Where am I in my brain?

If this isn't a self revelation, I don't know what is.

Last night I attended this event at Landmark Education. Yes, I went to Landmark for those gentle Internet readers that don't know. I was quite active until the birth of one particular small child that I have let usurp any shred of my life that is still mine.

But lately, I've been going through not just the little changes as usual, but whopping giant changes. I started reading this book two weeks ago, while daughter and dada were in Tennessee. This book was great, absolutely the sense that needed to be made of the chaos that is my head. This book was so great, that life worked well until my family came home and then chaos took over again.

Basically, the book is saying that all those thoughts in my head? They aren't me. I don't have to believe them, in fact, if I can just observe them, they may even start to be funny.

I went along, doing my things, for a while, actually chuckling to some of the crazy thoughts in my head, until my peeps came home and then those thoughts sucker punched me in the gut and sent me into a tailspin where I got waaaaaaayyyyy too sensitive and took everything like an attack and attacked back.

After a few days of arguing with T, we, but mostly he, suggested that I need something else in my life. He, amusingly as always said I should "go get laid." This always makes me laugh, because that is something a guy would tell another guy to do to get out of a funk.

But he is right, I am missing something that drives me, although I'm not going to find it between the legs of a different man.

Then a whole day passed where things worked out well, things lined up well, and that day was yesterday. I had a babysitter (Nana) and I could go to this Landmark event called Living A Created Life. Three hours. $45. My kind of commitment these days.

As it would turn out, the boiled down summary of the event was what I've been reading about in The Power of Now (book link above). The Landmark leader even had some cool brain science to back up the crazy notion that I am not my thoughts. Here is my over-simplified view of what was said, in my words, which may or may not be accurate.

There are a few parts to the brain.
There is the brain stem.
There is the midbrain.
There is the cortex.

The brain stem has a tiny bit to do with reactions - like if you touch a hot pan and you pull your hand away, really, only the nervous system and a bit of the brain stem have anything to do about it.

The midbrain is the same kind of brain an alligator has - it's our reptilian brain. It's that part of the brain that tells you to run or put up your fists because there is going to be a fight. Now the messed up part of this is that it also considers anything uncomfortable as a reason to fight or run. This is also a reflex action.

Then there is the cortex. It's most of the brain and there is a lot of it. The cortex is made up of neurons and there are thousands of billions of neurons in the brain and they are all connected to each other either directly or indirectly.

Basically, the job of the neurons is to remember stuff that happens. They gather together and remember things that happen and create patterns.

Then - this is the crazy part that makes sense - the brain uses these patterns to predict the future.

That's what the brain does. It uses the past to predict what it thinks will happen in the future.

So wait a second, I think to myself, you mean that my brain is thinking that since my last two marriages were over in 5 years a piece, that certainly this relationship will likely be over in five years also.

Brain, that is some fucked up thinking.

But the question that ties into The Power of Now is where am I in this mess? I'm not the neurons firing or not firing and using things that happened before as a means for figuring out what will happen. I'm certainly not the reptilian midbrain flying at the thought of danger or discomfort. I'm not the brain stem pulling my hand off a hot stove. Where am I?

I am the one, I am going to call the Witness who can observe the thoughts in my head as they pass by. Power of Now calls that Being. Landmark calls that Self. Call it whatever you like. The brain doesn't know what to do when I observe it, although now my brain is set to wreak havoc when I try.

This is where I am right now. I am discovering me in the present moment, because that is not where the cortex, midbrain, or brainstem focus. I am in the moments where there is no talking in my head.