Multiple Personality Theory

Let’s say that your life hinges on three events. These three major events shape your entire life. But what if your view of each event changed periodically. Whether it was good or bad. In hindsight, you create different realities. You reshape your current reality based on your view of these three events. But if the impact of these events changes, you change.

Let’s just say that your events have only one quality: good or bad. With three events, each has two different states. So that you have eight different potential states of your current self based on your views of these events.

If if you have eight different potential present selves, you have eight personalities.

If this theory is correct, the key to overcoming the disease would be an objective view of all three events. The truth to whether each event was either good or bad. That is the true self.

Electric Charge in an Aging Brain

• The brain has electric charge.
• The brain has a charge density.
• The brain decreases in size over time.
• Charge density increases if charge stays the same.

The charge has two sources: internal and external. But there is a limit to the amount of charge that the brain can contain. And as charge density increases the limit decreases.

Total signal= Internal + External

Sensory data input are electrical signals from the external world. There is also an internal source of electricity. But if there is a limit to the amount of charge the brain can have at any one time, and the internal source of charge increases [due to a change in volume], the brain may limit the other inputs to regulate this charge.

In the case of aging, the body may gather more signals to counter the lack of signal sensitivity. I’m sure you’ve heard that the ears and nose don’t stop growing. This is likely why. As the brain shrinks, it needs more and more molecules or vibrations to make a distinguishing identification.

Note: The eyes do not and cannot grow because they are a source of charge. Not just a signal, but also electric charge.

Sources:

1. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2596698/
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charge_density

Rethinking Epilepsy

Preliminary Reading: Laser Cascade, Too Much Light, and How a Flicker Causes a Seizure

I’ve recently covered a completely new electrical function of the human body. The input mechanism as well as the necessary output balance.  It the last post, we defined a seizure as the body’s natural way to rid the body of excess electrical charge.

Risk Factors:

• Babies who are born small for their age
• Babies who have seizures in the first month of life
• Babies who are born with abnormal areas in the brain
• Bleeding into the brain
• Abnormal blood vessels in the brain
• Serious brain injury or lack of oxygen to the brain
• Brain tumors
• Infections of the brain: abscess, meningitis, or encephalitis
• Stroke resulting from blockage of arteries
• Cerebral palsy
• Conditions with intellectual and developmental disabilities
• Seizures occurring within days after head injury (“early post-traumatic seizures”)
• Family history of epilepsy or fever-related seizures
• Alzheimer’s disease (late in the illness)
• Autism spectrum disorder
• Fever-related (febrile) seizures that are unusually long
• Long episodes of seizures or repeated seizures called status epilepticus
• Use of illegal drugs such as cocaine

Triggers:

• Missed medication
• Lack of sleep or disrupted sleep
• Illness (both with and without fever)
• Psychological stress
• Heavy alcohol use or seizures after alcohol withdrawal
• Use of cocaine and other recreational drugs such as Ecstasy
• Over-the-counter drugs, prescription medications or supplements that decrease the effectiveness of seizure medicines
• Nutritional deficiencies: vitamins and minerals
• Poor eating habits, such as long times without eating, dehydration or not enough fluids
• The menstrual cycle or hormonal changes
• Flashing lights or patterns
• Specific activities, noises or foods

The cause of most cases of epilepsy is unknown. Now we have a puzzle worth solving.

Certain disorders occur more often in people with epilepsy, depending partly on the epilepsy syndrome present. These include depression, anxiety, obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD), and migraine. Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder affects three to five times more children with epilepsy than children without the condition. ADHD and epilepsy have significant consequences on a child’s behavioral, learning, and social development. Epilepsy is also more common in children with autism.

What happens biologically during a seizure?

A seizure is a period of symptoms due to abnormally excessive or synchronous neuronal activity in the brain. Outward effects vary from uncontrolled shaking movements involving much of the body with loss of consciousness (tonic-clonic seizure), to shaking movements involving only part of the body with variable levels of consciousness (focal seizure), to a subtle momentary loss of awareness (absence seizure).  Most of the time these episodes last less than two minutes and it takes some time to return to normal. Loss of bladder control may occur.

