Do you literally see what you think? Do you actually perceive what you hear? They say “Seeing is believing” but is that really true?
The definition of “Perception” is “a single unified awareness derived from sensory processes while a stimulus is present”, so in other words we perceive our reality through our senses.
Have you ever really thought about how your senses affect your reality? Have you ever really wondered how they make you perceive a situation? How they impact how you make a judgement or how they can even affect your decision making? Sometimes it can be a “hunch” or a “gut feeling” that makes us not like something. Sometimes it’s the energy and we don’t like the “vibe”… I had a situation which I experienced recently that made me question my own perception and how I thought, felt and perceived my reality.
I came across the below humourous extract from Alice Vandal which highlighted how perception can be different for each of us:
“A woman heads off to work, but her car will not start. How does she perceive this circumstance?
- The optimist may run for the bus, assuming that one will come along at the right time and get her to the office only a little late.
- The pessimist goes back into the house and cries, defeated before she even begins, sure she’ll be fired for being late. She’ll run out of money and miss the mortgage payments on her house and she’ll end up begging on the street with no one to help her.
- The self-made woman will open the hood and get out her toolbox. She has already learned auto mechanics for just such an event.
- The femme-fatale walks onto the street and waits for a man to come to her aid. If she’s good at her character she won’t have to wait long!
- A witch might try casting a spell.
- A pragmatic woman might call her garage, then her boss and get on with the day without any hysterics.”
The above example highlights how reality and perception can be different for each of us. Perceptions can also be can be influenced by our upbringing, mood, beliefs, spirituality and interests, how one person sees one thing, another will see it completely differently.
The reason why I wanted to highlight this is that I feel it is important to have a level of self-awareness to really think about what is affecting your mindset and your reality. I regularly ask myself questions like; “Are you being too hard on yourself?”, “Are you being delusional?”, “Are you being honest with yourself?, “Did anything happen to make you overly emotional or biased?” This helps me to regulate my emotion with my reality.
Our emotions and mind are both beautiful and powerful tools and they can either be our best friend or our worst enemy.
How will you choose to Perceive?
Many Blessings Xx
