Blind Spots, Mindfulness and Victor Frankl
March 23, 2025
8 min read
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Newsletter
{Body}
Blind spots in your hologram
Last week, we explored the concept of your “Hologram” — an inner 3D model of your body that your brain maintains in real-time. Today, we'll consider why certain parts of this body map are clearer than others.
Your internal body map varies in resolution depending on how often you use different parts of your body. For example, you probably have a very precise sense of where your hands are relative to your forehead, but a comparatively less precise sense of where your left pinky toe is.
But even your left pinky toe is high resolution in comparison to, say, your pancreas. Even though your pancreas is actively sending and receiving signals from your brain right now, you likely have no clear sense of its location in your Hologram.
These blind spots in your Hologram are far more common than you realize. Not only are your abdominal organs extremely low resolution, but so is your spine, brain, auric field, and more. You may take pride in how well you know yourself, when — in truth — a vast majority of your physical, energetic, emotional and mental bodies have never been explored.
This is a real problem, because the dark regions of your internal landscape are where unconscious patterns and dysfunctional habits tend to accumulate.
Think of it this way: if you can't feel your liver, how can you truly monitor its health? If you can't sense your psoas muscle, how will you know that it's chronically contracted?
Just as a garden left untended will grow weeds, the areas of your body you are unwilling to look at quickly become fertile ground for tension patterns, emotional blockages, and physical dysfunction — recipes for misery.
But by practicing the simple technique I’ll introduce next week, you'll begin illuminating these blind spots — not just for the sake of a more complete body map, but because bringing awareness to these areas is crucial for unwinding deeply held patterns and restoring optimal health.
{Mind}
Mindfulness versus attention?
For two weeks we explored the subtle distinctions between attention, focus and concentration. In summary: attention narrows reality, focus sharpens it, and concentration maintains it.
These three faculties serve as the foundation for any form of mental mastery, whether creative, technical, or physical. Writing, cooking, listening, learning a foreign language, sex, archery — getting good at literally anything requires proper attention, focus and concentration.
Yet even when perfectly developed, this triad remains incomplete without a fourth element: mindfulness.
Mindfulness is the faculty that allows you to know what you’re experiencing. It is the aspect of you that sees without judging, hears without analyzing, and feels without condemning.
In our microscope analogy, mindfulness is not the instrument itself but the scientist's capacity to remain objective. Without this impartiality, even the steadiest, most-powerful microscope becomes useless. The scientist might perfectly see the sample yet completely misinterpret what they're observing due to bias or attachment.
In other words, mindfulness is non-reactive awareness towards what is being attended to, and focused/concentrated upon. You aren’t just clearly seeing the thing — you are peacefully knowing that you’re clearly seeing the thing!
Practically, when watching your breath, you might become frustrated when your concentration breaks. With mindfulness, you calmly and simply notice that frustration has appeared (rather than becoming identified with it and furthering your distraction.)
Basically, you can have laser-like attention on your breath, crystal-clear focus on its subtle qualities, and rock-solid concentration that never wavers — but without mindfulness, you remain trapped in the experience rather than learning from it.
Practice with me below to experience these distinctions directly, or wait until next week when we'll explore how this four-part framework applies to an entirely different domain: the science and practice of effective prayer.
(Note: Please note that in a few weeks, these guided meditation audios will be pay-walled.)
{Soul}
To give light to an unconscious world is not to condemn darkness, but simply to illuminate it.
Such a demonstration has real-world repercussions. Many do not like what the light reveals. To Shine necessarily reveals all that is hidden in shadow — the unconscious thoughts that manifest as toxic behaviors and selfish choices. And most would rather blame and destroy the neutral mirror than own the ugliness and fear it reflects.
Consider one of the most compassionate masters to ever grace this planet — Jesus Christ. Was he not brutally crucified for his perfect love? Aren’t his messages of forgiveness still not being misunderstood and distorted today?
This is what it means to bear your cross — to have courage in the face of untruth, even when your entire life and reputation are on the line. Allowing Light opens you up to potential misunderstandings, rejections, and even persecution. And yet, that’s the price of freedom.
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