Living Zen Remindfully
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Also by James H. Austin Zen-Brain Horizons (2014) Meditating Selflessly (2011) Selfless Insight (2009) Zen-Brain Reflections (2006) Chance, Chase, and Creativity (2003) Zen and the Brain (1998) Living Zen Remindfully Retraining Subconscious Awareness James H. Austin, M.D. The MIT Press Cambridge, Massachusetts London, England © 2016 Massachusetts Institute of Technology All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher. This book was set in Palatino and Frutiger by Toppan Best-set Premedia Limited. Printed and bound in the United States of America. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Austin, James H., 1925– author. Title: Living Zen remindfully : retraining subconscious awareness / James H. Austin, M.D. Description: Cambridge, MA : MIT Press, 2016. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016015015 | ISBN 9780262035088 (hardcover : alk. paper) eISBN 9780262336451 Subjects: LCSH: Meditation—Zen Buddhism. | Awareness—Religious aspects— Zen Buddhism. | Consciousness—Religious aspects—Zen Buddhism. | Zen Buddhism—Psychology. Classification: LCC BQ9288 .A935 2016 | DDC 294.3/4435—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016015015 ePub Version 1.0 In memory of Scott Whiting Austin (1953–2014) To my early teachers Nanrei Kobori-Roshi, Myokyo-ni, and Robert Aitken-Roshi for their inspiration; and to countless others whose contributions to Zen, to Buddhism, and to the brain sciences are reviewed in these pages The Zen Way is a demanding way, but it leads to the depths, to the light of clearly seeing what is when the veil is rent, and to the warmth of the heart that touches and engenders growth. Myokyo-ni (1921–2007)1 The only true law is that which leads to freedom. There is no other. Jonathan Livingston Seagull2 Notes 1. I. Schloegl. The Zen Way (London: Sheldon Press, 1977), 16. 2. R. Bach. Jonathan Livingston Seagull (New York: Macmillan, 1970), 83. The Zen Buddhist Path also has ethical guidelines (shila). Table of Contents Series page Title page Copyright page Dedication Epigraph Preface Acknowledgments By Way of a Personal Introduction Part I On the Path of Meditation 1 Can Meditation Enhance Creative Problem-Solving Skills? A Progress Report 2 In Zen, What Does It Mean “To Be Enlightened”? 3 Developing Traits of Character on the Way to Altruism Part II Implications of a Self–Other Continuum 4 The Self: A Primer 5 Emerging Concepts in Self–Other Relationships 6 Early Distinctions between Self and Other, Focal and Global, Are Coded in the Medial Temporal Lobe Part III Aspects of Memory 7 Remindfulness 8 A Remindful Route through the Nucleus Reuniens 9 A Disorder Called Transient Global Amnesia 10 Remindful Zen: An Auditory “Altar Ego”? 11 Following an Auditory Stimulus, Then “Seeing the Light” 12 Turning 13 Revisiting Kensho, March 1982 Part IV Neurologizing 14 A Mondo in Clinical Neurology 15 Two Key Gyri, a Notable Sulcus, and the Wandering Cranial Nerve 16 Paradox: The Maple Leaf Way Up in Ambient Space 17 The Nitric Oxide Connection 18 “Pop-Out” 19 Keeping Your Eye on the Ball Part V Living Zen 20 What Is Living Zen? 21 Sometimes, Zen Is “For the Birds” 22 Basho, the Haiku Poet 23 Basho’s States of Consciousness 24 Zen and the Daily-Life Incremental Training of Basho’s Attention 25 A Story about Wild Birds, Transformed Attitudes, and a Supervisory Self In Closing Appendix A: Back to Nature: Pausing in Awe Appendix B: Reminders: The Crucial Role of Inhibitory Neurons and Messenger Molecules in Attentional Processing Appendix C: Magnetoencephalography Appendix D: Diffusion-Weighted Imaging Appendix E: Some Newer Methods of fMRI Analysis Appendix F: The Enso on This Cover Appendix G: Word Problems Index List of Tables Table 1.1 Types of Meditation Table 24.1 Bird Citations in Basho’s Haiku List of Illustrations Figure 6.1 A hippocampal crossroad and the limbic circuitry. Impulses already undergo much processing on their way down to CA 3 cells (bottom square). From CA 3 cells, they are shunted on to CA 1 cells, next to the subiculum, and then relay to the mammillary body of the hypothalamus via the mammillothalmic tract (MTT). From the anterior thalamic nucleus impulses flow up to the cingulate gyrus and then back down to the entorhinal cortex of the parahippocampal gyrus. From there, they enter the dentate gyrus of the hippocampal formation via the perforant path (P. PATH) and relay on to the hippocampal CA 3 cells. This completes the Papez circuit, shown in thicker black arrows. The CA 3 cells also send off a second branch. This path leads through the lateral septum on to the mediodorsal nucleus of the thalamus and thence up to the orbitofrontal cortex. Axons called mossy fibers relay impulses from granule cells to CA 3 cells. Many axons of the perforant path release glutamate, an excitatory amino acid (appendix B). The arrows shown on this and the next wiring diagrams are oversimplifications. Sometimes