Redefining Perfection

"When you aim for perfection, you discover it's a moving target." ~ Geoffrey F. Fisher

Last night, while I was on the phone with my mother-in-law, our conversation led to a discussion on the concept of perfection.

According to the Merriam-Webster’s dictionary the following are two definitions for perfection: 1) the quality or state of being perfect: as a: freedom from fault or defect : b: the quality or state of being saintly; 2) a: an exemplification of supreme excellence b: an unsurpassable degree of accuracy or excellence.

Nice definitions, but if we look at them closely, they are not definitions of perfection per se, but definitions built around individual perceptions of it.

1a- "Freedom from fault or defect – what exactly does that mean? Who is perfect enough to decide what is faulty or defective? Our perception spins from what we have been taught, and it rarely reflects reality; it merely shows what we consider right or wrong in base of what we have learned. Even when we are sure to be "thinking with our own head," our perception of the world around us is filtered through our senses, which are limited and faulty at best.

1b- "The quality or state of being saintly" – What constitutes a saint? Is it someone who spends their life doing for others? Most likely it is someone who’s considered good when measured against our societal scales, which are created by men and are not perfect.

2a- "An exemplification of supreme excellence" – The only supreme excellence is that of a higher intelligence – no man, or anything created by man, can perceive the full concept of it. It equates fitting the waters of an ocean inside a bottle – only a tiny part of it can go in.

2b- "an unsurpassable degree of accuracy or excellence." – Big words, but again, who decides what is accurate and excellent? What parameters do we use to decide if something is completely correct?

Although amazing milestones have been conquered, even science is not perfect, and it is baffled by Nature quite consistently. Just like a virus, perfection cannot be isolated – it mutates and assumes different identities depending on what trends it contends with, and the perception of it changes from individual to individual. That explains why some people can see something or someone and think they are perfect and wonderful, while some others can look at the same and see only faults and defects.

This distinction applies to many concepts – good and evil, beauty and/or lack of it, religion, politics; the list could be endless. Our perception is largely affected by our environment and the rules we have grown to identify with. There is no such thing as a perfect human or a perfect thing – the sooner we realize this simple reality, the closer we will be to understanding that being unique is perfect in itself.


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Colors of the World (repost)

When you look at it in a mean way, how mean it is! When you look at it selfishly, how selfish it is! But when you look at it in a broad, generous, friendly spirit, what wonderful people you find in it.~ Horace Rutledge

I always find it interesting that my husband and I can meet the same people and have an entirely different impression of them. Similarly, our views of current events are also very conflicting at times.

My husband sees the world as a hostile environment, where ruthless people are consistently arranging their days around taking advantage of others. He is a news addict, and will – after a day of stress and countless exchanges – use his entire evening to hear more and more distressing segments, nodding his head when someone makes a statement of impending doom.

I am the opposite side of the coin. I peruse the paper every morning but focus mostly on the positive news. I don’t believe we live in a perfect world, but I don’t believe our world is all that bad either. We have conflicts, hardship and everyday obstacles, but so has had every generation before us.

I don’t believe people are any worse today than they were yesterday; we are simply more aware of events and heinous acts because of the advent of widespread media. I don’t think there are more child molesters loose on the streets; the only difference between yesterday and today is that in the old days we didn’t know of a child who had been kidnapped three states away, and victims were more reticent to come forth and point a finger at their abusers; dirty laundry was, more or less, washed at home.

It is human nature to be fearful and doubtful. It is also another human flaw to be easily influenced by negative suggestions. Since childhood we are conditioned to be afraid and careful. Germs will hurt us; friends have a double agenda; strangers will kill us; very few caregivers ever explain to children that stress and fear make us sick worse than germs, most friends don’t have hidden plans, and the majority of strangers will only kill us with a smile. Personally, I refuse to live in a world where I have to feel fearful and defensive at all times. I do believe in destiny, and I think that if something is meant to happen to me, it will happen regardless of how paranoid or relaxed I am.

Everything in our world is dual; we can choose to look at one face of it or the other. Electricity can warm us and provide light, but can also be used to electrocute; water is healing and soothing but can also be employed to drown someone; fire is warm and inviting but can also char everything on its path; air can be uplifting and wind relaxing, yet it can carry a blaze across forested areas.

There are always two ways to look at the same thing; it is up to us to decide which color of lens we choose to wear when we take a look around.

