Our Understanding Is Correlative To Our Perception

French abstract artist Robert Delaunay once said, "Our understanding is correlative to our perception." If this is true - which it is - we are in deep trouble because we often say and do based on our understanding of what we perceive as valid and true.

Most of the mistakes in our actions and thinking are inadequacies of perception rather than mistakes of logic. Everything we do on a daily basis is a consciously made decision based on a conglomerate of thought stemming from our own individual perception of what is logical. French philosopher René Descartes is often quoted as saying, "Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power." What we eat, how we choose to exercise or not, the way we recognize time and our timely obligations are all formulated actions based on our understanding of the world. And this is exactly where the problem lies.

Perception is not reality. What we see as logical is not always necessarily the truth. Case in point: Our government's handling of your health and wellbeing and your doctor's advice when it comes to cancer, heart disease, and other major health concerns that are deemed highly profitable by pharmaceutical companies in this country. Dr. Jack Kevorkian - who I've admired as a very prominent and courageous physician - once infamously said, "Although illness is profound, a transfer of money should never be involved. But medicine's a business today and
so is illness."

Recently, we've been bombarded by blatant lies which distort our perception of logic - all in an effort to prioritize access of powerful corporations, pharmaceuticals, and politicians to benefit their own agenda. You can see here how skewed and faulty research - often highly funded by large corporations to benefit their own cause - are being shoved in the public's throat to distort perception of reality. This practice is insulting our intelligence and is both maddening and disingenuous; exposing us to faulty logical perceptions about our health.

Let's take a step back to illustrate this point. Below are two interesting tests that give you an idea of shadow color perception and hazard perception. Perform each test yourself and see how you score.

First, take a look at the first image with the two boxes. What color are the boxes? Now, take your thumb or fingers and place them in the center of the image exactly where the two boxes meet along the middle crease - essentially covering the entire crease-fold between the two boxes. Are these boxes now the same color or still different? If you did this correctly, you'd notice the boxes are different colors without thumb placement and same color when the middle crease-fold is covered.

Secondly, take a look at the video underneath the image and follow the directions in the video. It only takes 1-minute and will give you an idea of your hazard perception.



What's the point of all this? In visual perception, a color is never seen as it really is physically. It is well documented in all scientific research that color does not exist and that our brains fill in the holes to allow continuation of thought. This means our world isn't always the way we think it necessarily is. It is only the way it is because of the construct of our mind; hence why color does not exist. Our brains are wired in ways that limits seeing outside details, but rather geared to focus on the immediate task at hand. And equally important is our inability to catch the obvious just as the video above. How many of you missed the moon-walking bear in the middle of the screen? This is why multitasking is a bad idea because it promotes stress, confusion, and mistakes. You can get a detailed explanation of brain perception here at Discovery alongside another interesting visual test.

The take-away from all this is that we ought to learn less what the media, authorities, and popular magazines tell us and contemplate more on what is right versus wrong by questioning what we perceive as logical.

For example, just because the news said taking too much vitamins will kill you does not mean the news is right. Just because doctors place "High Cholesterol" charts in front of you to scare you doesn't mean fat is bad for you. Just because you see a Cheerios commercial stating whole grains are good for the heart doesn't mean it is. In fact, everything is quite the opposite of what you've perceived as logical: Too much vitamins seldom kill anyone. The high-cholesterol myth has already been debunked because higher cholesterol makes you live longer as it has little to do with heart disease (remember, it's grain/sugar that causes this inflammation that triggers heart disease). And we all know how dangerous consuming grains can be to the body - including all whole wheat, bread, corn, soy, and cereal. Question what is actually making you sick and not what you've traditionally been told is making you sick.

Perception in our world is highly distorted. As somebody who offers professional services in health and wellbeing, it is my duty to warn and educate individuals the importance of understanding your self duties to achieve fitness, your obligations to exercise and eat right, and most importantly to have a clear mental approach that allows you to weed out faulty distorted information endorsed by media and government. It is very important to approach things with an open mind by challenging everything popular. After all, Oscar Wilde once said, "Everything popular is wrong."

In my field as a health professional, I see individuals who (1) continuously fail to understand the importance of eliminating grain/soy from diet because the ignorant media always tells otherwise, (2) individuals who continue to beat a dead-horse by repeating false information doctors have given them on cholesterol/heart disease even though it is sugar and grain that causes heart disease and weight gain not fat, (3) and individuals who continuously fail to understand the importance of an active lifestyle by thinking a mere 1-2 session per week of exercise with a trainer will transform their bodies into Superman.

I challenge you to wake up and question things around you. To stop fooling yourself in making excuses and to be proactive in your wellbeing. Is what you're doing making you healthy? Are the FDA and CDC guidelines really looking after your wellbeing? Are you constantly making excuses about not having time to exercise? Do you still think 1-2 sessions inconsistently each week is going to make you fit?

I challenge you eat right based on what is right and not what the media or your government says is right. Approach life knowing what you are seeing is not necessarily reality, but rather a perception based on thought. If the colors we are seeing as demonstrated in the above tests are not what perceive them to be, one must beg the question, "How real is the world around us and the information we're fed?"

Arin Gragossian | Arin Training
www.ArinTraining.com