Makes Sense - with Dr. JC Doornick - ASSESS - Step Three of the Interface Response System - Episode 9

Episode Date: April 8, 2024

The goal is to change the way we look at things, so that the things we look at can begin to change. Welcome to Stpe Three of the Interface Response System - ASSESS - In this episode we learn how to execute on this arduous task of assessing the scene of the interface from a different vantage point. Along with three powerful tools to add to your belt, this episode will play a major role in the rewiring of your assessment making machine. My favorite step of the 4 step process. Enjoy   Thank you to our sponsors Makes Sense Academy: https://www.riseupwithdragon.com/makes-sense-academy    ResourcesConnect With Dr. JC Doornick-  https://zez.am/makessense - Website: https://www.riseupwithdragon Resources:  Donald Hoffman Interview - https://www.youtube.com/live/1O0l9ynXY1g?feature=shared Case Against Reality Book - https://amzn.to/3U6O7dU Rizwan Virk Interview - https://youtu.be/x0iqxkdBplw?feature=shared Simulation Hypothesis Book - https://amzn.to/3J9IsxC The Holographic Universe - Michael Talbot - https://amzn.to/3J6aCcL  The Elephant Parable by John Godfrey Saxe - https://allpoetry.com/The-Blind-Man-And-The-Elephant Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman - https://amzn.to/3xqPwDe  Influence - The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini - https://amzn.to/3J8g0Mn  The Arkana Spiritual Center - https://www.arkanaspiritualcenter.com  Free Will by Sam Harris - https://amzn.to/4ancWrz  Timestamps(00:00:00) Introduction (00:00:37) Change the way you look at things so that the things you look at begine to change. (00:3:19) What we see is what we get but is what we get what actually is or just what we see? (00:5:37) Looking at things from a different vantage point. (00:6:47) A case against reality with Donald Hoffman (00:8:01) The Simulation Hypothesis with Rizwan Virk (00:13:20) Life as a video game?(00:15:46) The Eye of the Storm (00:14:37) Your old programmed mind is impatient and doesn't like to wait too long. (00:18:27) Cognitive Disputation (00:20:21) What is the efficacy of Free Will with Sam Harris (00:22:04) THe Elephant Parable (00:26:21) Survey the Scene (00:28:10) Thinking Fast and Slow with Daniel Kahneman  (00:29:04) Makes Sense Academy Sponsor Break (00:29:00) The Bouncer Revised (00:32:30) Whole-O-graphic Vision Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Make sense. Great morning friends. Great morning world. Great morning humans. This is your boy, Dr. J.C. Dornick, aka. The Dragon. And welcome to another episode of the Make Sense podcast. And another discussion about the things that make you go, hmm.

Today, we're going to make sense of step three of the four-step process we call the interface response system. And step three is called assess. And what we're going to do is, is we're going to learn to execute on this thing you keep hearing me talk about, and that is to change the way we look at things so that the things that we look at can begin to change. So once again, acknowledge that sounds like a great idea. You know, change the way you look at things. Things you look at will change. So if you're looking to change things in your life, what could that look like?

Accelerate yourself faster, leverage yourself towards your goals, not get distracted so easy. Maybe it's just about becoming that follow-through version of you that says that they're going to do something and actually does it. Whatever it is that you're looking for more of or less of, it's greatly leveraged by your ability to not just think it's cool to say, hey, if I change the way I look at things, the things I look at change. Step three is about executing on that, and that is everybody's largest obstacle in front of them. Let's get into this. In the words of Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Carl Jung. He says this. It all depends on how we look at things and not how they are in themselves. I love that because as we start to broach this idea of looking at things and changing

the way we look at things, which is what step three is about, it's important to acknowledge that the things that we're looking at are only looking like they're looking because of the observer, us looking at them and the way we're looking at them. I just love separating myself from that idea that everything that we look at and perceive is the way it is rather acknowledging. That's the way I see it. I very often having conversations in our make sense community or people that I'm coaching. I just all too often hear people explain their scenarios, but use words like, I just feel like, I don't know, what I think is always interesting to hear somebody say that they feel or think something. There lies the proof that it doesn't necessarily mean that it is. I'd like to say,

Well, is that a fact or is that just how you think and feel? Now that we recognize how that programmed brain works, and we've learned to place it on safety with our pause, that's what we've done in steps one and two. We understand brain awareness perception, how the brain works, validating this idea of placing it on safety, our automatic knee-jerk response system.

Placing it on safety with our pause, hmm, we've now gained the ability to consciously observe the interface. So when I say gain the ability, step three is about first acknowledging that we have a chance here. We have an opportunity. Our potential is higher to observe the interface from an untainted, uninfluenced perspective. So this gives rise to an entirely different perception of reality. What we see, indeed, is what we get.

