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This book argues for the central role played by absorption in the functioning of the human mind. The importance of absorption makes itself felt in different ways; the two studies combined in this book concentrate on two of them. The first study, 'The Symbolic Mind', argues that, largely as a result of language acquisition, humans have two levels of cognition, which in normal circumstances are simultaneously active. Absorption is a (or the) means to circumvent some, perhaps all, of the associations that characterize one of these two levels of cognition, resulting in what is sometimes referred to as mysitcal experience, but which is not confined to mysticism and plays a role in various "religious" phenomena, and elsewhere. In the second st...
Publisher description: As David White explains in the Introduction to Tantra in Practice, Tantra is an Asian body of beliefs and practices that seeks to channel the divine energy that grounds the universe, in creative and liberating ways. The subsequent chapters reflect the wide geographical and temporal scope of Tantra by examining thirty-six texts from China, India, Japan, Nepal, and Tibet, ranging from the seventh century to the present day, and representing the full range of Tantric experience--Buddhist, Hindu, Jain, and even Islamic. Each text has been chosen and translated, often for the first time, by an international expert in the field who also provides detailed background material. Students of Asian religions and general reader...
The human voice is one of the principal conveyers of social and affective communication. Yet relatively little is known about the neural circuitry that supports the recognition of different vocally expressed emotions. We conducted an FMRI study to examine the brain responses to vocal expressions of anger and happiness, and to test whether specific brain regions showed preferential engagement in the processing of one emotion over the other. We also tested the extent to which simultaneously presented facial expressions of the same or different emotions would enhance brain responses, and to what degree such responses depend on attention towards the vocal expression. Forty healthy individuals were scanned while listening to vocal expressions...
Thermic responses to vegetarian meals and yoga exercise (1992, Journal Article)
The thermic effect (TEF) of vegetarian meals was measured for breakfast and lunch in 6 lean healthy men (18-25 years) during normal feeding (NF) and with 20% overfeeding (OF) on 28 successive days. The energy contents of breakfast were 223 +/- 10 and 330 +/- 48 kcal, and those of lunch were 1,033 +/- 220 and 1,247 +/- 222 kcal in NF and OF, respectively. In NF, the TEF per 180 min was 32.7 +/- 8.6 and 54.8 +/- 6.3 kcal for breakfast and lunch, respectively. In OF, the TEF was 38.3 +/- 8.3 kcal for breakfast and 57.2 +/- 5.4 kcal for lunch. The increase in total TEF due to OF was nonsignificant (p greater than 0.2). In response to 20% OF, adaptive thermogenesis was manifested mainly through an increase in the resting metabolic rate of 4.9% (p less than 0.001). In both feeding, regimes, the percent TEF was higher for breakfast than for lunch (p less than 0.05). Regression analysis of TEF versus calorie load indicated a stable component of 42 kcal with a 2% rate of increase. Yoga exercises were performed from 16.00 to 17.00 daily. The thermic effect of yoga exercises observed from 17.10 to 18.30 was 21 kcal and persisted beyond 90 min, indicating the role of yoga in energy metabolism.
The most important discoveries of the 20th century exist not in the realm of science, medicine, or technology, but rather in the dawning awareness of the earth's limits and how those limits will affect human evolution. Humanity has reached a crossroad where various ecological catastrophes meet what some call sustainable development. While a great deal of attention has been given to what governments, corporations, utilities, international agencies, and private citizens can do to help in the transition to sustainability, little thought has been given to what schools, colleges, and universities can do. Ecological Literacy asks how the discovery of finiteness affects the content and substance of education. Given the limits of the earth, what should people know and how should they learn it?
Arranged thematically, Wisdom of the Elders contains sacred stories and traditions on the interrelationships between humans and the environment as well as perspectives from modern science, which more often than not validate the sacred, ancient Wisdom of the Elders. Native peoples and environments discussed range from the Inuit Arctic and the Native Americans of the Northwest coast, the Sioux of the Plains, and the Pueblo, Hopi, and Navajo of the Southwest to the Australian Outback, to the rich, fecund tropics of Africa, Malaysia, and the Amazon.
As featured in Bill Moyers’s PBS special “Spirit and Nature“, leaders from major traditions around the world speak out in this volume about what spiritual resources we may turn to in our age of unprecedented danger to the planet.
