Looking Beyond the Smoke for Inspiration: Perception is Personal

Looking at the smoke that blankets many areas of California presently, making it difficult to see and to breathe, dim specters like tarnished ghosts appear and disappear with the wind outside my window. Perception, how one views the world, alters what we see in the world just as surely as fire smoke.

But perception is malleable. Perception is individualistic. The way each of us perceives informs our reality. Something patently obvious to you may not even register with another. For instance, when I look at the present state of affairs in the United States, wrestling with a pandemic that causes loss of life, loss of jobs, loss of homes, loss of civility towards others, violence, and unrest, I see a script that alarms and unsettles our national psyche. Who knew our national psyche would become so fractured? But is it a healing, or a curse?

To live in the time of unrest is not new. Times of peace weave throughout human history, punctured by times of war and discord. Humans are amazingly habitual. This script, as old as we are, has played out with variations since we began. Environment and era color the plot. But the actors attempt to make sense of the puzzle pieces every time. There are many plots and subplots in this puzzle game, and many players.

William Shakespeare’s character Macbeth voiced this with eloquence saying,

“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

(Macbeth, Act V, Scene 5)

But is it? Are we so helpless? Do we not signify something beyond our scripts? I believe we do. There are those who reject the status quo and the tendency to not break out of patterns. They look at the puzzle and reject the dominant paradigm termed reality. Whose reality is the reality? If our perceptions are personal, our attitudes our own, can we break out of the dominant paradigm and create our own reality based on higher ideals? Change is the only given in this life, the only thing we can depend on. Why not make change a personal fulfillment? Make a change to support others rather than tear them down, make a change to bring harmony, not war and discord. It starts with one’s perceptions. It manifests in one’s projections.

Behind the acrid brown smoke out my window the blue sky prevails. The sun shines. And nature continues. Behind the negative news there are many good people working for a greater peace and good in the world. They don’t fall prey to perceiving only a negative paradigm. You can decide how to see. There is no ultimate reality. There is more that binds us than separates us. We must not forget that.

What you focus on has power over you. A positive focus helps you and everyone you encounter. It builds, not destroys. It opens doors. The imagination resides in the body in the same place as what mystics’ term the Third Eye, the place between and slightly above the physical eyes. Ever wondered why a book or movie can predate an event that is very similar? Creative types often access the energy of the mystical eye region and employ perceptions from there.

When you focus your concentration at that point between the eyes you start to feel a different sensation. Maybe you feel more rested, dreamy, peaceful. By concentrating, you enter an alpha brain wave frequency, which is slower in frequency and more relaxing than beta, the frequency in which the outer world vibrates. Everyone has experienced alpha. A common alpha expression is daydreaming. But to access it purposely brings calmness and a type of understanding that rejuvenates your being. Slow rhythmic breathing helps you drop into the alpha frequency. Once there you arrive at a stillpoint, a place away from the chaos of the world, a place to be still and enjoy that stillness. Here your imagination finds its natural home. Here you leave the worries of the world and see deeper, beyond conflict, to a refined way of understanding and from that level may come more meaningful, respectful ways of interacting with others, and more meaningful ways of interacting with your true self.

Who knows what kind of puzzle you can piece together with inspiration? Creativity comes in all forms. What form of expression are you drawn to?