WEBVTT - Like a Circle in a Spiral, Part 2 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.280 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, the production of 0:00:05.320 --> 0:00:14.160 My Heart Radio. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow 0:00:14.200 --> 0:00:16.720 your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, 0:00:16.720 --> 0:00:18.919 and we're back with part two of our series about 0:00:18.920 --> 0:00:22.720 people spinning around in circles. That's right. Part one was 0:00:22.880 --> 0:00:26.560 was essentially a breakdown of of why we've why we 0:00:26.640 --> 0:00:30.280 feel dizzy when we spin around in circles, and then 0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:32.239 we we also went in just a little bit into 0:00:32.280 --> 0:00:35.360 the art of spinning around in circles, particularly as it 0:00:35.400 --> 0:00:40.280 relates to figure skaters and ballet dancers. Now, while figure 0:00:40.280 --> 0:00:44.880 skaters and ballet dancers, I would say regularly practice feats 0:00:44.920 --> 0:00:48.279 that I am in all of in terms of, you know, 0:00:48.440 --> 0:00:51.400 their athleticism and their ability to spin around and stuff 0:00:51.400 --> 0:00:55.760 and still execute precise movements afterwards, I gotta say, there's 0:00:55.840 --> 0:00:58.760 one thing that that maybe makes them not that impressive, 0:00:58.800 --> 0:01:00.400 which is, you know, they only spin for a few 0:01:00.480 --> 0:01:03.280 seconds at a time. What if you were to spin 0:01:03.320 --> 0:01:07.280 around in a dance performance that lasted for minutes and 0:01:07.400 --> 0:01:12.000 minutes on end, maybe hours, who knows. Yeah, And this 0:01:12.120 --> 0:01:16.080 we're getting into the realm of of the whirling dervishes, 0:01:16.120 --> 0:01:20.240 of of Sufi mysticism, the Sufi Whirlers UH that you 0:01:20.280 --> 0:01:23.760 find mostly isolated in in modern day Turkey, but in 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:26.240 some other regions as well. And if you haven't seen 0:01:26.319 --> 0:01:29.839 footage of this and and certainly heard the corresponding music, 0:01:30.240 --> 0:01:32.920 I really encourage you to to check it out because 0:01:33.400 --> 0:01:36.720 it is. It is phenomenal. It is just to watch it. 0:01:36.720 --> 0:01:41.320 It's a very meditative experience I find. I've always found 0:01:41.400 --> 0:01:44.800 this very intriguing. I think you know I've seen some 0:01:44.840 --> 0:01:47.319 clips on TV at some point, and then back in 0:01:47.319 --> 0:01:49.920 the nineties, at one point, because I was getting increasingly 0:01:49.920 --> 0:01:52.440 into world music and into dead Can dance and stuff, 0:01:52.560 --> 0:01:56.480 I picked up an album off Hemisphere Records titled Mevlana 0:01:56.840 --> 0:02:00.600 Music of the Whirling Dervishes, and and really I was 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:03.760 blown away by it. Uh I. I looked it up 0:02:03.800 --> 0:02:08.280 again and I don't think this particular album is available anymore, 0:02:08.919 --> 0:02:13.000 but you can find the The particular musician is a 0:02:13.120 --> 0:02:16.040 nes A usual that's an easy I h u z 0:02:16.240 --> 0:02:19.360 e l and UH. A couple of their albums are 0:02:19.400 --> 0:02:23.280 available to stream. UH. It's it's it's really interesting stuff. 0:02:23.280 --> 0:02:26.560 Now I'm not all that well versed in Middle Eastern music, 0:02:27.000 --> 0:02:29.120 but it it does seem to have this very rhythmic 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:33.240 quality that inspires a certain kind of circular movement even 0:02:33.280 --> 0:02:36.400 in the mind. Oh I, I really enjoyed the music 0:02:36.440 --> 0:02:38.920 too when you shared it with me. Uh, I don't 0:02:38.919 --> 0:02:41.840 know if I found myself thinking in circular ways. Did 0:02:41.880 --> 0:02:44.519 you find yourself ruminating while listening to it? Yeah? I 0:02:44.800 --> 0:02:47.639 played some of I played Usels music for several hours 0:02:47.639 --> 0:02:50.560 while working on notes for for these episodes U the 0:02:50.560 --> 0:02:53.520 other day, and yeah, I found it. I mean, granted, 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:55.440 you know, part of it is I am thinking about 0:02:55.480 --> 0:02:57.640 