He says my daugther, and all the love he has is wrapped up in the tone of his voice when he says those two words, he says my daugther you must always look with both of your eyes and listen with both of your ears. He says this is a very big world and there are many many things you could miss if you are not careful. He says there are remarkable things all the time, right in front of us, but our eyes have like the clouds over the sun and our lives are paler and poorer if we do not see them for what they are.
He says, if nobody speaks of remarkable things, how can they be called remarkable?
- Jon McGregor, "if nobody speaks of remarkable things"
4 comments:
If you do remarkable things you better do not talk about them ;-)
If another one does remarkable things you should honour them - and also not talk too much about. Talking much about such things may destroy a good mood.
By focusing your mind just on whatever your eyes are focussed on you will miss the things that are going on right next to them...
If you do not focus your mind your consciousness will maybe even miss this but I think you will unconsciously notice them all. When we take our decisions our consciousness does not have to say very much anyway...
Greetinx, CwB
The question is, what is "remarkable"? In the book where the quote comes from, the girl is always searching for angels (the big things) and doesn't realize that all the little things that are passing her by are just as remarkable and that looking for them is just as worthwile.
We tend to only consider the big things remarkable and forget to see the beauty in the ordinary, everyday stuff. I sometimes remember that when it's a clear night and I look up at the moon and the stars - but by far not always. When I walk home from Kendo, I often only stop shortly before I reach the doorstep to look up at the sky and actually see it; so it takes me a 10 minute's walk to realize what a beautiful night it is.
Hmmmm, but maybe I would realize it more quickly if my mind was more open and less focused on specific thoughts. I tend to only see the small details and lose the big picture, or can't draw the obvious connections between the details (resulting in lots of Aha-experiences when people point those connections out :)
Hm, small things get remarkable very quickly if you miss them. For instance water. In our society it is something nearly without value because you can get it so easily. But sometimes when I practice kendo very hard my only wish is to get some drops of water. OK, sometimes I mentally cry for a cosy bed too *G*
Our senses send all the information they get from the surrounding to our brain. This preconsciously sorts out the stuff that seems to be irrelevant. If you were able to change this "filter" you would be able to change yourself very easily, I think. The things you recognise are those that seem to be the most important for you at that moment - hopefully.
If you consciously shift your concentration nearly everything can be remarkable I think. On the other side this can be a way to get a glimpse of how other people may perceive your work.
By the way I remember a nice effect related to this topic: Do you know the situation when flying over some pages and suddenly you notice that the passage you are looking for has already been there - on a page you have already scanned?
Good night,
CwB
Hehe, yes, Kendo makes you realize how amazingly good water actually tastes. A hard training makes you humble - afterwards, water and bread seem like the greatest feast in the world :)
Interesting thought about shifting one's preconsciousinformation filter. I wonder if it's even possible. It would open up doors to completely new worlds (or views of the world). A journey of discovering our lives anew.
I imagine it would be incredibly hard, though. Even consciously shifting attention for a longer period of time demands quite some concentration. And, in the end, your brain would probably still follow the paths it is used to, since we have predetermined our way of thinking for decades.
(Makes me remember something I once heard about our brain using the same neurons most of the time, while many remain unused until we do something that's very different to our normal behavioural scheme, which only then may activate those neurons - I think.)
Yes, I know that situation. I guess that happens because, in that situation, we pre-categorize the information we take in as very likely irrelevant, so when the relevant information does actually appear, we can't switch our modus operandi that quickly. That shows how we inhibit ourselves due to preconceptions.
Thanks for the great input! Gave me lots of interesting angles to think about :)
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