My grandfather taught me when I was little to recite a magical incantation when a bee was close and I was afraid of being stung. I just said “bread and butter bread and butter bread and butter” over and over and I always calmed down and the bee never stung me. Also, I always saw the world in a completely different way at these times. The world came completely alive for me - the smells, the sounds, the colors… There was some sort of magical combination happening - perhaps the sense of danger heightened the senses and the relaxation allowed those senses to function with natural ease. It was as if there wasn’t a world at all - and then suddenly there was a universe.
Sounds like a combination of endorphins mixed with a little adrenaline. This is exactly what prayer is. Say something out loud or to yourself that supposedly makes the badness go away. If the badness goes away, then the magic works. If the badness doesn’t go away, you said the something incorrectly.
If you had gotten stung by the bee, would you have thought “uh oh, grandpa was wrong, this incantation doesn’t work”. I highly doubt it. Especially since you were young and highly susceptible to believing the truth of your elders, not to mention a family member. You would have thought perhaps that you didn’t repeat “bread and butter” enough times, or perhaps not loud enough or fast enough, or something like that. Or maybe you would have gotten mad at the bee for not following the rules and listening to the incantation like he’s supposed to.
But now, do you still feel that it was magic?
Don’t get me wrong here, i don’t doubt that when you uttered that incantation when you were young made you feel a whole lot safer from the bee sting. But how has your perception of what went on changed?
The correct term is Mantra.
Not exactly. You can’t take just the right combination of endorphins and adrenaline as some sort of wonder drug and get the experience I described as a result.
I’m pretty sure seeing the bee as “badness” wouldn’t have been endorsed by my grandfather. The situation wasn’t about making anything go away. It was about transforming my relationship to my own fears.
Honestly if I had been stung the first time I tried it I might have thought it didn’t work and abandoned the practice. That would have been unfortunate, because the practice itself is more about a transformed outlook on life than not getting stung be a bee. An essential ingredient in the story though is my grandfather’s advice. It wasn’t all about a magic formula.
I might have thought that. I can’t know for sure.
I wasn’t that dumb as a kid. 
It depends on how you mean “magic”.
In fact it didn’t make me feel safer. It woke me up to an entire universe of perceptions that I was formerly dead to. I described this experience as well as I could, though briefly, in the OP.
True, at least in the Buddhist tradition.
perhaps what he was getting at is perhaps the origin of magic.
people in such a mind state might believe anything given that experiences are magnified.
that just my opinion however, there could be some genie that grants peoples wishes magically when they perform certain incantations, or maybe we all have a genie trapped inside of us 
Mightn’t a more clear and vivid experience of reality have exactly the opposite effect though? Isn’t this why astronomers use telescopes?
…I was taught something like this at camp.
When sitting around a smokey camp fire, if you begin to feel the smoke come towards you…you repeat “I hate bunnies I hate bunnies I hate bunnies.”
The smoke does not magically go away. You just keep repeating it until you no longer notice it or the wind picks up a bit.
Right here you made 2 correlations:
- Recite mantra → calms you down
- Recite mantra → bee never stings you
The first one is understandable; it takes your mind off of the possibility of being stung. But did the bee not sting you BECAUSE of the mantra? Thats typically how magical incantations are alleged to work.
I mean whatever magic that you described in your anecdote about your grandfather and the bees. I’m not trying to introduce new terms or definitions, I’m just going off of what you give me.
The part that puzzles me though is the correlation between reciting the mantra out of fear of a bee sting, and a heightened sense of reality.
I have one theory but its dependent on the mantra being uttered out of fear of a sting. Fear of something causes adrenaline to be emitted into the body, increasing awareness, sharpening the senses, etc. That, coupled with a successful utterance and safety from the bee sting, the brief jubilation would cause endorphins to be emitted into the body. These two types of hormones might cause one to experience reality in a different way than prior to the bee sting. Ever gotten an A on a test that you thought you’d fail, or have you ever had a child? These events trigger endorphins, which makes you feel a sense of euphoria (at least i hope it would for you).
Granted the emission of these hormones hinge on the fact that you had a sense of fear before hand, followed by safety from the danger being feared. You said yourself that you were afraid of being stung by a bee, and that’s why your grandfather told you about the mantra (or magical incantation). You also mentioned
It seems to me that the transformed outlook on life was just an added unexpected bonus, when all you really wanted to do was make the badness (the possibility of a bee sting) go away. Cuz think about it, if the bee stung you, you would have been very upset and want to cry depending on your age.
