Energy and Mind/Body/Performance Transformation
by Tim Brunson, PhD
The future of mental health, medicine, and human performance coaching resides in a much better understanding of the role that energy plays in both our demise and our positive transformation. Energy is the only true common denominator that permeates our neurophysiology, our personalities, our thoughts and behavior, and our fears, hopes, and dreams. So whatever the medical protocol, the alphabet acronym used to refer to psychological interventions, or technique that inspires us, somehow energy is involved. Thus it behooves us to understand the nature and function of energy much better as we seek answers to both human maladies and potential.
From the onset, I must clearly state that in this article I most definitely do not intend to take the path into the more idealistic, wishful thinking of New Age advocates. Therefore, I will leave out the more outrageous claims regarding the spirit realm and the more metaphysical. Nevertheless, I must warn even the most ardent self-styled skeptic from prematurely dismissing the incredulous less they overlook the truth. Much of humanity still considers what we Westerners believe to be scientifically valid as mystical. And, in our culture we have frequently looked askance at many concepts that had a rational basis but for which adequate empirical measurement devices had not yet been invented. For instance, many of Albert Einstein's theories immediately come to mind. Too often it is within what we dismiss prematurely as incredulous that we find our future scientific dogma. Unfortunately, frequently in Western culture those who label ideas as scientific or pseudoscience do so not based upon empirical evidence and rationality, but rather on relative popularity and opinions of the cognitively rigid.
Also, I must point out that I have been heavily influenced by my decades-long study of ancient cultures, which have for centuries discussed numerous concepts that have only just been validated by modern science. For instance, Bon-po, the pre-Buddhist religion of Tibet, recognized the primate origin of the human species long before Darwin took his voyage on the Beagle. Likewise, just a few years ago it was discovered that there was painted on a wall inside the temple of a very old African religious group a map of the universe. It contained groupings of stars that have only recently been confirmed by the Hubble Space Telescope. That drawing is centuries old. Therefore, even though I prefer that such findings be validated by the scientifically minded, I welcome the perspectives of these pre-scientific cultures and have not been afraid of exploring how they match contemporary findings.
In order to avoid the cliché, first you must understand the nature of energy. It is simply the ability to get something done. It is often related to everything from group efforts – to include wars and atrocities – to the forces that permeate our universe. It comes in various forms such as light, heat, electromagnetic, chemical, and social. It can be transformed from one type into another – such as light into electromagnetic (e.g. solar energy). This process is called transduction. Basically, our ability to see, which involves converting light into electricity, is an example of transduction, which explains many of our body's functions.
Energy is also organized around various rules, laws, and patterns. For instance, many of the things that we learned in science classes during our education were based upon ideas such as Newton's various laws. While learning to fly helicopters, it was drummed into my head that his principles of energy organization was what made both manned and unmanned flight possible. Many of these laws can also readily be used to explain how both individuals and groups function.
If energy affects every aspect of our lives to include our relationships, the molecular activities of cells and organs, and how we move and think, our understanding of the nature and behavior of energy warrants deeper consideration when it comes to health, happiness, and performance. In addition to classical and even the more recent quantum theories, you should also consider the pattern-related ideas that have been promoted both by the famous inventor Ray Kurzweil and in my previous writings. Thus concepts such as wave theory, entanglement, observation, pattern organization and harmonization, transduction, and movement should be superimposed over the medical, mental health, and other less pathological-oriented aspects of human endeavors. Once that is done, you will be amazed at the picture that emerges.
By the way, the application of energy ideas to psychology is not entirely new. In addition to his addictions and personal perversions, mental health giant Sigmund Freud was very much influenced by energy concepts. His psychodynamic theory, which was the basis of psychoanalysis, was heavily influenced by the idea of thermodynamics. There is a direct correlation between Freud's ideas and those of equilibrium and entropy. Likewise, as a student pilot, I constantly noticed that metaphors regarding helicopter stability and movement were related directly to my experiences in human dynamics.
