Recently I attended a seminar and learned a few more cool things about brain mapping. While I knew most of the stuff that was presented, I did not know how they all come into play together. I’m going to geek out for a moment, but also hope that this will help others to understand the true potential they have.
There are thousands of thoughts that rush through our brains on a daily basis. Most of them are so fast that we never even knew we’ve had them. Yet, the fast brain actually dictates the majority of our reality. The fast brain is the one that recognizes patterns and continuously searches for mapping clues. In other words, the fast brain maps the surroundings, then seeks out familiar people, scenarios and places that it can connect to previous experiences. The fast brain acts on only one thing: the world as we know it.
So what is the fast brain? It is the instinct, your “animal” brain and it does not discriminate between good and bad. It merely maps. This is why people keep repeating the same cycles and keep making the same decisions, hence, finding themselves in the same relationships and outcomes, year after year, time after time. Our fast brain mapped, recognized based on the existing database, then pulled the experience into existence; because we flock to what we know.
Luckily for us, we also have the slow brain, also known as the methodical side. This one does not act on compulsion, but actually responds to decisions that are well thought out, envisioned, wanted and desired. This is where your ability lies to change a pattern; and where your free will comes into play!
When talking about the slow brain, let’s also talk about your two best friends that will help you with the rewiring – procrastination and distraction. Yes, in the context of rewiring your brain patterns and impulses, it is not only OK, but necessary to use these two traits. Let me give you an example. Let’s say you want to lose weight and you seem to lack total control when it comes to sweets. If you can fool the brain, by ignoring the impulse to reach for the cookies, let’s say, and just simply decide to wait (I use gaming to keep me distracted), your brain will, after a while, learn that the impulse doesn’t mean you are hungry, no matter how you feel and that the urge will cease. The impulse may appear as true and real, for example being super hungry or starving, when all we are doing is experiencing an impulse, based on conditioned action. Slowing the impulse down is our friend and allows us to get back in touch with our true will.
How does this shape your true will, you may ask. Well, as human beings we often feel as if we are merely pinballs, mercilessly thrown around by emotions, seemingly random thoughts, impulses and whims. It appears as if we have no or very little control over what happens, because we keep ending up in the same situation, even though we may have moved; well, sometimes across the globe. Even though we truly changed the environment! It’s just that no matter where we go and what we do, we assess with lighting speed, unbeknownst to us, the one thing that is familiar, even if that’s the one thing we no longer want.
The beauty is, once you are aware and understand how your brain maps and how you are able to use the slow brain to dictate what you think and how you respond, you will also start attracting different outcomes. As you reinforce the new patterns, by visualization, meditation, or just acting, the fast brain will start mapping the new thoughts to match it up with the appropriate experience and outcome.
Thoughts become things, as Mike Dooley always says and you and your life are, in fact, a complete product of what you think. This is also how cognitive behavioral therapy works, btw. You delay the response, sit with the experience until you learn that absolutely nothing happens, contrary to what your brain tells you, which is to run or act. With this new knowledge you can start literally creating your life as you see fit; and the sky truly is the limit!
