The how-to of positive thinking

I am naturally suspicious of "positive thoughts." They have always seemed a bit cheap to me: A not very sophisticated balm for psychic scrapes and bruises.

Yet I can't forget my experience with the biofeedback lady that I reported on in last week's column. Tina Lerner hooked me up to a computer program that resulted in a gnarly portrait of my heart rate incoherence. That meant I was operating in a mild state of stress.

But when she asked me to refocus on positive thoughts -- like a pleasant memory, an image of someone I love or feel compassion for -- there it was on the computer screen: A coherent portrait of relaxation.

Why was this happening? How was shifting my thinking actually able to slow my pulse, bring down my anxiety, and shift me into a healthy state of relaxation?

I was reminded of Daniel Goleman, author of "Destructive Emotions," who claims that a positive emotion can actually inhibit the experience of its opposite. By his counting, there are 14 healthy emotions and 14 negative emotions and we can shift, by choice, to a positive emotion that then inhibits the expression of its opposite.

I needed to find out more, so Lerner referred me to the scientifically-based work of the Heart Math Institute.

Their research shows that the heart has the ability to influence the brain. We usually consider the brain in control. But, according to them, the heart has its own intelligence and is the most powerful oscillator in the human body. When we are able to shift our heart rhythms into more coherence, we are also able to shift our emotions and our thoughts into more coherence as well.

In a Heart Math Institute publication, "Transforming Anger," they write: "Love and related positive emotions not only increase coherent heart rhythms, they also increase synchronization between the heart and the brain, resulting in improved mental clarity."

Can it really be that easy to just substitute a positive thought for a negative one and receive such powerful health benefits?

Sometimes we need help. Biofeedback training is one way.

According to Lerner, when we use the technique of deep and rhythmic breathing while focusing on a positive emotional state, we can actually see our pulse rhythm on the computer screen shifting into a more ordered pattern. This "feedback" speeds our learning.

The Heart Math Institute prescribes a lower-tech cognitive technique called "freeze frame" to help effectuate heart-rate coherence. It works this way:

When you feel distressed -- for example, anxious or angry -- you "freeze the frame," stop your thought process right where you are and put it aside for a moment. You take a few slow, deep breaths focusing on letting go. You then direct your thoughts into a positive place -- say, gratitude or appreciation, the love you have for someone -- fully breathing in and embodying this chosen, positive, focus. You make sure you keep the negative thought or emotion set aside, in the frozen frame. When you are aware that you have shifted into a more relaxed feeling, you can more productively revisit the concern you had on hold.

Being ready for "fight or flight" may have been adaptive for our earliest ancestors, but in today's world, being in an emotional state that brings relaxation is most adaptive.

So let's not forget, joy and other positive emotional states are also very adaptive ... and healthy.

To find out more about the work of the Heart Math Institute, visit www.heartmath.com.

Dr. Michael O.L. Seabaugh, a Cape Girardeau native, is a clinical psychologist who lives and works in Santa Barbara, Calif. Contact him at mseabaugh@semissourian.com.