“Perception is a mirror, not a fact.”\u00a0 ~ ACIM Lesson 304<\/i>
\nVery early in this week I knew I would be writing about perception – how we take the things we see and interpret them in our own minds to believe they are real and fact.
\nAt the beginning of this week I started reading Iyanla Vanzant’s book “Peace from Broken Pieces”.\u00a0 Early in the book she tells on how she was compelled to write this book about her life experiences to help her to release the pain of her past and the pain following the death of her daughter.\u00a0 She struggled within herself with writing her life story down as she suffered abuse, rape, and abandonment in her childhood and had been taught by her family pathology never to speak of these things; if she spoke of them she would have to tell about what her family members had done to her.\u00a0 Realizing she would never be able to move past the pain and live a true, authentic life, she wrote the book.\u00a0 She said that in writing the book she was conveying her own perception of the events.\u00a0 In the book she tells how she perceived the events and the people when she was a child and how she, as an adult, is now able to perceive the events and the people to work through her healing.
\nOn Tuesday I listened to a Caroline Myss lecture and in her opening she spoke about how she no longer was going to be “politically correct” and keep sacred terms and behavior out of her teachings.\u00a0 She would speak of God and Grace, and end her lessons with prayer, something she had always avoided so as to not be ridiculed or portrayed as trying to force religion on people.\u00a0 She said, in her Sacred warrior tone, that if someone finds offence in what she says, that it is in their own minds.
\nI understood what both of these wonderful wise women were saying.\u00a0 We all perceive the world differently based on our state of mind as we evaluate the information we receive.
\nI knew for sure my lesson of the week to be perception when I recognized my own mis-perceptions during an incident at work.\u00a0 I was in a staff meeting and the boss was telling us that 4 field vehicles would be replaced this year.\u00a0 He named the ones to get retired and the list did not include the vehicle used by my friend C.\u00a0 C. is a very quiet and tolerant person so I decided to speak up for him as I knew he had the oldest vehicle in the office and that it had problems.\u00a0 I spoke up and had the group laughing as I told of the many issues with the vehicle that I had experienced when I had driven it.\u00a0 To my surprise C. started making excuses for the truck.\u00a0 I suddenly realized that he loved the thing. I had always thought that he saw the vehicle as I did, as old and un-safe.\u00a0 Many times I had said to him to ask for a new vehicle and had assumed that he didn’t because he didn’t want to be a bother or that he did and his request was rejected.
\nIn the meeting I closed my mouth and separated my self from the issue. In life, many people would continue to force their opinion just to avoid looking as though they were mistaken.\u00a0 \u00a0It doesn’t really matter if my perception was wrong or right about the vehicle as my intention was to speak up for my friend and I had assumed his position was the same as mine – I was wrong.\u00a0 Things are fine with me and C. and I have had a good laugh several times this week telling the story, it is just such a simple example of how we believe our own perception to be fact.
\nMy lesson on perception was fully realized on Thursday reading my daily ACIM Lesson 304.\u00a0 The quote I used at the top, “Perception is a mirror, not a fact”, goes onto say “And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward.”
\nThis quote says for me that our perception of the events of our life is swayed by our state of mind.\u00a0 If we live in fear and negativity, always expecting the worst from ourselves and from life, then we will see situations as fearful and negative.\u00a0 We are to choose to see through the eyes of Love – see the positive and that is what will be received.
\nThis world that we live in brings so much information to us through our five senses.\u00a0 There are those of us that rely on our vision, those of us that listen well, those that are sensitive to smell, those who touch everything, and those who avoid touch.\u00a0 There is so much information coming in and we are able to just grasp and hold on to a few bits of it.\u00a0 What we retain is usually the bits that our minds can relate to our previous experiences.\u00a0 We all know that we have different abilities but we still go through life thinking that everyone’s perception is the same as our own.\u00a0 And, when others have ideas that are different from ours, then we label them as stupid and wrong.
\nIt is with a glad heart that I accept this lesson and know that I can accept the perceptions of my own mind and those of others more lightly.\u00a0 What is significant and important can turn meaningless with a simple change of perspective.
\nI choose to view others with compassion.
\nI choose to ease up on myself and know that I will make mistakes.
\n“All that we are is the result of what we have thought.\u00a0 The mind is everything.\u00a0 What we think we become.” ~ The Buddha<\/i>
\nNamaste’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Happy Sunday! “Perception is a mirror, not a fact.”\u00a0 ~ ACIM Lesson 304 Very early in this week I knew I would be writing about perception – how we take the things we see and interpret them in our own … Continue reading