Hindsight

The person with good hindsight must have mastered being a keen observer and the other attention skills discussed in the blog. Unfortunately just a  few of which has entered my limited attention at the moment. The person must learn how to use or apply presently existing resources and/or past experiences to improve methods and other systems to work around similar or new problems.

Infants and young children must learn many other alternative uses of everyday things. Play games with your child to illustrate this. With a simple stick for example, show her its many possible uses. Show her different but similar-appearing objects that may be used in the same way.

Adolescents must become interested in findings more efficient ways of solving problems or of implementing projects. He must dig deep into his past experiences or the experiences of others and use what works. Rise above the fear of discussing your failures, discuss and try to understand the reasons or causes of failure and how to avoid them. Maybe put this into a game where different teams will try to solve a similar problem as different groups who will race to brainstorm and take advantage of each members experiences. Discuss how the winning team got the upper hand.

When confronted by a problem not solved by the usual available methods, adults must learn to leverage from past experiences or experiment with new ideas.  We must have enough contingencies as well as enough awareness to work around every obstacles we encounter that keeps us from reaching our goal. We must embrace error and failures as necessary components to learning. If we have to, we must fail our way to success. Once success is obtained, you may want to make some effort to understand why the chosen method/strategy worked. And exploration as to other possible future applications of the same utilized method may be undertaken. If only people use this everyday, we would notice more and more people learn genuinely and less people will believe that common sense is not common nowadays. Let us bring common sense back to our work places. Do you agree? Start with your kid. Spend quality simple and productive time with them. They will learn faster than us adults. In fact we could teach better than we could learn because of our bad habits that would get in the way. Our kids do not have those bad habits. It is our kids who will be able to solve the mess we leave them in this crazy world of ours.

Evaluation

I have discussed in moderate detail a few of several faces of attention control that included bias, option filter, foresight, hindsight among other things. Again whether you realize it or not, these attention control skills are actually products of Values such as Love. They are the things that successful people develop and use to make their lives wonderful. A lot of these successful people however do not have the skill to identify these details and link them to how they become what they are. Successful people are usually here to DO stuff rather than TEACH stuff. They parrot the catch phrases "positive thinking", "Love is Love", etc  but could not explain what it is they mean by all that in more and more detail. While they do what they do best, other less successful people see the benefits but are not fully aware of how those other people  do it. These attention controls can help everyone communicate. I could help partly by pointing to this fact. I do not have the necessary teaching skills myself but hopefully others who would pick up on what I say so they can either use it in their lives or teach it to others in better ways.

Aside from the other skills discussed, we must learn to master evaluation if we want to improve ourselves or our organization(s). It will help us decide if we did a good job or not or if the solutions we implemented are appropriate or not. Good periodic evaluation or assessment skills will help us accomplish what must be done.

Learn to how to evaluate projects. Learn how to quantify gains or losses. Learn how to gauge if the chosen solution was effective in answering any obstacle that was identified. Know what parameters to examine or monitor. You would have to identify the parameter to measure or quantify or count yourself. And you would have to find a way to count it periodically to monitor your progress. Without it, you might miss your goals or preferred outcome or dream. Without good evaluation skills, you can hardly keep yourself on track because you are again not paying careful attention. Perhaps you are not that serious in the pure longings of your heart. Do not let complacency again derail you. Get more serious in getting your wants, needs and purpose all aligned.

Infants must attain object permanence. He must learn to recognize his parents soon. He must learn to feel if he is facing danger. Pain assessment must be appropriate. Must be able to count or tell if something is big or small, high or low, light or dark, fast or slow. Play games that can teach all or some of these.

Adolescent must know what things, ideas, concepts can be beneficial for him or not. He must be able to evaluate which contemporary or adult has more influence which he can tap to his advantage. He must be able to identify which friends are good for him and which are not. Complementary traits as well as similar traits may work for him as he masters the intricacies of social life.

Play pattern recognition and error detection games. Indulge in periodic self evaluation and peer evaluation activities. Ask the kids what areas they would rather be  evaluated for.

