Perception is such a severely complicated thing. Especially the way humans form and use perception. We use our perception to determine how we feel/react to everything and everyone around us, and it's amazing that a little difference in perception can make two people see the same thing so vastly differently.
I never really noticed before how often this comes up in our every day lives. I've seen a lot of friends posting lately about how other people perceive them. For example, one of my sisters-in-law just posted that some people perceive that she doesn't put effort into the relationship- doesn't call enough, doesn't message enough, that sort of thing. The thing is, I personally think she is great at keeping in contact. She and I message constantly, and we're just sisters-in-law. So it doesn't make sense to me that any other member of her family should feel neglected if she does the same thing for them.
BUT!
What if their idea of enough contact is set at a far higher standard than mine? What if they perceive that unless you're talking every week or maybe every day, you're not getting enough contact? They perceive that she is being distant because she is not meeting their standards, which are different than hers because she was raised by someone else and grew up around different people- and therefore learned to expect different things.
Another example of perception is how we interpret how other people say things. I can think of almost no better example of this than myself. Apparently, I have a habit of saying things that I think are harmless in such a way that is offensive. Of course, I never mean to be offensive, but the people who hear me say these things have had different life experiences than I have, and maybe have even been taught that what I said should be taken offensively. But maybe someone else (being raised in a different environment) would think that what I said was meaningless. Societal and environmental conditioning plays a huge role here.
Just recently, a girl I don't know very well stopped speaking to me because something I said offended her. As usual, my comment was, in my opinion, harmless. But all her personal life experiences and conditioning led her to interpret it very differently than I did. It's fascinating to me that the exact same set of words, just put in someone else's mind, can mean something completely different.
Another thing that is interesting to me is how we all rally around our friends in these times. Let's say one of your friends posted a status about how someone called them "skanky", "immature", "stupid", c"razy", etc. If your experiences with that friend have been different, you obviously will disagree and probably stick up for your friend. I've seen several people comment on my friends' statuses saying something to the effect of, "That's not you at all, how can they even think that??" A lot of times people will even say, "Oh, they're just saying that because they're jealous/ignorant/have no self-esteem" etc, etc. That may be true, but most of the time what they said was probably their honest perception of your friend. You probably can't understand why they think that because you perceive how your friend acts in a completely different way.
Unless, of course, that person happens to have said something true about your friend and your friend was just upset because the truth can be hurtful. That can also happen.
On the other hand, when that person goes to re-tell the story to their friends, the opposite will happen. Their friends might be appalled at the way your friend is acting. They will probably even congratulate this person for calling your friend out for doing whatever it was they did. When really, in your mind and your friends' mind, your friend didn't even do anything to begin with besides just acting how they normally do. But of course, different cultures deem different ways of life acceptable or not acceptable.
Let's say you don't trouble yourself with other people's trivial "drama"- you are not exempt from this madness. There will always be something you perceive differently than another person. Nature, a piece of art, the way a country should be run, even how to tie shoes properly or which way the toilet paper should roll.
There really is no escaping it.
When I was young, my parents always said:
"Their perception is their reality."
It blows my mind trying to think about how each of us is living in the same world, but we're all living in different realities.
Our perception of other people, of life, and of how things are "supposed to be" is all over the place. This is why it is literally impossible to please everyone. Even though you might do something you deem completely right, it will be completely wrong in someone else's reality.
This, of course, also brings up all sorts of "live and let live" issues, but the fact of the matter is, I don't think that's possible either. No matter how tolerant of other people we might be, humans don't like their reality messed with. Getting frustrated with someone is inevitable. We will always want people who disagree with us to realize that their perception is wrong and ours is right, even if it is to the tiniest degree and desired with the purest intentions.
Kind of like how I wish people would realize that they don't have to say rude or cruel things to get their point across. It baffles me that people even think they have to be like that. In my reality, it's absurd. But those people were probably taught that you have to fight and be forceful in order to get anywhere in life, and my reality is absurd for being so passive.
In any case, back to my original point. This whole idea of perception is infinitely complicated. I really can't wrap my head around it. I guess what it comes down to is this: All we can do is live the BEST way we know how and try our hardest to treat everyone with dignity, honor, and respect- no matter how crazy or messed up their realities seem to be.
