Mind itself is magic

I'm reading a book called Mindsight by Dr Siegel which is about the power of the brain to grow underdeveloped bits, to integrate the parts that aren't well integrated, to repair damage. I'm only partway through, but it's done through meditation, journaling, linguistic exercises and such. The beginning of the book is a description of brain science, and then he goes chapter by chapter with a case study and how this person was helped.

The second case study is about a 90 something old man who'd always been fairly disconnected from his feelings (and other people), but had recently become even more so. The doctor practiced right brain exercises with him so he could get in better touch with his body and emotions and how to express them. The next time the doctor heard from the wife, a year later, he was a changed man.

Apparently the reason why the right brain picks up on body sensation better (which is where emotion begins) is that it's the bit that receives the body's cues. It's the bit that develops first as well, so we start as right brained bebbies.

He gives a nice brief summary of the differences:

This must be why when Dr Bolte-Taylor had a stroke that affected her left side, her right side took over and made everything feel whole--she had trouble distinguishing between her hand and her desk, cause the right brain is more holistic, more physical. And as the right side doesn't use language but uses physical cues, like a baby, she could still feel when a visiting doctor was treating her disrespectfully, as opposed to when someone came in who was respectful or caring. She was hyper-aware of nonverbal language. And though her left brain didn't recognize her mother when she arrived, her right brain did a happy dance when this being came in, climbed into the hospital bed with her, and held her.

Anyway, I really liked this bit next:

It seems like the right side is what allows us to accept contradictions and not try to solve them all--to allow for mystery. For example, when someone says to me "there are no coincidences" the left brain science oriented side of my brain is skeptical; but the right side of my brain says "It's okay to not understand everything... we can accept an impersonal universe AND a magical one."
    

Song of the Day: God is Alive, Magic is Afoot 

sung by Buffy Ste Marie (written by Leonard Cohen)