The Power of Inaction

The Power of Inaction

This video is me explaining my theory to a college classroom:

       

Buy the whole book The Shadowed Soul with a chapter on how I’ve overcome ADHD, Dyslexia, Suicidal Depression, PSTD and Anxiety, Schizophrenia and Bipolar, Epilepsy and Autism, Brain Damage and Digital Dementia and the Retardation of Thoughts in the link below:

Chapter 4: The Power of Inaction

           The point of this book is going to be about combining ancient philosophy and modern science. I will be using the medical theory of the neuroplasticity of the human brain and fuse it together with the mental exercises of Ancient Vedic scriptures. Neuroplasticity is why I was able to finally learn how to read at the age of thirty that I wrote about in the chapter A Glimmer of Hope. Reading was something which seemed like I was completely incapable of doing for most of my life because of my learning disabilities. The neuroplasticity of the human brains is saying this empirical world is constantly changing and shifting and all our minds (brains) are built to continually develop throughout our lives in a positive way which helps us adapt to those shifts and changes. My thesis that I proved in the last chapter Pseudo-Laws and Pseudo Morals: when the mind is controlled, the hand will follow, which is what jnana yoga is all about. Jnana in Sanskrit means knowledge or mind. What yoga means in Sanskrit is practice, so in the rest of this book I show how I am able to understand mine. By me understanding my mind, I infer others can use these same tools in this book to help themselves with their mental illnesses and brain dysfunctions because I have had a lot of brain dysfunctions myself and help or even overcome them with the exercises I provide here. I have overcome learning how to read with the Linda Mood Bell program like I said. The mental exercises in this book have led me to true happiness, and true happiness is what I want for everyone these days, so I infer if it can work for me, with all the complications of my brain, it can work for anyone if they give these exercises enough daily dedication and practice.

I prove I am not that much different than anyone else using ancient philosophy and the psychology of modern movies and commercials. Sure, I have a rare organic brain disorder, which gives me the aspects of eight different disorders without fitting one stereotype, but ancient scriptures and religions are meant for everyone, and so are catchy commercials and entertaining movies. I use the philosophies of Ancient religion and show how similar I am to everyone else in this chapter by the psychology of commercials.

I have learned how to understand my mind and abate my mental health through Ancient Philosophy. My hope is that others can use these same tools to help themselves understand their own minds with their mental health issues, and mental health issues are rising because of modern technology. I am also not encouraging anyone to get off medication or not to listen to their doctor. I am not a doctor and not giving medical advice. I am just showing what works for me, and assuming how similar all humans are, that it can work for you too.

Most medications just don’t work for me because of my organic brain disorder. I show amazingly high tolerances for lots of different drugs and several of the ones that do work at first stop working for me because I build a tolerance to that specific medication. I have also been on low doses of other medications that do work so my cognition isn’t impaired like it was for my brother. He couldn’t think with the amount of dopamine blockers they had him on and it made him miserable. I hate not being able to think as well, which some of these medications keep me from doing. It took me years of doing these exercises daily and I have to continue to do them. I argue in favor of modern science throughout this whole book. My hope is that everyone can better understand their own minds and improve their realities no matter what their reality is because, as I state all throughout this book: our realities are nothing but what we perceive, and our minds are nothing but imagination. As I also prove in my chapter on overcoming schizophrenia: we all have false beliefs, and it is the really crazy people that have no ability to question their sanity, so “insanity” applies to most “sane” people because most people, I have noticed, have no ability to question their own sanity just like a crazy person we all see walking down the streets in a big city talking to themselves! The world struggles with “sanity,” and we all struggle with pride, which pride is the greatest of all sins for the very reason it tells us we are right when the only thing anyone can be truly certain of is their own existence! “I am” is the main premises of Vedic Philosophy, and the only thing that is truly apodictic, which each experience that any of us has validates one only thing: we exists!

I take medication still to this day. I am on 2mg of CBD and THC for my epilepsy, which I would argue has some mild psychoactive effects for attention deficit issues. I take an evening dose of Geodon 80mg for mania and psychosis, which is half of what I used to take. And 600mg of Gabapentin four times a day for seizures and mood as well. Most medications just don’t work for me, and I have been on almost every psych medication and anticonvulsant there is. I just show in this book how I have been able to find happiness through understanding and controlling my own mind in a daily practice of single pointed concentration meditation: Trataka. Yet, my true hope is that I can get anyone who’s reading this to reflect and look for similarities if they feel as though they are mentally ill or not because happiness is just a state of mind.

I also encourage anyone to better understand their own mind in the combined processes of jnana yoga and modern science if they struggle with mental health or not. I am a firm believer that everyone can help their minds and their realities through a daily practice Trataka outlined in my chapter on ADHD. The chapter on ADHD is my main daily practice and is the cornerstone of the mental exercises throughout this book. I have a chapter on ADHD, PTSD and anxiety, suicidal depression, schizophrenia and bipolar, epilepsy and autism, and then the final chapter of digital dementia, brain damage, and the retardation of thoughts, then I prove God in the epilogue. I have struggled with aspects of all of those diagnoses with my organic brain disorder. Today I am fully employed as a corporate accountant and have been on SSDI for fifteen years. Most people when they get on federal disability never get off. Being a productive member of society was only a give through seeking answers in Ancient Philosophy and religions all over the world.

I agree with Proclus: “Each one is in All and All are in each.” No matter how different I may seem to be to everyone, you are all just a reflection of myself. Just as I am to others. We are all on a spectrum with the same universal character defects and assets, and at our Core, what our True Self is, is nothing but Consciousness. That is why I believe, despite my unique disorder, anyone can benefit from this book.

I have been diagnosed with a heterotopic grey matter. A heterotopic grey matter is a nerve everyone has had, and it migrates from the inner part of the brain to the outer part of the brain in late womb to early childhood development, and bit of mine with left over adjacent to my right lateral ventricle and within my right frontal horn. This gives me the aspects of all these disorders, as well as a couple of others, without fitting one stereotype. As I want to reiterate, I am not a doctor, nor do I argue anyone should not be on medication or not listen to their doctor. I am all for Western Science, which is what got me into Hinduism to begin with. I have found all the different forms Hinduism, especially Vedanta, are extremely compatible with modern science, and as of today, nothing has helped my mental state more than the practice that I developed through Ancient Vedic scriptures. These are all reinforced in the book I Am That. Nisargadatta Maharaj, in the book I Am That has transcribed conversations with people who sought his council, is my modern day Masai, if I have one.

Meditation is good for every human brain, and all our realities, as I will prove throughout this book. I would argue there are two disorders that I delt with that I am sure others can completely overcome without medication because of the way I meditate: ADHD and panic attacks.

Remember, no human is born with an “IQ,” for lack of a better term, being that “IQ” educational, emotional, or social. Developing our minds all throughout our lives is what neuroplasticity is all about. Our brains (minds) are meant to continually adapt throughout our lives, which is why I am sure that people can overcome their ADHD without such terrible drugs as Ritalin. I have talked to doctors who specialize in childhood psychology who think that Ritalin is the worst drug that is prescribed in anyway with all the damage it does to the brain. With such diagnoses as ADHD, which is more developmental, anyone who can get off such toxic drugs as Ritalin should get off them. Ritalin, and the different forms of Ritalin, are nothing but speed. Speed, by far, causes more damage to the brain than any other drug which can be abused. Ritalin can cause issues even just through proper use just like all other medications can. Ritalin seems to be nothing but a poison to me, and I didn’t feel Ritalin after one dose, so I really didn’t have an option if I wanted to be able to pay attention to the words on a page while I was reading a book. I had to overcome my ADHD through Trataka.

Benzodiazepines are drugs that are most commonly used for anxiety and are by far one of the most addictive drugs for any addict. The withdrawals for Benzodiazepines can be fatal. Sure, they use them in emergency situations to stop seizures and things like panic attacks, or severe mania, but I have seen people die from seizures because of their withdrawals from different benzodiazepines. No type of Benzodiazepines ever really even worked for me more than a couple of times no matter how much I took, which shows my abnormalities and tolerances to all kinds of drugs, but the theory in this book can help anyone improve their lives because the biggest problem with all humanity is ignorance and understanding as I proved in Pseudo-Laws and Pseudo-Morals. Ignorance and understanding are our biggest issuesbecause love is the root cause of every actions we take. We just get confused with what we are truly supposed to be doing in the moment. We just do not see the root of fear is love: fear we will lose something we love, or fail to get a desire met that we want. If we want to be able to take the first step in anything, we have to see what the problem is, so we need awareness. If anyone wants more awareness, the true key is an ancient solution: daily meditation. Especially the thinning of the mind and being able to drop it completely, like I show in my chapter on ADHD, through single pointed concentration meditation (Trataka).

