Stimuli. It’s everywhere. Car horns and ambulance sirens, crying babies in restaurants and snoring men on trains - all constantly pushing and pulling our minds and bodies in an infinite number of different directions. While some of the stimuli that we encounter are directly relevant to our own lives, the majority of life’s distractions are externalities – the spillover effect of one man’s life onto another, resulting from a lack of boundaries to separate the two worlds.
By definition alone, many would argue that the various externalities that we encounter on a daily basis are out of our control. They hold the power to push and pull us every which way, as other human beings are placed in the driver’s seat of our own lives. Given that it is often unfeasible to put the car in reverse and redirect the actions of others, our greatest power lies not in our actions, but in our reactions.
Have you ever been at an amusement park, waiting in line for two hours in the sweltering heat for a ride that will only last two to three minutes? When you first commit to waiting in line, your mind remains focused on the light at the end of the tunnel – the enjoyment that will come when it is finally your turn to go on the ride. But as time starts to crawl and heat and boredom begin to consume you, you become increasingly disconnected from your ultimate motivation for getting in line in the first place.
As you rise to the surface level, you start becoming more and more aware of the nuances that surround you: the little boy fighting with his brother, the man twitching his leg in front of you, the gum that recently found a home on your shoe, and the infinite amount of other intricacies that are suddenly starting to come into view. Yet, as you start to get closer to the front of the line, you remember why you were here in the first place, and you refocus your attention on the ride that is soon to come. While it is unlikely that the boys stopped fighting or that the man in front of you stopped twitching his leg, you become increasingly immune to the externalities that surround you as you connect with your inner motivations on a deeper level.
The key to dictating your own state of being is to go one level down. Instead of living your life on the surface level, where you are inevitably vulnerable to life’s many distractions, true power lies in the ability to connect with your inner self on a deeper level, and to carry your more complex motivations and ideas through to maturity. In order to gain access to this part of your mind, you need to overcome a fear that many of us don’t even realize exists within us – a fear of isolation. Without consciously disconnecting ourselves from the human and technological stimuli that surround us, we will never be granted access to the level that we must descend to in order to remain in control of our own lives. The only way to gain access to our innermost motivations and desires is to expose ourselves to a healthy degree of isolation. By removing the clutter that regularly consumes our attention, we open a gateway that allows us to connect with our inner selves on a deeper level. For many people, this exaggerated level of self-consciousness evokes many fears, as it may resurface some of the negative experiences that we have previously suppressed; however, granting ourselves access to our deepest level of thought is the only way that we can come to understand what lies beneath the surface.
Over time, your mind will become trained to subconsciously shift to different levels of cognitive awareness. However, until you get to that point, one of the best ways to train your mind to go one level down is to choose a consistent part of your daily routine that is most appropriate for slipping into a deeper realm of thought. Select a part of your day that is the most automated – such as the time you spend in the shower, your morning commute, or your daily run. Regardless of what routine process you choose, begin your mental transition by consciously taking your mind away from directly thinking about the logistics of what you are doing in the moment. Stop thinking about whether or not you washed your hair, or what stop you need to get off on when you are on the train; your mind and body are comfortable enough performing these tasks at this point, that they no longer require your full attention.
After you manage to reach this state of mind, there are a variety of potential ways to descend one level down. When first starting out, a good way to initiate a deeper level of thought is to ask yourself outlandish questions that begin with the phrase: ‘what if.’ What if trains and cars did not exist; how would people get to work? What if you lived in the middle of the jungle; how would you manage to find food to survive? What if you got out of the shower and found your dog serving you breakfast; how would you respond? When first training your brain to function at this level, the questions that you ask yourself do not need to be entirely relevant to your life on the surface; because at that very moment, you will not be functioning on the surface level – you will be functioning one level down, where assumptions are challenged and anything is possible. This type of thinking begins to stretch your brain in new directions, and you will be amazed by where your mind might take you.
After consciously pulling yourself into a deeper level of thought for some time, the process of riding up and down the different levels of cognitive functioning will begin to happen subconsciously. When you find yourself in a situation where attentiveness at the surface level is essential, you can focus your attention on your more reflexive thoughts. This surfaced level of functioning is required when performing tasks that require you to live entirely in the here and now - tasks like driving a car, giving a presentation, or cutting your hair. When you are directly engaged in a surface level action, going one layer down may actually derail you from successfully completing the task. However, when you find yourself in a situation that only requires you to play a passive role in the surface level experience, this is a good time to go one level down.
When placed in conjunction with a passive experience, immersing yourself in your deepest level of thought provides a promising foundation for innovation. This level of cognitive functioning is particularly effective when you don’t need to be extremely attentive to the present situation, and you can automate the surface level task – such as when walking to work, brushing your teeth, or standing in long lines. Given that different levels of cognitive functioning are more effective when partaking in certain tasks over others, your ability to ultimately increase your level of personal utility lies in your ability to effectively control the mental lever that moves you from one level of thought to the next. Once you have achieved this level of personal awareness and mental control, you will be well on your way to tailoring the world to your personal desires.
The first step in changing the world is to change the way that we see it. Though we may not realize it, life’s distractions only pull us in because we allow them to. The closer that you get to finding your center, the more leverage that you hold in dictating your own state of being. Instead of allowing the daily nuances of everyday life to rattle you, you will always have the ability to go one level down – to fall into a state of mind where your thoughts are all consuming.