This post is also available as an audio cast here.
Last winter, before I left for the US of A., I attended an introductory course in Neuro-Linguistic Programming at the local Adult Education centre... an experience worth writing about. Because, every time that you are able to be part of a group that is composed by several different personalities, you know that you are in the right environment to challenge your beliefs… and if you open up your mind, you notice different things! I could go as far as saying that the only commonality between us was… our interest in NLP…
… and this is the true recipe for interesting conversations.
About halfway through week three, we began to explore the senses, how they help us experience the world and how much of the data we store as a memory. Let me turn that last sentence into a story.
In your mind, go inside and… bring up a happy memory with someone special and now notice how you are holding an image of this memory in your mind's eye.
Notice how there are sounds and voices and…
… as you turn your attention to the way you felt then and now, remember what the atmosphere smelled like… then…
… if you were eating or drinking, remember what it tasted like!
What you will find interesting is that there are many more sensors, buttons and controls in the control panel of your memories that are fun to play with.
… Here's what to do next:
First of all, focus on the image inside your mind and as you're looking at this picture now, notice that good feeling that you have… and as you are thinking about it now... notice the location... is it on your chest, your stomach, your legs, your arms, your head… where on your body is it… exactly? If you can feel it everywhere, just notice where it starts… and then where it goes...
Now that you know where it is - what is the feeling like? How would you describe it to me if I was there? Does it feel hot, warm, cold, tingling, flowing, static, dynamic… ?
By now you know that you can recall a picture of you being in that place and feeling in a particularly pleasant way. Correct? Now, check this out.
Now, notice how the image in your mind has a location and a size… in physical space. Usually, if you were REALLY having fun that time, it will be right in front of you and will be as big or bigger than life. If it's not, it's probably a little further away from you and smaller, like someone is holding a picture of this image. If that is the case, then use your wonderful mind to make the image grow bigger… just as large as the image you see through your eyes… and bring it right in front of you. If the image is not focused, make it focused.
If you are seeing this memory as a third person, then step into yourself and see through your eyes like you saw then. Check that good feeling - how much has it grown?
Now turn the image brighter and let it move like it is a movie and it's now playing in real-time.
Great!
I told you there's many controls now, didn't I? In fact, there is a volume knob in your mind that can control the volume of the sounds and voices from this memory so turn it up and up and up!
Feeling better? Fantastic!
So … if you actually took 2-3 minutes out and actually do this you now know how to manipulate your memories in your mind to get (or remove) the feelings …
As far as I could count here, we went through five senses… what you saw with your eyes, heard with your ears, felt with your body, tasted with your tongue and smelled with your nose. That's what most of us have been taught at school and… that's how many the senses are… right?
Wrong.
Whether you believe there is a sixth, intuitive sense or not, this is not where I am going with this. Where I am going is that how many senses you have depends on how you choose to pick them. For example, if you restricted yourself to senses that give you information about the external world, you would probably get five but if you also included the internal world, you could count a sixth one, as the sense that lets you know about how you're feeling… on the inside. If you didn't care about inside or outside… you could go back to a different set of five and so on and so forth… makes sense?
Well, part of this "how many senses are there" debate is time. Some people say that our ability to tell time is another sense.
Time is… probably the most ludicrous invention of human kind. There is no time. Think about it. Speaking to you as a child now, do you think that you remembered what you did a couple of minutes ago or planned what you're going to do next? All you cared about then, just as now, is right now. You were probably thinking "what do I want right now" and did that… doesn't everybody say that kids are spontaneous?
Lacking "time", you just looked around in awe of all these new and exciting things around you… people, toys, electronic devices, furniture… and you thought to yourself "hm… aahh... that looks interesting, I need to go check it out"… and you walked over to the little toy car or Barbie and were like "oh, look at that, it looks just like that one"… and you played and played… because you asked yourself "what do I want?"… the answer was usually "play" and went ahead and did it until you were so tired that the answer became "rest".
Then, one time, your parents sat you down and told you all about this clock thing that ticks every so often and when 60 ticks have been, then a minute has gone past. You probably didn't understand what a minute was but I am on your side. There is no such thing as a minute. It's just a label we made up.
Now, before you begin to get relaxed about this, let me tell you that I think time is a marvellous invention… without the concept of time, we wouldn't be able to plan ahead of time and tackle those complex tasks that we tackle as intelligent human beings. So far so good.
