Barging In

Picture of the Day for 1/7/2014. This morning I was listening to a podcast where the speaker was talking about the human body's Reticular Activating System (RAS). It's basically how the brain filters all of the information out in the world so our heads don't explode from all the stimuli. We get just the "need to know" information and information we are used to seeing. Consequently, there might be things out in the world that exist, but our eyes just don't process them. 

Ironically, I was confronted by an example of this concept just a few mere hours after learning about it. I dropped by the hospital to visit my brother-in-law David. In the rehab wing where he's currently located, there's a little break room where patients, staff, and visitors can go get a free soft drink. FREE! You can't go wrong with FREE Diet Coke! Trust me, I take advantage of it. So, before stopping at David's room, I went to get my FREE Diet Coke. I barged right into the break room and didn't really notice until I was filling up my drink cup that there was a huge staff meeting going on and I was definitely intruding. It wasn't until I exited the break room with Diet Coke in hand that I saw a very prominent sign at the entrance indicating the room was closed due to a staff meeting that was in progress. Once I actually "saw" the sign, I wondered how I missed it in the first place. I guess my RAS system filters out anything non-Diet Coke-related. My RAS definitely knows what I consider essential information.