24
Lectures
30
minutes/lecture
1.
Why Don't Zebras Get Ulcers? Why Do We?
In Professor Sapolsky's introductory lecture, get a behind-the-scenes look at the science of stress and preview the groundwork for the course ahead. What exactly happens to our bodies when we come under stress? And how is our response to stress different from that of a zebra being hunted al ong a savannah?
1.
Why Don't Zebras Get Ulcers? Why Do We?
|
13.
Stress, Learning, and Memory
Memory—whether implicit or explicit—is an essential part of everyday life. So it's all the more important to understand how it's affected by stress. This lecture explains the science behind how short-term stress enhances memory and learning, while chronic stress may actually work to kill neurons in the hippocampus.
13.
Stress, Learning, and Memory
|
2.
The Nuts and Bolts of the Stress-Response
Every time you have a thought or emotion, things change in your body. Here, explore the two factors responsible for these changes: the nervous system and hormones. Learn how these systems work, how they're regulated, and—most important—what happens to them during moments of stress.
2.
The Nuts and Bolts of the Stress-Response
|
14.
Stress, Judgment, and Impulse Control
In addition to affecting the hippocampus, stress can prove harmful to the frontal cortex as well—the seat of behavioral regulation. As in previous lectures, discover what happens to this essential part of the brain when it comes under attack from chronic stress.
14.
Stress, Judgment, and Impulse Control
|
3.
Stress and Your Heart
Armed with the necessary background information, explore how specific organ systems suffer when faced with chronic stress. In the first of a series of lectures on this subject, learn how long-term stress can damage heart muscles, inflame and clog blood vessels, and even lead to sudden cardiac arrest.
3.
Stress and Your Heart
|
15.
Stress, Sleep, and Lack of Sleep
Most of us don't get as much sleep as we should. Yet the amount of sleep we get is highly intertwined with how our bodies deal with stress. Investigate why high levels of stress disrupt not only how long we sleep—but the quality of sleep's vital restorative powers as well.
15.
Stress, Sleep, and Lack of Sleep
|
4.
Stress, Metabolism, and Liquidating Your Assets
The next organ system you focus on: the metabolic system. Discover how cycles of chronic stress lead to a persistent activating and storing of energy, which in turn can lead to an inefficient use of energy and play a critical role in the prevalence of adult-onset diabetes.
4.
Stress, Metabolism, and Liquidating Your Assets
|
16.
Stress and Aging
As you age, your ability to deal with stress decreases. What's more: Lots of stress throughout your lifetime can accelerate aspects of aging. Here, examine a series of intriguing experiments and studies that explain the science behind these two views about the intersection between stress and aging.
16.
Stress and Aging
|
5.
Stress, Overeating, and Your Digestive Tract
Focus now on the role stress plays in our gastrointestinal tracts. Why do most of us eat more during stressful periods? How does stress affect bowel disorders like irritable bowel syndrome and spastic colons? And how does stress combine with a bacterial infection to produce a common stress-related disease: ulcers?
5.
Stress, Overeating, and Your Digestive Tract
|
17.
Understanding Psychological Stress
Why are some stressors more unbearable than others? This lecture introduces you to three powerful psychological factors that work to modulate the stress response: having an outlet, taking advantage of social support, and having predictive information about when and how long a stressor will occur.
17.
Understanding Psychological Stress
|
6.
Stress and Growth—Echoes from the Womb
The first of two lectures on stress and child development takes you inside prenatal and postnatal life. Using two extraordinary examples, Professor Sapolsky reveals the ways a fetus can respond to the environmental stressors of its mother, and how different parenting styles can affect the stress levels of young children.
6.
Stress and Growth—Echoes from the Womb
|
18.
Psychological Modulators of Stress
Conclude your look at ways to modulate the stress response by looking at two subtler variables: your control over the stressor, and your interpretation of whether the stress is getting better or worse. You also see why, despite being enormously powerful, these variables can work only within certain parameters.
18.
Psychological Modulators of Stress
|
7.
Stress, Growth, and Child Development
Investigate how chronic stress can disrupt the growth of young children by focusing on stress dwarfism and the connection between stress and low growth hormone levels. Also, learn how mid-20th-century experiments with monkeys proved how important love—and not just nutrients—is in raising less-stressful children.
