The Big Endorphin Rush of Just Having a Great Thought

 

“Although the base kick appeals to the body…the rest of the music of an Uplifting Trance track is actually enacting a profound intellectual-emotional process – the soundtrack to a revelation.”

 

Sometimes, I like to strip HDR back to a very basic formula, as here. I find it such a robust phenomenon – so repeatable by means of following the simple formula – that it seems there is not much else I need to pass on.

At other times, I’m more aware of how there is something remarkable about what’s going on in my head during HDR. Remark-able in the literal sense that it’s worthy of remark – “bloggable”, would be a more modern version of this word.

It’s standard knowledge that exercise can increase endorphins and neurotransmitters, but I think the way that mental processes can do this is greatly undervalued and under-investigated. The human brain is wired to encourage us to adopt life-affirming belief systems, and our reward systems are in fact designed to reward us massively if we have break-through realisations that support such belief systems. Why? Clearly, it was massively advantageous to our ancestors to have a positive, purposeful, meaningful outlook. And so in a sense evolution co-opted the cosmos, spiritual reams, and drew them down into our brains, because this worked better.

Unfortunately, because we evolved to live harmoniously in groups, the human brain is also predisposed to follow and fit in with the troupe, to not rock the boat, to adopt the consensus paradigm, to harmonise with the current alpha-figure. The issue really is that our culture doesn’t support the process of having revelations. In order to do this, you need to attach great significance to the mysteries that intrigue you and the answers you seek. The rush you get when your mental process resolves will be directly proportional to the emotional charge you attached to it.  There has to be a high degree of emotional engagement to the thought process. And without this, mental resolutions are at best insipid and we’re left with mindless exercise for our hits of endorphins, dopamine, etc.

I would say that our culture doesn’t support intellectual endorphin release because, for one thing, those who have developed their intellects often do so in a way that is disconnected from emotion, as if in a box. The scientific mind-set for example is quite dispassionate. Also, the intellectual paradigm that predominates at the moment, at least in public, is very materialistic, and so separates itself off from intuitive considerations of the existence, immortality, nobility and genius of the Soul. Nothing is really very significant if consciousness is just a flash in the pan. Nothing is a proper solution or revelation unless is has usefulness that goes on and on, without end. Furthermore, we pass from educational systems where the closest we come to deep thought is clambering over some cumbersome lit-crit clichés, to working lives that require us to use our intellects, hour after hour, for purely practical purposes that fit with commercial goals. Too busy to have revelations, after a while we forget that they are even a possibility, we become jaded, and the emotional-intellectual-reward-system structures get covered with cobwebs.

So it seems to me that we could experience a whole other tranche of endorphin rushes and increase our overall well-being, our enjoyment of life, if we could

1.  integrate emotional engagement into our intellectual processes
2.  embrace significance (including adopting an en-Souled perspective)
3.  ask more interesting questions and follow our curiosity until it leads us to the answers.
4.  upregulate our reward systems
5. cast off the cobwebs and un-jade ourselves.

Music is enormously helpful here, and the modern technology that gives us access to any genre we want at the touch of a button and allows us to hear it in high definition at any time, and indeed the vast amount of high quality music that exists – this is really the saving grace in all this. I painted a bit of a bleak picture just now, but we all know it’s not really so bad, partly because music is giving us regular respite, taking us into those very modes of mind that modern life – in the picture I painted – has closed off.

 

And as you’ll know if you’ve read a few of my other blog posts, I consider Uplifting Trance to be one of the most effective genres for casting off those cobwebs. For example:-

In fact, just as EDM in general with its big beats is well suited to physical workouts. I would say that Uplifting Trance arouses and gives a great workout to those emotional-intellectual faculties required to have proper revelations. And as I’ve also covered several times in other blogs on this site, restricting calories a couple of days a week to a quarter of your normal intake (as per the 5:2 diet) is sufficient to greatly upregulate your reward system, and this upregulation includes wanting/seeking/searching (dopamine), getting, liking (endorphins), arousal (orexin) and other pleasurable effects (endocannabinoids) and perhaps when research allows we will one day find that it also includes profound vision (endogenous DMT).

In a recent blog I looked at the facial expressions that help to induce the moods that lead up to and include peak experience while listening to Uplifting Trance music. As I looked into this, I got a clearer picture of how closely related the whole thing is to having a revelation or having a big Aha! moment. Although the base kick appeals to the body, reminding it of movement (as it sounds like the thud that goes through the body when our feet strike the ground while running or dancing) – the rest of the music of an Uplifting Trance track is actually enacting a profound intellectual-emotional process – the soundtrack to a revelation.

Consider again those expressions corresponding to the various stages of the standard Uplifting Trance track. First there is the blankness that comes across the face – picture someone who is becoming intrigued by a thought, by the dovetailing of various lines of inquiry, and so they dis-engage from the everyday world around them, being more interested in what’s going on in their mind. They don’t want the faff of wondering what persona to give out through facial expression because they’re too busy with the thought, so their face just relaxes and they seem to stare into space.

Next, as they move further into thinking they really are on to something, a somewhat more determined look comes over their face, the furrowing of the brow as they concentrate.

Having dis-engaged with the everyday world around them, they now re-engage but not with the everyday world, but rather they increase their degree of emotional engagement with the question. They want the answer, they realise they would love to find the answer. They commit to it.

Then they start to feel a dawning sense of amazement, and their eyes begin to open, their jaw drops slightly open.

Then comes the great Aha! as the thought process resolves itself and they realise they have the very answer they were seeking. Consensus pictures of reality collapse even more fully as they realise the fundamental level of synchronicity that guided them to this understanding.

 

So by pulling these facial expressions at the appropriate moment while listening to this music you will get a strong reminder of what it feels like to have a great thought. But how can you move beyond empty enactment? It’s not so tricky. Make a sense of mystery be part of the experience. Be brave enough to ask some questions. Ask to be given a sense of the purposefulness, meaningfulness and significance of the present moment. And let your appreciation of the beauty of the world be the answer to the question.

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