Section A – Article #31

- Diksha and the Hormones of Joy -

Article by Christian Opitz

Until now, I mostly emphasized the effect of diksha on various brain centers in my writings. An equally important aspect of the process of awakening the brain is the change in hormone and neurotransmitter production. I would like to give an overview of some of the significant changes in regards to hormones and neurotransmitters that I have found in people who have been receiving diksha for a while. First, let's take a look at some of the important neurochemicals and their effect on our experience of life:

Dopamine:

Produced in the substantia nigra in the mid-brain, this important neurotransmitter is almost always out of balance in modern people. We need sufficient dopamine to feel alive, vibrant, to be able to concentrate and have good discernment. Lack of dopamine leads to boredom, depression, brain fog, one merely exists but is not truly alive. This in turn leads to cravings for dopamine stimulation, mostly through destructive means. Intense but short-lived dopamine
stimulants are, for example, cocaine, amphetamines, junk food, aggressive behaviors and conflicts with other people. Those suffering from ADD are restless and often have hyperaggressive tendencies because they are desperately trying to stimulate some dopamine production.

Too much dopamine at once leads to a dulling of the dopamine receptors and that in turn has undesirable consequences. Delusions, including hallucinations that are mistaken for genuine mystical experiences, often go together with prolonged overproduction of dopamine. People addicted to computer games have similar dopamine imbalances, which shows an interesting correlation between the addictions to virtual realities, whether on a computer screen or on the screen of one's own mind. In some people, excessive dopamine can lead to stuttering. People who stutter usually have twice as much dopamine in their system than average people.

It is easy to see that for a balanced spiritual awakening, we want a consistent level of dopamine without the detrimental effects of extreme highs and lows. A consistent dopamine production goes hand in hand with awakened frontal lobes, which Bhagavan associates with God-Realization. Given the fact that dopamine is essential to feel truly alive, it makes sense that we need it to also feel the Source of all life.

Oxytocin:

Oxytocin is the hormone of love, open-heartedness and gratitude. Happily married people produce more oxytocin, but relationship stress severely decreases it. Oxytocin is the neurochemical foundation for compassion, for truly caring for others. When we care for others, we ourselves are rewarded many times over, because oxytocin regenerates the body and induces a very deep sense of well-being. Love is great health insurance because of oxytocin. Indifference and cruelty are accompanied by very low levels of this hormone. I assume that these biochemical facts are one of the reasons behind Bhagavan's emphasis on setting right relationships.

The production of oxytocin is severely hindered in most people today and this often starts at birth. In the late 1940s, medicine began to use drugs at birth as if it were some kind of disease. Among those drugs, petocin (synthetic oxytocin) is used to induce contractions and thus birth, on the hospital's schedule instead of following the natural interaction between baby and mother. Whenever we receive a huge dose of a synthetic version of a hormone, our receptors are overwhelmed and the body's own production can be compromised. If this happens at birth, there can be permanent damage and a life-long pattern of producing too little oxytocin.

It does not help much that the most important bonding phase between mother and child right after birth has become a medical procedure of taking blood, measuring the baby, cutting the umbilical cord too early and not allowing the baby a direct bonding with the mother and thus a gentle entrance into this world. The combination of petocin and the
lack of empathy for the newborn baby in medicalized birth procedures is almost certain to severely compromise oxytocin production.

It is interesting to note that heavy drug use at birth, from petocin to pain killers to even some psychedelic substances that are no longer used, was introduced after WWII. When the first generation of babies who came into this world on drugs had arrived at young adulthood in the 1960s, they where the first generation to seek a deeper meaning of life
through drugs. I believe the lack of natural oxytocin caused by drug use at the entrance into life can set up a strong recapitulation pattern of seeking life through drugs.

Cortisol:

The opposite of oxytocin, in terms of effects on our life experience, is cortisol, the stress and death hormone. We need cortisol in life-threatening situations, but, as Dr. Hans Selye discovered, we tend to overproduce it much of the time when there is no threat to survival in sight. On cortisol, all of life takes on the quality of struggle, including relationships and even the spiritual search. Cortisol activates the parietal lobes, which are supposed to give us a sense of our physical boundaries. When overactive, this sense of physical separateness is extended to our general experience of ourselves and we then feel existentially separate.

This is at least part of the reason why Bhagavan emphasizes the deactivation of the parietal lobes. Cortisol makes us walk around with chronically overactivated parietal lobes. In that state, we are not able to feel our feelings fully, to embrace ourselves as we are. Being in the here and now, being in the flow, requires abundant oxytocin, sufficient dopamine and low levels of cortisol.

The Effects of Diksha:

Although it is very difficult to measure hormones and neurotransmitters in the brain directly, electromagnetic signature testing allows for some conclusions about the effects of diksha in this regard. One of the main effects I have found with people who have been receiving diksha for a year or longer is a regeneration of receptors for both dopamine and oxytocin. This automatically leads to greater efficiency of these neurochemicals and a decrease in cortisol production. Diksha can also regenerate the substantia nigra, where dopamine is produced, and this directly shows up in changed electromagnetic brain patterns.

Many times I have observed a natural release of addictive patterns through diksha that were clearly related to low dopamine levels. Another interesting parameter is the electromagnetic communication between the brain and the heart. This seems to progressively get stronger in people through diksha and is one of the most important energetic correlation's of the flowering of the heart and true compassion. In some of the Dasas and in Ron Roth, this connection was off the charts when I measured them. Oxytocin is the biochemical bridge between the brain and heart.

