Understanding the Left and Right Brain Dynamics

The brain's division enhances perception, blending left and right functions for deeper understanding.

### Understanding the Left and Right Brain: Debunking Myths and Exploring Perception
* 🧠 The left brain/right brain myth has been debunked by science, revealing that **both hemispheres are active simultaneously** during various processes.
* 🔍 The initial fascination with the idea of **two distinct brain functions** sparked widespread interest, leading to catchy phrases and misconceptions about **left-handedness and creativity**.
* 🎨 A pivotal moment in understanding perception came from art teacher Betty Edwards, who discovered that her students **struggled to draw what they actually saw**, indicating a disconnect between perception and representation.
* 🔄 Edwards' innovative teaching methods, such as turning images upside down, helped her students **engage their right brains**, leading to **improved artistic skills** by focusing on **direct observation**.
* 📚 Mel Christ's work further explores how perception is influenced by the orientation of the brain, emphasizing that **both hemispheres contribute to our understanding of art, poetry, and life**.
* 🐔 The analogy of a chicken illustrates how the divided brain functions, with the **left brain focusing on specific tasks** while the **right brain maintains awareness of the environment**.
* 📖 Recommended readings like "Ways of Attending" and "The Master and His Emissary" delve deeper into these concepts, offering **scientific backing for the integrated functioning of the brain**.
* 🌅 Ultimately, embracing a holistic way of attending to the world can enhance our experiences, allowing us to **appreciate the beauty around us** rather than dissecting it into fragments.

welcome back. On my last video, I had a great comment, a powerfully motivating story. One caveat: actually, science has debunked the left brain/right brain myth. And I really appreciate this comment because it lets me know where some people are at. So, let's talk about the left and right brain. It's absolutely an amazing topic, which I like to explore on this channel over and over again because it has so much in it. So, let's get into [Music] it. First of all, let's make things very easy, very plain, and very simple. Sometimes we get so smart that the smartness gets in the way, and it's good to go back and just remember how did all of this start. And so, you're the doctor, and you're over the cadaver, and you open up the skull, and you look inside, and oh my God, there's a left and a right brain sitting there staring at you. Oh my my God, can you imagine if you're that doctor and you thought, well, there's just one person, therefore there is one brain, and you open it up, and the brain has

divided itself. Oh my God, can you imagine the shock that you would feel? Well, there's two of them. Why? Why is there two of them? And that's the essential question, isn't it? And then science came along, and they said, Well, we think we answered that. Some processes are over here on the left brain, and some processes are over here on the right brain. And the whole world caught fire with this idea. I mean, it was in commercials, it was on TV shows, it was on my t-shirt. I was in the third grade, and I had a t-shirt that said, The left side of the brain is connected to the right side of the body, and the right side of the brain is connected to the left side of the body. Therefore, only those who are using their left hand are in their right mind. Great joke. I'm not even left-handed, but I loved the shirt because it was so fascinating. We all loved it. It was amazing. Now, of course, the scientists were not overly pleased with all of this.

rhetoric right. You guys are not getting it right. You guys are not getting it right. And we've investigated some more, and we find that during all of these processes, we can see that the left brain is lighting up, and the right brain is also lighting up. So, it's being used at the same time. And as the right brain is being lit up, so is the left brain being lit up. Therefore, there's cross-connections going through the brain constantly, and we cannot say you are only using your left brain or you are only using your right brain during any process. And so, that is the so-called debunking of having a left and the right brain. But wait a minute, we opened the brain, and we looked at it, and obviously, there was a left and the right side. So, why did nature do this? The essential question still stands, doesn't it? Now, fast forward a bit, and we have a wonderful school teacher, Betty Edwards, and she's teaching art to her kids. And she puts up a picture of a vase and an

apple and the apple is slightly hidden behind the vase, and all of her kids draw a vase, and then separately they draw an apple. And she gets all of these pictures back, and she says, Kids, why are you drawing them separately, a vase and an apple? Why are you doing that? Can't you see that the apple is behind the vase? Why are you drawing them separately? And all the kids say, Well, I didn't know how to do that. And Miss Edwards doesn't understand how they can say that. You just draw what you see. What do you mean you don't know how to do that? Well, Miss Edwards, I could see the vase, and I could see the apple, and I can draw both of those, but I cannot draw them as I am seeing them. And Miss Edwards realizes, Oh my God, they're not actually looking at what is there for all us spiritualists, right? They're not here, they're not now, they're up in their head, and they are describing to themselves the vase and the apple in their heads. They're not

