The human being is the only animal known to cause itself suffering with its own thoughts.
And it doesn’t end there.
Then, we suffer because we suffer when getting upset about being treated unfairly, mad about having an illness, or sad about going to bed sad yet another day. The crazy thing is that this kind of unhappiness is totally a product of our brains which is at the same time good and bad. If your brain is causing the suffering, it can also stop it.
Over millions of years of evolution, our brains developed neural networks producing pain and anxiety under certain conditions, which while effective for ensuring survival and passing on the genes, do not leave us feeling good.
For your protection, your brain is naturally vigilant, constantly scanning its environment for threats with a built-in negativity bias – better to err on the side of caution than to be eaten. Negative experiences hold more weight with your brain and even get stored differently. In his book, Buddha’s Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, and Wisdom, Rick Hanson writes: “Your brain is like velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones.”
[To read the rest of this article by Debbie Hampton, click here.]
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