Adults must know how they are doing and how they can improve himself or his organization under many situations. We must re-learn what and how to count (we must also count the intangible stuff for these are Real Assets as well)  and how often we should count (maybe at least three times before the project/stage ends) to gauge our progress. Many of us can not even use our talent in counting to know how much we are spending on basic necessities every month. We can not tell how much we are spending on things that can wait. Those things that are not necessary for a full life we have been describing in each and every posted blog message here. No one has really ever taught us how to count those so we can re-align our goals and re-direct our trajectory through the path of Life full of Love.

Adults must determine possible parameters to quantify that can be used as basis to measure performance. If we Love something so much, we will know what we need to know about this.

We must make regular rapid and accurate assessments of available resources within our disposal. If we Love to get something, we will not surrender. We will have to stand up every time we fall short of our expectations.

Evaluations may help signal if we need to re-adjust our goals and strategies. It can tell us if we need new resources or newer strategies, preview better and more realistic goals or boost our hindsight to discover what is more achievable. Learning to minimize errors are not a daily concern of complacent people. Detect and try to correct your errors using better ways. Teach yourselves to make more sound judgments.

Problem-Solution Filter

This is one of the most commonly encountered stumbling blocks. There is unrecognized abundance of solutions to every type of problem imagined. The real task is not finding a solution from scarcity but finding the best solution(s) from a seemingly unlimited choice deeply seated within us. Remember that any problem and their appropriate answers have been in us all this time. We do not act alone but we act as a collective unit. More heads are better than one on condition that they all have the appropriate tools and have the proper mindset.

Since a given problem can be solved in so many different ways, we can start by listing as many solutions as we can think of. Try to find out if you'll use one solution or a combination of solutions.

Never jump in and use the first thing that comes to your mind with very few exceptions such as emergencies. Anyway, our response to such scenarios have actually been anticipated and already studied before it ever happens. Thus even emergency situations are confronted with solutions that have been well thought of in advance.

Among the growing list, take note of the most obvious solution to your problem and place it aside. The brainstorming group must try to understand the problematic thing or process in question and theoretically divide the process into about three stages- if that is possible. I call this as simple deconstruction phase. Study each process and find parallel occurrences from nature or from everyday life. Play around the currently accepted concepts and list any ideas that may be placed on the table regardless if it sounds so absurd at that moment. We can find parallel ideas from nature, we can oppose, or we can exaggerate the ideas and see what will come of it. I call that phase as simple brainsuperstorming phase. Attempt to integrate the seemingly absurd ideas with the specific problematic process under scrutiny/study. I call this phase as simple integration. If you are very interested to understand this by taking an example to illustrate how it is done, write a comment and identify a problem (I will not guarantee that we will be able to solve the problem, but I can guarantee one of the best experience in problem solving you may have yet encountered).

Summarize any potential solution that may come out. Discuss what you think about it, what you feel about it and what you believe should be taken into consideration.

Discuss potential obstacles by checking what is currently available. Then shift the group's focus to determine the solution's doability or feasibility also by checking what is currently available.

Repeat the above process by picking a few more ideas from your solution list with apparent potential.

Be decisive and choose the best option for serious implementation.

Expose the infant early to the concept that there are many solutions to one problem through simple games. Expose to sounds and color of nature.

Do the same for the older child. Let her understand how nature has arranged the dynamics, behavior and structure of living and non living things to maintain harmony. Let her develop a good sense of humor which may be of great help in advanced  problem solving. Talk with her about the obstacles that he encounters. Let her solve the problem herself if she has the motivation. You may demonstrate how it is done initially but be careful not to over do it such that she becomes dependent on you every time she faces a problem.

Adolescence is a time when higher centers of the brain are actively developing. Let her always take time out before implementing an obvious solution. Let her think of the many other possible alternatives and choose what is best by elimination of the weaker solutions. Demonstrate how she can deconstruct, brainsuperstorm and integrate ideas and form solutions. Initially move at the same pace with her slow development but later add speed and urgency as she enters adulthood.

For adults, do the same. Let them learn about critical or analytical thinking, lateral thinking and creative thinking. It is not a one-man show so it is not bad idea to get help in finding alternative solutions to problems. Life is not an exam or test where people should not collaborate on the best answers to question. Work in a group and actively participate in problem solving activities. Merge your minds and move as a unit at one time building ideas or at another time quality testing them. Grab every opportunity by practicing at work or in your extracurricular activities. But be ready to develop the capacity to orchestrate the problem solving activity as leader or moderator in a group. Be serious in taking advantage of such opportunities to learn since you will need it in the future where you may need to put up your own projects. Impulsive problem solving habits are hard to break in the adult, so prepare those fancy tools such as your thoughts and concepts (icons or images), feelings, beliefs, Values, etc.

