Jill Bolte Taylor (public portrait)
* Unlike our community interviews, public portraits are assembled from outside sources – their own words drawn from reporting, books, and interviews.
Jill Bolte Taylor wasn’t seeking a radical shift in perception. It found her when an artery exploded in her brain – disabling her rational analytical mind and leaving her barely able to call for help. As a Harvard-trained neuroanatomist, she had a rare “ringside seat” to her own stroke, observing in real time as her brain functions shut down one by one. When parts of her brain went offline, so did her sense of self. Unexpectedly, this created a feeling of peace she’d never felt before.
How could this be? Thanks to her expertise, Taylor offers an explanation:
“One of the jobs of our [brain] is to define our self by saying ‘I am.’ Through the use of brain chatter, your brain repeats over and over again the details of your life so you can remember them. It is the home of your ego center. Without these cells performing their job, you would forget who you are and lose track of your life and your identity.”
When Taylor’s “ego centered” left brain was damaged, her usual “self” went quiet. She felt enveloped in warmth and peace. Granted, without her ego-based rational analytical side, she couldn’t function normally, and was entirely dependent upon caregivers. Initially she didn’t want to go back to normal life. But gradually her resolve and motivation became clear:
“In order for me to choose the chaos of recovery over the peaceful tranquility of the divine bliss that I had found in the absence of the judgement of my left mind, I had to reframe my perspective from ‘Why do I have to go back?’ to ‘Why did I get to come to this place of silence?’ I realized that the blessing I had received from this experience was the knowledge that deep internal peace is accessible to anyone at any time. I believe the experience of Nirvana exists in the consciousness of our right hemisphere, and that at any moment, we can choose to hook into that part of our brain. With this awareness, I became excited about what a difference my recovery could make in the lives of others-not just those who were recovering from a brain trauma, but everyone with a brain!”
Taylor’s “Mental Weeds”
Eight years after her stroke, Taylor rehabilitated her brain and resumed life as a conference speaker and advocate for brain research.
But she was a new person.
Like tending weeds in a garden, she now “pruned back” the more bossy, annoying, ego-centered parts of her mind. Because she inhabited a place of peace, she was very sensitive when aspects came online that she didn’t want, e.g. anger, impatience, and snap judgement.
Taylor emphasizes we all have more control over thoughts and feelings than we realize:
“As biological creatures, we are profoundly powerful people. Because our neural networks are made up of neurons communicating with other neurons in circuits, their behavior becomes quite predictable. The more conscious attention we pay to any particular circuit, or the more time we spend thinking specific thoughts, the more impetus those circuits or thought patterns have to run again with minimal external stimulation.”
Taylor compares our mind to a garden:
“Regardless of the garden I have inherited, once I consciously take over the responsibility of tending my mind, I choose to nurture those circuits that I want to grow, and consciously prune back those circuits I prefer to live without. Although it is easier for me to nip a weed when it is just a sprouting bud, with determination and perseverance, even the gnarliest of vines, when deprived of fuel, will eventually lose its strength and fall to the side.”
How Self-Investigation Fits
How did Taylor “consciously prune back circuits” and sustain her peace?
Although her trigger – a stroke – was exceptional, the rest of her story follows a recognizable Self-Investigation arc: she glimpsed beyond ordinary perception, felt the difference between awareness and mind, broke her addiction to thought, and began deliberately training her attention toward new habits and values.
These are major elements of Self-Investigation, expanded on in our guide.
The result: a completely different way of being.
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