The Power of Perception

Hello All,

It is amazing how much energy we spend on arguing with what is. This means we experience a particular moment and then proceed to dialogue about that moment inside our minds. We take a stand against this moment in one way or another and sometimes from many different angles, then strong emotions are triggered based on the opinions we are formulating. Those emotions then trigger memories of past emotions of similar quality which triggers the thoughts related to those old emotions. PHEW! It is exhausting just describing the process. This is one explanation for arriving at work in your car with no idea how you got there. I know it's happened to you!

I call this the SPIRAL of INCREASING DRAMA. Consider that while we are spiraling into the rabbit whole of our fantasy world, life continues....the heart beats (faster due to drama), the body functions and the earth spins on its axis causing the sun to appear to move through the sky. The movement of the sun in the sky is a great support in illustrating the power of PERCEPTION. Everywhere in our language we talk about the sun moving across the sky because that is our visual perception. In fact, however, it is us (the earth) that is spinning and not the sun. This is the same in our lives. We are observing reality as though it is "objective" when, in fact, our perception of any given moment is made up entirely of our conditioned response (AKA reaction) to the information filtered by our senses. Still with me?

Consider the last person you saw....did you see them? Really? Or did you experience them as the sum total of your past conditioning (experiences, memories, fantasies). Look again, to look again is to RESPECT someone in the original Latin sense of the word. Look again at how you are perceiving the miracle of life spinning around you. At the end of the day, we are all spinning together on this glorious beach ball called earth. To practice meditation is to step to the center of your consciousness, of your life, at first everything is still moving but with practice and patience and the power of perception you may just discover what you didn't even know you were looking for.

Beloved Yoga & Meditation tonight at the Boathouse, hope to see you there. Then, I hope I re-member to look again and really SEE YOU.

Namaste,

Steve

Yogi Jayanta