We therefore should not spring to action impulsively. We need to think and feel with our Hearts, choose the best solution before we shift into ACTION.

ADDENDUM:
As an example of the brainstorming process I described above, I picked the simple example of an ordinary tool we use on the office table-the paper staple remover. A few days ago, I tried to again demonstrate how Superbrainstorming or Creative thinking or Conceptual thinking or Lateral thinking produces solutions. We all know that sometimes the staples are hard to remove and sometimes they can injure skin when not careful. In 10 minutes, I was successful in try to come up with alternative futuristic solutions to this simple gadget by just going through the process I described above. Highlight of the result was that we have a choice not to settle with the old clamping device. I was able to find doable alternatives as simple as using sticky material in the corners of papers (which is almost in existence in the form of sticky pads) to the more elaborate concepts of producing papers with corner cut out slit-like designs that will allow easy attachment and detachment using twisting or sliding motions on the paper edge to more high-tech alternatives of mixing very thin magnetic materials in the corner or edges of papers that will allow the same maneuver even without touching the papers. So this concept will then be forwarded to designers and engineers. There is more of those ideas waiting for minds that are ready to understand how superbrainstorming works.

Foresight

"among the many animals in Nature, Man is among the few given the natural skill to foresee or project into the future using our highly evolved brains."

After discussing Perspectives, let us discuss foresight- another seemingly ordinary word. But among the many animals in Nature, Man is among the few given the natural skill to foresee or project into the future using our highly evolved brains. We may call this ability as foresight. It is related to dreams plus a little help from our experiences with the causal relationships of situations, events or  phenomena in nature. If you are filled with living Hope, you can actually make that dream or carefully calculated foresight become reality.

 Hope is Living and it requires action!

Many of us feel hopeless because we never taught ourselves about true Hope. We are usually exposed or surrounded by people who lost Hope. Hope is a product of the Heart especially the kind of Heart that wants to make things better. The person who has real Hope forms his ideas in thought form. Breathes positive emotions into the idea and transforms it into Images. Images may symbolize a detailed plan(s). Plans can be transformed into action. This plan starts with dreams and foresight. It requires subsequent brainstorming for many alternative solutions, prioritization and identifying best methods to implement, resource collection, scheduling, evaluation and innovation which will be individually discussed. If these are not part of your daily activities yet, that is probably the reason why you feel you can't accomplish anything.

Do not let anyone rob you of your ability to Hope and foresee an image or abstract idea you want to concretely experience in the future.  Develop your fioresight and your other related skills to make plans and dreams come true.

Let infants, children, adolescents dream, guide them to the next first few steps to realize that dream in their lifetime. Let them be in charge of their attention controls as they grow into school age. Guide them through the next stages of Attention control which I consider as precursor skills to eventually  become competencies that will create global accomplishments.

But be reminded that accomplishments are not required to be competent. Certificates of accomplishments only mark that you have Competence. As long as you hold on to your dream and as long as you try everyday to move closer to it no matter what the pace, you are fine and well. Hope is dynamic. It is more alive than a passive wish. Hope acts to make your Dream come true.

Adults must lead people to better and better lives. Adults must learn to connect foresight or previewing abilities along with the other attention control abilities with Hope. Those other essential abilities are discussed later.

Time Allocation Control

We really never had any similar occasion in history where people enjoy spending a lot of hours with their addictions. It was different when early humans spent time out with Nature. At least the natural messenger was benevolent. Mother Nature's interest has always been to teach us to live in harmony with the rest of Creation. Nowadays, our attention (hours and hours and hours of it)  are captured for longer and longer periods of time by a questionable influence that have interests far different from our individual interests. This is done though our current high technology media that markets the ideas of a few people. We have been buying all their popular ideas.

So what can we do about it?

For infants, go back to basics and start with numbers.

For young children, introduce time telling and time management in terms of establishing schedules for school, homework, play, meals, sleep, etc. Present time and tasks in list or table format. If you have to use hi-tech media, make sure you provide more time on learning Values, good relationships, academic education, games and entertainment in decreasing if not equal amounts.

