We think of illusion as something that we believe we see but is not really there, like a mirage. Magicians depend upon certain tricks to entertain audiences through mis-leading their perception. Throughout our daily life, we often percieve things incorrectly, until we think or focus our minds in a particular way. Then we understand what is real.
The other definition of illusion is philosophical; may people believe that what we see in our life is an illusion; that if reach some spiritual state or condition, we will finally understand that what is out there in the world, is really not there at all. Then we will discover what is really Real. Or on the other hand, if we use some metaphysical, religious or spiritual ideal or doctrine and apply it to all of life, we will really understand what is really going on.
There is a different understanding of the illusion (of Reality) that I wish to identity. This is the notion that our perception of daily experience becomes illusory, through faulty habits of interpretion and emotional reactivity.
For example, if somebody I encounter in the market, let’s say, that I have indeed met before, and he looks over at me but does not respond; I may come up with the following interpretation: ‘This jerk is trying to act like he does not know me’. Now, let us assume that the person in the market is nearsighted (because she forgot her contacts lenses) and therefore, cannot not recognize me at all. If I use my original interpretation, I have actually deluded myself and this is actually an illusion of perception. I see her as she is in relation to her physical form (that is real); however, I do not see her social characteristics accurately. Therefore, I have distorted my social perception of her. That makes my perception distorted, and thus, “unreal”.
Illusions do not always involve the presence or absence of “things and objects”, like in magic tricks. It involves the presence or absence of clear perception in our daily life. What is the difference between looking and perceiving a fruit instead of a base-ball and misperceiving a social situation, like the one above? There is no difference; only different modes of misperception. The cognition of the a fruit instead of a baseball is an example of a visual misperception and the other is a cognitive misperception. They are both misperceptions, and thus, distortions.
You would be surprised at how often we make these misperceptions and thus render our experience, unreal. How does this occur? From the fact that we do not know how to observe our minds, and differentiate the difference between what is real and not. From this lack of examination, we often believe immediately what is going on in our minds, with out much understanding or scrutiny.
Our habitual patterns of subjective thinking and feeling are extended - or ‘projected’ - into social perception (thus constructing beliefs and conclusions) and this turns our experience into an illusion of personal and social misunderstanding.
How can anybody get out of this predicament? We can learn to see our self and our life clearly by learning the science of self-observation. There is a method of training that gives a clear understanding of how the minds works and how this can be can be transfered into actual perception.
When perception clears up - thus, ridding itself of illusion - we make better decisions, and act wisely. Then life becomes more real. We do not need to do any magic tricks to know how to get out of our delusions. We just learn to perceive our self and the world in a clear manner.
We start with the inner self or our own mind. When we can perceive what is going on in the mind, then the world will also be clearer and without distortion. It is like cleaning a window; when it has been wiped, even to a degree, we can see outside. There is no illusion.
Similarly, when we learn to clean up our minds, we can see external experience clearly, and we do not fall into the faulty habits of emotional and cognitive misperception.
To facilitate this, we need to understand how to look at the mind. An appropriate training and theory can teach you to ‘clean up your mind’ and thus, ‘clean up your act’.
Everything starts with the mind, because it is here that illusion begins to form. However, just because the problem rests with the mind, this doesn’t mean that we just work with thought or perception alone. This can be done, but it is arduous. We can also use other structures, such as Attention. Transformation really occurs by “putting together” different structures into a holistic process or matrix.
When we process experience, we just do not use our minds, but also other structures (or “centers”), such as attention, instinct and emotion.
However, much of our illusion starts with thought and perception, as shown in the examples above. One of the best methods of objectifying our misperception is to elist the faculty of Attention to enable us to be more cognizant and aware of what our minds our doing. Being attentive is a “yoga” in itself, and takes an extroardinary amount of discipline and interest.
Why is this so? Because just as it is easy to mispercieve our present reality, it is similarly easy to lose our attention and get lost in thought. In other words, if we learn to bring our attention into the present moment, we can “catch” when our thinking becomes muddled in narcissistic conclusions and perceptions. Attention is pure and can be counted on to notice things that are impure, such as unobjective conclusions about our self and others.
Remember, “illusion” actually is the misperception of self and world, which easily comes about through the “transferring” of early, childhood patterns into adult experience.
Another structure that can be utilized in the transformation of illusion or misperception is the faculty of instinct. In this case, we will use breath. The breath that is deep and centered is the “belly breath”; the breathing through the diaphram which brings us into our self in a full manner. When our thoughts and feelings run away from us, our breath will naturally move away from this deeper form of breathing. Therefore, it we are aware of our breathing and move it into this other position, we can tell when our thoughts and feelings run away from us (which usually implies a misperception), from the way we are breathing. The deeper breath feels “wise”.
We can also access this type of breathing through meditation. When we sit very still, our breath slows down and moves into this place. Here, we can then watch our minds and see how it runs away from us and forms all sorts of interesting conclusions about self and world. We have seen how attention, breath and body stillness all coordinate to transform misperception or illusion into Reality.
William Edwards
Author, Trainer
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