The importance of shutting down.

Neurotransformational Coaching

I recently participated in a week-long training workshop in Minneapolis on neurotransformational coaching, a fascination of mine. It blends the big picture spiritual vision (right brain) with the neuroscience of the brain (left brain) in service to brain integration (which is when both hemispheres of the brain work in balance). Brain integration is the key to high-functioning happiness in my world, because my hemispheres tend to argue with each other.

Two critical networks.

One of the things we focused on was the relationship between something called the Default Mode Network and the Task Positive Network in our brain. This isn’t a “right-brain/left-brain” kind of thing; the networks encompass both hemispheres. But the fascinating thing to me is that they both can’t be “on” at the same time. When one is in use, the other is dark and vice versa.

Why this matters, is that both networks are imperative to our well being and sometimes we have to learn to consciously shut one off, so the other can power up when we’ve become unbalanced.

The Default Mode Network is where dreams are born. It’s our big-picture place, where we can build community and collaborate. It’s where our meaning resides; it’s the stomping ground for life-purpose. It’s relatively abstract. It’s a place of quiet recovery.

On the other side, the Task Positive Network is our micro-manager. It’s where the minutia is organized. It’s the place of step-by-step planning. It’s tangible and solid. It’s our calendar, and our project management software.

What they look like.

Meditation, prayer, ritual, long walks in the woods… These are what we do to turn off the Task Positive Network. Life isn’t a fun place when we can do nothing but recycle minutia over and over again. This is the place of the Buddhist term, “Monkey Mind”. When we just can’t quiet our thoughts.

Both networks are equally necessary.

If we’re stuck in the Task Positive Network a majority of the time, good luck coming up with any new ideas, or innovating. This is what stagnancy looks like. Nothing much moves here, because creativity is necessary for forward momentum.

And if we’re stuck in the Default Mode Network a majority of the time, we can’t bring any of our visions to life. Our dreaming becomes detached and frustrating. It feels like floating in space, unable to find solid ground.

What we value.

One of the most common patterns in the Western culture is to place all of our value on the Task Positive Network. If we’re not doing, doing, doing…we have no value. There is a constant anxiety to produce more and accomplish more. Keep going. Schedule more. Scale. Build!

This misdirected voice tells us we don’t have time for a vacation, we can’t afford to walk away for a couple of days, and who has time to meditate?

As a society that leaves us burned out, stressed out, and hyper-vigilant. We become the people who are so focused on the minutia they literally cannot see the big picture.

I had an incredible and terrifying dream about this once. In my dream there was an F-5 tornado blasting through my town, visible to anyone who would bother to look out the window. It was deafening in sound, and the houses were shaking, but nobody would budge from their cozy chairs because the Weather Channel wasn’t reporting any tornado. A message about balance, for sure.

What is really happening in the brain?

The April 2015 issue of Psychology Today has a great article on this, called “Eureka!” In the article the author shares the latest research which is that neuroscience has discovered that the brain in idle (the brain in Default Mode Network) is actually far more active than a brain engaged in the minutia.

Neuroscientist Marcus Raichle proved in 2001 that when the DMN is taking over, there is a complete party going on in the brain. He described it as “exploding with neurogenesis, crackling with interconnectivity, and burning perhaps 20 times the metabolic resources of the conscious brain”. Therefore, when we veg out, we’re actually building the best, wisest, most creative thought processes which generally spark the flashes of insight.

Neurotransformational Coaching insights.

I think an important takeaway is this– If we don’t learn the importance of shutting down, turning off, vegging out as a critical component to our success and well being, then we’re going to get stuck. Painfully so. And until we learn to value an alternative way, we will not be able to reason or logic our way through that stuckness.

We have to find a way to make the time for being rather than always focusing on doing.

We have to make time for nothing, or nothing will make time for us.

Much Love,

Kristy