Miracles and Why We’re Reluctant to Own them

A miracle suggests divine intervention in human affairs.

Many of us tend to think that believing in miracles is unscientific. But it is science that has proved the existence of miracles, and it is because of a miracle, that we humans live and breathe on planet Earth

Fred Hoyle (2015-2001), the atheist-turned-agnostic astronomer, is responsible for coining the term the Big Bang, the explosion that created the universe.  Hoyle’s data revealed that the highly ordered event could not have occurred by random chance. His atheism was “greatly shaken” at these developments and he said, “A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a super-intellect has monkey-ed with physics.”  In spite of his observations, he remained an agnostic, a skeptic, who resisted the idea that the entire universe had been created de novo; instead he held on to a limited notion that only stars had been created from nothing.

Other scientists, according to an article by Eric Metaxas in the Wall Street Journal,  believe that the evidence of God’s existence may be irrefutable. The theoretical physicist Paul Davies has said that “the appearance of design is overwhelming,” and Oxford professor Dr. John Lennox said “the more we get to know about our universe, the more the hypothesis that there is a Creator . . . gains in credibility as the best explanation of why we are here.”

The writer C.S. Lewis, who, influenced by his friend  J.R.R.Tolkien, changed from an atheist to a Christian, explained that a miracle is something unique that breaks a pattern so expected and established we hardly consider that it could be broken.  In his 1947 Miracles, he wrote, “Men became scientific because they expected law in nature and they expected law in nature because they believed in a lawgiver.” That is why most of the great founding fathers of modern science believed in an order. Scientists, a few of which include Galileo (astronomy), Newton (calculus), Mendel (genetics) and Einstein (physics), were convinced that an order existed and pursued the search for it.   In essence, science is the discovery or clarification of an order that reveals God in nature.

In a New York Times article, Dr. Jacalyn Duffin, a physician and author of Medical Miracles andMedical Saints, summarized her experience with miracles. As a physician, she was asked by an ecclesiastical tribunal to review a slide of a blood sample. Only after she read the slide was she told that the specimen belonged to a woman she had treated many years ago for a fatal illness. The patient had recovered after praying to Marie-Marguerite d’Youville (1701-77),  the founder of the Order of Sisters of Charity of Montreal and a candidate to become the first Canadian-born saint. When  Duffin affirmed that the patient’s recovery could not be explained by science, but indeed transcended scientific understanding, it was declared a miracle and d’Youville achieved sainthood.

Curious about miracles after this experience, Dr. Duffin spent hours in the Vatican archives, examining more than 1400 miracle investigations from 1588 and 1999. She discovered that opinions of doctors detailing treatment and testimony was a critical part of the canonization process. Medicine is regarded as a manifestation of God’s work on earth. To be declared a miracle, a person has to be sick and dying in spite of having received treatment.

Dr. Duffin notes the parallels between medicine and religion. Both systems are based on evolving beliefs. Medicine is rooted in natural explanations and causes while religion is defined by the supernatural and the possibility of transcendence. Both address our plight as suffering mortals. Medicine helps to postpone death and relieve symptoms, while religion attempts to console us and reconcile us to pain and loss.

Given that miracles exist then, why are many of us skeptical or resistant? I think we fear that we have something to loose-- that we’ll be judged or have to give up a sense of control or power or free will. In actual fact, as Dr. Duffin substantiates, we have something to gain-two avenues instead of one- to heal and ease pain and suffering.  If we open ourselves to the healing of medicine, prayer and miracles, we may be more likely to be healed.

In my next blog, I’ll discuss how by observing nature’s laws in our daily lives, we can open ourselves to miracles.

Conclusion:  Although miracles may not be an everyday occurrence, we benefit from keeping an open mind toward the phenomenon of the mysterious, inexplicable aspect of human reality.

