Work in progress, come back anytime to read it again 😉

Deus is Latin and means god. But am I really that delusional to think of myself as Homo Deus? No, I use that phrase for everything about becoming a better version of oneself. Here the backstory to that:

Origin

A few years ago I read the book “Sapiens – a brief history of humankind” by Harari. Then I read the sequel “21 lessons for the 21th century“. The next in line would be “Homo Deus“. I will not read this book after reading the reviews, but I liked the phrase a lot. In the book are his thoughts about the future. But in this fast changing times I think fantasy books are probably more accurate. They fantasize about the impossible. And a lot of our daily technology would have been unthinkable for people a few decades ago. Books like “The Circle“, “Brave new world” and “1984” can not only scare but teach us a lot.

In an interview Harari told them about his habit of meditating two hours a day. It resonated with me because I too have the habit of meditating with the 7Mind and 7Sleep App. I think learning how to slow down in this fast digital world is the way to inner peace. Learning how to breath, focus or don’t react means to regulate oneself. It is one step to what I call Homo Deus. And everything comes back to a combine mind, body and feedback.

Focus based training

There are a lot of breathing techniques to calm the mind. There is the 4-7-8 (count to four while inhaling, hold the breath for 7 and breath out counting to 8). Similar is the box breathing technique where you do the same with 4-4-4-4. You add 4 waiting seconds between the ex- and inhale. To base the own focus on counting is often a good choice. For example by a panic attack you can count numbers out of order to focus on something else.

What I found for myself is Zen mediation and that the rituals tied to it help me. For example you bow before you sit down that’s called Gasshō. And doing daily mediation with Zaszen, that’s how sitting still is called, help improve my focus a productivity a lot.

While doing that the eyes rest on a spot. You actively try to relax your pupils so the view is blurry. And you can use an anchor like focusing on you lower belly and how your breathing start and ends there.

When I was an inpatient in 2018 another patient recommended some books one of the was for MCBT. That stands for mindfulness cognitive based therapy.

Physical based training

Another physical thing is to stimulate your parasympathetic nervous system

The parasympathetic nervous system is responsible for your breathing. By actively changing your rhythm you can help relax the vagus nerve. This nerve is connected to your inner organs and signals rest, calm and digestion to them. You also can massage the nerve directly, e.g. circling movements with open hands on your neck between the ears and your shoulders [cf. apotheke.de].

Also some as simple as massaging your face can do a lot in stressful moments. When I was first introduced in the hospital to stress relieving techniques they started me with progressive muscle relaxation (PMR). My relieve word is a neologism from lion and pig, cause someone once said that I’m both.

Feedback based training

Biofeedback is when your heart rate is tracked and you try to control your breathing. You try to breath out a lot longer than you inhale.

To get mindfulness to another level, there is something called neurofeedback. It’s where you get electrodes all over your head like they do for an EEG. Then the machine traces your brain waves, the beta, alpha, theta and delta waves which are specified with the frequency. I comprehend that the frequency reveals how fast your neurons are firing or rather working together.

When there are beta waves that means you are to concentrated, worried or excited (14-32 Hz). The theta waves (4-8 Hz) are the dominant one when you are a little bit to sleepy. The music stutters or the film stalls then. The clue is to get to the alpha waves (8-13 Hz). Then you are awake but most relaxed and just before sleeping. Edit: I now know that there are alpha one and two. Also beta one, two and beta high brain waves [cf. neurofeedback.gov].

The first introduction to this training I had in 2018 during my inpatient psychotherapy. You get the feedback e.g. with a film and when you’re to tense or tired the film will stop. I couldn’t get the feedback to keep playing more the 45s straight. My good brain activity was constant interrupted.

But I tried it again in 2023 were I was in hypomania every other day. I didn’t sleep one minute the night before the first test, but the scan showed I was totally relaxed. The physician was very surprised by my high alpha waves, normally beta would be dominant after staying awake.

Footnote

So with the category Homo Deus I write how to actively grow and master oneself. The subcategories are Mental Health, Inner Child, Mindfulness, Psychology, Neurology and Self–development. It’s about my own journey to a better version of myself and how I handle my psyche.

Feel free to connect and tell me about yourself or other interesting methods. I’d love to read your comment on the posts or an e-mail under Contact.

Stay tuned, Stay curious, Stay healthy.