"All human beings, all persons who reach adulthood in the world today are programmed Biocomputers. No one of us can escape our own nature as programmable entities."
-John C. Lilly
Everything we have ever experienced is stored as memory in the cells of our body. The mind uses this stored memory of experience as a program to function by. These programs are played out as the patterns in our lives. Patterns present themselves in many different forms, such as in our self-image, relationships, and actions. Lets take self-confidence for example, if we have experienced a strongly negative reaction to our behavior by others, we can feel humiliated. This experience is stored in our cells as memory so that in the future we are alerted to not act this way for fear of humiliation. This fear of humiliation is then the place we act from, or the program by which we function in life. So, the next time we are vulnerable or open to reaction from others for our behavior, we will probably retreat from the fear of our previously humiliating experience. In this way, we are have become programmed by our experience.
To function in the present moment with patterns of past experience is reactionary behavior - reacting "from" a place of previous experience. Instead, the ideal way to function is by reacting "to" a current situation. The programs of our biocomputers are often helpful for survival, such as pulling away from fire, and feeding ourselves when we are hungry. However, outside of the human need to preserve the body, to function from past experience is not often helpful. For example, as stated above, if someone is currently acting from a place of fear of humiliation, they are blocking enjoyment of the current moment, where humiliation may or may not be experienced. To assume humiliation is inevitable will only serve to create humiliation. When you are open to whatever the current situation may bring, you create a space for the possibility of all things.
If one could identify the functioning programs they are motivated by, and learn to use proper action instead of a predetermined appropriate reaction, they might see the benefits of their biocomputer as a tool for understanding themselves. When we understand why we do what we do we can become aware of our ability to create whatever program we want. Otherwise, our existing programs can become our worst enemy because we feel helpless to change them. People say, 'This is just who I am,' or 'its my nature to be angry'... these identifications with programming are detrimental to your health, and limit you to become or continue to be what you think you are. We are programmed entities, but we have the authority and the ability to change our programming.
We can have access to our Biocomputer through a technique called Muscle Response Testing. It's not hard to learn, you can do it on yourself, and for others. Muscle Response Testing is how we find the stored information about our experience that is affecting our behavior and our health. (For more information on MRT, see my page on Muscle Response Testing*)
Our 'Biocomputer' is a term coined by John C. Lilly, a doctor who has worked extensively in the fields of Neuropsychology, Biophysics, Neuroanatomy and electronics.