people spinning around in circles and then I'm listening to 0:02:57.680 --> 0:03:00.239 this music that is of course uh in a really 0:03:00.320 --> 0:03:04.160 tied to that practice. But but yeah, I found it. 0:03:04.200 --> 0:03:07.160 Found it give me this kind of like calming, circular feeling, 0:03:07.240 --> 0:03:10.320 and really I think it it contributed to yesterday being 0:03:10.360 --> 0:03:15.560 a pretty good day. Nice. Yeah. Watching Sufi whirling dances 0:03:15.720 --> 0:03:19.840 is UM it's kind of hard to describe exactly the 0:03:19.880 --> 0:03:22.320 feeling of what's so beautiful about it. It is not 0:03:22.639 --> 0:03:27.160 like a lot of other dances that UM that operate 0:03:27.280 --> 0:03:30.440 by sort of like surprise, where you know you don't 0:03:30.440 --> 0:03:34.200 know what moves someone's going to do next. The Sufi 0:03:34.240 --> 0:03:37.360 whirling dances are extremely monotonous. I mean, they're basically just 0:03:37.960 --> 0:03:40.200 There might be versions that offers something else, but the 0:03:40.280 --> 0:03:45.000 versions I've seen mainly just feature this repetitive turning in place. 0:03:45.440 --> 0:03:49.120 And yet it is extremely beautiful as a form of dance. Uh, 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:51.200 And I think it has something to do with the 0:03:51.480 --> 0:03:53.480 thing I want to come back to later in this episode, 0:03:53.480 --> 0:03:57.280 which is the particular movement of the dancers skirts as 0:03:57.280 --> 0:04:00.120 they twirl. There's a kind of like beautiful ge I'm 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:02.640 a treat to that. And uh, there was actually a 0:04:02.640 --> 0:04:07.040 paper I came across the addressed how that happens. But um, 0:04:07.080 --> 0:04:11.160 but yeah, it's strange that that's such a in a 0:04:11.160 --> 0:04:15.440 way conceptually straightforward type of dance would be so interesting 0:04:15.480 --> 0:04:18.479 to watch for so long. Yeah, there's a real fluidity 0:04:18.480 --> 0:04:20.839 to it. And and you know, we were talking about 0:04:20.839 --> 0:04:24.480 watching it because of course that's that's that's my experience 0:04:24.480 --> 0:04:27.200 with it, uh, seeing it done, listening to the music, 0:04:27.560 --> 0:04:29.880 and it's my understanding that if you you know, if 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:32.120 you're if you're to travel to say Turkey, you can 0:04:32.160 --> 0:04:35.320 certainly as a tourist see some of it today, observe 0:04:35.400 --> 0:04:38.680 it as a tourist, but of course it's really based 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:43.080 more in the experience of the dance of being the dancer. 0:04:43.080 --> 0:04:44.359 And I guess you can say that's kind of the 0:04:44.360 --> 0:04:46.800 case with a lot of dance, like it's there's dance 0:04:46.880 --> 0:04:50.920 to watch, but the dance is also the experience, and 0:04:51.160 --> 0:04:54.120 to be the dancer is to be within the system 0:04:54.160 --> 0:04:57.080 of movement. Yeah, so let's let's unpack things a little bit. Yes. 0:04:57.240 --> 0:05:01.240 Sufi Islam. Sufi Ism is the mystical branch of Islam 0:05:01.279 --> 0:05:04.840 in which the practitioner seeks divine love and knowledge through 0:05:04.880 --> 0:05:09.279 the direct experience of God. Uh. It entails different mystical 0:05:09.360 --> 0:05:12.600 paths towards this goal, but the one we're gonna be 0:05:12.640 --> 0:05:15.120 talking about here is, of course, this form of dance. 0:05:15.760 --> 0:05:19.040 The words sufi itself derives from the Arabic for wool, 0:05:19.240 --> 0:05:23.320 as early Islamic aesthetics individuals who practice the denial of 0:05:23.360 --> 0:05:29.040 physical or psychological desires dressed in woolen garments, and Islamic 0:05:29.080 --> 0:05:33.160 mysticism is also known is uh tassa wolf, which literally 0:05:33.200 --> 0:05:36.480 means to dress in wool. The movement originally stirred up 0:05:36.520 --> 0:05:39.520 between six sixty one and seven forty nine c e. 0:05:40.040 --> 0:05:44.599 Apparently in response to perceptions of worldliness in Islamic practice 0:05:44.640 --> 0:05:48.040 at the time. I find it interesting that the mystical 0:05:48.320 --> 0:05:52.920 tradition can sort of arise as a form of almost 