Fact or Sensory Illusion? (Repost)

Have you ever wondered if others see and hear the same things you do? After all, images and sounds are picked up by our senses, and then transferred to our brain for processing.

What if our brain - conditioned by previous experiences and teachings - decodes information in a bias fashion? Could a person say one thing and we hear another?

That would certainly explain why people don't seem to find a common ground, at times, or why some find a particular person or thing beautiful while others consider the same thing unattractive or unpleasant. In my personal experience, I know there have been situations when I said one thing and others understood something completely different; it was like we were on entirely different agendas.

What about those cases when the same thing is observed or heard by multiple individuals? Could it be that the response we hear from others is also biased and "produced" by our brain? Is it possible that we "decide" what we are going to hear from others, and selectively choose who will agree with us and who won't?

The hidden triggers in our subconscious have the power to affect our actions and the way we personally approach things, so it would only make sense that they have an impact on the way we see or hear.

What's your opinion?

The Roles We Play (repost)

It’s funny how humans thrive on drama. No matter what issue arises, we look for things to argue about, which will cause a stir. We can observe this flaw in the political arena, in religion, in life itself.

Of course, when we stand by a certain point - and look for confirmation through facts - we are likely to seek those corroborating facts from sources that share our point of view and look at the issue from the same angle we are. Everyone is going to have different opinions, different facts to quote, and different outlooks directly related to personal experiences and taught values.

It is very amusing to watch talk shows. Producers make a living from human drama, and saturate our media with a circus of flaring emotions and half-baked truths. Soap operas last for decades and hook staggering numbers of people through glittering drama, often exposing human flaws that nobody wants to recognize in themselves, yet are present in most of us.

We thrive on the negative, and several studies have shown that negative messages are more easily implanted in the subconscious than positive ones. That’s what political campaigns and organized religions thrive on to get their point across.

So, why do we thrive on negativity and drama? No matter what our religious affiliation, anyone at all comfortable with spiritual truth halfway believes that we are here for a reason, and we came to earth to learn something.

Our soul is here to learn basic lessons of compassion, forgiveness, unity, and tolerance, and we are all actors on the great stage life. By acting out our roles we understand the nuances behind the human drama, and learn our lessons throughout. Sadly, most of us forget we are the actors and blindly become the part we came to play. We become so engrossed in our role that we blend our identity with the character we impersonate. We all forget who we truly are, until something devastating in our lives knocks down our ego and reminds us of what is truly important.

Regardless of the fact that some believe in reincarnation and some don’t, we all agree that we only have one life at a time to be in, and we need to make the most of our time while we are here.

Focusing on the present, and choosing to overcome the drama we so easily become attached to, can free us from the chains of erroneous earthly perception and give us an edge in understanding who we truly are.

The Singer with a Fat Voice

“Assumptions allow the best in life to pass you by.” ~ John Sales


Yesterday morning I was working on one of my sites while my daughter was drawing a picture beside me. Since I had turned on the sound on my laptop earlier to listen to a song, the soundtrack of the novel video trailer came on. Without even lifting her eyes from the paper, Morgan said: “I like that song mommy. Is that guy fat like a teddy bear?”
Caught by surprise at the random question, I asked her what she meant, so she looked up at the screen and said again: “Where is the guy who is singing the song? I think he is big like my teddy bear.”

Since the only images on the video are related to scenes in the novel and don’t show the song performer, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJPL1wqlV_Y her assumption gave me food for thought. Why would a four-year-old think someone is overweight just from hearing a voice in a video, if she had no visual trigger that would support that assumption? I showed her what the singer really looked like in another video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8CNmEUVDjE, and she seemed surprised - the image she had conjured in her mind and the actual person didn’t match at all.

One of the greatest flaws of human nature is to assume facts before we even bother to check if our impressions are aligned with reality. We create a mental picture of someone and seal it in our mind with the fire of prejudgment, ready to jump to unsupported conclusions that are nothing more than shaky speculations.

The fact that a four-year-old was ready to prejudge someone’s appearance from the sound of his voice suggests that this type of behavior is a product of nature rather than nurture - to my knowledge nobody has ever taught my daughter that large men have throaty voices and small men don’t. If nature is at fault, it is twice as important to condition ourselves to never assume and prejudge, at least until we have gathered evidence to support our assumptions.

