Why do we have a mindbrain? The simple answer is that it sits between external stimuli and internal responses.
The mindbrain scans the external and internal environments looking for significant changes and arranging for fast reactions and slower and more mindful responses. The short term goal is to stay safe, healthy and alive; the longer term goal is to ensure the presence of your genes in the next generation.
The best known human sense organs are the eyes, ears, nose, tongue and skin but there are also many internal sensors associated with the various life processes – nutrition, respiration, excretion etc. The amount of data gathered by these various sense organs is staggering and could easily overload the unconscious mindbrain. But ways have evolved of filtering the raw data and of generating perceptions and concepts.
At the basic level our sense organs are limited in the range of stimuli to which they can respond eg from the electromagnetic spectrum our eyes respond only to that narrow band called ‘visible’ light. Other species can ‘sense’ types of light and sound that are beyond the human range. Bats use echolocation and some birds can sense the earth’s magnetic fields.
It is wondrous to behold the technical details of how the various types of stimuli impact on the sense organs; and how the sense organs generate electrical signals that pass along sensory nerves to modules in the brain where they are ‘interpreted’ in terms of their ‘meaning’ concerning survival. But we will skip the physics and chemistry here and give thought to the psychological and cultural aspects.
Fresh input from the sense organs is significant when it either (a) flags up a remembered thought/feeling that calls for very fast reaction (eg fight or flight) or (b) presents a new type of situation that needs to be analyzed so that an appropriate response might be made – often, but not always, very quickly. Beware paralysis by analysis!
Neurologists put people in brain scanning machines and asked them first to solve some problems and then to relax and take it easy. The expectation was that there would be less activity during relaxation. But in fact there was very little difference. Even when relaxing in a safe environment the mindbrain keeps churning. This comes as no surprise to meditators who are well aware that the mind has a mind of its own.
‘I’ am subjectively aware that the unconscious is continuously churning facts and feelings and making them into little stories some of which are fleeting inhabitants of the conscious attention centre. I sometimes wonder about the decision rules governing which stories are thrust into consciousness. But I now wonder about such things less often. I have learned to relax self consciousness and to let the unconscious do what it wants to do. The concept of the ‘muse’ comes to mind. Her voice can be most clearly heard when the mindbrain is in non-egoic (self-less) mode.
Many of the pragmatic shakers and movers that I know are restless multi-taskers. Their world is very fluid and opportunistic. They are at home in the rough and tumble of the socio-cultural jungle. They do not have much enthusiasm for philosophy and quiet sitting but they make an obvious difference – at least in the short term. They make things happen. Strictly speaking they may not be multi-taskers but rather serial single-taskers who are good at channel hopping and juggling several plates at the same time. The concept of the ‘muse’ comes to mind again. The busy-ness people may not be aware of her presence.
The muse muses about musing – bemused in a museum!
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