However, the question remains, is what we get what actually is. or just what our outdated, no longer relevant operating system saw. So let's put on our new make sense glasses that you see me wearing all the time. We'll talk about those in a little bit. And learn to claim control of our perception, thus creating the opportunity. There's that word again for a response that better suits our current wants and needs. Such an interesting concept. Let's go back to this idea that I said in the beginning that by changing the way we look at things,

things that we look at change. Again, something that sounds wonderful, most likely triggering the thought in your brain that says, yes, that's what I need to do in some way, shape, or form. It reminds me of that feeling when I remove myself from that awesome feeling of a jacuzzi experience that we all have when we first learn something like that statement. And that happens in that learning environment. Yet soon remember, at some point, as the show is coming to an end or the podcast episode's coming to an end, the closer you get back to your regularly scheduled program or reality, you understand and start to acknowledge progressively that that lesson means less and less as you move out of that jacuzzi experience and back into the reality of your life,

where it's more difficult to make sense of things. The whole practice of personal growth, whether you're reading something or listening to a podcast or a YouTube video, or going to see Tony Robbins or something like that, everything just makes total sense there. but when you leave, there's this lack of action. Love that quote. Remember, learning is nothing more than a distraction in the absence of action. What would it take to execute on that idea of changing the way you look at things in the real world while we're inundated by the many distractions and influences of society and the desires

to just keep up with the Joneses and run with the herd, most likely unconsciously? If the Joneses are not doing this, why would I? Think about that. This idea of even implicating that you're going to make changes right now and practice things. If the Joneses, if the herd, if the population at large that I'm keeping up with is not doing it, why would I? Make sense? What would it actually take to change the way that we look at things? It would require that we look at things from a different angle or from a different vantage point.

Just think about the rationale behind that. If I want to change the way I look at something, it would require at least that I take a couple steps to the right and look at it from a different vantage point. So step two of the interface response system, remember the pause, has done just that. It's actually allowed us. It's created the space. Think about the space for a second that we're in right now. It's actually allowed us.

It gave us the opportunity where there's increased potential. It's allowed us to step into that space between our old vantage point that was influenced by the old set of lenses that supported what you were taught and told, mother, father, teacher, preacher, society, and evolution, remember, but now all bets are off because we're in the space. And we now have this ability through a different vantage point. Remember, the different vantage point in perspective is the one that is not tethered and influenced and persuaded by the program. We have the ability to assess the interface that which we are interfacing with as it is, potentially, not as your program mind saw it. So this is a fascinating idea that always reminds me instinctively as it's doing right now. of that discussion that I had with a guest on the Rise Up with Dragon Show, my previous podcast, neuroscientist and author of A Case Against Reality, the amazing Donald Hoffman. If you've never heard Donald Hoffman talk or read his book, A Case Against Reality, just go YouTube him.

He'll just keep you busy, man. He's just amazing. Amongst the many massive breakthroughs that he shared in our interview, he shared one that is extremely relevant here. He was sharing the idea, based on the assessment, he's pretty much. telling us about the programmed version of our assessment, because once you step in the space, you can start looking at things differently. But he was sharing the idea that nothing can exist in the absence of our observation of it. He went further to give me an example like this. Look at the moon

at night and agreeing that the moon is this glowing planetary ball of light up in the sky. He then said, look away from that moon and prove to me that it's still there in the absence of my observing it. I could claim that I could prove it, but I couldn't prove it. So that kind of validates this idea in this space where we're starting to learn about assessing. Does something actually exist in the absence of our observation of it? Another guest on the Rise Up with Dragon Show and also one that you're going to see coming up soon because I've already interviewed him for the Make Sense podcast, and that is author of the simulation hypothesis and an amazing guy, MIT grad Rizwan Verk. He shared another scenario that further changes the faulty nature of our perception of the interface.

He used the analogy of a gaming platform where the gamer not only can see the player and the surrounding landscape. So here I am. I'm the gamer and I'm watching and there's my character, my avatar, and I can see him and I can see the surrounding landscape. Yet also, if you pay attention and you're curious, see far into the distance indicating the possibility that this virtual world that I've immersed myself in continues on. on and on. And if I continue to run forward, you'll notice that that world keeps going. That's what's

cool about virtual reality and these new gaming platforms is you can really feel like you're there, because one of the things that your program sense-making machine does is always seeking the validity. And that's why, you know, people like Elon Musk are saying that we're pretty close, if not already there, from not being able to discern the difference between a virtual world and what we call baseline reality. Yet the assumption that this landscape is synonymous to the right, left, and behind you or out of the perception range. So what he's saying is, is the assumption that what you're looking at exists out of the plane of your sight would be inaccurate. Going on to explain that in the construction of video games, so this is a guy that actually knows how to build video games,

and that's where his fascination with the simulation hypothesis came. Another great book in the notes. the scenery that you see in your immediate and far away vicinity, as I described, is only rendered upon turning your character towards them. So once again, validating that the only reason things exist is because we're an observation of it. But there's this question that's postulated. Does anything exist in the absence of it? Why am I sharing this? Because if you know that your perception-making or observation-making system is potentially faulty, and you know that you all you can see is what you can see, and what you see is what you get because of how you looked at it, something to take a look at. So in other words, in a video game, whatever we're not looking at

