In stress the same response, the blood vessels in the
forebrain get shut down...
because that pushes the blood to the hindbrain for reflex.
Hello, Bruce.
Hello!
Thank you so much for this opportunity to have a conversation.
I so appreciate this.
First, I came across your book sometime in 2012,
The Biology of Belief.
And I rarely repeat a book.
That's the first book that I read twice.
To deepen my belief system because it resonated so well.
You know, you have brought the science and made people think
that even during your pregnancy, you have to think because you are
transferring your wrong or right
kind of genetic pattern to your embryonic cells, and this is
all because of your sympathetic and parasympathetic system going
crazy, our remaining harmony.
In almost all of my public talks I give your references on how
creating an environment matters, especially when you are going
through this pregnancy phase.
And your experiment on neighbourhoods, you know, and
bad neighborhoods, as well in the suburban mothers, the striking
differences, born to children, born to mothers who had harmonious
lifestyle and stressful lifestyle.
So there's a big difference in that, big time.
And in Indian tradition, Bruce, earlier, at least before 1970s,
I would say that I recall, most, daughters-in-law, I would say,
the moment the father-in-law comes to know or mother-in-law
comes to know that their daughter-in-law is pregnant,
they perform rituals.
And respectfully send her to her parents' place.
So she would spend time in harmony in peace.
There's no stress and that could create a destiny kind of
a thing for a child, spiritual destiny, we like to call.
A better emotional, you know, emotionally developed foetus.
As we know the stress hormones,
shut the blood vessels in the gut, squeeze them.
So the blood is pushed to the arms and legs for fight or flight.
And, also this is the other critical part.
In stress, the same response, the blood vessels in the forebrain get
shut down because that pushes the blood to the hindbrain for reflex.
When you're running from a tiger, it's not time to think.
It's time to reflex, run.
And so I say, so when our stress hormones, the blood
vessels shut down here and they shut down in the gut.
And then I say, when a child is developing in the womb,
the development of any organ is proportional to the amount
of blood going to that organ.
So when a mother is in a full stress situation, then the
stress hormones in the fetus, as it's growing squeeze the
blood vessel shut causing less intelligence, that can reduce
the intelligence of a child 50%.
When a woman is stressed throughout the process because the blood is
being pushed to the hindbrain.
And what are you making?
A big hindbrain for reflexes.
And what else are you making?
Where's the blood going?
Arms and legs.
So I said, stress hormones make a soldier, but they compromise
intelligence to make power.
And, so stress has a long lasting influence in that population
because the children get compromised even before they're
born if the parents are in stress.
So true, so true.
And I ask mothers-to-be, and we go through this special course,
how to remain meditative, how to remain calm and more peaceful
through Heartfulness practices that we offer them how to become
more still, not just calm, but very still and very peaceful.
And also how to, before the environment attacks you, how
to vaccinate yourself against the environmental impact.
That is a meditative mind.
It remains combative against the influences.
So you're pre-empting the stress situation with the meditative mind.
And somehow, because of your carelessness, you end up
having a neural mental impact, or you have an argument with
someone which you absorb.
How to get rid of it?
Yes, it lingers in the mind.
And how to get rid of the impressions?
Because, you know, your approach is extremely spiritual and
extremely scientific too.
I mean, I cannot praise you enough for that.
When I understood the science and then the spiritual part, like "Oh
my God" cause I didn't believe in-
it wasn't spiritual, my life.
Not spiritual at all, but the moment, the moment I
saw the mechanism, of how the identity is picked up by
the cell antennas for self.
I said, "Oh my God, I can't die.
I'm not even in here."
And then my life just was a radical transformation because the most
important thing I realized in this, I think would be for almost every
human, cause I'm just like them,
what did happen at the very first thing, was my
life got so much easier.
Because, the fear of death, it lingers in people's
minds, and they're afraid.
They're always afraid about this future, of this death.
And the moment that I saw it was, well, I can't die.
I'm not even in here, I'm out here.
And I realize no fear of death and that moment I could
feel a whole physiological change in my entire body.
Because there was a joy, there was a lightness