For adults, re-learn how you can use simple counting to work for your welfare. Adults must become completely and totally aware of how much they spend each day for sleeping, resting their eyes and minds during work, time working for another person, time working to pay government taxes, time working on your own projects if you have any, time working on your physical health.  It may be time to re-balance your schedule. Reset the time schedule to make it work for you if really necessary. I understand that it  will be a little tricky at first. But you may do the re scheduling now and delay the implementation when it is more feasible. It is better late than never. Your own lives really depend on it!

Expect that no one else might do this for you except you. So it's about time to teach your brain some simple time allocation skills. If you think your brain is not naturally wired for it, then recruit more brain cells to make it possible. Your adult brain still has the property of neuroplasticity or malleability. Use a journal if you must. Time to get organized. Do it at work or in your extracurricular activities. Be serious of taking advantage of such opportunities for you will need it in the future where you may need to put up your own projects.

Focus

"Sharply focused adults may be effective in doing the job fast and efficiently. It may also be a trap by itself keeping the person inside a boring non dynamic scene. However, the roaming thinkers may provide out of the box and creative ideas that may be overlooked by the other group. They both need each other. But of course, the person who is able to master both kinds of minds may be in a better position to work under any circumstance and with any kind of partner available at that instant. This balanced kind of person may be the  type that may notice that a huge part of the human family is suffering, can temporarily put his personal interest on hold, understand the problems, contribute to the solutions by alerting other busy people to work on those ignored global problems."

With poor control of the roaming mind, a person's thoughts tend to wander into other things not so related to the topic at hand. There may even be too many external distractions. If there are no distractions and this still happens. It is either that individual really needs to rest or sleep to help re-organize his thoughts or he has a serious attention deficit.

In contrast a mind that is extremely focused can almost never be distracted.

We can help the normal child by giving them subtle cues to return to the topic or maybe ask the same question in a different way that his type of mind can understand. Some kids will understand abstract concepts if you use pictures to illustrate what is being discussed. The kinetic type of thinker probably would understand ideas if it is demonstrated with their physical involvement. Get her or someone in front of the class to demonstrate the idea. Games such as "Charades" may be helpful. Highlighting methods may help. Teach the kid a simple gesture of maybe temporarily using her hands (only when needed and highly distracted) to cover the sides of her vision to help her redirect focus while paying attention. Closing windows and doors to avoid distracting lights and sounds may also do the trick if really necessary. A spot light in a dark room could really help direct anyone's attention.  Use positive reinforcements. You may use short and consistent or regular schedules. Minimize time with the television for entertainment but go watch if those are educational programs.

Stages and screens are like windows. Make sure you are only looking out those windows if your attention in the real world is not needed at that moment. Your focus may not roam within the day, but it may roam around within the span of years. So you can also be gradually distracted especially if you do not have long term goals or deep foresight. Foresight is also discussed somewhere in the blog.

Do the same for older children and adults. Do not allow your thoughts and attention to roam back to dwell on your enslaving biases and addictions.

Sharply focused adults may be effective in doing the job fast and efficiently. It may also be a trap by itself keeping the person inside a boring non dynamic scene. However, the roaming thinkers may provide out of the box and creative ideas that may be overlooked by the other group. They both need each other. But of course, the person who is able to master both kinds of minds may be in a better position to work under any circumstance and with any kind of partner available at that instant. This balanced kind of person may be the  type that may notice that a huge part of the human family is suffering, can temporarily put his personal interest on hold, understand the problems, contribute to the solutions by alerting other busy people to work on those ignored global problems. Once the attentions of ordinary people are directed to where they should be, then we can prioritize and work on one problem at a time collectively while making sure that all the possible solutions are considered and implemented as necessary until the problem is contained. If we can do that as a specie, then we are well on our way to humanity's bold and bright future. Maybe there is also a way to change our limited focus to a near 360 degree type of situational awareness. If that is too much, then maybe at least the examples for activities for the child mentioned above may be a good starting point. Regardless we are always open to brighter ideas.

Perspective

"We may need secular and spiritual leaders who know the intricacies of life in the trenches. Leader servants (not insensitive unskilled tyrant leaders) who can walk the talk regardless of what position that is. Leaders must be exposed to menial work while the grass roots must taste or at least learn to understand the basic mechanisms of administrative work."

