Surrounding the Garden of Your Mind, there is a perfect wall - just as there is a dome encasing and protecting your brain.

Within that wall is a fertile garden, open to nurturing and growing any thought, idea or imagination that takes root there. The Garden of the Mind does not discriminate but rather multiplies anything that is sown - good or bad, resourceful or unresourceful, positive or negative. Which is why it is wise to guard the garden.

"If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need." Marcus Tullius Cicero

My mind is both garden and library - I have everything I need... as long as I understand my role as guardian, gardener and librarian.

As Gardener, I watch the Gateways to the Garden. These are the five primary senses: seeing, hearing, touching, tasting and smelling.

Let's take the last first. Scent is a powerful sense - and one that directly impacts memory and recall. Interestingly, it is one of the best guarded gateways to your creative garden. As soon as we smell an unpleasant scent, we naturally recoil and move away from a potentially noxious source.

Taste is the same. If it tastes bad, the brain says it is most likely to be bad. We spit it out, or, in the case of bad medicine, at least grimace. Touch is clever too - if something is too hot or too cold or too sharp - we respond rapidly.

I wish our senses were so acutely calibrated when it comes to seeing and hearing. These are the biggest and broadest gateways.

"More than 50 percent of the cortex, the surface of the brain, is devoted to processing visual information." David Williams

It seems to me that we are more than willing to let dangerous stimuli enter freely through what we look at and listen to. I watched "The Wolf of Wall Street" last week. It seemed that every other word was the "F" word. Whilst this is totally unnecessary, the toxin is the 'permission' this gives our brain to grow a crop of our own "F" response to anything which annoys us. Research into Mirror Neurons also would suggest that we mentally rehearse everything we pay close attention to with a view to imitating the behaviour. I wonder how many people my mind has murdered watching (and thus 'mirroring') the 'hero' in an action movie? Then there's all that sex... enough said?

Fear not! I'm not anti-TV or Video Games... I just believe we would be wise to be purposeful about what we sow in the garden of the mind. My belief is that we get more of what we pay attention to.

So, what shall we pay more attention to? What we want more of, of course!

So, sow, sew...

The great news is this stuff just works! What you look at will grow in the garden of your mind. What you listen to will grow in the garden of your mind. Who you mix with - their behaviours, attitudes, habits - all are infectious! Do you know someone with an infectious sense of humour? You'll catch it if you spend enough time in their presence! Do you know someone with infectious joy? It's catching!

What would you like more of? Let's be purposeful this week and deliberately plant good seeds in the garden.

Lex

A Moodscope member.