In researching the benefits of visualization, I kept coming across references to the reticular activating system, commonly shortened to RAS.
The RAS is a network of neurons located in the brain stem. The area is about the size of your thumb.
But like so many things in our body, it does more than the size would indicate. As Master Yoda said, “Judge me by my size, do you? And well, you should not!”
Your RAS looks at the information taken in and limits what the brain will look at since it can only process less than 1% of all the information and stimuli it receives.
It keeps what’s important. And lets the “non-important” pass on by.
The RAS then puts the important stuff in the front of our minds.
The rest of the things aren’t important enough; according to RAS, it keeps it from your cognitive ability.
If we tried to process every bit of information, we would most likely go insane because there is too much information to process.
It’s like having 100 browser tabs open, and you don’t know where the music is coming from. Eventually, your computer would just crash. The same goes for your mind.
So what does the RAS have to do with guarding your mind?
As the old computer coder saying goes, “garbage in, garbage out.”
Blain Oelkers gave a TEDx talk at Fountain Hills Salon and introduced the acronym WYTAYBA.
W Y T A Y B A. It stands for “What you think about you bring about.”
This is not some “name it and claim it” heresy.
This is about helping your RAS see what is already there.
How many of us have been in a loud crowd but heard our name being said?
How many parents have been around screaming kids but all of a sudden they sprang up because we heard “our kid’s scream?”
This is the RAS in action. This is “What you think about you bring about.”
Gardener Types
When it comes to your mind, think of it as a garden instead of some type of computer or machine.
We are organics, not machines.
Computers are always logical and predictable.
Gardens require tending.
If we what something to grow, we need to plant it.
In his talk, Oelkers asks the audience to decide what type of gardener they are.
A novice, that means you hate gardening. You never planted a garden.
Intermediate, someone that has planted a few gardens.
And if you’re an expert, then you not only can you plant, you probably can teach someone else.
Rember that if nothing’s planted, then nothing could ever grow.
Worse yet, you could get weeds and other nuisances to grow in your garden.
Your mind is like that garden. Whatever you plant in the mind is what you can bring about.
So you’ve got to plant something in there.
What type of gardener of the mind are you?
A novice is someone who really it’s their life is almost run by circumstance. They’re there. They’re not planting any kind of ideas of what they want. They’re just run by circumstance.
An intermediate gardener of the mind, is someone that has some goals, has written goals, plan some things in their mind what they want. Maybe you know some goals and some things you want to accomplish it to-do list that’s the intermediate.
And the expert, the expert is the person that actually plants what they want every day but also multiple times during the day. They’re always planning what they want.
According to Oelkers and others, it turns out that brain science, neuroscience, is explaining why WYTAYBA works.
WYTAYBA is connected to your RAS.
So we are going to decide the seed we want to plant in our mind’s garden.
As the inspirational lyricists’ Spice Girls (Matt Rowe and Richard Stannard) wrote, “So tell me what you want, what you really, really want.”
So I want you to write down one thing that you want to bring about your life right now.
So think about that for a minute.
Our 3 components
#1, we have this the seed you want to grow in your mind’s garden and your life.
Remember, “What you think about you bring about.
#2, we have to program the RAS.
#3, you have to take actions
Life Hack
How we program the RAS.
Do you think it is possible that I could remind you, let’s say you wrote down I want to exercise more? Do you think I can remind you of that 100 times a day, every day. that would be considered nagging. But nagging does work,
But do you think I can remind you 100 times a day?
Is that possible? Well, it is possible because right now, you live in a very unique time and space because you have the most powerful device known to mankind, and that is the smartphone.
Right, so everybody now there may be a few flip phones in the audience, and that’s okay. Don’t worry. But most people have smartphones. And so if you see on the screen here, that’s the unlock screen.
So smart people, this one company, they took 150,000 people, and they put on a piece of code, they measure how many times they turn on their and unlocked them.
How many times how many times a day do you think the average person unlocks their phone 10, 50, 80, 100, 100 Very close. It’s actually 110 times a day. 110 times. That’s the average.
Now there are some people who do much more that if you think about it, you know, there might only be like six or seven an hour of waking hours.
So the number one tool for programming your RAS is the unlock screen.
What do you want?
What do you think about, you bring about.
You have that opportunity right now to plant that seed.
When that seed starts to grow, and the RAS kicks in, you know, possibilities are going to be there.
Write out what you want on a post-it and take a picture of it. Set it as your locked screen picture. This will get burned into your RAS because you’ll see it dozens of times throughout the day.
Desiring God’s Calling
In the parable of the talents, one person did nothing with what they were given. One person did something with the little that they had. Somebody did a lot with a lot that they had. (see Matthew 25:14-30)
We have all been given gifts to use to bring glory to God.
We have been called to use them.
Remember that Ephesians 2:10 tells us, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
When we set our minds on what God has called us to do, we will start seeing His leading as the RAS starts filtering things out to show us where God is calling us to.
If we plant the seed, and that seed is to look for God’s sightings in our lives, we will start to see God sightings in our lives.
When we look for signs and guidance from God to see that we plant, we will start seeing just like the example of hearing your name in a noisy crowd.
Life is a noisy crowd, and God is more likely to speak in a still, small voice as He did with the prophet Elijah and less like the voice from heaven that John the Baptist heard.
To hear that voice, sometimes we need to look back at our lives. We look back at events.
We may see patterns or themes that pop through that could be telling us the areas in which God wants us to walk.
Have A Better Life
To have a better life, and not a bitter one, we need to plant positive seeds.
If we plant negative things, we will see and find negative things in our lives.
When we look at godly things and are looking for them, we’ll find them when we seek, we will find them when we knock the door will be opened.
So look at that post-it note. Write out what it is that you want to improve on. And then take the picture and make it the lock screen on your phone. So that the 100-plus times on average, look at your phone and unlock it go to unlock you’ll be reminded of it.
Make sure that the seeds that you’re planting are positive.
INSPIRED BY Blaine Oelkers TEDxFountainHillsSalon
Originally posted Dec 5, 2022
