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Any suffering that you are experiencing in the world lies in your perception of the person, place, or thing you are experiencing and not in the person, place, or thing itself. This is one of the most fundamentally important statements you will ever encounter and it can change your life forever.
Several years ago, I did some work on a very old structure I own down the street, on the beach. Essentially, all I did was add a porch. However, doing any sort of work on structures on the beach in California is a strict “no-no,” unless you have obtained a permit, which can require years of hearings and all sorts of things. The porch was falling down and it was important for me to fix it for safety’s sake. Little did I know, the State of California has satellite photos and other tools employed to monitor construction taking place on the coastline. A few months ago, I received a letter from the County, upset about the porch. To make a long story short, after a series of inspections, they are now considering “red tagging” this structure and making it so people cannot even live in it. Without going into a lot of detail, when you perform work on a structure that’s not up to code, you’re required to bring the entire structure up to code. Since it’s impossible to bring the structure up to code, I’m now faced with the prospect of potentially having to rip down the entire structure.
This is one of the worst things that’s ever happened to me–on several levels. However, instead of feeling bad about this situation I’ve decided to change how I perceive it. Although people cannot live in this structure as a dwelling, from what I understand, there’s nothing wrong with it being occupied during the day as a workplace, for example. Instead of feeling horrible about this situation, I have now realized that this is an incredible opportunity to convert a house into one of the most desirable office spaces in the world. It’s like a dream come true. Instead of suffering, I’m now feeling very excited about this situation.
Suffering lies in the perception of the fact and not in the fact itself.
How we perceive things and the world around us in a large part determines whether or not we are going to be happy. Our perceptions, most often, are clouded by a set of assumptions which most often are not true at all.
Imagine sitting in a dark room and something approaches you and touches you that feels like a snake. You recoil in fear, unsure of what exactly is going to occur. You might get bitten. You might die from a poisonous bite. You shudder and feel a great sense of alarm.
You may be sitting in the dark room for days, weeks, months, or even years. Despite a relatively happy existence wherein all of your needs are taken care of, you are constantly tormented by the snake. What would otherwise have been an ideal life is in a state of ruin, of sorts, due to the snake. Periodically, the snake approaches you and each time, you feel a great deal of fear and are terrified. Life is difficult because that snake wakes you up sometimes when you’re sleeping. It’s literally impossible for you to enjoy life when you’re constantly being threatened by the snake.
Then suddenly, the lights go on and you notice that what you fear is not a snake at all but a harmless piece of rope.
The lights go out and then, each time the piece of rope comes near you in the future, you don’t worry. Your life suddenly changes and what was once a life of fear and trepidation suddenly becomes a happy life, one devoid of worries. What you had assumed was a frightening snake, is actually a rope. Your life has largely been controlled by a sense of assumptions.
We often assume what we are experiencing is a snake; however, in actuality it’s a mere piece of rope.
This is no different than many of our lives. Our lives are typically controlled by a massive number of assumptions about this or that and our happiness, in large part, is determined by the nature of these assumptions:
The vast array of assumptions that control each of our lives is incredible.
Think about where you would be now and what would have happened to you if your life wasn’t controlled by various assumptions. Every minute of every day you’re making assumptions about who you are and what you can do. These assumptions are incredibly powerful and, fundamentally, they govern who you are and what you can do. Your goal needs to be to move from a position of assumptions to a place where you’re seeing what is and not what you assume it is. The realization that the rope was not a snake is something that has a profound impact on our freedom and ability to be happy. How many snakes are you seeing in your life that are in fact ropes?
Assumptions are related to our perception. We perceive the world based on a set of assumptions. We need to choose assumptions that empower and don’t hinder us. Most of the world is controlled by disempowering assumptions. These disempowering assumptions do us no good. We have many ideas about the people around us; we have enemies and friends in the world. One of the hardest things for any of us to do is change our assumptions about others and then change our own perception. We often strongly resist changing our ideas about others because having a negative (or positive) opinion about a person is something we cling to as a part of our own identity. Incredibly, having a negative feeling or belief about a person, place, or thing is something that many of us cling to when it does us no good.