has not yet been rendered. Now, that's not like theory. Video games are made to only render scenes when your character is pointing at them. While you're not pointing at them, they actually don't exist. They're not there. So my question is this. How is our interface with reality as humans any different than that. Sit with that for a second. Is anything that we see actually there in the absence of us seeing it? Here I am in my podcast studio. So I've left the environment of my home, where my wife was and my daughter, and we're watching some TV. I can't prove to you those things are still there unless I go there and look at it. Now, if my wife took a picture of it and texted it to me, that would be proof. But until she does that, I can't prove it. So fun little game to play. So the logic that has

been written into our brain-based program that formulates, this is what it does. It formulates its best guess of what it thinks that it's seeing would say, yes, it is still there. And that's our best guess. That's how we fill in the gaps of an unsensible world. We say, yeah, makes sense. But when you're asked to prove it, you can't. So why do I share this here? We have to think about this fact right now, that even though we're in this space where we're going to learn some tools on how to assess things, it's important that you still understand everything that you've learned before, that it's still you looking at those things. So you learned how to practice brain awareness perception, validating the idea of pausing. And now you're in this space and you're in giving yourself a different vantage point. But you still have to recognize that it's still you looking at things. And you have a system of looking at things that is flawed just by nature, even when you're conscious. So by becoming aware of those things, it's just, things adding to the equation, the fact that your program's sense-making machine plays a big role in what you end up seeing as well. I think everything, even things that I consciously look at and

determine I'm looking at them untainted, untethered to my program, but I'm still going to dispute everything. So at the end of the day, what I would say is this, because this could get exhausting if you just never trust what you're seeing. I just play this game until I see things the way that best suit me if you understand what I'm saying. The double-edged sort of that is if you're looking at things in denial, maybe using what you see as an excuse to not take responsibility for your life or something like that. So that's on you. But if you've decided to move forward and you have a desired state and we've spoken about that and you know what leverages it and what doesn't, what gets in its way and what does not, then you can start playing the game, right? So it's all an illusion. It's all an

illusion. But what I'm saying here is how to control the illusion. Remember this. The interface response system that we're talking about does not give you the ability to see things exactly as they are because we'll never know the depths of the truth that's another thing that Donald Hoffman speaks about but what I'm empowering you to do is to see things in a way that serve you rather than not so if life were like a video game in this sense perhaps two people from different realities that look at the same landscape we'll see two different things so just imagine two people looking at the same landscape one sees a tree in the distance and an event or a person taking place that they perceive as fun and friendly and highly relevant in their lives. That's what one of them sees. Yet the other at the same

time, looking at the same thing, but through their lenses, sees no trees and sees the person as either a threat or not relevant to them. So those are two sense making machines and they're both looking at things. So what would we do? The person, in light of what I just said, the person that's seeing things and it's and it's suiting them. It's putting them in a good mood. It's allowing them to move forward. Don't tell them anything. They're fine. But if somebody is saying, hey, I want more. I'm not liking my results. I'm unsatisfied. These tools are a way of doing that. It's about getting what you want. So step three of the interface response system is a fun one. Yet, as you can see, requires much practice and patience, as well as a few new skill sets and tools that I'm going to share

with you. Why? Why do we need those things? Even though we've managed to step into that space, or as I call the eye of the storm, it's still the same person that you were standing in that space. And your old program, guess what, is impatient. So you put your old program on pause in step two. You said, hey, 120,000 tonne oil tanker. You just take a chill, take a break. I'm going to put you on safety right now. But it's impatient. You know why it's impatient? Because it knows it's right. Here's a fun analogy. Just like Jennifer Gray, I believe her. nickname was Baby in the movie Dirty Dancing, a little dirty dancing reference, your program mine does not like being put in the corner and told to hold on. Nobody puts baby in the corner. Remember

that? Well, your ego and current interface response system that you're pausing is the same way as baby. It wants to do what it thinks it's right based on what it always does. That's logic and rationale for it. So you don't have much time and may run out of time if you don't know what to do with this opportunity to change the way you look at things. So I'm constantly teaching people how to insert that pause before they act. I had somebody this morning say, I always find myself when somebody is, you know, exhibiting some sort of a pain point, wanting to instinctively swoop in there as the hero, and that moves them into what we call the drama triangle where you're no longer helping the person. It's like that cat in the tree that didn't ask to be saved. It's just like being in the tree and say, how do I stop that?

So I just say, you just need to pause your system. You just need to, it's okay that you're that way, but you need to give yourself an opportunity, a different vantage point, to see that you were about to do that, and it would not give you a good outcome. So that's what it means, like the opportunity to change the way you look at things.

