Perception

Perception is the process of attaining awareness or understanding of sensory information. It is how we view and receive information in the world around and within ourselves. How we understand a thing is based on our perception of it. Perception is something which many of us find ourselves paying more and more focus to as our Awakening process develops and continues. The reason for this is because we are beginning to see how our thoughts affect our reality, how our feelings and understandings of a thing can either expand or limit our experiences. Perception is a tool much like a pair of glasses, as it helps us to understand better what it is before us.

What do you see first? The Chalice, or the two faces? See how your perception slips from one to the other once you recognize them both?

How Perception Relates to Awakening

Awakening is a highly personal experience. While many people on the planet are currently experiencing an Awakening within them, it is all based on their personal perception of what they are experiencing which shapes their reality. Some people are Awakening on a Spiritual level and perceive this process to be Divine, and evolutionary. Some people are experiencing a Universal Awakening which is having them see a wider scope of life from the smallest cell to the largest sun. How we see a thing plays a large part in how we react or respond to it.

One thing we see often in Spiritual circles, is people perceiving something in their Awakening which we do not perceive in our own. Some people have experiences with paranormal activity, which doesn't seem to be connected to what we are personally experiencing. You may know someone who feels thier Awakening has to do with other planets, ET beings, galactic councils of knowledge; perhaps this is your own perception of your Awakening, or perhaps you can't relate to it.

The thing about perception is it is an internal guidance system, can also act as a reflective tool of self-aware learning, and it is something each of us is using every moment of every day.

An example of Perception in Awakening is the key concept of God. While many of us are "Awakening", many of us have very different ideologies about this God character/entity. Some are personalizing God, making God conscious and aware and sentient. Some even believe God has form and material such as we do - a body. Others still believe God is nature, and all of life. And then of course there are the billions of people who believe that God favors one belief system over another, and requires us to adhere to the rules of that belief system.

Do you see how these varying perceptions can create what we see as "differences"? And yet what is the difference? Is it God itself, or is it our individual and collective Perception of God?

Our Awakening can be analogized in much the same way. It is individual, and it means whatever you perceive it to mean.

The Perception of Awakening Starseeds

This community incepted as Destra's Domain in 1999. And at that time the concept was based around a more of what I like to call "Roddenberry-esque" belief system. A very typical Starseed endeavor, the site focused on home planets, soul origins, past lives, and guidance from the planetary powers that Be.

Over the last decade this site has evolved, moved, shifted, shook and rocked, as my own personal perception has grown, expanded, begun to evidence itself. We no longer focus on where we just were, we are intent upon seeing the whole of who we Are. One past lifetime seems insignificant in comparison to an infinite Universal life process. And as such there is a desire to discuss and understand perception, because it is what we make our judgments in life by, and a closed mind tends to stagnate within it's very controlled perception.

We wish to open minds, quite simply. To expand perceptions, and to allow self conscious awareness to develop as personal perception evolves.

The Challenge

Though it can be painful to really examine ourselves internally, and try to understand our own motivations and behaviors and cyclic patterns, it inevitably leads to a truer sense of self awareness. And this is the goal of any Awakening; to better understand who we Are.

You can meditate, light candles, chant, do yoga, or any other New Age methodology towards your own Awakening. The tool is not so vital as the intent behind it, and if you feel something works for you then keep working with it. But we extend a challenge to any person reading these words, to include something into your regimen; self-conscious perception.

Be mindful and watchful of how you are perceiving things. This can be difficult at first, it is not always easy to shift from "I am my mind" thinking into "I am observing my mind" consciousness. And yet, when you do, you find how simple it is to shift back and forth. From doing to being.

As you observe your own perceptive process, and examine how you receive information/people/actions, you may learn a lot more about your own inner blocks, fears, things which are possibly keeping you feeling lowly about yourself or others. In identifying these things you are then free to understand them, and then work through them towards a resolution of internal awareness.

So watch, observe. See how conflict can arise with others when our perceptions clash. See how you may be limiting yourself or another based on your perception. Are you able to differentiate between what you perceive, and what another perceives?

One person will watch a documentary about hurricanes with fear and horror over the destructive nature of these storms, while the person next to them may feel awe and inspired respect for the destructive nature of the storms. Two people watching the same program, yet perceiving it in completely different ways. Feeling different reactions as a result.

We do this in everything in life, and some of our most intense personality clashes occur due to a perceptive difference which lends itself to aggressive defensiveness.

Understanding perception and how we use it can help us rise above the need to defend anything, as we can ultimately see that we have no control over the way another person perceives.