Bite the apple

How many times do we get caught up in the accessory, in the means to achieve an objective, forgetting the initial meaning of our purpose? Striving for a procedure or a solution that is denying us results, we continue there, trying to reinvent the wheel while, without realizing it, we kick away that apple that comes rolling to our feet.

Our attention is so selective that, if we have decided that our invention is to come as the culmination of a long deductive process, we will not see it. Among other things because, perhaps, it is no longer a question of inventing the wheel but of persevering in our endeavour, of showing the world that we are capable or, simply, of glorifying our clumsiness through our effort. The latter is also very human.

The ability to imagine, however, although prodigious, will never be as great as the generative power of the universe. If we manage to focus our attention for a moment on what is really happening, on what is happening out there, we will discover before us a virgin territory. An unexplored region. A space of pure potentiality where things become what one chooses, no more, no less.

That place where everything happens and outside of which experience lacks substance is none other than the present moment. There is no other part of the universe, no other location where our will interacts with the cosmos face to face, participating in its physical construction. Outside of that prodigious instant, nothing exists, nothing happens, there is no other possible time in nature. Past and Future are part of the narrative time of our consciousness and meet there only as mental projections to which we can pay attention, from which we can learn or, at most, aspire to achieve, but they are not part of reality. The present is the only place where we can achieve our desire and, nevertheless, how much attention do we pay to the immensity of this moment?

In his model of change observation or “process work,” Jungian physicist and psychologist Arnold Mindell proposes that what is “primary,” manifest and visible, is always accompanied by what that “primary” is wishing to become. Being attentive to that desire, according to this model, is what allows us to continue being part of the present in its entirety.

Through the articulation of the manifest, the visible, whether in an organizational system, a relationship or a person, which is defined as “primary,” to the articulation of what the manifest or “primary” is trying to become, which is defined as “secondary,” the desire for change is projected, but resistances are also defined.

The present, therefore, is not stable, it never remains unchanged, and if, for a moment, we have the impression that it is so, we can assume that some form of resistance is at work. Resistance to change is a form of disconnection from the future, a way of not being present or, to put it in some way, of not supporting it. It may allow us not to see it, but it will not stop the constant transformation of what is observed.

Likewise, what is trying to happen, what we establish as “secondary”, once its existence is elevated to the conscious plane, will cease to be so, becoming a new “primary” from which, in turn, another “secondary” will emerge, and so on.

Quantum physics defends the idea that reality, and in the case of subatomic particles it seems that this is a proven theory, tends to change simply by being observed.

This form of subtle observation, supported by intuition and consciousness, is a dynamic element of transformation. The apple is turning towards you, how long will it take you to pay attention to it?