I believe this concept applies to most areas in our lives. Stereotyping leads to undesirable and unwarranted drama, and it explains nothing about the unique personalities of the people we encounter. When we meet anyone, we should only be clear on one thing: we know nothing about them, and prejudging an individual’s potential, character or lifestyle can only blind our ability to see the real person standing in front of us.

By conjuring a mental image we feel in control and less vulnerable to surprises. We are naturally inclined to categorize and label our experiences, and we are afraid to give strangers the benefit of a blank board, even if what we rationalize is not necessarily reality.

After watching the two videos, Morgan went back to her picture, not giving this matter any further thought, but I hope that some day – when the time comes for her to step out into the world – she will benefit from having learned that what we assume is not always what is.

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall...

Very often, the person staring back at us when we look in the mirror is someone who’s been painted in our minds with the colors of personal experiences, and stroked by the brush of external opinions.
Many of us take pride in declaring we are immune from the negative perceptions of others, but are we being entirely truthful with ourselves? Since early childhood, we strongly rely on the opinion other people – mostly those we love- have of us, to help us bring our own inner image into focus. We revel in compliments which make us feel good, and cringe when others make us feel less than perfect. My daughter, for one, sees a princess every time she looks in the mirror. I’m not just saying that, mind you; she really, really does. Since birth, everybody has been telling her how sweet, pretty and good she is; in her child’s mind only princesses are sweet, pretty and good, thus, the only image of herself she can come up with is that of a princess.
We often hear of victims of abuse who see an ugly person when they stare into the mirror; in reality, some of them are really beautiful, but their broken spirit is preventing them from seeing the truth; the only image they can perceive is that of an ugly person looking back. The same can be said for individuals afflicted by eating disorders; the image staring back at them is simply a twisted reflection, deeply distorted by insecurity and fear.
The majority of the triggers which affect our self-image are planted in our minds early on; some sneak in through subliminal suggestions, but most of them are implanted, directly or indirectly, by our caregivers. We often associate goodness and worth with beauty, so if we have been made to feel not so good or unworthy we seldom see ourselves as attractive.
Once that original picture is published and stored within the archives of our mind’s screen, it is very hard to delete it and replace it with a nicer image. Even when people compliment us for our good looks, we skeptically look for excuses to undermine their opinion, and label it as non-reliable.
A simple way to replace the unwanted photo is to realize that it is possible we are seeing a distorted image. If we analyze closely the attitudes of the people who influenced us most while growing up, we will probably see that we are trying to reconfirm the image they had of us, and playing it over and over in our minds to see if they were, indeed, correct.
Our lives trickle through the limits which were imposed on us as children. By writing off some of those limits, and recognizing them for what they are - a faulty perception developed and planted by others - we can erase the board and draw a new outline. Maybe, then, the person in the mirror will finally smile back for the first time.

Fact of Sensory Illusion?

Have you ever wondered if others see and hear the same things you do?
After all, images and sounds are picked up by our senses, and then transferred to our brain for processing. What if our brain -conditioned by previous experiences and teachings - decodes information in a bias fashion? Could a person say one thing and we hear another?
That would certainly explain why people don't seem to find a common ground, at times, or why some find a particular person or thing beautiful while others consider the same thing unattractive or unpleasant. In my personal experience, I know there have been situations when I said one thing and others understood something completely different; it was like we were on entirely different agendas.
What about those cases when the same thing is observed or heard by multiple individuals? Could it be that the response we hear from others is also biased and "produced" by our brain? Is it possible that we "decide" what we are going to hear from others, and selectively choose who will agree with us and who won't?
The hidden triggers in our subconscious have the power to affect our actions and the way we personally approach things, so it would only make sense that they have an impact on the way we see or hear.

The Window

A young couple moves into a new neighborhood.
The first morning in the new house, while she is eating breakfast with her husband, the young woman watches her neighbor hang the laundry outside to dry.
Pointing her finger at some visible stains on the freshly laundered garments, the woman tells her husband: “Perhaps she needs better laundry soap.”
Her husband looks on, but remains silent.
From that day on, every time she sees her neighbor hang her wash to dry, the young woman continues to make the same comments.
A month later, the woman is surprised to see sparkly clean sheets on the line, and says to her husband: “Look! She has learned how to wash correctly. I wonder what changed.”
The husband says: “I got up early this morning and cleaned our windows!”
And so it is with life: What we see when watching others depends on the purity of the window through which we look. Before we give any criticism, it might be a good idea to ask ourselves if we are ready to see the good, rather than look for something in the person we are about to judge.