This phenomenon is commonly experienced and observed in both humans and animals, where a correlation between two events is thought to mean that one causes the other directly. A and B happening in at the same time or very close together does not mean that A causes B or vice versa. Often times its just luck.
It’s important to realize that there are two things happening in the story. One is that I was a child and therefore had a childish outlook. The second is that I was being guided through a process by my grandfather. I’m idealizing it a bit - in reality it was just something he told me I could do that would help. It was up to me to grow up and separate the wheat from the chaff - the sense of total alertness and acceptance of a heightened situation from the desire to reject something (the bee) from my experience. On the other hand, see the end of this post for a thought about the “because of the mantra” part.
I don’t doubt the body’s chemical reactions corresponding to the mental states. When I drink something with caffeine my clarity of mind increases. If I am at the same time in a poised, open, and alert mental state then my temporary experience of the world is similar to the experience I described in the OP.
Yes, it is important in the story to separate my sense of what happened as a child and my sense of what happened as an adult remembering the experience. As a child the transformed outlook was an unexpected bonus. In fact I didn’t really appreciate it the way I do now. But I noticed it and it affected me. As an adult, a bee sting seems almost inconsequential. The importance of the experience is all in the transformed outlook.
You mean that the ‘mantra’ made the bee not sting me? Well in some ways I do believe the mantra made the bee not sting me. Wouldn’t my own agitation possibly encourage the bee to sting? If it was close quarters (though it wasn’t in my memory) this would certainly be the case. You are critiquing the notion of ‘direct’ cause and effect, but why does cause and effect have to be direct? Why not indirect? When the causes and conditions which give rise to and contextualize events are extraordinarily hidden, subtle or complex we reasonably call it luck. But in the case of a fearful child and a bee? I’d say a calm and patient child is less likely to get stung.
Yes agitation would increase the chances of you getting stung. Your inquiry here implies that without the mantra the bee will sting you, or probably will sting you.
What I’m calling into question here is the efficacy of the mantra doing ANYTHING to affect the bee. If you had done nothing and just sat still and quiet, would you have a greater chance of getting stung than if you had recited the mantra?
Your “control” in this experiment would be to do nothing and see what the bee does. Your “test” is to see if the addition of the mantra does something. You wouldn’t substitute the mantra with physical agitation. That would be improper use of the control method of experimentation.
Seeing as how insects (at least a good bit if not all) do not have auditory sensors (meaning they can’t hear), I think it’s safe to say that the bee wouldn’t be affected by the mantra, and that any test in which the bee does not sting is just luck. Thats just Occam’s Razor talking.
Another thing is that bee’s don’t sting unless threatened. So unless you swat at it, or blow on it or something like that, it probably will just walk on you if anything.
(disclaimer: if I misrepresented biological facts about insects or bees please let me know.)
Right, but fear of bees had a lot to do with it. Take out the bees, and this never would have happened. Of course there was probably some other thing you were afraid of that your grandfather might have told you how to squelch in your brain with a mantra of bread and butter.
My ultimate point here is that what seemed to be magical can be explained using biology and the scientific method. If this takes away from the grandeur of it all, I’m sorry but that is not my intention. Its still fascinating to me how something so simple can have such a powerful psychological affect.
Science > Magic
As I’ve said though, it’s not just the mantra. Words have no power at all in and of themselves. Also, I have clarified that of course a childish understanding of the situation was part of it, since obviously I was a child.
I think that I wouldn’t have had an alternative focus to the bee. Sitting still and being quiet would have collapsed in the face of the perceived danger.
It wasn’t an experiment though. Are you suggesting that some institution should research this? Would they put children into small rooms with bees or something?
I have not once as an adult thought that the bee heard the mantra. Even as a child I didn’t have that belief - I just did what was suggested by someone I trusted and it proved efficacious.
Yes, I’m aware of that. The problem with children is that their fear-based responses cause agitation which in turn increases the likelihood of getting stung.
Fear was an instigating factor. Fear heightens the senses. My grandfather never taught me anything of a ‘squelching’ nature. He taught me to not reject or try to get away from my fears and therefore transform my relationship to them. He taught me bravery.