What causes a seizure? There is evidence that epileptic seizures are usually not a random event. Seizures are often brought on by factors such as stress, alcohol abuse, flickering light, or a lack of sleep, among others. The term seizure threshold is used to indicate the amount of stimulus necessary to bring about a seizure. Seizure threshold is lowered in epilepsy.

Even in someone with epilepsy, there are factors that make this event non-random. Seizures do not happen all the time. People have certain triggers, and warning signs that a seizure is coming. Meaning that the mental state that causes seizures is not stationary, and it is not random. The fact that it can be triggered means that it can be targeted and mitigated.

How can we best describe the mental states that produce seizures? High entropy. We describe in previous articles those people with Alzheimer’s and Autism as very high entropy. Also, the fact that psychological stress and lack of sleep may be triggers add to the case that the seizures are caused by a heightened brain state.

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What about Tourette’s? Would a Tourette tic be considered a mild seizure?

Here are the risk factors associated with Tourette’s:

• Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
• Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
• Autism spectrum disorder
• Learning disabilities
• Sleep disorders
• Depression
• Anxiety disorders
• Pain related to tics, especially headaches
• Anger-management problems

If time doesn’t exist in the brain, and a seizure is abnormal electric activity. Then Tourette’s is epilepsy. The duration and frequency of the seizures is different.

Tourette’s is defined by these tics. Involuntary muscle movements or speech. We know that the involuntary muscle movements are electrical signals. And the speech is too.

If Tourette’s is a series of involuntary electrical signals, it is no different than epilepsy. If the two are the same, why is one so much more frequent than the other? It’s the stress and rest pattern of the brain. Once the brain reaches the seizure threshold, it produces an undesired result. Higher energy individuals would naturally trend higher on this scale.

Sources:

1. http://www.johnhamelministries.org/be_free_from_epilepsy.htm
2. https://www.epilepsy.com/start-here/about-epilepsy-basics/what-happens-during-seizure
3. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/why-do-flashing-images-cause-seizures-180961504/
4. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/epilepsy
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epilepsy
6. https://www.webmd.com/epilepsy/medications-treat-seizures#1
7. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/tourette-syndrome/diagnosis-treatment/drc-20350470
8. https://www.epilepsyresearch.org.uk/epilepsy-rates-raised-in-patients-with-tourettes-syndrome/
9. https://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-09/researchers-translate-thoughts-speech-potentially-allowing-locked-patients-communicate

How a Flicker Causes a Seizure

Preliminary reading: Laser Cascade and Too Much Light

We know that some people can have seizures brought on by flashing lights. Previously, I tried to tie this to seasickness. Let’s explore this concept from another perspective. 

What happens physiologically when a light turns on? Your pupils contract. Then as the light turns off, your pupils dilate, controlling the amount of light that enters the eye. If we put the person in front of a strobe light, the cycle of light/dark could outpace the mechanism designed to keep excess light out. At very least, there is a lag time between the light, and the eye’s adaptation to the light. This process, over the course of seconds, gains photons in the eye. It simply cannot keep up with the rate of change.

Factors that are pertinent here are max pupil size, resting pupil size, and speed of contraction. With these three factors we can accurately draw a curve for the pupil size over time. 

Here’s how I see it.

In normal individuals, this is not an issue. But in with people with epilepsy, they already exist at a higher energy state. A bunch of extra photons could push them to their charge threshold. 

A seizure is the body’s built in mechanism to remove excess electric charge. 

Sources:

1. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-23265-x
2. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1528-1167.2011.03137.x
3. https://www.medpagetoday.com/neurology/seizures/3552

Jesus Didn’t Wear Glasses

And he won’t wear them when he comes back. It may sound trivial, but a guy named William Bates proved that eyesight was correctable without glasses. That’s important because it means you and I have a natural path to better sight.

More importantly, vision is closely tied to memory in the elderly. So if you can save your vision, you may can save your mind.

In my book, we take this concept use it to develop a working brain model, and apply it to some mysteries of science and medicine. We journey into psychology and psychiatry, theorize about mental illnesses, and expose some major shortcomings in the science of the mind. Get your copy today.

