Discerning information to convert facts into wisdom; thereby, becoming an “Authority of Experience” (Part I)
Written by Tyrone K. Jackson
Edited by M. Tracy Plourde
Navigating the landscape of life is our personal journey into the adventure of self-discovery. It is how we become an authority of experience through the process of opening ourselves up to our intuition. When we are open to our intuition, we are not acting-out due to our emotions, but rather, we are responding to life and trusting and loving our relationship with our self. This trusting is what will lead one into a deeper understanding of life’s purpose by mastering the use of your mind and becoming an authority of experience and as you learn to love yourself.
First, we need to understand how well we know our “self”. Our own way of being, thinking and our running belief systems. We have to recognize the degrees of internal self-programming that is running our thoughts and therefore, running our life-making decisions. The decisions we make are not always blatant or obvious. The self-programmed thoughts running in the background of our mind seem to make most decisions without our knowing. It runs mostly in a stealth mode, hidden and subtly executing karmas (actions) without our conscious permission. These actions are all run by our natural processing of our thinking/thoughts and creating thought patterns. We are constantly programming ourselves as we view and interpret life through the experiences of the world we live in. Our view of the world is mostly through the old thought patterns of programming – it’s what our subconscious knows. We view our perceived personal world based on the running of the ongoing processing of thoughts, thought form, thought patterns, and emotional feelings; made up belief. These thought patterns, if not positive, can be like viruses running in the background of our mind, covertly giving instructions to our mind, executing emotional feelings and ultimately creating our attitudes and behaviors. We are literally driven by these thoughts. Like a computer, our thoughts run in response to key strokes, external triggers, these key strokes are triggered by our internal atmosphere or external world. Simply put, how we view the world is a reflection and projection of our internal thoughts and thought patterns connected to our preconceived notion of the people, places, things, situations and circumstances; our world. Each person’s perception is individually unique to them. Hence, there is most likely unlimited ways of viewing the same persons, places, things, situations and circumstances. You have probably heard the cliché, “you are what you eat”. Well, I would add to that by saying, “You are the thoughts you have compiled from your experiences”, “you are what you think”, and “you are a reflection of your vision of the world”.
What does this all mean?
Most of the time we are not actively conscious/realizing that we are taking in information on a non-stop basis and processing it into a belief system. We get to know (hold on to) an extremely enormous amount of information. We truly know very little about the knowledge contained within our minds since this is done automatically without our direct input. This knowledge or knowing-of-information is nothing more than information. We can say we know a lot, but this knowing doesn’t necessary mean we are knowledgeable. The information stored does not compute in a way which contributes to our understanding of our self or anything much, we merely are a data bank storing up thoughts and experiences and creating our own self-dictionary or “how-to manual” regardless if the experiences were positive or negative. (It’s what we know). So, you’re probably asking yourself, “What is the meaning behind what I am saying? What is meaning of this information stated above”? How much information do we take in and store without having the slightest understanding of what it is or what it means? How do I correct/change any negative thoughts stored?
We collect all of that we are informed about and then we pass it on in casual conversations as if it has great value. We pass it on as if it really qualifies as knowledge. Have we become so superficial with the use of our mind and intellect, that the extent of it is, we do not understand the purpose of our thinking minds? Have we lost touch with the value of using the knowledge within the information we gather? Does it matter if the information is true or not? Does truth matter anymore? We are force-fed information from the time we wake up in the morning to the time we go to sleep and then it is regurgitated as we sleep in our dreams. How much do we take in is purposeful for the advancement of our lives and in that how much of what we take in is based on the truth?
If this is not the case, then how deeply do you understand the information that you have gathered this week or even today? What is its value or importance of the information in the future experience of your life? How much of it do you know for sure is based on truth? Garbage in, garbage out. We have become a world of the consumers of information, without consideration for the impact the information has on our way of thinking and our relationships with those around us. We allow the seeds–information gathering from most all of life to infiltrate our conscious into our subconscious and root itself into our thought pattern to become our perspective regardless if it is positive or negative. We only know what we know until we know it’s not healthy for the self and then we begin to change it.
Due to this automatic gathering of information from our experiences, we have an increased amount of thoughts each day. And each day, we continue to produce yet more thoughts causing us to use more of our personal/mental energy in a day; this is our active “thinking” mind. We have increased our thoughts to fifty to sixty thousand thoughts a day[1]. …it was once thirty thousand thoughts per day. A century ago, it was very little compared to now. How many of those thoughts are of value? Small talk dominates our use of self-expression. We spend a lot of time repeating what we hear and see without vetting it. We are constantly echoing word, phrases, etc., etc., etc. Don’t get me wrong, it is a joy to be entertained and to share our experiences with each other. Yet, at what point do we consider the degree of entertainment to be over-kill. It is the difference between value and clutter?
If someone were to say to you they know how to drive a car, what would that statement mean to you? Would it mean they have the knowledge (the information) of driving or the skill and ability to drive?
How deeply do we understand ourselves or is it only that we hold a superficial understanding of who we are? So, the gathering of thoughts may cause use to spend less time in identifying our own state of being and keep us from living our lives which will nourish us into fullness. What it is that will nourish us, nurtures us also? How do you get to a place where the thoughts that your sub-conscious is storing are beneficial to your well-being? How do you reprogram the old thoughts/behaviors?
Discernment
Discernment is experienced from the view of being consciously self aware. It is a value of self-love. This is when we are aware of our relationship with life and are conscious of the thought patterns which we are engaged in while having any type of experiences with life. This allows us to have life experiences and only take in what is a guide for our self-development. We discern what is important for our growth and allow for the packaging of the experience not to have an emotional impact on us. Doing so is what allows us to separate the gems from the garbage and have a mind full of treasure, not waste.
Discernment is not an act of judgment; it is an act of understanding from a non-emotional view. Discernment allows an individual to see what is happening before him/her without being influenced by the situation; from a place of innocence. From this place of innocence, one can see and understand the learning/test without reacting to it. This is the first step to becoming an “Authority of Experience.”
Through our life we tend to take in so much through our day; to think too much. The gift is to learn to view life with a more informed mind, a clearer way of thinking. Then your mind would not become so cluttered with thoughts and leave you tired from all that thinking. What is important to you? How much time alone do you give to understanding your own skills for thinking? This is of great value. When we understand our thought process through clear focused thinking, our minds become much less cluttered. How much garage do you collect in a day? And how much of what you have collected make it easier for you to think clearly? What is the value of your thought? Don’t you think you ought to know?
At the end of the day, how do you clear out the clutter from the day that is not needed and how do you reprogram what has already been collected?
As I mentioned, discernment is the first step. When you practice discernment throughout your everyday life and experiences, you will be begin to change your thoughts and begin to overwrite the thoughts stored with new thoughts. You will begin to recognize patterns in your behavior and belief systems which may or may not be healthy. For those patterns that are not healthy, recognize them and then choose to respond differently the next time the similar experience occurs and this will begin the process of changing your thoughts and your stored “how-to manual”. For those thoughts that are deep rooted and need extensive reprogramming, a Life Coach (for learning & experiencing the power of self-Love) will focus on assisting individuals as they navigate through life to discover their inner strength and deepen their understanding of self-love. One of personal goals as Life Coach is guide you through this process.