7.
Stress, Growth, and Child Development
|
19.
Stress and the Biology of Depression
Turn to the realm of mental health with this close look at the ties between stress and major depression—one of the leading causes of disability in the world. Start with an overview of the disorder's symptoms before delving into the particulars of its neurochemistry and neuroanatomy.
19.
Stress and the Biology of Depression
|
8.
Stress and Female Reproduction
Get an insightful overview of the multifaceted effects of stress on the female reproductive system. Some of the topics you explore are the intricate relationships between stress and fertilization, ovulation, spontaneous miscarriages, high-tech in vitro fertilization, and the strength of the libido.
8.
Stress and Female Reproduction
|
20.
Stress and the Psychology of Depression
To truly understand clinical depression, you need to grasp its psychological aspects as well. In the second lecture on stress and this prevalent disease, explore the pivotal role stress hormones play in depression. Then, use your newfound knowledge of stress to knit together the psychological and biological models of depression.
20.
Stress and the Psychology of Depression
|
9.
Stress and Male Reproduction
Despite being simpler than its female counterpart, the male reproductive system is just as vulnerable to chronic stress. Here, discover how stress leads not to a major decrease in testosterone so much as an increase in erectile dysfunction (with a focus on two of the most common symptoms: impotency and premature ejaculation).
9.
Stress and Male Reproduction
|
21.
Anxiety, Hostility, Repression, and Reward
Anxiety disorders, feelings of intense hostility, a decreased capacity for pleasure, and a repressed or addictive persona are just a few of the many distinct effects that chronic stress can have on an individual's personality and behavior. The ways these psychological disorders emerge are the subject of this fascinating lecture.
21.
Anxiety, Hostility, Repression, and Reward
|
10.
Stress and Your Immune System
Turn now to the relationship between stress and your immune system. After mastering the basics of how this system works, delve into how frequent stressors can result in flare-ups of autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis, can increase your vulnerability to infections like the common cold and herpes viruses, and more.
10.
Stress and Your Immune System
|
22.
Stress, Health, and Low Social Status
How strong a role does socioeconomic status play in what stressors you're exposed to, as well as your potential for chronic stress? It's a provocative question whose answer Professor Sapolsky reveals in this penetrating look at the characteristics and effects of psychosocial stress on both primates and humans.
22.
Stress, Health, and Low Social Status
|
11.
Stress and Cancer
Can an increase in stress actually cause cancer? Can it cause a relapse among patients in remission, or speed up the rate of a cancer's progression? Professor Sapolsky offers his insights on these and other controversial questions and myths about the possible links between stress and cancer.
11.
Stress and Cancer
|
23.
Stress Management—Clues to Success?
Before learning tips to manage chronic stress, it's essential to understand why certain individuals cope better with stress—both physically and mentally—than others. Discover that the key lies in grasping predictors of successful aging, including a position of respect, a resilient personality, a healthy lifestyle, and a realistic approach to life's challenges.
23.
Stress Management—Clues to Success?
|
12.
Stress and Pain
Stress and pain have an intriguing relationship: Stress can increase your sensitivity and resistance to pain, while pain constitutes its own particular stressor. Explore this fascinating bidirectional relationship, and expand your knowledge of how both balanced and stressed minds and bodies react to all varieties of pain.
12.
Stress and Pain
|
24.
Stress Management—Approaches and Cautions
Exercise. Meditation. Social support. Religious beliefs. In this concluding lecture, learn how these and other outlets can potentially help you manage life's everyday stressors—both biologically and psychologically. Regardless of how many stressors you deal with daily, all of us, according to Professor Sapolsky, have the potential to keep them in perspective.
24.
Stress Management—Approaches and Cautions
|
24
Lectures
30
minutes/lecture
1.
Mindlessness—The Default Setting
Do you control your mind, or does your mind control you? Investigate how the mind operates and the condition of "mindlessness"—the pervasive swirl of thoughts and judgments that separate you from the world around you. Consider the possibility of cultivating the mind in ways conducive to deep well-being for yourself and others.