0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:56.200 any religion. Like that, you can take almost any religion 0:05:56.279 --> 0:06:00.760 and then there will there can be a mysticism interpretation 0:06:00.800 --> 0:06:04.520 of it, which again is often focused on um individual 0:06:04.560 --> 0:06:08.360 experience and people having practices such as meditation or other 0:06:08.440 --> 0:06:12.320 practices to alter the state of consciousness to make themselves 0:06:12.760 --> 0:06:15.560 have what they believe to be a direct experience of 0:06:15.600 --> 0:06:19.760 the divine in some way. And that there there's Christian mysticism, 0:06:19.760 --> 0:06:22.720 and there's Islamic mysticism, and there's a mystical face of 0:06:22.760 --> 0:06:26.080 almost any religion you can imagine. Yeah, absolutely, and and 0:06:26.440 --> 0:06:28.120 and of course in pretty much any religion you can 0:06:28.120 --> 0:06:31.760 look at to it, it's a divide that can create problems, 0:06:31.760 --> 0:06:36.680 that can can create conflict as well. Um So again, 0:06:36.760 --> 0:06:40.400 out of this, out of Sufi Islam, we we see 0:06:40.400 --> 0:06:43.680 the Sufi whirling emerge. And I imagine a lot of 0:06:43.680 --> 0:06:46.400 you out there have heard of a key individual in this, 0:06:46.520 --> 0:06:49.520 and that is the Persian poet Roomi, who lived twelve 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:53.000 or seven through twelve seventy three, and he himself was 0:06:53.000 --> 0:06:56.480 a Sufi mystic again. He dies in twelve seventy three 0:06:56.560 --> 0:07:02.039 see and afterwards his followers and his son Sultan Wallad 0:07:02.200 --> 0:07:06.240 create themv Levy Order, an organization of whirling dervishes who 0:07:06.440 --> 0:07:10.960 sought to experience God through elaborate rituals of dance and music. 0:07:11.400 --> 0:07:15.000 And this was formed in thirteen twelve in the Turkish 0:07:15.040 --> 0:07:18.000 city of Kanya. Now many of you may have seen, 0:07:18.200 --> 0:07:21.840 you know, images and videos of of Sufi whirling and uh, 0:07:21.880 --> 0:07:24.840 and you know the dervishes where these tall camel hair 0:07:24.960 --> 0:07:29.120 hats that are said to represent the tombstone of the ego, 0:07:29.480 --> 0:07:31.960 which I really like. Uh. And then they have these 0:07:32.000 --> 0:07:35.000 wide white skirts that twirl around and of course these 0:07:35.040 --> 0:07:38.280 are very visually impressive and certainly play on that concept 0:07:38.280 --> 0:07:41.320 of whirling and turning. But these are said to represent 0:07:41.480 --> 0:07:45.200 the egos shroud. Oh. I love that. And it's funny 0:07:45.200 --> 0:07:48.600 because that might be a little bit more literal than 0:07:48.640 --> 0:07:50.960 people would think. Well, I mean, I guess you can be. 0:07:51.240 --> 0:07:53.200 You can't have something that's too literal if you're talking 0:07:53.240 --> 0:07:57.000 about the ego, which is an intangible concept. But um, 0:07:57.160 --> 0:07:59.880 the way in which it is somewhat literal is that 0:08:00.040 --> 0:08:02.800 it's not just you are wearing a symbolic piece of dress. 0:08:02.800 --> 0:08:08.240 But that when you watch somebody practicing a Sufi whirling dance, 0:08:08.760 --> 0:08:11.640 you will, I think very often find yourself not looking 0:08:11.680 --> 0:08:14.280 at the person and not looking at their face, but 0:08:14.480 --> 0:08:18.200 looking at the twirling skirt. The twirling skirt almost becomes 0:08:18.240 --> 0:08:23.280 the persons. So it's a kind of second order vanishing 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:27.240 of the identity or the ego. Yeah. Yeah, So the 0:08:27.280 --> 0:08:30.480 big ceremony here is the semi ceremony, and in the 0:08:30.600 --> 0:08:34.320 in this ceremony, the Dervish dancers rotate anti clockwise around 0:08:34.320 --> 0:08:37.720 the vertical access of their bodies while also rotating around 0:08:37.720 --> 0:08:41.160 the other dancers. It's all set to this this wonderful music, 0:08:41.520 --> 0:08:44.640 and it's intended to be a meditative experience, a highly 0:08:44.640 --> 0:08:49.320 meditative experience by which for the dancers their material self 0:08:49.400 --> 0:08:53.440 falls away and a state of oneness is experienced. Yes, 0:08:53.600 --> 0:08:57.680 and so you can obviously look at the the religious, 0:08:57.760 --> 0:09:03.800 the symbolic, the psycle logical importance and significance of this dance. 