Words from the Wise

A very good friend and longtime client of mine, Scott Hunter has become an important touchstone in my life.  Without fail he sends out his very simple and very brilliant newsletter to thousands of subscribers every two weeks.  I highly recommend signing up to receive them at http://www.thpalliance.com.  And here is one of my favorites:

Is There Really Truth?

by Scott Hunter

I really find that the hardest thing for most people I talk to to get is my assertion that there is no such thing as reality. There really isn’t. You think what you see is really there. It isn’t. What’s worse, you actually believe that what you see is the truth. It also isn’t. Already ready to argue with me?

So before you stop reading, consider the fact that every one of the 6.8 billion people on the planet lives in a different reality; meaning that if you looked out through the eyes of all these people you would, in fact, see a different version of the world. And don’t you find that in just about every conversation you have with another they see things differently than you? So how could any one individual claim to know what’s real?

If you’re still with me, the question you should be asking yourself is: what’s determining my reality? Actually, it’s pretty simple. You know that voice in your head? The one you call self-talk, or thinking, or mind chatter? Well inside of that voice is the story of your life. It’s the sum total of all of your life experiences, the meaning you gave to those experiences, and the decisions you made as a result.

Humans think they see with their eyes. That is one of the many illusions of life. It’s not the truth. We see with our minds. We take that internal conversation, the story I just discussed, and project it out onto the world and that becomes our reality.

It’s like going to the movies. You sit in the theater and look at a big blank screen on which the movie is projected and think that’s where the movie is. But the movie is in the projector in the back and the bulb and lens in the projector project the movie onto the screen.

So it is for you and I. We take the movie playing in our minds and project it onto the blank screen of life and think that what we see is the true. It isn’t. It’s only our truth.

What’s the real significance of all of this? It lies in how human beings operate. Listen to this carefully: our actions are ALWAYS exactly the appropriate action any human being would take given how life occurs for them. In other words, we are always reacting and what we react to is how whatever is in front of us occurs for us.

And who is determining how whatever is in front of us occurs for us? We are!

Each of us is playing a game called: this is my life. And we are the ones totally responsible for how that game plays out. As many of the great teachers teach: it’s never what happens that determines the outcome. It’s how we respond to what happens that determines the outcome. And we are always choosing our reactions.

So give up the victim game, stop complaining and stop blaming others if things are not going the way you would like. The good news is that you have total access to the only person whose determining how things are turning out: YOU.

In conclusion, take responsibility for what comes out of your mouth.

Everything you say becomes your truth. If you understand this, you can really create for yourself a magnificent life.