Dear Reader, I welcome your comments. jsimon145@gmail.com

How We Defend Against Death (from Ebenezer Scrooge to Eleanor Roosevelt)

Nature is cruel indeed.  We’re created with the capacity to develop huge egos and accomplish great feats. Then ultimately we lose our entire being. In spite of our capacity to alter nature (test-tube babies are now common), we are subject to some of Nature’s eternal laws. Bodily deterioration is one, immutable reality. Walt Disney may have hoped to have his cryo-frozen body return to life when technology advanced.  But as of this date, no one has come back from the apparently final, inert state.  

About the clutches of the grim reaper, the comedian George Carlin joked, “It’s definitely on your schedule.” Humor is one good defense. Some defenses against death, like humor are helpful, while others, like denial, have been portrayed as destructive. According to cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker,  denial culminates in wars. In his 1973 Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Denial of Death, Becker describes how dualism (the division between body and symbol), coupled with our refusal to accept the body’s demise, causes us to concoct heroic belief systems. He proposes that the conflict between one belief system and another leads to wars.

In this election cycle, it’s important to note that we are vulnerable to leaders who motivate by means of harnessing belief systems to fight for a cause.

Becker suggested that creative people manage to integrate the dualism through means of their creative projects. In essence, life can be viewed as a creative project in which each of us has the potential to participate.  In other words, heroism is embodied in everyday life. Through our good deeds to help others, we make the world a better place and create positive memories. Memories are the symbol through which we live on (in others’ minds) after we die.

In A Christmas Carol, the 1843 novella by Charles Dickens, Scrooge is haunted by the Ghosts of Christmas (past, present and future). These spirits awaken in him an awareness of death that transforms him from a bitter and miserly man into a generous one. By giving to others, he experiences the joy that had been missing in his life. After his death he will be remembered for enhancing others’ lives.

In her 1940 book, The Moral Basis of Democracy, Eleanor Roosevelt encourages us to prioritize the well-being of others and to choose love and faith over hatred and fear. Living by her tenets creates positive memories of our lives.

If we follow Becker’s thinking, an awareness of death, coupled with the idea that we live on in symbols of good memories, can help us accept death and create peace in our world.

Conclusion: Acknowledging the dualism between body and symbol in an awareness of death motivates us to live life to its fullest and to heal the world.

Dear Reader, I welcome your thoughts.

jsimon145@gmail.com

Identity in A Hall of Mirrors

Mirror neurons were discovered by the Italian neurophysiologist- researcher Dr. Rizzolatti in the 1980’s. Regarded as one of the most important findings in the last few decades, the mirror neurons confer the ability to recognize our reflections in the mirror, and are integral to our sense of self.

The finding explains much of early child development and good-enough parenting.  When children’s interests and talents are perceived accurately and ‘mirrored’ with encouragement and support, they develop a positive sense of real self.

The child psychiatrist Dr. Daniel Stern, observed and wrote about the dynamics of the parent-child interaction in his classic text, The Interpersonal World ofthe Infant. He describes the process occurs in which parents or primary care-takers reflect back to the developing child their perceptions of him, similar to an image in the mirror. When the caretakers’ reflections are in tune with the child, he develops a genuine or real sense of self.

 A mother who is tuned into her child night say,

“You seem sad today.  Perhaps it’s because you can’t visit your friend?”

A parent who fails to mirror, dismisses the importance of his feelings, and might say,

“Oh don’t be silly. You’ll see your friend another time. “

In essence each of us walks through a Hall of Mirrors in life. People reflect various images/pictures of how they perceive us. When we possess a genuine sense of ourselves, we (unconsciously) integrate these diverse perceptions and absorb the positive, realistic images.

Maestro, a play currently running at 59E59th Street theatre is a musical rendition of the life of genius composer/conductor Leonard Bernstein. His childhood was wrought with difficulty, because his father failed to recognize his son’s musical gifts. Instead, the older Bernstein projected his own fears of financial disaster upon young Leonard.

 As a result, Leonard was forced to fend for himself, work at an early age to earn money to pursue his training.  Lacking  paternal understanding, Bernstein searched for acceptance and love, first from mentors, and later through a series of  (indiscriminate) relationships with men.

