July 4 2012: Post 540 (2012 Day 186)

July 4, 2012

Daily Comment

Do my thoughts become things (as I believe), or is this just a conceit? Do I have any control over my future, or am I being swept along by events, as time unfolds?

Let's start looking at this question (these questions?) humbly, and admit that whichever position I take, I could be wrong - the answer may not be knowable, strictly a matter of belief. So that is what I'm talking about - my beliefs.

I begin with the idea I believe, that I am a self-aware collection of vibrations that has created the illusion of time and space to make sense of my existence. I believe that the whole fabric of the Universe, its substance, is vibrations.

I also believe that our sensory perceptions of the Universe we inhabit are limited. Our sensory input is itself made up of vibrations, in different frequency ranges, interpreted by our brains, determining how we interact with everything we sense is external to our selves. I believe this same limited sensory input is interpreted and filtered by conscious and unconscious thoughts, and so, our view of 'reality' is distorted by a variety of things - some we are aware of, but many (subconscious) that are below our threshold of awareness.

If we accept the idea that we relate to the external world by taking a subset of the information available (through our senses) as interpreted by our conscious and subconscious mind, we have to conclude that what we know as reality is subjective.

If our experience of reality is subjective, then that includes our sense of time, which includes the past and future. The only 'actionable' part of our sense of time is the present - we can't act in the past (we can only remember how we acted, probably inaccurately, too) - and we can't act in the future, perceiving as we do that it hasn't happened yet.

However, there is a cause and effect relationship between the past, present and future - but we perceive it 'backwards' most of the time. We believe that things we did in the past, and are doing presently, affects the things that are yet to happen. I think things yet to happen dictate, to a degree, what we do and what we did. Here's why:

Examining any event that you have experienced, look back and see the dozens, hundreds, or thousands of individual actions/events/situations that had to be coordinated to make that event occur. You can extend it back however far you like, to the beginning of time (No 'Big Bang' means no perfect birthday cake when you 10, for instance). It is impossible for you to coordinate the split-second decisions you and other people had to make, to align weather, geography, biology, geology, etc. to bring about any given experience. It would seem that, if there's any guiding hand, and things are not random, that the effect comes first, then all the contributing, cumulative details that manifest it are 'put in place'. 

While this may seem like the opposite of my belief, I don't think it is. Rather, I believe that when we visualize a certain future event as though it were already accomplished, then move in that direction, we free ourselves from the space-time illusion. It isn't thinking about, or planning, how to bring about some desired future event - we aren't smart enough, nor do we have enough information to do that - I'm talking about leaving out the 'how' of a desired outcome, going directly to the future where it has been manifested, and, as best as our imaginations will allow, experiencing it as though it were in the past. If time is an illusion, this acknowledges that, and combines the past, present and future into one thought - that something in the future has already happened, and our present is consistent with both.

So, I believe in visualization, as a way to do exactly that. I don't visualize building an ark. I visualize sailing on the ark through the flooding rains, how I perceive that - all the sensory data that having accomplished it. Then, in the present, I start collecting the wood the ark will be made of, and leave the rest to the Universe.

Empirically, I have tested this and found it to work out surprisingly well. Surprising, because once I let go of the 'how' of making a thing come to be, the way it works out has frequently surprised me - sometimes in its seeming randomness.  

Preparation is not quite the same as planning. The whole, "Man plans, God laughs" thing. Sometimes, if I may paraphrase Woody Allen, 95% of an achievement is just showing up. That is what I depend on: Imagine the result, then show up when it arrives.

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Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:        200.2 lbs 
Yesterday's Weight:    198.8   lbs  
Day Net Loss/Gain:     + 1.4 lbs

Year 2012 daily weight from December 31, 2011.

Diet Comment:

This slight increase in weight is just noise.

Food Log

Breakfast
Skipped.

Lunch

Eggs, onions and spinach with salsa.

Dinner

At my friend Al's house for barbecue, I had celery, broccoli, cauliflower with dip; a burger and lots of grilled loin of pork; and grilled yellow squash. zucchini and mushrooms, and cole slaw.

Liquid Intake

    Coffee:   32 oz,   Water: 84+ oz

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