In these ancient scriptures of the Vedas it shows the motivation of the desires that control us all: pleasure and pain. We are all controlled by the desires of what we love. Love is just the root of every desire and the pleasures we seek. Pain is our motivating factor to do or seek something else. Most of us just don’t pay attention to much of what we think, and I am encouraging everyone to change that and pay attention of all corners of your mind all throughout everyday once you start meditating every single day.

Our “IQ’s” (intelligence) is based on two things beyond our control: genetics and circumstances. 99.9% of all human DNA is identical and 90% of what someone learns happens in the first five years of their life. Given the right information and motivation, we can do lots for ourselves to get our brains to continue to develop and grow throughout our lives. I have even been able to overcome mild brain damage from my seizures and drug abuse through exercising my mind every day as well that I lay out in this book.

19 years ago, when I got sober, I could not really remember too much because of the seizure I had from speed abuse. Today I am a savant again with my memory. I can demonstrate my memory to anyone if they like, and it was all through my mental exercises and the Neurological Evaluation I had done at UCSF. I have also met others who have had brain damage and brain surgeries, where pieces of their brains were removed, and doctors said they were not going to ever have that high of a level of intelligence, but I have seen two of these other people defy their doctors and get such things as college degrees and graduate at the top of their classes.

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In the Ancient Indian philosophy of Vedanta, it is the Gunas which make up everything. In the micro sense, the three Gunas are what make up the different pieces of the mind. The three Gunas are Rajas, Tames, and Sattva. Rajas has to do with things like passion, anger, and all kinds of misguided energy. Tamas has to do with things like depression, delusions, and darkness. The Rajas itself has its roots in the Tamas because of the states of delusion, and the misinterpretation of what truly is. Then there is Sattva. The Sattva is the ground of Being that is in God. The Sattva is within us all, and the Sattva is the ideal goal we should all get closer to when it comes to our minds.

I am also using identity theory in this book. In identity theory the brain and the mind are the same thing. This is made obvious to us when there is damage to the brain, this impedes our thoughts and actions, and in Vedanta the mind is made of thoughts and is truly nothing but imagination. To get the mind closer to Sattva would be the goal for anyone in this religion, yet for most of my life, because of all of my physical abuse as a child, and enhanced by my psychological disorders, as well as the trauma I got from Discovery Academy, then the drug abuse of my adult life, the thoughts of my mind had mostly been cluttered with Rajas and Tamas. I realized if I was going to address the thoughts of my mind and get myself closer to a pure state of Sattva, the best thing to do was to not focus on what is important, or Sattva, but to focus on what is not important the Rajas and Tamas. This means I need to find the thoughts I should let go of, and upon seeing which of my thoughts I should let go of, or even replace, I would be detaching from Rajas and Tamas completely. I could then get my mind closer and closer to Pure Sattva and allow the Sattva to control me by negating the Rajas and Tamas and letting the Sattva rise.

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Executive function has to do with the part of the brain which is rational, discursive, and which regulates emotions. My brain has been in a constant state of high executive dysfunction for a large part of my life. I have the aspects of eight different mental disorders without fitting one stereotype: epilepsy, schizoaffective bipolar type, obsessive-compulsive personality, ADD, dyslexia, borderline autism, general anxiety and PTSD, and I’ve struggled with suicidal depression throughout my life starting at a very, very young age. I have no ability to count how many times I ended up in a psych ward for trying to kill myself. A lot of those suicide attempts were for attention and just a place to live, because I had no ability to be homeless in a big city, and other times I meant it and tried hard. I just never died. The City of San Francisco made sure after my first attempt that I couldn’t buy a gun when leaving the psych-ward with a document that they always made me sign. The City of San Francisco is the model that other cities in the US should model after when it comes to getting people healthcare that can’t afford it, but what the United States truly needs is universal healthcare for all.

The heterotopic grey matter is the direct cause of these disorders as well as my seizures is what the theories my doctors have told me. I had a Neurological Evaluation at UCSF, by Brandon E. Kopald, Psy.D., that states my brain is constantly going in and out of eight different brain states from moment to moment. A brain state is a level of what anyone brain is functioning at in any given moment. This is abnormal to have someone’s brain constantly jumping in and out of different states, let alone eight of them. I would argue most people function in a single brain state for large parts of their daily lives. Sure, sleeping would be a different brain state, but day to day living functions most people’s brains aren’t jumping in and out of eight of them. These brain states are not identical to the eight different disorders I have been diagnosed with, but anyone could see how this executive dysfunction of the eight different brain states would directly influence these disorders and make me incapable of treatment for a large part of my life because organic disorders are known not to react well to medications. Most doctors I met had no ability to help me in any way, and lots of doctors made my life worse from a very young age. Especially the doctor I saw at Discovery Academy.

I based this essay on years of psychological hospitalizations and this Neurological Evaluation at UCSF by Dr. Kopald at UCSF, done on 09/14/2017. The brain states that my brain was constantly jumping between, were a majority of the states of Rajas to Tamas, in my opinion, for a large part of my life. The proof of that is my Oppositional Defiance Disorder I was locked up for as a child. I took that difficult behavioral issue and it was perpetuated throughout a large part of my adult life because of my autism and the inability for my emotional behavior to evolve until I started meditating daily. Meditation has improved my emotional “IQ” severally. It was a doctor at UCSF: Dr. Paul Garcia, who is head of epileptology, who diagnosed me with the heterotopic grey matter. They found the heterotopic grey matter with an MRI. This nerve is what causes my seizures and speculated to cause, and definitely influences, my other disorders.

Three of my disorders aren’t really about my brain jumping in and out of brain states: dyslexia, ADHD, and autism. The dyslexia has to do with parts of my brain being underdeveloped, and parts of my brain being over developed, and they have a hard time communicating. This confusion of communication is also characteristics of ADHD and autism.

Autism and ADHD have a lot of the same symptoms. Lots of doctors have speculated recently that ADD and ADHD are really are just a mild form of autism. I agree that ADHD is just a mild form of autism. It is also why it is impossible to get an appointment at the autism clinic at UCSF because more and more people are getting diagnosed with it, and nobody, no matter who we are, has a 180 social “IQ” in anyway. Every single person has autistic characteristics. I work daily to abate the symptoms of both my ADHD and autism. This daily effort is also about the development of parts of my brain that are underdeveloped just like interpreting written symbols. I will go into that more throughout the other chapters of this book.

Autism is an organic disorder which affects my ability to relate to others. I am very good with people when they are suffering, but I am terrible with the average individual just socializing. People that are known to be on the spectrum can be extremely empathic, almost like a sixth sense when someone is suffering, but can’t relate on a basic level. That is me, but I really didn’t get diagnosed with autism until later in life when they started expanding the diagnostics of autism.  

My epilepsy is abnormal with the frequency of my seizures and the patterns of their occurrences, as well as the abnormal and atypical reactions to anticonvulsants and other medications. Nothing made my seizures worse than Xcopri, which is the latest anticonvulsant and why I am back on so many medications. The mental exercises I had in the book got me off most meds, but the Xcopri made my seizures so much worse I had to get back on a lot of different medication. That is an atypical reaction to Xcopri. It made my seizures worse.

The abnormal patters of my seizures was one of the reasons I was undiagnosed with epilepsy for five years as a child. My seizures were so abnormal, and I was so difficult to deal with, that the doctors at Discovery Academy told everyone I was doing it for attention. The doctors at Discovery Academy were quite terrible doctors, and by far the worst I ever saw. That opinion was reinforced when I had talked to other kids from Discovery Academy years after I left, and the medications that doctor had those other kids on were all wrong for them too. Every single one I talked to, and I talked to lots of them, all told me the doctor there, Dr. Christopher, was completely terrible and made their life worse. He gave me one EEG and told my mother they weren’t seizures. You have to be having a seizure at the same time you are having an EEG for it to show up as an electronical disturbance in the brain! I was a kid and didn’t know that! Dr. Christopher seemed to have no clue!

