Right brain processing: A stroke of insight to the soul

May 27, 6:12 PMNew Thought ExaminerAlex Marcoux

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Before I was a writer, I was a scientist. As a scientist I had become accustomed to process information using left-brain reasoning. It took a life altering event for me to start thinking differently, that is, to process information with more of my right brain. For Jill Bolte Taylor, Ph.D., it took suffering a stroke to experience right-brain processing which led to the experience of being “one with the universe” and the genesis of her bestselling book, My Stroke of Insight.

In the 1960s, Roger Perry, a psychobiologist discovered people have two distinctly different ways of processing information. Those who process information with the right brain view things more intuitively and look at the whole picture first and then consider the individual details. Whereas those who think with their left brain are more analytical and consider individual components before they piece things together to see the whole picture. Scientists are generally considered more left brained, while artists tend to process information with right-brain reasoning.

As a child, Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor became fascinated by the human brain. Her brother suffered from schizophrenia and she dedicated her career to studying severe mental illnesses.

 As a Harvard-trained neuroanatomist, at 37, Dr. Taylor’s life changed. In 1996, she woke to a horrendous pain behind her left eye, where a blood vessel exploded in the left side of her brain. In the hours that followed, while Dr. Taylor experienced a rare stroke she became aware that the left side of her brain was shutting down. Within hours she lost her ability to read, write, walk and talk.

With the left side of her brain shutting down, she lost left-brain reasoning where logic, analysis, planning, organizing and preparation originate. As a scientist, Dr. Taylor had relied on what she had come to know as the governing side of her brain to direct her thoughts. Without this left-brain function available to her, her mind went silent and her consciousness shifted from her reality; bringing her to a place of peace where she experienced oneness with the Universe, or Nirvana.

While suffering a stroke, a seemingly tragic event, a greater good was realized. This was truly a serendipitous event. While Dr. Taylor faced brain surgery to have a clot removed, then years of recovery, in the end she learned a new way to experience life. As a scientist she had the ability to share with us what happened during her stroke and in her recovery, and she does this in her book, My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey.

Dr. Taylor also shares how she was able to improve her life by consciously using more of her right-brain reasoning. Today she is an artist, author, as well as a scientist. Her book shows how the right brain works, and how we can use it to find inner peace and improve the quality of our lives.

Dr. Taylor is listed as “one of Time magazine's 100 most influential people of 2008.” Her book, My Stroke of Insight, is a New York Times Bestseller and she has been a premiere guest on Oprah. Dr. Taylor will be presenting: My Stroke of Insight on Friday, June 12, 7:00 PM at Mile Hi Church in Lakewood. Listen to this compassionate and dynamic woman talk about how we can ‘tend the garden of our minds’ to maximize our quality of life. Tickets are available online at MileHiChurch.org.

I’m sure it is no accident that this gifted brain scientist suffered a rare type of stroke, and has the know-how to communicate how we can tap our right brain toimprove the quality of our lives. What a gift Dr. Taylor was given, a stroke of insight to her soul, and what an opportunity we have to listen firsthand and learn from this amazing experience. Hope to see you there on June 12 at Mile Hi Church.

Namaste! 
 

If you like this article, perhaps you’d be interested in reading one of my other articles:

• The secret to manifesting your dreams: tilling the soil
  
• The path to enlightenment is paved with baby steps