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What you see is what gives you your attitude and your actions in life.
So if we can change what you see, we can help you change your life.
I love the analogy of the winding mountain pass where an unsuspecting motorist happens onto a car wreck in the middle of the two-lane road.
His options are to
- drive into the solid rock on the left,
- into the abyss on the right,
- into the wreck in the middle… or to
- slow down and drive around the wreck. Slowly.
My numbers show that 99.5% of them will not even consider slowing down and driving around the wreck. It doesn’t even occur to them to do that.
Because, obviously, testing people on winding mountain roads is not in my budget, I do the next best thing. I test people’s response to bad news.
This article is
- about the two main ways we deal with life. Different in where we put our efforts, where we put our attention… They both express our attitude quite precisely…
- And how can brain plasticity rescue you… from yourself.
When I click on the send button to send the report: the Starting Point Measurements, I don’t know what reaction to expect.
I know what I have been getting, but the past is not a reliable predictor of the future.
- 90% of the people focus on what’s wrong with them, and they hate me.
- Another 9% also hate me, but they say I was wrong, that my measurements are wrong.
- And 1% will want to find out what they can do with what they have.
About half of that 1% may be even willing to do some work.
You could say: oh, you are testing if people are pessimistic or optimistic, but that would be a gross misunderstanding of what I am doing…
It was April 15, and it was snowing where I live. Five inches of snow fell overnight, and more was coming.
- I was looking at my attitude about the snow, and I had none.
- Looked at the squirrels and they obviously enjoyed the challenge. I can feel animals’ feelings too.
- I tuned into the feelings of neighbors. They felt resigned, angry, and worried.
Squirrels see the world differently than most humans. Becoming more like a squirrel is a function of brain plasticity, and it’s what I am attempting to teach in this article.
Humans have a picture of how it should be, and when it isn’t that way, they are unhappy. They lose their will to look for ways around the obstacles, lose their desire to live…
Some pretend that they have nothing to go around, while they crash and burn…
One of the main difference between the three kinds of attitudes, the three kinds of approaches to life and difficulties is what questions you ask.
The 90% ask what’s wrong questions? What’s wrong with me and answer it? The 9.5% ask: What’s wrong with Sophie and then answer it. lol.
The Half percent asks different questions: HOW can I pull myself up by my bootstraps?
I don’t know if you can see it, but the 99.5% is reactive.
When you react you have a passive relationship to life. You have something done to you… There is no you.
The half percent may feel the same way, but act differently. There is a kernel of Self, a kernel of Them looking for the way up, through, and take some action.
The 99.5% crashes… or waits for luck, fate, a guru to straighten their lives out.
You can talk one way and act another…
- I am one of the people who feel one way but act another. My tendency is to say: I can’t, or say: it will never… and yet I have never given up. You can see it if you look at my actions.
- I know people who talk positive, feel negative, and their actions talk resignation, hopelessness, and ‘it’s not worth it‘.
It is rare that your speaking, your feelings, and your actions say the same.
What you see determine your actions. Your speaking, your feelings, your thoughts are not very relevant in this regard, they are just noise. Those come from the cave of your mind.
Lots of people talk a good talk. But if you have a chance to observe them, you’ll find out what they see from their actions.
When I get stuck, I now know that I got stuck in a view of life.
So if it is my view of life, then what needs to be unstuck is my view.
Here is an example: I got an email this morning that my webinar software company can’t charge my card… I called them and they couldn’t help: they said call the card issuing company.
After about half an hour of worry I looked around, relaxed, and realized: I have another card that worked … problem solved.
I learned that even therapists have a move where they ask the patient to slowly turn their heads to see the whole room, left to right and again right to left, without labeling things. Just allow the eyes to see everything NOT the obstacle they are stuck on.
When your neck turns to get your view unstuck YOU get unstuck.
That is what accidentally I did: I looked around just before I suddenly remembered that I have another card in my purse.
Information reaching you through words, sounds, will NOT get you unstuck UNLESS they instruct you to look differently.
Some people, certain soul corrections, are more prone to getting stuck than others.
Using this innocent but powerful practice always works.
Most issues in creativity, life satisfaction, health, love, come from a stuck view of life.
