Perception, Reality, and the Worst Catchphrase

I’m here to move some cheese today and talk about a pet peeve of mine. Go ahead and file this one under “Emily’s Unpopular Opinions.”

I already know it’s an unpopular opinion, because the contrary quote has become so deeply engrained in our beliefs for over three decades that we’ve forgotten its origin and adopted it as a modern day idiom of sorts. “Perception is reality.”

Ladies, gentlemen, friends, and family…

Perception. Is. Perception.

Reality. Is. Reality.

And while perception is real, plays and important part in our real lives, and is influenced by reality, it is NOT reality.

Reality, though influenced by actions based on perception, is reality.

We latch to this phrase in all of its Yoda-like cleverness. It is succinct. It is pithy. It has a meta-ethical, existential ring to it.

It has become the unofficial battle-cry from organizations of all walks and the launch pad for other slogans such as, “Speak your truth!”

This is not simply semantics. Not only is this statement positively false, it is also dangerous.

But first, a brief history lesson. It was not, in fact, the all-wise, little green, backward talking, Star Wars character who first suggested “Perception is Reality.” Instead, it was political strategist, Lee Atwater, who coined this phrase in the 1980s when working on George H. W. Bush’s presidential campaign and speaking to his own political tactics! Please take a moment and reflect on all of the warm-fuzzy feelings and inspirational wisdom you glean from a presidential campaign ad, and allow the root of this phrase to sink in. This is a concept to define how media controls the societal narrative.

“Perception is reality,” is grounded in the premise that we humans are so sensitive to suggestion, especially that which is emotionally or scandalously charged, that all that is needed in order to control our puppet strings is not actual truth and facts…no no no…the path to victory is paved with what you and I are willing to believe. Whether it is based in fact or fiction is simply irrelevant.

If I, the puppeteer, can convince you, the puppet, that you are this or that and you live in a society that is this or that, then I can essentially cause you to behave, spend, and vote as such.

I can convince you that you are elite. I can convince you that you are a victim. I can convince you that you are elite because you are a victim.

The quote used to highlight human gulability and prove why political manipulation is successful, is now adopted by the masses so we can suppress OURSELVES! We have become slaves to our own feelings and emotions. This propaganda is inherently preposterous, condescending, and ultimately terminal.

I have terrible vision. TERRIBLE. Like, the kind where my glasses prescription is very likely stronger than your 90-year-old grandmothers’. If I were to get behind the wheel of a car without glasses or contacts, I cannot see where the lanes are marked. To my visual perception, the lanes do not exist. Realistically, the lines are there, and everyone else can see them! I will then interact with my world according to my perception. So, when I REALLY crash into another car, not only is my perception inaccurate, it’s also irrelevant!

Luckily, when I was in third grade, my parents and teachers were able to identify that my visual perception did NOT align with reality, and my mother took me to the eye doctor. I suppose she could have just thrown her hands up and said, “Well, perception is reality! Go live your blind little truth, Emily Ann!” Instead, my mom took me on a journey…it was to Lens Crafters in Towne East Mall…to seek reality!

So now, when I get behind the wheel of a car, I have tools to correct my distorted perception. I can see what is actually in front of me. I can engage with the REAL environment.

If you’ve driven through a big city, you’ve inevitably seen the homeless man on the side of the road having an extremely animated conversation with someone else. Only, you cannot see the someone else. He can. You cannot. You cannot see the someone else because the someone else does not exist. Sure, the man on the side of the road perceives the other person and all of their hilarious antics. But the rest of the world knows the other person is not real.

His perception is his perception. His perception is not reality. And there’s no such thing as “his reality.”

We don’t each have our own reality. We have our own stories. We have our own experiences. We have our personal lessons we’ve learned along the way. Reality, however, does not belong to us.

Imagining we each have our own reality or our own truth simply provides an excuse for not seeking actual facts, truths, and solutions. It lets us off the hook and makes us lazy thinkers. We victimize ourselves.

Not only is this detrimental to the operations of our society, it threatens our very existence.

Satan uses this tactic to rob our hope and get God’s children out of the way by diluting our sense of truth. And though the phrase itself isn’t even quite old enough to run for president, this deceit dates back to the Garden.

The belief that our perception gifts us an alternate reality stunts our search for truth. When we stop searching, we stop using reality rooted in God’s truth and promises as the measuring stick for our perceptions.

When depression, suicidal ideations, feelings of worthlessness and being out of control, and fear set in, and we confuse these very real perceptions for reality, we lose hope and self-destruct.

The Bible instructs us to seek Him, that He is THE truth, and to lean NOT on our own understanding (Proverbs 3:5). One might even call that understanding, a perception.

Scripture warns us about buying into the lie in Proverbs 18:15, “The mind of the discerning acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks it.” In James 1:19 we find the first steps in breaking the toxic perception and reality cycle. “Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger.”

