Today’s topic is on personal development, and the practices of Mindfulness and Cognitive Behavior Therapy. Things that touch on mental health. Note, I’m not a doctor. I’m an opinion.
If this is your first visit, what I’m doing here is building my own world. I don’t like the one I’m living in now, so I decided I’m going to start something a whole new one, thanks to the good people over at the Many Worlds Interpretation Center. In my world, I see the tribe has gathered for something. We are here to witness a great event, and all kinds of things are going on during the build up to this great moment. As we move forward in time, life changing events are becoming more visible in the foreseeable future. We can see a little bit more than just their outlines in the distance. There’s good, bad, unspeakable… and ethereal. All kinds of impactful things wait for us in the near future, and you and I are here to witness it, and in my world, steer our way through it.
Billions of years of evolutionary processes, not just of the body but also within civilization, have made their way to this moment in time. It’s a time of great understanding. We have reached a tipping point of understanding produced thanks to our compounded advancements which historical referencing provides. It’s a time when science and technology promise great bounty. It’s also a time that denotes mass destruction, if we don’t harness these great new powers coming our way. Our future right now is in stasis. Life can go either way. Very good, or very bad.
We are living during the dawn of the process driven world. This new world is only possible because of computers and the immense processing power they bring to civilization. It’s a world where things happen much faster than ever before. It’s also an opt in world. You don’t have to be part of it, but if you choose not to, others who are using it, will dictate your life.
This new world is manifesting through the internet. The Internet has literally replicated the traits and characteristics of the human brain, and we now have a cyber mind that works just like your brain with neurons, and synapses, and myelin conductors. Information is flowing along highways and sometimes super highways, sending information from one place to another, and we are building a eternal state of fluid and evolving shared awareness. It’s our collective consciousness, and like an open highway, it will take us to new, and explosive understandings. Even as our world speeds up, our great giant brain, living in the ether, promises to provide us with much more stability than ever before, but it is under our directive. We must collaborate to find it’s potential.
You and I, are alive during a period of explosive leaps in discovery. Building upon the historical certainty of big numbers, science and technology is approaching an intricate understanding of all aspects of life. We have broken down the human body to it’s fundamentals and we know in the very near future, we will be able to fix anything. With stem cell therapy, nanobots, and other approaches, we will not only repair our bodies, but regenerate and rebuild them.
We have reached quantum level understanding of our world. Everything is understood from the basic building blocks to the outcome, making all things mechanical and something that can be fixed or built from the ground up. This understanding easily facilitates great leaps into new realities in any field we wish to exploit.
There are more new understandings out there than ever before. Those maximizing the newfound potentials of the cyber mind are finding a deep richness in it. They’re using it to expand their personal growth and turning it into purposeful growth. They learn and immerse themselves into things like the universe, history, science, politics and social issues. The choices are unlimited, and with each lesson, people are defining themselves better and bringing additional value to their lives.
The internet has become essential to our lives, and an extension of our identity. We send and receive signals that live with us personally, but also live forever in the cyber mind. We’re an open connection to a great flood of information, communication, sharing and subversion. We now live in a refined, or what I would call, a recursive state of communication, where the potentials that come out of it are still positive and negative, but much, much greater.
This new world is intentional. Everything you say or do gets set down as is, and is available for future reference or exploitation. Everything in the cyber mind can be used one way or the other. It all has purpose. When you use it intentionally, you have become purposeful in the new world. You become an influencer of reality.
There are consequences to not being intentionally engaged with the new world. It’s one of those things where if you don’t look up, you won’t see it. Both worlds exist. The world we lived in without the computers still exists. Now there’s just another layer to life, and as individuals, we can utilize the expanded nuance or not. The problem is, there’s so much greater potential in the new world, that clinging to our old ways will leave us destined to be forgotten in the past. It will void our utility and therefore, purpose.
Participating in a world that is intentional and purposeful is not an easy thing to do. If you’re anything like me, it takes practice. An intentional voice requires beliefs and convictions. Without those you have no place to take your intentions. I naturally lean towards being loosey-goosey with my beliefs and convictions. It provides leeway regarding any given situation. Without conviction, I can adopt the belief of my community, whether it’s good or bad. I can blend in with the crowd, even when it’s hostile, and still find some security in that.
It just doesn’t seem to be enough security to forfeit all this potential I find in the new world. I see that I have an equal voice in the new here, and a forum to create change. I’m not going to give up this potential because of a small amount of fear I experience by striking out with my conviction.