It is always better if we all have the ability to filter and manipulate all of Life's sensory inputs with perfect attention.

You may be the type of person that became preoccupied with detail. On the other hand you may be the type that only looks at the bigger picture.

If you are among the detail type, you might want to explore the bigger pictures in life. Do not be too concerned with giving coins to street children on the street when you can do a lot better if you grow your Heart to produce Assets for the long term. Those assets will enable you to support substantially and regularly those institutions that have programs that rehabilitate and empower those misguided kids. Why not try to dream and work on yourself so you can put up expanding organizations that will help those poor kids. Are you growing that kind of Heart? Many of the skills you need are discussed somewhere in my blogs.

For the Big picture guys on the other hand, why not try to exert effort checking out the details why you became devoid of details about yourself or about your companion or about your community. Why can't the budding entrepreneur who just recently became the boss of his dad's enterprise steer the business to expand rapidly like his dad used to do. He might be having persistent problems with handling of new employees. Why can't he go down the trenches and understand the details in workflow, routines, retraining, systems and people skills on site rather than abdicate those to subordinates who equally do not know what must be done? Those lost details are probably what his dad laid out long ago.

Maybe we could teach these to infants and young child by first letting them play with a magnifying glass and explain details versus the bigger picture seen by the naked eye. Explain as much of everything in detail to your ever inquisitive toddler who does not run out of questions. Do not curb their appetite to ask and to question some discovered inconsistencies in our adult way of life. Be honest if you do not know but tell the kid that you will try to find out why that is. Do it together. Teach them how to describe in detail. Keep the ideas in the discussion in context minding the bigger picture. Do the same for late childhood as well as adolescence but in more subtle methods.

"My toddler shows me nail polish on her toes. I know she's very detailed, so I launched detailed questions that ask if it's too dark...if it’s smooth... Then I gradually switched to low power magnification asking why she does not have nail color on her hands...why her teeth are not colored... why her dog or her doll doesn't have their nails colored (she laughed but I do not want her distracted by the joke so I continued) ...I asked her why I do not have color in my hand or why her mom also does not wear nail polish...something to that effect you get the point...just pull back to let her see the big picture..."

As adults, know and be informed that you do not have to be a big boss of a large company to learn how to run a business in order to get the lifestyle you yearn for if that is still the way you think. Find a way to allocate both seriousness and fun in your work no matter how menial and insignificant that work seems to you or other people. Who knows if that humble position may be a key to run a bigger organization /project at full efficiency. You know what? That is the key that most are ignoring. If you are a maintenance clerk or janitor for example, you can find ways to be very efficient in your work. Mind the details by innovating on the current routines. Your skills will not go unnoticed. You will find yourself later transferred to even higher and higher positions keeping those disciplines of turning your dry disorganized routines to very efficient ones. If you can do it in the small stuff, then you can do it in the bigger stuff. But after all that, do not be satisfied with mastering detailed attention since the big picture type of attention may be needed when you move to advanced stages of development. The latter type of attention perspective is more essential if you will begin to handle and manage plenty of detailed perspective partners that may number like an entire army. Since the rank and file people may not see everything beyond their highly specialized craft, the big perspective person must be in a better position to watch the trends, see what is needed or in high demand from moment to moment. He must sense any unforeseen consequences that needed corrective work or maneuver. If other projects needed to be built to work synergistically with the current project, then he is the person accountable for that.  This not only applies in businesses but also in non profit organization like religions. We may need secular and spiritual leaders who know the intricacies of life in the trenches. Leader servants (not insensitive unskilled tyrant leaders) who can walk the talk regardless of what position that is. Leaders must be exposed to menial work while the grass roots must taste or at least learn to understand the basic mechanisms of administrative work.

More about these kinds of rumblings and rantings in my blog. Feel free to find links to my blogs located on my Facebook wall.

Attention Control

"Not carefully paying attention resulted to a huge attention debt that we must now all begin to seriously settle collectively as a specie." - Al Cal

As we live our lives, we learn and experience many many things over the years. Learning can be easy. But sometimes, some of us may find it difficult because we have trouble paying attention. Attention includes our ability to listen and our ability to focus. It also include abilities to fit new ideas with old ones kept in memory. Attention is also involved in our actions to solve problems and to accomplish complex tasks.

