Understanding Perception, Projection, and Mirroring
by Kelly Tobey

Perception: Our perceptions are limited by our own programming. We can only perceive what our programs allow us to register and what we focus on. Example: A dentist will notice people's teeth; the shoe-person, people's footwear; a skin specialist, people's skin.

Projection: We come up with interpretations of what we perceive that fit our patterned way of looking at the world. Often we assume we are right about our way of perceiving things. We can end up projecting our interpretations on others whether the interpretations truly fit reality or not.

 Example: One person may see another across the room and notice a rosy glow in their cheeks. They might interpret this as meaning the person is healthy. A skin specialist may see the same person and decide she is unhealthy and that she has a rosy complexion because of broken blood vessels under the skin. A make up specialist may decide that the person has pink cheeks because she is using Avon's #10 blush. A lighting specialist may decide the cheeks look reddish because of the way the lights reflect the red from the sweater of the person beside her. Each of them may quietly believe themselves to be absolutely right about the interpretation they have projected on the situation.

In another example, a man may notice a woman with a certain look on her face and decide that the person is angry. It might seem this way to him simply because when his mother was angry she looked like that. For all the man knows that woman may have had her face scarred in a car accident and so it always looks that way regardless of what emotion she is experiencing.

Mirrors: Others may become mirrors to us in that they reflect back to us our interpretation of the world. Whether our idea about what we perceive about others is accurate or not in comparison to reality, it is always an accurate reflection of the interpretation that we have projected on to the other person.

The idea of mirroring can be misperceived and become confusing.

Some people have decided that if they see someone that is sad it means that they must be sad themselves. They have taken the idea of mirroring and decided that what they see in others is a direct reflection of who they are themselves.

I would suggest that rather than a direct reflection, it is our response or reaction to our interpretation of the situation that represents a mirrored reflection that we can own and learn about ourselves from. Because I see a mountain, it doesn't necessarily mean I am a mountain, but how I perceive, and then interpret my perception, and how I react or respond to that interpretation, gives me a mirror image of who I am.

 Example: If I see someone who I think is angry and I judge that anger as bad, then from this mirroring, I can conclude that I sometimes judge myself as bad when I'm feeling angry. Or if I see someone who I think is angry and I feel centered and loving towards them, from this mirroring I can conclude that I am sometimes loving of myself when I am angry.

Once we realize how all our interpretations are influenced by our own limited background and subconscious programming, we might see how our personal world view is in many ways actually unique to only ourselves. We start to realize that our belief systems are unique to us and that anytime we believe we have the last word on an ultimate truth that fits for everyone, we are deceiving ourselves. As well we are blocking ourselves from expanding into broader ways of seeing.

We are in a sense crippled by our own limited view of things. But we are still called into action; called to do the best we can with whatever perceptions and interpretations we do have. It is not useful or practical to immobilize ourselves just because we can't see the whole of the big picture.

Following intuition is probably our best shot at interacting appropriately with the whole of the big picture. But even intuition can get distorted if it gets filtered through our programmed interpretations.

What can help us live effectively given that we are living with distortions? We can let go of trying to be right about our interpretations of the things we think we perceive. We can stay open to new information. We can give ourselves permission to doubt and question. We can ask how others perceive things and not write them off if they don't agree with our perceptions. Instead of convincing ourselves that we've found an ultimate truth and clinging to it desperately whether it serves us and others or not, we can continually open to seeing what's best for ourselves and for others in any given situation. We can be willing to open and to be shown, what would be the most loving approach to each interaction that we have, rather than closing down and holding onto old belief systems that don't serve love in the situation. 

Example: A father named Joe has a son named Bill who has a great passion to be a car mechanic. Joe's father Sam (Bill's grandfather) was a mechanic and could barely feed his family. The lack of money triggered shame and anger in Sam and he lived unhappily. In Joe's mind, because of his perception of his fathers situation, he decided being a mechanic led to misery, so he tried his hardest to keep his son Bill from being a mechanic. Bill, caught between wanting to please his father Joe and wanting to follow his  own passion for being a mechanic, lived out a miserable life. Ironically, it was having a miserable life that his father Joe was trying to protect him from. Was Joe, the father, open to the most loving action within the situation or was he locked into being right about his belief system about mechanics?

When we offer our interpretations of our perceptions to others without any attachment to being right about them, or attachment to others agreeing with us, we provide an opportunity for open, loving, and informative communication to play out in both
directions. If reached, it is from this place of openness that we can shift and change to what is best. If we ignore what is best, and choose instead the emptiness of holding on to being right about our perceptions, it can cost us the loss of a loving connection.

An open style of communication makes it easier for the receiving person to open as well without being concerned about the speaker attempting to control or manipulate them in an attempt to force an agreement.

Releasing our demand to be right about our interpretations can be scary if the idea of the unknown brings up fear for us. To open fully means that at any moment we could be faced with something new and unknown. Yet to not open ourselves to seeing in new ways doesn't mean the new ways stop unfolding, it just means we'll stay blind to them. It's actually far less dangerous to open to the unknown than it is to stay closed and pretend that we are right about the unknown not existing. For example, if we refuse to believe that a friend is ever unsafe (yet in reality they are unsafe at times) we won't be aware enough to see an unsafe action coming our way and avoid it.

It's been said that all we see is a mirror of what our belief systems will allow us to see. There is a belief system that says that the only reality is love. It also claims that when we see anything besides love we are seeing through a limited belief system, but that the limitations can be dissolved if we are willing to open to seeing with the "eyes" of love. I (the author of this writing) don't know if this loving belief system is a true one, but it is the most effective one I've found for bringing peace of mind and happiness into my life. It gives me a constant feedback loop. Whenever my reactions to my perceptions are unloving, I know I have some old baggage left to clear. Once cleared I can respond in an appropriately loving way to anything I perceive. Whether I'm called to say yes or to say no to what I'm faced with, I can do it with an open heart. So I'll be sticking with this loving belief system until something even more expansive comes along.

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