blink
To honor my latest good read, Blink, I must write this as spontaneously as possible. That is, without much thinking and no editing. The subtitle on this book is “the power of thinking without thinking.” Well, ever since reading The Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell, I wanted to read this one, and I was not disappointed. I finished it in 3 days while waiting and caring for my mom who was post op left knee replacement. I usually read 2 or 3 books at once, interchanging them depending on my mood and time frame. So, I also finished Robert Johnson’s, The Fisher King and The Handless Maiden, more on the male and female subconscious. And now I am reading Exuberance by Kay Redfield Jamison. They all seem to be related which is exciting to me. Like even my subconscious picks my books.
Blink gives all kinds of stories of interesting people who do very interesting work, such as facial muscle readings or improv theatre directing or war planning. The author gives insight into decision- making from several different perspectives but the main point is that sometimes the instinctual feel, the decision made in the blink of an eye is often the best one. Even though we may not be conscious of why we say or do something when we are under pressure, our subconscious is playing a huge part in our decision –making. Of course, we are left wondering, great, how do we know when we should weigh it all out, pros and cons, lists and all and when we should let our gut reaction take over. The author himself tackles this with no definitive answer, thankfully, after all, we are talking subconscious, and we cannot know all these things. But I like this quote from Sigmund Freud, “When making a decision of minor importance, I have always found it advantageous to consider all the pros and cons. In vital matters, however, such as the choice of a mate or a profession, the decision should come from the unconscious, from somewhere within ourselves. In the important decisions of personal life, we should be governed, I think, by the deep inner needs of our nature.” (Joseph Campbell said this, too, in a different way.)
Another favorite piece of information I really grasped well and hung onto was Gladwell’s comment about how little we seem to truly know ourselves, and others. We tend to misjudge others quickly. Also, studies have shown that people make decisions and often do not know why. Or they might say, I like this and this and this, then when they decide on something (such as a mate) they completely change their list of priorities in that choice. In other words, they chose more out of some deep instinct, instead of what they thought they liked. This affirmed me in so many ways. Every time I hear someone say, “I am like this, or I do things this way,” I wonder how they can be so sure of themselves. I mean, I think a lot about things, I meditate, I write them down, and I can say very little about who I am, generally speaking. And lately, when people have said they are a certain way, I have noticed that they are just the opposite in their actions, so now I wonder if their words are meant to impress, not to be mean or dishonest, but it’s what they wish they were like.
After I read this book, and the Fisher King book, I hoped I would dream so I could do some more analyzing, and last night I had a dream filled with interesting images and possible inner workings. I was in a house with a man and 2 women. The 2 women were bitter and hostile and talking about me so that I could hear. There was jealousy and mocking and overall cruelty. I was with the man. He handed me a fork and told me to find the place where it belongs, but I couldn’t find the right place. I thought he would give me more clues, so I went to find him, and that is when the 2 tormenting women cornered me in a confrontation. I stood up to one of them, shouting and sticking my finger into her chest, very pointedly. She said that she would now beat me to a pulp, into the ground, and I was fearful for a few seconds, but when she shouted to the man I had been with to cover the doorway, I wondered why. I looked up in the doorway and there was another man, in a black cape, who looked amazingly like the Dark Shadows Dracula-like man ( I never watched that show, but recall the commercials and ads from it) I gathered up all my courage and voice and shouted at man #1 to clear the doorway, to stop blocking it, and as he jumped away from the door facing, the Dracula man leaped onto the woman and I was saved. Then I woke up. Since all I could think of to describe this savior was “dark shadows” character, this must be my shadow side, the one leaping out of the doorway, but I am calling it into being, and I am the one that is saving myself, by allowing it to come forward.
Now here’s the really interesting part. Before the attack scene, this man #1 had no name, but at the time I was about to be attacked by the woman, I shouted his name: “Jeremy” to have him clear the doorway. Jeremy? I don’t even know anyone named Jeremy. But I do know Jeremiah, the prophet from the old testament. I wrote about him once and taught this about him in a Sunday school class: From Eugene Peterson’s intro to Jeremiah in The Message: Jeremiah’s life and Jeremiah’s book are a single piece. He wrote what he lived, he lived what he wrote. There is no dissonance between his life and his book. Some people write better than they live; others live better than they write. Jeremiah, writing or living, was the same Jeremiah.”
Now, how’s that for blending the conscious and the subconscious world? For becoming the person we were intended to be we may have to fight off things inside and outside of our worlds. We may need to call on help from a higher source or from deep within ourselves, the seemingly unreachable places. Or maybe not, if we wait and listen. Or dream. Or even blink.
3:29:41 PM 
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