One of the greatest assumptions most of us in the world have deals with our relationship with the divine, or God. We all have a different idea of who God and the divine is. Some of us imagine God as:
Each of us has a different belief of who God is. However, my experience has been that God, like most people, responds in the form in which you perceive Him. Your perception of who God is generally shapes your personal relationship with God. For example, if you have a belief that God dislikes you, then you’re going to see the world as constantly punishing you when bad things happen in your life. If you have a belief that God loves you, then you’re going to see the world as constantly giving you positive reinforcement when good things happen in your life. I’ve studied and participated in religions on and off for most of my life. It’s incredible to me the range of assumptions that people make about God and the divine and how this controls people’s reality. It controls who they marry, where they live, who they socialize with and what they do for a living. The world responds to people based on the assumptions they have about God and the world around them. Your assumptions about people, God, the world, and everything around you are what create your reality.
In your career and life you are governing everything by a set of assumptions. I’m confident that not all of these assumptions are positive. You may be feeling bad about your situation due to the market, what happened in your last job, the conditions of your current job, your age, etc. The number of assumptions available for you to feel bad about are limitless. The job market and the world will respond to you based on the assumptions you have about them. If you change your assumptions for the better, your career and life will change. The suffering you’re experiencing lies in your perception of the facts of your existence, career, and life–and not in your existence, career, and life itself.
The best way to change your life is to change your assumptions about the world around you. Suffering lies in the perception of the fact and not the fact itself.
THE LESSON
Your perceptions can make you either happy or unhappy. Most peoples’ perceptions, however, are clouded by assumptions that frequently aren’t even true. To change your life, change your assumptions about the world around you. Suffering lies in the perception of the fact, not the fact itself.
About Harrison Barnes
Harrison Barnes is the Founder of BCG Attorney Search and a successful legal recruiter himself. Harrison is extremely committed to and passionate about the profession of legal placement. His firm BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys. BCG Attorney Search works with attorneys to dramatically improve their careers by leaving no stone unturned in a search and bringing out the very best in them. Harrison has placed the leaders of the nation’s top law firms, and countless associates who have gone on to lead the nation’s top law firms. There are very few firms Harrison has not made placements with. Harrison’s writings about attorney careers and placements attract millions of reads each year. He coaches and consults with law firms about how to dramatically improve their recruiting and retention efforts. His company LawCrossing has been ranked on the Inc. 500 twice. For more information, please visit Harrison Barnes’ bio.
About BCG Attorney Search
BCG Attorney Search matches attorneys and law firms with unparalleled expertise and drive that gets results. Known globally for its success in locating and placing attorneys in law firms of all sizes, BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys in law firms in thousands of different law firms around the country. Unlike other legal placement firms, BCG Attorney Search brings massive resources of over 150 employees to its placement efforts locating positions and opportunities that its competitors simply cannot. Every legal recruiter at BCG Attorney Search is a former successful attorney who attended a top law school, worked in top law firms and brought massive drive and commitment to their work. BCG Attorney Search legal recruiters take your legal career seriously and understand attorneys. For more information, please visit www.BCGSearch.com.
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Filed Under : Featured, Life Lessons
Tagged: perception, suffering
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I agree. If I hadn’t started networking I probably would not have been on this path that I am on. Through reading a lot of material on how to find a job, networking, and trying to engage my passion. I have learned so much. I try and share this but sometimes people just don’t listen.
This reminds me of a little parable where the infinite IF of Irrational Fear molds the individual identity. What you put forth is that significant alternative of the ‘I Am’ that is ‘Inter medium’ Affirmation. The ‘Inter medium’ of ‘Assumption’ called to order.
Mozart is another example that your assertions can relate to.
