{"id":17589,"date":"2020-02-10T20:35:47","date_gmt":"2020-02-11T03:35:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crucible.wpmudev.host\/?post_type=books-articles&p=17589"},"modified":"2020-02-10T21:58:24","modified_gmt":"2020-02-11T04:58:24","slug":"chapter-2-part-2","status":"publish","type":"books-articles","link":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/books\/brain-talk\/chapter-2-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Chapter 2 Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Nuts and Bolts of Mind Mapping<\/h3>\n

I love studying mind mapping because it reveals the incredibly sophisticated processes your brain goes through to accomplish things we all take for granted. For instance, when making a mental map of another person\u2019s mind, your brain has to keep track of whose thoughts are whose in your own mind. Are you picturing your own thoughts and feelings or someone else\u2019s? It turns out one part of your reptilian brain is responsible for representing the contents of your own mind while another part tracks the minds of others.<\/p>\n

Your brain also relies on two separate but related \u201cattention networks\u201d to alternately focus your concentration. Your \u201cdorsal\u201d system tracks other people while your \u201cventral\u201d system tracks yourself. By switching back and forth between your ventral and dorsal attention networks, your brain forms a cohesive picture in your mind of other people\u2019s minds as well as your own. When I first learned this, I was amazed! I\u2019d never even considered that distinguishing between your map of your own mind from your map of another person\u2019s mind could be a problem, and yet scientists already figured out how your brain does it! I could hardly believe brain science had advanced so far! I began reading everything I could find on this subject. I had to know how the brain actually pulls off this whole mind-mapping thing!<\/p>\n

My knowledge advanced greatly in 2011 when I encountered a sophisticated model of mind mapping published by Drs. Ahmed Abu-Akel and Simone Shamay-Tsoory. I\u2019d followed both scientists\u2019 extensive mindmapping research careers ever since they\u2019d collaborated on a simpler model in 2003. This time around, they not only integrated the latest neurophysiology research, they added crucial new information about mind-mapping\u2019s neurochemistry that was missing from their previous model. That\u2019s how much brain research had been conducted in the intervening eight years. I was literally jumping out of my chair as I read it!<\/p>\n

I, myself, have never been wild about memorizing parts of the human anatomy. But when clients learn how their brain actually pulls off this amazing feat, they pay more attention to mind mapping, so a brief summary of this model should be helpful. But rather than giving you an anatomy lesson, I\u2019ll give you a functional picture of how your brain works. (For those who are interested, the anatomy appears in Appendix A.)<\/p>\n

To begin with, your brain\u2019s mind-mapping system consists of three physically distinct but interacting parts, which aligns nicely with the triune brain model I mentioned earlier.<\/p>\n

First, there\u2019s a \u201crepresentational\u201d component located in the reptilian (rear) portion of your brain. This is where your mind maps initially arise. Your brain constructs two maps for you and two for the other person. One is a \u201ccognitive\u201d map of thoughts, beliefs, and knowledge. The other is an \u201cemotional\u201d map of feelings and hard-wired as well as socially-based emotional reactions.<\/p>\n

Secondly, there\u2019s an intermediate \u201cattribution and information processing\u201d component in the mammalian portion (middle) of your brain. This is where the process of attributing mental states to yourself and others occurs. For instance, this is where your brain decides you\u2019re a good person; but the guy walking down the street is a creep, and his hot girlfriend would be better off with you.<\/p>\n

Finally, there\u2019s an \u201capplication\/execution\u201d component in your prefrontal neocortex, the uniquely human region of your brain located in your forehead. This is where your brain makes decisions about implementing or acting upon your maps of yourself and others. In other words, here\u2019s where you decide that even though you\u2019re probably smarter than this dude, you\u2019d rather not have him pound you into the cement for coming on to his girlfriend.<\/p>\n

These three areas are interconnected by neural pathways and brain chemicals that relay signals between neurons (\u201cneurotransmitters\u201d). Recent discoveries reveal a complex system that staggers my imagination. It turns out dopamine and serotonin work together to form an integrated regulatory system that innervates all three mind-mapping regions. These two neurotransmitters work in concert to develop your mental maps and assist in updating and maintaining them. In other words, this dopamine\u2014serotonin neurochemical system turns on and off to form your initial map of another person\u2019s mind and then modifies it based on actual errors in predicting his or her actions and behaviors.<\/p>\n