However, a chance indeed you have when you step into that space. So let's talk about some effective strategies and tools that you can implement and practice in that eye of the storm. So in my book, makes sense solving the mystery of why shit happens. We spend a lot of time sharing fascinating signs and insights through stories that I made along the journey. Before people get to the interface response system, they found out about where I picked up

all of these signs and insights that ended up coming into play and creating this formula. So in a sense, these insights were synonymous to the tools that I have been acquiring for my tool belt all along. the road. And I would assume you understand what that means. There's certain, like, core principles and signs that you've noticed and turned into insights that have become tools in your belt right now that you break out and use. So as you know, certain tools are right for certain tasks. If I see a nail that needs to be pushed into a piece of wood, I'm going to take out my hammer. Makes sense. So that's the idea of using these tools. So to complete this task that we're trying to accomplish right now of changing the way we look at

things, we're going to need to access some of the tools that somebody that's read my book know about. So for those that have not read the book, which at the time of this recording is nobody, because it's not out yet, I'm going to share some of those tools here. So some will be ones that you've kind of heard me trickle in in the previous podcast episodes, but some are new. So we've spent quite a bit of time learning about the things like cognitive bias. Remember that idea of even if something is in the absence of fact or another fact proves that what we say is wrong. Cognitive bias is when we say everything to contradict what you're saying and find some sort of meager proof that what we're saying is true. So we talked about cognitive bias. And then in step two,

we also learned the practice of something called cognitive distancing, right? That was that pause when we we said, hmm. So now that we're in the space, we're going to talk about some tools and some perspectives and some things that you can practice. Now that we're in that space between And while we have that opportunity, although short-lived, to look at things untethered and uninfluenced by the program, it's time to challenge the interface. So the practice of cognitive disputation involves challenging our thoughts, beliefs, and interpretations of events. It's a process of challenging and examining the validity and impact of these cognitive processes. By engaging in disputation, which is that challenge, we gain the power to disarmine. what truly matters and what lies within our control. Sound familiar? Episode 6, sorting. We went into

depth with that in that episode called sorting. Now you know where sorting fits in, and that's why I shared that with you in episode 6. It fits into this step, step three of the process, of the four-step process. So step three is called assess. So sorting is an assessment tool. Now, you know where this fits in to the four-step process. This is step three. called the cess. This is a crucial moment right now as we learn more and more about how the brain makes decisions for us without asking us or this illusion of our conscious mind making decisions that end up being opinions, right? So there's all of these things at play. So here we are. This is why we have to learn how to dispute it. Now the very nature of step two and the pause is somewhat of a

cognitive disputation, but it's more of creating space for the disputation. It's almost like when you take somebody that's committed a crime and you put them in jail, that's the pause. Like, hey, you sit there and wait for a second. But the disputation happens in court with a jury and questions and all of that stuff. So in fact, there's a famous experiment from a physiologist Benjamin LeBay and his colleague using EEG, electrical encephalograms, showing that our brains initiate involuntary movements up to 300 milliseconds before we are even aware of having decided to move. And this actually calls into play the efficacy of things like free will. These claims have been challenged by many neuroscientists and philosophers to dive deep into

this concept. I placed a fantastic read in my book trail, which is where I'm sharing all of the books that I've read that have motivated anything, this podcast, or you'll see that this book is in the notes, but I'm creating this book trail. This is by author Sam Harris called Free Will. Fantastic book. It challenged this idea of free will because free will is this idea that we can do whatever we want. And it's true. The question is, are you doing whatever you want? Or are you doing whatever this brain that has ideas unconsciously happening 300 milliseconds before you're even aware of them? Is that where free will comes? It's pretty interesting. It's where I discovered the Benjamin and LeBay study is in that book, Free Will by Sam Harris. Fantastic. And he's got a great,

great podcast that I listened to called Making Sense, similar to mine. He must be a genius. What does this mean? It means that consciousness, the very idea of voluntary consciousness that we're hypothetically saying is increased in potential in the space may not be the controlling factor, but merely the witness of the controlling factor. If we know that for the most part, we don't really get to make decisions. In fact, me talking to you right now, most likely being controlled by my subconscious. But if that's true,

then coming online and being conscious is not really the controlling factor, but merely the witness or even the employee of the true controlling factor, and that is your subconscious mind. That's right, your conscious mind may be working for someone or something else. So let me share something really, really cool

that gives you a great example of how we perceive things. and this is called the Elephant Parable. And this is out of my book. And I'll put in the show notes where you can actually read the actual parable. So it's a great story called The Elephant Parable. And what it does is it puts perception into perspective. The blind men and the elephant is a parable from India adopted by many religions and published in various stories for adults and children.

There were once six blind men who stood by a roadside daily begging from people who passed. They had often heard stories of elephants but had never seen one. For being blind, how could they? So the driver drove an elephant down the road where the people stood one morning. When they were told that the great beast was before them, so they decided the only way to see this strange new animal would be to inspect it by touch. They were blind, which they could do. They approached the elephant and began touching it from different angles and sides,

reporting back to one another what they were experiencing. So the man touching the elephant's legs said the elephant was like a tree. The man touching the elephant's tail described the elephant was just like a rope. The man touching the elephant's tusk described that the elephant was just like a spear. The man touching the elephant's large side said it was like a wall. Finally, the man touching the elephant's ear said the elephant was just like a large fan. So we all touch the proverbial elephant and draw conclusions based on our truths and belief through our existing sense-making machine.