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:06.160 But another way to think about the stance is just 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:08.800 as a physical act. And it comes back to questions 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:11.200 that I you know that we brought up in our 0:09:11.240 --> 0:09:14.160 earlier episode in the first part of this series, which 0:09:14.240 --> 0:09:16.200 is I watch it and I think, just on a 0:09:16.280 --> 0:09:20.360 physiological level, how do you do that without becoming so 0:09:20.480 --> 0:09:23.320 dizzy that you have to stop? Yeah, because we're talking 0:09:23.360 --> 0:09:25.520 about a lot of spinning. You may have just seen 0:09:25.559 --> 0:09:29.480 clips of this, but the dancers will spend continuously for 0:09:29.520 --> 0:09:33.160 a solid hour with something like thirty spins per minute 0:09:33.880 --> 0:09:37.880 the performance. And this they performed this without experiencing vertico, 0:09:38.040 --> 0:09:42.200 without you know, feeling dizzy, following a reported thousand days 0:09:42.240 --> 0:09:46.439 of training within them of Levy houses. Uh to to 0:09:46.559 --> 0:09:50.200 give another number to you, According to the Guinness Book 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:54.080 of World Records, the most Sufi whirling revolutions in one 0:09:54.120 --> 0:09:56.760 hour for a mail uh that The record went to 0:09:57.280 --> 0:10:01.280 um Schaffik Ibrahim on January fifth, two thousand twelve for 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:07.480 two thousand, nine d and five spins in a single hour. Wow. Yeah, 0:10:09.200 --> 0:10:12.080 I have no words. That's that's so many spins. Yeah, 0:10:12.240 --> 0:10:15.720 it's just it's it's a tremendous amount of spinning. Um. 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:19.120 And and not only is the individual not like physically 0:10:19.160 --> 0:10:21.920 ill from it, not only are they they you know, 0:10:22.240 --> 0:10:25.559 retaining this uh, this fluid movement and this elegance and 0:10:25.559 --> 0:10:28.400 they're not crashing into each other, the walls. Uh they're 0:10:28.480 --> 0:10:32.200 keeping it beautiful, but they're also uh, you know, they're 0:10:32.200 --> 0:10:35.480 said to have this this this meditative experience throughout it all. 0:10:35.520 --> 0:10:39.440 So it's not you know, dizziness is in many ways 0:10:39.480 --> 0:10:43.720 feels like the opposite of of a meditative experience. I mean, 0:10:43.720 --> 0:10:45.480 into a certain extent, you could, I guess you compare 0:10:45.520 --> 0:10:47.760 some things about it. But but yeah, what whatever, whatever 0:10:47.840 --> 0:10:50.000 is going on in the mind of the of the 0:10:50.280 --> 0:10:53.600 Sufi whirler, of the of the whirling dervish, it is 0:10:53.640 --> 0:10:58.320 not a state of dizzy chaos. Uh So it's it's fascinating, Yeah, 0:10:58.320 --> 0:11:00.760 I mean, I would also think of dizziness is sort 0:11:00.760 --> 0:11:03.720 of the opposite of a meditative state. Dizziness makes you 0:11:03.840 --> 0:11:07.600 hyper aware of your body and makes it really difficult 0:11:07.640 --> 0:11:10.440 to focus your mind, right, I guess then the main 0:11:10.480 --> 0:11:13.439 comparison would be, well, you're you're living in the now now, 0:11:14.920 --> 0:11:18.040 if you're, if you're you're clutching your head on the ground, 0:11:18.360 --> 0:11:20.480 but not in the way that you want to feel 0:11:20.760 --> 0:11:23.440 in the moment. So I looked into this and I 0:11:23.440 --> 0:11:27.239 found an interesting paper titled a Possible role of Prolonged 0:11:27.360 --> 0:11:31.880 whirling episodes on structural plasticity of the cortical networks and 0:11:31.960 --> 0:11:37.120 altered vertigo perception the cortex of Sufi Whirling Dervishes by 0:11:37.200 --> 0:11:39.760 cal mac at All and this was this was combining 0:11:39.800 --> 0:11:43.880 researchers from New Zealand, the Netherlands and Turkey particularly. Their 0:11:43.880 --> 0:11:48.959 study looked at quote potential structural cortical plasticity unquote in 0:11:49.000 --> 0:11:53.160 Sufi Whirling Dervishes. These s w d s as the