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Knowing What You Want Will Show You The Way …
Posted by Joseph Riggio on Wednesday, August 23, 2006Finding your way in a world full of noise can be overwhelming ... knowing where you are headed can make all the difference!
Afternoon Folks,
I’m getting a bit of a late start on the ole’blog these last couple of days ... I mentioned to a colleague that it sometimes feels like I’m living in Grand Central Station ... phones are ringing, people are coming in and out, children want to be fed, coffee needs drinking (and therefore making ...) ... and so on, and so on. Most people however, myself included most of the time, simply call this LIFE!
So plainly the thing to do becomes obvious instantly when we’re paying attention ... get on with it ... get on with our lives. Yet sometimes this too can be a challenge unto itself ... choosing what to be getting on with. Where should we be putting our attention in terms of what has come up and what we find coming up around us that will most allow us to stay aligned with ourselves, operating with integrity and most effectively get our outcomes? Knowing how to answer this question can often make all the difference in both the quality of the outcomes you are producing ... and the quality of the life you are living.
One of the things I’ve been directing my attention to over these last few days here in “BlogNostra” has been the idea of noticing for information in the environment in a particular way - how the media directs our attention and how we attend in the world based on the “ground” created by the myth we hold, for example. What I’m really commenting about as I’m commenting on “noticing for” could be restated as commenting about the “signal-to-noise ratio” in the environment that we confront daily.
Simply put we are constantly under a barrage of “noise” that demands our attention by shear volume ... both in terms of amplitude and quantity ... it can be overwhelming! The trick to learn revolves around distinguishing the “signal” from the “noise” ... learning to pay attention not only to the “important”, but further refining this and paying the most attention to the “most important”.
Learning to pay attention to the “most important” information/data in the environment/context virtually always gives you a distinct edge in performance over those who are trying to pay attention to everything ... or even to everything that could be important.
In order to learn how-to pay attention to first and foremost (and at times only) to the “most important” information/data in the environment/context requires a specific orientation:
Most people can do one or more of these things some of the time, or do all of these things for a bit of the time - but very few people have learned how-to do all of these things, all of the time when they are operating in relation to getting their intended outcomes - yet learning how-to do all of these things simultaneously for as long as it takes to produce your intended outcomes forms the essence of what I’d call “Exquisite Performance.”
In fact what I’ve found seems to be that most people begin well and then ... get stuck. They literally “get stuck” and the simple evidence begins as you notice them holding their breath as they try to perform in realtion to producing their outcomes ... their very breath “gets stuck.” In contrast to this “exquisite performers” have learned to remain fluid and free as they perform - a measure of being “in the zone” or maybe accesssing a “flow state” - they remain aware and present as they continue to operate in relation to the outcome intended.
This last observation becomes critical when you apply it to “exquisite performance”:
The ability to “remain aware and present” as they continue to “operate in relation to the outcome intended” forming the essence of “exquisite performance.”
However, sometimes the environment/context stacks the deck against this kind of exquisite performance - by example we could use the idea of the “NEWS” as presented by the mass-media ... ALL NOISE! What these folks have become professional at doing includes raising the level of the background noise so high that it drowns out any possibility of extracting the “signal” - so ultimately the entire dump of information/data becomes virutally pure “noise.” Oh, of course the “signal” remains present in there - and it would be a clever trick to extract it despite the “noise” present - but what we’re talking about here would be the equivalent of the red dot on the red square extending to the edges of the canvas ... and your job would be to find the dot ... no contrast between the ground and the figure and for all intents and purposes no “figure” can be said to be present.
In a case like this what you’d need to know how to do would be to construct a filter that separates the signal that remains from the noise - think about those kid’s toys that have a secret message written in a scramble of letters/numbers/lines ... all in red and blue ... and by putting on a pair of cheap paper and plastic “eyeglasses” with red lens the message jumps off the page at you. Having that kind of a filter available in regard to the information/data in the environment/context you operate in would also make the “most important” information jump out from the background.
Fortunately for you - exquisite performers leave a trail of excellence when they do what they do, and one of the things that I’ve found to be virtually always present in this trail includes just such a filtering mechanism ... I call it a TELEOLOGICAL APPROACH ... meaning that you filter the information/data in the environment/context NOT only based on where you find yourself in the moment, but also and simulatneoulsy from the position you want to be holding when you have already acheived your outcome. This dual perspective allows you to develop a kind of perceptual wisdom in extracting the most important information/data from the entirety of what you find present.
Think of it in this way ... based on how you’d like your life to turn out, what do you think of all that you find present in your life right now will make the most difference in you having it turn out that way? Or ... based on the world you’d like to live in, what do you think the most important things are that you find present in the world right now that will make the biggest difference in you bringing about the kind of world you want to have left behind?
Joseph Riggio, Ph.D.
Princeton, NJ
PS - Take a look at the upcoming MythoSelf Advanced Program I’ll be leading in October 20-22 in Princeton, NJ (at the AmeriSuites Hotel on US. Rt. 1). You’ll find more information as well as a link to download the program PDF on the MythoSelf.com site.
(2) Comments • (1) Trackbacks • Permalink
Good Morning, Joseph! I usually start my day off by reading your blogs and eating my breakfast (toast today). It’s interesting that you talk about teleology today or yesterday rather, b/c I am way mixed up with it and asked a question about it on the mythoself list.
Anyway, I thought that a teleogical approach is that the future is designed, it’s purposeful - things don’t just happen naturally - and that you step into the future and live from that position only in the present - so you’re in like two places at once, living your life, jumping between the future and the present all the time. I’ve heard “teleological” at least a hundred times and apparently I don’t get it...but I think it’s making a little more sense...I could be thinking about it too hard, though.
(I tried to post this earlier and it didn’t take, so it may turn up twice).
Thanks,
Allison
I am really fascinated with your insights and their depth, but I feel I need more resources and clarifications for the techniques used themselves. I have already grasped and taken hold of the theortical ontological awareness that lies beyond your writings. The feelings I get is deep and vague, though curious and spiral. I am after the techniques and methodolgies. There are not enough other resources available. I have read almost all your Authenticity Blog. I feel I need to get more acquinated and guided. The Exquisite performance is very expensive for me right away to say the truth. I am intending to enroll in one of your trainings in the nearest possible future. Any insights?
