#behavioral science

I know almost nothing, please tell me about the birds. What makes a falcon able to fly that fast? Do eagles migrate? Are there birds with strange behaviors, and how do we explain those.

Tell me about the fish, what types of fish are there. What are those fins used for? Does a salmon really transform into a creature during mating season?

Some people don't relax when you guide them "down." They just become… quieter while still holding everything in place.

They just become… quieter while still holding everything in place.

Because DOWN doesn’t create trance.

It creates structure.

If the structure isn’t safe, you don’t get depth.

You get obedience.

And those are not the same thing.

If you make a mistake here is a fool proof step by step guide to HANDLING it:

1. Acknowledge it was a mistake- admit you messed up.

2. Forgive yourself. It's okay to make mistakes.

3. Feel whatever you're feeling, take a deep breath, and let the feelings go. Fear? Anger? Disappointment? Embarrassment? They're not going to serve you for the next steps. It's okay to react to any type of mistake with shame or guilt or tough emotions, but how you handle your feelings is your responsibility. Take charge. Let yourself feel. Name those feelings. Say how you're feeling out loud even to acknowledge it, sometimes that helps you pin down what you're feeling if you're not even sure. And then let those feelings flow out of you in a deep breath, and inhale- imagine calmness spreading through you like cool, refreshing water. Find your peace again.

4. Take accountability- accept the consequences. Understand that no matter what the consequences of the mistake- you will be okay. You can handle it, it may be hard, but you will come out the other side. Vocally acknowledge that you know you are responsible, acknowledge that there may have been things outside your control, but take responsibility for your part.

5. Listen. Try to understand how someone who may have been affected by your mistake feels by hearing them out. Put aside your defensiveness. You don't need to argue. Just let them speak their mind and let their own feelings out.

5. Repair. Apologize. Take action. Know that it will take more than an apology for true repair. Following all the steps above will help. But the most important thing you can do to repair is take action. Whether that's physically repairing something you broke, replacing it, or if that's not possible at least acknowledge the damage and admit you were wrong and vow to do better- don't just say that as an empty thought.

6. Learn from your mistakes and do not repeat them. Say how you plan to repair the mistake, and your plan for not repeating the mistake in the future.

7. Change your behavior. Stand by your word. Make your best effort to do better.

8. Be self reflective, self aware, but also aware of others so you can exercise empathy and be considerate.

9. You're not perfect, you may mess up again. Repeat these steps as necessary, but reflect on your patterns of behavior and if you can't break those patterns yourself, find some guidance on how to avoid making the same mistakes from someone with experience in changing behavior.

Spirituality is so fucking important when it comes to Mental Health and it's literally been proven that spirituality helps with mental health when done correctly, very few people actually have a negative response to spirituality being involved in self-help

But I feel like the two are far too often disconnected from each other because spirituality isn't considered scientific enough for the Behavioral Science community at Large

So now that I'm seeing more people who understand the importance of bringing spirituality into mental health spaces and mental health in the spiritual spaces, it makes me so happy because it's so necessary and I've been bitching a lot about how it needs to be done more

Well, no, they have to, it's human nature. It's actually more so that they SAY they crave it, but then run away from the opportunities because they realize how scary it is. They realize deep conversation and enhancing critical thinking is not, in fact, "everyone agrees with me and will only offer up why I'm even more right."

That's an echo chamber, there's no room for growth there

So, when they find people who actually value critical thinking, questions, deep dives, and actually finding solutions to problems and can't be bullied and peer pressured into mindless agreement, they get scared.

They feel intimated

They don't know what to do

So they attack or they run.

Instead of engaging in what they claim to crave and gaining new persepctives. Instead of learning and growing. Instead of looking inward, they project. They attack. They insult. They try to bully people into backing down.

They hurl insults, result to death threats, or encourage suicide

And the majority that are like them encourage it.

People claim to want intellectual conversation, until someone presents it

People always talk about people needing to look inside and grow and expand their knowledge, until they're the ones who have to do it.

It truly is maddening. There's a reason that people who actually value knowledge have learned to keep their circles closed.

I grew up near a farm in Ontario before my family moved to Quebec, so I ended up learning quite a bit about farm life & farm animals. City folk have quite a lot of misconceptions about farm animals. Take the cow, for instance. There's a belief that country folk like to tip over cows for fun. This is a flat-out lie. To begin with, cows don't sleep standing up, so you wouldn't be able to sneak up on them, startle them & quickly push them over. Cows need to lie down to sleep because that's when they get their REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, which is crucial for memory consolidation, learning, brain development, brain repair, restoration & alertness. A study by researchers at the University of Tennessee shows that cows deprived of the ability to lie down can't get REM sleep.

Hypothetically, even if they did sleep standing up, cows weigh 3 times as much as a baby grand, which weighs 500 lb (226 kg); their center of mass is low & their stance is wide, so a person trying to push a cow over would require 2,900 newtons (N) of force to push one over. A newton is the force needed to accelerate 1 kg at 1 m/s², so you would need a sideways push of 650 lb of weight. But humans cannot generate 650 lb of horizontal push; even elite athletes max out around 300-400 lb of force in a controlled environment. Cow2s are basically biological refrigerators with legs. In addition, cows are easily spooked; they would either take evasive action & simply run away or start trampling people. The same thing goes for horses. True, they can sleep while standing, but only for naps or light sleep. They too need to lie down for REM sleep.