My seizures are caused by structural abnormalities. This nerve, heterotopic grey matter, gives a surge of chemicals at the time I am having a seizure. A seizure itself is nothing but a surge of electricity in the brain. This surge of electricity will also fluctuate the other chemicals in the brain, because all our brains function off of is nothing but electricity, and all any chemical is, is nothing but a compound of electromagnetic energy. Yet, only about 2% of the people with epilepsy have a heterotopic grey matter. It is hard to know how many people suffer from a heterotopic grey matter completely because some people might have it and it is too small to see on the MRI. I stated that my heterotopic grey matter in my brain is located adjacent to my right lateral ventricle and in my right frontal horn, and with this surge of chemicals happening in my brain from the seizures, it shows at least a part of all of these disorders to be an organic executive brain disfunction, but all mental illnesses are both genetics and circumstances no matter who we are.

Mental illness being a combination of both genetics and circumstances is proven by studying identical twins. Just because one of the twins gets an organic disorder, such as paranoid schizophrenia, it does not mean the other one will. They are both born with the same genes, but as they get older, their genes mutate, so their genes change just like everyone else’s does over their lives. This is call epigenetics, or the mutation of your genes based on circumstances. Their genes mutate differently because of the different circumstances they are in. The identical twins’ genomes are not anywhere near identical when they are measured at ages such as 60, so circumstances play a role even in organic brain disorders such as paranoid schizophrenia or mine.

My Seizures were also brought upon by circumstances at Discovery Academy. The kids there would try and pass each other out, but hyperventilating while kneeling on the ground, standing up, and having someone cut off their oxygen supply, to get a quick buzz. One time when they cut off my oxygen supply was when I had my first grand mal seizure. It is this lack of oxygen to my brain that triggered my seizures to begin with at the age of 15 or so, even though I had the nerve in my head my whole life, I hadn’t had any seizures until then. When I have this surge of chemicals in my brain from the seizures, this surge influences both the brain states and the thoughts. I noticed this because I sit in silent meditation every day for forty-five minutes and just watch my thoughts.

I just happened to start the daily meditation right before I had this Neurological Evaluation. I saw, after I had the Neurological Evaluation at UCSF, that when my brain states were jumping extremely rapidly at the same time my thoughts were bouncing all over the place too. I would also argue that there are times my brain could be jumping in and out of even more or less brain states than the eight this specific Neurological Evaluation showed because of my constant fluctuations with seizure and moods. I even have prolonged cycles of the mania as well, which I was not manic, and on lots of medication, at the time of the Neurological Evaluation at UCSF.

My seizures, as well as such things as mania, come in swings and waves, which is a direct relation to the diagnosis of bipolar. This bipolar is connected directly to my mood. But I noticed in silent meditation that when my thoughts would change rapidly, so would my feelings along with all other such issues such as more seizures within that 24-hour period. I have noticed since I have been digging deeper into my subconscious with meditation, every time I switch to another brain state there is a shift in thinking which goes along with it. It was an extremely rapid change when this all first began. I also enjoy meditation now which has gotten me to let go of Rajas and Tamas that make up these brain states and disorders my brain is mostly made of, improving my life, and becoming more and more Sattvic.

The thoughts of my mind, and anyone’s mind (brain), are made from the three Gunas, yet my mind is in a constant change of brain states and executive dysfunction. So, do the brains states precede the thoughts, or do the thoughts precede the brain states? Was the first question I asked myself when I sat in silence after I was told the results of this Neurological Evaluation. There are also the feelings which change with the brain states that are triggered by the different thoughts. Is it the brain states or the thoughts that influence my emotions? Noticing how much my mind was jumping with the thoughts I asked myself: can I address my brain states and disorders through my thinking? I started to wonder could I focus on my brain states through the Gunas of my mind? Maybe I could redirect my brain states through redirecting my thinking! I did not know it was possible for me to improve my brain through learning how to gently concentrate. Learning how to control my mind through directing my thinking.

I have also noticed through meditation (separate from the brain states), that thoughts rise and fall in my mind without any control. I am constantly aware of what I am thinking these days because of mediation, and thoughts rise and fall in everyone’s mind without their control. I only have confirmed this by talking to others who meditate on a daily basis. I was able to shut a Buddhist monk up right, who was convinced she had free will, so I asked her: “it is how we feel about what we think that controls our actions, so do you have any control over the thoughts that rise in your mind and how they make you feel?” She was in shock! She was giving a Dharma talk at the San Francisco Zen Center at that moment, and she had no response whatsoever to that challenge! She is also someone who watches her own mind every day too, and she had been meditating much, much longer than I had, but she couldn’t respond to me because I proved to her none of us have any control over the thoughts that rise in our minds and how they make us feel, so how are we supposed to truly have this free will we all claim to function off of?

How and why random thoughts do rise in our minds is something neurologists and psychiatrists still have not discovered the happenings of yet. Sure, certain situations will provoke certain thoughts, but I am sitting in silence, just like anyone else who meditates, just watching these thoughts rising randomly at different rates triggered by different brain states, and anyone I have talked to who meditates has told me they have no control over their minds either, especially when they first begin. I have seen lots of people refuse to meditate for the very reason they have no control over their minds, and they do not like what they see in their mind when they are meditating. It scares them to see how little control they have over their own minds. Yet, these thoughts control the emotions we all feel, and when the emotions are provoked by the thoughts in our daily lives, they are followed by the actions we take.

The epilepsy, schizo, and the autism are not mood disorders, but they directly influence the brain states as well as influence the feelings. It is the thoughts which control the feelings as well, so it is that the thoughts and the brain states are contingent on each other. If there are thoughts (T), then the brain states (B) change, and if there are brain states (B), then the thoughts change (T); it is the change in the brain states and thoughts that control how I feel, and how we all feel (F), which it is how I feel about what I think that controls my actions (A).

The Buddhist monk agreed that her thoughts lead to how she felt, which controlled her actions. She had no understanding of the brain states I am talking about, but it was the testing of the brain states at UCSF, and adding it to the awareness brought upon by daily meditation which got me to the full equation of human behavior: (((T>B)_*(B>T)) >F)>A.

The problem with this equation is if the brain states are what are truly coming first, then I, or anyone else, would have no ability to “control” our actions whatsoever. The only way to solve this dilemma would be to make an assumption of faith, which all science does constantly is make assumptions, then verify those assumptions through experiment, which is what this book has done as well. So, if I simplify the equation by putting my thoughts before the brain states. In symbolic logic if the conjunction is isolated you can just drop one of the premises. So:

(T>B)*(B>T)

This can be simplified to:

(T>B),

Then it can be added back to the rest of the argument:

((T>B)>F)>A.

This equation shows me the best way to deal with my feelings, which control my actions, is to address my thoughts before the brain states. I would need to have the thoughts at least influencing my brain states to try and address my disorders directing them through how I consciously think.

What I have noticed is I do not have influence over the thoughts that rise in my brain, but I do have influence over what I do with each thought once they do if I can be truly aware of what I am thinking. The more I train my brain, the easier it gets as well. My theory is that I can rewire my brain states, which give direct influence on the different diagnosis: schizoaffective-bipolar type, ADHD, dyslexia, autism, obsessive-compulsive disorder personality, anxiety and PTSD, and depression, if I can see these thoughts for what they are: imagination. I work on emptying my mind daily to get to that Pure State of Being that is within all of us: Consciousness. Today I can function in this society. It does not need to be the control of the thoughts rising, but the ability to realize a thought is just a thought, or nothing but that imagination, and take these thoughts as something I should take as important or not when I am walking down the street.

One of the most amazing things that I have learned about the mind by sitting in silence was the only thing the mind truly is, is imagination. When someone realizes thoughts are not reality, this realization can take the power right out of any thought. I have been able to function through mild hypnotic illusion that I still deal with at times. In my past, I have been completely powerless over my actions for most of my life because I have been completely powerless over my thoughts and how these thoughts made me feel. I took this “imagination” as reality. I was powerless over all my thinking because I was never aware of what I was thinking, and my behavior was extremely out of control for a large part of my life.

I don’t believe most people have any idea of what they are thinking most of the time because it was Sigmund Fraud that said all humans do is seek pleasure and avoid paid and we don’t pay attention to 90% of what we think. This means that 90% of what every human thinks is subconscious, and it was Descartes that said if you meditate you can look at your own mind from any angle. Both those concepts are in the Vedas, and the Vedas have been my answer to things most doctors could not help me with.

