Perfecting The Process | Living out a Dream
- Bob Sandidge in Algonquin, IL 2006 on a humid summer evening by the river
What’s going on today? Well I’m feeling badly for neglecting my blog. More so than ever because I know that I have valuable information to convey. But I suspect that whatever I write here now will not be that. Why? Because I’m feeling very close to my life. Very in touch with my surroundings. Very connected to people around me. This is good. Because sometimes my daily sensory input is so overwhelming that I can’t extend myself to others – in phone or in person. I’m “there” in body and voice but the me of me is not really present. I’m outside observing – keeping a “safe” distance from the me that is transacting the business of the day. Result? Not being alive. Walking through the day. Showing up for myself and others as a shell of who I am and what I have to offer.
I think too much. That is my “smart” brain keeps me occupied with so many possibilities of what is going on around me and possibilities of what it all means and the possible ramifications of every word and action that my energy, expression, and presence is always being shunted. Narrowed - compressed – filtered – mineralized – the ultimate in Political and Social Correctness – to a blander less alive and engaged and engaging me.
The good news is that few are fooled. Almost everyone who has had at least a two minute conversation with me knows that I’m not the guy next door. I could be an alien from the future. I don’t think that is as far fetched as it sounds. Here’s why. One of my creative strategies when writing or thinking or leading or visioning is to “think backwards” – that is, if I were in the future 20 years what would today look like from that vantage point. From that alien to this moment vantage point. Inevitably when the “alien” me looks back to this moment there is direction about what to do and how to do it. This “alien” perspective helps me see my today as foundational to my tomorrow. Whatever I begin today is the beginning of an “energy – intention wave” which has great potential as it unfolds into the future.
I also think the other way. When I take a picture, I ask myself – “what about this scene will be a gift to the future?” – “What is going on here that will tell some part of the story of this time to a generation not yet born?” Talk about brining some consciousness to your picture taking .. what is it that you want to “send forward” to future generations.
Never before were these questions as boldly written as they are today. Today the “artifacts” of our culture are everywhere and in the flash of a broken internet could be nowhere.
The internet is our new collective consciousness. Inter and Net are both great words to combine for this globally connective electronic tissue. Inter – between – among – in the midst of. It’s the externalization of our neurology. It is the big brain with each of us connected and talking and feeding the big and bigger ideas and big and bigger relationships that the INTERnet makes possible.
What feeds the internet is the “intranet.” Where do you think this writing is coming from? Very “intra” and I’m going to publish it on the “net” that is an extension of my own thinking process which then puts these ideas into the potential thought processes of hundreds of thousands – yes – millions of other “intra net” minds via the inter net.
Do you remember the amazing, ahead of his time, media visionary, Marshall McLuhan? He postulated that all of our technology is an extension of the human body. The car is the extension of the foot. TV is an extention of our sensory system. Consider that everytime we watch TV or a movie that we are giving up the everyday option that we exert over our eyeball to look at what we choose. When we watch TV or movies there are other people who are holding and pointing our “eyeballs” toward what they wish us to see. We don’t have the option to zoom back or pan over or zoom in. We are looking at what they choose to “edit” into our awareness. The director is creating within us – our screens are only a transmission device to reach our brains – are creating within us the reality that is shaped by their filters and world view. Like it or not. We are influenced and changed by it. We cannot be not changed by what we perceive. The mind can “decide” to not act on something, it cannot make what has happened not have happened. In other words, we are shaped by our perceptions more than by our thoughts. This is how marketing really works.
Most people will say that they are not affected by marketing. And they are right. They are not consciously affected. But the truth is in what they buy and what they own and the lifestyle they live. Who made up that story? How did they know to live the way they do? How did they know to buy what they bought? They may not – likely will not – know how most of the “conventions” in their life came into being. They will have a conscious mind story about all of it. We all make post event stories to explain what just happened – but the stories are just that. They are not what happened. They are a narrative applied by the mind to help us maintain our sense of “understanding” and “control” over what goes on around us. But what if what goes on around us has no words or concepts that fit it? Then what do we call it? Usually .. .the closest reference that we can pretend to believe ourselves or that we think someone else will believe.
What if we live in the world of the “unbelievable.” What if it is all beyond our comprehension? What if nothing means what we insist that it mean? What if that were the definition of freedom? What if freedom was living outside the encumbrance of cultural thinking? What if what we called real was not? What if we were far more powerful and divine than we could have ever imagined (especially considering that we live in a world where keeping us enslaved to the idea of “higher power” and “higher authority” is what our social and religious institutions work so hard to keep us believing.)
My point? This is my personal Bob’s Eye View …. That each of us is so much more than we can currently imagine given the cultural and social hypnosis that keeps us in the aggressive, domination, strive, kill or be killed mode. How many times a day do you evaluate where you are at by are you “right or wrong” – “Good or bad” – you see any of those choices are not about who we really are. Those are judgments about us . Judgments made about us and internalized by us as legitimate coterie for deciding how to be. The only way to know yourself is to be beyond judgment – “good” or “bad” both ideas carry just as much life limiting energy. Do you have the courage to just .. BE?