In this example, they had no vision. So their virtual reality suit was lacking vision, which is something that maybe you just needed to be reminded of how cool that is. But still, we all perceive things through our sense-making machine. So our subjective experience is limited by our personal experience and supported and delivered to us by our virtual reality suit. We are all experiencing the same things in life from our unique perspectives through our sense-making machines,

which significantly impact how our reality unfold. Elephant's leg is a tree. If you decide it is and protect your position, you will stay locked into this idea and come to blows with anyone that says anything different. However, if you expand your subjective experience and become curiously open to alternative perspectives, and that's what cognitive disputation would allow you to say

is, is it a tree? You'll gain access to a new reality that has no limits. And from that new reality, you can start learning how to bend reality and start identifying things that best suits you in a forward-moving structure. Developing our minds and recognizing

that our mindsets are subjective in nature is essential regarding personal growth. However, when we take the time to listen to our other perspectives, our attitudes can change. Remember what we're trying to do here is change the way we look at things so that the things you look at change.

Personal growth, can be found in the shift. That's where you'll find the growth. In the opportunity, the permission for the shift. Goal is not to discover the absolute truth in our perspectives. Because I don't think human beings were engineered to be able to perceive the truth. Instead, we aim to cultivate logical, efficient, less distracting attitudes and support our goals. Make sense?

Warning. Events and people that we interface with don't always have 10 minutes to wait for a response. I said that before. So it's one thing to recognize that your program is impatient. The things that you're interacting with, they don't have like 10 minutes for you to ponder all this stuff. No response at all becomes the response if you take too much time. So give yourself a little bit of grace here, right?

And get you into trouble if you like say, hey, wait a second. Have you nothing to say, they might say. Sometimes I'll say, huh. And it's interesting what you do when you pause. People want to hear that answer right away. The idea here is to start disputing our knee-jerk perceptions, thoughts, and feelings, and allow ourselves to get the big picture. Think about where you've heard that before. Where do you go to get the big picture?

They teach that to you in driving. Remember that? When you're driving, you're supposed to get the big picture. Or, in another analogy, they teach us when we learn CPR, when we pull up to a situation where someone is in need of medical assistance, the first thing you do before you jump in and try to save them is you're taught to, assess the scene. Okay. So that's the idea here. And what that means is to take a look around logically and rationally at everything going on in order to help gather more information before making that decision to interface and help the victim. Makes sense, no, right? I mean, this is a logical

thing that you would do when somebody else's well-being is in question. We need to do this in step three. The same thing, especially if we have reason to believe, and we do, in assessment of our lack of forward progress that I said before, that our previous system has been running inefficiently, has not been assessing the scene. Can you see how a proper assessment requires some disputation? Like detective work. Not about saying I'm 100% sure this is wrong. I'm just going to say, let me look at all the facts. It's the very nature that I'm so fascinated with the concept that I speak about in my book very often of what's called the crazy wall or an investigation board. It's the reason why detectives will find suspects and then connect the dots with thumbtacks and red

yarn to solve the case. You have to look at the whole picture, and that's how a great detective works. There's a very big difference between mechanically surveying the scene and methodically doing so. One of the things that I noticed, especially in times of high stress, when my program stress response system is rearing up, and I've got the gun cocked back, and I'm on a hairpin trigger. and only looking at what I was programmed to look at, one dimensionally. In other words, we often look only at one aspect of what it is that we're looking at the way we were taught to.

So a spectacular depiction of this is explained in another fantastic read that was very, very inspiring to me and gave me a lot of my language. One of my all-time favorites called Thinking Fast and Slow by author and Nobel Prize winner, Daniel Caneman. He breaks down the two systemic responses that. that we have into two systems. System one, simply referring to the programmed automatic system. So that's that one that was just rearing up.

System two refers to the one that we access by consciously surveying the scene and checking the facts. We're using our system one, the one that is automatic 95% of the day. So even though you're in the space, you have to consciously look to use system two. So what we need is some powerful tools to help us tap into and strengthen our,

kung food technique when it comes to sorting. Hey, let's take a quick break to hear from our sponsor. The Make Sense podcast is sponsored by the Make Sense Academy, co-created by both myself, Meeker, aka The Chicken, and The Dragon. The Make Sense Academy is a live interactive community where like-minded, solution-focused, curious seekers of expansion, gather daily in a mastermind setting with both chicken and dragon, where they have access to premium content, online courses and powerful collaboration and networking, all for $24 a month. The Make Sense Academy and its members are solely responsible for funding the Make Sense podcast. So feel free to reach out to us at www.orgizeup with dragon.com and check out the Make Sense

Academy, risk-free, with a money-back guarantee. Now, back to the Make Sense podcast. So speaking of sorting, another technique that I shared in episodes, Six. To apply in step three is the concept, if you remember, called the bouncer. Remember that I. The visual that you are the bouncer working at the door and your job is that of quality control. Who gets in and who gets out? Part of the sorting process. That's why you carry that guest list or the bouncer does, which represents the new set of requirements needed to get into the bar or into your life. You are in the space between accessing a higher degree of your untainted conscious mind, which has a different guest list than the other bouncer that is on break at the moment.

