The minds eye

We often remark that "this world around us is a funny old place"

What we see and how we reference what we see is indeed strange.  Not because of the diversity that surrounds us but strange in that much of what "we see" is simply not actually what we see but a compilation, a continual referencing of past events and images that we archive in our mind.

The world we see is in our mind !!

Since before we are born we are picking up signals from our environment which become embedded in our mind for reference. 

This referencing continues throughout our lives and acts as a way of understanding the environment we are in at any moment. 

The eye perceives a landscape, a tree, a persons face, a dangerous situation, anything and everything and coupled with what we hear and what we smell, the mind refers these sensory inputs to its stored reference library of previous similar events.

The outcome of referencing to a set of "comparatives" previously acquired and held within the mind is what we see. 

Our reaction to what we see therefore is not to what we actually see but to how we make sense of what we see through this process of referencing to past experience. The world we see is a composite of the stimulus of our surroundings, coupled with our experience of similar events and similar stimulations. 

The mind is therefore the "world of our experience", what we feel, hear and see is in a sense, manufactured !!     

A tree becomes a composite of the information we have about trees. It is not the actual tree at which we are now staring at but a tree that fits the picture of a tree we hold in our mind.

A person, their face and body shape are an amalgam of images that we have stored in our mind.  

Therefore might we ask, what is this, shall we call it, the "real world" if, in effect it has to go through the process of assimilation to past images, to fit, and be "recognised" !!

Is everything around us "false" with each persons tree a personal reflection of that persons experience of trees ?

How understandable the misunderstandings humans have in conveying their recognition of events to others !!

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder  -  now it makes sense.