abbreviation, 0:11:53.880 --> 0:11:57.080 because again we're talking about a level of sustained spinning 0:11:57.360 --> 0:11:59.720 that most healthy adults are not going to be able 0:11:59.760 --> 0:12:03.680 to hand handle without experiencing vertigo. As they put it, quote, 0:12:03.720 --> 0:12:08.240 this unique whirling based meditation style of Sufi Whirling Dervishes 0:12:08.480 --> 0:12:14.359 achieves extraordinary physiological outcomes that overcome vertico and balance impairment 0:12:14.559 --> 0:12:18.319 which would be expected after prolonged times of whirling. So 0:12:18.440 --> 0:12:22.200 they looked at quote potential relationship of the motion body 0:12:22.280 --> 0:12:26.160 perception related cortical networks and the prolonged term of whirling 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:30.040 ability without vertigo or dizziness. So a note here again 0:12:30.280 --> 0:12:32.600 is the vestibular system, which of course we went into 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:36.000 and defined in the UH in the first episode, you know, 0:12:36.040 --> 0:12:38.360 related to inner ear and our the inner ear in 0:12:38.360 --> 0:12:41.479 our sense of balance. They point out that vestibular processing 0:12:41.559 --> 0:12:44.840 is involved not only in space perception and locomotion, but 0:12:44.960 --> 0:12:48.520 also in cognitive perceptions of self. And so there is 0:12:48.559 --> 0:12:52.520 this connection, they say, between the vestibular system and the 0:12:52.640 --> 0:12:56.160 default mode network as well, something we've also discussed on 0:12:56.200 --> 0:13:00.120 the show quite a bit, tied to self awareness, to consciousness, 0:13:00.160 --> 0:13:04.360 to embodiment, but also in many cases unhappiness. You know, 0:13:04.520 --> 0:13:08.720 this this dwelling on what has happened in the past, 0:13:08.800 --> 0:13:11.679 what has happened to me, what is happening in the footle, 0:13:11.720 --> 0:13:14.880 happening in uh to me in the future, et cetera. 0:13:15.160 --> 0:13:17.520 And and you know, getting away from that now nous 0:13:17.559 --> 0:13:21.320 that we often associate with a meditative calm. Yeah, the 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:24.680 default mode network, I think, is highly associated with cognitive 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:28.520 patterns that are focused on the self, thinking about self, 0:13:28.559 --> 0:13:32.000 and making judgments about the self. And I mean, what's 0:13:32.040 --> 0:13:35.160 more miserable than that. Yeah. I think it's interesting too 0:13:35.240 --> 0:13:39.040 that we're talking about wheeling and spinning, because there's you know, 0:13:39.800 --> 0:13:43.600 the sort of thinking associated with the default mode network 0:13:44.320 --> 0:13:47.400 sometimes takes the form of a wheel and other belief systems, 0:13:47.440 --> 0:13:50.840 you know, like some some treatments or interpretations of the 0:13:51.320 --> 0:13:54.280 like the wheel of being in in Buddhism kind of 0:13:54.280 --> 0:13:56.080 relate to this, you know, or just sort of the 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:58.880 feeling of like, oh, I'm on the I'm on the 0:13:58.920 --> 0:14:01.520 hamster wheel of my own default mode network right now, 0:14:01.520 --> 0:14:04.880 I've got to eject myself from that wheel, uh and 0:14:04.920 --> 0:14:08.320 do something with my time. So the question is does 0:14:08.400 --> 0:14:12.560 prolonged whirling contribute to structural changes in the networks of 0:14:12.600 --> 0:14:15.840 the default mode network and self perception in addition to 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:19.840 motion perception related networks. So the authors point out that 0:14:19.920 --> 0:14:23.720 previous studies have observed, first of all, that decreased cortical 0:14:23.760 --> 0:14:29.280 thickness and meditator's brains relate to the posterior singulate cortex 0:14:29.400 --> 0:14:33.360 or PCC and default mode network also decreased activity in 0:14:33.360 --> 0:14:36.960 the default mode network as well as long And also 0:14:37.000 --> 0:14:40.720 they point out long term meditation practices associated with altered 0:14:40.760 --> 0:14:45.280 resting brain activity, so long lasting activity changes that persist 0:14:45.440 --> 