It is not an accident that most creative people walk when they feel stuck. When you walk AND allow yourself to see what you see as you walk, your stuck view of life loosens and even disappears.
One of the practices I am attempting to employ is to come up with 10 ideas a day. Good, bad, indifferent, 10 ideas, and write them down. It is slow going…
That is 3650 ideas a year.
It is easier when I walk. It gets easier when I allow myself to see different things… move the eyes.
I am both limbering my brain’s idea muscle, and making sure that I am unstuck.
Most of you are frozen into some grotesque position, between dutiful and slavish, victim and entitled.
100% of humans. Even very creative people, unless they do something with their eyes to keep on seeing different things, will get sluggish and stuck.
Your emotions also get stuck… maybe it is more precise to say your attitude gets stuck.
You can limber up your emotion/attitude muscle while you are at it.
But coming up with new ideas takes the prize: it is hard enough, and it’s impossible to stay stuck.
What should be the ideas about? Whatever…
Problem solving ideas have a special place because they give you a view of life where you are a value provider.
I was born with dyslexia. Dyslexia is a brain irregularity where the brain cells don’t quite grow at the same place as in a ‘standard’ brain. At some places they overcrowd, while at other places they are too sparse. So in some functions a dyslexic is exceptional, other places they are weak, maybe even moronic.
When I was little, dyslexia wasn’t a thing, so I was just weird, and stupid, and hapless… according to my parents.
I came up with lots of ideas for activities my brain wasn’t good at. Ideas for how to be able to do things, to read, to tell left from right, to read the right numbers, to notice when there is a mixup or reversal of left and right… To find my way in the maze of streets, to remember how things, how people, how trees, houses, signs of buildings looked so I can find my way, and not be hopelessly lost.
I tell you, it wasn’t easy not to get lost. Sometimes I get lost in my apartment… I have lived here for 19 years… 🙁
I delivered magazines to clubs in three states in a previous business. Predictably, I got lost more often than I care to remember. But I also saw more of the world as a result.
I often, randomly, took a turn off the known street… intentionally getting lost. You cannot count on learning only when you really need it… It’s too late to dig a well when you are thirsty… So I practiced.
Making myself get lost helped me grow my awareness. Awareness is another word for seeing.
Of course if you are one of the 99.5%, your attitude will be, when lost, hopeless and resigned.
But you don’t have to remain that way: you can train your brain to look for solutions instead of instantly giving up.
You can start with just looking around without naming what you see (not as easy as it sounds!) and be OK with not knowing what you see, not recognizing. Recognizing is a ‘mind’ word, meaning that you remember… But what if what you remember was not accurate?
So looking around without words may help you to unstuck your pitiful attitude, and put on your way to become a happier human. And to become a lot more successful.
Let me explain why you need to be looking at things without words. Words take you, words hijack you to the same old same old. To the cave of your mind, where all your resignation, all your helpless victim attitude comes from. All your past failures, mistakes, giving up.
It my take many attempts to forego words, but it’s worth it. If you continue to label and remain in your mind, no change can happen. You will stay stuck.
Ask yourself if you care about yourself and your life. If you answer yes, then you are worth it.
Even just seconds of ‘being worth it’ can cause a miracle… Just watch. You’ll be amazed.
Not surprisingly this process be part of the work we do here…
The goal is to take you from where you live to a new place where you can live better, be better, feel better, and do different, and maybe even get successful at life.
In the program I am running now, From Intention To Self, that is exactly what we do.
Turns out that Intention to see different is crucial… So we activate intention in the beginning of every session. Turns out that seeing from a different angel is crucial, so we activate that as well…
And then we look at painful incidents, each person in their own head, and attempt to look differently.
I am seeing success, more success than with other methods.
One of the things that may become available with this practice is seeing a future that can lend enough pull for the person to actually go for it.
If you still have nothing really to live for, nothing really to change for, then this is an excellent way to change that hopeless, futureless view of yourself and the world…
Anyway, I still accept students into this program. We meet three times a week. You make the sessions you can, and catch up on the ones you miss from the recording. It’s a tiny group. And friendly.
It is already causing miracles after just a few weeks.
Change what you see and change your life