Slovic's thesis is that the nature writers Henry David Thoreau, Annie Dillard, Edward Abbey, Wendell Berry, and Barry Lopez were preoccupied not only with eternal nature, but with the psychological phenomenon of awareness itself. The interactions they made with nature led them to a better understanding of the human mind, thus achieving a heightened attentiveness to our own place in the natural world. Slovic says, "To write about a problem is not necessarily to produce a solution, but the kindling of consciousness -one's own and one's reader's is a first step - an essential first step." Thus, for Slovic, "Nature writing is a 'literature of hope' in its assumption that the elevation of consciousness may lead to wholesome political change, but this literature is also concerned, and perhaps primarily so, with interior landscapes, with the mind itself."
The Need for Something Different: Spirituality and Wilderness Adventure (1992, Journal Article)
"This book traces the Animal Rights/Environmental Ethics dispute through the key steps of its history, in the form of the most important original articles, and points the way to a resolution. It is useful to the scholar interested in the animal rights issue and it is appropriate as a textbook in a course in Environmental Ethics at any level, from beginning to graduate. For the beginner, it teaches the key issues in non-technical language and for the scholar it traces the history of an important dispute and clearly distinguishes basic ideas in their historical context."-- Donald C. Lee, University of New Mexico
In Fractals: The Patterns of Chaos, science writer John Briggs uses over 170 illustrations to clearly explain the significance and beauty of fractals. He describes how fractals were discovered, how they are formed, and the unique properties different fractals share. Fractals is a breathtaking guided tour of a remarkable frontier in art, science, and nature. It will revolutionize the way you see the world and your place in it.
Cyclopedia of Yoga (1992, Book)
Cyclopedia of Yoga (1992, Book)
Prashnopanishad: Yoga Siddhanta Bhashya (1992, Book)
OBJECTIVE: This study was designed to determine the effectiveness of a group stress reduction program based on mindfulness meditation for patients with anxiety disorders.METHOD: The 22 study participants were screened with a structured clinical interview and found to meet the DSM-III-R criteria for generalized anxiety disorder or panic disorder with or without agoraphobia. Assessments, including self-ratings and therapists' ratings, were obtained weekly before and during the meditation-based stress reduction and relaxation program and monthly during the 3-month follow-up period.
RESULTS: Repeated measures analyses of variance documented significant reductions in anxiety and depression scores after treatment for 20 of the subjects--changes that were maintained at follow-up. The number of subjects experiencing panic symptoms was also substantially reduced. A comparison of the study subjects with a group of nonstudy participants in the program who met the initial screening criteria for entry into the study showed that both groups achieved similar reductions in anxiety scores on the SCL-90-R and on the Medical Symptom Checklist, suggesting generalizability of the study findings.
CONCLUSIONS: A group mindfulness meditation training program can effectively reduce symptoms of anxiety and panic and can help maintain these reductions in patients with generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, or panic disorder with agoraphobia.
Relaxation therapy reduces anxiety in child and adolescent psychiatric patients (1992, Journal Article)
The immediate effects of relaxation therapy (RT) were assessed in 40 hospitalized children and adolescents with diagnoses of adjustment disorder and depression. These effects were assessed using a within subjects pre-test/post-test design and by comparison with a control group of 20 depressed and adjustment disorder patients who watched a 1-h relaxing videotape. The 1-h RT class consisted of yoga exercise, a brief massage and progressive muscle relaxation. Decreases were noted in both self-reported anxiety and in anxious behavior and fidgeting as well as increases in positive affect in the RT but not the video group. In addition, adjustment disorder patients and a third of the depressed patients showed decreases in cortisol levels following RT, while no changes were noted in the video group. Thus, both diagnostic groups appeared to benefit from the RT class.
How can human beings kill or brutalize multitudes of other human beings? Focusing particularly on genocide, but also on other forms of mass killing, torture, and war, Ervin Staub explores the psychological, cultural, and societal roots of group aggression. He sketches a conceptual framework for the many influences on one group's desire to harm another: cultural and social patterns predisposing to violence, historical circumstances resulting in persistent life problems, and needs and modes of adaptation arising from the interaction of these influences. Such notions as cultural stereotyping and devaluation, societal self-concept, moral exclusion, the need for connection, authority orientation, personal and group goals, "better world" ideologies, justification, and moral equilibrium find a place in his analysis, and he addresses the relevant evidence from the behavioral sciences. Within this conceptual framework, Staub then considers the behavior of perpetrators and bystanders in four historical situations: the Holocaust (his primary example), the genocide of Armenians in Turkey, the "autogenocide" in Cambodia, and the "disappearances" in Argentina. Throughout, he is concerned with the roots of caring and the psychology of heroic helpers. In his concluding chapters, he reflects on the socialization of children at home and in schools, and on the societal practices and processes that facilitate the development of caring persons, and of care and cooperation among groups. A wide audience will find The Roots of Evil thought-provoking reading.