New age limit, new requirements, a new set of sorting skills in that filter to get into this new club. And that's the one that is going to move forward, the one that is favorable and supportive of your goals and dreams. This bouncer analogy works very, very well with self-assessment, well. It's not just this idea of what gets in and out of your brain. Remember, one of the aspects of the bouncer is the bouncer would walk through the club from time to time and see if anything or anyone was not playing nice and needed to be kicked out. So if you're able to assess things with a more rationally and logically based mind, you may notice some of your thoughts and feelings still hanging around that the other bouncer somehow previously let in. Feel free to bounce them out

with force if necessary. However, this sorting tool is an effective way to have those disputational questions come into play, right? That's what we're doing, filtering and sorting when interfacing with a person or event. So if you're a member from episode six, we taught you some questions to ask that are kind of representing of that filter. And this is what you would be doing at the door to your nightclub. What's happening? Does this matter? Does this apply to my goals and dreams and what matters most. Is this in support of my goals and dreams or not? What aspects of this are in my control versus not? Is this event about me or them or it? As the bouncer, you can see the analogy is that's how you're deciding who gets in and who gets out, but also going through and

see who needs to be kicked out. And that's how step three works. In this space, it has to be in support of where you want to go because this impatient paused version is going to bring you back to where you're not moving forward. So that's why you have to do this. And naturally, the more we do this, the more we, hmm, and rationally look at things and ask these questions, the better. So one last tool to install into your operating system. An eventual new upgraded virtual reality suit is something I call holographic vision. Before I get into holographic vision, let's just capture that idea that the goal is to eventually have these tools, not be things that you have to consciously, interact and interface with or pull out of your tool belt.

But just like your current 95% subconscious mind, they will be on autopilot. How do we do that? Hebs theory, the Hebbian theory, neurons that fire together, wire together. That's the whole idea of creating things that are habitual and forming habits. Those are the things that happen without you even knowing it. So if you do this stuff long enough, it'll become your new operating system. And just imagine having a new operating system that was in support of where you wanted ago that happened without you even knowing it. As Plato used to say, whenever you want to talk about

people, it's best to take a bird's eye view and see everything all at once. So let's talk about holographic vision. It's always been a very, very interesting topic for me to play and learn about holograms. And I don't know if you know what a hologram is, but they're really, really fun. You see them in airports sometimes and just fun shops and things like this. They're fun to walk around and look at from multiple angles. And I love looking at things, obviously. from different vantage points, right? Activating various different images. You can't see it from this angle,

but when you turn, the image evolves into something else. Then I read, because I became fascinated with that idea of a hologram, and I was like, how do you create that visual? So I read the holographic universe

by Michael Talbot in the notes as well, fantastic but heavy book. And I learned something about holograms that just rocked my world, and it was where I created this concept and tool called holographic vision. So do you know what happens to hologram if you drop it on the floor and it breaks into many, many little pieces all over the floor.

You'll notice that you can't see the pretty hologram anymore because the pieces are all over the floor. However, what's unique about a hologram is that every little bit of those pieces, you can pick up any piece, any size piece, every one of those pieces contains every element of the entire holographic image. Do you understand what I'm saying? Makes sense? So the book relates this concept. This is a fact about holograms. That's what's so cool. It's like every bit of that image that you walk around and see is programmed into every little piece,

every little chip of a piece of that hologram. That is the same thing that he's saying about this concept of the universe being the same way. That's what Talbot says. It's the same thing. Every little bit of the universe contains every bit of the universe. Here's what this did to me. This made me recognize that our lives are the same.

And there was a lot more going on than what I was perceiving from my vantage point. It was a very, very one-dimensional programmed vantage point. When I learned this concept and put it all together with a logical idea of looking at the whole picture, remember, survey the scene, big picture, all that stuff. Looking at the whole picture when observing a happening, I constructed a tool for your belt now called whole, a graphic vision. W-H-O-L-E-O-Graphic vision. I made it up. It's about embracing the fact that what you see is what you get, like we said before,

but only from that vantage point. So if you're looking to really know what you're looking at, you have to acknowledge that. Step to the left or the right, you may see something else or see it differently, and that would trigger a completely different perception and outcome. While observing an event from other vantage points, we're able to ask new questions of curiosity. A prime example of this would be me looking around at my first. father and learning where he came from. Rather than just looking at him from the perspective of somebody that left us, my parents got divorced and he left. And that's the only vantage point I was looking at. But as I evolved and grew up, and I started looking at it from a different vantage point for the

different experience, I started to learn why he was like that. And I started to learn how to forgive. It was a huge step. So holographic vision in many ways has saved my life. Milton Erickson was a revered 20th century psychologist who contracted polio as a child. Fascinating story, which caused full body paralysis only leaving function in his eyeballs. Nothing else worked except for his eyeballs. Only capable of ending his days in observation, naturally, he learned that people had a second language that unveiled traits as intentions behind the mask of what they projected. So what he's saying is, is only able to interface with reality in the world through his eyeballs. Naturally, his eyesight and his observation skills got very, very keen and sharp.

