Perception Is Fluid

And because we have free will, we can choose our perception. And should.

I handed Bill the information that Joe wanted. A few days later, I asked Joe if Bill had given it to him. I said I would find it for him when he said he hadn't. Thinking that Bill might have put the information on his desk, I turned towards his office to look inside.

However, it wasn’t there! It had disappeared. Confused, I walked over to the wall where the door should have been and stared at it. There was no door. Perhaps they had covered it up?

“Nope, no office has ever been there,” said Joe.

I knew I had seen the office where that wall currently resided, but since it was not there now, I pretended it existed, perhaps in another realm and somehow not in this one.

Perhaps I read too much science fiction or quantum mechanics, but it was more satisfying than thinking I had not seen it when I knew I had. I knew the answer to where the office was would eventually reveal itself.

The mystery solved itself a few days later.

Walking to a class, I turned and saw the open door to the office right where I had thought it was. At first, I pretended momentarily that I had stepped back into the realm where the office door existed.

Not so—or at least not in this instance.

Instead, I realized that there was another wall in front of the one where I had looked before. Yes, it was in the exact direction that I thought it was, but not in the same space.

Here’s the point. Perception is fluid.

It changes based on who we are, what we think, what we notice, and what we believe is real.

Nobody sees the same thing the same way. We don’t even remember things the same way we experienced them, either.

Perception is fluid.

And since it is, here’s the important question: why do we fight so hard to maintain how we think things once were or how we want things and people to be?

Why do we honor willpower? Stubbornness. Decisions build on hurt feelings.

Divisions, wars, and sadness are all planted in perceptions that can be shifted at any moment.

I love the idea of free will.

However, I think we have misinterpreted it and wasted its true power on wanting things how we want them to be, instead using it to shift our perception about every event, every idea, every concept, and every desire.

Because we have free will, we can choose our perception. We can choose one that is limited and restrained or one that is expanded and open.

Have you read Pollyanna lately? In this book, Pollyanna chooses a perception of good about every event that comes into her experience.

She is a master at shifting to a perception that brings good to everyone whose life touches hers. She sugarcoats nothing; she simply sees it differently.

How many things do we fight for that could easily be resolved by shifting our perceptions about them to see the good?

How many years do we waste wishing for something that we could easily have if we shifted our perception about how it will happen or how it will look?

With free will, we can choose whether we most want to be happy or if we want most to be right.

With free will, we can choose to accept a dualist reality where some people win, and some lose, or we can choose and act from the perception that omnipresent Good is the only power.

Guess what? We will get the one we choose.

This isn’t about right and wrong. It’s about choice, fluid perception, and what kind of life we want to live.

There is no need to hang onto hurt feelings or painful experiences. Facing them, recognizing that the perceptions that trap us are false memories, and replacing them with a revised and more spiritually healthy perception improves everyone’s life.

Seriously.

I was right about where the door was, except I was wrong about where the wall that housed that door was. Instead of arguing or thinking I had imagined that door, I waited to see if it reappeared. It did.

Perception is fluid. Perception is not a creator; it simply shows us what we believe to be true and then, reinforces that belief.

Hey, why not choose the perception that omnipresent Good is all that is going on? If we do that together, we might remove all the obstacles that keep us from seeing that Good IS all that is actually going on.

The two most powerful things we can do with our free will are to be willing to let Good direct our path and to set our feet on a path to action directed by the quiet voice within that is All-Good.

Do you have something better to do with your time than shift your perception? To be willing to listen to the guidance of the Divine and then take action?

I didn’t think so. Let’s shift together. It’s easier that way!