of anxiety or depression or hopelessness. We are in touch with our beginnings; but before we can feel it we get ready for the day, get busy and ignore it. We move out of the lower level into the higher levels (the precise order in which we wake up). But if we lay back and allow that stab of anxiety to overtake us it would help make us free. It is that deeply imprinted feeling we have touched.

There are drugs that suppress the first line, brainstem and leaves the emotional level intact. There are drugs that suppress emotions and leave the top level neo-cortex intact, and there are drugs that suppress top level cortical cells that block inhibition and give us some access to feelings. That top-level suppression inhibits some of our inhibition and makes us feel somewhat freer for a time. Think of hypnosis. It blocks some of our top level critical faculties. It begins as something psychologic--suggestion, which then becomes chemical-- enhancing unconsciousness). But it allows us to descend to our past. The problem is that there is no final connection that would really free us. We need conscious/awareness for that. And again, when we defy evolution we fail. But it does show us our unconscious and how memories reside on lower levels. Hypnosis allows us to travel back to old memories. But as I noted, there can be no long-lasting cure there. There is no organic connection.

What we have done is set aside the top level for a moment, allowing lower level imprints surge forth. The imprinted memories were not suddenly manufactured; they reside continuously below higher levels of consciousness. They are active all of the time below the level of conscious/awareness. And they agitate us all of the time; hence we cannot sit still and relax. We are unable to relax, because in ordeer to relax we cannot be hyper-vigilant. We are hyper vigilant because down deep there is danger---of the imprints and their force. It is a vicious circle. When we let go of vigilance we get anxious because the feelings are right there. So we still can’t relax. Visiting them for a moment in hypnosis versus experiencing them are two different universes of discourse. It looks magical that hypnosis but it cannot be curative. The laws of evolution won’t allow it. But still, many of us want that magic. That is the attraction of EMDR, a magic wand (literally) that passes before our eyes and makes us well. Unbeatable. So even better, we take tranquilizers which take only minutes to work. That is good except it shortens life. Someone says, “yeah but it is only at the end.” So ask yourself when considering any therapy—does it follow evolution? It is not a theory; it is a fact.

When we look at evolution we also see confirmation both of the unconscious and the hierarchy of the brain. There are indeed three levels, as I have describing for forty years. Those levels have to do with neurosis, depression and cure. They cannot be ignored or defied if we want to provide a cure; neurobiology leads the way for how to do it. There is are brain processes underlying our actions, thoughts and beliefs; we cannot forget them to produce some psychotherapy that is not based on how our biology functions. What all this means is that a proper therapy must obey strictly to how we evolved.

We can say that ideas are strong and change feelings when science shows that is exactly that opposite. This is the dilemma of the cognitive-behaviorists who do indeed believe that beliefs and ideas are the sine qua non.: change ideas and we change feelings. They develop a therapy based on a falsehood. No one can get well that way; in the mind alone. Ideas only slightly affect feelings but they do not radically alter or transform them. Only experiencing those feelings, back then when they were imprinted, can there be a cure. Feelings are stronger than any ideas; don’t forget, ideas and beliefs came along millions of years after feelings. When a theory does not correspond to the reality of how our brains and bodies work there is no way to get well. And neurology teaches us that when feelings get to be too much the neo-cortex whips into action to stop them. Evolution dictates how therapy should go, not some intellectual notion from a therapist. Humility is foremost; and let us not imagine we are smarter than evolution, probably the greatest discovery in history.