Why Cognitive Truths get Trumped by Experiential Truths Psychology in the Spirit Coe and Hall

Belief Distortions What do we do with emotions? The heart is deceitful above all things, wicked and beyond cure. Who can understand it? Jeremiah 17:9

Belief Distortion There are two ways of knowing: Head knowledge ….. the high road and gut-level knowledge …. the low road

Belief Distortion There are two ways of knowing: Problem: They are neighbors, but they do not speak the same language.

Belief Distortion There are two ways of knowing: The high road speaks the language of words and logic. (Explicit) The low road speaks the language of emotions. (Implicit)

Belief Distortion The Low Road is literally speechless, We know much more than we can find the words to say. The key is to have a personal, relational knowledge of God and self that informs the development of conceptual principles about God and spiritual growth.

Belief Distortion The High Road Head knowledge: linearone piece of info follows another logicalpremises lead to conclusions language based processed in words consciousconscious attention required Information that gets processed in the prefrontal cortex, (therefore the high road) the brain’s executive center.

Belief Distortion The high road receives significant input (influence) from the emotional centers of the brain that evaluates meaning and processes our relational experiences, it sends back fairly little to the emotional centers of the brain.

Belief Distortion The Low Road: Gut-level knowledge Intuition Emotions Physiology We don’t know how we know it, we just know it.

Belief Distortion The Low Road: Gut-level knowledge The bottom and right parts of the brain. (therefore the low road) Amygdala assigns our experiences meaning. Low Road: Knows through physiological sensations, gut level meanings and emotions. Sub symbolic code.

Belief Distortion The Low Road: Gut-level knowledge Emotions: the unconscious and automatic way we evaluate the meaning of experiences. Examples:

Belief Distortion The Low Road: Gut-level knowledge Emotions Processed automatically Outside of direct control Therefore: Emotions are the clearest window into the deepest level of our soul….what we really believe.

Belief Distortion The Low Road: Gut-level knowledge Primary emotions: shifts in brain states events tagged as either good or bad the brain groups them into one of seven groups anger, sad, happy, surprise…etc.

Belief Distortion When conscious ideals do not translate into behavior: it may be that The low road vetoes the high road when in conflict.

Belief Distortion The more intense the feelings of the low road, the more likely they may veto the high road when in conflict!

Belief Distortion How to get the High Road and the Low Road together: Back translate: Narrate story lines: Skills of: contemplation, solitude, quiet, safety.

Belief Distortion How to get the High Road and the Low Road together: Preparation: meditation Incubation: “turning away” Illumination: new ways of looking at the problem Reflection and Interpretation: head knowledge

Belief Distortion “Gut level knowledge of one’s self and others filters the flow of emotional energy that comes through our system. One of the ways it does this is by cutting the link between painful, gut-level experiences and symbolization of meaning of the experiences in the explicit head-knowledge system.” A classic defense mechanism.

Belief Distortion “If there are certain gut-level experiences that we cannot access due to our own pathology, this cuts off a source of very important information about human nature that could potentially be articulated conceptually in the explicit system.” Projectives can access the lower road.

Belief Transformation The Upper Road and the Lower Road connect in: Truth Safe environments Empowering environments One on one intimacy Community Family Small Groups

Case Richard came to see the you stating that he “was struggling to make it day to day.” His wife and kids had recently left him and he was not performing well at the job. He was very depressed. He would lose his job soon. He is a Christian and believes that God is sovereign over everything. He believes that God is good. But Richard is sleeping only two to three hours a night. He cannot function at work, he just stares at his computer.