WHAT AM I MISSING?

WHAT AM I MISSING?

Right now, as you're reading this, are you consciously aware of your breathing, or were you, before I brought it to your attention? Are you aware of your heartbeat? How about the way your collar feels on your neck, or the way the shoes feel on your feet? Actually, thousands of perceptions reach our brains each moment, but we only pay conscious attention to one or at the most a few of them at once. The positive side of this is that we can consciously focus on those few things that we have decided need our attention. The negative side is that the vast majority of sensory input we perceive, we are deleting from our conscious awareness. The reticular activating system (RAS), part of our nervous system, filters out all input we don't want in conscious awareness. Without the RAS we would be in such overload from sensory input that we could not function. There is, however, input that we may be filtering or deleting that could improve the quality of our lives. We can pull these things from being filtered out by taking time to pay conscious attention to them. For example, if while driving you decide to notice all the blue cars in your city, you will notice cars you've never paid attention to before and will most likely be surprised at how many blue cars there are in your city. If you decide to notice the 'good things' in your life, you will notice or become aware of so much you had been deleting before. People who take time to read from spiritual or motivational books everyday notice things of a spiritual or inspiring nature they had been deleting before. One can't help but wonder, "What am I missing?"