I doubt there's someone out there who truly understands how the mind operates, at least from a comprehensive standpoint.
Despite centuries of research and philosophical inquiry, I think we are merely scratching the surface of consciousness.
One of the contradictory aspects of mental experience is how we can be both the observer and the observed. The latter mostly comes about when there's some form of separation between immediate experience and reflective awareness.
It's not that far fetched to picture the mind as a complicated maze, through which each corridor represents a pattern of thought and intersections serve as a decision point.
Some paths lead to dead ends of circular thinking, but if you're lucky, other paths open into vast chambers of insight.
The walls themselves seem to shift and reorganize, much like how our perspectives and beliefs evolve over time.
Hidden doorways could represent sudden connections we make, 'aha' moments that transform our understanding.
And just like a real maze, sometimes the most valuable discoveries come from first getting lost, and then realizing that getting lost is a form of navigation.
Sponge-ness
People like me question where the center of the maze is and how does one get there, or is it just a shifting center that moves as we move?
Also, when people say "mind", are emotions also involved or is it just mind as in thoughts?
Experientially, I think both exist on the same layer. It's not uncommon to experience a thought that triggers an emotion and vice versa. If both are two separate layers, then there must be some form of intricate communication system between them.
Brain rot, in the modern meaning of the term is mental fatigue and disconnection that comes from endless scrolling and consuming fragmented information.
For me, when I started objectifying this term, I've noticed that I experience it less now.
It's not an easy task to be aware while going through a large body of information, sometimes very uncorrelated, in a bite sized format.
I think what happens during those moments is your awareness just shrinks down like a muscle going slack and what's left is pure reactivity without reflection. I wonder what's that "thing" that's reacting when our conscious awareness has taken a back seat.
Isn't it interesting that after such experiences, we can't retain or remember much of the content we consumed and have this mental numbness of being spaced out or a sense of regret for wasting precious time?
Ah, modern people are trapped in a loop of being more connected yet more mentally scattered than ever.
Put in a different way, we are both information-rich and wisdom-poor.
But I guess in our quest to know everything, we have to be okay with the risk of understanding nothing at all.
Thanks for reading!! Share your thoughts below on the comments.