Intuition
is Compass to Your Soul
The
study of intuition is assuredly moving from the battleground of trying to
“prove the reality of ESP” to the culture-building process of researching
the application of intuition to daily life. A case in point is the new book,
Compass of the soul: 52 ways intuition can guide you to the life of your dreams
(Andrews McNeel Publishing). The author, Lynn A. Robinson, whose previous book
of , Divine intuition: Your guide to creating a life you love, is a member of
the Intuition Network (www.intuition.org),
which is devoted to helping society embrace intuition.
Some
of the ways in which intuition can provide applied benefits, according to
Robinson’s book, include
Personal
guidance
Sense
of personal happiness at being true to one’s essence
Increasing
abundance and prosperity
Spiritual
awareness
Experiencing
heart connections with others
Health
information
Finding
a path to making desired lifestyle changes
Dealing
with uncertainty
Gliding
through transitions
Dreaming
Our World Past Crisis
In
response to the crisis surrounding Iraq, dream researcher Ariadne Green (author
of Ariadne's Book of Dreams and
Dream Analysis for Kids
) has prepared a website to collect dreams about the situation. You can find
them at www.dreamthread.com/gath997.html
and are invited to incubate your own dream about the future implications of the
world’s response to this crisis. Greene has reported that some of the dreams
seem possibly prophetic. Other dreams apparently portray the feelings of the
collective mind, while others point to the personal price for war. Some dreams
support the power of prayer or may suggest the influence of spiritual or
paranormal forces at work.
Health
Benefits Found in Cranberry Juice
Researchers
have found that drinking three glasses a day significantly raises levels of
"good cholesterol" in the blood and increases plasma antioxidant
levels, reducing the risk of heart disease. Joe Vinson, Ph.D., the study's main
investigator and a professor of chemistry at the University of Scranton, in
Scranton, Pennsylvania, measured cholesterol levels in subjects with high
cholesterol, followed by monthly samplings. Ten of the subjects were given
cranberry juice with artificial sweetener but without high fructose corn syrup,
while the other subjects drank cranberry juice with no added sugars. The drinks
tested all contained approximately 27 percent pure cranberry juice by volume,
like the common supermarket variety. While there were no changes in overall
cholesterol levels, good cholesterol (high density lipoprotein, or HDL) appeared
to significantly increase by an average of 10 percent after three servings of
juice per day, an increase that translates to an approximate 40 percent
reduction in heart disease risk.
If
you don't like cranberry juice, drinking three cups of orange juice per day
similarly increases levels of good cholesterol, but unlike cranberry juice, it
doesn’t increase plasma antioxidant capacity, says Vinson. Grape juice,
another breakfast favorite, increases plasma antioxidant capacity but appears to
lower the level of good cholesterol, according to another study by Vinson.
For more information, go to . http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2003-03/apa-amp031003.php
It's easy to plant false memories
Do you remember that day when Bugs Bunny hugged you at Disneyland? A study by Elizabeth Loftus, of the University of California, Irvine, presented the results of her most recent study on “false memory syndrome” to show just how easy it can be to induce false memories in the minds of some people. The Bugs Bunny memory is impossible because Bugs is not a Disney character.
The false memory was planted through simple conversation. Dr. Loftus talked with research participants about their childhood experiences. She asked them whether they ever saw someone dressed up as the Bugs Bunny. She also asked whether they hugged his furry body and stroked his velvety ears. In subsequent interviews, 36 percent of the subjects recalled the cartoon rabbit at Disneyland. In another study, researchers using similar methods were able to elicit false memories of abduction by space aliens.
The research suggests that police interrogators and people investigating sexual-abuse allegations must be careful not to plant suggestions into their subjects. Loftus believes her research shows that some people may be so suggestible that they could be convinced they were responsible for crimes they didn't commit.
For more information, go to http://www.cnn.com/2003/HEALTH/02/16/false.memory.ap/index.html
Research on Walking Ignored
In the application, comes the awareness. If you tried daily walking, you’d discover for yourself and become aware of the benefits of walking. Unfortunately, most people are ignoring the suggestion.
