The reticular activating system in the brain enables us to remember how to brush our teeth, how to drive our car etc. It has been subconsciously programmed/ conditioned through repetition and it has, no doubt, also acquired inherited, genetic downloads. It is an amazing functioning as it enables us to navigate through our lives smoothly, without having to re learn processes to function every day. The data once learned is ‘in there’. We know how to drive effortlessly, once learned, we know how to dress ourselves once learned, we know how to use cutlery once learned, we know what a male is, we know what a female is, a cat, a dog, we think we ‘know’ what every sensory feeling means once learned, we are continuously ‘interpreting’ neutral data according to our programmed accumulation that of course creates our unique and personal bias, perspective or ‘position’.
We know, effortlessly that we are stupid when the RAS has received the thoughts enough (eg from what a teacher, parent, friend, maths test has determined). We know we aren’t as attractive as others once learned. We know we are the chubby one or beautiful, clever, funny, naughty, good one. We know we’ll never have enough money when we’ve had enough experiences to validate that belief. Get my drift??!! We know that ALL men or ALL women are untrustworthy when we’ve had that role modelled enough, or experienced a personal massive let down. We KNOW, we KNOW, we KNOW it all :). In fact, ALL knowledge is merely a conceptual construct.
Our beautiful, pristine consciousness, our minds, have downloaded a lot of valuable, productive concepts and a lot of self sabotaging junk! (Which is continuously repetitively fed in to us through most media channels, advertising, people talking BS (as if they KNOW :)) etc…etc…None of it is definitively true, even the ‘good’ ones. So if a belief is working for you all good. If it isn’t re evaluate it. Sensitive human vibrations seem to unconsciously realise the deeper truth that all knowledge is essentially made up, and reality can be really confusing for them. Because of a deep humility, sensitivity and innocence that none of us really definitively know anything they can be swayed and influenced by the dogmatic forces who put on a really good show of definitively KNOWING what this craziness we call life is all about! And who we should all be in it in order to ‘belong.’ Sensitive vibrations seem to be Trumped (no pun intended) by bigger, louder ‘knowers’, until they wake up and reconnect to the power to choose who they are and what life is all about for them, within themselves.
The reticular activating system is the ‘focus of attention’ centre of the brain and its primary role is to focus on exactly what your subconscious mind has been programmed to believe/perceive is true for you. There are literally millions of bits of sensory information flooding in to your senses and if your brain didn’t discriminate what was relevant for you in this this quantum field of sensory data, you would only be experiencing indiscriminate chaos. You wouldn’t be able to assimilate and process the continual influx of sensory data in to a ‘relevant for you’ or discernible ‘personal’ experience.
It works in cahoots with your subconscious mind (programmed beliefs) and directly influences your emotions and actions; how you actually ‘experience’ your personal reality.
None of it is definitively true or real, it is just a personal interpretation. All based on the genetic and conditioned downloading of the RAS! Based on ALL of the information that it has absorbed historically,as though it is true and relevant NOW, about us, about life.
How liberating! That nobody actually ‘knows’ what is definitively true. There really is only what resonates in the moment for each of us. That is our Truth and nobody can validate that for us :).
We literally see/ perceive what our RAS ‘believes’ to be true or real in our life experience. All just personal interpretation, and it’s not even yours per se. Just information that the RAS presents to you - you, being the infinitley clear channel, the neutral observer, prior to conditioning (the ‘pre conditioned’ innocent seeing of the baby).Your attention is drawn to sensory data that will confirm your bias eg. have you ever noticed if you have been thinking about buying a new car and studied it, then like magic you’ll begin to see that car EVERYWHERE. Your incredible RAS perceives them for you, draws them in to your experience, because you’ve been focusing and repetitively contemplating them. Whatever we focus on naturally expands and becomes our perceptual reality for us!
You know what your beliefs are by how you ‘experience’ realty. Perception isn’t ‘true’ per se it is just a personally biased perspective based on inherited and conditioned beliefs. Wow!! And get this, you are not even seeing with your eyes, light waves enter your eyes and the brain interprets the view according to your beliefs!! sensory data is only perceived AFTER it has travelled through your interpretation machine!!!
If you ‘believe’ yourself to be overweight, unhealthy, incapable of change, unworthy, stuck in a rut, not good enough, unlovable, that life is unsafe, that you are unsafe etc…your RAS will assimilate all sensory data and confirm your beliefs and bias to perpetuate that reality for you. It is literally your magic genie in the lamp!! Your wish (belief) is my command, you'll keep seeing what you believe and you’ll keep believing what you see. A persistent, negative feedback loop that perpetuates itself.
Perception has no particular bias until the RAS has been entrained by genetics and conditioning. We could say that the baby has no particular sensory bias as it looks around the room after delivery. It is just seeing shapes and colours, hearing sounds and feeling heat, coolness, hunger, sleepiness etc…It has no judgement or knowing…just natural bodily preferences of the moment eg taste, to want to be warmer or cooler, to sleep, to laugh, to cry, to want comfort etc…as we get older we still have the natural preferences of the body in each moment, but our accumulated ‘knowing’ tends to negate our authentic preferences. We ‘should’ feel less of that and be ‘more’ like that!
