How to get into Second Life without really trying
Selby Evans is Thinkerer Melville in Second Life
Do you ever have to wait at a checkout counter? Pick a specific place where you often have to wait. Try to remember how you feel, what you see, and what goes through your mind. Don’t expect to do this while you are reading. You don’t expect to carry on a conversation while you are reading. So close your eyes and imagine the checkout counter where you sometimes have to wait.
(This line intentionally left blank as a cue.
Stop reading and imagine.)
What do you do while waiting? Your brain keeps running. Maybe you notice a tabloid headline and wonder what the space alien baby would be like. Maybe you notice batteries and wonder if you need to buy some. Maybe you notice some new candy item and imagine some child asking for it. Maybe you see an ad and wonder whether you want the product.
There is a pattern here. All these things start with something in the world around you. Something that captures your attention. Your brain starts there and follows a train of ideas that fit the something to you.
Here is another pattern. You notice those things and ask yourself why those things are there rather than some other place in the store. You don’t wonder for long. You know those things are next to the checkout line so they can spark your attention and use your brainpower to figure out why you might want to buy the product.
Ever hear of the Whys Guys?
You may not mind if the store uses your brainpower. As long as you are not using it yourself. But you might decide that you do want to use that brainpower. How do you put it to work for you?
You can observe a lot by watching.—Yogi Berra
Look at what the store did. The store put things in front of you to spark the ideas it wanted your brain to work on. So maybe you have some ideas that you want your brain to work on. Do you know what they are? Could you make a list? Could you get the store to put the list in front of you at the checkout counter?
That’s silly. You can imagine the store manager’s response to that idea. Besides, you don’t have a list. But if you had a list of things you wanted to think about, and if you could get it to appear in front of you at that checkout counter, you could use it to spark your brain into working on your projects.
When ifs and buts are candy and nuts, every day will be Christmas.
—Don Meredith
We’ll get back to the list later. If you had the list, of course, you would know how to pull it out and hold it in front of you. Does that plan work? No. If you expect to remember to do something, you need to arrange for a cue at the time you are supposed to do it.
No plan is complete without cues.
To set up a cue, imagine that checkout line again. What do you notice there? Tabloids? Lifesavers? Pick anything you are likely to notice while waiting.
You need to do the next step with your eyes closed, but read this first. Imagine yourself at the counter. Imagine your view from that spot. Imagine the things that will catch your eye. Imagine that you touch one of those things and it turns into a bouquet of sparklers with a sign that says “MY LIST.”
Now close you eyes and really imagine what you just read about.
If you really imagine the scene, you will find that you can easily remember about your list when you are at that scene. Of course, this will work better if you actually have a list.
The secret of patience is doing something else in the meantime.
Thinkering is not about how to occupy yourself while waiting in line. If you get bored or irritated in line, you can use thinkering to fix that. But there are probably several things higher on your fixit list. You can use thinkering on them, too. You may even find them more interesting than alien abductions..
Thinkerer’s notes
Your brain is built to work on inputs.
If you pick the inputs, you can market your ideas to your brain.
You can open the theater of your mind and see things in your
imagination.
You can imagine ‘what if” trials to tinker with possibilities.
You can use the typical inputs from a place to remember what you
intended to do there.
You can do these things without much help from the talkative part of
your brain.
Market to your brain
Everybody else does it. Why not you?