“If a pill could significantly lower the risk,” writes Suz Redfearn for The Washington Post “of heart attack,” diabetes, stroke, osteoporosis and breast and colon cancer while reducing weight, cholesterol levels, constipation, depression and impotence and also increase muscle mass, flatten the belly and reshape the thighs even as it reduced the risk of age-related dementia and made you better-looking -- and had no negative side effects -- there would be panic in the streets. The American economy would tip into chaos. The military would have to be called in to secure supplies of the medication. Luckily, there is no pill.”
Walking most days of the week, according to a growing body of research, provides the benefits of that imaginary pill. But the majority of the population are ignoring this potential health bonanza. When The Washington Post decided to do a special issue on walking, the reporters working on the assignment found that even among those people very familiar with the research were still sedentary. It raised a question, why is this very important piece of health information gathering dust rather than selling walking shoes? Among the potential answers explored is the possibility that there’s little economic incentive to encourage people to walk, compared to the incentive to motivate people to drink soda pop.
For a comprehensive report, with many links, on walking, its benefits and how to get started applying this often-made suggestion from Edgar Cayce, go to http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A17484-2002Sep28¬Found=true
How Much Happiness is in Your Heart?
“Love is not a matter of what happens in life.” Wrote philosopher of consciousness, Ken Keyes, “It's a matter of what's happening in your heart.” Research on happiness suggests that Ken is correct.
In a study of the effect of marriage on happiness, according to a news tip found on www.schwartzreport.net, researchers found that there is a happiness boost to getting married, but it is temporary. Soon the honeymoon is over and people are about as happy as they usually are. The same goes for the impact on happiness of a death of a spouse. At first, there is a drop in happiness, but then it returns to normal level. The research, conducted by Richard E. Lucas, Ph.D., of Michigan State University and published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, is part of a larger program of study that is leading to the conclusion that circumstances affect people’s happiness much less than their own internal happiness style. We create our own happiness, the research suggests, with but a slender connection to external events.
For further information, go to http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2003-03/apa-amp031003.php
Evangelicals Represent Religious Awakening
There is a religious movement afoot, both here and abroad, which some scholars have described as an “religious awakening,” according to an editorial, “God, Satan and the Media,” in the New York Times by Nicholas Kristoff. This movement is among the Evangelical Christian denominations. In Africa, for example, the number of Christians has exploded, from ten million at the beginning of the twentieth century, to three hundred and sixty million by the beginning of the twenty first century. The news media, however, have generally ignored this movement, or have written about it in a somewhat condescending or scornful manner. The “educated elite,” as Kristoff describes the mentality of the northeastern USA which dominates the news media, would discuss the causes of crime in terms of deprived childhoods, whereas “conversation would stop abruptly if someone mentioned Satan.”
According to Gallup polls, however, as much as forty six per cent of Americans label themselves as aligned with the Evangelical Christian movement. Another Gallup poll shows that forty eight percent of Americans believe in creationism, and only 28 percent in evolution. Twice as many Americans believe in the existence of Satan, according to polls, than believe in evolution. Yet, Kristoff notes, there is not a single Evangelical Christian writing for a major news media operation. He notes, “One of America's most prominent television personalities is Benny Hinn, watched in 190 countries, but few of us have heard of him because he is an evangelist.”
For the full text of the editorial, go to http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/04/opinion/04KRIS.html
Vegetarian Diet Cuts Cholesterol
Whereas most people with high cholesterol can lower it only about ten per cent through changes in diet, it is possible to switch to a vegetarian diet, rich in soy and soluble fiber, and lower cholesterol by as much as one third, a recent study showed.
At a recent meeting of the American Heart Association, according to an Associated Press report by Daniel Haney, medical research conducted by Cyril Kendall, of the University of Toronto, featured what he called “The Portfolio Diet,” including tofu and other soy products, okra, beans, eggplant and Metamucil. An extreme diet, he admitted, but one which shows that it is indeed possible to make significant reduction in cholesterol without use of prescription medication.
