HUMAN POTENTIAL
If Media Reprogrammed Algorithms From Fear to Love, Could the Virus End Sooner?
Or could ending the pandemic be as simple as reprogramming our own thinking?
The 1950’s post-war era in America is often associated with images of a happy family in front of its suburban home, a new car and dog in the driveway. This “American Dream” materialized for many, but before it could, people had to dream about it.
Americans had just lived through 16 years of fearful times, from the Great Depression until the end of World War II. When the war ended, dreaming about a happier future seemed natural. The auto and home-building industries understood happiness, and not more fear, was what Americans wanted and started selling such images. Once people were sold on the “American Dream,” the cars and homes materialized and the bank accounts of automakers and homebuilders swelled. For the nation, that time became known as the “Golden Age.”
Fast forward 70 years to today. Markham Heid’s article “How Looking Ahead Can Hold You Back,” reminds us humans are “hardwired to peer into the future and fret about what it may hold for us.” For our bodies, this hardwiring is inherently designed for failure, not success. Do world-class athletes prepare for a competition by fearing loss? Of course not! They visualize victory and empower their visualizations with emotion. They try to “feel” as if they had already won.
When looking at the images traditional and social media are showing us today, do they make us feel like the American Dream did? No! Instead, we are constantly being shown a virus that potentially could cause this or become that. Add to that potential environmental catastrophes, social unrest, economic collapse, and political instability. All of those are frightening — but only potential.
Instead of scaring us into action, these threatening images scare us into fear. Our bodies don’t distinguish between potential and real threats and begin responding as though under attack. If and when the real threat finally arrives, our defense system is already weakened from responding to the potential threat. We end up getting sick more easily. Thus, more fear leads to less immunity leads to more people stricken with the virus. Notice how this pathway begins with a mental construct (fear) and ends with a physical outcome (illness).
For anyone questioning the connection between mind and matter, consider these examples that may even be part of your experience:
- Have you ever woken up from a nightmare in a cold sweat? How did your „imaginary” nightmare manifest real sweat on your body? Or maybe you have seen a scary movie that sent chills through your body?
- If you have built a home, even a “dream” home, or gotten a “dream” job, could you have done it without first “dreaming” about it?
- In vaccine trials, why do those people receiving the placebo sometimes show the same positive physical responses as those receiving the real vaccine? Just because they thought it was the real thing?
- Why do young people commit suicide or have eating disorders from cyberbullying? Is the children’s rhyme “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words shall never hurt me” no longer true?
There is no purpose in belaboring this point just like there is no purpose in giving the virus more attention than it deserves. That is why I believe:
The moment traditional and social media reprogram their algorithms from fear to love and begin selling us images of a brighter future, the virus will begin disappearing from our reality.
Why?
Because we will start directing our attention (energy) toward the materialization of different, more pleasant images. By not giving our primary attention to the virus anymore, we will be energetically starving it. We’ve all studied for exams and know how energy-draining it is to concentrate on something for a long time.
But I’m still not convinced about the life-giving force of attention.
Consider the scenario where all your followers unfollowed you and ignored everything you posted. Would you thrive or not survive? No followers = no income = no food = no good. Lack of attention = dead.
But how do we know the energy of our thoughts can travel far and physically impact another physical entity?
Have you ever received a “nasty” response from someone on the other side of the globe to something you wrote on social media? Did it hurt not only your ego, but perhaps make your blood “boil?”
The fact a non-physical thought can almost instantaneously cause physical pain halfway around the world is a sobering reminder about the power of internet technology. The power to hurt and the power to heal. We carry great responsibility when using such powerful technology. Are we using it wisely?
If physicists converted into nuclear weapon equivalents the attention the world has given the virus and humans have directed at one another in the form of anger and vile, we would be horrified. Even without such a calculation, we see the fallout based on the current physical state of humanity. It looks as though the entire world has been carpet-bombed, sending everyone scurrying for cover, shell-shocked. And not one actual missile has been fired.
When our descendants look back on this time, they may refer to it as the „Global Nightmare.” A time when those with material interests exploited peoples’ naturally hardwired, forward-looking fear, through the propagation of nightmarish images. Sell those images long enough and they will rewire peoples’ thinking and eventually materialize before our eyes.
Which raises the question — why are capitalistic interests today, unlike those of the 1950’s, selling us the „Global Nightmare” instead of the equivalent of the „American Dream?” Why are they not using their unique position for the betterment of humanity? The 1950’s demonstrated that helping people visualize a happy future can facilitate the eventual manifestation of that future. And even make the promoters of that future a lot of money.
When our root cause analysis eventually leads us back to an ill human psyche, we will acknowledge the virus is the result of humanity’s collective mental state. Not the evil end-all we have been led to believe it is. We will then transition from victimhood to empowerment and finally understand what Buddha meant by:
“We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.”
If our media leaders choose not to lead us out of the current event by shifting our thoughts with more pleasant images, then we each owe it to ourselves to seek out such images. We can help ourselves from getting depressed in the present moment by envisioning a brighter future. Visualization is a very powerful form of medicine that doesn’t cost anything or require a prescription. For those not choosing to inject vaccines into their bodies, inject images of love, hope, and happiness into your minds.
And who knows, the future may end up looking more like the bright images in our minds than a continuation or worsening of present reality. If it does, great! But if not, then at least we won’t have hurt ourselves any more by worrying about it.
A win-win for our well-being in 2022!
Author’s note: This article does not advocate for the pursuit of the American Dream, and does not constitute medical advice for how to deal with the current global event. Rather, it seeks to illustrate how images can be used to influence collective thinking and thus impact material outcomes. In the absence of media leadership, let’s choose our thoughts and words carefully and not inflict additional casualties on our fellow human beings.
Thank you, Dr Mehmet Yildiz, for hosting this publication on Illumination! Thank you, Bebe Nicholson, for your sincere and constructive feedback!
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