here looking at the actual scene and drawing what they actually see, and she realizes this is exactly the left and right brain description. And she starts coming up with creative ways to force her kids to actually look and draw what you see. And the one I love the most, she gets a very complicated picture of a man sitting in a chair, and she turns it upside down. And she says, Draw what you see. And they all draw what you can't make sense of it, so you just have to draw the contours and the lines as you actually see them. And they all flip their pictures, and they realize they've done a very good job of imitating exactly that picture. This is something they never would have been able to do before, but now because they're actually here, they're actually now, and they're functioning just a little bit more in what they actually see in the moment. They've become great artists. And so she brings us this amazing book with her methods, with her kids drawing on the right side of the brain. And of course, if you want to argue

with her, you could. For those of us who have struggled with drawing in our lives, it absolutely works. It will teach you to see what is there rather than labeling what you see and drawing the label, which is a left-brain function. Then Along Comes en migil Christ and eigil Christ has realized something quite profound. He says, I love poetry, and I love music, and I love art, and I noticed something very strange about poetry. When I take the whole poem in as one and I enjoy it as it is, I feel all of the meaning in the poem. But as I hunt down and break apart the poem to try and figure out where did that meaning arise, as I break down the poem, all of the meaning automatically evaporates. And this happens without fail. Why is that? Why is it happening that way? I taken the hole and it works. There is meaning. I try to divide it apart and understand why it works that way, and as I divide apart the poem, the meaning automatically evaporates. So he's asking this question.

why does it work that way, and he hunts, and he hunts, and he hunts, and he hunts through science, and what he has given us by his questioning is unparalleled in this realm of the left and the right brain. So, if we are going to catch up with Mel Christ, well, he's given us a mountain to catch up through. And the very first book that I would recommend is Ways of Attending, because this is really a summary of his thoughts, and it's a very easy document to read, rather than some of his other books, which are mountainous. I mean, we're talking Mount Everest here. And so, what he is saying in Ways of Attending is, Look, yes, you are correct. Crosscurrents are going through the brain all of the time, and so it's not that processes are isolated. Of course not. Your brain is very homogeneous, and it's very integrated. And so, as one process is going on over here, things are lighting up over here. And as one process is going on over here, things are lighting up here. So, cross currents

are going through the brain all of the time. Absolutely. But when you are oriented in your left brain, there is a way that you are seeing things, and that will color everything that you perceive. And when you are oriented in your right brain, there is a way that you are seeing things, and again, that will determine all of the outcome of your perception. So, it's not so much an isolated island of a process which is taking place inside of the brain, but rather a way, an attitude of perceiving either the left or the right. And my favorite story from this is the chicken. And so, the chicken again has a divided brain. We find that most mammals have a divided brain. Why is this going on over and over and over again? And he says very plainly, Look, as the animal comes up in evolution, it tends to have a further and further divided brain. So, it has these ways of attending which are more and more divided, which it makes it smarter and smarter and more perceptive. Really fascinating. And so, the chicken

has a divided brain, and the chicken wants to eat the seed, which is down on the ground. So, it looks at it with its right eye. It has to turn its head to the side because the eyes are on the side, so it's so easy to see. I am looking at that seed just with my right eye. Why does it use the right eye? Because it's cross-connected to the left brain, and the left brain zeros in like a predator. And that's our left brain, very practical, very matter-of-fact, down to the brass tax, the point of the spear. That is the left brain. And that chick looks at the seed, and then it pecks at the seed using its left brain. And nature, in M. Gilchrist explains, Nature has provided that the chicken can do this action and yet be protected. So, while this is going on, the right brain is aware of everything going on around it. The right brain is keeping track of everything, and it's a completely different function, right? So, the left brain is pecking away at the seed, and

