Have you ever noticed that if you set out to look for something that unless it is really lost in the mists of time, that you find it soon enough?
My children often let out a wail akin to your average banshee that something is lost, gone, no more. But I've looked everywhere Daddy …. Uh huh. OK so let's think. Where did you last see it? Right here in this room and you have not taken it to the loo with you or out to the kitchen on your endless trek to the refrigerator for yet more food? No? OK so let's look in this room first. Oh, would you look at that, there it is, tucked under a cushion inches from where you were sitting. Amazing!
In life, we often get what we look for, whether we're aware of it or not. Have you ever noticed that the yummy mummies at school, who all look worriedly similar in my humble opinion, stick together as if their lives depend on it whilst quietly (if not subtly) shunning others? Do you think those people actively set out to be clones of themselves? Or is it that they see the familiarity as comfort and cling to those things seemingly in common?
Or the way the fit bodies at the gym greet each other like best friends whilst studiously ignoring those with the fuller figure? Is it really the case that when those people are not admiring how great they look in the mirror, that they actually do not see the others?
Then there's the person who is always at the center of a crisis or drama. Everything's just a little too fraught and it looks to be one thing after another that befalls this type of person. And is it a coincidence that this type of person is surrounded by people that enjoy being involved in a drama or crisis? Some people genuinely feed off of this type of person and enjoy living out the equivalent of a real life soap opera.
So I've said that some people ignore others that do not fit a certain profile and that some people actively seek out people from what they can get their kicks?
Sadly, it's true. We are really gifted when it comes to tuning out things that do not interest us, whether consciously or otherwise. When engrossed in a good book, it's very easy to become unaware of those around us as our imaginations take us in to the very heart of the story and we see, hear and maybe even smell the setting as the scene unfolds. Like many people, I've missed my station on the train on numerous occasions, even though the stop is reminded repeatedly.
Or when we're driving and we get to our destination and can not remember the journey. Why? Well, let's take what used to be a typical car journey for me a few years ago. I'd leave the house at 7am with a coffee and listen to a little breakfast radio and then around 7:30 the cell phone would start to ring. My team in Europe would be starting their day and if they needed me they would call. A text message or two would arrive, and maybe I have to check some 'urgent' emails. As one call / mail / text spawned another I'd be doing one thing or another until I reached my destination. I've arrived at the other end feeling as if I've driven there on autopilot.
The brain is a marvellous thing. It would have automatically filtered out everything but that which was crucial. I've arrived through a dense peak hour traffic, sometimes at high speed, unscathed and in good order. No near misses, no wrong turns, no other mishaps. I'd meant meaningful conversations, made decisions, driven normally and gotten the various things that had demanded my attention done.
What I'd missed out on is the minutiae of the journey. The scenery, many of the unimportant road signs and messages and the detail one might expect to take in if on a leisurely drive. And this is important to note as it demonstrates the amount of 'noise' that the brain takes away from us to allow us to focus.
Similarly, we filter in the things that are of interest to us, as per the 'drama feeder'. In the case of the walking drama, it could be said that those individuals bring exactly those situations upon themselves. People typically do not just have cars towed off their drive, their electricity cut off or myriad of other issues for no reason. There will have been a series of events that will have occurred and a number of opportunities will have arisen to take corrective action. Yet they did not and therefore allowed the situations to play out as they did. They attracted those events and there before attracted those drama-feeding people. Which is an interesting concept is it not? We can actually attract those handsome mishaps!
That's a negative example so let's look at it a different way. How do some people acquire a guru-like status? Are they genuinely successful and gifted in the field in which they claim or is it purely a perceived image? Or is it an example of very clever branding? Perception becomes the reality and perhaps even a self-fulfilling prophecy.
So the questions I'd like to ponder for a moment are these: Can we all do it? Can we all attract goodness to ourselves?
There is a school of thought, of which I'm an envoy, that we can do exactly this. It may not be an overnight transformation and in truth may take a reasonable amount of time. But what a pay-off! If we in fact get back what we give, surely this means that we have the ability to reinvent ourselves?
We've all known that person who's 'glass half empty' in attitude and is generally negative about everything. You know, the one who can single-handedly drain the energy from a room? I have to confess that I've been that person. Never intentionally, of course, but I have been the guy who poo-poo's every idea, who argues every point and been the only one in large group to argument a minor detail for the hell of it.
That is not me anymore and has not been for quite some time. You see, I learned that being that way visits like-minded individuals and then what do you have? You have a self-defeating group of nay-sayers that just brings everyone, including themselves, down. And who wants to be in the company people like that? Well, nobody except other 'negs' and people that feed off them and their created dramas.
That was not for me and I committed to seeing myself and my world through different eyes. It took time and it was not easy, but slowly and certainly I looked myself free of negative influences. With a fresh outlook, it will not be surprising to hear that the void left by the negative was filled by the positive. And with that renewed influence and outlook things started to change. And fast!
Personal development of this kind is hugely powerful and I'm blessed to have experienced the process first hand and to be able to show others that they have choice.