Perfect is Impossible

We all know perfectionists. The question is what type of logic is it that makes them that way, and what does that logic set do to their behaviors and their happiness.

For perfectionists, right and wrong become perfect and imperfect. And they have to dislike or hate the imperfect to be willing to change it.

To be a perfectionist, you have to develop an eye for spotting the negative in situations that are mostly positive. Because if you can’t spot the negative, you can’t change it. And if you can’t change it, things aren’t perfect.

Expecting perfect is essentially expecting unhappiness. Because the world lies outside of the realm of perfect.

And when you hold things to a perfect standard, it’s hard to see the positives when you’re too busy trying to correct the negatives. There is little room for gratitude when perfect is expected.

Admittedly, many people are very successful because of their perfectionism. Their ability to spot imperfections and correct them right away is a part of their life. The key is being able to turn it off when you get home. Realizing that one of your gifts is spotting the negatives in things, no matter how small, should help you in spotting the positives in people and things that you care about.

We must recognize that there are positives in almost every situation, when we just allow ourselves to see them. 

 

I am an addict [And so are you]

Preliminary reading: Expecting Unhappiness

While I was doing my Venn Diagrams for my article about expectations, I did a set on addiction. At some point, I realized that I’ve always been an addict. 

Addict (noun) – someone that looks forward to something with expectation. That would make the opposite of addiction being fully present. Habit becomes addiction when hope becomes expectation.

I’ve been addicted to

• fitness
• caffeine
• learning
• sex
• porn
• food
• social media
• writing
• gambling
• fear
• work
• money

The tricky part is that most of these things by themselves are not inherently bad. They become bad when I start thinking about them instead of the present moment. Eating a hamburger isn’t bad, but if I’m thinking about eating hamburgers all day, I have issues.

Working out isn’t a bad thing, but thinking that my reality or happiness depends on my workouts is.

Caffeine is not a bad thing, but thinking that I need it to be myself is.

If you decide you need something to be happy, you’re right.

Once you start trying incorporate things that can never be a part of you into your character, you begin to need them. To expect them. And when your reality doesn’t include them, you think about the next time that you could have a reality that could. You make plans to achieve that as soon as possible. This mindset is what an addict is. It’s not a chemical need for a drug, it’s the refusal to accept the present moment as being enough. Or refusal to accept yourself in that present moment in your current state. And when the present moment is not enough, you decide what you think would make it enough.

The chemical need comes from perceived mental want. [For more, read the Conservation of Dopamine] When your reality requires a drug, any reality without that drug increases stress. You’re basically comparing who you are right now to who you think you should be. Whether that be working out, writing, eating, or doing drugs, etc.

Suicidal thoughts come when your reality can no longer meet your expectations. Not only that, but you can’t foresee any future realities that meet your expectations. You have no hope. And the opposite of hope is despair.

• Hope (noun) – belief that there is a chance of a future where your reality is better than now.
• Actual needs- food, water, shelter, human contact, air, sleep
• Perceived needs- anything else

Chances are great that you’ve never even been close to needing food or water. The human body can go days without water and over a month without food. People have lived long and healthy lives without working out. Coffee may help you function, but you do not need it to survive.

When we mentally categorize things as needs that are not needs, they become needs. Not because we actually need them, but because when we think we need them to function, we think we’re incomplete without them. We expect them, and thus our reality is incomplete without them.

Another interesting perspective on this is time: Because time does not exist in the brain, there is not a set amount of caffeine, sex, or working out that makes it an addiction. It’s the mindset. For example, if you’re addicted to food and working out, an outsider may not even know anything is wrong with you. Someone would just think you have a fast metabolism because of all the working out that you did.

Remember, we already made the spectacular claim that there is only one brain disease. That gives us the freedom to make some other observations about these addictions.

