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A review by lory_enterenchanted
Your Survival Instinct Is Killing You: Retrain Your Brain to Conquer Fear, Make Better Decisions, and Thrive in the 21s t Century by Marc Schoen
informative
medium-paced
2.5
Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle
This book had some interesting information but also some half-baked ideas. And it was repetitive. The central idea is that we have grown intolerant of discomfort, interpreting lower and lower levels of discomfort as a threat to survival, and that this leads to a vicious cycle of low dopamine levels and reaching for addictive remedies that lower dopamine levels further, etc. This was stated over and over, along with the argument that we need to tolerate higher levels of discomfort. Okay, we get it.
The "warring brains" concept is fascinating, but presented a bit simplistically here. Still, I think the basic issue that our emotional, irrational brains are getting activated and taking over many of our actions and even driving what we think of as conscious decisions explains a LOT about the world today.
What I think is really interesting, different from many other strategies I've tried (including mindfulness), and important, is the assertion that we have to not attempt to better control the limbic brain with the cerebral brain in a top-down approach, but take a horizontal approach of enlisting both parts of the brain, better engaging both and integrating them. This is done by learning to let discomfort and safety exist side by side. The author gives some strategies for doing this, but perhaps others could be devised, or found in the existing spiritual literature. I am definitely interested in pursuing such a path.
In any case, what a novel way to look at our polarized world, in which so much of political and social life is clearly being driven by people who are acting out of their limbic systems and fear reactions. How could we bring change to that realm? Could the practices advised for individuals be extended to a social setting? I can't see how, but I also can't see any other way out of our dilemma. The two sides bashing each other and trying to control each other is not working. And although we like to think that our cerebral capacities, logic and reason, will win out, the reality of our bodies is that the emotional, irrational side is stronger. It will win if reason doesn't take a different tactic.
I think this is why the rationalists are bent on developing Artificial Intelligence - as if we didn't have enough to deal with in trying to learn how to use our natural intelligence. What they want to achieve is a cerebral brain free of that pesky emotional and bodily element, that won't be overridden or pushed around by our survival instinct at all. This is a wish that comes from our inner warfare with our bodies, but do we really want to live without bodies? Do we really want to eliminate nature and life and replace it with pure intellect? If that is not to happen, we need some horizontal strategies to stop the madness. I really hope we can find them.
To return to the book, I was left wondering, though, why there was no addressing of the ultimate origin of discomfort, nor any impulse to actually uncover and heal it. It seemed the goal was just to live with it and push through it. That might be necessary for a while, but in the end it could turn out to be just another survival strategy. I think we need to do more than that, to actually transform the discomfort and not only let it sit there.
However, it is an essential step to dial back our reactivity, to allow the discomfort to be there without attacking or denying it, and these integrative strategies could be a useful tool in that pursuit.
This book had some interesting information but also some half-baked ideas. And it was repetitive. The central idea is that we have grown intolerant of discomfort, interpreting lower and lower levels of discomfort as a threat to survival, and that this leads to a vicious cycle of low dopamine levels and reaching for addictive remedies that lower dopamine levels further, etc. This was stated over and over, along with the argument that we need to tolerate higher levels of discomfort. Okay, we get it.
The "warring brains" concept is fascinating, but presented a bit simplistically here. Still, I think the basic issue that our emotional, irrational brains are getting activated and taking over many of our actions and even driving what we think of as conscious decisions explains a LOT about the world today.
What I think is really interesting, different from many other strategies I've tried (including mindfulness), and important, is the assertion that we have to not attempt to better control the limbic brain with the cerebral brain in a top-down approach, but take a horizontal approach of enlisting both parts of the brain, better engaging both and integrating them. This is done by learning to let discomfort and safety exist side by side. The author gives some strategies for doing this, but perhaps others could be devised, or found in the existing spiritual literature. I am definitely interested in pursuing such a path.
In any case, what a novel way to look at our polarized world, in which so much of political and social life is clearly being driven by people who are acting out of their limbic systems and fear reactions. How could we bring change to that realm? Could the practices advised for individuals be extended to a social setting? I can't see how, but I also can't see any other way out of our dilemma. The two sides bashing each other and trying to control each other is not working. And although we like to think that our cerebral capacities, logic and reason, will win out, the reality of our bodies is that the emotional, irrational side is stronger. It will win if reason doesn't take a different tactic.
I think this is why the rationalists are bent on developing Artificial Intelligence - as if we didn't have enough to deal with in trying to learn how to use our natural intelligence. What they want to achieve is a cerebral brain free of that pesky emotional and bodily element, that won't be overridden or pushed around by our survival instinct at all. This is a wish that comes from our inner warfare with our bodies, but do we really want to live without bodies? Do we really want to eliminate nature and life and replace it with pure intellect? If that is not to happen, we need some horizontal strategies to stop the madness. I really hope we can find them.
To return to the book, I was left wondering, though, why there was no addressing of the ultimate origin of discomfort, nor any impulse to actually uncover and heal it. It seemed the goal was just to live with it and push through it. That might be necessary for a while, but in the end it could turn out to be just another survival strategy. I think we need to do more than that, to actually transform the discomfort and not only let it sit there.
However, it is an essential step to dial back our reactivity, to allow the discomfort to be there without attacking or denying it, and these integrative strategies could be a useful tool in that pursuit.