He noticed a different type of language and communication that was going on. So what does this say about the practice of psychology and why did this guy become so revered? He had a very keen practice of observing that there was more than meets the eye. Once again, validating the value of using this holographic vision tool. The use of holographic vision can achieve this without being paralyzed by polio. Not only is it insightful and fascinating to observe all elements and things that you interface with, it's actually enriching as it uncovers things like intentions and insecurities in others that release you from feeling like a victim of circumstances.

Imagine if you were looking at somebody that was originally perceived as doing something bad to you. They had ill will and they were challenging you and they're coming at you with objection. But imagine if you had the ability to see that from a different vantage point and recognize that it was only due to their insecurities and it actually had nothing to do with you. Thus triggering retribution otherwise and feeling shame or placing blame. But you don't have to do that because you can actually say, I have compassion for this person. Forgive them for they know not what they do.

Author Robert Chaldeany, another amazing author and book, also exhibits the same robust skill of observing more than meets the eye within his brilliant, brilliant work. One of my top five favorite books on communication. He authored a book called Influence the Psychology of Persuasion, where he introduces some beautiful observations of human behavior that help you learn how to communicate better and what influences others to take action. In addition, he introduced a fascinating concept of playing the role of a detective of intrinsic motivation, which simply means rather than judging things, play detective work and see why that people are doing things. Rather than just looking at the behavior, he was a master at looking at the motivation and the

origin of the behavior and how it impacts others. Holographic vision, baby, that's what it is. It's just this idea when you're in that third phase and you're assessing things to just remind yourself to assess the whole scene. Get the big picture and look at things from different vantage. points. Sometimes after I say, hmm, I'll just move my body, just to remind myself to look at things from a different angle. But what I do also in holographic vision, and as I just question, rather saying, what are they doing to me? I also question, why are they doing this? What's happening to them?

Where is this coming from? Very often, that creates a much better outcome for everyone. For those that know me well, I openly share that for several years now, I've been working passionately, very, very fascinated with plant medicine and sitting with ancient shamans in both the Amazon jungles of Peru, as well as the Yucatan jungle in the Tulum area in Mexico. I've experienced both working with ayahuasca and the ultimately powerful 5-M-E-O-D-M-T-Sapo Bufo Frog. These experiences will be discussed in great detail in my next book that I'm writing, and I am now actually ironically co-hosting about a month the way from our first retreat, my own plant medicine retreats with some amazing, great new friends that I've made along the way. Really, really amazing stuff. The most significant distinction that I

made while experiencing this alternate fantasy world that everybody hears so much about, which is greatly misunderstood, was that we could see things that previously couldn't be seen. This is what was fascinating to me. What most people don't know when we discuss the experience of working with plant medicine is that it's not necessarily a drug. I know that that's the easiest way to refer to it. This goes way, way back before drugs. It's more of an augmented enhancing teacher, if that makes any sense to you, that brings things that we need to see into our field of vision that were not there prior. Most people will find information that labels it as hallucinogenic drugs, right? This hallucinogenic drug that takes you away from to some fantasy realm. While experiencing the

effects of things like ayahuasca, I actually found myself completely coherent and aware of the same reality around me as I would not be on ayahuasca as you'd see it as well. In fact, I can say that I didn't actually feel anything. I didn't feel like high or woozy while I was on the medicine. However, at the very same time, I was able to see things that somebody that was not on the medicine could not see with their regular human-born eyes that were not augmented. So I saw things in the spaces between like animals and fantastic fractal designs and other strange beings that I would converse with, just like you would, if you walked up to somebody and chatted, meaning they were not perceived as hallucinations because I was in the same realm as you and I could see you and I could have a

conversation with you, but there were other things going on. That's the best way that I can explain it. Unbelievable. One particular example of this while I was deep, deep in the Amazon jungle of Peru and deep into the medicine. I was sitting with ayahuasca at this place called the Arana Spiritual Center, deep, deep in the medicine and having this in-depth conversation with one of the shamans that were at the facility that had come while I was on the medicine to come sit on our mattress. We're all sitting around in these mattresses. It's at night. It's quite amazing because you're in the middle of the jungle hearing all those. sounds and there's sloths up there and all that stuff. So anyway, I'm having this wonderful

conversation with one of the shamans that I'm pontificating and addressing some very, very powerful and potentially traumatic events that have transpired in my life with him and made some amazing breakthroughs that night. For at least an hour, I'm having a conversation with him. And I remember how grateful I was even for the time that he spent with me and how special I felt that he had spent so much time with me. There were 25 other people in the group and, you know, he gave me. He gave me me this hour. However, it wasn't until I observed him slowly dissolve and disappear into a puff of smoke that I realized that he was not of the human realm and from this alternate world that I had been exposed to while under the medicine. So I hope that gives you an example of what it means

to be on plant medicine. Because I made breakthroughs that will change my life forever in that conversation with this dude, but he wasn't actually there. And it was only then after he disappeared. with a puff of smoke that I also realized how strange it was in hindsight that he was only about one foot tall. So I learned that there exists a world within this world. And I don't know how you feel about that. Maybe it's the same world that things like deja vu and coincidence and consciousness lie in. Sometimes we think we see things. But there's a world within this world that carries most of the answers that we seek in our everyday lives. Why am I sharing this? Because in the realm of looking to have a more efficient assessment, I think it's important for you to understand the scope

