Homeostasis

[.Spectator]

I started thinking about this idea of homeostasis. For any stimulus, there is an adaptation, always seeking a balance. I started to wonder what it means to have homeostasis. And what those implications are for how we live our life…

I realized that I didn’t know the answer. I think I might know the answer but I’m not sure I’ve ever EXPERIENCED the answer…

What would you consider it means to have homeostasis? How would you know you are living in homeostasis?

[Simon PayntonParticipant]

You could say, the body is full of biological adaptations aimed at homeostasis – in other words, staying on an even keel, biologically, when things might (would 100% definitely) go wrong otherwise.

The mind is full of automatic mechanisms too – such as, ego defenses.  When we are faced with something we can’t cope with, the ego will deploy an ego defense, which can either be unconscious (usually troublesome and weird, and often at someone else’s expense) or conscious (under conscious control – fully seen by the person doing it), which basically gives the rest of the mind some time in which to muster its forces and eventually be able to accept the reality.

Buddhism talks about the state of “spiritual bliss”, equanimity, or, alternatively:

 

Joking aside, this is said to be a state where someone can handle comfortably all that happens to them – because they accept it head on for what it is, and start accommodating it straight away in a healthy and conscious way.  Of course, mindfulness comes into it – allowing one’s emotions to do their own thing, that they are going to do, and seeing them fully.

[Author]

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