For more information, see http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/health/2526891.stm
Purpose in Life Makes Death Easier
What makes it easier to let go on the deathbed is not so much a faith in God or an afterlife, but the feeling that one has accomplished something in life, or having found a purpose and meaning in life, according to a study conducted at Fordham University.
In this study, conducted by psychologist Colleen McClain and associates, 241 patients with less than three months to live were interviewed. Those who found little meaning in their lives were more depressed and more likely to want to “get it over with.”
For more information, go to www.usatoday.com/news/health/2003-03-10-meaning-in-life_x.htm
Happy People Live Longer
Heart patients who are happy are much more likely to be alive ten years down the road than unhappy heart patients, according to a study conducted at the Duke University Medical Center. According to the lead investigator, Beverly Brummett, the experience of joy seems a key factor. It has physical consequences and also attracts other people, making it easier for the patient to receive emotional support. Unhappy people, besides suffering from the biochemical effects of their sour moods, also are less likely to take their medicines, eat healthily or to exercise. The depression has worse consequences than the heart disease itself.
For the complete story, go see www.usatoday.com/news/health/2003-03-04-happy_x.htm
Self-Control Can be Exhausting
To stop yourself from unhealthy habits takes energy. Will power seems not so much to be a skill nor a logical process, but rather is an exhaustible resource that can be depleted with use or refilled through rest.
In a study conducted by Roy Baumeister, a social psychologist at Florida State University and published in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, students received exercises designed to tax their self-control. One such task was to inhibit all thoughts of a white bear, a difficult exercise in mind control once the thought has been introduced. Students in the control group simply sat still and allowed their minds to wander freely. Afterwards, when they were given puzzles to solve. The students who had been exercising mind control gave up on these puzzles much more quickly than the control students.
Hugs Protect the Heart
Handholding and hugging may protect the heart from the adverse effects of stress, according to some research conducted at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, School of Medicine.
Having to speak in public about a recent stressful event normally raises blood pressure and drives up heart rate. In this research, however, some participants were encouraged to hug and hold hands with their significant other prior to being asked to make their public statement, while participants in the control group simply sat quietly alone before receiving their instructions for telling their tales of woe. The results showed that the period of public complaining caused the blood pressure to climb radically in the control group, more than twice that of those who got a hug first. The heart rate of the control group increased by twice as much as that of those who received hugs.
Another study showed that receiving touch lowers stress hormones, but that hugs from loved ones are much more effective than hugs from friends.
For the complete story, go to www.usatoday.com/news/health/2003-03-09-hug-usat_x.htm
Is Someone Staring at You?
At least seventy per cent of the population have sensed when they were being look at from behind, and were correct. That factoid is a core finding obtained by Rupert Sheldrake who studied more than 4000 case histories and interviewed more than 1500 people on the phone for his new book, The sense of being stared at: And other aspects of the extended mind (Crown Publishing).
Sheldrake proposes that the mind does not exist only in the brain, but exists in expanded form throughout all of space, in its own domain, which he calls “the morphic field.” It was his research that led to the popularization of the “hundredth monkey” tale, as his research suggests that when enough people are harboring the same idea, it becomes easier for other people to come up with the same idea.
Graphic Novel Depicts Cayce’s ESP
In a move to attract young people to the idealism of Edgar Cayce in regard to consciousness research, a special project to create an Edgar Cayce “comic book” on ESP has reached its first milestone in its experimental production. The experiment involves a collaboration between Atlantic University faculty member Henry Reed and student Kumiko Sakurai Foster, whose connection with the Edgar Cayce Center of Japan located a Japanese professional “manga” artist, Miyuki Kaneko. “Manga” is the name the Japanese give to their comic books, which are highly popular and influential in Japan. Professor Reed provided a core text of Cayce’s ideas on ESP, together with tales of modern ESP research, and a storyboard to suggest their visual representation. Mrs. Sakurai Foster provided the translations and Ms. Kaneko created an imaginary story about a university where consciousness and ESP are explored and drew the evocative graphics.
The completion of the first, experimental chapter, may be viewed at www.creativespirit.net/manga