1.
Mindlessness—The Default Setting
|
13.
Insight—Clearing the Mind
Practicing mindfulness over time prepares the mind for "insight," which in this tradition means seeing clearly into the fundamental nature of reality. Begin an inquiry into what Buddhism calls the three "marks" of existence with the notion of impermanence—the eternal arising and passing away of all phenomena.
13.
Insight—Clearing the Mind
|
2.
Mindfulness—The Power of Awareness
Explore the notion of "mindfulness"—nonjudgmental attention to experience—as it occurs in everyday life and as a deliberate practice. Note the many benefits of mindfulness practice, from the freedom to choose how you respond to life, to releasing detrimental emotions and patterns of thinking, to its effects on your physical health.
2.
Mindfulness—The Power of Awareness
|
14.
Wisdom—Seeing the World as It Is
Now investigate dukkha, the insatiable quality of human experience—seen in our endless pursuit of the symbols of well-being and achievement and avoidance of unwanted experience. Finally, contemplate not-self—penetrating the illusion of the "I" as an entity separate from the rest of reality, which must be bolstered, protected, and satisfied.
14.
Wisdom—Seeing the World as It Is
|
3.
Expectations—Relinquishing Preconceptions
This lecture introduces the practice of meditation as a tool for developing mindfulness. Here, distinguish the true nature of mindfulness meditation from common preconceptions about it, revealing its capacity to instill a deeper connection to reality, as well as cultivating a wisdom based in empathy and compassion.
3.
Expectations—Relinquishing Preconceptions
|
15.
Compassion—Expressing Fundamental Kindness
With relation to mindfulness practice, explore compassion—the desire to alleviate suffering—as an essential component of our nature as human beings. See how compassion allows us to look at suffering without aversion or attachment, and learn specific practices for developing empathy and deeply recognizing the inner experience of others.
15.
Compassion—Expressing Fundamental Kindness
|
4.
Preparation—Taking Moral Inventory
In approaching meditation, consider the interconnections of ethical behavior with the development of mindfulness and the shaping of personal character. Drawing from the Buddha's teachings, explore five precepts of behavior that are conducive to the greatest benefits of meditation practice, based in the fundamental principle of not harming others or yourself.
4.
Preparation—Taking Moral Inventory
|
16.
Imperfection—Embracing Our Flaws
Finding compassion for ourselves is greatly challenging for many of us. Consider the complex of beliefs, attitudes, and conditioning that underlie this; in particular, the thorny phenomenon of perfectionism. Learn how to embrace and accept both imperfection and perfectionism itself as an opening to freedom and deeper humanity.
16.
Imperfection—Embracing Our Flaws
|
5.
Position—Where to Be for Meditation
Now learn about the most beneficial physical conditions for your meditation. First, consider the time of day and the physical setting that will best serve your practice. Then, study the most effective sitting postures on the floor, cushions, or chair and the optimum alignment of the body for mindfulness meditation.
5.
Position—Where to Be for Meditation
|
17.
Wishing—May All Beings Be Well and Happy
The mindfulness tradition offers an additional practice that is highly effective in revealing and cultivating compassion. With Professor Muesse's guidance, experience metta meditation, a focused contemplation wishing well-being and peace for others. See how this practice works to relinquish alienation and hostility and to deepen solidarity with all humanity.
17.
Wishing—May All Beings Be Well and Happy
|
6.
Breathing—Finding a Focus for Attention
Mindfulness meditation is based in the use of an anchor or focus of attention, allowing the mind to calm itself. Using your breathing as the focus, learn in detail about the fundamental elements of sitting meditation, focusing attention on the breath and returning to it when the mind strays, without judgment.
6.
Breathing—Finding a Focus for Attention
|
18.
Generosity—The Joy of Giving
Here, study the mindfulness tradition's insights concerning attachment to "things," our culture's dominant emphasis on possessions, and the psychological roots of greed. Learn about the Buddhist tradition of dana (sharing with others) and specific practices that reveal the life-giving effects of generosity on the giver and receiver.
18.
Generosity—The Joy of Giving
|
7.
