Now that I am a real adult, I have come to understand what that saying means. Perception is really ALL there is. For example, if I am walking down the street and I perceive a threat and act accordingly, the law will take my perception into account when deciding my fate. If i look up and see a green sky, there is little chance that you can do anything to convince me that it is blue, because I perceive it to be green.
Today, as I drove down the street and all my characters fought over my mental microphone, I had a minute to think( and Yes, I have quite a active internal life), and I wondered about my perception. How do I perceive the world around me? Is my perception correct? How does the world perceive me?
If my reality is based on my perception and my perception is filtered thru my life experiences then how can I ever be sure of what I see, hear, taste, smell and touch. How can my perception based reality be real?
Let's say, I got up this morning, got ready for the day, kissed my family goodbye and headed out in search for a great spot to write. In my search for utopia, I enjoy the smell of fresh baked bread coming from the local bakery, the vibrant colors of the flowers at The Bull City flower shop and lucky for me ,I get to overhear stimulating conversation about politics and religion which jump starts my characters to talking. I spend a few hours absorbing this wonderful reality I live in. When two-thiry arrives, I replace my writers hat for my mommy bonnet and head over to the school to get my son, unfortunately, along the way I am kidnapped. I am thrown into a van, taken to another state, beaten, raped and tortured for six months. During my captivity, my abductor tries to win my affection by giving me fresh cut flowers from his yard before he spends hours torturing me. After each session that he unleashes his twisted violations upon my person, he slices, butters and eats his freshly baked bread while he watches his religious talk shows to relieve his mind. He watches these shows while I am chained to his recliner. After six months of this hell he gets drunk and forgets to chain me tight enough and I am able to get free. I am reunited with my family.
A year goes by and I decide I want to try to write again. I get up and kiss my family goodbye and head out to find the perfect writing spot. Along the way I pass the local bakery and the smell of freshly baked bread stops me in my tracks, I feel sick to my stomach...it smells putrid. I walk as fast as I can to be free of this when I come across the flower shop and can barely contain myself at the sight of the freshly cut flowers, my body begins to hurt and my fear of what is coming next paralyzes me. I stop walking and try to sit down on the sidewalk when I hear people taking about religion and politics. Their conversation brings the noise of clanking chains and I feel the weight of them around my waist. So, in one reality I am in awe of the wonderful sights and smells and in the other, they bring me unspeakable pain.
Which is right? and just because you cant hear the clanking chains in my reality does it mean they don't exist? And who is the judge of which is right?
In Facebook, I belong to several private groups and in one of those groups( lets call it my home or preferred group,) we talk about everything without judgement(at least most of the time). One of the things we have done was we(the women)show a pic of a woman we find sexy or a woman's body we most would like to have...the men also show pics of a woman's body they would love to have(sexually)....I was amazed at the difference in the bodies the women thought was sexy and what the men thought was sexy. I posted a picture of Jada Pinkett Smith. I LOVE, LOVE,LOVE her body and would love to crawl inside of her skin and have it for my very own. She is lean, great abds and thin. The men were not feeling her and went as far as to say " fucking her would be like fucking a boy"...I was dumbfounded. I was sure she was a perfect goddess and I thought all the men thought so too. Most perceived her as a skinny boy who they would not touch if given a choice. The men posted pictures of round very curvy voluptuous women with large breast and large asses. Most of these woman had bodies that would send my crying to the gym to lose. I perceived some of them as fat, jiggly and mess. So, which perception is correct?
" My perception is my reality." is how this all began, and if this is true and perception is filtered thru life experiences and our life experiences occur all day everyday for the rest of our natural lives, then OUR reality is as changing as the wind. Since, MY reality is as changing as the wind then I have to assume that everyone else is just hanging on to their reality with a long string of silk. We have 50 billion people walking around in their own little ever changing realities and we have the nerve to get angry when some one doesn't see things our way. We want the other 49 billion to people to wake up and see whats real. To see what we see and when they don't, we wonder what the hell is wrong with them. We say they are crazy, we say they are damaged, we say they are stupid and we say they must be put away so they don't upset our Utoipa. We say they are not normal. The thought that two people can share a common reality is ridiculous. Since Two people cannot have the exact same life experiences, the filter with which they perceive their reality though, will be different from all others.
The next time you are standing at a bus stop and the nice person you have been having a conversation with turns and tells you the sky is green, instead of calling the cops, telling them they are crazy or walking away, you might want to stop,take a look up and ask yourself... why you see the color blue?