Although energy comes in many forms, at this point I want to compare human existence back to the more mundane phenomena of electromagnetism. That is, when our cells function – to include the aggregate activities of our organs and neural substrates – there is a constant flux in our electromagnetic organization. This can be easily detected by commonly used medical devices such as MRIs, EKGs, EEGs, etc. In fact, in most modern hospitals, just about all testing and monitoring involve some type of energy awareness device. Therefore, the reality that our neurophysiology can be monitored energy-wise constitutes a de facto recognition of our essential energy nature.
Let's now expand this to the realm of our thoughts and behaviors. Over the years I have read countless studies where medical energy-related equipment was used to study how a patient's neurophysiological energy organization was modified when various thoughts and behaviors changed. Just speaking of the brain, we routinely monitor neural substrate activation, idling, and inactivation while patients are having various thoughts to include empathy, compassion, and risk. Also, we have studied the impact various behavior patterns have on the development of individual or collections of substrates, which again have energy manipulation ramifications. Add to this research conducted in Australia during which behavior change and artistic capabilities were related to the use of transcranial magnetic stimulation as a tool to inhibit the energy functioning of a specific neural substrate. Thus much of our understanding of our brains can be described in the language of energy concepts. Likewise, this can be extended to the rest of our physiology as when electromagnetic energy is changed in the brain, there is always a corresponding effect on our body.
Again, this is not something that is entirely new. Those who study neurofeedback know that intentionally changing thought patterns will alter substrate activation patterns to include controlling predominant brain wave patterns. And, biofeedback technicians have always known that thoughts and biological responses are very closely related.
The core idea here is that energy is the language with which the various components of our mind and body encode and communicate. And, the corollary is that energy functions can be significantly changed by our thoughts. As such, as humans we have an innate capability to alter how this coding and communication takes place. In fact, counseling theories such as the popular Cognitive Behavior Therapy – whether it is recognized or not – are based upon this theorem. The typical CBT intervention is little more than an effort to re-harmonize energy patterns through the use of intention. Other techniques, to include the more manipulative NLP, EMDR and EFT (i.e. Emotional Freedom Technique), are likewise designed to disrupt and reorganize energy patterns so that they have the opportunity to return to a more harmonious state. Again, let's take this a step further. I've already mentioned that the popular and seemingly extremely efficacious CBT is essentially a set of energy-manipulation tools. And, I mentioned that it is primarily based upon changing the subject's intention. This act involves the use of the brain's simulation and anticipation function, which is for the most part centered in the right prefrontal cortex just above a person's right eye. By suggesting that a person anticipate a different meaning and then simulate alternate consequences, provided that the suggestion is adequately antithetical so that resistance to change is overwhelmed, corresponding entrainments and energetic rebalancing occur throughout brain and body. For the most part this can be measured not only with behavioral changes. There should also be a consequential reorganization of the subject's neurophysiological use of energy and even an alteration of the secretion of hormones, neuropeptides, etc. This cascading effect started with a communicated suggestion that coincided with an alteration of energy organization.
Incidentally, the ability for a person to embark on such a transformational journey has a lot to do with the mollification of the brain's natural tendency to maintain stability and resist conflicting suggestions – even when they are to the subject's benefit. Once that resistance is reduced, there is an enhanced capability for the new thoughts to function more efficiently. The process that I just described is by definition called hypnosis. The goal is to achieve the desired change by helping the subject to more efficiently incorporate suggestions – to include the use of imagination in the forms of metaphors and analogies. Thus, hypnosis is the process that allows for selective thinking to be more effective and efficient. (Note that I am leaving out the less accurate and marginally valid definitions of hypnosis, which center upon the subconscious mind, trance creation, and focused awareness.)
At this point I hope that the reader is starting to connect the dots. Not only is the universe essentially comprised of various forms of energy, which in turn behave according to very distinct rules, our ability to selectively think not only results in the building of pyramids, putting people on the moon, and will eventually help us find a cure for cancer, it also changes the organization of our internal energy and thus affects our entire neurophysiology. When we change our thinking – to include making it more efficient – we affect both our internal and external universe. While the medical profession is rife with approved and proven protocols and mental health folks apply their litany of acceptable counseling techniques, what they are often missing is the realization that the core foundation of their fields can be found in a better understanding of the role of energy. And, the most unappreciated aspect is the central role and vast potential of intentional thought. Not only can a person change their behavior patterns, time and time again, we are surprised when a thought is related to somatic healing as well.
