Is There Someone Standing Behind You?

Here's a really interesting exercise which has been developed using neuroscientific research. It can have a very powerful, immediate effect. This effect will most likely be very pleasant, even ecstatic, but be warned that in some cases it can be less pleasant - and of course, it's best if you don't try it while driving!

First, you need to get into a meditative state. The easiest way to do this is to focus on your breathing. Just be aware of your breath going in and and out, in and out... If other thoughts come along, then as soon as you are aware of them, just take your attention gently back to your breathing: in and out, in and out...

When you are feeling more relaxed, imagine that you are feeling a 'presence' somewhere behind you, over to your left.

What do you experience?

That's all there is to it...

*     *     *

If you felt something significant, then tests have shown that this will have coincided with activity in your amygdala, a part of the brain which is associated with emotion. In most people, the amygdala in the left hand side of the brain is associated with positive emotions, which is why you were asked to imagine the presence on the left side. Many such people will have a pleasant experience when asked to imagine the presence in this way. This can range from feeling safe and protected to sensations of ecstasy. Some people even find that they have a visual image of the imagined presence, which might be an angel, a hooded monk, a knight on horseback, a spirit familiar, or one of a range of other forms.

In a minority of people, the amygdalae are reversed - a bit like being left-handed. In this case, the left amygdala is associated with negative emotions, so such people are more likely to have a bad experience when they imagine a presence on this side. This can range from mildly unpleasant to a feeling of impending doom!

These people tend to have a positive experience when they imagine the presence on the right hand side instead, whereas most people have a negative experience when they imagine it on this side.

Some people have positive experiences whichever side they imagine the presence. Apparently, these are invariably people who perform regular spiritual practices such as meditation.

There is also a twist in the tail. Apparently when people have their amygdala artificially stimulated in the laboratory, they are likely to spontaneously sense the presence!

Many thanks to my skeptical friend, Lee (who has been following this blog but hopes I will grow out of it) for drawing my attention to Todd Murphy's excellent Spirituality & The Brain web site, where I found the above exercise. Todd is a behavioral neuroscientist, who has worked with Dr Michael Persinger, the neuroscientist who pioneered the research which underlies this exercise. Todd's special interest is in understanding how the brain contributes to spiritual experiences, and his site contains a wealth of information on the subject.

The sensed presence exercise is fascinating but what does it mean? I think we are unlikely to reach any kind of consensus on this. Todd Murphy seems to argue that so-called 'spiritual' phenomena are simply the product of certain brain activity. He doesn't deny that such experiences can be beneficial, but he doesn't believe that they relate to 'real' phenomena outside ourselves.

A new-agey person like me, on the other hand, is more likely to believe that we have these pleasant experiences because a link with some kind of presence is really happening. The fact that some of the people in the experiments come up with entirely unprompted visions of what this presence might look like seems to me to support this idea. And yet... do the unpleasant experiences which many people have, if they imagine the presence on the other side, suggest that a darker figure, some shadow self, is also in existence? That's an idea with which we might be rather less comfortable...

I hope to return to this subject when I have had a chance to look at more of Todd Murphy's site. Until then... if you tried the 'sensed presence' exercise, I'd love to know what you felt. Please leave me a comment! And afterwards, I'll leave a comment to let you know how it was for me...

Comments

[Alexys Fairfield]

Hi Simon,
What a lovely exercise. I felt a presence of love over my shoulder, as I often do. It wasn't embodied as a person, just an strong energy.

I find that energy always surrounds me and I embrace it.

Thanks for sharing this experience. I loved it.

[cardiogirl]

This is so interesting! I had to look back to find a post where I wrote about feeling God's presence while meditating in the sauna. I realized that I see Him to my right. I just assumed that it was because I am right-handed.

In my post I said I see His left side, which would indicate He is in front of me, to my right. And I would definitely say for the last year or so I have been experiencing some negative turmoil.

I guess this means my amygdalae is left-handed? Did I get that right?

[Sue Ann Edwards]

When it comes to genuinely BEING 'embracing' of "All That Is", does left or right really matter?

