My unreliable brain and I - Part 2

When your heart says one thing and your head another

Most of the autumn leaves on the tall poplars you see when driving into Kingston have now fallen from the trees. The tailwinds from big trucks hurtling along the highway are wooshing up the leaves on the ground and there is still a sky dance of the remaining golden leaves twirling and pirouetting slowly downward from the trees. It’s both beautiful and poignant at the same time. Very soon this line of stately old trees will stand bare and mostly unnoticed.

Lately, I have been waking up with a sore shoulder and niggly knees from sleeping scrunched up, origami-style, trying to get warmer in bed. Next month we’ll have the heater coming on in the early mornings in the bedroom. In Tasmania the chilly weather lasts way longer than just the three months of winter — it always feels like such a l-o-n-g s-t-r-e-t-c-h. It’s no wonder there is often a period of adjustment as we enter the last month of autumn. If you are not careful it can get you down.

I’ve been feeling a little deciduous like the poplar trees. There’s been a feeling of uncertainty and of needing to let go of something — or a lot of things. Did you know we lose more of our hair in autumn? Thinning hair aside, I am feeling less sure about a lot of things I’ve taken for granted. The general state of the world plus a federal election happening here in Australia this weekend, are no doubt intensifying this feeling.

During a walk last weekend on kunanyi (the mountain that fills our view every day) I pondered why I have this feeling of uncertainty. I remembered that 2025 is ‘my’ year in Chinese astrology — it’s the Year of the Snake. I will be 72 this year, and the next Year of the Snake won’t happen until 2037 so whatever serpent’s wisdom is offered this year I should be tapping into it!

I learned a lot about snakes when I was writing my book, The Snake Around My Heart. In many cultures, snakes represent the shedding of old ways and the beginning of something new, much like how a snake sheds its skin. Maybe I could do with shedding some of my old ways at this stage of my life. Perhaps it is time to look at all my long-held-but-not-questioned beliefs, shoulds and musts, and a whole lot of habituated ways of being.

I would like to be someone who is adding, in whatever small way I can, to a shift towards more peace and harmony on this planet. I want to make a difference in the lives of others (particularly those I love) while I am still around. I also want to spend more time in nature because I know this helps transform my outlook in lots of positive ways.

I am reading a book on the human brain that is giving me plenty to think about. It’s called Whole Brain Living by Jill Bolte Taylor. Dr Bolte Taylor is an American neuroscientist who had a massive stroke in the left hemisphere of her brain when she was 37. Her personal experience of a stroke and her subsequent eight-year recovery period profoundly influenced her work as a neuroanatomist. In 2008 she gave the first TED talk that ever went viral on the Internet (it’s worth watching), and her first book, My Stroke of Insight, became a New York Times bestseller.

Dr Bolte Taylor believes that our two cerebral hemispheres (the left and right) think about different things, care about different things, and have very different personalities. If understood and taken into account she believes this knowledge can help us make choices to live a better life. She describes each hemisphere as having both a distinct thinking and emotional profile.

Left hemisphere thinking profile — Verbal. Thinks in language. Thinks Linearly. Is Past and Future based. Analytical. Organised. Seeks differences. Judgmental. Punctual. Individual (a focus on the ME). Busy. Conscious … plus more descriptors I haven’t included here.

Right hemisphere thinking profile — Nonverbal. Thinks in pictures. Present-moment based. Thinks experientially. Concerned with the Big Picture. Seeks similiarities. Gets lost in the flow. Collective (a focus on the WE). Flexible/resilient. Unconscious. Fluid. … plus more.

Left hemisphere emotional profile — Rigid. Cautious. Fear based. Loves conditionally. Critical. Superior/inferior. Right/wrong, good/bad. Tried and True. Independent … plus more.

Right hemisphere emotional profile: Friendly. Loves unconditionally. Trusts. Supports. Grateful. Creative/innovative. Sharing. Kind. Equality. Fearless. Risk-taking. Open. Expansive … plus more.

The left hemisphere of our brain is the primary tool we use to interact with the external world. It’s the main serial processor and is very focused on logic, structure, and order. Dr Bolte Taylor found that the right hemisphere, where she spent so much of her recovery time, is focused on being in the present moment and is more ‘heart-based’. It’s a quality humanity needs more of right now. Increasingly it seems that we are spending more of our time in our left brain hemisphere. Technology probably has a lot to do with this. When both sides of our brain are working together and balancing one another as a whole brain, the results are much better for all of us.

When your heart says one thing and your head another, it is simply a dispute between the different parts of your brain.

During an interview, Dr Bolte Taylor was asked how living in her right brain during her recovery period influences how she lives her life now. She said she now spends half of each year living on a houseboat up the end of a quiet river with her dogs and the local wildlife.

Last year I gave up editing (rather dramatically because I had a hand injury that prevented me from using my right hand for a couple of months) but also because I had been feeling for a while that this kind of activity was no longer good for me. An editor’s focus is analytical and concerned with small details. It’s about looking for errors and making decisions about what’s right and wrong, better or worse … over and over again. It’s very ‘judgey’ and very left-brain focused. I’d also been doing it for a long time. An editor’s job is a much-needed skill but it was time for me to give my left brain a break and to hand editing over to those with younger and more agile brains.

I’m concentrating now on spending time writing rather than editing. I still get to play around with words but in a more balanced left/right brain way plus my husband still likes having some editing to do.

In a couple of weeks, we are heading off to New Zealand for a writer’s retreat at the remote end of the Coromandel Peninsula. The word retreat had me hooked from the moment I read about this opportunity. I look forward to writing about our time spent there on our return …

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Thank you for reading my ramblings. I know I said Part 2 of My Unreliable Brain series would be on dementia but I’ve shuffled that one down the track for a Part 3 sometime in the future. I’m sure you won’t mind. It’s not exactly a subject many of us want to think too much about.