There is goodness in everyone even in the worse you have ever known. It is just that bad people try to shut down a part of the brain that cares. The most unkind and also the kindest people you know who makes mistakes do it in the same way. We all have the empathy neurons or mirror neurons in our brains that allow us to feel the pain and pleasure that others may be experiencing. But the attention of many are still voluntarily being trapped in materialism, consumerism, physical accomplishments, etc rather than intangible treasures that will stay with us for as long as we live. Simply speaking, it is just that we fail to pay attention to our surroundings such that we can not act accordingly.

Attention control is a job we should have completed during school age. This is a time when the brain is suppose to establish its executive attention controls mostly under higher brain functions. If fight and flight automatic responses are controlled by the brainstem, then the higher brain functions that include complex processes are handled by a different part of the brain-the supratentorial brain or upper brain.

Shifting our attention by first disengaging our focus from one stimulus, moving our focus and then engaging another stimulus are also handled by different parts of the brain.

Our attention may be greatly influenced by bias, perspective, focus and time allocation. Attention may also be influenced by foresight, problem-solution filter, scheduling/pacing, sequencing, resource enumeration, evaluation, and hindsight. The above mentioned attention control skills or creativity skills are themselves products of Values such as Love and others that include Hope, Prudence, Restraint, Justice and Order.

Poor attention control results to inaccurate perceptions, impulsivity, or consequent avoidant or antisocial behaviors that distract us from attending to our real Needs.

Bias Control 2

The same for early and late childhood as well as adolescents. Say "No" firmly when appropriate. Avoid leaving the kid to grandparents (not applicable to all of course) who usually have less energy to train the kid. Help the child adjust the volume of his voice when talking. Remind him constantly to adjust the voice volume to socially acceptable levels. Do not expect patience to develop completely earlier than late childhood since most brains are not wired for Patience and other related Input control skills before that time. Make humanitarian endeavors appear like child's play so that your kid will become more familiar with such activities that it becomes deeply incorporated into the growing environment friendly biosphere culture of the future. Teach him the basic life skills that we lost because of our culture of cynicism and convenience.

What good will a young genius rocket scientist kid be if the economy fails or typhoons wreak havoc and the kid has no survival skills. Does you kid know some form of first aid.. As adults, have you any idea how to do basic life support using chest compressions without breaths? Are we really walking the talk of Loving Life? Or are we stubbornly fixated to our own little addictions that ruin life? Do we have a caring Heart?

As adults, we developed Hearts attached to  ownerships and concepts of hoarding. Even hoarding of special knowledge. Since that time, we have been subconsciously accumulating stuff at a rate more than our skills could find time to use them. We did not develop skills of adding  value to anything we get our hands on and sharing it with others. Those commodities become junk the sooner we crave for the latest thing. We trashed our world while we pampered ourselves. It is now a time to help and give. Stop hoarding. What we have today may all be thrown to waste if everything collapses. No one will ever use those resources that were tucked away for some rainy day if we do not use them now. Care to take a look outside, it's already "raining and flooding".  We will respect your decision if you will continue to fill the environment with waste from totally short lasting commodities that were designed to break down fast. Our world became a "big junkyard" of things of stagnant value  that are withheld from the needy which creates a temporary illusion of scarcity instead of revealing real abundance. This was partly the reason why the global economy was all messed up. That is how we dealt with our possessions, our skills  and so called academic competencies. We kept and held on to them fearing we could lose them if we shared and taught our secrets with the needy others. Look at what you have been accumulating all this time. What are your addictions? Do you really believe that is what you will be doing all your life? Have you tried to do other stuff without necessarily giving up on your first biases or wants? Why not try exploring the kind of satisfaction gained from physical activity if you are the reclusive type? How about real humanitarian projects and causes if you were the narcissistic type? Why not try inner explorations if you are the outgoing kinetic type?

Try not to restrict your preferences because you are actually capable of less self-restrictions than you'll ever know. Yes you can always get a partner who can complement your weaknesses. But if they leave for some reason, you are once again left disabled. Try to learn things you never had before. You do that and you will closely approach being fully interdependent.