Performer Hersey Felder brilliantly portrays Leonard, who in later life, regretted that he didn’t invest more time and energy to composing.

We can hypothesize that if Bernstein’s father had been able to mirror, to perceive his son’s gifts instead of projecting his own personal fears, the composer would have been able to focus more attention on composing.

Conclusion: To the extent that we are mirrored, encouraged and acknowledged for our achievements and our creative pursuits, we are unified within ourselves. To the degree that we are perceived through a distorted mirror, we are torn asunder and may search for approval at a cost to our real self and creativity.

Dear Reader, I look forward to your responses.

Friendship and Our Vagus Nerve

We don’t often think that the nature of our friendships has a profound  or major impact on our health and well-being. But a recent New York Times, article by journalist Kate Murphy cites recent research to support that loneliness is detrimental to our health. As we know, the antidote to loneliness lies in the bonds of friendship.

Research links friendship with the tenth cranial nerve, the longest one, known as the ‘vagus’ (“wandering” in Latin) for its meandering course through the body—from the brain, through the chest and abdomen. This nerve is largely responsible for our behavior to fight or take flight or freeze in response to stress, which in turn, affects the rate of respirations and heart beats per minute and the amount of gastric juice secreted by the stomach.

  

Research shows that the tone of the vagus nerve has been connected to longevity. If we don’t relax, the tenth nerve loses its tone. Authentic friendship keeps the wanderer in shape, while loneliness has been equated with effects as detrimental to our health as obesity or an addiction to alcohol or cigarettes. Therefore, working on obstacles to friendship may be as important as exercising in the gym.

In this day of Facebook a person puts forth a public image. Real friends accept us beneath the image, for our genuine self. But friendship isn’t always easy, especially if we’re not good enough friends to ourselves. If we’ve grown up in an abusive environment of any kind, physical or psychological, we may find people who, in some way, replicate this maltreatment. We have to learn to view and accept ourselves as well as our friends for foibles and vulnerabilities.

Friendship is a two-way street.  A solid relationship creates a safe space for both people. Friends are open to learning about each other, but also open to learning about themselves. They’re able to accept criticism offered in a constructive and caring way and be open to changing their behaviors.

We may assume that friendship flows like water, but like boulders in a natural spring, friendship can hit tough spots. These require effort to navigate. Sometimes a therapist’s tools come in handy.

 

A favorite therapeutic tool is the “holding environment.” In this situation, a therapist  listens with acceptance, sympathy and empathy. Other times confrontation (in a caring way) is indicated to communicate that a person’s words or actions impact negatively on another.  For example, many years ago my brother Bob pulled me aside at a family gathering and said, “Do you realize you always go for a person’s Achilles heel?” Because I knew he cared, I was able to hear his criticism and to change my behavior.

Conclusion: Friendship is linked to the vagus nerve, which innervates many organs, and is vital to our health and sense of well-being.

Dear Reader, I look forward to hearing your response.

  jsimon145@gmail.com

The Gift of Grit (with Gratitude to Angela Duckworth)

When she was a school teacher, Angela Duckworth observed that some of her students performed better than would have been expected based on the results of their IQ test. She noted that they were motivated, passionate and persevered to achieve a goal in spite of difficulties,

Spurred on by her observations, she became a psychologist and devoted her studies to the subject of grit—a term that refers to an individual’s effort, passion and perseverance in achieving a long term goal.

(Duckworth credits her predecessors, including William James, Erik Erikson, and Aristotle, who recognized the value of tenacity.)

Duckworth presented a TED talk, received a MacArthur fellowship in 2013, and her book , GRIT: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, was published this year.  This New York Times best seller details her studies that extend from West Point Cadets to salespeople to students to show that grit supersedes IQ and the Big Five personality traits (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism) in explaining who accomplishes their goals and derives satisfaction from their lives.