This is pretty amazing information. But you can\u2019t really appreciate the neurochemistry of mind-mapping without a more sophisticated description of its neurophysiology. So bear with me for a moment while I regale you with a more complex picture of what\u2019s taking place.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. There are actually two separate mind-mapping networks. One is the cognitive network which maps your own and other people\u2019s thoughts, knowledge, and beliefs. The other is the affective mind-mapping network, which maps your own and other people\u2019s feelings and emotions. Together they form the larger mind-mapping system by your brain’s integrating these cognitive and emotional maps into an integrated whole.<\/li>\n
  2. These cognitive and motional mind-mapping networks share connections in the reptilian (rear) region of your brain. This is where your brain actually creates representational cognitive and emotional mental maps, and your brain distinguishes maps of your own mind from those of other people.<\/li>\n
  3. Previously I said your ventral and dorsal attention networks track different streams of information regarding your own versus other people\u2019s mental states. Your brain alternately turns these two systems on and off to direct information to the correct areas of the self-other mind-mapping system in your reptilian brain. It also uses this mechanism to shift your attention from focusing on your own mind, to focusing on other people\u2019s minds, and then back and forth endlessly. This is how your attention \u201cdecouples\u201d from your current focus and allows you to refocus on something else.<\/li>\n
  4. Norepinephrine, another neurotransmitter, plays a critical role in this ventral-dorsal switching process which distinguishes maps of your own mind from maps of other people\u2019s minds. Norepinephrine is a third part of the neurochemistry of mind-mapping, and how it interacts with the serotonin-dopamine system is still being discovered. Norepinephrine also promotes vigilance, increases your arousal and alertness, enhances memory formation and retrieval, and mobilizes your brain and body for fight-or-flight reactions. It\u2019s pretty cool that this neurochemical not only helps you track other people\u2019s minds, it also prepares you to act on what you\u2019re mapping.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    If you want the whole incredible story of how the brain produces mind mapping, all the neurobiology and neurochemistry, and what interacts with what, it\u2019s succinctly laid out in Appendix A. Researchers continue to discover new neural connections between brain regions in the mind-mapping network, and incredible secrets of its neurochemistry are still being revealed. At this point, for example, scientists can only speculate about research findings which indicate that oxytocin (a neurohormone) greatly improves healthy subjects\u2019 mind-mapping abilities when sniffed!10 But some things aren\u2019t likely to change. For instance, growing up blind doesn\u2019t change the neural basis of mind mapping.<\/p>\n

    Mind Mapping Shapes Your Life Story<\/h3>\n

    I\u2019ve just given you a rough idea of how your brain maps your own and other people\u2019s thoughts and emotions, and maintains or changes these maps over time. Here\u2019s how it stores and retrieves these maps: Researchers have long known the human brain is functionally subdivided into left and right hemispheres, with each side contributing specialized functions. What researchers haven\u2019t known until recently is the extent to which the left and right hemispheres of the brain are differentially involved in mind mapping.<\/p>\n

    Although your left and right brain hemispheres are integrated and work together, their respective abilities differ. Left-brain thinking is verbal, analytical, and deductive. It processes information sequentially, first looking at details, then, after putting them all together, coming to conclusions. Leftbrain abilities include logic, linear and verbal thinking, mathematics, and an astute memory for facts and song lyrics. Your left brain uses deductive logic and reasoning built on facts, ideas, and recalled memories. Your ability to use language comes from this part of your brain. Your left brain talks to itself in words. When you read this book as text, you\u2019re using your left brain.<\/p>\n

    Right-brain thinking, in contrast, is nonverbal, intuitive, and holistic. It relies on pictures rather than words, and processes information in an instinctual, instantaneous way. It first looks at the whole picture, then the details. It focuses on feelings rather than facts. Right-brain abilities are holistic thinking, nonverbal communication, imagination, intuition, daydreaming, art skills, rhythm, and remembering the tunes of songs. Visualize your first kiss. Remember the way you felt the moment your lips touched. In doing this, you just engaged your right brain.<\/p>\n

