Pattern Recognition

 

We humans are highly susceptible to and adept at recognising patterns. We have a inbuilt, subconscious process wherein the brain associates information from an external cue with something in our memory. If something breaks a pattern we are suddenly aware of it. 

• If while walking along a bush track, we observe out of the corner of our eye something move on the ground, we immediately respond.

• If lying in bed in the middle of a night we sense something different, we immediately become alert.

• If we meet someone we know in public and we are aware that something about them has changed (hairstyle, black-eye, wearing a beard, cheerfulness...), we are immediately aware of it and frequently have the urge to comment, "You've lost weight...".

There’s no rationality involved in pattern recognition responses – It’s instinctive.

Similarly the brain is highly tuned to picking up astounding coincidences.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

moment n common single/plural

shortest period of humanly-observable time that may be:-

seen (against a blank/crowded visual background) 

-  a sudden short-term vision of something permanent or transient

-  a sight that can't be unseen

Examples:

• A flash of light in the blackness of night (as witnessed the night we had intruders ),

• A sudden change in a suspense or horror movie 

• Noticing a person in the crowd wearing a hat, hijab or motor-cycle helmet 

• Recently while staying at a relatives house my wife went to the toilet. As the door was open she walked straight in. One of her brothers, a huge 6'6" hunk of a man, was facing the door urinating. Despite his, "Oh, my God!" her response was, "Oh, I can't un-see that". 

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• The sudden, flash-by vision of a corpse by a car accident, I witnessed while travelling on a coach filled with students on our return from a snow-camp (*).

heard (against a blank/crowded auditory background)

- The split-second beginning of a continuous aural interruption 

-  A sudden, one-off aural interruption

Examples:

• a siren, music, voices...

• bang, gunshot, bark... 

felt (a disturbance to our famiar every-day feelings)

-  a sudden, short-term feeling 

-  the instant an ongoing pain makes its presence felt

Example:

• the jab felt when a nurse gives you a blood test by placing that small device against your thumb, presses a trigger with the resulting sharp needle suddenly pierces the skin with the resultant drop of blood appearing

• leg cramp

experienced (a total multi-sensory assault on the senses)

Example:

• The instant I realised I was caught on my bike in inescapable position between a van and a truck (*)

 

life-moment n common single/plural

A sequence of simultaneously-occurring, unrelated situations that combine to form a single 'collective' life-moment for the participant(s), Though not earth-shatteriung in importance may be:

• totally unexpected, thedy aremore often routine, predictable and of little consequence

• coincidental and or synchronous  

Example:

• While you are going out to collect the mail a cyclist rides past

• mother (Mary) and daughter (Amy) arriving at a family wedding wearing the same dress.

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consequential life-moment n common collective 

Consequential life-moments occur when a series of individual highly-improbable moments become a single entity which; one which which  impact to a potentially life-alterin degree on the person(s) experiencing the chain of events.   

The classic logic-defying, "What are the odds of that happening?" situations sometimes have the feeloing of being influenced or caused by a greatedr power. They may involving 

• may relate to one of the persons involved in the experience

• may relate to more than one of the persons involved in the experience

• may be transient ~

my walking through the park on my way to my hotel room after beiung with my wife the day she had been diagnosed with aggressive totalally untreatable brain tumour

my walking through the park on my way to my hotel room after beiung with my wife the day she had been diagnosed with aggressive totalally untreatable brain tumour

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Seemingly incidental moments sometimes morph:~

> relevant moments

> life-moments

> consequential life-moments.