Problems—Stepping-Stones to Mindfulness
Here, explore difficulties often encountered in meditation and ways of working with them that are also useful in the larger context of living. Consider physical discomfort and the specific use of mindfulness itself in working through it. Look also at ways to strengthen concentration and to counter frustration and discouragement.
7.
Problems—Stepping-Stones to Mindfulness
|
19.
Speech—Training the Tongue
Mindfulness practice brings focus to the critical link between speech and behavior. Consider the ways in which both inner experience and outward action are influenced by our use of language. Reflecting on four Buddhist principles of skillful communication, explore mindful attention to speaking and the use of language in genuinely beneficial ways.
19.
Speech—Training the Tongue
|
8.
Body—Attending to Our Physical Natures
Building on your work with mindfulness practice, learn another technique that augments and supports meditation. The "body scan" directs focused attention to different areas of the body, promoting deeper sensory awareness, relaxation, and concentration. With Professor Muesse's guidance, experience a 20-minute body scan meditation, a fundamental practice of self-compassion.
8.
Body—Attending to Our Physical Natures
|
20.
Anger—Cooling the Fires of Irritation
This lecture discusses the challenges of dealing with anger and ways to disarm it using the skills you've studied. Reflect on our cultural predisposition to either suppress anger or to express it thoughtlessly, and a third way offered by mindfulness, of nonjudgmental observation, acceptance, and the mental spaciousness to choose your response.
20.
Anger—Cooling the Fires of Irritation
|
9.
Mind—Working with Thoughts
The mindfulness tradition has much to say on the nature of thoughts and their power to shape personality and character. Here, learn specific ways to identify detrimental thoughts and a variety of methods to work with them, demonstrating that you can influence the conditioned mind through conscious and deliberate response to your own thoughts.
9.
Mind—Working with Thoughts
|
21.
Pain—Embracing Physical Discomfort
The skills of mindfulness offer powerful means to work with physical discomfort of all kinds. Consider the crucial distinction between pain and suffering as it directly affects our perceptions. Then experience two meditations for alleviating physical suffering—first, focusing on observing the exact sensation itself, then, on your response to the sensation.
21.
Pain—Embracing Physical Discomfort
|
10.
Walking—Mindfulness While Moving
Walking meditation, another core element of the mindfulness tradition, allows you to practice mindfulness wherever and whenever you go. Learn walking meditation in detail, including beneficial conditions for practice, the method of mindful walking, where to focus your attention, and advanced variations on the practice.
10.
Walking—Mindfulness While Moving
|
22.
Grief—Learning to Accept Loss
In reflecting on the universality of loss, take a deeper look at the notion of impermanence and how refusal to embrace life's transience affects our experience of living. Learn how mindfulness approaches grief through centering focus in the present moment and fully experiencing what grief brings to us without fear or aversion.
22.
Grief—Learning to Accept Loss
|
11.
Consuming—Watching What You Eat
When approached with mindfulness, eating offers heightened awareness and undiscovered depth of experience. This lecture takes you on a rich exploration of mindful eating, beginning with an eating "meditation," using all five senses. Then contemplate mindful eating in daily life and detailed suggestions for sharing a fully mindful meal with others.
11.
Consuming—Watching What You Eat
|
23.
Finitude—Living in the Face of Death
The mindfulness tradition considers reflecting on death to be both liberating and essential to living a full and satisfying life. Contemplate the ways in which our culture conditions us to avoid and deny death, and learn four meditations that deepen both the awareness of life's transience and our ability to live freely.
23.
Finitude—Living in the Face of Death
|
12.
Driving—Staying Awake at the Wheel
As a familiar and potentially hazardous activity, driving provides a perfect "laboratory" for practicing mindfulness. Assess your own approach to driving and bring the principles of meditation to bear on the road; in particular, giving focused attention to the present moment, to your sensory experience and emotions.
12.
Driving—Staying Awake at the Wheel
|
24.
Life—Putting It All in Perspective
Finally, consider various possibilities for continuing your practice through the methods you've learned, further study, and retreats. Professor Muesse concludes with reflections on his own path and on the very real capacity of mindfulness practice to profoundly alter our perceptions of self, the world, and our place in it.
24.
Life—Putting It All in Perspective
|