Addictions are highly correlated with ADD, ADHD, OCD, and many other mental health issues. Now our big leap of logic becomes more of a short step. Let’s define these with our new definition of addiction:

• Attention Deficit Disorder: looking forward to the next thing
• Obsession Compulsive Disorder: looking forward to [relative] perfection
• Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: looking forward to a reality that excludes a past event
• Anxiety: looking forward to the next potential negative reality
• Depression: looking forward to despair

So what about the medications that resolve these issues? We’ve discussed it several times in Don’t Trust Your Psychiatrist and Void Avoidance. But the short answer is really at very least, psychiatry has no idea how their drugs work. At worst, they only mask underlying issues. With our brain model, we believe that you have the ability to be happy if you’ve been happy before. With that in mind, and the fact that time doesn’t exist in the brain, the permanent addition of psychiatric drugs is terrifying. It would literally prevent you from becoming who you were designed to be. It would stop you from facing your fears, overcoming your demons, and telling your true story.

Sources:

1. https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html
2. https://www.dualdiagnosis.org/mental-health-and-addiction/the-connection/

 

 

Expecting Unhappiness

 

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When one’s expectations are reduced to zero, one really appreciates everything one does have. -Stephen Hawking 

First, let’s define expectations as a set of predictions about the future. Gratitude is the opposite of expectations. We can be grateful about certain things, but not others. But it’s nearly impossible to be grateful for something that is outside of our set of expectations. As expectations approach zero, we are fully grateful. If gratitude approaches zero, we are full of unmet expectations. Expectations create a void. Gratitude is the absence of void.

Hope is not expectations. I hope that I live another forty years, but I don’t expect it. Once I expect it, anything shy of that is a disappointment. Hope is belief that there is a possibility that there will be a time where your reality [or a portion] is better than right now. Hope becomes expectations when you decide that your dream is essential to your happiness.

What is the difference between hope and expectations? Hope does not create a void. Hope is just belief that the future could be better. I hope my arm heals up or I expect my arm to heal up. Hope involves accepting the present reality. I do not need my arm to heal to be whole, but I would be very grateful if it healed. If I expect my arm to heal, my current reality is incomplete until my arm heals. I can never be fully whole without a healed arm. And the truth is there is an infinite set of realities that involve a healed arm, and an infinite set that involved an unhealed arm. If I expect my arm to heal, I cannot be completely happy with an unhealed arm.

The past is unchangeable. There is literally no hope to change it. It has been written. If you expect a life that doesn’t include your mistakes, you’re going to be unhappy, because it doesn’t exist.

What do you expect out of your life? How far are you from that right now? Let’s start with a much smaller scale. You go out to eat and you order a steak. It’s a nice restaurant, so you’re paying $30+ dollars per streak. You order it medium rare.

At this point, you’ve probably unknowingly set some expectations on the meal. [And the restaurant has placed some expectations on itself] With the price of the meal being high, and the restaurant being fancy, you automatically expect more out of this meal. You put in your order, and expect it to be right, and delicious. Maybe it’s good, and maybe it’s terrible, but expectations at this point are so high, that even a good steak make just appease you.

On the other hand, take the same meal at a dive bar with a $15 steak, and you may have people lining up down the block for it. With lowered expectations, the customer has no choice but to be impressed with a good steak.

How does this apply to the bigger picture? Imagine that fairy-tale wedding: the perfect dress, picturesque setting, and Prince Charming. Girls dream about these things when they are very young. We encourage it. They make decisions based on this ideal.

In reality, you wear a great dress, and have a great wedding in a great place to a great guy, but you may still not be happy. Because you let your dreams effect your reality.

Chances are great that you’re not a millionaire and you didn’t marry a supermodel, so how do you get out of bed every morning? Gratitude. Gratitude is the ultimate mindset in accepting what you have. It doesn’t mean that you can’t work towards making millions, but it means that you can be happy along the way.

So how do I keep moving forward without being bogged down by my expectations?I’m not saying that it’s not okay to dream. It’s important to move ourselves and society forward. But as things happen, we shouldn’t look back on our plan constantly, because it will never measure up. And if our happiness is based on how well our expectations match our realities, we will never be happy.

Don’t let other people’s expectations of you effect you. I really struggle with this. I’m pretty good at this sport, so my friends think that I’m good at this sport. But I haven’t been playing lately, so I’m not as good as they expect me to be. When my reality doesn’t match their expectations, they feel obligated to say something. If I let my current reality inherit their expectations, I’ll be unhappy with my play. But if I can accept my current reality, I can embrace each match and still have fun.