the situation is more reminiscent of a haystack. Countless pathways go in many—and frequently reciprocal—directions. The diagram is therefore highly selective and schematic. (Adapted and modified from multiple sources.) Figure 6.2 Two pathways from the parahippocampus into the hippocampus via the perirhinal and entorhinal cortex: A schematic overview. Much of this figure is based on Knierim et al. (n.1) and on box 2 of Moser et al. (n.4). Many other pathways leading into and out of these regions cannot be included in so simple a diagram (n.10). Moreover, the lateral and the medial entorhinal systems differ in other ways. For example, the LEC innervates the outer third of the molecular layer of the dentate gyrus. The MEC innervates the middle third. †In humans, the perirhinal cortex is heavily interconnected with the amygdala, the ventral temporopolar cortex, and the lateral orbitofrontal cortex (see n.12). Its activations correlate both with our sense of familiarity and with our learning of meaningful associations about objects, including their affective and motivational significance. ††In rats, the postrhinal cortex responds to scenes in a manner similar to the ways our parahippocampal gyrus responds to scenes. Figure 15.1 A basal view of the left hemisphere, emphasizing the temporal lobe. The frontal lobe is at the top. The occipital lobe is at the bottom. Notice that the parahippocampal gyrus leads (imperceptibly) first into the perirhinal cortex and then into the entorhinal cortex as it nears the (hidden) hippocampus. Proceeding from the midline at the left and moving laterally toward the right, the three largest temporal gyri begin with this parahippocampal gyrus. Next in line is the fusiform gyrus, and finally the inferior temporal gyrus. The uncus is a major entry site for the uncinate tract. Its two-way connections link our temporal lobe functions with those of the inferior frontal lobe. In the hypothalamus, the mammillary body issues the important tract that connects the hippocampus with the anterior thalamus. The nomenclature follows that in J. Mai, J. Assheuer, and G. Paxinos. Atlas of the Human Brain, 2nd ed. (San Diego, CA: Elsevier, 2004), 92, 121–219. Preface To some persons nowadays, mindfulness might seem to be just another short course. After auditing it for only a few weeks, they could thereafter meditate casually, whenever … This isn’t where Living Zen Remindfully is coming from. Authentic Zen training means committing oneself to a process of regular, ongoing daily life practice. This preparation enables one to unlearn old unfruitful habits, retrain more wholesome ones, and lead a more genuinely creative life. Currently, mindfulness usually means that one is consciously aware of events in the immediate Now, in “the present moment.” Then why will the word, “subconscious” appear so often in these pages? A short answer here leads us back to Sigmund Freud. (A longer explanation is presented elsewhere.1–6) Freud considered that our mind’s conscious compartment was only the small visible tip of a large iceberg. Barely “one-seventh of its bulk” could be seen floating above water. Therefore, most of our brain’s activities—those other six-sevenths—were submerged, out of sight. Similar comparisons captured public attention after an iceberg sank the Titanic in 1912. Then, eight-ninths or even nine-tenths became common estimates for how much lurked in our subconscious mind. There, its hidden potentials often seemed readier to access our worst behavior, not our best. This book extends some original implications of mindfulness. It explores the many positive, helpful subconscious aspects of remindfulness. It suggests ways that long-term meditative retraining can help cultivate hidden, affirmative resources of our subconscious memories. Accessing these subtle processes of transformation can enable us to adapt more effectively and to live more authentic lives. To these goals, part I reviews different types of meditation and briefly discusses what enlightenment means. It then considers how long-term meditative retraining influences creativity and sponsors the development of character. Part II addresses the fundamental biological distinction: Self/other. We’re reminded that certain nerve cells in the medial temporal lobe are already sensitive not only to such contrasts as being Self-centered (egocentric) or being other-centered (allocentric) but also to the different ways we blend our focal and global attention. Part III reviews the remarkable processes that first encode our memories, then store them, and later retrieve them. It focuses more on those covert, helpful remindful processes that have been incubating problems at subconscious levels, less on situations that we remain all too Self-consciously aware of. Part IV takes off from there. It considers why ancient aspects of Zen, thorny issues in clinical neurology, and concepts at the cusp of neuroscience research have already become topics that are mutually illuminating.