BY BOB FUSELIER
Los Alamos
Whether we want to admit it or not, the subconscious parts of our mind (the majority of our brain) is programmed to see life as a choice: is this good for my survival or is this harmful for my survival. We share this programming with every living thing. Even plants, which have no nervous system as we know it, react to their environment through this paradigm.
Our minds are programmed to see the world through the dualistic lens of either/or.
This/they are either on our side and good or this/they are against us and are bad.
Unfortunately, this view is an extremely limited view of reality. It is a subjective view
centered around a programming that amoeba and worms use. Yet, it is how we operate
throughout much of day and most of our life.
As humans, we have another choice: we can become aware of how our brain is reacting to that which is happening around us. It’s not easy. In fact, the very nature of how our brain is organized makes this extremely difficult. The conscious part of the brain that allows us to see the reactions of the subconscious parts of our brain is controlled by the subconscious brain. It’s like trying to examine our own eye through our own eye. Without a mirror, it’s impossible.
I was speaking recently with a Pakistani man who had lived as an exchange student with my wife and me many years ago. The topic of this column came up during our conversation. He shared with me a teaching he had learned, one that he attributed to Rumi, the thirteenth century Sufi poet. It was simple: I spent most of my life cleaning the mirror, then finally washed my face.
The mirrors that help us see ourselves are other people. Unfortunately, we don’t realize that we are using the other as a mirror. We either try to fix our problems by trying to change them or we hate in them what we hate in ourselves. Until we realize it is our face that is dirty, we will get nowhere; we’ll just keep appeasing our inner ego by cleaning the mirror and only add to the division and hate that surrounds us today.