What Are You Looking For?

You have to look for them. That’s what our friend Pip does. Pip is a monarch butterfly. We had no pollinators in our yard until my wife planted coneflowers. Butterflies and bees showed up in less than 24 hours. The butterflies with the deep orange-colored wings and the big, fat bumblebees that fly around, defying the laws of physics.

They are always looking for certain kinds of flowers. And in a field of hundreds of options, they see what they choose to see. Time is of the essence, and they have pollinating to do!

You can find what you’re looking for, too. It’s not some floofy pseudo-science feel-good thing. It’s the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon! Let your reticular activating system do its filtering, and you’ve created selective attention that will bring you joy.

But I’m not writing about science today. This is about intention. I want you to find something that makes you happy, and look for it every day. Could be a favorite candy, a flower, a dog (probably a dog), or even a red car. As the phenomenon goes, the more you look for it, the better chance you’ll see it.

Be careful, though, because it works when you look for bad things too, like black licorice, ketchup on hot dogs, cats, or brownies without walnuts (especially these).

You’ll see what you regularly look for.

Just like our pollinator friend, Pip, found these beautiful coneflowers. Because that’s what it was looking for.