0:14:48.320 in the brain. In a way, you could think about 0:14:48.560 --> 0:14:53.640 meditation as a way of practicing control over what the 0:14:53.720 --> 0:14:58.080 brain does win at rest, right, Yeah, And you know 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:00.560 it's it's you know, we we've talked about aitation on 0:15:00.560 --> 0:15:02.240 the show in the past. I'm sure we'll continue too, 0:15:02.320 --> 0:15:06.440 because it is, it can it can feel very elusive 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:08.160 at times, and I think part of it comes down 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:10.920 to this connection between the mind and body. You know 0:15:11.040 --> 0:15:13.920 that that UM. I mean, that's why I think a 0:15:13.920 --> 0:15:17.400 lot of us find meditation in meditative states or even 0:15:17.480 --> 0:15:22.160 of the flow state in activities that are physical, you know, 0:15:22.640 --> 0:15:27.120 like in in yoga for instance, um or or um 0:15:27.160 --> 0:15:29.640 you know, even you know, other type forms of exercise, 0:15:29.920 --> 0:15:33.120 swimming laps, running laps, going for a jog, that sort 0:15:33.120 --> 0:15:36.080 of thing. Yes, though I feel like I would identify 0:15:36.240 --> 0:15:39.800 more of that meditative type flow state in physical tasks 0:15:39.880 --> 0:15:45.840 that also require some degree of constant uh sort of 0:15:45.880 --> 0:15:50.680 mental engagement, more so than say jogging does U you know, 0:15:51.040 --> 0:15:54.360 Like I've heard some people complain that maybe they can 0:15:54.480 --> 0:15:58.720 enjoy sports, but they find quote exercise boring. And I 0:15:58.760 --> 0:16:01.320 think what they're thinking of is like running on a treadmill, 0:16:01.960 --> 0:16:05.040 in which like in which case, um, you are engaging 0:16:05.080 --> 0:16:07.480 your body, but you are not you are not being 0:16:07.600 --> 0:16:11.480 faced with tasks. You know, there's not like any problems 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:13.760 for your brain to solve the way there is when 0:16:13.800 --> 0:16:17.120 you're say playing a sport or something or doing something 0:16:17.200 --> 0:16:21.720 with UM, doing something with like variable activities throughout, such 0:16:21.720 --> 0:16:25.200 as like a yoga practice or a or a you know, 0:16:25.240 --> 0:16:28.000 a dance routine or something. Yeah. Well, but I guess 0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:30.200 if you're, like say, jogging around the neighborhood, you're having 0:16:30.240 --> 0:16:33.160 to solve various problems, right like, Okay, I'm gonna not 0:16:34.000 --> 0:16:37.240 run onto that sidewalk that's all crooked, I'm gonna jump 0:16:37.280 --> 0:16:39.200 over that dog, and I'm not going to step in 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:42.360 that that or that. Right though. It's funny because I 0:16:42.400 --> 0:16:48.120 feel like that just manifests as extreme annoyance. Yeah, I guess. Yeah, 0:16:48.200 --> 0:16:52.200 it comes like there's a thin line sometimes between uh, 0:16:53.120 --> 0:16:55.680 tasks that are fulfilling and tasks that are just a chore. 0:16:56.760 --> 0:16:59.720 I mean, we've talked before about how, um, sometimes when 0:16:59.720 --> 0:17:02.680 you're driving in a car, it can make other people 0:17:02.800 --> 0:17:05.840 just appear as obstacles to you. There's this kind of 0:17:05.920 --> 0:17:10.040 horrible desnsitization that goes on, and we talked about one 0:17:10.080 --> 0:17:14.679 reason for that being that, um that perhaps the you know, 0:17:14.880 --> 0:17:17.520 updating the body schema to include the car makes you 0:17:17.560 --> 0:17:21.280 feel bigger looking at people through the glass of the windshield, 0:17:21.960 --> 0:17:25.440 operating on you know, the different rules of the control 0:17:25.480 --> 0:17:29.560 traffic versus control foot movements. Those things could be separating you. 0:17:29.640 --> 0:17:31.639 But I think another one that maybe we didn't consider 0:17:31.760 --> 0:17:33.399 enough when we've talked about this in the past is 0:17:33.440 --> 0:17:37.520 just speed, because when you're out running on the sidewalk, 0:17:37.600 --> 0:17:39.879 it seems like you have a very different relationship to 0:17:39.920 --> 0:17:43.400 other people than if you're out walking. When you're out running, 0:17:43.640 --> 0:17:46.560 you start to view other people as like obstacles in 0:17:46.600 --> 0:17:48.159 the same kind of way you do you're when you're 0:17:48.200 --> 0:17:51.160 in a car. You're like persons in my way. They're 0:17:51.200 --> 0:17:53.040 not even really a person. This is just like a 0:17:53.080 --> 0:17:57.280 sack of meat that I need to get around. Yeah, 0:17:57.480 --> 0:17:59.600 you know, I'm not myself a runner, but I do 0:17:59.720 --> 0:18:10.320 I get I get hints of that from other runners sometimes. 