Take Control of Your Brain

 "Take Control of Your Brain"

During holidays like Lunar New Year or Chuseok, there was a program that never missed on TV: magic shows. Watching David Copperfield perform his magic tricks always brought cheers and applause. It's proud to see young magicians in Korea showing off their talents these days.

I've always been curious. Where did the person go? How did they split in two and come back to life? And where did the bird go? Haha!

Steve McNick's "Why Does the Brain Fall for Illusions?" says that magic manipulates the brain's tendency to be deceived cleverly. But the question is, why does the brain create illusions?

Why does the brain deceive?

A person's eyes are like a 1-megapixel digital camera. Considering that current smartphones have 8-megapixel cameras, our eyes aren't that sharp. It's the brain that transforms the two-dimensional images captured by the retina into three-dimensional images.

Moreover, our eyes can only perceive visible light. If ultraviolet light is turned on, fluorescent colors appear, different from under sunlight. Magicians can use just lighting to perform quick-change effects on their clothes.

There's another method: the afterimage effect. When exposed to very bright light suddenly turning dark, people can't see anything for about 1/10 of a second. Magicians can use piano wires to flick clothes, attached with Velcro, into the sky.

Computers can multitask, but humans can't. Can you watch a movie properly while having a meeting? To achieve results, you need to create conditions for concentration. You can see people around you who think narrowly. They have convictions and beliefs but lack reasoning.

The reason is simple. It's because they only see what they want to see. Even reading the same newspaper, different stories emerge. They accumulate as distorted materials that justify their beliefs. Moreover, as time passes between learning and recalling memories, accuracy decreases, leading to accelerated reorganization into narrow-minded thinking.

The same goes for magic. Remember the magician bending a spoon? Just by lightly touching and sliding a finger over it, the spoon bent like rubber. People believed Uri Geller had psychic powers when he performed this.

Prepare three spoons. Choose one from the three apparently normal spoons. The audience confirms that the spoon is very firm. Then, the magician focuses on the person on stage while bending the necks of the other two spoons with his right hand (I I → ><). Holding the bent spoon's necks with his thumb and index finger makes it seem like he's holding the two spoons crosswise. Then, he swaps them later.

But is this only in magic? In a video where students wearing white and black T-shirts pass a basketball, many people miss a gorilla passing by because they're focused on counting the passes.

When you enter a restaurant, you smell something, but after a while, you don't notice it anymore. It's becoming accustomed and desensitized. Magicians use this desensitization to perform shows where they make watches and rings disappear. The tactile lingering effect persists even after the watch or ring has disappeared if the magician is holding their wrist or fingers tightly.

What's the secret to excellent memory? Memorize the following words well:

Umbrella Night Strawberry Banana Giraffe Button Coin Wooden chopsticks Stepping stone

What was the fifth word?

Many people get confused. But there's a way to remember well: associating places and objects. The words I mentioned earlier are associated from head to toe, calling out similar words in order, like head, eyes, nose, mouth, neck, and so on.

Creating a story format to remember words based on the process of moving from the front door to the living room also helps recall the sequence. Anyone who remembers everything will never be truly happy due to self-blame and injustice. It's said that 98% of a person's brain is dominated by their words. Why does the brain listen to the owner's words so well and store illusions and misinformation?

Why does the brain fall for illusions and errors?

It's said that the brain deludes to extremes for the owner's happiness. Even Dr. Yang Chang-soon, a psychiatrist, says that most mental illnesses occur when narcissism is damaged.

Is human experience derived from thoughts? Or do thoughts come from experiences? It's a difficult question, isn't it? In Richard Carlson's "Don't Sweat the Small Stuff," an interesting story is introduced.

A man accidentally spills water in a restaurant and notices another man looking displeased when he lifts his head. The man thinks to himself, "Haven't you ever made a mistake? What a funny guy..." and silently becomes annoyed. Then, he quickly cleans up his bag and leaves for the office. He encounters his wife when he arrives home early, and she happily greets him, saying, "What's up with you today? I love you, honey." The man replies, "What's wrong with you? Are you crazy?" The wife, feeling extremely embarrassed by the unexpected reaction, becomes upset and angry. Their daughter, who didn't realize the change in atmosphere earlier, comes to her mother and says, "Mom, I think I forgot to write my name on the exam paper." The mother, feeling irritated, says, "You! You never forget to eat, but you forget to write your name on the exam paper? Lose some weight!" The daughter feels worse due to the unexpected reaction from her mother just now. Meanwhile, their dog, wagging its tail, plays around in front of the daughter, wanting to be hugged. Annoyed by the hyperactive dog, she kicks it without realizing how cute it is. The dog, in pain, almost hits its head. Thinking that her father, who's trying to comfort it, is trying to hit it, it bites him. Eventually, chaos ensues in the house...

What do you feel when you see this situation? Haven't you had a day as tangled and twisted as this? But what if the man who made eye contact in the restaurant didn't remember the face and wasn't interested in the situation where the cup broke?

Did you get scolded by your boss? Think of your boss as a customer of your life. Your life's customer. When you change your attitude and thoughts about life, you'll realize something significant.

