Tuesday, May 3, 2011

I Can’t Believe My Eyes!

“I can’t believe my eyes”, people say…

Well, they shouldn’t either. Because you’re eyes don’t actually see.

They’re merely lenses that pass on information to the visual cortex in the brain. And only there do you see.




So you actually see with your brain, not with your eyes. “I saw it with my own brain!” would be a better way to put it.

After all, we decode the visible frequencies of light that our eyes pick up into ‘physical reality’. Your eyes don’t send images to your brain of 3D street scenes or whatever we think we see outside of us.

They perceive frequencies and then send them to the brain in the form of electrical signals. And your brain decodes those signals into an apparent 3D reality that we think is outside of us.

What we see is ‘light’, as it’s reflected by what’s called ‘luminous matter’. ‘Luminous matter’ reflects electromagnetic light, which your eyes can perceive.

But 95% (at least) of the mass in the universe is known as ‘dark matter’ or ‘dark energy’. This ‘stuff’ doesn’t reflect light, and therefore can’t be seen by us humans. However, it can be measured by its effect on the part of the universe that we can ‘see’. That’s how we know it’s there.

But anyway, the only light we can see is the light reflected within the visible range of the electromagnetic spectrum. And we only see those particular frequencies within that electromagnetic spectrum. And actually, it’s only a fraction of the spectrum that can be accessed by our human vision:


But there’s even more…

The electromagnetic spectrum is only 0.005% of the estimated mass of the universe. And human sight can see only a tiny fraction of these electromagnetic frequencies. So imagine how little of the universe we can actually perceive and decode into ‘physical’ reality!

We’re virtually blind!

The truth is that we only see what the brain tells us to see. And let’s take a quick look at what happens before we actually ‘see’:

First, light enters the eye by passing through the outer, transparent layer called the ‘cornea’.

Then it goes on through the pupil, which gets bigger or smaller to allow for more or less light to be let in (depending on the circumstances). This latter process is controlled by the iris (the colored part of the eye).

Then it goes to the lens to be focused.

After that, it enters the ‘vitreous humor’, a jelly-like substance behind the lens.

And then the light (or information) strikes the retina, which ‘captures’ the image like the film in those good old photo cameras. However, this image recorded on the retina is two-dimensional and upside-down!

The next stop is the optic nerve, which in turn sends the image through the brain to the ‘occipital lobe’. This is where the brain re-assembles the two-dimensional and upside-down image that was delivered by the eyes into the form that we think we are seeing.

So this is really quite a path to travel for what we think is an ‘objective image’ before we actually ‘see’ it. And what’s even more striking are all the things that happen before we actually ‘see’ the image that we think we see.

After all, what we think is a 3D image that situated outside of us is only constructed when frequencies are recorded as a two-dimensional and upside-down image on the retina. It’s only later (when the info reaches the ‘occipital lobe’) that it’s constructed into a 3D image. And this construction happens in your brain.

So does the world outside of us really exist in the way we think we see it? But wait… Here’s another thought-provoking realization:

On the way from the eyes to the visual cortex, the temporal lobes edit and reconstruct up to 50% and more of the ‘light’ or ‘information’ that was perceived by the eyes. In his book The Holographic Universe, the late Michael Talbot [1] writes about the work of neurophysiologist Karl Pribram and others [p. 163]:

“Pribram discovered that the visual information a monkey receives via its optic nerves does not travel directly to its visual cortex, but is first filtered through other areas of its brain.

“Numerous studies have shown that the same is true of human vision. Visual information entering our brains is edited and modified by our temporal lobes before it is passed on to our visual cortices.

“Some studies suggest that less than 50 percent of what we ‘see’ is actually based on information entering our eyes. The remaining 50 percent plus is pieced together out of our expectation of what the world should look like (and perhaps out of other sources such as reality fields). The eyes may be the visual organs, but it is the brain that sees.”

Wow! And then consider this…

What we don’t ‘see’, we make up. Seriously, we make it up! Here’s how…

Our eyes have a blind spot where the optic nerve connects to the eye in the middle of the retina. We can’t see anything with that part of the eye. However, the brain weaves the picture together from the information available and ‘fills the hole’.