Over the ensuing years, a variety of approaches have been used in an attempt to prevent children from following the path that leads to criminal behavior or to remedy that behavior before they become habitual criminals.The unique contribution of the 20th century, we believe, has been method. By introducing experimental approaches to the study of intervention strategies, enduring results can issue from programs that have failed to achieve their therapeutic goals.
The studies we selected for this work vary in the ways in which science has been applied. . . . We hoped that by selecting variety in method, this book would provide readers with the opportunity to consider evaluation techniques while also enabling some readers to develop strategies for evaluating their own programs.
Our intention was not only to stimulate clearer consideration of evaluation strategies but also to show some of the imaginative interventions that have been designed to assist children at every age. The chapters include biological, social, emotional, and cognitive approaches. We have included interventions aimed at infants, at children, and at adolescents. The order of presentation follows, roughly, a developmental perspective in which the age of earliest intervention accounts for placement.
Experience seems to show, however, that even effective prevention strategies will miss some of the people some of the time. That being the case, we are likely to need a variety of programs in order to help the variety of children in need of assistance. The chapters that follow describe programs that intervene in families, in schools, and in communities. Some target populations at risk, while others focus on individuals.
The Caring Child (1992, Book)
An account of our understanding of the motivations behind prosocial behaviours and how these motives develop in various situations. Eisenberg seeks to broaden our concept of the moral potential of children by shifting the focus to an active promotion of kindness and caring in children.
Stress and working with addicts: a role for meditation? (1992, Journal Article)
Occupational stress is frequent among individuals whose work brings them into close contact with other people. One putative means of preventing or alleviating such stress is meditation (West, 1987). A six week course in meditation was recently held for staff in the Drug Dependence Service based at University College Hospital, London. The idea for the course came from the head of the unit who had personal experience of meditation. The course and its acceptability to staff are described below.
Effects of meditation on stress, health, and affect (1992, Journal Article)
Administered the Comprehensive Scale of Stress Assessment: Part 1, Global Assessment, the Comprehensive Scale of Stress Assessment Symptom Checklist, and The Multiple Affect Adjective Checklist—Revised to assess dysphoria (anxiety, depression, and hostility), positive affect, and sensation seeking among 126 Ss (aged 25–50 yrs). Ss also indicated their frequency of meditation. Frequent meditators reported significantly fewer stressors and illness symptoms; lower levels of anxiety, hostility, depression, and dysphoria; and higher levels of positive affect and sensation seeking than did infrequent meditators. Frequent meditation was associated with reductions in the degree of correlation between stress and dysphoria, and between illness symptoms and dysphoria. Thus, for frequent meditators, increased stress and illness symptoms were not necessarily accompanied by increased negative affect.
Yoga for children (1992, Book)
Children from three on up can enjoy gentle, fun-filled exercises from the experts at Gaia--no matter where they live or what their abilities are. Yoga is a great way to develop strength and suppleness, as well as good posture and coordination in a noncompetitive setting. 100 4-color photos. Diagrams.
OBJECTIVE:This study was designed to determine the effectiveness of a group stress reduction program based on mindfulness meditation for patients with anxiety disorders.
METHOD:
The 22 study participants were screened with a structured clinical interview and found to meet the DSM-III-R criteria for generalized anxiety disorder or panic disorder with or without agoraphobia. Assessments, including self-ratings and therapists' ratings, were obtained weekly before and during the meditation-based stress reduction and relaxation program and monthly during the 3-month follow-up period.
RESULTS:
Repeated measures analyses of variance documented significant reductions in anxiety and depression scores after treatment for 20 of the subjects--changes that were maintained at follow-up. The number of subjects experiencing panic symptoms was also substantially reduced. A comparison of the study subjects with a group of nonstudy participants in the program who met the initial screening criteria for entry into the study showed that both groups achieved similar reductions in anxiety scores on the SCL-90-R and on the Medical Symptom Checklist, suggesting generalizability of the study findings.
