TED Community » Stephen Dolle

More About Me

I'm passionate about

Innovative ways to connect/impact others in my neighborhood, schools, businesses, and government - and share knowledge.

An idea worth spreading

To elevate our understanding of health care and consumer technology, we must first learn to disseminate KNOWLEDGE, to walk in the shoes of the tech user, and the patient. After my 1992 brain injury, I got more into tech, and the more I did, the more frustrated I got. I cite health care & tech together here because they both suffer from poor adoption, poor user interfaces, and a lack of information. Do you find this interesting? It is as though these folks designed services for themselves, not users, or patients. So, these two industries (which will become very intertwined), need to change the way to teach customers to use their products. They need to revolution the "USER INTERFACE." It's almost scarry to think of what we might be able to accomplish in educating and gaining adoption by the masses!

Talk to me about

New brain training methods & research that boosts productivity, skill-sets, and human potential, and how this can be used to create change in people, organizations, and in communities.

People don't know that I'm good at

Dance. I play amazing Afro Cuban drum rhythms and move similarly. People just don't expect a white middle-aged man to move the way I do.

My TED Story

My story dates back to my 1992 brain injury and pioneering of methods in brain training and neurodiagnostics (DiaCeph Test) which I used to direct my own brain surgeries since 1998. In 2004, I became very involved in drum circles and the rhythms of the brain, and have since pioneered some very important research in the areas of drumming and trance states, cognition & learning, movement disorders, and team-building. Some of the instruments I play, I played as an expert the very first time I touched them. It's as though I was meant to do this work, or had done it before. I am finding that my intuitive experiences from my youth in the 1960s & 1970s are more relevant than ever today in mind-body work and in healing. I speak and perform as a drum circle facilitator & neuroscientist, and share my personal story and insights into the brain and learning, now having undergone 10 brain surgeries and 20 years of research.

Comments

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• +1

  A comment on Conversation: Development or Destruction, where are we heading?

  Mar 23 2012: We must be able to separate the "science" of these challenges from the "politics" and "financial winfall" for those who stand to gain from policies. What I find most disturbing today is not so much in the tragedies of what are occurring, but rather the callousness and down right evil of the deception that is a means to an end. And how people in the know CAN make a difference, but are not willing to speak up.
  
  In the U.S., many people are more concerned with the news of individuals prosecuted for heineous isolated crimes, gay rights, chem trails in the sky that the gov't may be poinening us, whether Pres. Obama is a U.S. citizen or went to Harvard, and religious groups who believe the earth is only 7000 years old.
  
  Folks, we must retrain ourselves in how to THINK & WORK TOGETHER as families, communities, organizations, companies, and governments with a common goal. Until we get this right, we will remain in harms way.
  
  Stephen
  Southern California

• A comment on Conversation: Use of Strategic Affirmations to Heal Illness, Change Behavior, Change the World

  Mar 23 2012: I'd like to share specifically how affirmations can be used in weight loss, and in combating illness. I wrote this for a friend yesterday on weight loss, and it caused me to describe how affirmations are used in illness. I've learned my nsg implanted a different shunt than what I requested last month, and my recovery and brain swelling is not resolving. From my 30+ years in mind-body work with health and disease, I know affirmations do work.
  
  In weight loss, affirmations are used in two ways: First, describe to yourself how you want to be and movet. Then, ask your higher self to give the necessary instructions to your brain & body thru movement and activity to burn the necessary calories and prepare your body for its new form. Meditation and visualization ofyour desired outcome helps to welcome in your new body.
  
  Fasting, as many of you likely know, is rooted in religious study and practice of the last several thousand years, and you can attain a higher brain and spiritual state thru fasting, in part to slowing down your metabolism, and the confidence and feedback you receive thru this biofeedback. People do this in holding their breath for very long periods as well as fasting. Today there is also supporting medical research in fasting, termed the Calorie Restriction Diet. You can actually have MORE energy by eating less, and I've experienced this many times over the last 4 years.
  
  In the case of illness, like I am dealing with in my brain swelling, you visualize what is going wrong and either ASK or COMMAND your higher self to correct it. Whether you ASK or COMMAND is based on the karma of your illness or injury. But you must be WORTHY of healing! If it is karma you need to work off & learn from, you ASK for blessing & intervention. But if it is the result of another's karma, you may COMMAND it to abate. Or, if it is your karma, and innocents are being harmed thru your convolesence, you can ASK it be waived & healed to help the others.
  
  I hope this helps.
  
  Stephen

• A comment on Conversation: The current bandaid solutions for obesity

  Mar 22 2012: Mary,
  
  I wish my book were finished and available. I've been working on it for a year or two. I live in Orange County, California, and I showcase my methods in drumming and the brain on the 2nd Friday of each month at the Temple of Light Spiritual Center in Lake Forest, California. I maintain a variety of percussion instruments that I use to go on location and speak and put on drumming events, should you be in the Orange or Los Angeles county area.
  
  You can visit my web site at www.dollecommunications.com and "Like" my Facebook fan page as I post here on my brain related research and developments.
  
  I'd love to be a TED speaker and am regularly told I should be.
  
  Best,
  Stephen
• +1

  A comment on Conversation: The current bandaid solutions for obesity

  Mar 22 2012: Well, combating obesity is not as simple as it seems. If you can separate obese individuals into three (3) causes: physical health & metabolic problems, mental health problems, and lazy/over-indulgers, it is the last group which this IDEA seems to be referring to.
  
  I am a drum circle facilitator and neuroscientist and will put on a workshop on rhythm, movement, aging and weight management in May 2012. My scientific premise is that body movements and rhythmic patterns tell our brains about how youthful we are, and the heavier we are, the more injured or slow we are, the less favorable and youthful image our brain's get of our bodies. Once a person is obese or injured (which restricts mobility) for an extended period of time, our brain's and subconscious mind then see us as older and unengaging, i.e. as in life is nearly over!
  
  The way you reverse this process is to MOVE! Any kind of movement is good, but rhythmic movements not just in rhythm & dance, but in walking, sports like basketball, or tennis, or swimming - the rhymic movements will not only help to burn calories, but it will provide favorable biofeedback to our brain's regarding our status and youfulness.
  
  But, the first step is BELIEVING. You must believe that this will work.
  
  The next step is DESIRING CHANGE. You must want to be thinner, more youthful. It can be life-changing!
  
  AND, it's also kind of scary cause if this works, you have taken RESPONSIBILITY for your health and appearance, and this is something no doubt you thought was beyond your control.
  
  Stephen Dolle
  Survivor, 10 Brain Shunt Surgeries
  Drum Circle Facilitator & Neuroscientist
• +1

  A comment on Talk: John Markoff on newspapers

  Oct 13 2008: I listened to the first few minutes of Mr. Markoff's speech, and he appears to be rambling on with details that seem meaningless to listeners. I have had much difficulty getting the interests of the Times and other leading media on investigations and advocacy with medical devices. In one instance in 2003, I was contacted by a family in Chicago whose 14 yr old daughter had 42 brain shunt surgeries over 2 1/2 years and was confined to a wheelchair. I was able to get the girl moved to another hospital and get corrective treatment, and advocated for the family for 6 months for no pay. This was the Rodney King beating equivalent of shunt device mis-use, and I could not get any media to write about it. In 2007, I requested a criminal investigation of the FDA. Such abuses with shunt devices continue unabated today, while Mr. Markoff rambles on about what its like inside an editorial room. I have found some comfort in my work with drum rhythms and the brain. But it does not change the fact that public interest advocates across the country face much difficulty in reaching the media. What can one do to attract the interests of the media?