Self Consciousness day to day...

In Dr. Yake's second paper he talks about our self-consciousness in relation to how we reflect on our experiences in measures of time:

"when I look at my behavior of a minute ago and reflect on it, its meaning, its significance, its apparent effects, my intention or non-intention, its causes, its antecedents, etc...I can set limits to my reflection in one way or another, but there are a myriad of angles...that are possible, that are accessible to me..."

This passage reminds me of one from a book by Alan Watts titled, The Wisdom of Insecurity. The books main point is that the only way to truly become secure in oneself, is to abandon the fear of insecurity. He says this with the notion that as long as someone is aware of their sense of security, they will always have reservations and second thoughts and therefore cannot achieve security. Watts gives an example of what he means; Try reading this sentence while reflecting on it at the same time. You will find that it is impossible to do both at the same time. Although we need this occasional reflection, I have found that even Watts forgets his own advice from time to time because he is so caught up in the research and constant thinking about his theory.



Yet he is very convincing in perpetuating his theory through examples; If my happiness at this moment consists largely in reviewing happy memories and expectations, I am but dimly aware of this present. I shall still be dimly aware of the present when the good things that I have been expecting come to pass.

Here, Watts gives a controversial look at reflections. He asserts that always focusing on reflections and predictions about the future keeps us from living in the present times and recognizing the reality of the present. Because of this, Watts argues that the future is essentially meaningless unless it is realized when it becomes present.

Question:

Dr. Yake states that "visual art intervenes in our psychic days and modifies or becomes the grist of our conscious mills, thereby allowing us...into reflections on the various facets of the psychic moment"

Pairing this with Watts' stand on our reflections of daily life, where does visual art come in? Does is distract us from reality or does it aid us to make brief yet frequent reviews or perhaps something completely different?