She concludes that aptitude tests can get a lot wrong and intelligence leaves a lot unexplained. Some smart people aren’t high achievers, and some achieve a lot without having the highest test scores.

Unlike the relatively stable measure of IQ, grit isn’t a fixed trait but, when nurtured like tomatoes in a well-tended garden, can flourish.

In other words, we can benefit (enhance human potential) by shifting the  (educational) focus from IQ and talent to grit.

Duckworth suggests several ways to increase grit, first from the inside. Following your passion, practicing it, discovering purpose and maintaining hope all enhance grit. Ways to increase grit from the outside include:

1.     Wise parenting—demanding performance within a supportive environment

2.     Finding the playing fields of grit—activities that require discipline and offer support—such as ballet or marathon running.

3.     Finding a gritty culture—a group of people that support grit.  As an example, Duckworth quotes the psychologist, Dan Chambliss, who studied professional swimmers. “The real way to become a great swimmer is to join a great team.”

In my experience, good-enough parents and psychotherapists know how to increase grit in others. It can be summed up simply in one sentence (rephrased from my blog of June 13, 2016). Simple in its dictim and highly intricate in its execution, the goal is to nurture with an open and curious mind and to avoid negative criticism, while homing in and encouraging the individual’s interests and attributes.

We psychotherapists work to uncover the obstacles that interfere with a person’s grit. For example, Ms. O. was raised in a well-meaning family that didn’t understand a child’s needs. She had passion for writing, but her parents demanded she earn a living. Tragically, the emotional pain of  criticism and rejection caused her to turn to drug abuse. In a supportive psychotherapeutic relationship,  she accessed her grit, learned how to stand up to her parents, stop drug use, pursue her writing career, and join a gritty writing group.

In summary, the passion and persistence of grit motivates and carries us over rough seas like a well-made surfboard. We can think of an absence of effort like a crack in our surfboard that needs repair.

Conclusion: Grit predicts performance better than IQ and talent.

Dear Reader, I look forward to your comments. jsimon145@gmail.com

Derailment: What it is and How to Manage it

In the world of psychology, derailment describes thought processes that veer off track, go awry, stray from the thought. Like a car that has skidded off the road, the ideas fail to arrive at their destination. In the realm of politics, derailment refers to a tactic by those in power that deflects attention away from complaints about abuse or wrongdoing by introducing an alternative topic. This blog explores derailment as a diversion from a life goal, and how it’s possible to get back on course.

In his journal, the writer John Cheever alluded to a loss of continuity at a critical point in his life. “It seems that in my coming of age I missed a year—perhaps a day or an hour....The consecutiveness of growth has been damaged. But how can I go back and find this moment that was lost?” Although the impact of Cheever’s derailment extends beyond the scope of this blog, his expression highlights the common problem.

In the newly released movie, Florence Foster Jenkins, the heroine, Florence, contracted syphilis from her first husband. As a result, she didn’t bear children and was deprived of a fulfilling family life. That derailment led her to devote her life to singing and supporting the musical world with the fortune she inherited from her father.

We assume an extreme diversion is equivalent to a disaster, but the event may actually represent a chance to recover a “lost” direction or passion. The classic story of The Little Prince (recently made into a popular movie) can be viewed as a metaphorical derailment in the realm of literature. As a young boy, the protagonist of the story drew a boa constrictor swallowing an elephant. But the adults insisted that the drawing resembled a hat. Unimpressed with the child’s skill, the grown-ups redirected him from artistic to practical studies— geography, history, arithmetic, and grammar. “That is why I abandoned, at the age of six, a magnificent career as an artist,” the protagonist says, justifying his profession as a pilot. Years later, his plane crashed in the middle of the desert, and he was visited by a little prince who commanded him to draw. The little prince may well represent the pilot’s imagination or alter ego that harbored his desire to become an artist.

