A Piece of My Mind

We do not change our minds. We adjust them. We only modify our thinking. Survival of the organism is priority over all others. The safety, protection and security of the brain is the primary operating principle. We like to think we are changing because this comforts our sensibilities that we ought to be. Whenever we receive any new piece of information, no matter how wonderful, we find ways to select the parts we want and reject the parts we don’t. Our brains, completely resistant to transformation, only absorbs that which can be integrated without upsetting the system already securely embedded in our thinking. We think that we change incrementally, so we continue our endless search for new information that will only entrench us further in our own precious presuppositions.

I’m not talking about knowledge. I’m not talking about facts. I’m not talking about, say, 1+3=4. Knowledge is incremental. We have to learn what one is, then what three is, then what four is, before we can understand the mathematical problem. Same with geography, science, etc. I am talking about transformation. I am talking about change. Transformation is not incremental, but traumatic. It means death, then resurrection. In other words, I need to die in order to live. My mind needs to die in order to be transformed. Truth, if it is real, will overthrow my existent thought-patterns. I might think that I have transformed incrementally. But this is only because I have experienced a series of crises, or deaths and resurrections, that resemble incremental growth. But it is not the same.

This is why, when I speak on a Sunday morning, I assume that everyone listening is going to nod their head in agreement or shake them in disagreement. I assume, because I believe I have an understanding about the way the brain works, that everyone listening is going to integrate what they agree with and reject what they don’t agree with. Even questions, guised under a desire to learn, are almost always dogmatic statements of the questioner seeking affirmation for what they already believe. No change is going to occur unless someone experiences a crisis in their thinking. But this is rare.

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