    Mind mapping involves both brain hemispheres, working back and forth in powerful combination. In addition to mapping out your and other people\u2019s thoughts, beliefs, and knowledge, your left brain stores your \u201cautobiographical memory\u201d\u2013\u2013the story of your life based on remembered past events including your mental maps of your own and other people\u2019s mental states at the time. This information is actually distributed in various parts of the brain rather than stored in a single location. In contrast your right brain, which maps out feelings and emotions, is also responsible for retrieving and re-assembling your autobiographical memory.<\/p>\n

    Here\u2019s why this is important: Many of my clients are stunned when a completely different picture of their lives emerges, having spent hundreds of hours (and thousands of dollars!) on prior psychotherapy. The flaws in their previous understandings become obvious. They realize insight-oriented talk therapy can only go so far, leaving them with the mistaken impression that they comprehend their past. Because their understanding is based on deductive logic, words, and remembered details, they often fail to see the bigger picture, which has much greater power and meaning. This awareness typically arises when I help them recognize gaps in their autobiographical memory of pivotal events in their lives. From years of experience, I know exactly where to look to expose this gap.<\/p>\n

    Without fail, what\u2019s missing in clients\u2019 autobiographical memories of prior troubling experiences is their mind maps of the people involved. As I\u2019ll explain in Part Two, a right-brain retrieval error often occurs when you try to remember past traumatic events. Common stereotypes suggest people don\u2019t remember prior bad experiences at all\u2014that they are repressed in the unconscious. But my experience indicates complete amnesia is unnecessary because the absence of mind-mapping information about the people involved sufficiently changes the meaning of things to make remembering the event itself tolerable.<\/p>\n

    A variant of this involves instances where you can remember an event and you can retrieve your maps of the self-perceptions, knowledge, ideas and thoughts of the people involved. However, you still misinterpret their mental states because maps of their emotions and feelings (a right brain process) are absent. When clients put the mind-mapping information back into their autobiographical memories, the meanings of their life stories change significantly. Digesting these new pictures can be upsetting.<\/p>\n

    Part of the shock comes from realizing your mind-mapping information has been absent from your memories. Most clients had no idea anything was missing! This realization encourages re-examining other memories through the lens of mind mapping, trying to retrieve what their nemesis (the person in their memory engaging in cruel, destructive, or traumatic behavior) was thinking and feeling towards them at the time.12 After the initial shock of recognition wears off, clients feel more relaxed and grounded.<\/p>\n

    Getting to this point can be challenging. When clients try to fill in the gaps in their autobiographical memories, without fail, they attempt this using their left brains. For instance, they try to work off historical facts, like \u201cMy father used to take me fishing as a child.\u201d Using deductive logic gives them a (false) sense of moving forward, but, unfortunately, they\u2019re using a method that\u2019s guaranteed to fail. Their left brains are simply incapable of retrieving the missing mind-mapping data.<\/p>\n

    Clients usually have no difficulty retrieving detailed memories using right-brain methods I\u2019ll describe in Part Three, including those who initially reported remembering virtually nothing of their childhoods. Their story often changes to something like “My father took me fishing so he could get away from my mother. There was little conversation between us. I got to tag along while Dad did what he liked to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

    You only get part of the picture using your left brain to retrieve missing mind maps. But I\u2019ve come to the conclusion this mistake is purposeful. Leftbrain attempts to access missing mind-mapping information are actually a defense mechanism that prevents your brain from becoming dysregulated by seeing upsetting things. This way is like looking at something using only one eye. Sure, you can see something<\/em>, but it\u2019s only two-dimensional. Using both eyes produces stereoscopic (three-dimensional) vision which contains much greater details.<\/p>\n

    Whenever clients try to grasp the meaning of their past intellectually\u2014for example, by offering theories they\u2019ve polished in years of prior therapy\u2013\u2013I interfere and push them to describe what they actually see<\/em> when they look at their memories. People who are avoiding the emotional impact of their leftbrain, intellectual theories always fail. They say, \u201cI understand it intellectually, but I don\u2019t get it emotionally.\u201d<\/p>\n

