You walk, but you don't realise the way you move. You raise your voice (unconsciously), which you notice after somebody else tells you. You wake up and without thinking much, you get into the groove of daily routine, which happened without you - one would say instead of living, you "are lived by you."
Or you are alert, self-aware, concentrated on a certain aspect of your person i.e. "am I a fair person?", "am I likable?," "am I respected as I should?", going through circles of thoughts which, fully automated for the sake of their function, are a spontaneous response to larger automatic modes of your operation as a human. Firstly, you've been programmed to maintain a certain level of human quality, especially its face value which lies in the judgement of others. Secondly, your status must have been under pressure, from internal or external factors, otherwise your wouldn't care. Thirdly, you're an analyst and a thinker: this trait was given to you without your knowledge, merit or decision. Thus, being "alert, self-aware, concentrated on an aspect" is paradoxically contrary to self-awareness, concentration as a complete control and management of your behaviour, flow of thoughts, modes you're in.
I acknowledge that I am a self-moving being, controlling maybe 30% of all my processes of speech, emotion, muscle tension and thought flows, when I try to focus on my person, controlling maybe 5% of them, when I am in a "cruising mode".
Is the automatisation, unawareness of processes, unawareness of their automated structure a flaw in the human or animal nature? Not at all! It's the law that underpins our existence. Buddha, a human who once had enjoyed piece of mind and emotions, state of being blessed by lack of care, created a religion, claiming he found the state of being closest to God. Nirvana is a state where all automated thought, followed by emotion and a body reaction has come to a stop. All you can feel is freedom and pure joy of existing. Buddha was only human and his intelligence managed to describe the state and conditions around to get in or lose it. What he didn't get is that the description of the case, as well as the means of meditation to get into nirvana are not a tool set for a sustainable nirvana or most importantly a better life. It's like listening to a music which generates instant pleasure inside you; it comes and goes quickly without a meaningful trace. Moreover, I argue, it may have a negative effect on a human, as its interference into your automatic life's functions may distort them and lead to an unwanted exposure. Meditation, drugs or anything which generates a 'feel good' by suppressing or breaking your modus operandi can lead to seclusion, madness or self-destruction. It may sound crazy to hear that nirvana is bad thing. Please note, it's not particularly bad in itself, but the way of getting into heaven can eventually lead to hell.
Automatisation it's an attribute that is good in itself! It helps us to maintain the level of high activity without the effort of performing analysis every time you move your finger. Thanks to unaware automatism, you can preserve behaviours and beliefs. By allowing the scripts to run in the background, you can focus your attention on current tasks which require instant analysis. For example : is this pool small enough to jump over? Is this umbrella suitable for today's wind? You don't analyse why you meet that girl. To be honest, you don't have to, you've been conditioned to like this type, to meet her this way, to speak to her that way. You are lived by yourself and shouldn't destroy the process.
Contention point of this essay, however, is to help an individual to carry an aware desautomatisation of unaware processes in order to perform aware actions. Why? Because we live in a civilisation which produces people like ducks, stuffing into them 'useful' garbage through all channels: education, ubiquitous propaganda, things you consume and job you're required to do. 2000 years ago, there was Roman civilisation, people were produced like ducks, set to carry in them certain truths, to comply with a type of beauty, to abide to 'eternal' rules. There is nothing left now, except useless ruins and wasted lives of believers.
If you don't fully understand yourself, if you are doing things you don't like, if you're not the person you mean to be, if your body and emotions play tricks to you, you should strive to stop the automatism of your acts. You can eliminate wrong habits, stress, personality flaws and even improve the health of your body. You can implant qualities you want : detachment from reality, energy, particular perception of things or sens of humour.
Aware reconstruction through desautomatisation can be performed in three simple steps:
Slow down now, whatever you do. By stretching the matter, you will perceive each particle of the process: thought which generates emotion, emotion which generates belief, beliefs setting the mode. You will notice areas of you focus (why them?), the hurry (what is the cause?), your immediate goal (does your frustration mean to do harm, to teach them lesson, to show your vulnerability or to simply that you give up?). You're getting into questioning your operations which will lead to a negation : you're not stupid, therefore your deeper self will quickly understand that what you were doing reflexively was wrong.
Step two : Negation will lead to a stop. Your mechanical body movement will stop. Muscle tension will ease, eyes will open looking for information, you'll feel amazed and surprisingly empty. Your mind will try to perform a kind of testing, i.e. stupid idea, flush of argument to see how your background appliances respond. There will be no response! Your body may try to move on its own a bit. A kick in the air, shake of head, you may swoop to the ground and look eyes wide open. This state may cause a short spell of euphoria, as it would feel like on a different planet! Your beliefs were wrong, there is no fear, no need of being down on you. All you were 20 minutes ago doesn't matter anymore.
Step three : start an aware action. Decide the way. Why not differently? After completion, your next step was to yield. What is your preferred action now? To walk past? To skip guilt thing because it's not the point? To act as if you were there before? You're a creature which learns new things quickly and automatisation of new behavioural findings is your nature. Do things you decide to do. Next time, even when you wake up semi-conscious, your background will ask you to decide which set of functions to authorise. Do you start the day by going through all your misfortunes, or you follow the decision not to engage in activity which causes misfortune 90% of the time? Do you go for a ride on a rainy day? (because 20 years ago you decided that weather is not an issue for a man who will survive the harshest). Or you wait for 2 hours for the sun to come out, as you decided yesterday? (because it's practical and there's nothing wrong to it). Do you wear a fake smile? (because otherwise all say you look miserable). Or you cut off stupid remarks and search where lies the reason why you are unhappy? (Maybe the reason is just those stupid remarks? Are you the only person around to tolerate this and those assholes need to give vent onto anybody? Or are you the only person around to easily get offended, while the words you speak are no sweets whatsoever?).
There is no step four, which should be about the preservation of decision upon using desautomatisation of unaware automated processes to help you achieve your goal. Consistent programme seems to have no sens and surely would turn one into a nervous control freak! Once an action is performed, habit will follow. Fight back once. Overcome fear once. Once and consciously. Next time your old involuntary reaction will be there at hand along with the new pattern, asking you to choose. Your new processes will stay with you, will always remain deep in your mind.