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I had always gotten into a lot of conflict with people throughout my life, and, at times, daily. This was a chronic issue I had had to deal with for most of my life. I was institutionalized as a child for my behavior at Discovery Academy. I brought these behavioral issues into my adult life as well. As a child I had the most extreme case of Oppositional Defiance Disorder I have ever really heard of. It was all verbal, but I had no ability to think something, and not say it. It got me into extreme amounts of trouble, but meditation, and developing my brain, extremely slowly, on a daily basis, has been, by far, the best psychological treatment I have ever gotten.

I have been attacked and beaten up more times than I can possibly count for the things that I have said to people. I am someone who had a doctor in charge of hospital cuss me out for what I had said to him, and I was his patient at the time it happened. A psychiatrist, Richard Shapiro, told me my verbal “IQ” with insults was at a genius level, somewhere around 150 to 160. I have always been able to see what is wrong with anyone, then take their own words that they said to me and use both those against them. I am also quite terrible at seeing what is appropriate and what is not because of my autism, but nothing makes people angrier than when you get all of their friends to laugh at them. Sometimes I thought I was just joking around, but others took it extremely offensively. Then they would get angry, and I would really go off on them because I would get defensive. Getting beaten up has happened more times in my life that I can possibly count. I have even gotten false charges from police officers from what I have said to them. As a child I had the head counselor of the female students in the front office in tears at Discovery Academy screaming “I am not fat!,” and Dr. Throne, who owned the place, was cussing at me too! And they were all Mormon! So that F-word was not even allowed for him to say to me, but Dr. Thorne did to me!

Even when people were pounding my head in, I still could not shut my mouth! One of the other things the Neurological Examination showed me at UCSF is I have never had any impulse control whatsoever, and these thoughts and behaviors of aggression are what make up the Rajas of my mind. Because of the Rajas, and the complete lack of any impulse control, which is an underdevelopment of my brain from the ADHD and autism, if I thought something, I had to say it! Especially if it was rude and funny because I craved the attention so much! If anyone wants to see the way I can talk to people read my first book A Vicious Cycle. Every insult in that book I said to someone, and the whole point of that book is I try not to be that way anymore. I have changed my behavior completely. Especially now that I meditate daily. Nothing has helped my obtuse behavior more than Trataka because everything gets me to self-reflect.

Because I was completely powerless over what I was thinking and had no impulse control to keep my mouth shut! These thoughts were an exhilaration of nothing but my ego, which in Vedanta is not what I truly am. My biggest addiction by far has been the need to feel superior to another person. That was what was shown by poem I wrote locked up as a kid That Might Be Me i Hate in the front of this book. This overpowering ego to be a bully was the extreme pride within me. I was never violent with anyone, but I was an intellectual bully for a large part of my life. All it was, was the fact I was just a very damaged person who was extremely scared of everyone and had no ability to see that fear in any way. How this fearful character defect manifested was in pride. I loved making everyone feel as stupid and as worthless as my father made me feel as a child.

My father taught me one thing extremely well because, and as I wrote above, 90% of what we learn happens in the first five years of our lives. What my father taught me was how to bully anyone. He was both an intellectual and physical bully with me. I was never big enough to beat up anyone, but it was Discovery Academy that I definitely turned into intellectual bully with everyone, which my father was to me as well. My father would beat me in chess in four moves when I was in the first grade whenever I tried to play him, and I when I got locked up with those kids at Discovery Academy, I learned how to beat anyone in chess in four moves with my words that kept me safe. That school made me much, much worse than just my early childhood did.

I was getting on the bus a week before I came up with this theory, and there was this African American man who got on the bus with me. His cigarette was still lit so I snapped at him because I hate the smell of cigarette smoke now that I have quit. He looked me up and down, and he got in my face and said something to me. It felt like he was talking down to me. So, while I was pointing my finger directly in his face, I yelled something extremely mean and cruel.

He looked shocked! He was about to get in my face, but then this other African American man started to laugh and said, “Good one!”

Because the other Black guy thought it was so funny, he threw the guy’s bag off of the bus to protect me. Because he threw his bag off of the bus, the guy jumped off to go after it. The bus’s doors closed and it took off! I was safe! This whole interaction was a state of Rajas in itself.

While this situation was happening, I was extremely scared. I was extremely scared because of the consequences of being beaten up. I have always been overpowered by my ego, pride, zero impulse control, and the value of someone thinking that they are better than me in anyway, that I could never back down. These thoughts are nothing except things I take as important, and most of what I took as extremely important was completely self-centered and self-destructive. I had never been able to let my need of superiority go until the last couple of years of me developing this theory, and I am still struggling with it at times, but nothing like I used too. I would argue that the reason I have never been able to let my need of feeling superior to another person go is because my brain tells me it is so important. Why do I have to take these situations as so important? They do not serve me in any way. They have caused me, and others, harm my whole life. I went off on someone a couple of years ago, and I was terrified the whole time while I was laughing in his face, and that time I ended up in the hospital! But it was drilled into my head in the first five years of my life how I needed conquer everyone!

After that exact situation, I thought of what I said to the African American on the bus, and I started to laugh really hard. It lifted my mood right up. I started to feel euphoric. I was laughing so hard. Then I started to think about how he treated me, and I started to get really, really angry. I was in a rage. My mood changed in a split second. Then I started to think of my wife and my friends who do not like it when I say those things to people. My wife gets really upset, and when I thought of what her reaction would be I got very sad and upset.

All of these thoughts seem to start a cycle of one brain state to another. They fluctuate so quickly, and it is the same tape that plays on a loop continuing to alter my moods and actions. These same thoughts are constantly being recycled in my head days later; these thoughts do the same thing to my moods every time. I never noticed this my whole life until recently. This is why I completely agree with Freud, that for most of us who do not meditate, 90% of the mind is subconscious, but if anyone wants to see all their thoughts from any angle and what it is that is truly controlling them, I encourage them to sit in silence every single day and meditate, especially Trataka.

With the awareness of my thoughts, and the awareness of the Neurological Evaluation, I have noticed my brain going in very rapid cycles, going from Rajas to Tamas constantly. It was nothing but insanity! An egotistical insanity I had never been able to control because I was never paying attention to hardly any of it!

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When I was having the Psychological Examination, the lady giving me the test said, “Tell me as many male names you can think of as possible?”

I responded, “Steven…..” then my mind went blank. I felt a little overwhelmed that I could not think of something as simple as male names. I was starting to feel really stupid and was worried about that, so I immediately improvised and said, “Proclus, Plotinus, Theaetetus, Antenor, Pherekydes, Menelaus, Zeno, Parmenides” and I went on like that until she told me to stop. She even complained to me that she did not think she spelled most of the names right with a grunt.

I thought I was so clever, and to this day every time I think of that I start laughing. I was told, from the Neurological Examination at UCSF, that my mind is constantly jumping from brain state to brain state, is why I paused at first with such an easy question. She also said my “IQ” would be impossible to test because I have so many brain states that my mind is constantly jumping between with this executive dysfunction.

This cleverness is something I value about myself and then boom: the energy of Rajas! My thoughts and values change, so do my mood. It brings about a hypomania, and I feel completely powerless over it all. I also do not want to control the hypomania when I have it. I want the hypomania to continue because it feels so good. It is a drug without having to take any chemicals. The same thing that happens to a speed addict and a cocaine addict is what happens to someone who is bipolar and schizophrenic. The chemicals in their brain go up. With me it is especially dopamine that increases just like speed and cocaine. I know this because the medications that have been most effective to stabilize my mood are the dopamine blockers like Saphris, Zyprexa, and Clozaril. All those medications work by keeping anyone’s brain from pumping out too much dopamine, and they severally retard thoughts too, so these medications lower the “IQ.” My mind is constantly overactive because the chemicals are at a higher level.

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I was at college, where I was studying philosophy at SFSU, one time just ordering a sandwich and glass of water at a counter. I was buying food, and I asked the guy behind the counter, “Could I have a glass of water too? I’ll pay for it. I just want a glass.”

He was telling me they do not sell glasses of water. I’d have to buy a bottle. So, I said, “They do it everywhere else on campus. I will pay you extra. I just want a glass.”