In real life, a patient of mine, Ms. W., experienced a serious depression, a kind of psychological crash. During her hospitalization, she recalled that in her youth, she had aspired to become a singer. In the hospital, she had the opportunity to connect her depression with the long-forgotten ambition. Upon her recovery, she studied voice and became a successful musician.

Conclusion: Although we can’t undo the past, we can recognize a derailment and take action to get back on track.

Dear Reader, I welcome your input. jsimon145@gmail.com

Our Curative Breath

“For breath is life, and if you breathe well you will live long on earth.”      Sanskrit proverb.

With the opening of the Olympics in Brazil this week, focusing on the breath is timely.  Without proper use and training their respirations, athletes wouldn’t be able to accomplish their amazing physical feats. On a perhaps less ambitious but no less vital scale, we can become a kind of athlete by paying attention to our everyday breathing.

By the end of reading this blog, you will understand why literally everything depends on the breath. Of course without it, we don’t have life. But we rarely think of the extent to which proper breathing affects our health.

First, a bit about the anatomy of the respiratory system: It consists of the nose (nasal passages), trachea, diaphragm, bronchi and bronchioles all the way down to the tiny air sacs at the base of the lungs. Good-enough breathing depends on using muscles that include the diaphragm, intercostal muscles (between the ribs) and the abdominal muscles.   When we don’t breathe fully we don’t circulate the air down to the alveoli or tiny air sacs.

The two main types of breathing are superficial or chest breathing, which involves the expansion of the chest, and deep or abdominal breathing., which engages the abdomen.

For the most part, breathing is automatic. If it weren’t, the attention we’d have to pay to it would detract from our daily activities. But if breathing is automatic, how can we forget? Yet when the coach asks, “Are you breathing?” we realize that we haven’t been breathing. Instead, we had focused on the exercise and held our breath, a counterproductive, but not uncommon, behavior.

Not infrequently, we hear in the course of an exercise class, the instructor remind us to breathe,  “ Breathe to the bottom of the lobes; she might advise. “That’s where the calmness is.” Obviously good breathing doesn’t come naturally.

Ignoring the mechanics of breathing handicaps us. Disorders of breathing cause physical symptoms. and we rarely realize how simple it is to correct these symptoms. Under stress we tend to hold our breath, which may compromise our body’s ability to stave off disease, helping to explain our tendency to become ill under stressful circumstances.  Common sense suggests that deep breathing enhances the flow of air that prevents bacteria, viruses and fungi from settling in our lungs.

Failure to use our abdominal muscles can cause health problems like poor posture, which leads to problems with balance and the potential to fall.

Abdominal breathing helps us to become aware of the muscles that support our frame.  In addition, we burn more calories when we put our muscles to use. Abdominal breathing involves the large muscles that support the abdominal cavity and utilizes more calories than the shallow breathing that involves the smaller intercostal muscles located between the ribs. One fitness instructor, Jill Johnson, even invented a weight-loss regimen called Oxycise based on breathing from the stomach.

The added benefit for using the breath as exercise is that we don’t need a gym, i a change of clothes or even additional time. We can perform deep breathing while remaining in our seats in a classroom or an office by focusing on our respirations.

We can wake ourselves up by increasing our oxygen level by breathing deeply.  Or conversely, we can put ourselves to sleep with a kind of meditation of shallow breathing, and repeating silently the words to the rhythmic “in” and “out” like a mantra.

When we feel out of control, remembering that we can modulate the breathing has the power to give us an immediate sense of control. Mr. G. treated his flying phobia by focusing on his inhales and exhales. Ms. K. treated her panic attacks, exacerbated by light-headedness resulting from breathing too quickly and over-oxygenating the blood, by breathing in and out of a paper bag.

We may not be aware of our anxious state, but experience chest pain or pressure caused by holding our breath.  If so, inhaling deeply will give relief. (Of course, if the cause is more serious, the discomfort won’t disappear.)

Conclusion: A focus on the breath grants everyone the power to become an athlete and a self-healer.

Dear Reader, I look forward to your comments. jsimon145@gmail.com