We cannot fall into the trap of believing WE have a personal truth to share. But something heavenly happens when we ask Christ to help us reflect upon our perceptions and identify our distortions. We see truth. We want more of it. We don’t want to go back to the old distorted view. We find ourselves behaving differently, feeling empowered, asking more questions, seeking others who operate in truth, and forming new habits.

Despite what the enemy wishes us to believe, our perceptions belong to us, but ALL truth and ALL reality belongs to God

14Margaret Christensen, Sharron Hayward and 12 others

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Caterpillars and Dial-up Internet

Our WiFi was ridiculously slow last Wednesday. Baker looked at me and asked, “Is this what dial-up was like?”

Waiting is not something we are accustomed to, today. We are a society frequently defined by convenience and instant gratification.

On a seemingly unrelated (but I’ll tie it together...I promise) note...

A common random theme that has surrounded Baker over that past week has been butterflies. Everywhere he looks, from his morning devotional, to his reading work from school, to his science work from school, to our family walks, to our pastor’s sermon this morning, the theme of butterflies/caterpillars keeps popping up.

In my experience “random themes” tend to be God’s way of tapping us on the shoulder.

Let’s be real. When you see a caterpillar do you stand in awe of its beauty?

If one crawls across your back porch, do you take a picture? Do you stare with wonder at the grace with which it inches across the ground? What if one falls from the porch covering and lands on the side of your drink? Do you grab your phone for a selfie?

Or do you notice its awkwardness? Do you get a little queasy thinking about it landing in your sweet tea? Do you wonder if it’s one of those poison ones like you saw on Facebook?

Do you see its future state, or do you fixate on its current condition?

I see the caterpillar exactly as it is right now. “Don’t touch that!” I holler to my curious kids. It’s not welcomed on my drink, on my skin, or in my house. The stranger it looks, the more I fear the unknown. I don’t like it. It’s gross. It creeps me out.

These last few weeks have felt like that.

Like a big, fat, juicy, creature fell out of the sky and straight into our laps. The really weird looking kind...the slimy and spiky kind with fur and horns.

Like a whole rolling swarm (that’s the actual term!) of gross weirdness just came out of nowhere and took over.

We look at our current condition and it’s absolutely surreal.

What we forget, though, is that the end is far more beautiful than the beginning.

We are NOT meant to know when this all will end...so we can go back to business as usual.

We are meant to use this time to to draw closer to our families and our God.

The caterpillar becomes the butterfly that my son and daughter chase through the pasture as they giggle with delight and pray that one will land right on their heads. I grab my phone to take a picture. I post it on Instagram for the world to see.

It takes time.

It can’t be rushed or forced.

The metamorphosis is a delicate process.

And when we attempt to speed things along, we destroy the beauty that is intended to emerge.

The trash heap that seems to have befallen us all, WILL produce beauty...in His time.

That’s hard for us. We want God to operate with WiFi service when it feels like He’s operating through dial-up...or worse...a carrier pigeon.

His thoughts are not our thoughts. His perspective is not our perspective.

The end-beauty will not come through impatience and wondering when this will all end. The questions where we allow our mind to fixate, influence the peace in our hearts.

The beauty will come with our willingness to believe that what comes next is unimaginable beauty.

It comes with our willingness to ask what we can do with this time to glorify Him.

It will come with us asking what we can do to serve those around us.

It is time to wrap ourselves in the cocoon of His promise, pour out our love, and trust that we will emerge a new creation.

25Donna Rial-Baker, Sharron Hayward and 23 others

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AND know...

 Some thinking during my morning run (got a pretty pic during my run too):

Every time I’ve heard Psalm 46:10 I’ve heard two instructions:

1. Be still.

2. Know that He is God.

Seems pretty clear.

But what if He wants us to read it differently right now? What if the emphasis should be on the “AND”. Not two directives...just one.

Time, right now, seems to be moving at warp speed and simultaneously standing completely still.

Many of us are under orders to “shelter in place.”

We are schooling our own children, and we are working from home.

Everything seems so uncertain. The world has come to a screeching halt.

Be still.

But do you see Him in the stillness?

Do you know that He is GOD in the stillness?

When we have NO control over anything, and we are forced into the stillness, do we still KNOW that He is God?

Like...the same way Luci KNOWS Dave will pick her up when she falls? The same way Baker (in all his science knowledge and life of anxiety) has absolutely no fear in all of this because he KNOWS we will provide for him?

Are we able to be still AND know that He is the almighty...who knows the plans he has for us...to give us hope and a future?

Can we find a way to welcome the stillness...and in that stillness, find a way to KNOW that He is God?

41Donna Rial-Baker, Margaret Christensen and 39 others

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