Mental Processes 7 & 8
As cultures mature from primitive to more advanced they enter an age of transition. The result is “cultural lag.” “Cultural lag” means that people are trapped between the old, traditional ways and the new ways. Life in an age of transition is a battle between Nature's Intent and the culture’s momentum.
Nature’s Intent directs your Life-Energy towards high Integrity choices to further evolutionary excellence. The culture's momentum fights to continue to control your Life-Energy and direct it towards the culture’s priorities.
MENTAL PROCESSES THAT AUTOMATICALLY DIRECT YOUR LIFE-ENERGY TOWARD THE CULTURAL PRIORITIES
7. SYNAPTIC MISFIRES
Synaptic misfires are thoughts or chains of thoughts that take over your mental capacities, whether you want them to or not. Synaptic misfires compel you to think about things you have no reason to think about. They "force" you to tell stories/jokes you know you have told a dozen times before, even to the same people. Synaptic misfires compel you to mind-spin on issues over which you no control. They not only drain you of your vital Life-energy, but they cripple your mental capacities and inhibit your ability to act in your own best interest.
Once again, as with the other mental processes, synaptic misfires lead you away from dealing with anxiety provoking issues which violate your Integrity and deplete your quality of Life.
Financial synaptic misfires are one of the most common forms of this mental process. Any stressful experience, or anticipated stressful experience, can trigger mind-consuming thoughts and fearful scenarios about your financial survival. For example, when I was young I had my house painted and I spent the day moving my things to the center of each room and carefully covering them, hoping they would not get paint on them. That evening I was all ready for the painters to arrive, but my normally well-ordered home was in such disarray that the stress of the entire situation began to get to me. I found myself focused on my draperies and stories I had heard that older draperies can fall apart when they are dry cleaned. I became consumed with fears about where I would get the money to replace my draperies if the painters got paint on them, and I had to have them cleaned and they fell apart? I worked myself into quite a stew about all this, imagining all sort of terrible scenarios as to how I would try to protect my drapes from these mad, uncaring painters – when I finally realized that I only have shutters. I don't have a single drape in my entire house.
This example of financial synaptic misfires illustrates the power of financial fears to entirely distort reality. Luckily, I realized my distortions before I canceled the painters. Much of the time we are not so fortunate. Synaptic misfires, unknown to us, direct much of our behavior.
CORRECTIVE ACTION: Rigorously monitor your emotions knowing that stress, fear, concerns and even new situations are likely to trigger synaptic misfires. Call yourself to attention and align yourself with reality. Refuse to allow yourself to indulged in fear-directed behavior.
8. BLOCKING
Mental blocking allows you to ignore emotional and physiological responses you would rather not see in yourself. Anger is an example of an emotion which you often block. It is not uncommon for you to evidence (via your body language) that you are contorted with anger: your eyes narrow, your brow is furrowed with tension, you clear your throat, your hands and feet are sweaty, your fists are clinched, your legs feel like they want to run. And yet consciously, you may not even know that you are angry. This kind of mental blocking eventually causes headaches, ulcers, fatigue, immobilization, explosive behavior, and severe illness.
Blocking also separates you from past experiences you would prefer to forget. Sometimes this is helpful for children who are being subjected to volatile and degrading childhoods. They may need to block out these experiences until they are emotionally prepared to deal with them. But remembered or not, blocked experiences and emotions unconsciously control and direct your behavior, especially as you mature.
CORRECTIVE ACTION: Assume you are blocking emotions and memories you would rather not experience. Know you have the capacity to hide important information from yourself. Then develop the habit of looking for what you might be hiding. Study your own body. What is it telling you and others that you do not want to recognize?