Spend any time at all on the internet and you will eventually see one of those visual puzzle or multiple image advertisements inviting you to count up the number of different images or faces that you see within a given picture. Another variation of this often in the back pages of a magazine such as People, is two images of the same scene presented. The details within the second image are close to but not an exact match of the first image. Some details have been added; some have been removed or relocated. In each case, your goal is to count up the total number of faces, or altered details you spot that will equal the number of actual faces or changes listed in the answer key.
These kinds of visual puzzles can be fun and entertaining. There is also a more serious side to the process of what your mind is seeing.
For one thing, people tend to see and hear only what they already expect to see. In other words, they already have a preconceived notion of what ought to be visible or audible to them. Whatever you are locking in on (expecting to see or hear), also means that you are also locking out and dismissing a lot of data, sounds or words that don’t match with what you want to experience.
We wind up seeing what we want to see; and hearing what we want to hear.
This perception process has a lot to do with what is known as your RAS, or Reticular Activating System. Your RAS is an area of the brain stem that is primarily responsible for arousal, alertness, and sleep-to-wakefulness transitions. The RAS acts as a kind of filtering system between your conscious and subconscious. Your RAS takes instructions from your conscious mind and then passed them on to your subconscious mind.
Make an adjustment to your RAS filter and you suddenly begin to see or hear things you had not noticed before. Kind of like changing the channel on your HDTV. A different station, different program and a different point of view.
Respected author, speaker and noted sage Dr. Wayne Dyer is well known for his quote, “When you change the way you look at things what you look at changes.” Dr. Dyer’s quote is right on point with respect to the topic at hand. When operating, your RAS locks onto something you are highly interested in or motivated by. At the same time it is also locking out a lot of other things you have deemed as irrelevant or not important. Thus you will see some things, but lock out, ignore or overlook others.
Paco Underhill, in his retail sales research book entitled, Why We Buy, summed it up very well when he addressed the issue of how customers of a business can act in a way that is a complete surprise to the merchant owner. Mr. Underhill simply surmised, “the obvious isn’t always apparent.” The issue in the book concerned merchants being caught off guard by a customer behavior because the merchant was only looking at things from a sellers point of view instead of a buyers. Step into the shoes of a buyer and now the merchant sees things he completely missed before.
So what happens when you decide to tone down or shut off your RAS filter? What might you begin to see or experience that is different from what you did not see or experience the first time you viewed an image, met someone new, or conversed with a relative?
Start to look at things differently and what you notice will be different from what you saw before. Open your mind up to new possibilities, and what you experience will now be seen or felt in a new light.
As a caregiver who has been working with Alzheimer’s and dementia stricken parents over the past 6 years, I have made substantial efforts at trying to see things from the point of view of the parent with the failing cognition. Entering Alzheimer’s World requires patience, adaptability and the desire to change the way you view what is happening with that person.
You CAN see as though you are seeing things through the eyes of another. You just have to adjust your on-board mindware a little.
The choice is yours.
Jeff Dodson
December 19th 2010
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