Criticism: Friend or Foe?

Criticism is often perceived as a personal attack, and our first reaction, when others criticize our actions or thoughts, is to become defensive and, often, lash back.
When someone criticizes our behavior or words, we feel undermined, and are afraid that once discredited, our personal worth is compromised in the eyes of the world.
As children, our greatest goal is to please adults and hear their words of praise. As adults, things don’t change much. We long to be connected to others, and become distraught when we feel rejected.
No matter what the issue at hand, people will have different opinions. Although some will choose to spew their position using less than desirable words, it is possible that a bit of truth is hidden within the wave of negative statements.
Many of us argue with others merely to hear a confirmation of our own beliefs; receiving approval for what we think or feel gives us a sense of validity of our own ideas, and reinforces our resolve to believe in them.
When we are entirely comfortable with something, we don’t feel the need to argue our point, as we know that, no matter how others feel, our ideas are unchangeable, and we will stick by them even if we are one against the rest of the world. When we argue – and especially when we become belligerent around the issue we are arguing about – is simply because we are still trying to figure out the validity of what we are stating. We seek approval from others in supporting us against those who don’t agree with us, as we feel comforted by the power of numbers. If others agree, we assume, our ideas must be right.
How can we accept criticism as our friend, and turn a negative into a positive?
1) Take time to cool off, so that raw emotions won’t cloud your judgment. Delay response until able to process the meaning of what’s being said.
2) Turn a negative into a positive. Rather than arguing your point, seek the silver lining within the hurtful words. Everything has a positive side.
3) Be open minded enough to accept the fact that there may be some truth in the hurtful words, and commit to try to see if you can indeed learn something new.
4) Criticism is very rarely a personal attack. It may be an attack of your words or actions, but it is not inherently directed to you as a person. Learn how to detach the two.
5) Remain calm and positive, and take the opportunity to clarify your views without feeling you have to become defensive. You are not being personally attacked. Thank the other party for their opinion. After all, opinion is tied to individual perception and does not always reflect reality.
Ultimately, criticism can be a positive thing, if it is viewed as such. And we’ll feel good knowing we have turned an enemy into a long lasting friend.

Double Vision

Many cultures believe the perspective-perception concept is one of the most important life lessons. In African lore, for example, one of the most well-known entities is Eshu.
Eshu is a trickster god, a benevolent-yet-prankster spirit, who confuses people in order to impart knowledge and teach fundamental life lessons.

In one of the folk stories, Eshu walks down a dirt road between two rivaling farms. He wears a red and black hat; the hat is black on one side, red on the other. After he has passed the farms and can no longer be seen, the two farmers come together, asking questions about the stranger with the hat. The first farmer insists that he saw a stranger wearing a black hat, while the second farmer insists he saw the same stranger, with the same clothes, but he swears up and down that the hat was red. As the two farmers continue arguing about the color of the hat, the stranger comes walking back up the road, this time in the opposite direction.

The farmers then realize they were both right; they saw what was in front of them and assumed the other person saw the exact same thing. They never considered the perspective from the other side.

It is hard to understand or believe the other side if we don’t make an effort to see things from their point of observation. We waste energy trying to convince others of the validity of our opinion, but don’t realize that their own standing is simply supported by a different foundation. If we keep one eye closed we can only see one half of the world surrounding us, and we miss out on many opportunities to widen our vision.

By changing our perspective we can change our perception of reality.

