An excitatory bias is a state of openness and readiness, and attention is how you reach it. Whether a good day comes from things going right externally, or from a deliberate internal effort to enter a good frame of mind, probably is not an either/or question. It is likely both. What is clearer is that attention itself has real power: putting your focus on what is working, on something you genuinely like, tends to produce a felt sense of good regardless of what else is happening.
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How Attention Creates an Excitatory Bias
This is the second piece of the series on why “my life feels empty and hollow” is so common, and what the MythoSelf Process does about it. Within the process, this is called accessing an excitatory bias, and it is the foundation a facilitator works from before anything else.
A client’s body becomes chemically and structurally primed for learning once this bias is in place. They become open to what is coming, rather than defended against it.
Why Attention Matters So Much
Attention is the steering wheel of experience. Where you place it determines what you notice, and what you notice shapes how you feel. A habit of attending to what is wrong leaves little room for anything else.
Redirecting attention does not deny difficulty. It makes sure difficulty is not the only thing you see. For background on how attention works, see this overview of attention.
The Exercise: What Am I Like When I Am at My Best?
The exercise is simple to state and harder to fully inhabit. Ask yourself, “What am I like when I’m at my best?” Do not answer intellectually. Go there, in your body and your mind, and let yourself enter it as fully as you can.
Practical Ways to Build an Excitatory Bias
Begin the day by choosing something to give your full attention to, however small: a piece of music, the light in a room, a conversation you are looking forward to. Let yourself enjoy it properly.
During the day, pause now and then to ask what is working. Before a difficult conversation or a learning task, enter the state deliberately. An excitatory bias makes you more open and less defended, which is exactly what learning and connection need.
Over time you will reach this state more quickly, and it will last longer.
3 Simple Ways to Build an Excitatory Bias
Attention is the lever.
- Start the day with something small that holds your full attention.
- Pause during the day to ask what is working.
- Enter the state on purpose before a hard conversation or a learning task.
Return to this exercise whenever you notice your attention drifting toward what is wrong. An excitatory bias is not a mood you wait for. It is a state you can enter on purpose, and the more often you do, the more naturally it arrives, which makes everything else in this series easier to practise.
A good way to check progress is to notice how quickly you recover after a setback. As the bias becomes familiar, the gap between a rough moment and your usual openness shrinks. That shorter gap is the clearest sign that the practice is working, even when nothing in your circumstances has changed.
Where This Goes Next
The next instalment goes deeper into how much your body dictates how you feel: not as a side effect of emotion, but as its mechanism. Catch up on Part 1 if you missed it, continue to Part 3, or book a free consultation to work through this directly with Charles.