What’s going on today? Well I’m feeling badly for neglecting my blog. More so than ever because I know that I have valuable information to convey. But I suspect that whatever I write here now will not be that. Why? Because I’m feeling very close to my life. Very in touch with my surroundings. Very connected to people around me. This is good. Because sometimes my daily sensory input is so overwhelming that I can’t extend myself to others – in phone or in person. I’m “there” in body and voice but the me of me is not really present. I’m outside observing – keeping a “safe” distance from the me that is transacting the business of the day. Result? Not being alive. Walking through the day. Showing up for myself and others as a shell of who I am and what I have to offer.
I think too much. That is my “smart” brain keeps me occupied with so many possibilities of what is going on around me and possibilities of what it all means and the possible ramifications of every word and action that my energy, expression, and presence is always being shunted. Narrowed - compressed – filtered – mineralized – the ultimate in Political and Social Correctness – to a blander less alive and engaged and engaging me.
The good news is that few are fooled. Almost everyone who has had at least a two minute conversation with me knows that I’m not the guy next door. I could be an alien from the future. I don’t think that is as far fetched as it sounds. Here’s why. One of my creative strategies when writing or thinking or leading or visioning is to “think backwards” – that is, if I were in the future 20 years what would today look like from that vantage point. From that alien to this moment vantage point. Inevitably when the “alien” me looks back to this moment there is direction about what to do and how to do it. This “alien” perspective helps me see my today as foundational to my tomorrow. Whatever I begin today is the beginning of an “energy – intention wave” which has great potential as it unfolds into the future.
I also think the other way. When I take a picture, I ask myself – “what about this scene will be a gift to the future?” – “What is going on here that will tell some part of the story of this time to a generation not yet born?” Talk about brining some consciousness to your picture taking .. what is it that you want to “send forward” to future generations.
Never before were these questions as boldly written as they are today. Today the “artifacts” of our culture are everywhere and in the flash of a broken internet could be nowhere.
The internet is our new collective consciousness. Inter and Net are both great words to combine for this globally connective electronic tissue. Inter – between – among – in the midst of. It’s the externalization of our neurology. It is the big brain with each of us connected and talking and feeding the big and bigger ideas and big and bigger relationships that the INTERnet makes possible.
What feeds the internet is the “intranet.” Where do you think this writing is coming from? Very “intra” and I’m going to publish it on the “net” that is an extension of my own thinking process which then puts these ideas into the potential thought processes of hundreds of thousands – yes – millions of other “intra net” minds via the inter net.
Do you remember the amazing, ahead of his time, media visionary, Marshall McLuhan? He postulated that all of our technology is an extension of the human body. The car is the extension of the foot. TV is an extention of our sensory system. Consider that everytime we watch TV or a movie that we are giving up the everyday option that we exert over our eyeball to look at what we choose. When we watch TV or movies there are other people who are holding and pointing our “eyeballs” toward what they wish us to see. We don’t have the option to zoom back or pan over or zoom in. We are looking at what they choose to “edit” into our awareness. The director is creating within us – our screens are only a transmission device to reach our brains – are creating within us the reality that is shaped by their filters and world view. Like it or not. We are influenced and changed by it. We cannot be not changed by what we perceive. The mind can “decide” to not act on something, it cannot make what has happened not have happened. In other words, we are shaped by our perceptions more than by our thoughts. This is how marketing really works.
Most people will say that they are not affected by marketing. And they are right. They are not consciously affected. But the truth is in what they buy and what they own and the lifestyle they live. Who made up that story? How did they know to live the way they do? How did they know to buy what they bought? They may not – likely will not – know how most of the “conventions” in their life came into being. They will have a conscious mind story about all of it. We all make post event stories to explain what just happened – but the stories are just that. They are not what happened. They are a narrative applied by the mind to help us maintain our sense of “understanding” and “control” over what goes on around us. But what if what goes on around us has no words or concepts that fit it? Then what do we call it? Usually .. .the closest reference that we can pretend to believe ourselves or that we think someone else will believe.
What if we live in the world of the “unbelievable.” What if it is all beyond our comprehension? What if nothing means what we insist that it mean? What if that were the definition of freedom? What if freedom was living outside the encumbrance of cultural thinking? What if what we called real was not? What if we were far more powerful and divine than we could have ever imagined (especially considering that we live in a world where keeping us enslaved to the idea of “higher power” and “higher authority” is what our social and religious institutions work so hard to keep us believing.)
My point? This is my personal Bob’s Eye View …. That each of us is so much more than we can currently imagine given the cultural and social hypnosis that keeps us in the aggressive, domination, strive, kill or be killed mode. How many times a day do you evaluate where you are at by are you “right or wrong” – “Good or bad” – you see any of those choices are not about who we really are. Those are judgments about us . Judgments made about us and internalized by us as legitimate coterie for deciding how to be. The only way to know yourself is to be beyond judgment – “good” or “bad” both ideas carry just as much life limiting energy. Do you have the courage to just .. BE?
posted by Bob Sandidge | Perfecting The Process | 7:46 PM
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