The Neural Sublime: Waking Up From Autopilot

We are sleepwalking.

Operating on automatic.
Trapped in routines.
With our minds always living in tomorrow.

The world has become too familiar.

Between the logic of lines of code, the constant rush through the streets of São Paulo, and endless notifications, our brains create quick shortcuts.

We stop seeing things as they actually are.

We only see the labels we attach to them.

1. The Blue Sky of Consciousness

Imagine your original consciousness.

It is like an endless blue sky.
Boundless.
No north or south.
Pure and expansive.

But today, that sky is overcast.

Clouded by stress.
Polluted by rigid concepts.
Muddied by daily worries.

The journey of experiencing the “neural sublime” is trying to purify that sky. It is the process of returning to that clean, limitless consciousness.

2. The Weight of Words

How do we do this?

By dropping the filters.

The next time you take a walk, or even just look out your window, try an exercise:

Drop the words.

Don’t look at a tree and think “tree.”
Don’t look at traffic and think “traffic.”

Try to spend some time looking at things in their raw, strange reality.

Without the abstract symbols our minds use to catalog the universe.

3. The Beauty of the Strange

When you drop the labels, everything changes.

The process of defamiliarization means nothing is ordinary anymore.
Everything becomes weird.
And everything weird is wonderful.

A crying baby stops being just “a noisy child” and becomes a fascinating creature trying to figure out the world.

The clouds in the sky, which we ignore every single day, reveal themselves as absurd formations that only exist because our planet has the exact atmosphere for them.

Everything is a miracle when you stop assuming you already know what it is.

4. Reversing the Logic

Our minds love repetition.

To break this cycle, we need to scramble our normal thinking patterns.

Do the opposite of what you are used to doing.

Take something you have always considered ugly and repulsive, and force your mind to find beauty and wonder in it.

Take a perfect, airbrushed image, and try to see its artificial, empty side.

By actively altering your thought patterns, you expand how you feel the world. Not just intellectually, but physically. In your very body.

5. The Brain as Clay

The truth is that your mind is malleable.

It is like clay in your hands.

You can play with your consciousness.
You can forge your own way of thinking.

By mastering this process of looking at the familiar with first-time eyes, you embark on the greatest adventure possible.

Start Simple

If you want to start, try:

• Looking at the sky without thinking the word “cloud.”
• Observing your city’s architecture as if you just arrived from another planet.
• Questioning a strong opinion you hold and mentally trying to defend the opposite side.

Not to change your core.

But to finally wake up.

The Awakening

The sublime isn’t only found in distant travels or on weekends.

It is in the ability to make today, the right now, completely new.

Thiago Colman
Software Engineer
https://thiagocolman.com