Your perception creates your reality. What you see is what you get.
Or should I say how you choose to see determines what you get.
There is a great quote by Dr. Wayne Dyer that says - "When you change
the way you look at things, the things you look at change.". I believe
that quote sums the message of this article up perfectly.
Whatever you focus on expands. If you meet someone and decide to focus
on their negative or unattractive qualities, then you will begin to
notice more and more negative and unattractive qualities. If, however,
you meet someone and choose to focus on their positive and attractive
qualities you will notice more of their attractive qualities, and they
will suddenly become a very attractive person to you.
It is our choice how we choose to see and perceive things. We always get
to choose how we see a person, place or a situation. Our perception
determines our experience.
Life is all about perception. If you look at a homeless person, for example,
and you think to yourself 'how disgusting', 'he/she is so dirty','why don't
they get a job, like everyone else', 'what a loser', etc........
Then you will see a filthy disgusting person that is below you.
If you look at that same homeless person, and you think to yourself, 'I send
that person love', 'I pray that they find food today', 'I wonder what
situtaion occured in their life to put them there', 'How may I serve that
person', 'I admire their peacefulness','I respect their humanity', 'I am one
with their spirit', etc......
Then all of a sudden they look completely different to you.You see their inner
beauty, you respect them as your brother/sister, you see their humanity, you feel
empathy and compassion, you see that beautiful Soul as one with yourself.
When you change the way you look at people, places or circaumstances in your life,
they will change. It is your choice if you want to see through fear and anger or
see through love and compassion.
It is the same thing if you are in a romantic relationship. What happens
often times, is after two people have been in a relationship for a long time, one
or both of the people involved will begin start noticing some of the qualities,in
the other person, that they find annoying or frustrating. As they notice a few, they
begin to notice more, then those qualities seem to grow and become very exagerrated.
At this point, all of a sudden the person seems completely intolerable, and very
often the relationship ends, or they stay together and are miserable.
If you look at the beginning of most romantic relationships, it is the opposite.
Both people in the relationship are noticing what they like about the other person,
and the more they focus on those positive and attractive qualities, the more they
notice, then those qualities seem to grow and be exaggerated. They then fall in
love and think the other person is the most amazing person on earth, because they
are choosing to focus on the positive qualities of the other person.
We can always make that choice to focus on the positive qualities of another
person. If you have been in a romantic relationship for a very long time and
you begin to notice yourself focusing on the qualities that frustrate or annoy
you, catch yourself and make a different choice to focus on what you love about
them and their positive qualities and attributes. Whatever you focus on expands.
We have seen it many times where two siblings, who are close to the same age,
both grow up in an abusive environment. Each sibling will grow up to be completely
opposite, one sibling will grow up to have a very troubled life and the other
will grow up to have a very happy and successful life. In this situation, each
sibling chose to perceive their situation growing up in different ways, which
caused very different outcomes. It is your perception that creates your reality.
Your perception creates your reality, not only with people, but also with how
you perceive situations and circumstances. No matter what the situation is,
it is up to you how you choose to perceive the situation. There is positive
and negative aspects to every situation, even the ones that appear to be
very horrible. It is up to us to find the positive and focus on that part
of the equation. Your perception of any circumstance or situation will
be your reality.
The same goes for places. Your perception of any particular place will become
the reality of that place. You can take two people and have them stand right
next to each other at the same place, looking at the same things and they may
have completely different experiences at that same exact place. They have
different experiences because they are each choosing to have different
perceptions.
The most important thing to realize is that our perception is always a choice,
we can stop at any moment and choose to have a different view of things. Your
reality can be anything that you choose it to be, it all comes down to the
perception that you choose to have.