CONCLUSIONS:
A group mindfulness meditation training program can effectively reduce symptoms of anxiety and panic and can help maintain these reductions in patients with generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, or panic disorder with agoraphobia.
Relaxation therapy reduces anxiety in child and adolescent psychiatric patients (1992, Journal Article)
The immediate effects of relaxation therapy (RT) were assessed in 40 hospitalized children and adolescents with diagnoses of adjustment disorder and depression. These effects were assessed using a within subjects pre-test/post-test design and by comparison with a control group of 20 depressed and adjustment disorder patients who watched a 1-h relaxing videotape. The 1-h RT class consisted of yoga exercise, a brief massage and progressive muscle relaxation. Decreases were noted in both self-reported anxiety and in anxious behavior and fidgeting as well as increases in positive affect in the RT but not the video group. In addition, adjustment disorder patients and a third of the depressed patients showed decreases in cortisol levels following RT, while no changes were noted in the video group. Thus, both diagnostic groups appeared to benefit from the RT class.
OBJECTIVE: This study was designed to determine the effectiveness of a group stress reduction program based on mindfulness meditation for patients with anxiety disorders.METHOD: The 22 study participants were screened with a structured clinical interview and found to meet the DSM-III-R criteria for generalized anxiety disorder or panic disorder with or without agoraphobia. Assessments, including self-ratings and therapists' ratings, were obtained weekly before and during the meditation-based stress reduction and relaxation program and monthly during the 3-month follow-up period.
RESULTS: Repeated measures analyses of variance documented significant reductions in anxiety and depression scores after treatment for 20 of the subjects--changes that were maintained at follow-up. The number of subjects experiencing panic symptoms was also substantially reduced. A comparison of the study subjects with a group of nonstudy participants in the program who met the initial screening criteria for entry into the study showed that both groups achieved similar reductions in anxiety scores on the SCL-90-R and on the Medical Symptom Checklist, suggesting generalizability of the study findings.
CONCLUSIONS: A group mindfulness meditation training program can effectively reduce symptoms of anxiety and panic and can help maintain these reductions in patients with generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, or panic disorder with agoraphobia.
Divided No More: A Movement Approach to Educational Reform (1992, Journal Article)
An approach to analysis of educational reform on college campuses that focuses on movement toward, rather than organizational manifestations of, change is described. Four stages include (1) the decision to act consistently with principles; (2) establishment of internal organizational support; (3) going public with intentions; and (4) emergence of a pattern of systematic rewards for reform.
Science Within an Ecology of Mind (1992, Journal Article)
Light on Prāṇāyāma (1992, Book)
Mindfulness of Breathing in the Dhyāna Sūtras (1992, Journal Article)
Equanimity, good health, peace of mind, and long life are the goals of the ancient Taoist tradition known as "internal alchemy," of which Cultivating Stillness is a key text. Written between the second and fifth centuries, the book is attributed to T'ai Shang Lao-chun—the legendary figure more widely known as Lao-Tzu, author of the Tao-te Ching . The accompanying commentary, written in the nineteenth century by Shui-ch'ing Tzu, explains the alchemical symbolism of the text and the methods for cultivating internal stillness of body and mind. A principal part of the Taoist canon for many centuries, Cultivating Stillness is still the first book studied by Taoist initiates today.
Effects of yoga training on exercise tolerance in adolescents with childhood asthma (1991, Journal Article)
Forty six young asthmatics with a history of childhood asthma were admitted for yoga training. Effects of training on resting pulmonary functions, exercise capacity, and exercise-induced bronchial lability index were measured. Yoga training resulted in a significant increase in pulmonary function and exercise capacity. A follow-up study spanning two years showed a good response with reduced symptom score and drug requirements in these subjects. It is concluded that yoga training is beneficial for young asthmatics.