And isn't studying our dust, which is just a 3D APPEARANCE, in order to understand multiple dimensions, like studying a blind venetian in order to understand venetian blinds?

rofl....

[Simon]

Hmm, not many takers so far. Either it didn't work for most people or they were put off by my warning that the experience might not be pleasant. Or else people are just out enjoying the summer!

The first time I tried this on the left side, I felt a really warm loving presence which bordered on ecstasy. The whole left side of my brain seemed to pulse. When I tried on the right, I got no response - and I've had no response on either side since.

My wife Chris fared less well. She misread the instructions and kept peering over her left shoulder, hoping to see an angel. Doh! After about half an hour, she gave up. But she's going to try again now she knows what to do...

Just to clarify: if you see a figure, it'll be *in your mind's eye*.

[Simon]

Hi Alexys - Your experience seems to have been the pleasant one predicted, though the fact that you often feel this energy *surrounding you* suggests that some such experiences may not be as easy to categorize as the scientists hope.

It's really great that you have this connection, and I'm glad you enjoyed the exercise!

[Simon]

cardiogirl - I don't have chance to read anything like as much of your excellent blog as I would like, so I didn't see your post about your experience in the sauna. But assuming that this feeling of God's presence was a pleasant one and you felt it on the right hand side then, yes, it seems like you might be 'left-handed' in the amygdala department. In other words, your amygdalae may be reversed when compared to the majority of people.

On the other hand... you felt the presence in front of you rather than behind, so once again this isn't the standard predicted response. I don't think those scientists are going to pin us down...

[Simon]

Sue Ann - I agree with you really about the limitations of all this. I can understand why it interests the scientists, but it's just a piece of fun as far as I'm concerned. I was, however, attracted to this by the intensity of my original experience - and having read a bit more of Todd Murphy's site, I've found an interesting bit which ties in with my 'Ultimate Truth' posts, in which I talked about the transmutation of pain into bliss. Todd has a scientific theory about this - and I'll cover it in a future post.

[Michael]

The first thing that came to mind with the "left side exercise" was, strangely enough, how it is we are (naturally) on the right side of this "presence" in the exercise.

Before you say...duh! Allow me to explain.

Because we are, as it would seem on the right side of this presence, I immediately began to wonder if this is unwittingly how Jesus historically and traditionally seemingly finds himself at the "right hand of God." WE project upon Jesus our lives so that we might discover "what would Jesus do" with it.

This thought led me to some speculation about how all of life's situations will always point back to how we will deal with them.

In other words, we have this historical figure Jesus, who undoubtedly has left and indellible mark on history, and we are asked to deal with the message he has left behind for us to try and understand, possibly appreciate, and ultimately love as our own; creating, as if it were, a world in which to live.

Since therefore we are on the right side of this presence (most of us see as great and good) we are left to wonder if what we are (in fact) some one part of God..."someone"...Or some body on the right in the presence to be feared and loathed.

Those of us willing to learn of our connectedness to what is great and good will do so with varied levels of success. Those few who choose to learn nothing more than the despot activities of fear will, in affect....discover such,identify with it, and ultimately believe their Self to be "somebody" to be feared.

[Kelvin]

I have trouble visualising any sort of presence, but the warmth and well being produced is remarkable. Thanks for the link to Todd Murphy's site.

[se]

Have to be frank with you Simon, I smiled very wide when I saw that the hope of the exercise was that there was indeed a spirit. I tried this, I felt behind my left, smiled and said thank you. I know the angels are there, I simply elbow them out of the way a lot.

[Simon]

Michael - Thanks for dropping by. 'The right hand of God': a good point - I hadn't made the connection. And it may be that that's where we already are...

Welcome Kevin - I'm pleased to have discovered your blog. You seem to have had a similar experience to me. I don't think we're intended to *try* to visualize the presence, simply to imagine that something is there. But it seems that some people spontaneously receive a visual impression.

Hi SE - thanks for your feedback. I'll put you down as 'angel on coffee break' then...

Great to hear from you all!

[Robin]

Hi there Simon - I felt a presence sort of like an angel - an angel in that it had wings which it started to envelop me with - and probably would have except I kept reading your post instead. It was a sort of motherly-love type figure.

