You and I are deeply habituated to seeing everything that happens to us as
either good or bad. We are always passing judgment.

One of the points I was trying to make last week was that what we attend to,
what we pay attention to becomes our reality.

We take it for granted that the way we see things is how they are. We rarely
question this opinion.

We assign qualities to things and people without realizing that our mind
imposes these opinions on things and people. We have a tendency to divide the
world between what is desirable and what isn't. We assign permanence to things
and are upset when that proves not to be the case.

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When I was a child growing up in Columbia, Tennessee Saturdays were
magical times. I would, after lunch, go back with my father to town. If I needed a
haircut he would give me a dollar and I would go get the haircut - my father called
it "getting your ears lowered" - and, then, with the money that was left over I
would go to the movie, buy popcorn and a box of Mild Duds. I could do all of that
for a dollar. I think I had a nickel left over. Amazing.

You could spend your whole afternoon in the movie theater. Saturday was the
day of the double feature - and more. There was a mystery or detective movie, a
cowboy movie with someone like Roy Rogers or Gene Autry. If you've never
seen one of those movies, they were amazing. The hero would be in a desperate
rush to save someone from impending disaster but would still have the time to
stop and sing a song about it. And all the guys with him seemed to be able to pull
guitars out of nowhere and join him. Then there was the cartoon. After that and
most important came the serial.

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