After the stroke Jill lost functions of left hemisphere. The most interesting part is that despite the loss of cognitive functions, she describes her experience with sincere rapture. She emotionally tells us about feeling of “deep inner piece and bliss” and expresses ideas that I highly connected with a topic of mindful meditation that kind of follows me last month. BTW, here are two awesome Google Talks about it: first, second. I even decided to listen to book of the latter one, but that’s a separate story.
In My Stroke of Insight Jill talks a lot about right hemisphere with which connects this state of bliss comparing it to nirvana. She highlights how close we are from this state: “only one thought away”. But we often lose it by being immersed in our thoughts and actions or in left hemisphere.
How according to author can healthy people get closer to this state? Among many ideas which she shares you can find very simple things. Such as gratitude for everything that you have and what surrounds you, attention to and development of sensory feelings, meditation, special perception of environment during physical activity, etc.
But the most important thing is attention to one’s own thoughts and feelings, conscious choice of what to focus on and what not to. Jill believes in neuroplasticity, in our ability to train our brain through attention and concentration on aspects that we’re interested in.