the right brain is aware of everything simultaneously. Okay, Forest, all of that is great. I need more proof. The master and the Emissary, I.M. Gilchrist, is talking about the master of the right brain and the Emissary of the left brain, and he goes on and on and on and on, proving it to you over and over and over again with study after study after scientific study backing up every inch of what he is saying. Well, that book is quite impressive, but I'm still not convinced. Forest, fantastic read these, The Matter with Things. Oh my God, look at that, The Matter with Things. So, if you are brave enough to get through all of this, The Master and His Emissary and The Matter with Things, if you can get through all of that, then by all means, come back and tell me you're still not convinced. That's great. I totally understand, but for me, I got it right here. Miss Edwards gave me the clue, and I understood, and I will have a link down below for all of these, so if you want to

check them out by all means, and you can feel it. It's so amazing. Go down to the ocean, go down to the beach, go down to the canyon, go down to the forest where it's big and it's open and you can see so far, or go up on the mountain and get that big huge panorama and take it all in. And you sit there in wonder and you take it all in, and it's so amazing. Maybe you just look up at the sky and you take all the clouds, all of the blue, and you take it all in, or all of the ocean. Whatever you can do in your area, take it all in, and then you'll feel it. The left brain will try to reassert itself, and it will say, Oh look, here's a cloud, here's one cloud. Oh look, here's one rock. Oh look, here's one tree. And it will piece apart this huge beautiful panorama. And then you will say, No, no, no, no, wait, and you'll take it all in, and you'll feel your mind stretch.

as you take in that way, that attitude of attending to the world around you, you take it all in because the right brain sees it all as one, but the left brain says, No, no, no, we have to break this down, we have to break it apart and make it easy to assimilate. Here's a beach, here's the sand, here's the sky, here's the rock, here's the water, and pretty soon you lose that huge beautiful expanse which was breaking through your mind and expanding you everywhere, right? You can feel the play go back and forth, and the left brain will pull you down, and the right brain will let you soar, and that's it, that's it. It's a way of attending, and that is of the truth to get us started on understanding what is happening inside of us in deep meditation. That's just enough of the understanding. Now the yogi is going to take it a thousand miles farther than Miss Edwards or Mr. Migil Christ. We're going to take it much, much farther, but that's another story.

isn't it just understanding? It's a way of attending and that nature has divided your brain for a purpose. That's enough to get us started in understanding the left and the right brain. And so when we do a technique like hakala and I take in everything I taste, just a hair of that right brain, and maybe you feel a little bit of that peace settle in on top of you because you're out of the stress, you're out of the division, you're out of the to-do, you're out of the predator-like left brain, that way of attending. You've put it aside for just a moment to embrace something larger, and you can feel that it's not something I need to prove to you. It's something you prove to yourself. So I hope that you love this. If you did, be sure to hit that bell down below so I can see all of you next time.

You Have a Left & Right Brain  - Yogi Explains

Forrest Knutson

The left and right brain concept has been debunked by science, as both sides are used simultaneously and have constant cross-connections.

The idea of a divided brain gained popularity, leading to widespread misconceptions and cultural references.

Despite the debunking, the question of why nature created two brain halves remains unanswered.

Miss Edwards' students struggle to draw a vase and an apple together, as they are mentally separating them instead of observing the actual scene.

She uses creative methods, like turning a complex picture upside down, to force them to draw what they see, leading to their success as artists.

The narrative parallels the experience of en migil Christ, who finds that breaking apart a poem to understand its meaning causes the meaning to evaporate, highlighting the importance of holistic perception.

The Role of Brain Hemispheres in Perception

Mel Christ's work emphasizes the integrated and homogeneous nature of the brain, with crosscurrents constantly influencing processes.

The left and right brain orientations shape perception and behavior, with the left brain focusing on practical tasks and the right brain maintaining awareness of the surroundings.

The example of the chicken illustrates this division, as it uses its right eye to see the seed and its left brain to peck at it, while the right brain monitors the environment.

The right brain is aware of everything simultaneously, while the left brain focuses on details.

Gilchrist's books, "The Master and His Emissary" and "The Matter with Things," provide extensive scientific evidence for this concept.

Experiencing nature's grandeur, like a beach or a mountain view, can help one feel the right brain's holistic awareness, countering the left brain's tendency to break things down into parts.

The right brain sees the world as a whole, while the left brain breaks it down into parts for easier understanding.

This dynamic interplay between the two hemispheres can create a sense of expansion and peace.

Techniques like hakala can help shift focus from the stress of the left brain to embracing a larger perspective, allowing for personal growth and self-discovery.