A lady from behind me said, “Don’t be a jerk. He said no.”

I did not think I was being offensive in any way, but when she said that I went off on her! Other people tried to get in to defend her! I went off on all of them! None of them could keep up with me! I shut them all up, and I was telling them if they wanted this to end all they needed to do was shut up! One lady even took my picture to see if she could find out who I was and turn me in. I did not give up on any of them until I got my sandwich and the guy working there, who finally gave me a glass of water, were all in shock. I was going crazy. I was also terrified in the moment I might have gotten caught and get kicked out of school, but not letting someone get the best of me in that moment was a value I had which was more important than my future at that specific time.

After I left, I was feeling terrible. Later that day I was crying as hard as I could. I even called the counselors as the Disabled Programs and Services in tears asking them if anyone reports anything I want to apologize. I hated it, and I hated myself for doing it, but I could truly not stop in the moment. Coming down from that energy of conflict and mania to the depression was going from a state of Rajas to Tamas.

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The common thread of all these disorders are the brain states, or executive dysfunction, and what I am powerless to value when those brain states change, but if I can take a value as not important when it rises in my brain, which means I need to be able to see it clearly, I might be able to control how I feel about that value, or thought, when it rises. If I can control my feelings by seeing my thoughts clearly, with an ability to pause, I would be able to have control over my behavior and actions because, as I stated, it is how we feel about what we think that controls all our actions, and most of us are not even paying attention to all we are thinking, even if they do have impulse control, because most don’t meditate. This all takes a pause, but I have to value the pause, and developed my brain to be able to slow down and take a pause with daily meditation. Meditation is the only thing that has gotten me any type of impulse control, which I have genetically lacked my whole life. Today I developed my brain to be able to pause by making a conscious decision in meditation, which I do for forty-five minutes every single day. Through the exercises of pausing daily I have been able to in situations which I never had the ability to before.

I have found, for myself, I can have some type of “control” over my actions if I can see what I am thinking clearly and negate the destructive thoughts instead of valuing them in the current moment, which me valuing a destructive thought is when these conflicts arise. If I have a thought that rises that truly does not serve me, and it is truly not important, especially if it puts my life and future at risk, or causes harm to someone else, and if I see that thought clearly in the moment, I might be able to get from the states of Rajas and Tamas to Sattva by just the negation of the Rajas and Tamas that rises. This can only be done through the clarity of daily meditation. To see the thoughts impinging in all corners of my mind takes a daily practice of meditation. I have to value the meditation practice.

It is the egotistic and prideful values that are intruding in my psyche. It is how I take creative cruel humor as important that causes lots of my issues in this world. It is the importance of how others perceive me, if they take me as weaker than them or stupider in anyway, then the values of Rajas and Tamas surge with my ego. It is the importance of paranoia which makes my heart palpitate and freezes my every move from my anxiety when I would call 911, or the importance of a disturbing thought that did nothing but magnify my depression, which all depressed people find comfort in thoughts and activities that enhance their depression. To negate all the Rajas and Tamas is where the solution lies.

These values also manifest in different ways. With my ADHD, when I am trying to pay attention to what I am reading, it is the importance of the next book I’m going to read which keeps me from focusing on the information I need out of the current book I am trying to enjoy. Or with my ADHD, I would be reading, and a word would trigger a different thought, then I would be thinking of all these different things instead of paying attention to the words in the book. I would not even know anything that I had just read because I would be focusing and valuing on lots of different thoughts, instead of being able to pay attention in any way to the message of the words on the page. Sure, my case is going from one extreme to the other, which might be a bit more complex than some, because my brain does this so quickly and is an organic brain disorder, but this rapidity of constant change has revealed to me what my brain focuses on: nothing but a different value.

This is what happens to all of us whether we have mental illnesses or not. I have noticed we all do this with the similarities I have with others. All humans are controlled by what they value and desire just like the Buddha said. The plus about the Buddha, as opposed to Freud, is the Buddha offered a solution. But they both talk about pleasure and pain, and they both say that most of us are not paying attention to what we are thinking! Yet, it is nothing but what makes us feel good and bad that controls all our actions. We all just want our rewards and pleasures. Not just human life, but all life. This is the Pleasure Principle, and it is an Ancient Vedic principle. The Pleasure Principle is how we all learn – rewards and consequences – pleasures and pains.

It was Jeremy Bentham that gave this Ancient Vedic principle a Western name, and he defines his theory quite well in this thesis: “at any given point we are beings that seek pleasure and avoid pain,” but his writing is quite lacking because in his writing he does not give much attention to pain.

Freud gives just as much attention to pain as he does to pleasure, and Freud shows how it determines our behavior. In the Vedic scriptures I have seen the best understanding of the Pleasure Principle because the Vedic scriptures give just as much attention to pleasure as they do pain. The Vedic scriptures also do something most western sciences do not: address the paradoxes that are all throughout this empirical world (Maya) of relativity and duality.

With the Vedas, it describes the empirical world as the Maya. The Maya in itself is nothing but an illusion because there are paradoxes everywhere that contradict themselves, but the Maya arises from what is true and only true: Brahman, or the One. The Maya itself is nothing but a combination of opposites: hot and cold, bitter and sweet, pleasure and pain, and at the most fundamental level matter and anti-matter. This is why the Pleasure Principle is just as much about pain as it is about pleasure because all duality is made of the opposites which rise from the One. This One, or Brahman is non-duality, or Consciousness. It is our ignorance which takes this empirical world (Maya) of duality and relativity as “reality.”

It is acknowledging paradoxes, that Easter Religions do such as Vedanta, that I believe modern Western Science could learn a lot from. Paradoxes have been shown to all of us quite clearly in Western Science and the quantum world because the quantum world is nothing but paradoxes: quantum gravity, at what level something becomes quantum, the electromagnetic effect, which is the wave particle duality and is where Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle was discovered, and is this empirical world digital or continuous digital? All those are observable paradoxes of the quantum world. The justification of paradoxes has been proven to me quite well in these Ancient Scriptures which were the first to acknowledge relativity and duality. If motion and perceptions is relativity; therefore, individual minds and “truths” are relative, and everything has its opposite, how could there not be paradoxes all around us? Vedanta, like other forms of Hinduism, addresses these paradoxes.

Einstein neglected his own theory, which he won the Nobel Prize for, because it had a paradox: the Electromagnetic Effect, which led to Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle, but how could any existence of relative truths and duality function without paradoxes? Those two concepts together should let anyone know that the different forms of Hinduism have a better understanding about the “true” function of the empirical world (Maya) than most modern western sciences. Sure, we should continue constantly try to figure out every paradox and every scientific problem! I am all in favor trying to figure out everything in the Maya, but we all need to realize the paradox of Western Science is that every answer just brings about more questions, or as Nisargadatta Maharaj said, “every realization gives new dimensions to conquer. The unknown has no limits.” Every time we get any answer in this empirical world (Maya), it does not lead to the end of answers, it only brings about to more and more questions. This is the paradox most Western scientists refuse to acknowledge, and I have proved it to several doctors I have taken classes from!

Einstein said, “God does not play dice” because Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle violates causality. Einstein denied paradoxes. Vedanta would agree with Einstein on saying God, or Brahman, is quite simple. Brahman is a Non-dual One, that “does not play dice” in anyway, but how Brahman manifests, this Simple Consciousness, is in a very, very complex way because from the One rises relative “truths” and dual “truths.” These truths could be nothing but paradoxes at the most fundamental level, and it was Neil Bohr, one of the main proponents of quantum physics in the modern world who said, “Einstein, stop telling God what to do!”

So, the paradox with the Pleasure Principle is that Vedanta acknowledges we are all determined through the rewards of pleasure and pain. This world is just Karma, or causality. With every action, there is an opposite and equal reaction just like Newton said, yet in my life I am the only one that has the power of choice. The rest of the world is determined, and I am supposed to learn from it and accept every piece of it because it is nothing but God. I am here in this ego to grow and learn from my consequences, and in anyone else’s life, that is what they are here for: to learn and grow. It is only the individual who lives through the power of choice, not because any of us have power of choice, but because there is no other way to live! Without the power of choice nobody can be held responsible for their actions, and the best way to be held by the pleasure and pain of our consequences is to live by the power of “choice!” This means each one of us is the Center of our own Universe and we are all on our separate path to Salvation. The Universe is a complex machine rotating around each one of us separately. It is this paradox that we all need to address! This is the Law of Karma, and this Ancient Principle goes very well with the Theory of Evolution too.

Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution states: “any life that loses its ability to learn and adapt becomes extinct,” and how we learn is through rewards and consequences: pleasures and pains. It is nothing but the actions we take that bring about our karma, and we learn from the consequences of our karma. This is what has gotten me to fall in love with Vedas. I see so much truth is in it, and I have even found the Theory of Evolution in such scriptures as the Chandogya Upanishad. The Chandogya Upanishad talks about all life evolving into all other forms of life, and what I have found with Vedas is we either learn or we suffer. We adapt, or we die. It is nothing but ancient scriptures that has told me the same basic conclusion Charles Darwin came to himself: life is about learning.

Once I had the clarity and awareness to see of what the troubles of my brain were through, the reflection of daily meditation, and the Neurological Evaluation I had done at UCSF, I decided to put it into a speech the next day in a class. When I gave this speech, I asked an active participant in the audience, “What is something important to you?”

“Family.” She responded.

“Why?” I asked.

She was in shock! She could not think of why! She had never asked herself why she thought her family was important before? She just always thought they were. This was when I told her, the only reason she takes her family as important is for no other reason than her mind tells her they are important. Most of us can never even look at something as simple as this, and our minds tell all of us what it thinks is the best way for us to survive, family is definitely one of them as a child, so we take it throughout our lives. We all have two problems as rational animals: ignorance and understating. It is right in front of us, but we take it for granted, and most of us are not even paying attention to what we are thinking.

The reason most of us do not see things like this is because most of us aren’t even paying attention to the only thing we can see from any angle: our own mind. I had my Hindu guru tell me we all do this. It is not just me, and it is not just the girl I got to participate with me in the speech I gave, who does not look at her mind, but most of us never question our thoughts and the conclusions our minds come too.

The problem is when we look at the world, or try and get information from the world, we are clouded by relativity. We only get a subjective view of the world. But the one thing we can look at from any angle is our own mind. These thoughts are not objective truths, but we can view them in an objective way when we meditate. When I saw the objective view of my own thoughts, I saw how the thoughts themselves are nothing but thoughts: imagination. The Rajas and Tamas which make up the complications and conflicts of our thoughts. They are not reality. By sitting in silent meditation watching where my brain states rapidly take me, I was able to get this clarity. My brain would always take me to something it thought was important even when I tried to control where my mind was going at the beginning! I could not! What my mind, or anyone else’s mind, does is take what they are shaped to value as important through karma, or causality, so it is those values which control my actions, and everyone’s actions. Most of the time it is nothing but our selfishness and our self-seeking desires that we value. We value this selfishness because without desire there is no life. Because without desire there is no action, and without love there is no desire, so again: “life is love and love is life.” Nisargadatta Maharaj. We are also always seeking validation of those selfish values and desires through our experiences. It is the egotistic and prideful tendencies within all of us that tells us not to question ourselves, and take what we perceive in our daily lives, and the first conclusions we come to, as the “truth.”

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Even with my disorders being so unique, it has been shown to me that I have a lot more in common with people than I ever really thought through the exploration of my own mind in silence. Sure, I have a lot of disorders, but I am like all living things, not just human, but all life on this planet. I want to feel good, and I learn through pleasure and pain. I am also selfish and self-seeking because of that desire to always feel good. It has been shown to me how much I have in common with other people with all kinds of experiences such as the psychology of TV commercials and movies. Through the psychology of both movies and commercials I can see how I am not unique when it comes to other humans because commercials and movies are meant for all of humanity, and I am amazed with how well I relate to them. I find most TV commercials obnoxious, but I also notice they work very well too. TV commercials are meant to stick in our brains.

Wayfair has truly the most annoying commercials, but when I walk down the street, nowhere near a TV, I have had their commercials playing in my head. There was this one Wayfair commercial I thought was so stupid. All it did was repeat the word “better” over and over. The whole commercial was “better, better, better……” Better was basically the only thing it was saying to silly music for 30 seconds or so, yet I was focused on it. My mind was focused on it even when I was not in front of the TV.

I have commercials in my head from childhood. As I stated I think in words, so I memorize things I hear quite easily with my savant skills. I have an OB tampon commercial in my head that popped into one time I was walking down the street with my wife, and we saw a clean tampon on the road. I made her laugh by singing it to her “OB, it’s the way you should be. Keep it simple and set yourself free. OB.” My wife started laughing really hard and told me how silly I was. I do not have any use for those because I am male, but the song still stuck in my head from the early 80s. I had to have been like 4 years old when I heard the commercial on TV. Years later, at the age of thirty, I can still recall it walking down the street with my wife. My wife found it on YouTube that night, and that made her laugh even harder.

There is only one commercial I thought made no sense whatsoever, and that was about Subaru being about love. I talked to some other people who did not see the point in that one, but it was so ridiculous I still ponder it at times. I also saw how it did not last too long, and you can tell when commercial themes are given up quickly, they do not work for the business.

I have a friend. Probably the only close friend I truly have. He suffers from chronic depression. He refuses to be on medication because of all the commercials he sees that advertise them too. They all have this list of crazy side effects. They list these side effects in a calm and soothing voice to wonderful relaxing music and people finally being able to live their lives again. They show the people who are on that specific drug finally being able to live a happy life. Medications are also ridiculously expensive in America. I, myself, take drug commercials as quite terrible for lots of reasons. Exploiting the weakness of any human for a quick fix and lots of prophet.

The psoriasis commercials I take as completely evil with the drug Tilts. They have the bride being able to have the father/daughter dance at her wedding because her skin is finally clear. I see how and why they work, but the Tilts commercial, in particular, disgusts me. It is so manipulative, and the people who created it know it. It is why the drug companies play them. These commercials work for some but scare others, and the prices they charge are ridiculous when they do not even pay for the research. They pay for the patent. The government grants pay for the research. Yet, they advertise these commercials and charge ridiculous prices because they know we all relate to having a problem beyond our control, and we all want simple relief. So, I guess, who I am to criticize anything but the price and ridiculous profit they make if they can relieve suffering?

Skyrizi is a drug for psoriatic arthritis, and its commercial has the catchiest tune I have ever heard. Its lyrics “Nothing is everything” is the same concept as the Vedic God Brahman. God is Everything, yet nothing as in no thing; therefore, Nothing is Everything, which is also a title of a book from Nisargadatta Maharaj. The way to say Nothing is Everything in Sanskrit is Sunyam Sarvam. I actually tried to download the song on iTunes, and they had it, but it was made to sound really corny, so I didn’t download it.

With my friend who struggles with depression I have also noticed the same thing as with myself. He worked for a home improvement store. He worked there, and he hated it. He hated the company. He thought it was a terrible company with what they did to him and their employees. He even blames himself for giving people promotions there. He feels terrible he participated in their corporation. The reason he blames himself, and takes it out on himself, is because he values his dislike for the company so much. He also thinks that because he hates that company, everyone else should as well. It is the self-centered and obsessive focusing on his misery which is the driver of his depression. This is the depression of Tamas. Every chronically depressed person I have met has a self-centered obsession. It is of different things and circumstances, but it is always self-centered.

I do not think he should blame himself in any way for working for a place which he was making a living at doing the best job he could because I have never seen this man do anything malicious to anyone, yet he blames himself for helping other workers move up the ranks. He takes it as his fault for no other reason than his mind takes it as important. What he values does the same thing to him as it does to all of us. They just give us different results, but they are still mental illnesses none the less. They are a mental illness whose disposition is self-centered values.

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Movies also show me how much I have in common with people. There have been several movies I have seen that got me to think about myself and how much I have in common with others more than anything else: Her, Three Billboards, and something I saw just recently Everything Everywhere All at Once.

Her was all about love. Joaquin Phoenix plays a tortured character who just wants what we all want: love. This love is pure being characteristic of the Sattva in itself. This emotion of love, how we think of it, and the way it makes us all feel, I thought were exclusive to me. While I was in the audience, I realized, and was overwhelmed by that realization, that everyone in the audience was relating to it. This movie about love was not just for me, it was for all humans, and how we all relate to it. I was not as unique as I thought I was when it came to the needs of romance and love. Her was meant for everyone. I had a friend who did not even like it too much who said he related to it.

