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Tap into your subconscious
Tuesday, 2 May 2006
When I was at school, I used to get in trouble for “daydreaming”. It was seen as an unproductive activity, interrupting my sharper “conscious” learning. It was something I had little control over. My mind just seemed to want to drift off sometimes.
I'd to get top marks for subjects requiring “imagination”. My teachers grudgingly accepted that this was at least partly because of my tendency to “daydream”. What they didn’t accept, but I suspected, was that allowing my mind to drift was also helping me do well at math and science.
In my experience, having a strong connection to my subconscious mind has given me a big advantage over many of my peers. It allows me to come up with original ideas, make connections between information that others had missed, and learn quickly.
I read a lot of technical books, and often feel as if I’m just going through the motions – reading the sentences, but not taking the information in. Sometimes, I’ll read a whole chapter and feel that I haven’t understood any of it. Yet days, or even weeks later, a situation arises where I need to recall the concept I’d read about, and somewhere out of the depths of my mind the knowledge will appear.
I seem to be able to feed my subconscious with material that my conscious mind doesn’t understand at first. My inner-mind will then turn over that information and make sense of it. It’s a powerful method for learning, that you can benefit from too.
Simply force yourself to read that difficult text you’d like to understand, no matter how little sense it makes or how much difficulty you’re having concentrating. Then, let your mind drift away. Lie down, close your eyes, and simply let random images and thoughts swim through your head for a while.
Often, your understanding of the topic won’t appear straight away. It can take days or more. But if you practice this regularly, you'll find yourself surprised at just how much you’ve taken in. Of course, the more information you feed your subconscious with, the better this technique will work.
I’ve also found daydreaming is a wonderful way of solving problems creatively. From the most worldly concern – “How am I going to make up my mortgage payments?” – to the most fantastic – “What would be a great children’s story?” – you can use the power of daydreaming.
Clearly define the question you'd like answered and then ask it to yourself over a period of time. Allow your mind to drift for a few moments during the day, and eventually you’ll likely find the answer will just pop into your head. Again, it might take days or weeks, but the power of being inattentive will likely provide you with an answer.
One problem with the modern world that detracts from this power is over-stimulation. Sure, you need to feed your mind information, but sometimes it can be overdone.
Constantly being bombarded with messages, noise, and other stimulus, reduces the opportunities for daydreaming. If you don’t spend some time letting your mind wander, it won’t provide you with the rewards.
Perhaps this is why the great geniuses of the past seem to outdo us today. Think of Shakespeare, Einstein, and Michelangelo. Without the constant crash of stimulation around them, these men had time to think and piece their works together.
Take some time out from the world to daydream. I promise you, the rewards will make it worthwhile.
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