    I reply, \u201cWell, if you don\u2019t get it emotionally, then you don\u2019t get it! And if you want to get it, stop telling me your theories and tell me what you see<\/em>!\u201d<\/p>\n

    To produce a more accurate autobiographical memory by retrieving mind-mapping information, you have to visualize the picture and watch what\u2019s happening rather than intellectualizing, rationalizing, or speculating about what things means. This, as I\u2019ve explained, is a right-brain process.<\/p>\n

    Be aware of this as you read this book and sift through your autobiographical memories. Mind maps of your antagonists are probably missing in your memories, whether they involve your spouse, children, parents or siblings, employer, or co-workers. To retrieve these maps, use your right brain to visualize what\u2019s happening in a particular remembered event. Keep watching your memory as if you were studying a videotape, watching the action develop. You\u2019ll see things that aren\u2019t evident in your verbal descriptions and summaries. If you keep at it, eventually you\u2019ll see the meaning of the entire picture suddenly come together all at once. You\u2019ll get an entirely different picture of the event and perhaps your whole life. I\u2019ll show you exactly how to do this in subsequent chapters.<\/p>\n

    Mind Mapping Impacts Your Brain<\/h3>\n

    Mind mapping lies at the heart of your connections with other people. Mind mapping constructs your understanding of people and events as they occur in real time. Likewise, your ability to accurately retrieve mental maps of other people and yourself greatly shapes your autobiographical memory and the story of your life. How you think and feel, what you desire, what you refuse to see in yourself\u2014all this and more dramatically impacts those around you for better and for worse. The same holds true for other people\u2019s thoughts, feelings, and behaviors profoundly affecting how you feel about yourself, how you see the world, and what you say and do.<\/p>\n

    It\u2019s less obvious that mind mapping also changes your brain as well. But mind mapping profoundly interconnects us all, down to the level of interpersonal neurobiology. Traumatic interpersonal experiences can have far-reaching negative neurobiological impacts on your brain. I\u2019ll explain this in Part Two where we\u2019ll dive into the murky world of traumatic<\/em> mind mapping.<\/p>\n

    These negative impacts, however, are not set in stone. In Part Three, I\u2019ll show you how to reverse damage done by traumatic mind mapping and heal yourself in the process. Moreover, you don\u2019t have to wait until then to use mind mapping to create positive<\/em> neuroplasticity for yourself and those around you. It\u2019s actually quite simple. Do something positive that\u2019s completely out of character for you. When you violate other people\u2019s mental maps of you, it grabs their attention; and they\u2019ll start re-mapping you to make sense of what\u2019s going on. If you keep this up, their maps of you and how they interact with you will change.<\/p>\n

    Do you want your aloof, adolescent daughter to be less adversarial? Want your husband to stop glancing at the football game and have a real conversation with you? Wish your employees were more motivated? Just do something positive that challenges their map of you. You\u2019ll not only have their undivided attention, you\u2019ll be changing your brain and their brains for the better. Most people are amazed to discover the breadth and depth of mind-mapping\u2019s impact on their lives. This particularly happens when they learn about children\u2019s mind mapping abilities. Once you know how early this starts, and the full extent to which they can map you, you\u2019ll never look at your kids the same way again. This is where we\u2019re headed in our next chapter.<\/p>\n

    \u00ab Brain Talk – Chapter 2 Part 1<\/a> Brain Talk – Chapter 3 Part 1 \u00bb<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"parent":17268,"menu_order":12,"template":"","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"wds_primary_category":0},"categories":[65],"class_list":["post-17589","books-articles","type-books-articles","status-publish","hentry","category-brain-talk"],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"woocommerce_thumbnail":false,"woocommerce_single":false,"woocommerce_gallery_thumbnail":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"developer","author_link":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/author\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"The Nuts and Bolts of Mind Mapping I love studying mind mapping because it reveals the incredibly sophisticated processes your brain goes through to accomplish things we all take for granted. For instance, when making a mental map of another person\u2019s mind, your brain has to keep track of whose thoughts are whose in your…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/books-articles\/17589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/books-articles"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/books-articles"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/books-articles\/17589\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/books-articles\/17268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crucible4points.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}