A long time ago, when my husband and I were purchasing our first home, we became quite friendly with our mortgage broker. She was young, dynamic, and always pursuing continuing education to improve her capacity to serve her clients better. Her approach must have worked very well, because at one point, she revealed to me that her debt-to-income ratio after purchasing her own first home was one percent. For someone in her late 20s to have built her business to the point that she had a paid-off home in an expensive housing market and lived pretty much debt free is impressive. As a result, when she talked about her business, I listened.

One day when we got off-topic and were chatting, she told me all about how at a sales seminar that morning she had learned about a part of the brain called the reticular activating system (RAS). She thought knowing about the RAS was going to change everything for her and that it might just change everything for me, too.

At this point, I wasn’t even considering pursuing my master’s in counseling psychology, so I didn’t know anything about the RAS. She fixed that by telling me that it’s the brain’s filter. It determines what captures our attention and what does not.  Her example of how it works was a new car. Let’s say you have just bought a blue Honda Accord.  After you make that purchase, you are going to notice blue Accords pretty much everywhere, and you may come to the conclusion that the big new trend must be blue Accords. In truth, those blue Accords were always there, but your RAS is now picking them out of the flow of the hundreds or perhaps thousands of cars you see every day.

I thought this was fascinating, and I certainly saw it in my own life. One example that came up for me was pregnant women. When I was expecting a baby, I saw other future mothers pretty much everywhere. Interesting as the idea was, though, I wasn’t sure how it applied to my life beyond its entertainment value.

Fast forward in time, and I can see that leveraging the power of the RAS can change your life. If you are always focusing on the details in life that generate anxiety or stress or anger or any other feeling that you identify as negative, those details are what you’re going to see.  If you expect to find rude customers in retail stores, for example, you’re going to start noticing them more, and you may find shopping to be an unpleasant experience because you believe that the world is full of negative people.  On the other hand, if you expect people to be kind and understanding, guess what—you’re going to start noticing all the kind and generous people out there in the world.

What’s interesting is that it’s possible to change what your RAS delivers to your conscious awareness, and it’s not that hard (just think of the blue Accord example). When you focus on something, the brain learns and delivers it back to you.  I love this because this concept plays into my work and the people I serve every day, especially for my hypnosis clients.  Focusing on your goals, or more positive experiences, can change everything for you.

If you’re interested in learning a bit more about the reticular activating system, how it affects what you notice in the world, and how to harness that power to change your life, I suggest starting with a Ted Talk by Blaine Oelkers. Like all Ted Talks, it’s short enough to fit into your day.  You can find it here.