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Premature cognitive commitments, or PCC's, are one of the ways we use to describe the effect of stresses on our system.
When we have a life experience that involves a demand that cannot possibly be met by the body, a fight or flight response occurs. Danger, threat, injury, attack. Neurotransmitters, peptides, are sent to the cells of the body, informing them of the need to prepare to fight or to flee. Along with this instruction from the brain also is sent a catalogue of all sensory information occurring at the moment of the stressor. When our ancestors were out hunting and gathering on the savannah, this was a tremendous help in keeping the species going; for when the grass moves in just that way, and there is that special scent on the breeze, the body would give the signal that there was danger about, because just before the last lion attack it had experienced these very same inputs and now, our ancestor maybe is able to pull everyone together just in time so that the lion's attack can be averted.
Now, let's say we're alive in the 21st Century. It's Father's Day and we've baked an apple pie for Dad, we've just pulled it from the oven and we're on our way to dinner with the parents. The car is full of that lovely apple and cinnamon smell. On the way there, someone is in an even bigger hurry to see their father, they run a light and hit us. Luckily, no one is terribly hurt (it's my story, I get to decide); but of course we have a huge fight or flight response. The world indeed seems to have attacked us. The brain downloads the peptides appropriate to the experience, and along with them, all the sensory information available. That feel of a Sunday afternoon; that intersection on Ventura where we really should have been paying more attention; and yes, the smell of warm apple pie. Next time we go through that intersection, we'll definitely be more aware of what other drivers are doing. Driving on Sunday afternoons may be a bit different for us as well, at least for a while. Both of these changes in our experience may, in fact, be useful to us, may help us to avoid another accident in the future. But next time we smell apple pie, this otherwise innocent sensory experience will also cause a fight or flight response in us. The cells in our system have prematurely formed a cognitive commitment between this stimulus and the possibility of danger.
This is just one example. In point of fact, each of us have these PCC's in the hundreds of thousands. We are responding with fight or flight to stimuli that are not dangerous to us, or no longer dangerous to us; and we are responding with warmth and openness to stimuli that may have potential truly to harm us. (More on this idea some other time.) This is the bad news.
The good news? By meditating, we are unwinding these stresses that have been stored in our cells, and with the download of bliss chemistry that occurs in our practice, we actually are reprogramming the cells to have a more open, appropriate and pleasant response in our day to day existence.
Today, if some part of me says I need to skip one of my meditations, I will ask myself if the 20 minutes spent doing whatever the alternative to meditation is going to be will be worth the transformational experience I will be forgoing.
 Times Square, Saturday Night, New York, NY
All material copyright Jeff Kober
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