Where is the Oxytocin?

Meditation. What is it? For me, it's directing my energy to achieve peace...inner peace...world peace...and clean water.

As I imagine the rippling effect of energy, I see the calmest of places. I go there and know that I am contributing to a happy, collective energy. Water, mother earth's element, that physically mimics this energetic vision, ripples through us connecting us to a fluidity that nourishes, cleanses, and sustains life. I meditate for stillness among the ripples but I also meditate for the preservation of our mother's gifts. Our mother empowers us with the ability to heal and feel love when her elements are respected and unadulterated. Meditation is soul soothing. Meditation increases oxytocin...empathy. I want meditation for all.

Empathy increases oxytocin and oxytocin increases empathy. They have a symbiotic relationship. Oxytocin is that love hormone that really fills and drives our compassion. If oxytocin were a currency, your wealth would be determined by the production of love. How do we increase oxytocin? How do we become richer? Logically, from a scientific perspective, oxytocin is increased through loving kindness, meditation, extending and receiving compassion, gastrointestinal health (she's a beauty! and is particular about the chemicals you give her, I've heard), listening to music, yoga, and more. I am speaking from a yoga perspective having just finished my course on "Teaching the Neuroscience of Yoga" by Kristine Weber of Subtle Yoga. Weber teaches about vagal health and consequently an increased production of oxytocin.

Your vagus nerve is that really long, important nerve (your longest nerve, actually) that starts in your brain stem and extends all the way to your abdomen. It serves to counteract the sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight) and empower the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest.) Vagus nerve health generates more oxytocin and general wellbeing, shifting your system to a more parasympathetic, ventral vagal dominant state, achieving a more unburdened allostatic load. An unburdened allostatic load means less work for your body to maintain homeostasis and more space for you to reach deep, meditative states and frequent expressions of peaceful love. You can flex and tone your vagus nerve just like you tone your muscles through yoga and meditation. Flexing and toning your vagus nerve can prevent anxiety, depression, disease, and inflexibility.

Yay science. Love more. Do more yoga or Tai Chi or your choice of activity that increases "interoception," that sense of inner awareness. Practice pranayama and have fun humming and chanting, all of which contribute to high vagal tone and stress resiliency. Eat and drink your probiotics and clean food and water. Shine your true self and pad your oxytocin bank with wealth.

This (shine your true self), don't we have to collectively work towards this? Don't we have to cultivate safe spaces for all beings to engage in their right to shine, to assume their natural disposition to shine? We well know cultures and races of people and people of opposing ideologies have been surrounded by oppression, intolerance, and discrimination throughout history and have struggled to simply survive. Would these oppressed groups of people have been punished or threatened for shining their light? I reflect on instances when control hierarchies have created fear and terror to suppress light shining to try and understand this better.

Back to oxytocin...feeling the love, feeling our hearts open, we cannot fathom participating in the fear and control tactics. We make safe spaces for all. We evolve consciously, beyond our abilities to just survive. We must have clean food and clean water as well as love. They are all critical variables. They have a symbiotic relationship.

Clean food and clean water contribute to preventing the real, physical burden of chemical toxicity? Where is the oxytocin among a pool of endocrine-disruptors in the body? Imagine someone trying to tone their vagus nerve when their body is ridden with toxic levels of Pb (atomic symbol for lead) or As (atomic symbol for arsenic.) Broke. Oxytocin currency depleted. Work harder. What about Hg (atomic symbol for mercury) and Al (atomic symbol for aluminum?) I know silver amalgam fillings are on their way out as more and more dentists are trained on how to remove Hg (mercury) safely from their patients teeth, to avoid poisoning themselves during the removal (because it's that toxic!) As healthcare evolves, oxytocin increases, right?

Black men were abused by the healthcare system in the Tuskegee Experiments. I wonder how they felt about their own mental health. I wonder how many of them died never knowing the source of their very physical anguish and consequently their emotional health. Where was the inclusivity of healthcare? Where was the oxytocin?

Ruby Bridges was threatened with food poisoning when integration was the goal. She had to focus on physical survival first. How often did her production of oxytocin suffer? How many black people suffered from the threat of poisoning as integration was fought for. Oxytocin was being held hostage.

What about the environmental burdens of toxicity? The chemical C3H8NO5P (molecular formula for glyphosate) has been the source of much controversy for it's suspected disruption of ecosystems, killing entire insect populations effectively eliminating important pollinators, not to mention it's potential to cause cancer in humans. How does glyphosate make its way into humans? How does it affect a human's production of oxytocin and incidentally their treatment of other humans?

I remember reading something about how Hitler intentionally and nefariously drugged his reich to have more control over them. Makes sense. A numbed regime is capable of unfathomable acts against humanity.

How much love might someone feel for themselves, others, or life in general when they can't figure out the source of their aggression or depression or ailing health due to toxic levels of elements misplaced? Where is their high tone vagal health? Where is there gut health? Where is their oxytocin?

How did the children, subjected to a water supply overloaded with lead, meditate, in Flint, Michigan? How did those children respond to their taxed physical health? Were they able to achieve a meditative state and glowing health despite the burden of Pb (lead?) What kind of heartache did the mothers endure after loving their children so entirely when they knew they gave them all they needed to thrive and have the childhood they deserved despite the economic challenges many of them faced. What do you think they felt when psychologists, mental health professionals, and child behavioral health specialists repeatedly deferred to "problems at home" as an explanation for behavior problems? What kind of heartache did the mothers endure knowing their child was suffering and not knowing why. Why couldn't their child enjoy a meditation exercise instead of screaming and fidgeting and refusing to participate?

What kind of rage did those mothers feel when they discovered their water was poisoned and likely caused permanent damage to their children. How often does this happen? Who does this happen to?

According to an EPA flyer, "Lead poisoning is much more serious when children are exposed to lead"..."can cause slowed development, learning or behavior problems, lowered intellect, and restlessness." Additionally, "Lead poisoning occurs without any obvious symptoms and harms your child's body."

It's 2022 now and what do we know about targeted groups of people being afflicted the way they have been in the past? History tells us we may not fully understand that scope of oppression until decades after it happens and even then we have to ask, "is history getting a fair replay?" Are we aware of who is writing history? Is history being written now or is it being heavily censored?

With this meditation, I reflect on clean water and nutrient dense food unadulterated by harmful pesticides, for all. I reflect on all people having safe spaces to work with conscious choice unadulterated by bullying and harassment. I reflect on healthcare being inclusive. I reflect on all children having safe spaces to play and simply be children unadulterated by discrimination or manipulative grooming meant to control and harm. I reflect on us all claiming our sacred space to feel love, for ourselves especially, because then...we claim our oxytocin and we flex our vagus nerve. We feel love for each other and without saying a word we make space for each other to be...to be still...among the ripples. I meditate with this awareness for clean water, for without it, how can mother empower us?

These are the meditation steps I am taking to achieve my dream for an inclusive world where all beings glow with health because that's where the oxytocin is. Sing it, hum it, chant it, people, "money money money mooeennnyyy."

**Thank you Black Eyed Peas for your inspiring song, "Where is the Love."