MindScience: an East-West dialogue (1991, Book)
In the rush of modern life, we tend to lose touch with the peace that is available in each moment. World-renowned Zen master, spiritual leader, and author Thich Nhat Hanh shows us how to make positive use of the very situations that usually pressure and antagonize us. For him a ringing telephone can be a signal to call us back to our true selves. Dirty dishes, red lights, and traffic jams are spiritual friends on the path to "mindfulness" -- the process of keeping our consciousness alive to our present experience and reality. The most profound satisfactions, the deepest feelings of joy and completeness lie as close at hand as our next aware breath and the smile we can form right now. Lucidly and beautifully written, "Peace Is Every Step" contains commentaries and meditations, personal anecdotes and stories from Nhat Hanh's experiences as a peace activist, teacher, and community leader. It begins where the reader already is -- in the kitchen, office, driving a car, walking a part -- and shows how deep meditative presence is available now. Nhat Hanh provides exercises to increase our awareness of our own body and mind through conscious breathing, which can bring immediate joy and peace. Nhat Hanh also shows how to be aware of relationships with others and of the world around us, its beauty and also its pollution and injustices. the deceptively simple practices of "Peace Is Every Step" encourage the reader to work for peace in the world as he or she continues to work on sustaining inner peace by turning the "mindless" into the mindFUL. "This book of illuminating reminders bid us to reorient the way we look at the world...toward a humanitarian perspective." -- "Publisher Weekly"
Contemplative psychology (1991, Book)
The Kalachakra Generation-Stage Sadhana (1991, Book Chapter)
Transformative dimensions of adult learning (1991, Book)
This two-year longitudinal study investigated the effect of participation in a special university curriculum, whose principal innovative feature is twice-daily practice of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) and TM-Sidhi program, on performance on Cattell's Culture Fair Intelligence Test (CFIT) and Hick's reaction time. These measures are known to be correlated with general intelligence. One hundred college men and women were the subjects—45 from Maharishi International University (MIU) and 55 from the University of Northern Iowa (UNI). The experimental group (MIU) improved significantly on the CFIT (t=2.79, P<0.005); choice reaction time (t=9.10, P<0.0001); SD of choice reaction time (t=11.39, P<0.0001), and simple reaction time (t=2.11, P<0.025) over two years compared to the control group, which showed no improvement. Possible confounds of subject's age, education level, level of interest in meditation, father's education level, and father's annual income were controlled for using analysis of covariance and stepwise regression. The results replicate the findings of previous longitudinal studies on intelligence test scores at MIU, and indicate that participation in the MIU curriculum results in improvements in measures related to general intelligence.
T'ai chi ch'uan and meditation (1991, Book)
The wheel of time : the Kalachakra in context (1991, Book)
The practice of Kalachakra (1991, Book)
The Yogācāra School of Buddhism: A Bibliography (1991, Book)
Reflective Self-Awareness: A Basic Motivational Process (1991, Journal Article)
The theme of this edition of the "Journal of Experimental Education" is "new perspectives" on motivation. As understood in this article, new perspectives means synthesis and new understanding of old ideas about motivation rather than outright abandonment of accepted thinking. This article has both a theoretical and an empirical objective: First, and theoretically, a new conceptual model of self-regulation, reflective intentionality, in which motivation to act is based heavily on one's conception of self and on higher order processes--specifically reflective self-awareness, emotion, and volition--is described. Second, findings are presented from a study that represents the seminal stages of a program of research to validate the proposed model. The findings tentatively suggest the value of a process-content view of motivation. According to this view, motivation can be understood as being a self-determining process emanating out of the ongoing self-regulatory interaction among self as process (i.e., levels of consciousness, emotion, and volition), the self as content (i.e., self-conception), and the environment. When this ongoing self-regulatory interaction involves higher order consciousness, one's motivation is reflectively intentional.
The States Associated with the Path (1991, Book Chapter)
The Four Foundations of Mindfulness (1991, Book Chapter)
Yogic high-frequency respiration--kapalabhati (KB)--was studied in 24 subjects from a point of rhythmicity. Respiratory movements, blood pressure and R-R intervals of ECG were recorded in parallel and evaluated by spectral analysis of time series. Respiratory signals during KB were modulated by 0.1 Hz rhythm in 82% of experiments. This component was also present in R-R intervals and blood pressure during KB. Frequency (0.2-0.3 Hz) was observed in 67% of respiratory records. The presence of the component 0.2-0.3 Hz in respiration was dependent on resting respiratory frequency. This frequency component was reduced in R-R intervals but increased in blood pressure during kapalabhati as compared to that at rest. The occurrence of both frequency components in respiration during KB supports the hypothesis about the integrative role of cardiovascular and respiratory rhythms in physiological states characterized by altered respiratory frequency.
