So, What Do You Want?

The Rules for Being Human - 
Cherie Carter-Scott

10.You always get what you want. Your subconscious rightfully determines what energies, experiences, and people you attract – therefore, the only foolproof way to know what you want is to see what you have. There are no victims, only students.

Another couple of posters in my office:

Things are not as they are. Things are as YOU are.

All that you are is a product of what you have thought.

As I noted in my booklet, "The List of 50," we are all subject to subconscious programming. I used the concept of "filters" to describe this phenomenon.

For example, tune your ears into the room you're in. Really listen. You'll likely hear a ton of stuff you hadn't noticed prior to, well, noticing. Now, of course, the sounds are "just there." Your ear drums vibrate to all of it -- in it goes, through the bones, through the nerves, right to the brain's auditory processing section. There, through some mysterious subconscious process, the only sound you previously "heard" (became conscious of) was the sound you'd chosen, at some level, to hear.

It would be the height of naïveté to think that this process only applies to sounds and sights and senses. It actually applies to all situations in our lives. What happens in our life is about what we notice or give credence to.

I have a client who thinks her life sucks. She's been depressed lately, and thought she figured out why. She was enthroned in the john when she had "a mini-epiphany." Her whole house was painted and decorated gray. Here comes the filter. Her belief is that her life is a mess because of often unseen outside forces. Her "epiphany" was that her depression had been caused by the colour of her living space. No, really. Her depression would be cured by her walls being a different colour. No, really. To which The Phoenix replies, "Interesting…"

Never mind that, when I first met her, she was depressed and living in another, presumably non-gray abode. Never mind that, last week, her depression was caused by a lawsuit, and the week before by a bad back. Her filter is set on this: "Every bad feeling I have is caused by something or someone else outside of me." Thus, it never occurs to her to ask herself why she is always depressing herself.

My parents set an interesting filter some years ago. They began to assume that all grocery clerks cheated them. Now, clearly, things that are scanned have to be programmed correctly to scan right, and with thousands of items in a store, mistakes happen. They believed, however, that they always got robbed.

What they were doing, of course, was forgetting any time they didn't get robbed, and noticing every time they did. Dar and I checked 6 or 10 times, and our slips seemed to be perfect.

If all you choose to notice is what confirms 
what you already believe, you'll soon believe anything.

Just like the tobacco companies can prove tobacco doesn't cause cancer. All you have to do is discount any study that says it does. Simple, eh?

Our lives are the testing ground of our beliefs. Where I am in life right now is a perfect demonstration of who I am and what I believe. I can look at my surroundings and my mental and emotional and physical state and tell precisely what I want and who I am.

I had my every three years "annual" physical Monday. Healthy like horse, thanks for asking. 120/80 Bp., pulse 66, weight and cholesterol on target, I think. Last time, three years ago, the doc said I should just keep a small watch on fat consumption, as some ratio was a little off. As he looked at the test results from ‘97, he said, "Well, your bad cholesterol is below the problem area, and your good cholesterol is fine, but this one ratio is off by 4/10ths."

I used that news, which by the way is 3 years old, (the new results aren't back yet,) to have a small poutine with dinner tonight. The Canadians are groaning and also thinking, "Damn. Now I want a poutine, Wayne, you jerk!" (For the rest of the world, get this. Poutine is a Quebec invention (laying blame where it is due) and consists of a wad of french fries covered in cheese curd and gravy. The cholesterol count approaches the combined western debt.)

I may be healthy and fairly buff for my age, (a 37 year old colleague called me a "hottie" the other day. After I looked up what she meant ;-) I complemented myself.) but I want my poutine, too. So, I make up excuses and stories to get what I want. I ate this 30 minutes ago, revisited it just now, and will be feeling poutine all night long. How dumb. Yet it made sense when I ordered it. I was rewarding myself for 3 year old test results. I may say I eat healthily. The actual story is in what I choose to eat.

On a more practical level, I'm a counsellor because I made a decision, and jumped through the appropriate hoops – I did a Masters in ‘83. I'm a counsellor because that's how I set up my life. We live in the house we live in because of our incomes and preferences in housing. We understand this.

When I say, "And your primary relationship is the way it is because of what you set up (what you want) you may scream (especially if your relationship is not good) "You've got to be kidding! I don't want this! The fighting (or whatever) just happens." Or, "I do my best. It's all his/her fault!" Or, "What choice do I have? I have to stay for the kids." Whatever.

Well, whom do you think is setting up your side of the dramas you face? You are not compelled to do anything. That you choose to may not be apparent, but that's because of your subconscious filters.

If you assume your husband is a jerk, you will not notice his kindness, just his "jerkiness." If you assume your wife is never happy, all you'll hear is sadness. Not that the rest is non-existent. You'll just not notice. If you assume people are out to get you, you'll only notice the situations and times when they are. It will seem to be all the time.

If any aspect of your life troubles you (or better, if you trouble yourself over any aspect of your life) the ONLY way out is to begin to notice what you are asking for. If you find yourself saying "All men are the same," expect to be treated shabbily by "all" men. If you assume some situation will take forever to shift, it will, because you will ignore your positive steps and notice only the plodding ones, which lead inevitably to confirmation of how long it will take.

If you assume that your genetics or choices mean a life of pain and no hope of change, you're right. Nothing will change until your opinion does. And this is true, not in some weird, new-agey way, but because without conscious thought, you'll not notice situations or information to the contrary.

Look, instead, with a careful eye, at what and who is in your life right now. Claim responsibility. You brought in the cast of characters, you feed them their lines, and they obey your direction. You only see the aspects of your life -- and their and your behaviour -- that you allow in. You miss everything else they are doing or saying, all aspects that do not fit with your pre-conceived notion of what's going on.

You might, instead, ask yourself why your life is as it is – from the perspective of what you are choosing to have happen. You might ask yourself what you believe your relationships and life are about. And, at the end of this reflection, if you feel stuck, find someone to talk to about re-setting your filters.

It can be done, with diligence and patience. But first, you have to choose one thing.

You must choose to believe that life 
is much more broad than what you let in.

As you let the filters go, you become free to see that life is so dynamic and full as to break your heart.

If you only choose to see and hear and feel it all.