Looking Too far Ahead

Posted on February 2, 2008
Filed Under Awareness |

Being extremely aware of things can at times pose problems - after all, how aware is ‘too aware’? I have always made a point of following the patterns people create, and which can be found within events. Patterns which link A to B to C; the chain of cause-and-effect so to speak. When you do this for a long enough time - as I have, you eventually find that you can foresee the far ends of a pattern, without having to see the interceding steps. So your mind jumps from A to D without the need for seeing B and C.

It can be very handy indeed because it allows you to see events before they occur, or to side-step things way in advance. However there are a number of problems this has created for me over the years - sometimes it’s easy to get caught up in potential possibilities, as I look at the long line of events which are unfolding into the future - I foresee numerous possibilities. Outcomes and eventualities which are dependent upon choices I make or influence in the here and now. And this can cause a kind of negative-reflex action…or else cause me to freeze in place.

This accumulates with indecision, because you attempt to foresee the eventualities of each and every potential choice. For me this isn’t the sort of indecision which may last for weeks and months, but rather an intense concentrated moment of an overwhelming awareness of possibilities. Each and every decision cascading out from that moment flowing into the unknown future, attempting to form its own image of temptation. And I stand on the cusp feeling as though I must reconcile myself to fall into one of those many paths.

Ultimately - I recognize - that this is a way of pulling myself out of the moment. And in truth it is questionable whether it is actually a worthy exercise, because often the correct choice of action is only found in the present moment - not in some potential possibility which may or may not unfold at a future point.

Perhaps then it is about how we choose to apply ourselves. During our life-time we develop certain skill-sets - ways of perceiving and interacting with the world. The evolution of these ’skills’ is one of the challenges we face, how to apply them then is quite another.