When I saw Three Billboards, it was about what anger does to all of us. Frances McDonald was playing a lady who was a mother. Her child was killed, and the sheriff could not find the killer. McDonald’s character took the anger she had over her daughter’s death out on the sheriff and everyone in the whole town. I related to this movie as well because I was extremely abused as a child, and I took that anger out on everyone in my life for a long time. I saw in Three Billboards how powerless we are over this rage we all can go through. It is not just me who gets into conflicts with other people. It is the whole human race. This passion of anger would be the Rajas. It is an extremely old argument that is in the New Testament on the Law of Love. Anger creates more anger is a key argument in that law.

Sure, I fluctuate quicker, and might be an extreme example of the passion that flickers inside me, but when it comes down to it, I am just like everyone else. I was obsessed with what I thought others were thinking of me, just like everyone else, and I always got some sense of self by what I thought others were thinking of me, just like everyone else does too. We all get this amazing amount of sense of self from what we think others think of us because we are meant to survive together. We are meant live in families, tribes, cities, and civilizations. We only know if we are smart, or good looking, or ugly, or stupid, by comparing ourselves to other people. We all do it because we were created to survive together. But because I fluctuate so quickly, I have been able to see how my values change. These values, which change in our brains, affect all of us and control the shifts in all our behaviors. Like I said, each of our minds tells us the best way it thinks we need to think so we can survive. We all just have the same two problems: ignorance and understanding. We aren’t paying attention to most of what we think!

An amazing movie that I saw once was Everything Everywhere All at Once. I loved it and I could tell everyone did in the audience too! I could also tell that even the annoying people behind me, who would not shut up through most of movie while it was playing, were reflecting at the same exact parts as I was. We would laugh at the same times, it seemed as though others were shedding tears at the exact times I was, and I started to reflect about my existence and where I was in my life, and I leaned over to my wife and asked her, “is this movie getting you to reflect?”

She responded, “Yes.”

I could tell everyone was reflecting because when the whole theater went silent, with a seen of two rocks talking to each other on a cliff looking off a huge Canyon, that they were reflecting with the same questions that were being presented on the screen between these two rocks in a subtitled conversation. They went from laughing extremely loud, to silence! There was no sound from the speakers either! That is how I could tell they were all reflecting! I used the quote from Maya Angelou in the second chapter to prove how much I have in common with everyone despite my rare genetic brain disorder, but we all have desires, we all want to be important, we all question our existence and the point of this ridiculous empirical illusion to some extent or another. It is things like how much I have in common with every single person I meet now that shows me that I am truly not that much different than anyone, and I have this belief reinforced to me over and over when I continue to open my mind. I am not much different than anyone despite my rare brain disorder and crazy background because all life is here to learn. All life suffers, and this pain is one of all our two teachers in the Vedas. The other is pleasure.

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When people are depressed, they value things which make them more depressed. I have tried killing myself more times than I can count as I stated. A lot of it was for attention, but I even tried to cut my throat one time. That time I meant it. A couple of other times I did too, and I just would not die. One of the things I have noticed since then, is when I was depressed the only thing I held onto in my mind, or valued in anyway, was how terrible I was. I was the greatest most terrible person who ever lived. I valued how terrible I was because I did not have anything else, and being the worst was the only way to be the best at something. I have seen people do this all throughout society. The Punk Rocker and Gangster Rap are the same song with different lyrics and a completely different tune, but we have all been there. That is why those completely different beats are for everyone! Not just me, but everyone!

This depression I went through, and the depression anyone can go through, has its basis in ego. I have seen that in every depressed person I have talked to as well. They all value and take comfort in things, situations, and thoughts that do nothing but enhance and magnify their depression.

Because I had the realization of thoughts being nothing more than just thoughts, and that meant these thoughts were nothing more than just imagination. I saw my problem was that I valued this imagination. This imagination that I valued was what was completely controlling my actions. I have the clarity today to see I could take these thoughts as important or not. Now days, I can value a thought or not value a thought, especially if I can pause and see that thought clearly. I see most of my thoughts are just as important as imagination because these thoughts all have their root in my toxic ego. I do not need to take anything as important or even real because, not just me, but we are all wrong all the time in our relative and dual “truths” that we cling too. I see with myself when my thoughts cause harm to me and others I have the ability to negate this imagination. To negate these thoughts, the thoughts of the Rajas and Tamas, would be a good way to address them. Neglecting these thoughts when I meditate allows me to pause and neglect them during the day, which is nothing but one of the mental exercises to rewire my brain’s neuropathways.

I can take the power right out of the Rajas and Tamas. Even if a thought is truly important, like the next book I want to read while I am trying to just pay attention to what I am currently reading. Sure, I need to read that next book someday, but at the moment I need to negate any other thoughts except where the words of this specific author are taking me on this very page that I am trying to pay attention to. So, I now have the clarity to see that the next book I need to read is not important in that very moment.

When it comes to what others might be thinking of me, which was what led to nothing but a self-defensive and aggressive behavior for me for years, I can just pause in the moment and negate them completely. This is how I can solve the problem of my eight different brain states: neglecting the chaos in a daily practice of emptying my mind every morning. But why is my brain so cluttered with chaos?

What is it about all our brains that gets us to focus and dwell on problems to the point where it harms ourselves and others? Some say the nature of man is good. Some say the nature of man is evil. There is a lot of evidence to support both of these claims. What I say is that the nature of man is confusion. Confusion is a problem of the human brain and its intellectual capacities. This confusion of the brain is because of one thing: we cannot get the best answers out of the options that are in front of us in that current moment. Understanding these answers is what the brain was created for. Any brain is meant to solve problems, and the human brain has the ability to solve more rational problems than just basic survival. My belief is where all human difficulties truly arise is the ignorance and understanding just as Socrates stated: “no one would knowingly do wrong.”

The reason the brain needs to be able to solve problems is because solving problems is our way to the survival of all life, and with evolution we are always growing and adapting. The human brain, and even all animal’s brains, are considered plastic. Which means they are meant to constantly grow and adapt with the flux of the Maya. All life, be it animal or plant, either learns and adapts or it dies.

It is always being focused on the problem which keeps our brains in the problem. The chaos of humanity is not just about ignorance either because there are lots of people who have the answers who do not know how to apply them to their lives. I have had my wife tell me to treat everyone with the same love I treat her. I have had the answer for a while. I did not think this was possible, and I did not think I could implement it. I have now seen if I can do it with her, then I can do it with anyone as long as I value this solution. I work constantly on not valuing the chaos of my pride and ego. Just neglect the pride and ego: Rajas and Tamas, and as Socrates said: “To know is to do.” So, when I truly understand something is when I take the right action according to Socrates.

It is amazing how for so much of my life I wanted to solve my problem of fear with something which just brought about more fear. This is why I needed to insult people and feel superior to them. It was about the fear of inferiority. It was about the fear of people, and it just isolated me even more and made me more scared of people.

When people use drugs, gamble, eat too much, and every other self-destructive behavior, we are all just trying to satisfy a feeling of fear with something which brings about more fear. It feels good in the moment, but as the Buddha said is the Second of the Four Noble Truths: “selfish desires are the main cause of all suffering.” These desires, in themselves, are nothing but confusion. People cannot see what they are truly doing. Satisfying a desire is also how we all stay alive. We need to eat, and when we eat it feels good. We are all just terrible at seeing how we all chase what feels good to the point where it causes problems for ourselves and others. Why would anyone take any action besides what they think best suits them in the moment? Our minds always tell us what we think is the best thing to do is. Why would our brain do anything else, and as I said most of us are not even aware of our whole minds because most of us do not meditate, especially the way I do in the next chapter on ADHD.

Not being able to implement the solution which is right in front of them is also the main problem I see with the follower of different religions. Most religions tell people the most peaceful and best way to live. It gives them the solution to living their life, but a lot of conflict has risen from every different religion. They have the answers. The answers of religions are nothing but simple logic and common sense. It is the true misunderstanding of their own text, and applying it to their lives, that is their main problem. People do all kinds of terrible things in the name of God. What most people desire who practice religion is the impossible: certainty in an uncertain world.

This desire for this impossibility of this certainty is why their religion does not bring about peace and happiness to them. Their religion only brings about fear. This fear is what the delusion of fundamentalism gives all its followers. The Maya is always uncertain. The plus about Vedanta is it gives certainty in only one place: I am! The only thing that is certain is my existence. Everything else is an inference subject to doubt. This Maya is perfect in one way: It is nothing but my perfect teacher. This shows the problem of the brain is just as much about understanding as it is ignorance because God would never want us to do anything terrible in any way.