From the data I have gathered so far, diksha seems to be effective in strongly enhancing oxytocin in the vast majority of people. I also believe that this is one of the aspects of birth trauma that can be healed through diksha and that this effect makes diksha so worthwhile for children. Even though children are not supposed to enter into an enlightenment process, growing up with lots of oxytocin will give them a much more beautiful life experience.

Finally, the neurochemical effects of diksha are one reason why other methods people utilize for inner transformation can become so much more effective when people receive diksha. If someone does not need meditation anymore to lower cortisol, meditation can go to much deeper levels right away. If emotional or physical healing work is done on a
person who already has high levels of oxytocin, the receptivity to receive healing is enhanced.

The synergy of diksha with specific methods of inner transformation is a fascinating subject for more exploration and the role of neurochemicals is essential for the effects such synergies produce.

* * *

Christian Opitz is a neurophysicist, biochemist, herbalist and author. He has developed a new paradigm of healing called Radiant Life that combines whole brain functioning, raw food nutrition, exercise and nature awareness. Christian has taught in Europe and the United States for the past 15 year.

An Experiment with Oxytocin

My Oxytocin Dose

Last Sunday, Mike and I tried our our own oxytocin dosing experiment.

My baseline mood: For the past week, I had been feeling cranky in general. I also had been dissatisfied with my relationship with Mike. Some of those issues were situational: For several months, he has had band practice or a meeting scheduled every week night, and he's been staying in the TV room late at night. He hasn’t joined me on hikes or bike rides lately. There are also the typical living-together annoyances: not putting dirty dishes in the dish washer, leaving newspapers all over the dining room table, not helping take care of the dog.

I realize that how I react to these annoyances depends on my general mood. Sometimes I can just shrug, other times I feel intensely annoyed, even though the situation hasn't changed. As I said, I've felt cranky lately.

We did our experiment in Sunday afternoon.

I chose an anti-snore inhaler because it was cheap and had a screw top. I poured out the contents and rinsed the bottle with distilled water. I was very casual about mixing: I simply filled the little plastic oxytocin vial with water, shook it and emptied it into the inhaler, then refilled the vial with water and repeated to make sure I got every possible molecule out. (The dose for the two of us cost me $87!)

We alternated taking an inhale in each nostril, passing the inhaler back and forth about six times.

After the first two inhalations, I felt a fairly intense flush that started in my sinuses and extended out to the sides of my face. My lips felt thick and, at first, I felt slowed down, moving through syrup. I felt, in other words, stoned -- but stoned in a way that grass seldom makes me feel. (I don't smoke weed, because it usually makes me feel anxious; my mind races and I lose my belief that I know and understand the people around me.)

After the first druggy feeling passed, in about five minutes, I felt very calmed down. I looked at Mike and thought of the things I was mad about, but I couldn’t get in touch with that angry feeling.

Neither did I feel any intense, oceanic bonding with him. But I was very aware of and attracted to the smell and touch of his skin. I always love the way he smells, but it was now delicious to kiss and sniff and lick his ears and neck and shoulders and chest. He even let me suck on his nipples, something that's usually too intense for him. Mike is a good cuddler in general, but not especially interested in my breasts or full-body licking and sucking; none of this changed with the oxytocin.

We looked at each other with smarmy smiles, a little giggly. We didn’t sink into intense talking or gazing.

In ten minutes, the stony effects began to dissipate for me. I still felt very calmed down and interested in Mike's skin. Our lovemaking seemed within then bounds of the usual for us. It was nice but not ecstatic or spiritual.

For the rest of the afternoon and evening, I experienced Mike as being nicer and more responsive to me. He said it was because I was being more open, which certainly could be true. It's difficult to know where the physical effect of oxytocin ends and the effects of our intention to focus on each other and have a good experience begins. Of course, behaving sweetly and focusing on the other person can create endogenous oxytocin.

Our experience mirrors the general understanding of how women differ from men. We're more emotional, more vulnerable, feel more bonded after sex. Estrogen increases the effects of oxytocin, while testosterone mutes them and causes them to dissipate sooner, so women feel all oxytocin's effects more strongly.

I felt the initial effects of oxytocin quite intensely, both physically and emotionally. I did not feel vulnerable, because I trust Mike, but I did feel open. These effects are not something that I would want to experience while at a party or while making some anxious social transaction like calling an editor or making a date.

Mike didn’t feel either the physical or emotional effects as much, he said. Again, some of this difference could be the result of his level of self-analysis and disclosure, or the fact that he has chronic sinusitis and one nostril has been cauterized, so he might absorb less. There were some moments when he acted shy, the way he did when we first met.

By Monday, I was all the way back into my cranky mood.

I hope more women experiment, and people do different kinds of experiments. For example, I wonder how I would have felt if I dosed alone. Would I have run out of the house madly looking for a puppy?

From Website: Hug The Monkey

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More Quotes To Come.

Affirmations work. Is that true? Trying to change things by forcing them to be something they are not is called manipulations. Has it ever worked? . . . or has it just moved around the suffering to another part of your life. Exchanging one suffering for another.Love is the answer to everything.Let darkness consume you. If you defend yourself against it, you immediately become a victim. Victim consciousness is a state of duality. Stop defending yourself against anything. All protection . . . All psychic protection . . . All protection is declaring that you are a victim. It is a lie.

More Quotes To Come.