Love Beyond the Shell

Although we often use popular labels in conversations, few of us know the origins of the expressions we so freely use.
I think most people – at least once in their life – have used the term “my better half” when referring to their significant other; yet, if asked, not many of them would know how this affectionate address ever came to be.
In 360 BCE, Plato attempted to explain the concept of soul mate in “Symposium”, and used the analogy of humans having four arms and four legs before the Greek God Zeus split them in half and scattered the severed parts to the four winds. After that, humans wandered the world looking for the other half.
As enchanting as Plato’s story may be, it has one fatal flaw: When thinking of soul mates we readily assume that only humans can have such deep connections, while other aspects of creation are automatically relegated in a different category, void of emotions and unable to experience attachment to one another.
For the habitual visitors of Laniakea Beach, a small stretch of sandy Paradise located about one and a half miles from the old Haleiwa town in the island of Oahu, it was suddenly very clear that animals have soul mates too.
Although strict regulations protect the welfare of green sea turtles, one unfortunate individual known by the name of Honey Girl was senselessly slaughtered last week, and abandoned to the shore to be found by regular visitors. Saddened animal lovers set up a small memorial for Honey Girl, including flowers and a photo taken while she was alive. To everyone’s surprise, on Monday, a large male slowly made his way out of the waves and inched toward the memorial, where he remained for several hours. Onlookers were stunned by the fact that the male turtle – affectionately known as Kuhena – appeared to stare for a long time at the picture of his companion. http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2008/07/23/mizutani.hi.turtle.love.khon?iref=mpvideosview
Needless to say, the people who were fortunate enough to witness Kuhena’s final goodbye to his mate were left speechless and profoundly touched.
Sadly, we are conditioned to function in a world which promotes separateness from the whole. We live our lives on automated pilot, choosing to view ourselves as the only beings able to love and connect to one another. True love and friendship are powerful enough to cross past the boundaries of time, space and form; no matter what type of home our soul chose to inhabit during this lifetime, we are all aspects of the same source of creation, briefly sharing an earthly experience, and all connected by the need of unconditional love.
Kuhena and Honey Girl had a special bond which was untainted by her death.
By allowing humans to witness this powerful display of soul connection, they have blessed all of us with an awareness that might have been elusive otherwise, and have gently shown to all of us that love should not be considered a human exclusive .

The other face of the Homeless.

When walking down the paths of Moore Square in downtown Raleigh, North Carolina, one has the feeling of having reached the heart of the city.
The ancient oaks and poplar trees set a marked contrast to the rest of the world vibrating all around, and embrace each other as to create a net of protection over this tiny island of peace, from the hustle and bustle of the nearby City Market.
Moore Square is the home of Christine and some of her homeless friends.
I met Christine a few months ago, when I strolled downtown looking for a group of homeless to bring a box of groceries to. The first time I saw her, she was sitting on the edge of a small garden bed with a few others, and eyed me suspiciously when I walked right up to her and put the box down near her feet. I asked her if she knew anyone who could use the things I brought, and explained that the homeless guy I had bought those items for was nowhere to be found that morning. Christine told me that she was going to take care of distributing the groceries I brought, so I thanked her and left. As I walked off, I turned around to look, and saw that she had summoned several people I had not seen just a moment before, who were now all gathered around the cardboard box. Watching them go through the few treats I brought was like watching my children on Christmas morning: they were smiling and talking excitedly, and held fruit cups and packs of peanuts with the same reverence and enthusiasm that my kids display when opening an expensive new video game.
Since then, I have gone back several times to bring groceries and other small items. With each visit, their suspicion has thawed a little, and has now been completely replaced by gratefulness and excitement.
When I went to bring a box, two days ago, I saw that Christine’s backpack was badly torn, and her few belongings were falling out of it. I thought of the many backpacks in my storage room that my kids no longer use, and told Christine that I would bring them to her the next day. Yesterday morning, I went back with my younger son, my daughter, my friend Connie and her two children. Christine was in her usual spot sitting beside a few other homeless people, and greeted us with a big smile as we approached her “home”. I laid the bags near her other stuff, and we all talked for a while. While we sat, a small man, attired in a blue dress shirt and khaki pants walked up to my son, and handed him a small handful of change. Michael immediately refused, and tried to give the coins back, but the little man was adamant about him keeping them: he was touched by Michael’s compassion and good heart, and wanted to give something back.
Before we left, I told Christine that I would be back soon with more things; she just smiled and said: “You don’t have to bring anything. If you are in the area, just come by and talk to us for a while”.
Needless to say, we all left Moore Square with a lot more than we walked there with, and realized that there is another face to the homeless, a very human, warm and caring one. Beyond the rough edges, they are normal people, who enjoy human contact and love one another. Life circumstances have forced them to shed their ego and live humbly, but have not robbed them of human dignity and inner beauty. Their light shines from within and touches the heart of anyone who will take a moment to know them beyond their appearance. I don’t know if my son will ever again meet the little man who gave him the coins, but he will forever remember how, one day, an angel came up to him and gave him a gift from the heart, mindless of the fact that those coins could have been his next meal.