ॐ

I saw for a very long time how I was always stuck in the problem. Especially in the moments when I would lose all control. These situations of complete loss of control were frequent because my brain would value the thoughts which rose, and I was not even paying attention to what I was thinking. It is this same clarity of awareness that has gotten me to deal with my hallucinations. These hallucinations are based in the Tamas. I can now see these hallucinations are just images. Images I do not need to put any value on. I can detach from them and let them go. When I have hallucinations now, I meditate and empty my mind completely, which I will be showing in the chapter on schizophrenia. These hallucinations are more illusions now because I can see they are not reality. I can be in a state where a hallucination is just an illusion, which, either way, it is just a pointless thought, and there does not need to be anything important about the illusion. I have illusions at night sometimes, but they have not bothered me for a while, and I explain how I deal with them in that chapter too. I can see what any thought can be today: pointless imagination.

With this awakening through the combination of meditation and the Neurological Evaluation at UCSF, I now have the ability to put a weight on each of the thoughts I have and see if I should truly value them or not. This has been the best way for me to overcome my eight different brain states is to try and do the mental exercises daily in the next chapter on ADHD and all the following chapters. I have adapted my techniques many, many times. You can also see what works for you and be able to take this and figure out your own mind.

I have been able to take all the power out of the different brain states. My hope is to show people how to understand their minds, and work through their own executive brain dysfunction. I have the power to not engage with these different brain states today when I address the brain states through the thinking. I refocus the brain states through Trataka and work on evening the chaos of my mind daily.

Just be aware that I do not identify my True Self, or Atman, which is defined as nothing but consciousness, then when I am identifying my body and mind. My True Self is nothing but my consciousness, as it says in the Rgveda:

“The True Self, itself, is that Pure Consciousness, that which nothing can be known in any way, and the same True Self Pure Consciousness, is no different from the Ultimate Principal Brahman, Brahman is the only reality, since it is untinged by difference, the mark of ignorance, and the one thing that cannot be improved upon.”

In Vedanta the Brahman and Atman are one, but I do have all kinds of issues that I am able to overcome by just being the Witness and addressing the brain states through the redirection of my thinking, which is the single pointed concentration meditation (Trataka) laid out in these scriptures. 

Today I can keep my mind from wondering without medication. I am working on the daily negation of all my urges, and I believe it will come with time. Especially when I do nothing but accept the rest of the world as the way it is meant to be. I can feel the energy still being there in my mind and gently say to myself: “who cares?” I just do not need to torture myself by focusing on the value that drives me crazy because, with meditation, I have been able to shift my focus throughout my day no matter what I am doing to get to the next solution clearly. Before I was not even aware of what my mind was focusing on at all. I would just lose all control.

I notice what I am thinking all throughout the day now, and because of this I notice I even have the insanity of an “if/only” situation. I was walking down the street the other day, and a car came close to hitting me. It did not. The car stopped in time. There was also a cop car right there. Then my mind went to the fantasy that the car did hit me. I followed the fantasy to the point where the cop chased the driver down and arrested him. I saw it and pulled my thoughts back from the fantasy. It was a value that did not even happen that was driving me crazy. I was even getting angry over a fantasy. That angry fantasy in itself was the chaos. That Rajas is within us all.

We are all addicted to our fantasies, especially because most of us don’t acknowledge that is all, all our minds are: fantasy or imagination. We dwell in them and play the same broken record in our heads. I cannot count how many times I have replayed the situations of what I have said to people which gave me those different brain states. The same situations give me the same thoughts and brain states. These thoughts and brain states are addictive because what we all take as important is what stratifies our selfishness most of the time.

ॐ

I have found the best way for me to overcome my faults of any kind is to identify them through seeing each thought clearly through meditation, and then I just let them go by not taking them as valuable and not interacting with them. I even am able to shift my focus. If I want to be rid of my character defects, I should not define myself, or identify myself, by them. I should be able to see my character defects as they are there but should not take them as myself or important in any way. These values, and what I have always taken myself to be, are just thoughts. Thoughts do not need to control me, and thoughts do not need to control anyone. We just need to see them clearly and let go of the Rajas and Tamas. Just not take them as important. Especially because all thoughts are just imagination. What I have been saying to myself when a thought, or a value, rises in my brain which does not serve me is: “who cares?”

After about a week of having that clarity, I made more progress than I have ever made in such a short amount of time. I have not been to a psych ward or a jail cell in a long time either. It has been over 19 years now since I have been in and arrested. I have been able to just see that anyone else’s issues are about them. Realizing every single person in this Maya is my perfect teacher. I can pause and see they are having a bad day, or even other complications in their life I do not need to take personally. I can take myself down from my hypomania of my bipolar with the clarity I have gotten by seeing my thoughts clearly, focusing my mind, and detaching from the thinking. I have been able to just remove certain thoughts which do not serve me out of my field of vision. I shift my focus and neglect the thought by saying “who cares?,” and when I meditate, I empty my mind completely with just saying those words to any thoughts which rise at all every single morning: “who cares?” is what I say to any thought no matter what it is every day while I practice for forty-five minutes.

Panic attacks have always been the worst feeling I have ever had; with my new practice, I have been able to focus and see the anxiety attack as just a feeling. A feeling provoked by a thought which does not serve me. When I had these panic attacks in the past, I was someone who would call 911 because they were so scary. Nothing was worse than a panic attack! Truly, nothing! To take this thought as valuable gives me a feeling I do not need to give any credence too. It has been amazing, and it has only come with awareness and the determination to implement this theory, and I have overcome them without medication.

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaja said in the book I Am That: “anyone can step over into the solution anytime they like.” Progress does not need to be slow and painful. I have always been beaten into the next solution, but now I just do not need to engage with the problem. I can detach from what I once valued.

Seeing what is truly important is something which could help anyone with mental illness, or even the basic problems we all have with our behavior when we have a bad day. That is why these are ancient principles which apply to everyone. My mantra today is “who cares?” We all put so much value on things which cause us and others harm. We value these selfish desires because of our egos. I need to not put a value on my prideful egotistic disposition. I can now just neglect the thoughts of the Rajas and Tamas, or: ~T, when I see them clearly. By neglecting the Rajas and Tamas it negates those actions that do not serve me:

((~T>~B)>~F))~A.

This way we can open the door to the Sattva. This is what is called in Sanskrit as Viveka and Vairagya, or discrimination and dispassion. The concepts of the Vedas have gotten me to ask myself, “Do I want to be a philosopher, or do I want to be a lunatic?” If there is such a thing as the power of “choice,” it is the ability to see our thoughts clearly, in all areas and corners of our minds, and to be able to neglect any thoughts we have that cause us or others’ problems. What we take as important is what controls all our actions, and if most of us are not even paying attention to 90% of our minds, so most of us do not have much control at all. We are confined by our circumstances.

If anyone who is reading this thinks they have any power of choice just sit in silence and try to control your mind.  Try to keep all thoughts out of your mind for forty-five minutes. You will realize you have no control! Your mind will do whatever it wants, especially when you first start. True power is the power of inaction, or the ability to see your thoughts clearly and then to neglect any thoughts that you have that do not serve you or cause you and others’ problems throughout the day. This takes Viveka and Vairagya: discrimination and dispassion. Viveka, or discrimination, is seeing your mind for the imagination it is and being able to look at your mind from any angle. Vairagya, or dispassion, is the ability to say, “who cares?” to any thoughts you have that causes you or others’ problems, or to be able to just neglect that thought.

If anyone wants Heaven, Nirvana, Moksha, Salvation, or whatever you want to call it, I have found the only place. It in the here and now. Happiness is nothing but a state of mind, and the mind is nothing but imagination. Just neglect the Rajas and Tamas and let the power of the Sattva shine through. This takes seeing every corner of your mind clearly through daily meditation, and controlling your mind through Trataka. This happiness is the essence of Sattva within us all. This is an experiment anyone can do, for as stated in the Volume One of the Rgveda

“when purified through rays of intelligent discrimination, the mind humbly submits to wisdom”

through the Viveka and Vairagya.

ॐ        ॐ      ॐ    ॐ