0:18:10.320 --> 0:18:12.919 So for for this particular study, the authors are going 0:18:12.960 --> 0:18:16.680 to look at um at a Sufi whirlers. Now. One 0:18:16.680 --> 0:18:19.000 thing they note, though, is that the practice of MeV 0:18:19.119 --> 0:18:22.760 Levi ceremonies they're not as robust as they were prior 0:18:22.800 --> 0:18:26.040 to the twentieth century due to a secular policies that 0:18:26.080 --> 0:18:29.320 were enforced. So a lot of what remains today apparently 0:18:29.400 --> 0:18:33.359 isn't as rigorous and is often aimed at at tourist audiences. 0:18:33.400 --> 0:18:37.040 So it's difficult to study quote the traditional physical and 0:18:37.119 --> 0:18:40.520 spiritual method involved here. As a result, you know, it's 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:43.840 not a huge sample size they're working with. So they 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:48.800 looked at eight males and two females adults right handed 0:18:48.920 --> 0:18:53.080 traditional Sufi whirling dervishes with more than eight years of 0:18:53.160 --> 0:18:56.520 whirling meditation experience, so the average with something like ten 0:18:56.560 --> 0:18:59.600 and a half years of whirling uh, which I think 0:18:59.640 --> 0:19:02.760 broke down about like two whirling sessions per week to 0:19:02.880 --> 0:19:05.359 keep the practice up. They also had a ten person 0:19:05.400 --> 0:19:08.520 control group that was otherwise matched up with the attributes 0:19:08.600 --> 0:19:13.360 of of the individuals that were themselves whirlers. They performed 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:16.080 m r I scans and found an average difference in 0:19:16.119 --> 0:19:20.040 cortical thickness of point ten millimeters for the left hemisphere 0:19:20.040 --> 0:19:23.120 of the brain and point fifteen millimeters for the right 0:19:23.160 --> 0:19:25.800 hemisphere of the brain. So they present this as proof 0:19:25.840 --> 0:19:31.600 of structural plasticity induced by the whirling meditations of Sufi 0:19:31.680 --> 0:19:36.000 whirling dervishes. Now, one of the take homes from this 0:19:36.080 --> 0:19:38.959 study is that this sort of information could lead to 0:19:38.960 --> 0:19:42.600 some improvements in vertigo therapy UH. And I also imagine 0:19:42.640 --> 0:19:43.960 it goes back to what we mentioned in the last 0:19:44.000 --> 0:19:46.200 episode about the more we understand this sort of thing, 0:19:46.520 --> 0:19:49.240 the more we can understand just to how the brain functions, 0:19:49.240 --> 0:19:51.440 how the brain can heal itself, that sort of thing. 0:19:52.040 --> 0:19:53.919 But they also stress that there's a lot of possibility 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:57.960 in the the potential mood enhancing effect of the defined 0:19:58.280 --> 0:20:02.919 structurally plastinated cortical areas um and and and how that 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:06.320 is worth consideration. So they point out that the default 0:20:06.359 --> 0:20:10.120 mode network is active except when it is suppressed by 0:20:10.119 --> 0:20:14.640 other networks or stimulated by other states, and that its activity, 0:20:14.680 --> 0:20:19.920 of course, is generally correlated with unhappiness in the human experience. Quote. Therefore, 0:20:19.960 --> 0:20:23.400 it is theorized that prolonged periods of gold erected cognitive 0:20:23.400 --> 0:20:28.560 processes may decrease the mind wandering activity in the swd's 0:20:28.640 --> 0:20:32.960 brain because the pecunious activity has been decreased. They also 0:20:33.040 --> 0:20:37.240 theorized that the suppression of cortical areas related with the 0:20:37.320 --> 0:20:44.000 