The fundamental ideas here are that our entire universe can be understood in terms of the organization and behavior of energy and that thought manipulation changes energy organization – whether we realize it or not. What if, then, we decided to intentionally change our behavior, our neurophysiology, and our universe by specifically varying our thoughts? And, what if we intentionally decided to change how our body's energy is organized as a way to alter our physiology, our cognitions, and our behavior? Although at first these hypotheses may seem to be something more appropriate for comic books, they are not as far fetched as they may at first seem. They are clearly supported both rationally and by tons of empirical research that has been conducted by mainstream universities and hospitals. Rather than first considering something as trite and mundane (and commonly used by CBT practitioners) as change-thoughts-change-behaviors, I am addressing the concept of using thoughts to specifically change and manipulate energy and then in turn change our behavior – and our physiology. It achieves the same results but does so more efficiently as it cuts out the middleman. Again, to a large extent, when you look at the currently acceptable medical and mental health practices, we are already in the business of affecting change through manipulating energy. Yet, we are doing so very sloppily.
As I pointed out before, in coming up with these conclusions, I have been influenced by my study of ancient religions. More specifically, as a novice I was introduced to some of the higher level tantric practices of Vajrayana Buddhism. This was done during instruction received directly from the Dalai Lama, the abbots of several Tibetan monasteries, and other learned teachers. (Incidentally, by tantric I am referring to the concept of continuum of consciousness rather than the Hindu use of the term which refers to sexual practices.) Once a practitioner has achieved a relatively effective ability to stabilize their consciousness, in two stages they are taught to focus directly on controlling various energy flows within their mind and body. The goal of such practice is to attain a certain purity of consciousness. By the way, the precondition of thought stability has numerous benefits. Currently, in the world of the mental health practitioner, there is a fascination with the concept of mindfulness. Essentially, this is the same thing as the stability that I just mentioned. Note that while mindfulness has its own set of benefits, it is to a large extent only an initial step to a wider range of more advanced practices, which include analytical meditation during which an idea is exhaustively explored and the energy manipulation practices that I just mentioned.
One of the beneficial side effects of these practices is that it enhances mental capabilities. Over the years I have met several adept practitioners who very humbly mentioned various extraordinary somatic control and mnemonic capabilities. Add to this the studies by Harvard Medical School's Dr. Herbert Benson, who documented the thought-based heat generation capabilities of monks who used gTomo meditation techniques as they quickly dried out the wet sheets they were wearing in caves where the temperature was way below freezing. This should not be surprising as recent research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Medical School and at other universities have discovered that life-long meditators have somehow altered their Recticular Activating System and as well as attentional-related parts of the prefrontal cortex of their brain. Therefore, the act of specific energy thought manipulation can enhance brain function, which is not a very novel idea. As such, intentional thought manipulation not only affects current energy organization – and related behavioral attributes – it also can affect our future capabilities and further our subsequent potential to continue along this evolutionary path.
Core to this connect-the-dots analysis has been my experience as a clinical hypnotherapist, who has been trained in the full spectrum of hypnotic skills ranging from classical and direct to the more conversational and permissive ones. Add to that my role as a Neuro Linguistic Programming trainer. Then superimpose my enthusiastic involvement in integrative mind/body medicine, energy psychology and medicine, and pain management. Mix all of this with a few decades as a practicing clinician and my successful efforts involving two doctoral programs in my field. The result of this intellectual stew has come forth in the new ideas that I have labeled as Advanced Neuro-Noetic Hypnosis or ANNH for short.
In many ways ANNH itself is not entirely new. The starting requirement of becoming an ANNH certificant is to master the full spectrum of traditional direct and permissive hypnosis skills. As the goal of hypnosis is to make selective thinking more efficient, it is vital that the practitioner have a comprehensive set of skills rather than limiting oneself to a very narrow range of capabilities – which apparently is a popular tendency among numerous hypnotherapy-appreciating mental health practitioners. However, to stop there means that the practitioner's skills would be somewhat limited to techniques, which were developed just after the middle of the last century. Therefore, updating one's ability as a hypnotic operator must also incorporate more recent mind/body concepts, findings in neurology, and artificial intelligence mind modeling concepts.