So actually, what we believe we are seeing is what we see. Upon constructing the 3D image that we think we eventually ‘see’, the brain filters and tweaks the information received by filling in holes and matching it to its expectations of what there is to be seen, based on its engrained beliefs. And that latter part makes up for more than 50% of the images we actually ‘see’!

That’s quite something! We also describe this mechanism in our free book on the Premises Of Your Own Power. Here are some excerpts of what we wrote:

“Most people will be familiar with overlooking misspelled words. This is because your eyes, or rather your brain, is so accustomed to reading the words in correct spelling, that it simply overlooks a typo. The typo is filtered out of the image by your brain, which causes you to overlook it and see the correct spelling, which is in line with your expectations. This does not happen all the time, but it does happens sometimes, which illustrates the point to make here. Neurophysiologists like Karl Pribram have long been aware of this fact.

(…)

In relation to the example of the misspelled words, your engrained belief system (the correct spelling of the words you see most of the time) caused your brain to filter out the information (the typo) that was at odds with its conditioned worldview (its expectations).”

Here’s another excerpt:

“Likewise, studies have shown that men and women often have trouble communicating accurately with each other, because what one says the other does not hear. Each hears merely whatever supports their belief and prejudice about each other. They pick up only what they want to hear, or what supports their conditioned view of the way things are. This is a psychological phenomenon called ‘selective retention’.”

And here’s a final one:

“The catch is that seeing is not just believing. Apparently, ‘believing is also seeing’.

Because the information picked up by your eyes is edited by your brain according to its engrained belief systems, a large proportion of what you actually ‘see’ is determined by what you believe deep inside to be true. You see what you believe.

And of course, because you see what you believe, you immediately believe what you see, because it supports your belief systems that determined what you saw in the first place. Thus, what you see reinforces your belief system, which causes you to keep seeing things in the way you believe things to be, which in turn again makes you see things in that way. It’s a self-reinforcing cycle!”

You can read more details on that in the book on the Premises Of Your Own Power…

But for now, we’re slowly moving into the point that we want to make…

After all, it’s clear that the beliefs programmed into your brain have a significant effect on the way you perceive ‘reality’… or in fact, on the way you even construct reality and thus what you seem to be ‘attracting’!

The thing is… Your brain is not the center of control that determines what happens and what doesn’t happen.

And that’s good news!

Because it’s still true that you can be the one taking control. You don’t have to be a slave to your body and brain. That is, if you recognize that you are not your body. You need to recognize that you are indeed the essence controlling it and occupying it to allow yourself to experience this ‘3D solid world’.

After all… Consider all this:

There has been this publication of an article in the scientific journal ‘Science’ with the provocative title ‘Is Your Brain Really Necessary’ [2].

This article was a reaction to the description of this British neurologist John Lorber of a young man of ‘normal development’, with an IQ of 126, and an academic degree in mathematics.

The funny thing was that a brain scan of this apparently highly intelligent young man showed that he was a pretty hardcore case of what’s known as ‘hydrocephalus’, or ‘water on the brain’.

Put differently, the head of this ‘IQ 126’, ‘academic degree in mathematics’ young man was filled with cerebrospinal fluid for 95%. What this means in layman’s terms is that his skull was like a swimming pool for his brain, which basically drowned in all that fluid.

His cerebral cortex had a gauge of about 1 millimeter, so there was hardly any brain tissue left. The weight of his brain was estimated to about 100 grams, where 1500 grams is normal for an average homo sapiens sapiens. But the workings of his brain were hardly impaired at all!

Maybe we underestimated him…

Anyway, it seems like the brain is not the source of consciousness. And so the good news is that you can exert control over your brain (and thus your perceptions and the way you construct your reality (or what you seem to ‘attract’)) through your own being conscious.

Put differently:

YOU NEED TO WAKE-THE-HELL UP!

Basically, your body (including your brain) is a vehicle for experience, and you’re in the driver’s seat.

You can take control and manipulate your perceptions, and it has been shown that you (being a conscious essence) can even change your brain (being a part of the ‘space suit’ (your body) you’re wearing in order to be able to experience this ‘physical ‘reality’).