of what's actually out there to see, to assess. So what I mean by this is that the world that we see through our current lenses and operating system, which has been tainted, and we are only able with those lenses to see as we've been programmed to see. Very, very limited. It's extremely limited. That's why we've put it on pause. We want to actually not just see things clearer. We want to see bigger. So when this reality is in some way, like I did with medicine, augmented, enhanced, with the help of things like plant medicine, we still see that limited world through those augmented glasses or while I was on medicine. Yet, in addition to that, we start to take note of everything else that's going on, previously

unseen to our narrow-minded eyes. So a question that I can ask you right there is, do you believe there's more than meets the eye? Do you think that this is it? Do you think that what you see is what you get? And that's it. Can you acknowledge that what you see is what you've been trained to see and that there could be a lot more? That's why two people can look and see different things. Even though they're programmed, they have different programs, different experiences. So what I'm sharing with you is this concept called augmented reality

that just by understanding and embracing it by possibility will expand your ability to work this step three of the interface responsiveness. So let's just quickly talk. for a minute as we come to the end about this idea of augmenting reality. Different from virtual reality where you place a pair of VR goggles on, like the MetaQuest or something like that, that transport you and your perception of reality to an entirely new place, different than what you saw before you put the glasses on, void of the one that you saw without them. Augmented reality is very different, AR. It combines the real world, meaning you still see the real world with computers. generated information to create an interactive experience. Augmented reality in the technology world uses hardware glasses like these new Apple visions, for instance. You see people walking down the street

and not getting hit by cars and seeing people, but it's combined with software and apps that produce an overlay digital content on top of the real life environments and objects. That's what augmented means. Augmented means changed or enhanced. Augmented reality can affect. multiple sensory modalities, including visual, auditory, haptic. There's actual haptic suits where you can start to feel what it is that you see. And this is going to continue to evolve. Somatocentury and olfactory. Doesn't this sound like what we're trying to do when we say if we could change the way we

look at things, the things that we look at change? I like to look at the normal baseline way that we've been programmed to interface with the world as that of my VR goggles. Like I said, when you're in a VR world, you're transported to a place without being able to see anything else. When I refer to the sense-making machine that includes your brain and your virtual reality suit, that's what I mean by the VR world. So to a certain degree, this is similar to that of the VR technology, isn't it, that produces an experience. However, if I put on my augmented reality glasses, it begins to unveil one thing that I couldn't see without them, and that is that augmented world, hence changing the way that I look at things.

So the reason why I'm sharing that is, isn't that what we're trying to do? Hence, changing the way I look at things. And yes, this changes the things that I look at. This is a great way to explain step three right here of the interface response system called assess. And I have a cool pair of my own augmented reality glasses that help me execute this every day. And I refer to them as my make sense glasses. In the words of the late great Johnny Nash, not Johnny Cash, Johnny Nash, I can see clearly now the rain is gone. Is it raining on your parade at this time?

Are you having trouble changing the way you look at things with a desire to see the things that you look at change? Is that your current reality? For some time now, I've adopted a powerful tool that helps me anchor and reminds me to pause and say, and to make a more logical assessment while interfacing. Step three. As a way of me augmenting my reality and taking note of things, I previously would not have taken note of and just simply run my normal operating system. I call them make sense glasses and I wear them every day. If anybody ever meets me, take a look at my glasses and you'll notice on the side that they say make sense. Nothing fancy. They're black-rimmed, nerd-like glasses. I bought many, many, many pair of them.

they say make sense on the side. When I put them on, however, because of the power of using a tool of an anchor, I put those glasses on, they actually remind me to do this stuff. They augment my reality. A switch immediately flips and I begin consciously perceiving all things with compassion and curiosity not buying into anything I see, always disputing when I'm wearing these glasses. So if you're looking for a way of reminding yourself how to stop that 120,000 tonne, oil tanker, the glasses work for me. I become acutely aware when I'm wearing these glasses of things that don't matter as well as delineate the things that I can't or can control. If you hear me speak, come say hello and I will hand you a pair of these make sense glasses because I always carry a

bunch with them. Okay, my friend, you're aware of your brain and how it works. Check, you now know that your sense making machine has been programmed to perceive reality by others and may have a few things wrong about your particular needs. Check. And now you have a few new tools that help you change the way you assess things so that the things you assess can begin to change. Check, check, check. Now we're ready to respond. So in closing, I don't know who you are. So if you ever feel the fierce urgency to connect and you want to have an actual conversation or potentially look into joining our community and rising up with me live in person every day, please feel free to reach out. We can survey each other scenes and make a logical decision whether or not we want to place each other on one

another's guest lists. Have a great day, my friend. And remember, if you learn something today, please consider giving it away. If you're looking to win, that's actually the only way what you've just learned is going to stay. Please pay this podcast forward to others, and we hope to see you inside the Make Sense Academy. Have a great day. Make sense.