Once comprehensive hypnosis skills are appropriately updated, the journey is far from over. There are two other dimensions that must be added. Those have to do with space/time considerations and ultimately the incorporation of energy-based therapy. The importance of space/time issues should not be surprising. Since the days of Freudian psychoanalysis there has been recognition that a subject's current mental state and behavior could be affected by a historical sensitizing event. Therefore, a standard practice in psychotherapy and hypnotherapy included regressing the subject back to that event so that they could be desensitized to the negative effects of that memory. There are even those who insist that the event may have been during a previous life and believe that it is possible to regress the subject back to that point.
The incorporation of space/time concepts into ANNH is somewhat different than the Freudian concept as it is not a regression-oriented approach. Instead, it looks at space and time more from the perspective of Einstein's ideas, quantum physics, and theoretical physics and mathematics. I must admit that this is a stretch for many of our students. However, not only are the underlying concepts extremely well researched and vetted, many of the inventions that are so common in our lives are based upon these ideas. Among others, they include cell phones and Global Positioning Systems.
In regards to energy-oriented therapy, based upon what I have already shared, the ANNH approach regarding energy visualization and manipulation should not be surprising. Like the Vajrayana stance that an energy practitioner must be adequately rooted in mind stabilization, our presumption is that both the practitioner and the subject must be adequately experienced in thought stabilization. From that point, the goal is to introduce the subject to a set of practices, which allows them to imagine the manipulation of energy. (Incidentally, although one's imagination is used in these exercises, the neurological and physiological evidence related to these mental activities can readily be measured by equipment used in just about any Western world hospital or clinic.) The intention of these energy-manipulation-through-hypnosis techniques is to greatly enhance self-efficacy and self-empowerment while directly creating measurable neurophysiological transformations.
As the wide range of ANNH techniques are equally applicable to a broad variety of applications, it should be always remembered that these are process-oriented tools that should only be used only by qualified and properly credentialed practitioners. ANNH is much like providing a surgeon a much more advanced cutting device (i.e. a laser versus a scalpel). Just because someone is adept in using ANNH techniques does not mean that they should use them in situations, which require specific qualifications and licensure. Many of the applications involve the assumption that the practitioner is qualified to address the presenting problem. Thus, when this involves a medical situation, ANNH can assist with diagnosis and healing. However, it should only be used by qualified medical personnel. With mental health issues, ANNH can greatly enhance the use of most counseling techniques. But, a practitioner should never use their advanced skills in such cases unless they are properly trained, experienced, and licensed. When it comes to performance coaching, while licensure and certification may not be an issue, the use of ANNH by a competent coach, who is affiliated with formal associations, will most likely produce the best results with appropriate clients.
Energy-based therapy and coaching performed by a competent practitioner will most likely become the future of human transformation. I anticipate that resistance to this way of thinking will result in slow acceptance in the wider medical, mental health, and coaching communities. As with any other change of this magnitude, such acceptance will face tremendous opposition. This has always been true with the advent of novel ways of thinking. Those whose personal and professional identities are mostly based on old protocols will vigorously (and most likely viciously) oppose this energy-based approach. Many of them will claim that the concept itself is flawed and incredulous. However, this argument will remain weak once someone actually looks into its underlying basis, which includes a tremendous number of fully vetted practices. Rather than being something which is radically new, energy-based ANNH is merely a conceptual paradigm that aggregates numerous previously accepted theories and methods into a more effective, comprehensive approach.
Tim Brunson, PhD, is the founder and Executive Director of The Hypnosis Research Institute and the principle developer of Advanced Neuro-Noetic Hypnosis. He is also the author of hundreds of hours of professional development courses, which are available through the Institute and has authored and produced over 150 self-help and clinical hypnosis CD's, which are available through TimBrunson.com.
Posted: 09/14/2014