He always assumed the brightest possibility; no, not the ‘why worry about it…’attitude; but instead, the ‘I will worry about it in a GOOD way; it is the GOOD reason; it is the POSITIVE side of the situation. He carried it to a historic extreme and may be a bit beyond the normative personification of the concept; and yet to experience his genius and monolithic output one must accept the ‘poser’ or ‘pretender’ in his nature (pretending that everything is just amazingly great in the face of any indication to the contrary) as being a testimony to the operation of the human psyche.
Thank you, Harrison. A reminder well received.
I believed that God was good, and he’s been punishing me for the last forty years. How can I still feel good about him?
When you have no food is the assumption that you will be hungry wrong?
Given the complex way you described how our assumptions and perceptions affect how we intereact with the world, could you expand on how this could impact our ability to create a world that responds to us positively and helps us achieve want we want, so we do not continue on mistaken assumptions or negativity, particularly in cases where we could be confused?
This is really a great article.
Excellent article,very much like the book “The Secret”. We make life good or bad how we approch our thoughts and perceptions.
I enjoyed the enlightenment of this article. It was very needed nd timely in my life today. Thank you.
Might check with a local architect or the authority having jurisdiction on whether it is really possible to use the structure as a business. If it is deemed unfit for use it very likely cannot be occupied at all.
Great article and just what I needed to hear at this time – I’ve been feeling pretty low while in the midst of a job search. I was pretty prepared for the layoff from my last job so am not suffering too much financially but I’ve been reading too much into employer HR Departments not returning my phone calls after the 2nd interview (sorry, HR Managers – I just think that this is really rude). I can handle a “No” but I didn’t ignore you when you called me (twice) to drive 30 miles for 2 interviews. This article has really helped – I am a talented HR professional and I know that my next career opportunity is just on the next horizon. Thanks!
great article…..i was actually very depressed but after reading this article, i am feeling much better
I bodimutelokoli an orphan,I come to across you profile from web;search looking for your help concerning the education in fact very much interesting,but the poverty are not aloud me to proceed on that is why,I took this fundamental to e-mail you.Am in form(3) drop high school which is Kenya system.I have got talented also soccer and athletic etc and am sure if,I can be assisted,I can make it believe and sympathize with me.I mean if you cannot able to support look for me then.What am bicker is for your assistance(….)is or at least be able say that you have made me to know this or that.john 15;16,you did not choose me,but,I chose you and appointed you the you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should remains.Hope to hear from you.
Thank you,
Aduki regard.
How true! We have to look at the alternate possibilities like I am trying nowto get back into the entertainment industry after getting fed up with the IT industry and their unrealistic “best practices” models and offshoring our jobs. It seems to be government as well as corporate nature to place unnecessary obstacles to improvements and better ways of dealing with things al in the name of control, taxes, and money.
Funny how California is touted as an ideal state for free-thinking, liberated people; and yet the open-minded citizens of the Left Coast tolerate sneaky agents of Big Brother flying around in spy helicopters looking for ways to enforce their draconian laws; all the while ignoring the war zones in places like L.A., and the pervasive crime that permeates the daily life of average Joe’s.
Allowing a gang of bureaucrats to take away your rights as property owners just proves a line from our forefathers, “… mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.” Thank God there were once men who had the courage to change the world rather than submit to tyranny by dumbing down their perception of tyrants.
The bible says the same things only with another language which most people don’t understand. However, this is a transparent language for everyone to understand. Accept my compliments
Great article on attitude adjustment. I welcome receiving more pearls of wisdom.
Mr. Barnes, you say that because you are a goog guy. All I can do here is didicate this song for you;’Somethings will never change’ by SUPERTRAMP.
My Best Regards .
I love your posts–you are so inspirational and they come at just the right time. The power of positive thinking!
I am sorry, but the situation posed about the waterfront property is the luxury of a well paid American.
One can look at very stark situations where the bromide does not hold true (e.g. Yazidi women being kidnapped by ISIS, the folks standing in line at Birkenau, the beastly pain of cancer – I guess these examples suffered from the wrong perception rather than the facts).
Yes, if one gets lemons, make lemonade – but there are limits.