Oxygen consumption during pranayamic type of very slow-rate breathing (1991, Journal Article)
To determine whether the yogic Ujjayi pranayamic type of breathing that involves sensory awareness and consciously controlled, extremely slow-rate breathing including at least a period of end-inspiration breath holding in each respiratory cycle would alter oxygen consumption or not, ten males with long standing experience in pranayama, and volunteering to participate in the laboratory study were assessed. These subjects aged 28-59 yr, had normal health appropriate to their age. Since kumbhak (timed breath holding) is considered as an important phase of the respiratory cycle in the pranayama, they were categorised into two groups of five each, one group practising the short kumbhak varieties of pranayama, and the other the long kumbhak varieties of pranayama. The duration of kumbhak phase was on an average 22.2 percent of the respiratory cycle in the short kumbhak group, and 50.4 per cent in the long kumbhak group. The oxygen consumption was measured in test sessions using the closed circuit method of breathing oxygen through the Benedict-Roth spirometer. Each subject was tested in several repeat sessions. Values of oxygen consumption of the period of pranayamic breathing, and of post-pranayamic breathing period, were compared to control value of oxygen consumption of the prepranayamic breathing period of each test session. The results revealed that the short kumbhak pranayamic breathing caused a statistically significant increase (52%) in the oxygen consumption (and metabolic rate) compared to the pre-pranayamic base-line period of breathing. In contrast to the above, the long kumbhak pranayamic breathing caused a statistically significant lowering (19% of the oxygen consumption (and metabolic rate).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Reversal of nostril dominance by posture (1991, Journal Article)
Reflex reversal of differential air flow through nostrils (DAFTN) by the adoption of suitable lateral recumbent position was studied in male Nigerian subjects. The subjects who demonstrated more air flow through the left nostril initially in the supine position, adopted left lateral recumbent (LLR) position which brought the decongested left nostril to the down-side and the congested right nostril to the upside. Within 3 to 4 minutes after the adoption of LLR position, the air flow through the nostrils was equalised and by 11th minute the DAFTN was reversed, with more air flowing through the upsided right nostril. Return of the subjects to supine position could not result in the recovery to the initial pattern of DAFTN. It is suggested that reversal of DAFTN with adoption of suitable lateral recumbent position was a reflex effect due to the pressure stimuli to the lower lateral side of the body particularly around the shoulder region and effect was mediated through the sympathetic innervation to mucosal venous sinuses of the nostrils. Possibility of gravitational effect was ruled out.
Effect of yoga on aerobic and anaerobic power of muscles (1991, Journal Article)
Aerobic Power (VO2 max) and anaerobic power were estimated in medical students before and after six weeks of yogic training. A significant increase in aerobic power and a significant decrease in anaerobic power was observed. This may be due to conversion of some of the Fast Twitch (F.T.) muscle fibres into Slow Twitch fibres (S.T.) during yogic training.
Bringing population education closer to effecting fertility behaviour (1991, Journal Article)
When population education programs are linked to community outreach efforts, there may be a direct and immediate impact of fertility. Examples are given of 2 such programs in India and china. In India, state and nongovernmental resources support Maharashtra's 34 women's Development Camps (WDC) for women of childbearing age, which propose to affect fertility behavior and improve quality of life. 9 of these WDCs were set up in densely populated and low income areas, i.e., in Bombay, Pune, and Nashik. The remaining 25 were in rural areas. The 1035 women who participated tend to reflect the conditions of work overload and nutritional deprivation with few rights of decision making. Population education was tailored to the most immediate needs of participants. The aim was to develop awareness and understanding of population as it is related to socioeconomic development, family health, family and community living, and civic responsibilities which benefit the individual, family, community, and society. Critical thinking skills were developed, as well as the awareness of primary health care for women, children, and the family. This involved information on maternal and child care, personal and social hygiene, and the importance of women's education and literacy. Women's rights were discussed in terms of laws for women, consumers' protection act, inheritance rights, irrational beliefs and superstitions, and the injustices of castes and society. Training was given in handicraft making, other employment schemes, energy saving devices such as solar cookers and hand water pumps, sanitation, as well as savings opportunities. Personality development through the use of yoga, and warnings about alcohol, smoking, and drug taking were encouraged. Innovative methods were used to maintain involvement. In China, 34 Peasant Secondary Vocational Schools in Hunan province (1000 teachers and cadres and 25,000 students) provided courses in reproductive responsibility. Specific school results indicated changes in attitudes and support for the 1 child family and delayed marriage. Many engaged in programs to educate peasants in villages on birth control, and hold influential positions after graduation in their communities. College students become agents of change, and teachers sensitize the community too population issues.