My voice will carry in the new world. Once it’s in there, it flows along the super conductor of the Cyber Mind. Common voices will adhere to it, adding strength and security to my idea. A shared voice will evolve and create momentum, forging a pathway to a new reality. Everyone has a voice and influence in the new reality. All they have to do is actively speak.
If you choose not to develop beliefs and convictions, your life gets worse, not better. The environment gets worse, not better. World conflict gets worse, not better. The days of thinking your rights cannot be alienated are over. Any guise of security is gone. This is the new world, where if you don’t do something, things get worse not better. Without purposeful participation in the Cyber Mind, you stand to lose everything. With the environment alone, you stand to live a life worse than death in just a few short years.
We have come to the end of the line as a species. A change has to occur or we will die. Look at the environment. We have arrived at end times. The same can be said regarding the wayward economy, and the global fight for power and dictatorship. Life is about to change and there’s nothing we can do about that fact. What we can do, is choose how it’s going to change. Are we going to accept the end times trajectories out there, or are we going to pivot to an alternative and more fulfilling existence?
We are at a global crossroads regarding the governance of humanity. The democratic momentum of the world is being challenged by totalitarian nations. The consequence to us is either having a government serving on our behalf, or one we live in fear of. This is another end time scenario we are living in. A decision and outcome on the global rule of law is very visible on our futuristic highway.
Right now, it’s very possible we’re going to lose democracy. China is much more pragmatic in it’s goal to consolidate power than the Western World. It’s momentum is cohesive while the Western World’s is fragmented. In one generation, China has risen to superpower status and become an equal to the United States in many metrics. They, and loosely allied nations are now openly challenging the status quo. The first visible attacks on democracy are the assimilation of Hong Kong, expropriation of the South China Sea, and the war in Ukraine.
How are you and I to defend ourselves from these threats to democracy? Because we live in a dualistic and recursive world, there will always be a way to fix things, once we choose to fix them. In the physical world, history has shown us we build things and we keep getting better as we go. We develop histories of our knowledge. Stored understanding we can build upon. We learn to use the same metal we originally used to make crude pots, tools and weapons, to make cars, rockets and advanced technology. Because of historical reference, we’ve become pretty good at building things out of the physical universe. The truth is, with science and technology, we have built a great foundation to facilitate our continuation as a species, providing we use it with purposeful intention.
We can build things the same way in our abstract world. This is the Cyber Mind, but it’s also the uniqueness that is you, and it lives within you. It’s the thoughts, ideas, and mental wanderings only experienced by you in your abstract awareness. It’s your world, and no-one else’s. The physical and abstract worlds are dualities, and when you engage purposefully with awareness in this duality, you become an agent of change, and you will change reality.
Besides the physical world, I live in my abstract world, as do all of you. It’s my personal world, of thoughts, ideas, beliefs, and it’s unique to me. It really is my world. No-one else can penetrate the self aspect of my abstraction. Still, it’s shared somehow. It’s connected to you guys. All those little steps that brought us to cars and rockets came out of the abstract world of shared experience and understanding.
We are all connected to, yet unique in this majestic universe of abstraction. In this universe, I can build constructs of ideas, beliefs, purpose, conviction and goals, and share them with you. If I know what I want, and proceed with intention, I can create new realities by building upon experience, and it doesn’t have to be direct experience. I can draw from the experience of others.
Right now, because of this shared information, we know each and every one of us can develop superpowers. It’s been proven. You can become one who moves like ‘The Flash’ to get where others arrive at a walking pace. We started to see signs of this ability when Roger Bannister first ran the 4 minute mile. An impossible achievement at the time, but Roger was the little engine that could. From the very beginning, even though he couldn’t run the 4 minute mile, in his mind, he was saying, ‘I think I can. I think I can.’ As a matter of fact, he was visualizing himself achieving his goal. Conceptualizing different strategies over and over. As he practiced, he made changes that emulated the motions from an evolving conceptualization that eventually took him to success. He imagined how he was doing it just right, and from this perspective, Roger ran the 4 minute mile.
What Roger didn’t fully understand was he was constructing a superhighway in his brain, that would greatly enhance his ability to reach his goal. The highway was built upon repetition and refinement that comes out of intentional practice. Anything you practice with intention and commitment will take you to whatever your promised land happens to be.
We know this to be true. We know the biological process’s that occur in your brain when you practice. At first, you’re forming neural pathways through uncharted grey matter. The brain is going somewhere it has never been before, and with practice, it’s building a permanent structure that will take you to that place. It’s building a pathway to a new skill, and with repetition, the path becomes stronger, more defined and takes on permanence.
