I can’t tell you how many times someone has said to me, “I’m just being realistic.” But the truth is they do not know what they do not know. They are not being a realist. They, just like everyone else in a human body, are interpreting reality through a set of filters. Those filters alter the way we perceive reality.
We cannot see beyond those filters unless we adjust our filters. If someone believes the world is awful, they interpret reality through a filter created by that belief. If someone believes a certain group of people is bad, they interpret reality through a filter created by that belief. Beliefs are just one of many filters the inputs from our senses go through before we become consciously aware of the data our senses received.
Filters are good. Our minds are not designed to process all the input form our eyes, ears, nose, touch, and taste buds simultaneously. Information deemed unimportant is filtered out.
Our life experience can be greatly enhanced when our filters are set to serve our highest good and greatly diminished when they are not. Still in doubt? Tomorrow put a roast in your crock pot and stay home, inside, near the kitchen all day. Do whatever you want while you are there. Mid-day, go out to your mailbox and come back inside. Doesn’t your dinner smell terrific? Before you left and came back you could not smell it. Your filter had decided that the smell, which had been there for a long time, was not important. The input from your senses about the delicious smell was not passed to your conscious mind. It is not that your nose stopped working.
So, if you pride yourself on being a realist, how do you reconcile your inability to be consciously aware of the real reality with that desire? Do you have any idea what is being filtered out and what is being highlighted in your reality because of the way your filters are set? Most of our filters are established by age 6. They impact every area of our lives. We teach our students how to adjust their filters to serve their highest good.
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