deprive them of light. Except for once a day, for just an hour or two, when the scientists beamed in just enough light for the kittens to see a couple of vertical black and white stripes. That’s it. A couple of hours, a couple of stripes. Now, I don’t know whether their consciences finally got the better of them or whether some PETA-type predecessor started breathing down their necks, but after several months they released the kittens from the dark. What they discovered was the kittens’ cortical cells (cells in the eyeball for those of you who aren’t scientifically minded) that favored nonvertical orientation had gone into hibernation. They could no longer make out horizontal lines. They literally bumped into horizontal ropes that were stretched out in front of them.
In 1961, when anthropologist Colin Turnbull studied Pygmies, he took one of his subjects outside of the forest where he lived. Since he’d never been exposed to wide, open plains, the Pygmy’s sense of depth did the same disappearing act as the kittens’ cortical cells. Turnbull pointed out a herd of buffalo in the distance, and the Pygmy, whose depth perception was distorted, refused to believe it. “It has to be ants,” he insisted.
His perceptions were influenced by what he had been conditioned to see. As thinking beings, we continually try to make sense of our world. Sounds like a good thing, right? Except that any piece of information that doesn’t quite fit with our beliefs, we alter without even noticing. We knead and we squeeze until everything finally fits into the tight box of our limited belief system.
We think what we perceive with our senses is true, but the fact that I will keep banging you over the head with is … it’s only one-half of one-millionth of a percent of what’s possible.
At the base of the brain stem, about the size of a gumdrop, is a group of cells whose job is to sort and evaluate incoming data. This control center, known as the reticular activating system (RAS), has the job of sending what it thinks is urgent to the active part of the brain and to steer the nonurgent stuff to the back. But as it’s organizing, it’s also busy interpreting, drawing inferences, and filtering out anything that doesn’t jibe with what we believe.
In other words, we rehearse ahead of time the world we want to see. Too bad we all picked up the wrong script.
This simple, 48-hour experiment will prove that what you see in life is none other than what you look for. It will also prove that it’s possible to find anything you look for. And most important, it will prove that by changing what you look for, you can radically change what shows up in your world.
Anecdotal Evidence
“Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.”
—B UMPER STICKER SEEN IN L AWRENCE , K ANSAS
You’ve probably never heard of Peter and Eileen Caddy. But I’ll bet the name Findhorn rings a bell. Remember that garden in Scotland that yielded cabbages big enough to knock over a postal truck? Well, Peter and Eileen Caddy are the folks who grew those 40-pound cabbages (keep in mind that the average cabbage is four pounds, five ounces), and they did it by focusing their thoughts on a higher truth.
They certainly didn’t have anything else going for them. In fact, when the Caddys, their three sons, and fellow spiritual seeker Dorothy Maclean moved into the trailer on that windblown peninsula jutting out into the North Sea, the land could best be described as dead and profitless. Nobody in their right mind would have chosen it as a spot to grow anything, let alone a garden. The soil—if you could call it that—consisted of rocks and sand, the gales were strong enough to knock over the average second grader, and their “less than Better Homes ” locale was smack-dab between a garbage dump and a dilapidated garage.
But by focusing on a higher truth, they created a garden that can only be described as miraculous. Although it was the 40-pound cabbages
In 1961, when anthropologist Colin Turnbull studied Pygmies, he took one of his subjects outside of the forest where he lived. Since he’d never been exposed to wide, open plains, the Pygmy’s sense of depth did the same disappearing act as the kittens’ cortical cells. Turnbull pointed out a herd of buffalo in the distance, and the Pygmy, whose depth perception was distorted, refused to believe it. “It has to be ants,” he insisted.
His perceptions were influenced by what he had been conditioned to see. As thinking beings, we continually try to make sense of our world. Sounds like a good thing, right? Except that any piece of information that doesn’t quite fit with our beliefs, we alter without even noticing. We knead and we squeeze until everything finally fits into the tight box of our limited belief system.
We think what we perceive with our senses is true, but the fact that I will keep banging you over the head with is … it’s only one-half of one-millionth of a percent of what’s possible.
At the base of the brain stem, about the size of a gumdrop, is a group of cells whose job is to sort and evaluate incoming data. This control center, known as the reticular activating system (RAS), has the job of sending what it thinks is urgent to the active part of the brain and to steer the nonurgent stuff to the back. But as it’s organizing, it’s also busy interpreting, drawing inferences, and filtering out anything that doesn’t jibe with what we believe.
In other words, we rehearse ahead of time the world we want to see. Too bad we all picked up the wrong script.
This simple, 48-hour experiment will prove that what you see in life is none other than what you look for. It will also prove that it’s possible to find anything you look for. And most important, it will prove that by changing what you look for, you can radically change what shows up in your world.
Anecdotal Evidence
“Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.”
—B UMPER STICKER SEEN IN L AWRENCE , K ANSAS
You’ve probably never heard of Peter and Eileen Caddy. But I’ll bet the name Findhorn rings a bell. Remember that garden in Scotland that yielded cabbages big enough to knock over a postal truck? Well, Peter and Eileen Caddy are the folks who grew those 40-pound cabbages (keep in mind that the average cabbage is four pounds, five ounces), and they did it by focusing their thoughts on a higher truth.
They certainly didn’t have anything else going for them. In fact, when the Caddys, their three sons, and fellow spiritual seeker Dorothy Maclean moved into the trailer on that windblown peninsula jutting out into the North Sea, the land could best be described as dead and profitless. Nobody in their right mind would have chosen it as a spot to grow anything, let alone a garden. The soil—if you could call it that—consisted of rocks and sand, the gales were strong enough to knock over the average second grader, and their “less than Better Homes ” locale was smack-dab between a garbage dump and a dilapidated garage.
But by focusing on a higher truth, they created a garden that can only be described as miraculous. Although it was the 40-pound cabbages
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