And if you listen closely, you’ll see this is true, and you’ll learn how you can benefit from this…

Science has shown during our lives there’s this ongoing process of adaptation in your brain. This happens because your mental, intellectual, spiritual and physical activities influence both the number as well as the locations of the mutual connections between neurons (brain cells). This process of ongoing adaptation is called ‘neuroplasticity’ or ‘cortical remapping’.

So basically, because of conscious attention, emotions and active thought processes, as well as due to physical activity and movement, the neural networks in your brain change continually. And as such, the electromagnetical activity in your brain changes all the time as well.

In a recent article in the scientific journal called ‘Progress In Neurobiology’ called ‘Mind Does Really Matter’ [3], neuroscientist Mario Beauregard comes to the conclusion that trust and positive expectations are capable of influencing (changing) the parts in the brain that play a significant role in perceiving, movement, pain and a whole bunch of emotional processes.

So your mental processes (thoughts, feelings, beliefs, but most of all your conscious free will) can significantly influence the functioning of your brain on various levels.

Your conscious and deliberate manipulation of your thoughts and expectations not only greatly improves your feelings of well-being. It also causes a demonstrable biological change in your brain. (Beauregard outlines a whole list of studies that demonstrate the effect of consciousness on brain functioning in his book The Spiritual Brain [4]).

So what to make of all this scientific mumbo-jumbo?

Well, here we go…

By waking-the-hell up from the vicious cycle that you may find yourself in, you can make astonishing changes in your perceived reality.

After all, we’ve seen that you see what you believe. Your brain edits the information it receives based on its engrained belief systems to determine what you see. And then what you see is merely a confirmation of what you already believe. It’s a self-reinforcing cycle, and it’s vicious as long as it’s based on beliefs of negativity, being powerless, being poor, feeling guilty, and so on…

But by waking-the-hell up, you can consciously change your perceptions. You can consciously cause significant, demonstrable biological changes in your brain.

Your brain will change, and your perceptions will change. And as your perceptions will change, your beliefs will change. And as your beliefs change into knowing that you have full power over your own reality, your perceptions will change accordingly.

It’s still a self-reinforcing cycle, but not a vicious one anymore. Both your conscious and your subconscious mind will change into a state in which you genuinely believe down to the core of your being that you’re the one in control.

And you can simply pick your beliefs. Your brain, mind and perceptions of your ‘outside reality’ will follow automatically.

Even if you have ‘water on the head’, as you have seen…

So who cares if your brain scan looks like Homer Simpson’s?

It doesn’t matter, because you are not your body. You are a unique representation of all that exists, and you’re awesome. You can choose to make the change. It’s your call.

And here’s how you can:

http://revolutioniz.com

======
Nicholas P. Kidd and Henk J.M. Schram are the instigators of the alleged ‘Great Revolution’, which provides the members with truthful instructions regarding the universal principles of life.

The Revolution is receiving increasingly widespread attention for its straightforward explanations and instructions with regard to complex issues, which are made understandable for people from all walks of life. In essence, the true secrets of the ‘Law of Attraction’ and the other ‘Universal Laws’ are explained in much clearer and practical ways than the 'enigmas wrapped in riddles' that usually characterize the descriptions of the Law of Attraction and its application.

More information on the Great Revolution, on joining and on the ‘universal principles of life’ (the true ‘Universal Laws’) can be found at http://revolutioniz.com.






References

[1] Talbot, M. (1991), The Holographic Universe, HarperCollins Publishers Inc.,
New York;

[2] Lewin, R. (1980), “Is Your Brain Really Necessary?”, Science 210, pp. 1232-1234;

[3] Beauregard, M. (2007), “Mind Does Really Matter: Evidence From Neuroimaging Studies of Emotional Self-Regulation, Psychotherapy, And Placebo Effect”, Progress In Neurobiology 81 (4), pp. 218-236;

[4] Beauregard, M. and D. O’Leary (2007), The Spiritual Brain: How Neuroscience Is Revealing The Existence Of The Soul, Chapter 6: Toward A Nonmaterialistic Science Of Mind, HarperOne, A Division Of HarperCollins Publishers Inc., New York, pp. 125-180.

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