"I can't change my friend next to me, but if I change, the world changes."...

That's a fact.

Napoleon said, "To succeed, you must first imagine success." Famous PGA players Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods are said to "imagine tomorrow's game while watching videos of their best shots." Andrew Carnegie, after studying successful people for 20 years, obtained the same result: "A person's thoughts create wealth."

There is something called the placebo effect. It explains that when patients suffering from colds and body aches are given fake medicine made of sugar or similar substances and told it's a newly developed drug, their condition improves as they trust the doctor.

If you imagine a lemon, your mouth waters. It's said that if you believe a hot iron rod is a cold spoon while under hypnosis and touching it to your skin, you'll get blisters. The brain cannot distinguish between imagination and reality.

According to research from Stanford Medical School and the University of Michigan Psychology Institute, no correlation was found between smoking and health issues. However, significant differences were observed in attitudes. People who smoked while worrying about lung cancer were found to be in very poor health.

It's said that when humans imagine illness, stress hormones are released in the body, causing harm. This can be measured by PET and fMRI scans. A heart overflowing with love and gratitude produces white blood cells and endorphins. When 159 terminal cancer patients were encouraged to imagine cancer cells being eaten away, 22.2% recovered, and those who reluctantly lived with terminal cancer lived twice as long as other terminal cancer patients.

A person who visited Niagara Falls felt thirsty after drinking the waterfall water and rushed to the hospital upon seeing the POISSON sign nearby. When the doctor explained that POISSON means "fishing" in French, the pain disappeared.

The human brain operates based on command systems regardless of the truth of the information. In other words, just like a computer. A computer only calculates based on predetermined programs. It doesn't say, "That's funny," or "Is this what you call an answer?" when you input something. It's said that the human brain is the same. If the owner imagines and accepts information, the brain simply follows the owner's commands.

The brain earnestly desires the owner's happiness.

UCLA Professor Norman Carson was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) at the age of 50. One day, he randomly picked up a Bible and read the passage, "A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones." He decided to laugh without reason and started to recover. After laughing for a month, his previously immobile fingers began to move, and after six months, he could pick up a fork and eat. Eventually, he recovered.

Laughter produces killer cells that attack cancer cells. After laughing, blood tests showed a 200-fold increase in gamma interferon and a decrease in dopamine and epinephrine, activating T cells and becoming an important factor in the growth of immune-related cells.

In Korea, Chungjang Gochujang plays classical music in its factory. Even microorganisms respond to music. Introducing laughter into business management increased sales by 2.5 times, reduced defects by one-third, reduced theft of goods, reduced monthly accounting errors from ₩300,000 to ₩1,000, reduced employee turnover, and reduced lateness, according to research.

At a major US university in 1960, a study was conducted on 141 graduates to select those who genuinely smiled in their graduation photos and investigate their lives. The results showed that they had excellent marriage and life satisfaction compared to others. Proverbs 17:22 says, "A cheerful heart is good medicine," and in the Samguk Yusa, when King Shinmun was sick, a jester made him laugh, curing him of his fatigue-related illness. Dongui Bogam also states that laughter is better than medicine.

Many books, such as Ansari Robbins' "Infinite Ability," Lee Jiseong's "Dreaming Attic," Rhonda Byrne's "The Secret," Cha Dong-yeop's "Rainbow Principle," Shin Jae-deok's "Factorial Power," and Joel Austin's "Power of Positivity," ultimately make the same claim: "If you imagine strongly, you can achieve it."

At the Piola Mind School, Principal Kim Yeon-soo states in "The Wondrous Me" that we are not originally limited beings but cosmic, infinite, transcendent beings. It's said that everything is made by the mind, which is the eternal truth.

The saying of the Buddha, "No two Buddhas," means "You are the Buddha." The meaning of Emmanuel in the Bible is "God is with us." There are said to be three greatest things in this world: the universe, God, and the mind. All three are infinite. Saying they are all infinite simultaneously means they do not coexist but are one.

Einstein's E=mc^2 equation states that all mass is energy, and energy becomes matter. Einstein discovered this equation through imagination without experimentation. And that imagination was proven by the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan during World War II, the Manhattan Project.

Dr. Duncan MacDougall of Massachusetts, USA, performed an experiment in 1906, weighing the souls of six dying patients on a scale. The results were astonishing. The weight decreased after death. It was thought to be due to air and sweat in the lungs, but after analyzing with precision scales, it was found that 21g decreased further. Dr. MacDougall considered this 21g to be the weight of the soul. In connection with this, American director Alejandro González Iñárritu made a movie called "21 Grams."

It's said that 1g of uranium, through nuclear fission, produces about 1MW of energy per hour. Since a South Korean nuclear power plant produces 100MW per unit, the energy of the human soul is extremely powerful. Einstein's equation speaks to the power of human mental energy.

Is a rose seed a rose? Isn't it? Are the thorns? Is the stem? Is the root? Is the pollen? A rose combines all of these to be complete. So is a believer. That's why it's said that nothing is beyond the reach of God's touch. That's why you are a Buddha and there is divinity.