The Politics of Emotional Feedback, Kundalini Yoga, Dopamine Casinos, and You

in #emotions7 years ago

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With all the gun control talk going on in the mainstream media, I thought I’d delve a little deeper into the mindset behind the political posturing.

POLITICS OF EMOTION

In any gun control debate, the very first argument made by a GRABBER will be an appeal to emotion. “Won’t someone think about the children,” they’ll cry, while completely ignoring the statistics on homicide or inefficacy of gun control policies. What’s most revealing about the attempt at emotional manipulation is the mindset of the person making the argument. The grabber is motivated more by their own emotional state than by facts or logic. Journalists and political elites have been using emotional insecurity as an exclusive means for obtaining an income for as long as their positions have existed, but what are the physiological mechanisms of the emotional feedback loops they manipulate?
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EMOTIONAL FEEDBACK

In the broadest general sense, when an emotion is experienced two neuro chemicals are produced: Cortisol, the stress response and Dopamine, the pleasure response (these are generalizations, don’t @ me). When these emotion chemicals are repeatedly produced in response to stimuli, the stimuli creates an emotional feedback loop similar to a circular reasoning fallacy (the conclusion proves the premise to be true). The casual consumer of emotional politics is given a stimulus creating stress and unease, then a solution is presented and uncritically accepted because of the release of dopamine that a perceived solution provides the brain. “Gun control is the solution because guns are the problem”. The feedback loop is completed and no further information is required to address the problem. You can see this in the limited information capacity of the casual gun control advocates:

KUNDALINI YOGA

Most people lack the self awareness to see this type of conditioning, but there are ways of self directed reproduction of the emotional feedback loops. One very interesting technique I’ve learned deals with the emotional chills created when a dopamine release is imminent. Everyone knows the sensation of chills running up and down your spine when music is being played or when an emotionally charged moment happens in a movie, but very few people research this phenomenon. The prevailing theory is that the sensation is most common when something bittersweet is happening that slightly delays the dopamine rush response, making it more intense. I’ve found, that by focusing on this emotional chill when it occurs, you can lengthen, dampen, and eventually generate this emotional chill at will through the practice of Kundalini Yoga. If you master the technique of harnessing the emotional chill response, you can gain total awareness of your emotional feedback loop. Harnessing your emotional feedback loop helps motivate you to learn new skills, manage self destructive thoughts, and increase overall well-being; simply through the act of releasing your own neuro chemicals choosing any stimuli you wish. It’s a powerful way of reclaiming your own mind from the emotionally manipulative.

THE DOPAMINE CASINO

Much the same as a baby smiling at the voices of their parents, dopamine is released when attention is reciprocated. This latest shooting in Florida has created young adult celebrity victims being showered with attention. The Baltimore City School district, despite not being able to afford heat, has spent $100,000 to send their students to Washington D.C. for astroturfing in anti gun marches. Let’s look at this on a neuro chemical level inside the minds of these young adults: Sudden, undeserved attention dopamine from a tragedy happening in general proximity to you, vacations and special treatment from authorities any time they want to use you to push their political agenda, showing young adults that proximity to tragedy creates celebrity and can make you set for life. Having people murdered around you is like hitting the jackpot at the dopamine casino. This emotional feedback loop will not create well adjusted adults, it will perpetuate adolescent behavior indefinitely. Just the type of thing that keeps people incentivized to keep coming back to the state and media manipulated dopamine casino for the rest of their lives.

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"GRABBER will be an appeal to emotion. “Won’t someone think about the children,” they’ll cry, while completely ignoring the statistics on homicide or inefficacy of gun control policies"

I would disagree with this part. Grabbers tend to use lots of statistics (from www.statsthatprovemeright.com) while ignoring principles.
They often try to take the pragmatic position "look i get the 2nd amendment but Japan did bla bla bla an Australia did X Y Z"

They used to, but Australian stats fell through a couple of years ago when looking at the murder rate that went up.

Any tips for building up an ability to “complete the circuit” at will? Read a few books on kundalini many years ago. Would be cool to learn a few basic exercises to build from.

The easiest way I’ve found is trying to stimulate the emotional chills with the activities that produce them the most, then as you’re experiencing them, close your eyes and focus on the sensation till you can prolong it by reverberating it up and down your spine and through your skull. Then, when you want to reinforce a positive behavior focus on what you were able to do in your meditation with an organic sensation, and it will return to emotionally reinforce the positive behaviors. Keep practicing, it’s a skill you can use your whole life.

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