Our fellow Qi-ster Ann reminded me recently of Jill Taylor-Bolte’s wonderful book, My Stroke of Insight. In it the author, a neuroanatomist, describes how she recovered from a massive stroke in her left brain. With her logical left brain somewhat out of the picture, her right brain’s intuitive wisdom had a chance to shine through. One thing she sensed was her need to spend a lot of time sleeping, to give her brain the time it needed to heal. At the time, sleep was not the usual medical protocol for stroke patients, but she knew, instinctively, it was what her brain required to make a full recovery.
This morning, I picked up my copy of the book, looking for a nice, pithy quote about rest, so important for one’s brain health and ability to learn and process memory. (See blog post from 1/5.) Instead, I was drawn to re-read Bolte’s appreciation of the powers inherent in the right hemisphere of our brains. “…the right hemisphere thinks in pictures, and perceives the big picture of the present moment, our left brain thrives on details, details, and more details about those details,” she explains. “To the right mind, no time exists other than the present moment, and each moment is sensation.”
It is also, as she discovered first-hand, the only place we can sense a connection to something greater than ourselves. “Based upon my experience of losing my left mind, I whole-heartedly believe that the feeling of deep inner peace is neurological circuitry located in our right brain,” she wrote. “Knowing that I am part of the cosmic flow makes me feel innately safe and experience my life as heaven on earth. How can I feel vulnerable when I cannot be separated from the greater whole?”
Sound familiar? This is what we play with in Qigong: marrying the linear, detail-oriented skills of training how our bodies move (left brain) with the intuitive, joyful freedom that comes from feeling safely relaxed and supported by the energy residing in present moment(right brain). The more we practice returning to that peaceful, joyful present moment, the stronger those skills become. It helps us become better at locating a sense of spaciousness and possibility within stressful times, whether we’re struggling to balance on one leg, or navigating through the ever-changing chaos of life.
