Reality Vs Illusion

Illusion — an instance of a wrong or misinterpreted perception of sensory experience.

Reality — the state of things as they exist, as opposed to an idealistic or notional idea of them.

As usual, I would like to give the dictionary meaning first so that we understand what is what. How do we know that something which is happening is real? What if it is an illusion? I am an imaginative person. My state of mind doesn’t allow me to bring something from the past. I live in the now as I have trained my mind to be like that. So, either I live the now or dream about my future. I know it is confusing for most of the people who read this. Below is a narration of what my realities and illusions are. Let me take you on a joy ride with me while I narrate, and your experience. My fact and your fantasy.

Anything that you experience in your five senses, in a way, is called reality. Experiencing things in the same state as they exist and not your opinion of what it is. How can one consider stuff without having a view or an impression of what it is? If you find this as confusing, what would you tell about the things which are about to come?

A small narration

Let me narrate something. I am a trainer and a coach by profession. I conduct classes every weekend in different cities. I have to fly to the cities where my classes do happen. In the first half of the week, I will be in my home and the second half of the week in other cities. I travel to my office at times, which is in another city during the first half of the week. When I don’t have classes in a week, I go to my office too during the second half of the week. On some days, I also conduct courses in companies for their employees. I also had to travel to other countries for my classes.

I wake up in one city and sleep in another city. Sometimes, breakfast in-home and lunch in some other city. Initially, it was all fun and exciting. I am traveling to other cities, meeting new people, having conversations with them, and helping them learn. One beautiful day, when I was in flight, I had a sudden thought, “Where am I?”. I was in flight and woke up in half-sleep. My mind was struggling to get the answer. I forgot where I am going, where did I start, and what is wrong with me all of a sudden. I couldn’t think straight, and so I slept back. It was not the last time that I am going to feel it either.

The same thing happened when I was on a flight to the US and the UK. It was a long journey, and since there are no direct flights, it was a connecting flight. Boarded in Chennai, landed in Dubai, completed formalities, and boarded to Boston again. Since I take very short trips, I had to return in less than a week. I am a movie buff, and so all the places that I see somehow would have been seen already in movies. I also hear experiences from people who share their travel pains and experiences.

What if I am inside a movie? Or What if I am in someone’s experience of traveling? In school days, I used to have a thought of what if all the life that we live in is someone’s imagination? It is not just for me. Everyone will have this at some point in time in their life. For people who say they are practical and approaches life as it is, faces similar things too. So, what is happening?

I know it’s confusing, just like Christopher Nolan’s movie, Inception. It did not just happen to me. It happens to every one of us. Few accept and rest just adamantly ignores.

The Illusion

Close your eyes and think of a beautiful monkey that has eight legs. It is building a web like a spider. It has created a fantastic web and resting at the center. Now it has seen you see it, and it is marching towards you.

Don’t run, open the eyes.

Isn’t it fascinating? There is no beautiful monkey with eight legs that can shoot the web. But, how could you imagine such a being/creature which doesn’t exist? Your brain has all the information that it needs to create anything that you want to see. It is possible to construct anything literally in your mind and bring it into reality, just like building VFX (visual effects) and adding it into an existing video. Your dreams are a perfect example of how your brain can construct things that you have not experienced in reality.

Consider, you saw a horror or a thriller genre movie/tv show and alone in your house. Your mind tries to play with you by showing off those horrifying things which don’t exist in reality. Ever thought of understanding the fact that ghosts don’t exist just because it is dark? It will be funny to uncover all these things.

These are some examples of an illusion that your mind tries to trick you with, and many of them will seem real. When you keep liking and believing these as you do with Facebook posts, you will start experiencing it for real. While it is still a hallucination, it feels and looks like real.

Continue reading, here.