Our beliefs shape our reality.
We know this to be true but may not fully acknowledge it. Because owning that means admitting some of the shit we see around us is nothing more than our perception clouding up our vision.
If we believe people to be primarily good, benevolent, kind, that is what we will see. If we believe humanity to be a cursed bunch of selfish pricks, we will see that too.
Because of that, perception can be a gift for some and a burden for others.
You have seen the memes: someone looking out the bus window at the beautiful view looking hopeful and happy while the person on the other side is staring at the muddy hill looking defeated and broken.
My take: that guy looking at the mud is doing it on purpose.
Sometimes we get so caught up in our bullshit that we fight extremely hard to keep it without realizing it.
A few years ago, I had a realization in Target. To be honest, I thought I had lost my mind for a moment.
I was in line with a cart full of bullshit. Clothing, socks, throw pillows, laundry detergent, fancy cleaning spray promising to kill every germ while not containing any harsh chemicals (sounds legit). I had nothing but time that day. I was pregnant with my third child, another at school until pick up at three, the other at home with a babysitter hired to watch him while I work – jokes on her – I was working really hard that day…
Life was good. It was better than good. It was magnificent. It was everything I prayed for and so much more.
Yet there I was – standing with my cart full of bullshit and belly full of life, completely pissed off that there was a line in front of me, and the women had the audacity to pull out a checkbook. An actual fucking checkbook. I was going to be stuck standing there – with my cart and my happily kicking 7-month fetus scrolling my Facebook feed to kill time because god forbid I get off my fucking phone and take in the life around me for at least 3 to 5 minutes.
And that is when it hit me.
Hundreds of realizations came rushing into my awareness like a tidal wave of gratitude. Reality – actually reality – not the bullshit sob story I was telling myself about why I should be annoyed and bothered in the Target line slapped me in the face.
My belief about having a hard life, about nothing being fair, about being a broke teen mom, a daughter of an addict, a dropout, a loser who would always be behind the ball because her life went differently than the lie about happiness Disney tried to sell me had followed me into my current life. The one where everything is going right. And I am not broken, single, alone, unhappy. Everyone is healed. Healthy. Thriving. Happy.
But my story was still there. My belief was present, and that belief was clouding and fucking up my perception.
Because what we believe about life is what we will see.
What we believe about ourselves is what we will see.
What we believe about our situation is what we will fight to confirm over and over and over again.
We all have our shit. We all have our past and our traumas. Every person alive has experienced things they did not deserve. No person makes it into adulthood without experiencing pain. In a lot of ways – we are all fucked up.
But if we STAY fucked up – that's on us.
We are all grown from our bullshit. Fertilized in the manure of life's impacts and injuries. It is what we do with that fertilizer (bullshit) that matters.
Some of us allow it to help us grow. To bloom into something extraordinary, full of life, of experience, knowledge of who we are and who we never want to be… We take that shit, and we make something beautiful from it.
Or. We grow nothing. We smear that shit all over our bodies, faces, and everything around us, letting it stink up everything we touch. Spreading our past all over our future.
That is what I was doing. I realized it at that moment: I was the one fucking my life up. It wasn't my past; it wasn't all reasons I had tucked away in my back pocket, ready to pull out and place the blame on. It was me. I was the one bringing that shit along with me every day.
Perception creates reality. If you see nothing but problems, there is a 100% chance YOU are the problem.
It is often said that people's reactions to you are more about them than they are of you – and to a point, I agree. We are viewing things from our specific, life-defined lens. But there is more to it than that. That statement implies we have no responsibility for our actions, and just as vital, our energy.
We are all empathetic. Yes, it is a new-age buzzword, but it is scientifically proven. We have mirror neurons that want to match our energy with the energy around us.
If we walk around chronically worried, angry, trying to impress because of the story we are telling ourselves about not being seen or apricated, judging the people around us because we spend our days judging ourselves…. That rubs off. That gets felt.
Their reaction is absolutely based on your actions and energy. Believing anything different is assuming you are entirely powerless over every person and situation in your life.
We need to drop the idea that we are not responsible for how people perceive us. We are. Not entirely, some will hate us, and some will love us, and to a point, it will have nothing to do with us. But it also has a lot to do with us. Embrace the idea that multiple things can be true at one time.
Because perception creates reality, and if you walk around like your actions and energy affects only you, you are an asshole.
Instead – let your perception be that your energy is loud, and how you act will create waves of reactions.
We are responsible for the tides we generate.
I ask myself often: what am I seeing right now? What story am I telling myself about this situation? What worry about the future am I allowing to destroy my present? What interpretation and retelling of my past am I permitting to fuck up my NOW?
Our perception creates reality. Our responsibility is to make sure that perception is working in our favor.