~ Robin

[Sue Ann Edwards]

Honestly Simon, (smiling), this exercise confused me. One of my "quirks" is that I don't like to feel crowded. I've even gone so far as to double up my fist while sound asleep and punched my husband for getting too close to me in bed. So..., I have a standing 'order' that I do NOT want to sense ANY of the Presences that constantly surround me.

I CAN open up my senses and count but what good would that do me? I guess that is why I am confused. For not all the presences that surround us on a daily basis are our 'Higher Self'. The astral realms being the closest to where we are in this dimension, are filled with 'beings' that aren't any wiser or more enlightened then we are and just as likely to be ego centered. Just as it serves our Vanity to say we can 'channel', so does it serve the Vanity of those in the astral realms to find one of us gullible enough to listen to them. Great joke on us, laughing all around.

Our Spiritual Presence can be sensed through the top of our heads or a little to the back at the top of our heads. Imagine flying a kite with the string at the top of your head, that kite will be your Spiritual Self.

When I read your post the idea of "dream catchers" came into my mind. Awful things, dream catchers, for they retard our spiritual development. Left, right, these are momentums of energy, we as Souls, have already set into motion through our various lifetimes. One side is 'positive', the other 'negative'.

Our goal is to accept and integrate all of these momentums into One Unified Self Expression, representing a balanced sum total of our Souls' experiences in matter.

[Robin]

Hi Simon - later I tried imaging a presence behind my right side, and I found my self cringing away from that area. I did not feel upset by this - I was just observing myself having that reaction. I tried it again just now, and I did the hunch-and-cringe thing again.

When I do the left side one, it makes my chest swell with love.

Just reporting - see you!

[Simon]

Hi Robin - Thanks for your contributions! I certainly empathized with the first one. There you were being embraced by an angel but your brain was more interested in some stupid post you were reading. That would be me: more interested in intellectual constructs than actual experience. But I'm glad that you got to see the angel!

I'm glad, too, that you weren't too phased by the less pleasant experience on the right hand side. Your two experiences seem to have been exactly as predicted by Mr Murphy.

[Simon]

So what exactly were those two 'presences' which Robin experienced? I'm intrigued by what you say about dreamcatchers, Sue Ann. So they're like positive and negative karma which we need to deal with? They're kind of like splintered bits of us which need to be embraced? Is that what Robin encountered?

Or are these 'presences' simply down to some quirk of the brain, as Todd Murphy suggests?

From our present perspective, is it possible to know the truth?

It's like this desk I'm sitting at. Is it possible to know the truth about that? Is it really composed of solid wood - or a quantum field which is principally empty space?

[AngelBaby]

This is wonderful. I think the presence is our Guardian Angels letting us see and feel them. I found it amazing and I loved it. Thank you for sharing this.

Love and Blessings,
AngelBaby

[Simon]

I thought that's what you might think, Angelbaby! And who is to say you are wrong? I'm glad you had such a wonderful experience.

Incidentally, I still haven't been able to repeat my own very pleasant 'connection' since the first time I tried this exercise. I wonder if that is because, having once experienced it, I am now *expecting* to feel the same thing again. I often find that expectation (aka the constructs of the mind) can get in the way of spiritual experience.

[Simon]

Incidentally, it occurs to me that what Todd Murphy says about people who do regular spiritual practice having a pleasant experience whichever side they imagine the presence tends to support Sue Ann's interpretation of things, i.e. that we are tapping into some sort of pocket of accumulated experience, 'good' on one side, 'bad' on the other. Those who have achieved some measure of spiritual development may be more likely to understand that all is really 'good' - and so be more relaxed about whatever they encounter.

[Bendz]

Hi,

Something interesting. Can't explain :(

;)
Great

[Simon]

Hi Bendz - Glad you liked it, and thanks for dropping by! I hope you'll call again...

By the way, I asked a question or two above, and Sue Ann has replied on her blog. You can find her response at http://sueannedwards.wordpress.com/2008/07/26/thats-me-all-over-the-place/

[Sue Ann Edwards]

It was toooo long to write *here*

{{{{hugs}}}}