Chapter 2 of LIFE AS PLAY. Audio and full text. Reading time: 5 min.
Listen to the audio of this chapter here:
WHAT IS REAL?
In a world that sees the universe through the lens of rational materialism, claiming that the world is an illusion sounds ridiculous.
But my coffee mug is real! My family, my friends, they exist! They do. Of course, they are real.
But there are various levels of reality.
🎲
It’s just like a Monopoly game: on one level, it’s just cardboard and plastic. On another level, it’s real estate and investors.
🎲
Films have often been called illusions: we’re hypnotized by dancing shadows on a wall. For a moment, we suspend disbelief and get sucked into the story. But then the lights are turned back on and we emerge from the dream.
🎬
So, what is real? When Harry Potter asks Dumbledore ‘Is this real or is it just in my head?’, Dumbeldore answers ‘It’s just in your head but why would you think that makes it any less real?’
HALF PERCEIVED, HALF CREATED
What we commonly call ‘reality’ is the combination of our perceptions and thoughts.
As William Wordsworth puts it, our reality is half perceived, half created.
“Therefore am I still / A lover of the meadows and the woods, / And mountains; and of all that we behold / From this green earth; of all the mighty world / Of eye and ear, both what they half create / And what perceive; well pleased to recognize / In nature and the language of the sense, / The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse/ The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul / Of all my moral being.”
― William Wordsworth, Tintern Abbey, 1798
A—HALF PERCEIVED
Our reality is created by the instrument we perceive it with. We navigate virtual worlds with VR headsets. We navigate the physical world with a bodymind.
•
This physical body perceives the world through our senses. For humans, the world is made up of tastes, smells, vistas, sounds, and textures. That’s what we are equipped to decipher and measure.
🕹️
But the world could be perceived by other devices, thereby providing another experience of the same data. Play a video game on a flat screen. Now strap on a VR headset. It’s simply another reality of the same game.
🖥️
Our body devices format our perceptions. A blind person perceives the world differently than a deaf one. Dogs and bats perceive frequencies beyond the range of humans. Drop down to a subatomic level, we only perceive space. This vibratory clay can be perceived in a myriad of ways.
B—HALF CREATED
Our bodymind devices come with two parts: a body and a mind. Our body creates our perception of a 3-dimensional space. The mind creates time through memories and imagination. As Eckhart Tolle puts it, the now is all there ever is: there is no past or future except as memory or anticipation in your mind.
🧩
By organizing our perceptions, our mind creates our reality. It labels perceptions according to our concepts and categories.
📽️
It’s the same when we watch a movie. The movie is technically the same for all the spectators in the room. But the story’s characters and plot generate identification, which draws upon our personal, individual stories.
•
Ultimately, everyone in the room is experiencing a different film: we all perceive it through the lens of individual experiences and conditioning. Have you ever watched a film and then rewatched with someone else, and seen it differently? Watch it tomorrow and it will be different again. The film never changes. But our minds process the data differently every time.
🎞️
We create our own reality. Walk down the street. If you are hungry, you’ll focus on food and vending machines. If you’re horny, you’ll focus on physical attributes. If you’re frustrated, you’ll perceive it through a dark filter. Same street, different realities.
CONCLUSION
Take the Rorschach blot. Some see a vase. Others see a silhouette. For others, it’s just an ink stain. Others might say that it’s the picture of an ink stain.
🎨
Under his portrait of a pipe, René Magritte wrote ‘Ceci n’est pas une pipe’. That’s true: it’s not a pipe but an image of a pipe. In fact, it might even be the portrait of an image of a pipe. Or the thought of a pipe.
The interpretations are endless.
•
Reality is a multilayered concept with various levels and interpretations. We navigate these layers as we play, enjoy stories, and experience the physical world. To call it real or illusory only depends on where we stand and what meaning we put behind those words.
