I wrote yesterday in Man Controls Robotic Hand Using His Thoughts that years ago I watched Deepak Chopra and Wayne Dyer on the dias at a conference years ago, talking about the fact that we are all, indeed, one connected organism rather than individual, separate beings.  “If that’s so,” asks Dyer with a twinkle in his eye, “why can I move the fingers on my hand and I cannot move the fingers on your hand?”

“Because,” Chopra said, “it’s because you think it’s my hand.”

I put Today’s Post on Facebook and Renee Frechette Speir Great commented: I heard about this! Do you know that they have done studies where people think about lifting extreme amounts of weight with one finger, and over time, the finger is measurably stronger? Power.

Cassandra Yorgey wrote: I wonder how long it takes before they combine this with stem cell research to make long term bionic arms? and how long before the bionic arms can out-perform the natural ones?

I commented: Renee, I have heard of that, also as rehab for injuries to keep muscle memory engaged. Oh I just remembered a funny story to add to the end of that post.

In my Horizons Magazine editorial in September 2007, I wrote:  I’ve been having a recent spell of misjudging my audience, with sometimes comical results. My most notable example was several years ago when I had walked into a metaphysical class at the last minute. It was a class I’d not been to before, although I knew many of the people in it. I came in and took the only available seat  – next to the facilitator, just as they were beginning to go around the circle and give our names.

The question we were all to answer was “name one thing you would change about your body.” Inexplicably, they began with me, the newcomer. But I was glad for the question because I’d given it some thought just that morning!

I said I’d like to be able to extend my arms out so they were 2-3 times as long, to enable me to accomplish tasks that needed long arms. Either that or I’d like a tail, a prehensile tail that I could use to grip things with.

You could hear a pin drop. They thought I was kidding.

The next woman to speak introduced herself and said she’d like to weigh 20 pounds less. The next one never liked her hair and so she’d make it straighter and finer. A few didn’t like their noses and they wanted to change that. Thighs and wrinkles were other changes mentioned, as well as bad habits and character traits.

I was stunned. It didn’t take long to realize I had taken for granted that I was in a different level class than I was actually in. Here I was, in a class of people I know to be metaphysical students for decades, and these were their sincere responses? I was stunned into silence.

These were all things that were well within their control to change and work on.  I’d known 2/3 of the group for a dozen or more years.  It made me realize that with people, no matter how long or how well I know them, if we aren’t communicating effectively, we could have been talking apples and oranges all along.

Interesting how we can convince ourselves we are being heard and understood, when that isn’t the case at all.

And vice versa

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