~ Willy Wonka
(Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley)
My partner and I have a joke that my mind is like the chocolate room in Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory. One year he even gave me a flute as a gift to help me control the Oompa Loompas in my brain. I keep that flute on display in the cabinet of my father's antique desk to remind me of the little orange creatures I have at my command to put me to rights when things get out of hand. And let me tell you, from time to time, things do get out of hand.
I'm a single mom of a freshly minted teenager, partner of seven years to a talented writer, leader of people and corporate firefighter extraordinaire, daughter, #seester, friend, mentor, advisor, sometimes writer, perpetual neurotic, irredeemable positive, and hapless hopeful romantic.
If an advanced degree in psychology has taught me anything, it's that the order of operations in my mind, as in everyone's, begins with the amygdala. Fight or flight? Cut or cry? I am a slave to my emotions. Even when I think I am making my decisions there are silent forces pulling me in a predetermined direction. There was a time I considered the reptilian brain capable of rendering only the most basic verdicts to avoid fatality. But, it turns out, so here are born the first kernels of fervent desire, deep within the heart of the limbic system. What force urges the child to attempt to obtain the cookie from the far-out-of-reach jar, or the teenager, raging with hormones, to position herself to win that first kiss? It's all in the amygdala, baby.
The amygdala isn't just a bossy pants who tells but never listens. Our limbic system has all the feels and will call up the ones we want if we only know the right query string. Our body-brain connection goes both ways. Interoception, or listening to our bodies, according to Dr. Tara Swart, "can kick-start a revolution in our attitudes toward wellbeing." For example, if we're looking for more confidence, and we consequently stand up straighter and begin to take up a little more space, we will feel that boost we need. And serotonin is just a smile away.
There is a benefit to this biology I have been recently pondering, postgraduately, now that my mind has so much more time to wander, where the role of the brain is as responsible for bringing about happiness as it is for processing it. And if my deepest desires emerge from the part of myself most intimately tied to my survival, then perhaps the fulfillment of my desires is essential to my life. And that thought feels revolutionary, especially as a woman, and all the other things I am to everyone else - everyone to whom I usually subvert my desires for the greater good of all.
So what do I want? Perhaps this is a question brought on by the darkening moon in the sign of Scorpio, the sign of passion and desire, and then maybe the answer the key to renewed life. My friend and mentor Vance Caesar would say desire has to be tied to purpose, and with purpose comes a vision, which leads to meaningful work, surrounded by relationships that give energy, based upon beliefs and behaviors that bring peace, taking the time occasionally to renew, review, and recommit, and with the discipline to stay on track. That's a tall order. Or maybe it's a recipe for magic. And what better time for magic than this?
- Ode
- We are the music makers,
- And we are the dreamers of dreams,
- Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
- And sitting by desolate streams;—
- World-losers and world-forsakers,
- On whom the pale moon gleams:
- Yet we are the movers and shakers
- Of the world for ever, it seems.
- By Arthur O'Shaughnessy