A physical process takes place because of practice. The brain insulates the new neural pathway with a fatty substance called Myelin. Myelin is a conductor. It’s like opening a channel free of resistance. It takes you to your newly forged place in the brain every time, quickly and with exact sureness. You develop a new ability and a new neural pathway that not only provides a protective layer to your new skill, but acts as a conductor to take you there quickly and with precision.
Practicing and building Myelin in your brain is consciously activating a recursive process of refinement. It’s a purposeful and powerful practice to a whole new existence that’s not just a bit better, but much, much better. Where once there was grey matter, Myelin replaces grey matter with a white shiny highway, where neurons no longer have to plow through a mass of uncharted territory. They now leap like electrons leap along a copper wire towards the desired and established outcome. You have consciously switched your capability to a speed that’s near instantaneous. You have become ‘The Flash’ at something.
When building our personal, abstract universe, we don’t seem as structured as we are when building our physical one. Maybe it’s because civilization has had countless generations to build upon the shared world, whereas you and I only have a lifetime to understand our personal potential. We do have some tools that have come to us along our shared abstract timeline. We find these tools in myths, stories, faith and science. The Roger Bannister story is one we can all learn from, use to inspire, and serve our personal experience. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Where does that fit into your world view? Living by this simple rule will make you more complete in who you are, and give you unbounded strength of character. You will move forward because of it.
Another personal development tool that’s founded in both faith and science, is Mindfulness and it’s close relative, Cognitive Behavior Therapy. Two things, that are the same thing, even though they’re not. This is a very sacred juncture because here we have something science came up with independently, even though it’s been around since 500 B.C. Here we have two opposing perspectives that teach the same thing, and so you have an exploitable duality which if used with intention, will bring you tenfold results in developing a powerful personal perspective. When you find a duality, act upon it. The rewards are exponential.
Both Mindfulness and Cognitive Behavior Therapy practice becoming disciplined at placing yourself in the here and now. It can be a place of reprieve. Both practices have physical and mental exercises to facilitate getting to the here and now, and sustaining the experience. The exercises are identical. Still, if you attend a CBT session and point out you’re doing Yoga, the instructor will argue it’s not until you’re forced to flee the ashram they rented to hold the practice. Surprisingly, CBT exercises are not Yoga, even though the practices are identical.
Scientific method was used to create CBT. A religious practice had zero role in the development of this medical tool designed to overcome anxiety, depression, and provide a management tool over stressful and mental challenges. When science developed physical exercises to facilitate focus on your breathing, they weren’t referencing the energy flow of chakra’s in your body. They were looking at scientific understandings of blood flow, muscles and ligaments, and relieving stress baring areas of your body. Science does not recognize energy releasing Chakras. It recognizes physiology and the movement of regenerative oxygen filled blood cells to relieve physical stress. Science is so diametrically opposed to Mindfulness, that it’s unable recognize the identical process they share. Two completely different perspectives.
What’s interesting here is science came to agreement with proverb. With both practices the sole purpose is to learn to focus on the here and now, and free yourself of self-inflicted judgment. As a result of Cognitive Behavior Therapy we know that if practiced properly, it will bring sustained calmness to undisciplined and looping thought processes, and train you to manage them. For those prone to looping thoughts, CBT will give them a place to be other than the inescapable. It teaches how to escape personal and often unwarranted stressors, and return to a calmer more productive state. From CBT, we learn there’s a place other than our negative thought, we can go to find relief when life gets ahead of us. You can’t be focused on your problems, when you’re in the here and now, and thinking about your breathing. Your mind cannot be in two places at once, and you will find reprieve in this. You will also find strength once you recognize and harness the potential, and this notion comes from Mindfulness.
Mindfulness teaches us of the Warrior Mind. We all have an image of a Bruce Lee type guy who can walk into any given situation with calmness and confidence, kick the crap out of a bunch of bad guys, and then instantly return to a state of complete serenity, having taken control of his surroundings. This conceptualization covers a key element of the warrior mind. Absolute confidence and contentment, during all of life’s situations, even the most dire. It’s a calmness and way of being, that comes from knowing you will be in control of every moment you experience, even if you can’t control every experience.
We can use mindfulness not only as a stabilizing tool, but also as a practice to find the greater potential that lives within us. We can learn to live in the warrior state of mind, and greet all of life’s moments on our own terms. Not only that, we can live ahead of the curve, and direct what moments we will allow into our personal experience.
