Thursday, December 26, 2019

Perception Deception

by John Boodhansingh of Zero Mindfulness

After pulling a load of groceries from the trunk of my car and leaving another load behind, I dropped the trunk lid just enough so it appeared closed but didn't lock.

Why do you think I did this? Because…

  • I feared some hoodlum would see the remaining items and steal them while I was in the house?
  • I didn’t want the blazing hot sunlight to directly hit the cold items?
  • I was trying to be secretive and wanted to minimize the chances of my neighbors seeing what I buy?
  • My parents had slapped me as a child for failing to shut the trunk when I wasn’t standing right there?
  • I had this idea for a blog post and didn’t what the intro statement to be a lie?
  • I wanted to burn the extra 1/8 calorie by opening and closing the trunk again?
  • There was also a mannequin in the trunk, and I didn’t want anyone to see it and mistake it for a human body? (...or was it the other way around?)

Rather than provide my reasoning, I’ll leave you to think whatever you want.


Because it doesn’t matter.

The point is that, regardless of circumstance, one simple thing can generate many potential perceptions about that thing’s occurrence.

This is important to realize because people lean heavily toward thinking and behaving as though their perceptions of life are “how it really is.” Yet all of these perceptions are relative, the vast majority of them are completely inaccurate, and “what’s happening” is not likely the concern of any secondary perceivers.

To make matters worse, people frequently share these phony perceptions with others and defend them in an oft-closed-minded but believed-to-be-sane fashion—as in gossip.

Evolving beyond Survival

I encourage you to make a practice of consciously seeing your thoughts as they arise and considering how you think about things. Consider that how you perceive things to be may not be how they actually are—not even close—and that your judgments as to "what's happening to who" are most likely irrelevant to you.

Consider that you are telling yourself stories about this thing, that thing, and everything else in order to close any mental gaps of not knowing. This is how our brains are programmed to operate at a survival level, after all—to make up and believe lies in lieu of the truth for the sake of self-protection when the truth is unavailable or uncomfortable.

But by rampantly and haphazardly calling “truth” to both falsities and arbitrary perceptual data, we close off our minds to any actual truth and to the openness of infinite possibility and potential. Said differently, in observing without unnecessary judgment and speculation, we enable ourselves to see what is as it is.

In order to truly grow up, to not just age physically or collect data intellectually but to actually evolve as souls, we must consciously reprogram our minds and rewire our brains.

By all means, we’re all more than welcome to have preferences, to wonder, to think about the things of the world, to make jokes, and so on—this is not about anyone becoming an impersonal robot.

This is about taking on a constructively critical approach to faulty thought processes—something we’ve all got a heavy hand in. This is about removing the internal circus of mental flop that is general thought and its more destructive off-shoots such as judgment and blame.

People cling to their crappy thoughts like stink on shit, but it must be understood that stink on shit is natural—most human thought is unnatural since it’s an effect of junk programming.

In utilizing this or any other self-help practice, we aid ourselves in returning to our natural state—which for us, thankfully, doesn’t imply a rank stench. Indeed, the “rank stench” is what we’ve already been emanating profusely, “normal” though it may be.

We only stand to gain through conscious awareness and letting go.