On Total Absorption

When you are “in the zone,” you are totally absorbed in what you are doing and you are fully in the present.

Simple, direct, that’s what being in the zone is all about in terms of temporal relativity. And the zone requires the same temporal dimension no matter what the sport. Creating the temporal dimension of the present is a matter of combining the past and future dimensions of the contact sequence environment into the unified dimension of the present. It doesn’t matter what sport you are playing. What matters is that you create the temporal dimension of the present in that particular sport. Create the present and you create the zone.

The present is the most temporally efficient and accurate dimension in which to play the game, not to mention the greater degree of efficiency and accuracy you get when you are in a parallel mode/parallel interface instead of a serial mode/serial interface.

Your operating mode with its inherent IPO interface determines the temporal dimension to which you connect, and the only way to create the temporal dimension of the present is to connect to both the past and future dimensions equally and simultaneously. That is not accomplished in a serial mode with its serial interface, only in a parallel mode with its parallel interface. So what you have are these two opposing modal interfaces: a serial mode/serial interface and parallel mode/parallel interface – and only one of them puts you in the present.

Serial Interface = Past or FutureParallel Interface = Present

Getting in the present, being in the present, putting yourself in the present, are all slight misnomers, although they are attempts to convey a specific temporal state. What really happens is that you “create” the temporal dimension of the present when you engage your operating system in a parallel interface with your environment.

What that means is that being in the present is a creative act; even if it happens to you accidentally. The fact that you have a sense of being totally absorbed in the activity at hand is caused by being totally connected to the whole of the activity’s environment. When you are equally connected to both the past and future of the activity at the same time, you are connected to the temporal whole of that activity. That’s how you become totally absorbed in the activity itself. That’s how you become one with that activity.

And don’t forget that this equal and simultaneous connection to past and future is also an equal and simultaneous connection to the material and spiritual dimensions of that activity, creating a non-dual, unified reality – another factor in the “total absorption” characteristic.

Total absorption in an activity means connecting to the whole of the activity with the whole of your operating system – and that means your operating system in its highest-order interface – a parallel interface.

How can you be totally absorbed in an activity if you are only connected to half of that activity’s temporal potential? Full absorption in an activity requires an interface with the full temporal potential of that activity.

Focusing on the ball is an attempt to be fully absorbed in the movement of the ball. Nothing wrong with that, except when you focus on the ball, you are attempting to become absorbed in the temporal dimension of the past, and that will never create the temporal dimension of the present, nor will being absorbed in the material dimension of the ball ever create the synthesized combination of material and spiritual dimensions that is required to create the non-dual reality of the unified whole.

You can concentrate on either the material or spiritual dimensions of any activity, but that means you are concentrating on only half the activity’s full potential. Is that full absorption?

If you think it is, then you are missing out on something very extraordinary that is available to you in every activity. Something, however, that requires a different flavor of absorption, a different connection to the temporal and spatial dimensions available to you in the unified whole of the activity. Full absorption in an activity requires a parallel interface with the full potential of the activity itself. That means being equally connected to the activity’s material and spiritual dimensions and its past and its future temporal dimensions – simultaneously.

That’s how you get total absorption in the activity at hand. That’s how you create the temporal dimension of the present. That’s how you create the non-dual reality of the unified whole. That’s how you create the zone.