It starts by managing the thoughts associated with our troubles and worries. These are debilitating thoughts. They can stop us in our tracks, but in the end, they are only places in the mind. There’s another place we can be, and that’s the here and now, as CBT and mindfulness have taught us.
When our troubling thoughts threaten to overwhelm us, we have to learn to set them aside, with all due respect. We don’t minimize our troubles and worries. We learn to file them, where they have a home with a degree of independence from our self. We consciously create a construct of separation and coexistence. Like a file on your computer, they’re always there and accessible with a shift in your thinking, but they’re not always the thing you’re staring at on your screen. Filing a troubling moment doesn’t remove the pain, but it separates it from you, and allows your to move on with your life. It’s recognized as a specific, identifiable, and something that no longer gets to have all of you. As a result, you gain strength because you’ve regained your focus. You have consciously created structure to your experience, and when you return, it will be on your terms, not the experience.
The reason we can feel confident in shelving our problems is because we never lose connection to them. They are exactly like a split particle. We once were whole, but now we’re fragmented by an experience. The experience is a part of us, but also separate. You can place it in a wave state, out of mind until you are prepared to focus on it intentionally.
The warrior mind is a lot like adopting a quantum mechanical perspective to manage our lives. We dive into the chaos, and find there is mechanical process with rules down there to manage and build our life. It demands we become more objective, and process driven, because here we find process to structure a productive life. The here and now. This is the place where you will build your reality. Both emotion and mechanical process will always be a part of what makes us move forward, but until we adopt the discipline and structure of the mechanical process, we will not make significant progress in our life.
The warrior mind sees the here and now not only as a place of reprieve, but also the only place in your life where you are in a position to change reality; yours and others. The here and now becomes a place where you set down, take stock, make sure you’re on the right course, and then leap into your next future moment. You become much more aware when you consciously touch down to the here and now throughout the day. You’ll find you start planning goals and objectives, as well as the frame of mind needed to take action. You begin directing your life, gaining momentum, and bringing the changes you desire.
This is the mindset we all have to adopt if we’re to survive in the new world. It not only gives us a higher degree of management over our personal lives, but also places us in a position to influence shared experience. Life becomes situational where objectivity and pragmatism can be applied to anything, even social issues.
Things like the environment are not too difficult to read. The trajectory is defined. We can either intervene and alter the direction of the outcome, or let things ride right into extinction. It’s important to note, it’s never too late to jump onto a new perspective. Letting things ride on a trajectory is a repeat function. It comes to it’s predictable outcome, and then it starts over again. Each time new information is gained from the process.
The repeat function of recursive duality is found in all things. We are no longer evolutionary beings. We are beings, continuously refining our potential. We experience a thing, and if we don’t find a new potential the first time around, it comes back with new information gained from the experience. We are then in a new position to make a more informed and refining decision, or recursive leap.
Regarding the environment, new information comes around all the time. Last year we were presented with information defining where we are in the environmental crisis, as well as how desperate our lives will be in a few years if don’t change the trajectory. This year, new information has come around where we identified tipping points of environmental systems. If activated, we will experience compounded acceleration of the crisis. A repeat, only more magnified. You get exponential rates of increase from that moment on.
This year we have a new sense of urgency to our condition. Last year, knowing without question, our lives will get a lot harder due to inaction, was not enough to get us to act. Maybe with the new information on the same old problem, will be what it takes to get us to do something, but it’s unlikely. Next year, we’ll have a more tangible account from the crippling droughts, and flooding that incapacitated the entire nation of Pakistan to take into consideration. By then, we’ll also have had another summer to relive it all over again. By then, we might have enough information to provoke us into action. The day is coming. Hopefully the damage will not be too great.
We will repeat and repeat until we organize and act. This day is inevitable, and on that day real change will occur. We too have our recursive tipping point, where we can no longer function within the status quo, and we’re prepared to venture out of our comfort zone. We will do it together, and our kinship will provide the security to see our way through to a world founded on greater potential. An evolution if you will.
Those of you who are already living with this new perspective and are not only prepared for structural change, but fighting for it, have already made the leap. You just can’t identify with your new state of abstraction, because of all the chaos down here created by a world where no-one has ever thrown a lasso around it and managed it, as it should be.
You’re the one who’s going to do this. You’re going to bring the tribe together and make them aware of the consequences of this world, and the potentials of the new world, where we create the reality we choose to live in. Develop your warrior mind. Get pragmatic about creating change in the minds of others. An explosive, recursive change is coming, and you are part of what it will be.