With so much drama currently being enacted and imposing a deluge of information into our lives, this particular post delves into a very real aspect of our understanding – how do we react to new information? How do we perceive reality?

Conflicting evidence and emotions are inherent in our thought processes and our ability to get the correct interpretation is rife with complexities.

This blog goes on and on about the main issues regarding war and terrorism, global warming, vaccine dangers and financial crises, all of which are contentious and, in some way or other, life-threatening. Surely it is important to get our perceptions correct and our decision-making based on truth and reality, rather than living in a sort of dream world?

We all handle and react to information differently, this article from ‘Zero Hedge‘, by ‘Cognitive Dissonance‘ takes a bit of absorbing, but puts into words the personal internal issues that affect our judgement.

Do you remember when you first woke up, that point when it all became frighteningly clear to you? I certainly don’t, and if rigorous honesty is employed I doubt you do as well.

I make this statement with a high degree of certainty based not just upon my own personal experience, but from countless conversations over the years. Stated simply, ‘waking up’ is not an on/off switched event, but rather a process of slowly clearing away the fog of self deception and comforting illusion. Just as we do not instantly wake from our overnight slumber fully aware and properly functioning, so too do we fail to shake off decades of deep social conditioning and propaganda in an instant.

Sure, during this awakening process there are lightening strikes of clarity and revelation that stop us dead in our tracks while sickening the stomach and weakening the legs. The most devastating of these bolts from the blue are usually self revelatory and rarely joyful events. In fact I still suffer from these ‘First Light’ events to this day. The only thing worse than being caught naked to the world is to be exposed to our ‘self’ devoid of comforting emotional cover.

It is the height of childish thinking, something I am guilty far too often of, to believe we can wipe away in days, weeks or even months what has been carefully and painstakingly crafted within our psyche (what we think of as our ‘self’) over decades; our entire lifetime in fact. The ego does not easily concede its manipulative techniques nor lift its concealing veils willingly and without a ferocious fight.

That emotional stab in the gut you feel when you reach a recognition point is your ego falsely telling you ‘here be dragons’. The trick, if further progress is sincerely desired, is to stay the course and endure further emotional pain rather than run for the hills and continue to hide from the self.

A common misconception, maybe even self deception, pertaining to our corporate and governmental masters is the idea ‘they’ somehow trick ‘us’ into doing things contrary to our own best interest. I deliberately use the word ‘trick’ in this case since others, myself included, dress it up (lipstick on a pig anyone?) by calling it manipulation, propaganda and implied consent. While those words accurately describe the larger overall picture of what’s going on under the covers, in fact the techniques employed are not speaking directly to ‘us’, but rather to our ego and subconscious ‘self’.

Like the master puppeteer carefully hidden above by darkness, heavy curtains and the prancing distraction below, the ego wants us to ‘believe’ the thoughts, ideas and ‘beliefs’ (aka ‘truth’) we profess as ours are actually ‘ours’. Thus ‘we’ are as vulnerable to circumvention as the Maginot Line was and tragically ignorant of our own defenseless condition. Sadly most, if not all, of us are willfully ignorant of our own vulnerability because to examine that particular line of thought requires we open the entire can of self revelation whoop ass. And as we all know too well by now ‘here be dragons’ so why even try.

If this is starting to make sense, read the complete article here.

In real life, it is important to be able to base our lives on actualities, not on misconceptions and propaganda. Be wary of any attempts to control your independence and freedoms, or to affect your health, or to lessen your moral values.