In life you probably wonder at times why your dreams and desires don’t come true. The reticular activating system may be negatively primed to perceive only data that confirms that you will fail, because you have a subconscious belief that to succeed is scary or that “I never achieve anything” or “I’ll fail if I try.” “Or my family won’t love me or relate to my if I do that thing I’ve always yearned to do.” Etc..We have many detrimental and downright self sabotaging subconscious beliefs that seemingly block our contentment and the living out of our dreams.
If your conscious mind wants something but your subconscious beliefs aren’t on the same page, I.e have been programmed with unworthiness etc…then you have conflicting powers at play. One part wants you to have that thing and one part doesn’t. Core beliefs will always trump conscious wants. Because we don’t know we have a self sabotaging program running, life can be really confusing and you may be left with a feeling that life is against you, but really it’s the software program running as it has been programmed to.
It’s essential to explore lack beliefs and begin to feed only positive thoughts and feelings in to your RAS. You could view it like play dough that has been shaped for so long in a particular shape that it seems so rigid and impossible to form new shapes with. But it is NEVER too late. You just need to soften it (and the rigidity in the body that has been shaped by perception) with love and acceptance and gently, gently, gently form new shapes, new perceptions. This can involve a lot of loving, somatic healing work to come back in to the body, to feel what is actually here, viscerally, so that you can begin to allow, soften and open to evolve beyond all of those inherited, intergenerational patterns of ‘experiencing.’ I love the etymology of words, there are so many clues to our existence in them. The word evolve comes from the Lain word ‘evolvere’ to unravel, slowly :)
Like magic your reticular activating system can call to you (perceive) people and circumstances that help you to build the life you want. When you ‘believe.’
By being aware of, exploring, examining, admitting and metabolising old, outdated beliefs, we can begin to clear space for new data to be perceived. But the old (shameful, guilty, blameful (rejected) parts of ourselves) need to be faced and held in love; in our unconditionally loving, still presence, first. We need to be brave enough to venture inside and face our own illusionary darkness within. You can’t get to there from here. You can’t get to there by ‘avoiding’ what’s HERE…When you become really still, to explore, feel and re evaluate and allow consciously then THERE becomes HERE…organically.
The best way to ensure that your RAS is energised with productive and positive thoughts is cultivating mindfulness “What am I thinking now, what am I feeling now, what am I believing to be true that is making me feel so terrible, so angry, so confused, so stuck?”.
“Does it really serve me to accept this thought?”. Presence and awareness is your ONLY point of power and control. It is the only place that you can access the power to change…NOW. Like Eckhart Tolles’s amazing book “The Power of Now”
You really have to stay present to focus on how you feel - Be brave - feel the feeling in the body - let it talk itself out….let it shout…let it scream (not necessarily at someone, although that maybe necessary at times, it can get a little messy as your Truth begins to emerge.)
Then….flip the script with open curiosity “Maybe she didn’t text me because she’s busy, not because she doesn’t like me” “Maybe he didn’t even give it another thought that I forgot his birthday.” “Maybe I really am as capable as any other human being on this planet.” “Maybe others do actually perceive me as attractive, kind, loving.” Etc….
Challenge, investigate, be open to explore your existing paradigms. The is where your true freedom exists.
Open curiosity is the quickest way to access a higher level of mental processing; I.e out of stale belief patterns of what I think I ‘know’ and in to the quantum field of potential or ‘not yet manifest.’
Just to reiterate for a persistently negative bias where maybe there has been covert or overt nervous system trauma it really takes a lot of love, patience, kindness and gentleness to really somatically and viscerally ‘feel’ through some of these negative traumas. They literally become like energetic phantoms in the body that crave your recognition and love. Just parts of your beautiful self that have been so rejected that they even feel scary to you! This is how we release or integrate ‘stuck’, persistent negative beliefs. This is how we begin to actualise authentic self love. True acceptance of EVERYTHING that appears in our body of experiencing.
‘Pretend’ practices, really getting in to the feelings you want to feel are amazing for priming the RAS with new blue prints as it really is amazing at believing whatever you feed it. Just like an open child; when relaxed and feeling loved and supported it will learn, absorb and believe new information.
Your RAS really is your faithful servant but it can only act on your instructions. If your instructions are outdated from a traumatic childhood I.e negative conditioning it can only perceive through the lens it has been given.
Your RAS is working for you 24/7 (again a faithful servant) it’s not its fault that it has a negative program. May as well give it some positive and nourishing updates, that actually serve you.
Don’t hesitate to text for appointment if you’d like a guide (someone who can hold a loving space) while you navigate through your personal evolutionary transformational process.
0432 659 044
We are ALL evolving as a species and it can be a scary process.
Inner child work
Practicing mindfulness and presence
Cultivating unconditional love for yourself
Going on hypnotic inner journeys eg “Back to the womb pre birth.”
Learning how to ‘open’ to and be in presence with inner feelings and sensations
Gentle yoga to re connect to your body of experiencing
These are all amazing practices to come home to your authentic, natural expression, the place where unconditional love and contentment lives.
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