You’ll notice I posted this in the Psychology forum, not the Religion forum. Are you suggesting that the natural world has no grandeur? Is a sense of wonder not appropriate in a scientific world?
Magic in my usage here isn’t supernatural.
you put too much stock in the reliability of the human senses. when things become magnified perceptions are altered. who knows what you might percieve
How did I put too much stock in my senses? When you said “people in such a mind state might believe anything” - did you mean that I believed something I shouldn’t have? Which part of my assessment of the experience would that be?
Whether or not you would have been mentally able to sit still and quiet is not important when you are trying to figure out if sitting still would affect the chances of being stung. IF you were to sit still and quiet, the behavior of the bee would not change.
If words have no power by themselves, then what else was supplying power? An even more important thing to point out would be where or to what is this “power” being applied to?
I hope you are joking here. Having an institution researching this would be absurd. It would be absurd because all that is necessary to gain an understanding of what’s going on here is a little critical thinking. Like thinking about what would be most likely the case as to whats really going on when you cite a mantra and you don’t get stung by the bee coupled with a heightened sense of reality.
Bees can’t hear, ergo if you were to remain silent, the bee wouldn’t behave differently. Experiment on it if you want to, but i think you’d be wasting time because you already know that bees can’t hear.
You are twisting my words. You are wrong for implying that I would suggest this. I was trying to be nice, but apparently you are not able to notice so I wont bother anymore.
You implemented a solution and it proved to be efficacious. That’s fine. The bee didn’t sting you, you got a heightened sense of awareness, yada yada. Ok.
So what have you learned about the situation. Was it the mantra that caused your heightened sense of awareness, or was it the fact that you didn’t get stung? A way to test this is to recite the mantra WITHOUT being in danger of anything.
If you say “bread and butter bread and butter bread and butter” right now (assuming you are in a state of relative safety) will your senses heighten?
If it doesn’t work without the element of danger, then your mantra is not the cause of heightened sense of awareness.
Now you’re just moving the goal post. You were the first one to use the word “magic”. Do you still think that the incantation, and the events that followed its recitation, was really magical as you thought them to be when you were little, or can the events be explained with science (which I have already done)?
Its really not a mantra, the sound of a mantra (most of them you are never to say out loud) in your head is suppose to hit a certain frequency and trigger something (putting one to sleep…etc).
This just calmed you and like someone said before, the adrenaline enhanced your expirience.
I personally believe magic is just a deep unexplained part of science. Alot of summoning rituals I have read about actually resemble some mathematical patterns (some quantum physics stuff) along with the drawing of geometrical things like the Unicursal hexagram.
Along time I ago I was reading a chemistry book that showed the movement of some particles in a certain fashion, I then realized that it resembled a Unicursal hexagram. If you connect the dots it turns into a hexgram, which is also the shape of the kaballah tree of life… AHHH! ITS ALL MAKING SENSE NOW!!!
yea… sorry I don’t have more time to go deeper.
This isn’t necessarily true. As I mentioned before, if I had been in close quarters with the bee sitting still and remaining calm would have definitely made a difference.
The power was coming from my mind and being applied to my mind, in my opinion. That in turn affects a broader field than just my own mind. By reducing my own fear it is conceivable that the fear of the bee was also reduced.
I’m glad you agree about the absurdity. I personally wasn’t sure if you were joking or not. I’m also glad you agree about the critical thinking.
Yes, we already went over this.
I wasn’t trying to twist your words. I apologize.
I’m not scared of bees anymore. They just give me a slightly nervous feeling sometimes. My story isn’t subject to testing that I am aware of. But I’m not a scientist. You keep fixating on the mantra and maybe that’s my fault in how I presented the story, but I have tried to convey that there were multiple aspects to what happened. It’s a very simple story, but I never simplified it to the point that you seem to think I did.
Did you even read the OP? I’m beginning to wonder.
I just checked the dictionary and of the 11 definitions given for ‘magic’, only one refers to the supernatural.
The repeating words, which many people call a mantra (it doesn’t bother me whether it is called that or not) were a factor in calming me down. I think it provided an alternative focus to the bee, without my ignoring or running away from the bee. The adrenaline triggered by fear was an essential aspect of the experience. I’m not sure if in your post you’re suggesting that I have misunderstood the experience or not, so I’m not sure if this response is pertinent. Thanks for your input though.