discriminational perception here leads to less selfish, egocentric behavior and 0:20:44.119 --> 0:20:47.320 increased levels of happiness. And they think that the decreased 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:52.679 activity in the dorso lateral prefrontal cortex may contribute to 0:20:52.720 --> 0:20:57.080 the behavioral attribute of honesty. And additionally, there could be 0:20:57.119 --> 0:21:00.320 a neuroprotection advantage here as well, you know, against likes 0:21:00.320 --> 0:21:04.320 of say Alzheimer's and other conditions. Well, I guess, like 0:21:04.359 --> 0:21:07.520 a lot of neuroimaging and neurological studies, it it opens 0:21:07.600 --> 0:21:10.080 up a lot of possibilities that you should we should 0:21:10.080 --> 0:21:13.360 be careful to remember aren't necessarily proven yet, but are 0:21:13.400 --> 0:21:17.240 really interesting and worth looking into with other experiments. Yeah, Like, 0:21:17.240 --> 0:21:19.560 there are a lot of questions about the default mode network, 0:21:19.640 --> 0:21:22.120 for example, and and just about anything else you could 0:21:22.240 --> 0:21:24.800 point out in the human brain. Yeah, we've even talked 0:21:24.840 --> 0:21:26.679 about how there are some people I think who question 0:21:26.760 --> 0:21:29.560 the validity of the default mode network as a coherent 0:21:29.640 --> 0:21:32.840 concept and like is this really a thing? But um, 0:21:33.760 --> 0:21:35.879 but but there are others who advocate for it. So 0:21:36.200 --> 0:21:38.640 I don't know how to sort that question out. Yeah. 0:21:38.720 --> 0:21:40.719 I would say that some of the key takeaways from 0:21:40.720 --> 0:21:42.680 the study though, or that that first of all, this 0:21:42.760 --> 0:21:47.000 incredible act of spinning by by the Sufi Wherler's it 0:21:47.160 --> 0:21:49.880 is it is producing like physical changes in the brain, 0:21:50.000 --> 0:21:54.360 like there is there is neural plasticity involved here, and 0:21:54.720 --> 0:21:57.480 you know it is. It is also a meditative state 0:21:57.520 --> 0:22:00.119 they enter into and you don't have to it's not 0:22:00.160 --> 0:22:03.080 really a stretch to say that, Yes, the meditative states 0:22:03.800 --> 0:22:07.560 repetitive me meditative states, meditative meditative states that are engaged 0:22:07.600 --> 0:22:10.080 in with with a fair amount of frequency that has 0:22:10.119 --> 0:22:15.160 an effect on your resting um neural level. Uh so 0:22:15.440 --> 0:22:17.879 all of that is, you know, really fascinating, makes me, 0:22:18.359 --> 0:22:21.720 you know, respect this tradition even more, and I have 0:22:21.800 --> 0:22:24.679 to say, it makes me want to spend more in 0:22:24.760 --> 0:22:28.240 my life. Um well, wait, don't. I mean it seems 0:22:28.240 --> 0:22:30.080 difficult that, like, is it a thing where you'd have 0:22:30.200 --> 0:22:32.320 to do it a lot to get used to it 0:22:32.480 --> 0:22:34.800 enough to get the benefits from it. Is that the case, 0:22:35.400 --> 0:22:38.520 I guess, I mean, yes, that's certainly too well to 0:22:38.600 --> 0:22:41.520 spin at their level, it requires I mean they they 0:22:41.560 --> 0:22:44.479 prescribe what what I say, a thousand days of of 0:22:44.480 --> 0:22:46.960 practice to get to the point where you could actually 0:22:47.040 --> 0:22:51.159 partake of this ceremony. Um, but I mean just in 0:22:51.280 --> 0:22:53.479 terms of, like, on on on one level, it may 0:22:53.560 --> 0:22:56.000 I want to do it just because I I fail 0:22:56.040 --> 0:22:58.800 at it so much. Now, like the idea that I 0:22:58.840 --> 0:23:02.600 can change my brain, that I can change myself to 0:23:02.760 --> 0:23:06.119 spin better, like to do not feel like my soul 0:23:06.200 --> 0:23:07.840 has been ripped out of my body when I spin 0:23:07.920 --> 0:23:11.600 around five times on a yoga mat. Uh Like that 0:23:11.600 --> 0:23:14.480 that alone is attractive, you know, the the idea that like, yeah, 0:23:14.600 --> 0:23:17.600 I'm I can, I can change and become this slightly 0:23:17.600 --> 0:23:20.240 different version of myself. And you know, it's also worth 0:23:20.320 --> 0:23:24.600 noting that, you know, while this is the most um 0:23:24.640 --> 0:23:28.240 intriguing and probably the most extreme example of spinning dance, 0:23:28.520 --> 0:23:30.960