Bridge over Troubled Perceptions

Have you ever had a dream where you were wandering through an immense forest all alone, in search for something important? No? Well, me neither. But now that the image is in your head, I would like to indulge you, dear audience, with the microcosmic effects of our minds and imagination.

You see, the forest which our minds have now generated is, in truth, a reflection of how we perceive our life environment - the entire picture of our current struggles, past memories, and future aspirations all depicted as a single three dimensional space, in the form of a forest.

In fact, I believe that whenever we are stimulated to imagine ourselves within a hypthotical environment, we render that environment in a way which reflects our real-life perception of who we are, and the world around us.

So why do I bring this up?

Well, in this fantastically complicated and peculiar experience we term as "life," there exists a myriad of possibilities - most of which we are in full control of, due to the moment-to-moment choices we encounter. So, in theory, all we have to do is draw out some kind of general, long-term plan or route, and make our current choices line up with route we carved out for ourselves. Then, naturally, the clutter of every other possible turn you could make clears away, and voilà - you're on your way.

But - we all know that there's something about this theory which never seems to work out. And I believe the reason why we can't expect to control our lives in the manner aforementioned, is because when we are placed in the vast, endless forest of life, we get caught up and carried away in all the possible directions we can go. The clutter of possibilities and options overwhelm our mental and emotional stability to the point that we just tell our feet to take us wherever they please.

This is why it is absolutely crucial for anyone who is even vaguely interested in clearing up some of that clutter and simplifying their trajectory to proactively influence what we see and what we don't - to render our forest only with the things which pertain to who we are, and our goals.

How does one do this?

Before setting off - before we make any final decisions about what we want out of life - we have to locate that one area of our personality, our character, our nature, which defines us more than anything else. Therefore, when we open our eyes, we will find that the majority of the things that are visible to us are only the things which will facilitate who WE are. As a result, the number of visible items will decrease rapidly, the clutter begins to recede, and our lives will rapidly start simplifying themselves.

In a sense, we have to find within the deep forest our "Bridge over Troubled Perceptions."

This bridge will allow us to traverse across the impassable terrain which is the countless number of life choices which do not need to bog us down. This bridge will provide a means to stay straight, face forward, and gaze ahead - ahead into the life of our dreams.

- PH