Have you ever looked at something without judgment? Have you ever just observed without thought? Your judgment is altering your reality. The moment we look at something and think a thought, we are altering the reality of what we see by bringing our expectations. Thoughts arrive with feelings; feelings bring emotions and emotions conjure memories. Memories are past experiences, not present ones. When we see the world through past experiences, we fail to see the reality of the situation.
By becoming aware of how we influence the things we look at, we can begin to see the world from a neutral perspective. I read once that the moment you name an object, you automatically think you know what’s in front of you and fail to see the object for what it truly is. Psychologist Richard Gregory claimed that perception was constructive, that when a person looks at something they begin to perceptually hypothesize about it based on prior knowledge pattern recognition and contextual information. Richard Gregory has conducted many experiments which can be found at richardgregory.org. If interested in exploring this concept, I suggest you delve into some of Richard Gregory’s written work, Seeing Through Illusions, Eye and Brain: The Psychology of Seeing.
If we live our entire lives recycling old experiences, can we say that we are living? Only by changing our perspective can we begin to experience freedom. If you carefully observe your life, no two days are the same, yet we assume nothing changes throughout our daily activities. Our world is continually transforming right in front of our eyes, and we don’t notice. Our minds are fixated, unable to overwrite our past programming.
By labeling things we no longer feel threatened, because we believe we understand what we are looking at, and this understanding brings us security. But let’s open up the box of a human being. Humans are the most complex being on this earth; our largest organ is a sensorial one- the skin. Emotions drive us, our feelings change our body moods. Music and food shift our attitudes. There are areas in our bodies we tune out completely. (we don’t feel at all) and other parts that become heighten- like our reproductive one. Why? Because we have associated them with pleasure. We are pleasure-seeking begins.
But why have we conditioned it to be that way? Isn’t their pleasure in a simple head rub or gentle touch? Or by feeling the warmth of the sun on your skin. We choose our source of joy based on labels. If we carefully observe, there is pleasure in everything we do.
We must continue observing, from a neutral place of non-judgment, to be able to know more and see the truth. The moment you begin to watch without projecting is when the world becomes alive right in front our your eyes. I dare you to reopen the labels you have created.