The moral of the story: dream big, expect nothing, be grateful, hope for the best, and don’t let anyone else’s expectations become your own. Every time you compare reality to expectations you will be disappointed, so just don’t do it.

Expect the world, and you’ll find disappointment. Expect the worst, and you’ll find worries. Expect nothing, and you’ll find everything.

 

 

It’s Never Too Late

1. If eyesight is reversible in me, it is reversible in everyone. Or rather, if Bates proved that all cases are reversible without glasses.
2. If eyesight is reversible, it is not a physical impairment, it is a brain condition, or sub optimal mental state.
3. If my brain condition is reversible, other brain conditions may be reversible.
4. If a brain condition has been reversed in one individual, it is reversible in anyone.
5. If brain conditions can be reversed without medicine in one in individual, all individuals with that condition can be reversed without medicine.
6. If all individuals with these conditions can be resolved without medicine, our mental wellness can be achieved without medicine. And when time does not exist, it does not matter the age of the afflicted individual. Healing is always possible.
7. If our mental wellness is obtainable without medicine, we were created to be mentally well.
8. If mental wellness can be achieved without pharmaceutical assistance, we were made in the image of something greater.
9. If we were created in the image of something greater to be well, we have a purpose.
10. If it is never too late to be healed, it is never to late to find our purpose.

An Unpopular Approach to Homosexuality

Homosexuality was removed from the list of mental illnesses by the American Psychiatric Association in 1973. Here’s why I think we should put it back. 

It’s a choice, in the same way glasses are a choice. I know what you’re thinking: glasses are not a choice. I only wear glasses because I need them to see. But if I told you that it was possible to see without glasses, what would you say? We’ve proven this over and over again. William Bates did all the work in the 1920s. So if it is possible for you to see without glasses, yet you use them, that is a choice. And that choice is causing your brain to operate at a less than optimal level.

We all have our issues. But the difference here is the ability to identify them as issues. When society begins to accept or even embrace it, the fine line between right and wrong becomes blurred.

Some correlations with homosexuality:

• Higher rates of major depression, generalized anxiety disorder and substance use or dependence in lesbian and gay youth.
• Higher rates of recurrent major depression among gay men.
• A fourfold increase of the likelihood of suicide in LBGT youth.
• Higher rates of anxiety, mood and substance use disorders, and suicidal thoughts among people ages 15 to 54 with same-sex partners.
• Higher use of mental health services in men and women reporting same-sex partners.

If being gay is correlated with negative mental health, why are people gay? Because society and culture have told them that they were born that way. They have forgotten how to piece apart what’s right and what’s wrong in this perspective. If your group of friends was based on the worst thing that you did, who would you hang out with?

If we view being gay as a suboptimal mental state, it would make sense to be associated with disorders associated with suboptimal mental states. Remember: There is Only One Brain Disease.

While obviously frowned upon by most realms of contemporary ethics, there have been multiple case studies to show that homosexuality is reversible. That’s important, because with our view of the brain, that means it’s always reversible. By what mechanism, I don’t know.

In looking at past research in homosexuality, here are the flaws I see in the logic: if we don’t know why it’s wrong, it must be right. If we don’t know how to reverse it, it must be irreversible, and thus something that we must accept.

If being homosexual is operating in a sub-optimal mental state, it is impossible to become your best self without challenging the deep-rooted logic that has become part of your being. When you begin to doubt the feelings that society has told you to embrace, you will start to rediscover your true self.

Sources:

1. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4887282/
2. https://www.cdc.gov/msmhealth/mental-health.htm
3. https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/LGBTQ_MentalHealth_OnePager.pdf
4. https://www.apa.org/monitor/feb02/newdata
5. https://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/facts_mental_health.html
6. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conversion_therapy
7. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/may/12/lgbt-mental-health-sexuality-gender-identity
8. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4936529/
9. https://www.hrc.org/blog/flashbackfriday-today-in-1973-the-apa-removed-homosexuality-from-list-of-me