What happened as you began to observe your “old-personality self”
related to the familiar thoughts, habitual behaviors, and memorized
emotions that you previously connected with your mother-in-law? In a way,
you were going into the operating system of the subconscious mind, where
those programs exist, and you were the observer of those programs. When
you can become aware of or notice who you are being, you are becoming
conscious of your unconscious self.
As you began to psychologically project yourself into a potential
situation ahead of the actual experience (the impending dinner), you began
to rewire your neural circuitry to look as though the event (being
compassionate toward your MIL) had already taken place. Once those new
neural networks began to fire in unison, your brain created a picture, vision,
model, or what I will call a hologram (a multidimensional image)
representing the ideal self that you were focused on being. The instant this
happened, you made what you were thinking about more real than anything
else. Your brain captured the thought as the experience, and “upscaled” its
gray matter to look as though the experience had already occurred.
Embodying Knowledge Through Experience:
Teaching the Body What the Mind Has Learned
Soon it’s game time, and you find yourself sitting at dinner, face-to-face
with “good ol’ Mom.” Instead of knee-jerking when her typical behaviors
manifest, you stay conscious, remember what you learned, and decide to try
it out. Rather than judging, attacking, or feeling animosity toward her, you
do something completely different for you. Like the books encouraged, you
stay in the present moment, open your heart, and really listen to what she’s
saying. You no longer hold her to her past.
Lo and behold, you modify your behavior and restrain your impulsive
emotional reactions, thereby creating a new experience with your MIL.
That activates the limbic brain to cook up a new blend of chemicals, which
generates a new emotion, and all of a sudden, you truly start to feel
compassion for her. You see her for who she is; you even see aspects of
yourself in her. Your muscles relax, you feel your heart opening, and you
breathe deeply and freely.