44 A Programmer’s Guide to the Mind
The situation with the mental storage shed of automatic thought is
similar. Not every Mercy person is good at „doctoring.‟ The potential is
there, but the actual result depends upon the quality and content of
automatic memory. I suggest that a good mental „storage shed‟ has three
requirements: First, there must be something in the shed. Just as a storage
shed must be filled in order to be useful, so the Mercy person must expose
his mind to situations which can fill automatic memory with experiences.
The reason that my sister-in-law‟s brother is so good at building gadgets is
that he has been working with electronics since he was a little child. He
can find just about anything he needs by looking at those past memories.
Second, the contents of the storage shed must be useful. The Mercy
person who spends his time watching soap operas on television may have a
shed full of experiences, but there is not much that he can do with this
mental information. However, I suggest that if the contents of the mental
shed are useful, then they will also automatically become available. This is
because the mental storage shed has one major advantage over a physical
shed. Real sheds which are disorganized stay that way. The more you
rummage through them, the messier they get. Mental storage areas, in
contrast, are self-organizing. Simply stick your mental hand into the shed,
think of what you want, and if something useful is there, then it will
magically appear in your fingers.A
Three requirements for a working „storage shed‟ of automatic thought.
It must have content.
The content must be useful.
The organization must be appropriate.Finally, I suggest that the mental shed needs some way of deciding
what is appropriate. Since Mercy strategy works with emotions, every
item in the Mercy storage shed will be labeled with some type of feeling
indicating what works and what doesn‟t. We even speak of getting a feel
for something. The Mercy person decides which mental tool to use
depending upon what feels appropriate—what seems right. If the Mercy
individual has healthy feelings, then he will automatically pick the correct
piece. But, if his emotions are either inappropriate or lacking, then the
Mercy person will find himself reaching continually for the wrong mental
tool. Our story of the doll illustrates how a childhood experience of
embarrassment can warp Mercy feelings. In the same way, the Mercy
person who lives in the unreal world of television sit-coms, or who harbors
bitterness, hurt, or resentment will find over time that these deep-seated
A Those of you who have studied neural networks will recognize the
concept of self-organizing memory.