This book examines the relationship between the mind and the body; identifies ways in which the mind impacts the physiological system, including the immune system; and explains the theory underlying biofeedback.
The Mechanical and the Organic: On the Impact of Metaphor in Science (1991, Book Chapter)
Australian aboriginal people have lived in harmony with the earth for perhaps as long as 100,000 years; in their words, since the First Day. In this absorbing work, Lawlor explores the essence of their culture as a source of and guide to transforming our own world view. While not romanticizing the past or suggesting a return to the life of the hunter/gatherer, Voices of the First Day enables us to enter into the mentality of the oldest continuous culture on earth and gain insight into our own relationship with the earth and to each other.This book offers an opportunity to suspend our values, prejudices, and Eurocentrism and step into the Dreaming to discover:
• A people who rejected agriculture, architecture, writing, clothing, and the subjugation of animals
• A lifestyle of hunting and gathering that provided abundant food of unsurpassed nutritional value
• Initiatic and ritual practices that hold the origins of all esoteric, yogic, magical, and shamanistic traditions
• A sexual and emotional life that afforded diversity and fluidity as well as marital and social stability
• A people who valued kinship, community, and the law of the Dreamtime as their greatest "possessions."
• Language whose richness of structure and vocabulary reveals new worlds of perception and comprehension.
• A people balanced between the Dreaming and the perceivable world, in harmony with all species and living each day as the First Day.
Voices of the First Day is illustrated throughout with more than 100 extraordinary photographs, bark paintings, line drawings and engravings. Many of these photographs are among the earliest ever made of the Aboriginal people and are shown here for the first time.
Gift from the Sea (1991, Book)
In this inimitable, beloved classic—graceful, lucid and lyrical—Anne Morrow Lindbergh shares her meditations on youth and age; love and marriage; peace, solitude and contentment as she set them down during a brief vacation by the sea. Drawing inspiration from the shells on the shore, Lindbergh’s musings on the shape of a woman’s life bring new understanding to both men and women at any stage of life. A mother of five, an acclaimed writer and a pioneering aviator, Lindbergh casts an unsentimental eye on the trappings of modernity that threaten to overwhelm us: the time-saving gadgets that complicate rather than simplify, the multiple commitments that take us from our families. And by recording her thoughts during a brief escape from everyday demands, she helps readers find a space for contemplation and creativity within their own lives.With great wisdom and insight Lindbergh describes the shifting shapes of relationships and marriage, presenting a vision of life as it is lived in an enduring and evolving partnership. A groundbreaking, best-selling work when it was originally published in 1955, Gift from the Sea continues to be discovered by new generations of readers.
Stress recovery during exposure to natural and urban environments (1991, Journal Article)
Different conceptual perspectives converge to predict that if individuals are stressed, an encounter with most unthreatening natural environments will have a stress reducing or restorative influence, whereas many urban environments will hamper recuperation. Hypotheses regarding emotional, attentional and physiological aspects of stress reducing influences of nature are derived from a psycho-evolutionary theory. To investigate these hypotheses, 120 subjects first viewed a stressful movie, and then were exposed to color/sound videotapes of one of six different natural and urban settings. Data concerning stress recovery during the environmental presentations were obtained from self-ratings of affective states and a battery of physiological measures: heart period, muscle tension, skin conductance and pulse transit time, a non-invasive measure that correlates with systolic blood pressure. Findings from the physiological and verbal measures converged to indicate that recovery was faster and more complete when subjects were exposed to natural rather than urban environments. The pattern of physiological findings raised the possibility that responses to nature had a salient parasympathetic nervous system component; however, there was no evidence of pronounced parasympathetic involvement in responses to the urban settings. There were directional differences in cardiac responses to the natural vs urban settings, suggesting that attention/intake was higher during the natural exposures. However, both the stressor film and the nature settings elicited high levels of involuntary or automatic attention, which contradicts the notion that restorative influences of nature stem from involuntary attention or fascination. Findings were consistent with the predictions of the psycho-evolutionary theory that restorative influences of nature involve a shift towards a more positively-toned emotional state, positive changes in physiological activity levels, and that these changes are accompanied by sustained attention/intake. Content differences in terms of natural vs human-made properties appeared decisive in accounting for the differences in recuperation and perceptual intake.
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