By Paul R. Scheele, Ph.D., Learning Strategies
The morning a blood vessel in her brain popped, Jill Bolte Taylor became the subject of her most important experiment.
She was a neuroscientist at Harvard University’s brain research center. She woke up on December 10, 1996, to a piercing pain behind her left eye. It was a stroke.
Strangely, the pain gave way to deep peace—and then joy.
In a memoir titled My Stroke of Insight she recalls the event: “I felt like a genie liberated from its bottle. The energy of my spirit seemed to flow like a great whale gliding through a sea of silent euphoria.”
As time went on, her mind became more still. She lived each day in a state much like deep meditation. Surgery removed the blood clot in her brain, but Dr. Taylor faced immense challenges during her eight years of recovery.
What happened during her stroke, Dr. Taylor says, was that her left brain hemisphere was temporarily disabled. The left hemisphere is the seat of language, logic, and planning. In contrast, the right hemisphere excels at images, creativity, and compassion.
While Dr. Taylor found the intensity of her present-moment experience of her right brain blissful, she struggled to rebuild her left brain neural network and re-integrate the two hemispheres. Today she’s healthy and active and helping others recover from similar challenges.
Fortunately, you can quickly access the riches of your right brain—while leaving your left brain functioning—using whole mind learning, the basis for our Paraliminal learning technology.
When listening to a Paraliminal, you hear one voice speaking through your headphones in one ear to one part of your brain and a second voice speaking in your other ear to a different part of your brain. Your mind finds it difficult to process two voices simultaneously, so it shuts down, putting you into a deeply relaxed, clear-headed state.
Using a Paraliminal starts with entering this state of relaxed alertness that’s free of mental chatter—much like the state Dr. Taylor experienced.
It’s the ideal state for focused concentration and learning. Let’s say you need to remember a lot of information for a presentation or an exam. Take a few moments to activate your right brain and get into state. Here’s how:
- Sit in a chair with your feet flat on the floor.
- Rest your hands on your thighs with palms open and facing up.
- Take a deep breath.
- As you exhale, close your eyes, and think only of the word relax repeating in a space behind your eyes. Continue deep breathing for at least 90 seconds while holding this image.
- After relaxing as long as you’d like, mentally count up from one to five. Open your eyes, take another deep breath, and then stretch your arms.
You’ve now cleared a mental space to efficiently store new information.
Use the same steps later to effectively tap your memory system and recall that information before your presentation or exam. Give your inner mind a clear request to remember it. Then relax and let your right brain comply. With practice you’ll find your brain responding with greater clarity and ease.
Achieving a relaxed state of alertness will help you more effectively engage the full resources of your mind no matter what you are choosing to accomplish or create. The technique is a part of every Paraliminal recording. Simply push play, close your eyes, relax, and listen. You will be led through a closed-eye process that activates your “whole mind” with a precise blend of music and words to help you acquire new behaviors.
To learn more about the Ultimate You Library of Paraliminal programs, please click here. Titles include Abundant Money Mindset, Anxiety-Free, Break the Habit, Deep Relaxation, Financial Security, Focus & Concentration, Ideal Weight, New Action Generator, Peak Performance, Perfect Health, Self-Discipline, and many more.
