We can’t help but look at attractive people. I don’t mean that figuratively- I mean really, we can’t. They catch our eye the moment we see them, just a person in yellow stands out in a sea of black. Think carefully about the last time you glanced at someone attractive- you did not actually get to choose whether or not you wanted to look at them! You may have thought immediately afterwards that you wanted to look again, but the initial look was beyond your control.

That’s kind of a scary thought. But it’s only scary because we tend to think far too highly of our own consciousness, which is a self-glorifying entity. Once our consciousness becomes self-aware, it becomes childishly arrogant, taking credit for everything that we do. It’s a cute little logical fallacy that’s practially wired into our brains- we aren’t conscious of what we’re doing when we’re conscious of something else, so we tend to assume that whatever we’re not conscious of doesn’t really matter.

But think about it- who’s driving the car while you’re focused on the conversation you’re having? Who alerted you that you just sat on a pin, that you just touched something incredibly hot, and commanded that you get up, move aside, or stick out your hands to break your fall? Most of what we do is non-conscious! We typically only realize this during brief startling moments where our non-conscious seizes control- but the cognitive dissonance is hard to deal with, so we convince ourselves that such incidents are one-off. The truth is, our non-conscious is running at full speed pretty much 24/7. We are primarily nonconscious creatures.

You can apply this model to a lot of things. The best teaching happens outside of the syllabus. The best conversations are defined by the words unsaid. The best sex happens when you stop worrying about trying to impress the other person. The best gatherings tend to be serendipitous and improvised rather than planned. That’s because whenever we plan things (in the rigid sense), whenever we try to impose conscious control over how things ought to be, and our consciousness is far more limited than our non-conscious.

Some of my religious friends describe this as surrendering to God, when you let go of the illusion of the self and embrace the universe in its all-encompassing Being. I think of it as relinquishing conscious control, acknowledging that your non-conscious knows far more than your conscious, and having faith that it has a much better idea about how things ought to be carried it out. We have different names for it, but it’s the same thing.

Trust and faith- in yourself, and each other. It’s the source of the absolute peak magnificence of human experience- if you’ve ever felt what it’s like to completely let go and find yourself in a heightened, euphoric state- whether during conversation, sex, while playing a sport, working on your art, or even in meditation or prayer- then you know what I mean. I like the idea that those moments are infinite- because the amount of data going through everyone’s minds is far beyond conscious comprehension. The bandwidth of consciousness is far, far smaller than the bandwidth of experience- you’re experiencing millions of sensations and emotions at any second, but you’re only conscious of a few things. It’s especially beautiful when it happens in synchrony with others- whether you’re playing a team sport, having conversations over drinks or making music on stage.

It is the source of true humility- because you realize that you weren’t quite responsible for your own excellence- you were a spectator to that within yourself that is greater than you. You can call it God if you like. I like to think of it as the cumulative wisdom of the universe, accumulated and manifested within us, passed on from generation to generation- neurons, synapses, all part of a huge neverending cosmic dance. To have had the opportunity to witness and participate in it is the highest honour.