Defensive Eh? Not a Problem

Just as surely as you have a physical immune system, the good news is, you have a psychic immune system.

You are carrying about a virtual edifice of stored functions, adaptive strategies, and defensive maneuvers that are continuously in play in, for want of a better word, your mind or your psyche.

Let’s consider for a moment the popular conception of ‘defensiveness.’ It has a negative connotation. Are we to be without defenses? I think not.

There is another popular conception. Let’s call it the ‘are you out of your mind?’ conception. Are we ever ‘out’ of our minds? Yes. Can we ‘lose’ our mind? Yes. In an earlier, pre-medicalized phase of the development of psychological theory , people, some might say had ‘lost their minds,’ were said to have had nervous breakdowns.

Would it surprise you to know that when people were found to have had a ‘nervous breakdown,’ they might have gone away for about three months and returned home refreshed and quite themselves? True. To read more about this, I refer you to a wonderful book by journalist, Robert Whittaker, Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine, and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill.

You bet we need our defenses. We carry about a phenomenal mind system that, like any system, needs mechanisms to ensure it’s well being and functionality. So, the next time someone says to you, ‘you’re being defensive,’ I suggest you reply, ‘yes, and the problem is what?’

Materialism and Nonmaterialism

Materialist science examines, works with and manipulates measurable things. It could be said to work with what you can hold in the palm of your hand but for those little things called atoms, electrons and the like that are small but measurable.

Nonmaterialist science considers things that are in play but can neither be examined nor held in the palm of your hand.

We could speak of things spiritual or things quantum at this point but I prefer to speak about information, particularly, thoughts, assumptions, conclusions drawn and the like, in other words, the stuff of mind.

An interesting thing happens when we explore the nature of minds and our own mind in particular. We come to see that it is uniquely positioned at the intersection of the material and non material world . It’s wherewithal to help us knows no bounds. At Phenomenal Mind we will explore the nature of mind and learn to work with it, not against it.

Working with it requires a homeopathic attitude. It requires a holistic point of view. Opportunities for us to learn are abundant. Opportunities for us to heal are abundant. Indeed, we can ‘right ourselves in the event of imbalance.’