• 
    The Emergence of Will
  
  
  •    Invitation to the Hero's Path
  •    Learning to Steer
  •    Internal vs. External Control
  •    Optical Illusions
  •    The Soul Illusion
  •    Two Minds
  •    Determinism
  •    Exercising Will
  •    True Grit
  •    Willpower
  •    Perseverance
• 
    Taming the Creature
  
  
  •    Coping with Raw Experience
  •    Attachment to Outcomes
  •    Meta-Cognitive Awareness
  •    Mindfulness & Awakening
  •    The Serenity Prayer
  •    The Catagorical Imperative
  •    The Power of a Will
  •    Hypnosis as Covert Doing
  •    Intention and Attention
  •    Ordinary Trances
  •    Hypnotic Methods
• 
     Addictive Traps
  
  
  •    The Traps
  •    The PIG
  •    The Imp of the Perverse
  •    Karma of Bad Behavior
  •    Recursive Traps
  •    Attachment to Outcomes
  •    Dependence
  •    Traps Fork
• 
     Pathology
  
  
  •    The Study of Paths
  •    Matching Considerations
  •    The Impeccable Path
  •    What it Means to Decide
  •    The Open Path
  •    The Enlightened Path
  •    The Truth Will Set You Free
  •    Cognitive Behavior Therapy
  •    A-B-C Thought Record
  •    Ruminative Self-Focus
  •    An Exquisite Irony
  •    The Middle Way
• 
     The Passage to Change
  
  
  •    Stages of the Passage
  •    The Contemplation Stage
  •    The Contemplation Fork
  •    The Penultimate Step
  •   The Decision Matrix
  •    Decision Time
  •    The Action Stage
  •    Relapse Prevention
  •    The End
• 
    Researching Desire
  
  
  •    Looking Within
  •    The Existential Path
  •    Conflcting Desires
  •    Knowing Yourself
  •    Contemplation Exercises
• 
     Exercising Your Will
  
  
  •    Puppy Training Basics
  •    Warning Signals
  •    Study the Past
  •    General Coping Strategy
  •    Specific Coping Tactics
  •    Hypnotherapy Scripts
  •   The Reminder Card
  •   Your Treatment Plan
  •    Cheap Research
  •    Hardening

Optical Illusions

The organizational mechanisms of vision are best demonstrated by illusions. Illusions illustrate that perception is a creative construction that the brain makes in interpreting visual data ....Learning does not prevent us from being taken in by these illusions.

 —  Eric Kandel

We do not see the world as it really is. What we perceive is a creative construction of our nervous system. Subjective phenomena such as our appraisals of the choices available to us is dependent upon our motivational state at the moment. For example, the wisdom of a first lapse is appraised differently before it happens than afterwards. Learning does not spare us from repeating the painful mistake of relapse. We are continually taken in by an illusion [The Soul Illusion], because of the tacit acceptance that our current perceptions and appraisals are valid.

The images below - while limited to the visual modality - illustrate that perception is an active construction of the mind rather than a valid representation of objective reality.

Escher "figure-ground" illusion

Celestial Bodies

Art by: Octavio Ocampo

Can you find nine figures embedded in the image?

Embedded Dali

There seems to be a white triangle in the center.

Absents of the Mermaid

Art by: Octavio Ocampo

Our Bread

Art by: Octavio Ocampo

Impossible perspectives

Young girl ⁄ Old woman Illusion

Phantom Dots Illusion

Identical Table Tops

Chalk Drawing

Phantom Expansion

Impossible Figures

Necker cubes

How fast can you switch?

M. C. Escher: Day and Night

The red boxes are identical

Man or woman

Phantom Movement

The diagonal lines are straight

Figures & Backgrounds

The figures are identical

Stare at the image for 30 seconds then look at a background.

M. C. Escher: Waterfall

The organizational mechanisms of vision are best demonstrated by illusions. Illusions illustrate that perception is a creative construction that the brain makes in interpreting visual data ....Learning does not prevent us from being taken in
by these illusions.

- Eric Kandel

The Soul Illusion > >