Perception

Only in quiet waters things mirror themselves undistorted. Only in a quiet mind is adequate perception of the world.

HANS MARGOLIUS

Shifu: "Po, the day you were chosen as Dragon Warrior... was the worst day of my life. By far. Nothing else came close. It was the worst, mostpainful, mind-destroying, horrible moment--"

Po: "Okay!..."

Shifu: "--I had ever experienced. (shivers) But once I realized the problem not you, but within me, I found inner peace and was able to harness the flow of the universe."

—While speaking to Po in the Dragon Grotto, Kung Fu Panda 2

The next step I'm looking at in my self-actulizing journey is my own perception, perception of myself, how I perceive others and the assumptions I make.

Last night I was sitting with the pirates(a reference to my 3 children, scallywags the lot of them), being Friday it was movie night, and last night was Kung Fu Panda 2. I do love kids films, especially if they are on multiple levels so that I may enjoy the "grown up version". One scene struck me last night when master Shifu told Po about searching for inner peace. You don't need to be a student of Kung Fu to make that a goal for yourself, it sits firmly on the path to self-actualization. Though what is inner peace, well that varies from person to person, so step one what is inner peace to me. I've been chewing this one over. My current definition, which is subject to change without notice or warranty, is that I want to be able sit, close my eyes and absorb the world around me without the noise in my head causing clutter. All those little nuisances that consume our idle thoughts. Could be money, could be anything. 

Being the pragmatist that I am I decided to break it down into bite size chunks. Perception is first up.

So my own perception of self. What is it? What don't I like about it? What do I like about it?

On the whole I'm pretty happy with who I am and where I am. I'm in a pretty good place emotionally, in a relationship with someone who is nothing short of perfect for me and I adore completely. Our whole relationship dynamic is a topic for another post. What don't I like? I'd like to be more patient with my kids at times, a little less snark maybe with others. I don't like myself when I get cross or snarky with others, so why do I do it? It's usually because I'm unhappy about another area of my life, so the plan is to stop myself, take a breath and go sort out the root cause of the problem. Wash, rinse, repeat.

How I perceive others and the assumptions I make? Now here is an interesting question to ask myself, I'll start with an example. This morning I made a rather salacious comment in chat to my other half, a short time later she posted a poem. Now the question to ask is that given our relationship, did I inspire this poem? Is that a reasonable assumption to make? This is where it gets a little murky for me sometimes, especially in the world of the arts where I'm a bit like a fish out of water to start with.

The actual answer is neither, what I came to understand is that Amy writes for everyone, she aspires to evoke emotions in her readers with words, and she does it spectacularly well. She can make you feel. If you haven't circled her on Google+ then you certainly should.

Once I understood this perception, Amy and I discussed it too,  a lot of her writing became a lot clearer to me ( I still don't like some of the more personal comments she gets, but I guess it comes with the territory). I have learned to read her a lot better through her writing, judge her moods, and distinguish when she is writing for all and writing for me. For me this was a large step towards inner peace.

The road to inner peace, not sure I like the description as it does sound a little twee, is the same as the path to self-actualization, to introspect and become a better person because of it, to seek that inner peace be happy with yourself and answer the questions within you.