But let's face it. There is no such thing as time. All the time you have is right now. Right now as in the moment that just passed as you read the last sentence. Yes, I really mean now. That is all you have. Seriously, think about it. Whether you think of the good or not so good things of the past or dream about the good or not so good things that may or may not happen to you in the future, the truth is that all you have is right now. All you can change is right now. All you can be is right now.
Most of us don't live to experience the now sometimes. I know I have. Have you ever been with someone who you consider to be precious and yet you were so enveloped in your life that for split seconds or longer were living inside your head listing the things that you have to do later or whether this thing that you are worried about is going to happen or not. Meanwhile… missing the love, care, and attention that the other person is giving you. Let me say that again. Love, care and attention. Are those really things that you want to be missing over something that you can do nothing about?
Let me give you an example. I used to be in a relationship with this lovely girl, a while ago. We met through a good friend and as soon as we did, it was almost like a switch turned inside my head and I could hear "click". You know what that means, right? I fell head over heels for her and so did she. I swear I could write a romantic novel about it. It was one of the most passionate and important relationships in my life… while it lasted… and you know, when we were together, this weird thing called "time"… stopped! It was almost as if it never existed. I instantly forgot about my worries, couldn't think of anything else other than the conversation we were having and all it mattered was the space between us… that invisible bubble that wrapped around us and kept us in a mental cocoon and create intensely pleasant feelings.
Then… the sun came up in the morning and we separated ways to catch some sleep before… the next time.
When I got back home, I went inside my mind and went through the memories of that same night and I could feel good about it once again. I really couldn't understand this but parts of the night were missing from my memory. Almost like someone paused the CCTV in my mind and there was only a blur… though I still felt great. Has that ever happened to you?
That night, I slept like a baby. I was so relaxed and mindless that I woke up on exactly the same place that I laid my body on. I hadn't moved an inch and it wasn't because I was tired.
The next day, I looked at the calendar… it was late July. Come September 15th, I was leaving home to go back to university… about 10,000 miles away. Once the thought of her met with this fact in my mind, I was horrified. Here I was, I had found someone that finally I could click with, after months of bachelorhood, and I was about to leave the country. I'm not sure if it was minutes or seconds later but that doubting voice in my mind began making uncomfortable suggestions: "I'm not going to see her for a long time"… "when am I going to find someone like her again"… "why me"… "this is awful"… "why"…
Needless to say that after this process had repeated itself for hours, it just wasn't the same next time I was with her. I couldn't stop my mind from drifting away and thinking all those scenarios that could or could not happen. What was going to happen… how were we going to make it? Were
we going to make it at all?
I must have been really strong because I remember torturing myself like that for at least a week and a half before I told her that this wasn't going to work given the circumstances… that I didn't want to hurt her and so on… I remember that she had several arguments that she presented to let us be together but funnily enough I remember none of them. In fact, I don't think I even took them in the first time.
Even though I know that I only know it because of this, I still wish I knew then what I know now.
Sure enough, I let her go and she left without another word - she was a proud girl with a lot of self-respect. I spent the rest of my time home being miserable, wondering what could have happened between us… and…
… the truth is that I will never know. Maybe the switch would have turned back and did that "click" again and we wouldn't like each other any more. Maybe we would still be together until I left and then separate. Maybe we would have continued to be together. I don't know... Then it hit me.
Maybe is not good enough.
I owed it to myself and I owed it to her to be in the now - out of respect. To be there for the moment and for her. To respond to her with my whole being, now. To be one hundred percent present and react to every little thing that happens… to be there and experience… her beauty… her sweet voice… her gentle touch… her seducing perfume… the taste of her lips… to experience her and allow her to experience me. To commit to our time together, and be present in this cocoon where anything is possible for us… to live extraordinary moments that are exciting … wonderful… to truly be in each other's presence and realize that anything is possible.
Let me tell you. This is what I'm going to do when I meet a girl as special and unique as her again. I know exactly where that is going to take me. Actually… I have no idea where it's going to take me but I know exactly how it's going to happen. With feelings of excitement… passion… love… with feelings that are going to create some of the most fulfilling memories of my life. Memories that I will look back to in the future knowing that it was worth it, no matter what. Tales more important than those of achievement, that I will tell my children, as a specimen of how to be a person. Not a good, or better person. But a person. Because only a real person can transcend into the company of someone else for their time together.
So … when the mysterious workings of the universe bring another opportunity like this in front of me, I will just ... STOP…
… take a deep breath...
… and ask "what do I want?"…
… when the answer comes up… it's just a matter of doing it, so do it.
