A Continuum of Persistent Non-Symbolic Experience in Adults?

1. A Continuum of Persistent Non-Symbolic Experience in Adults? Jeffery A. MartinCenter for the Study of Non-Symbolic Consciousness And Harvard University

2. What is PNSE Catchall phrase for persistent… • Enlightenment • Mystical Experience • Nonduality • Cosmic/God/etc. Consciousness • (and about 200 other terms, worldwide) • Not limited to spiritual or religious people.

3. What is PNSE • Persistent Non-Symbolic Consciousness = PNSE • Term is adapted from 2000 Cook-Greuter paper: “Eastern psychologies have often pointed to the nonsymbolically mediated, or immediate ways of knowing as the only kind of knowing that can lead to enlightenment or true insight into human nature. In fact, they consider our addiction to language-mediated, discursive thought as a major hurdle in realizing the true or divine Self, or union with the Ground.” (Cook-Greuter, p. 230) • Ultimately the term was used because participants accepted it.

4. Approach • Piece 1 • Start to get arms around the population • Standard self-report instruments, from best guess within research community, delivered in batches • Chosen to be maximally compatible with existing data from other studies of temporary and permanent forms of NSC • Example: Batch 1 - Modified M-Scale, DES2, STAI, SWLS, BFI, TAS, and Modified MUMEX

5. Approach Three piece structure, continued • Piece 2 • In-depth interviews (6-12+ hours) • Focused on Cognition, Affect, Memory and Perception • Extracting and refining testable psychological claims from self reports • Example: “Loss of self” …what does this actually mean? • Clearly talking to someone who’s saying “I did X” • Population tends to speak in metaphors, be very vague, and so forth • Often takes an enormous effort to correlate claims across subjects, try to really get in and understand them, and narrow them down into something testable • Basically spending time scratching things off a large list • Piece 1 and 2 were concurrent, and are still happening in some populations • Piece 3 • Imaging/brain measurement • EEG, fMRI, …

6. Participants • Super achievers => broke and homeless • Mostly religious or spiritual • Age range late teens to mid-nineties • Globally dispersed (we only track English speakers, but come across many others) • Generally educated • Skewed toward men • Various races but our sample is skewed towards Caucasians

7. PNSE Continuum Location 1 Location 3 Location 4 Location 2 • Locations actually represent regions with sub-locations • Some people stay in one spot, others move • Generally a forward progression but not always

8. PNSE Continuum Location 1 - Expansion of sense of self, connection to divine - Much less affected by ‘self’ thoughts - Distance from but still have positive and negative emotions - Deep peace but can be suppressed by triggered conditioning - Effects from perceptual triggers fall off quickly - Deep peace and beingnessfeels more real than anything previous - Trust in ‘how things are’ - Personal history less relevant, memories less

9. PNSE Continuum Location 1 Location 3 Location 4 Location 2 - ‘Self’ thoughts continue to fade - Peace increasingly harder to suppress/conditioning fades - Shift towards increasingly positive emotions, until only very positive emotions remain - Intermediate levels of perceptual triggers increasingly fade - More likely to feel that there is a correct decision or path to take when presented with choices - Higher well-being than location one

10. PNSE Continuum Location 1 Location 3 Location 4 Location 2 - Only single positive emotion remains - Feels like a combination of universal compassion, love, joy, … - Higher well-being than location 2

11. PNSE Continuum Location 1 Location 3 Location 4 Location 2 - Expansion of sense of self, connection to divine - Much less affected by ‘self’ thoughts - Distance from but still have positive and negative emotions - Deep peace but can be suppressed by triggered conditioning - Effects from perceptual triggers fall off quickly - Deep peace and ‘beingness feels more real than anything previous - Trust in ‘how things are’ - Personal history less relevant, memories less - ‘Self’ thoughts continue to fade - Peace increasingly harder to suppress/conditioning fades - Shift towards increasingly positive emotions, until only very positive emotions remain - Intermediate levels of perceptual triggers increasingly fade - More likely to feel that there is a correct decision or path to take when presented with choices - Higher well-being than location one - Only single positive emotion remains - Feels like a combination of universal compassion, love, joy, … - Higher well-being than location 2 - No sense of agency - No emotions - No ‘self’ thoughts - Perceptual triggers at their bare minimum - No sense of divine or universal consciousness - life was simply unfolding and they were watching the process happen - Memory deficits/scheduled appointments, etc. - Highest well-being reported

12. Getting There…

13. Applied Research - Feedback PNSE • Home Bio-feedback

14. Applied Research - Stimulation PNSE • Home Unit

15. Recent Experiment • Best practices • Combined based on data • Taught by best people in each area • 4 months • 2 classes – 1 course • 6 participants • 3 men, 3 women • 2 high, 2 med, 2 low well-being (1M, 1F ea.)

16. Recent Experiment • 3 weeks to go… • NSE • Location 1 = 1 person • Location 2 = 1 person • Measures • STAI, STRESS, PILL, M-Scale, NETI, AHI, CES-D, FEQ, GHS, PNAS, Gratitude, Optimism, Meaning, ATH, SWLS • All in ‘positive’ direction across subjects

17. Thank You! Slides at: nonsymbolic.org/TSC2014.pptx Paper at: nonsymbolic.org/PNSE-Article.pdf Email: jeffery.a.martin@gmail.com