Paying Attention

 

In a podcast between Jonathan Pageau and Jordan B. Peterson (The Perfect Mode of Being), Peterson asks Pageau what the first response would be if one were to believe in God. Pageau replies with an emphatic, immediate, and unequivocal: ‘Attention’. Our first response would be to give God our full attention with our entire selves. For most people, the first response would be some sort of action fuelled by guilt or shame within the purview of how they have lived their lives and how, morally, their paths have been filled with substantial immoral meanderings. People’s morality, or lack thereof, would drive their first response and most of us would bow our heads in shame riddled with guilt.

I am of the opinion that this response finds its source in the grammar we use when we speak about God. People constantly refer to ‘The Fear of God’ which doesn’t really make sense but it does explain that if we think of God as invoking of fear, we would be scared as a result of our moral failings and that would be the primary response to him; scared of the repercussions of our sin. But ‘God is love’ and ‘love casts out all fear’ therefore a fear response to love doesn’t make sense to me. Fear is an inappropriate and antithetical response. There is another response, however, and that is wonder which then becomes awe. When we sing ‘Our God is an Awesome God’ then we really are on to something.

 

John Vervaeke describes Awe as a confrontation we have with something so vast, so big, so larger than ourselves that demands us to change who we are. In order for us to accommodate or begin to wrap ourselves around the object of our attention; our rather limited finite selves need to change. We cannot remain as we are. A metanoic experience awaits us.

In his essay, A Secular Wonder, Paola Costa writes ‘In wondering the subject is absorbed by reality; without being its hostage or puppet. In this sense, the wonder-response always embodies a form of assent , ‘yea-saying’ and having no utility whatsoever, it fosters in the subject a vague of sense of joy in the very fact of being alive and of objectless gratitude that turns outward. Wonder, is an expansive response to the world’s allure that encourages respect, compassion, gentleness, humility, unpossessiveness.’ I think wonder puts us in deep contact with reality. And since God is love; then with love itself.

 

‘As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”

“Martha, Martha” the Lord answered, ‘you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed- or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better and it will not be taken away from her.’ Luke 10:38-42.

Mary knew the first act of worship is attention.  

 

Joe Dispenza is famously known for saying ‘Life is about the management of energy, where you place your attention, is where you place your energy.’ But it doesn’t end there, attention is at the heart of every transformative experience, but it is also at the heart of ways transformative experiences are impeded through distraction. In his YouTube video TikTok: The Worst of the Worst Thinking Ape describes how he thinks the way TikTok is setup; with short video automatically cascading into short video ad infinitum programmes us to develop short attention spans and he thinks this is particularly deleterious because in order for human beings to progress or to create something that will move the needle with regards to advancement requires long attention spans of dedicated focus; the equivalent of what Michio Kaku calls ‘Butt Power’. Cal Newport in Deep Work writes about dedicating 4 hours of your day to deep work; Robert Greene also writes about spending 4-5 hours a day on ‘your life’s task’ if you are going to achieve mastery. But I think it’s not just limited to TikTok; it’s simply how social media makes its money. More than anything our attention is currency, so fundamentally it doesn’t make a difference to FAANG (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google) whether we are using their platforms constructively or not as long as we remain on them. Which is why I think attention can be used to literally block any sort of transformative experience. All of the psychotechnologies that John Vervaeke mentions in his series Awakening from the Meaning Crisis, for example, are depended on where and how we focus our attention. From meditation to contemplation to Tai’chi or flow states or even internalising the inner sage. Our attention is the Noble Rock; the place from which all creation begins. We come to realise that our biggest resource is not time in its generality but attention in its specificity.

 

 ‘Every great magic trick consists of three parts or acts. The first part is called “the pledge’. The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of cards, a bird or a man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to inspect it to see if it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course…it isn’t. The second act is called ‘The Turn’. The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you’re looking for the secret… but you won’t find it, because of course you are not really looking. You don’t really want to know. You want to be fooled. But you wouldn’t clap yet. Because making something disappear isin’t enough; you have to bring it back. That’s why every magic trick has a third act, the hardest part, the part we call “The Prestige”.’ Christopher Priest in The Prestige. 

The Latin Omne trium perfectum comes to mind which is partly why those are the most memorable lines of the book and film. The pledge. The turn. The prestige. I think the machinery of transformation through wonder can also be summarised with these three parts. Surprise (The Pledge) when we are shown an ordinary physiological response. Wonder (The Turn) when ordinary surprise becomes extraordinary wonder. Awe (The Prestige). The great reveal. The Vervaekean confrontation. There is a 4^th part I would like to discuss. A part that is mentioned by Priest in passing; but I would like to linger on it. The reason it’s not given priority in the quote is because it is not directly a part of the magic trick, but rather is directly inspired by it; which is the audience clapping their hands. The audience participating and witnessing a good magic trick cannot help but clap their hands in response to one. Let’s call this 4^th part, The Impel. The audience is impelled to clap. Once we have experienced the full progression of surprise to wonder to awe then we are also impelled to transform; because Christ’s love compels or in this case impels us. And I believe that this comparison holds true because a transforming person is but a magical thing to behold.