The RAS ( Reticular Activating System) Advantage: Leveraging Your Brain’s Filtering System for Career Success

The Reticular Activating System (RAS) can play a crucial role in advancing your career by enhancing focus, awareness, problem-solving and decision-making.

Ever since I was a young doctor working in an extremely busy city hospital at the start of my working life, I have been amazed by the power of the RAS. Though dedicated, I quickly became overwhelmed by my workload. I felt lost in the chaos of my demanding schedule and as I was constantly exhausted it soon felt as if my career had stagnated.

In the early morning hours of one of the darkest nights of my career, I decided to focus on becoming a top specialist in psychiatry. This clear goal activated my Reticular Activating System (RAS), sharpening my focus. Suddenly, I began noticing psychiatry conferences, specialised training programs, and research articles I had previously overlooked. My RAS filtered out irrelevant distractions, allowing me to concentrate on pertinent opportunities. As I immersed myself in my speciality, I made a couple of groundbreaking discoveries about stress management and gradually built a reputation as a stress management expert.

My RAS, by focusing my attention on key resources, transformed my stagnating career into a flourishing one, eventually guiding me to realise one of my wildest dreams: owning a little farm in the south of France where I host mindfulness and meditation retreats with my Friesian and Falabella horses.

As professionals, we today face a barrage of challenges, from information overload and constant distractions to maintaining focus in high-pressure environments. The incessant stream of emails, meetings, and multitasking demands can fragment our attention, leading to decreased productivity and burnout. By harnessing the power of our RAS, we can steer our careers more effectively, seize relevant opportunities, minimise distractions that impede progress and pave the way for career advancement amidst the modern workplace’s complexities.

Anyone can use their Reticular Activating System for Career Advancement by:

Setting Clear Goals: When you define clear career goals, the RAS helps by prioritising information and opportunities relevant to these goals. For instance, if you aim for a promotion, your RAS will filter and highlight information related to leadership training, networking opportunities, and job openings that align with this goal.

Concentrating on your Career Objectives: The RAS helps you maintain focus on tasks and projects that move you closer to these goals. This selective attention allows you to better manage your time and energy, leading to improved productivity. The RAS aids in directing your efforts toward areas most relevant to your career growth, ensuring that your skills align with your professional objectives.

Noticing Opportunities: The RAS increases your awareness of opportunities that align with your career aspirations. For example, if you’re seeking a new job, the RAS helps you notice job postings, industry trends, and professional connections that you might otherwise overlook.

Networking: In professional settings, the RAS helps you pick up on relevant conversations and potential connections. This can lead to valuable networking opportunities and partnerships that can advance your career.

Staying Motivated: When your career goals are clear and present in your mind, the RAS reinforces your motivation by keeping these goals at the forefront of your thoughts. This helps you stay committed and driven, even when faced with challenges.

Enhancing Your Problem-Solving Abilities: By focusing your attention on specific career-related challenges, the RAS helps you identify solutions more effectively. This improved problem-solving capability can lead to better outcomes and career advancement.

Identifying Learning Resources: When you’re focused on improving specific skills or acquiring new knowledge, the RAS helps you notice relevant resources, such as courses, workshops, and mentors, that align with your learning goals.

Practical Steps to Leverage the RAS for Career Advancement

I have listed below the steps that worked particularly well for me:

1. Define Your Goals: Clearly formulate (remember SMART goals?) your career aspirations. This helps the RAS filter and prioritise relevant information and opportunities.
2. Visualise Success: Regularly visualise your career achievements and progress. This keeps your goals prominent in your mind and reinforces your focus.
3. Stay Informed: Actively seek information and resources related to your career goals. The RAS will help you notice and act upon these resources more effectively.
4. Network Actively: Engage with professional communities and networks. The RAS will help you pick up on relevant connections and opportunities in these interactions.
5. Reflect and Adjust: Regularly assess your progress and adjust your goals if needed. This ongoing reflection helps keep your RAS aligned with your evolving career objectives.
6. Use Affirmations: I often tell myself, especially when my motivation is flagging: “I am laser-focused on my career goals, and my RAS helps me to identify and seize every relevant opportunity that comes my way,” or “My mind is attuned to important information that propels me forward in my career, filtering out distractions effortlessly,” or “My brain naturally filters out negativity and distractions, allowing me to concentrate on tasks that lead to my professional success.”
7. Be Intensely Grateful for what you have achieved already. I keep a Gratitude Journal, doing this daily has made an enormous difference in my life.

How To Start Using Your RAS Right Now

To help you leverage the power of the RAS, I include 5 journaling prompts designed to enhance focus, recognise opportunities, minimise distractions, and nurture valuable connections, all of which contribute to career advancement.

1. “Identify Your Career Goals: Write down your top three career goals in detail. What specific skills, knowledge, and experiences do you need to achieve them? How will attaining these goals impact your professional and personal life?”
   This prompt helps you clearly define your career objectives, making it easier for your RAS to filter and focus on relevant information and opportunities.
2. “Reflect on Opportunities: List all the opportunities, big or small, that you noticed this week that could help you advance in your career. How did you become aware of these opportunities, and what actions did you take or plan to take in response?”
3. “Daily Focus Check-In: At the start of each day, journal about the key tasks and goals you need to focus on that day to move closer to your career objectives. Reflect at the end of the day on how well you stayed focused and what helped or hindered your concentration.”
4. “Recognize and Filter Distractions: Write about the distractions you encounter in your work environment. How do they affect your productivity and focus? Brainstorm strategies to minimize these distractions and enhance your attention on career-related activities.”
5. “Networking and Connections: Reflect on the people you interacted with this week who could support your career growth. How did these interactions come about? What steps can you take to nurture these professional relationships?”
   Focuses on the importance of networking and recognising valuable professional connections, enhancing the RAS’s role in identifying and building these relationships.

“The difference between great people and everyone else is that great people create their lives actively, while everyone else is created by their lives, passively waiting to see where life takes them next. The difference between the two is the difference between living fully and just existing.” Michael E. Gerber

In addition to the transformational retreats that I host at my little French farm near Bordeaux, I have also created a couple of online courses, ex. Break Free from Uncertainty and Get Going in a New Direction – each course is available with or without one-to-one coaching. To receive notification of last-minute and early-bird specials on all of the above, I invite you to subscribe to my Savoir Vivre Vignettes newsletter which gives immediate access to my free  How to Survive a Life Quake e-course.