Optimistic Illusion: What You Want to See is What You Get

Timing is often comical to me. I had written a lovely piece about personal perception. Then out of nowhere: THE DRESS. If you are reading this 15 minutes after I post it, this social media phenomenon will probably be history, so let me remind you.

There is a dress. It’s posted to the internet and suddenly no one has a clue what color it is. Well, actually most people are dead certain what color it is. One side screams gold and white. The other side screams black and blue. And, oddly, both are right…though not exactly. The actual dress, when seen in person, is said to be black lace and blue satin. But in the picture more than half the population sees it as gold/white (or brown/lilac, or anything except black/blue).

And for these folks, they are REALLY, DEEPLY experiencing the dress in these alternative colors.

Families are arguing on couches all over the world as I write. Why has this taken up so much of our collective time in the last 24 hours? Because people want to stand on their perception as truth.

I’m not headed down that rabbit hole at the moment (though Holy Mackerel what a metaphor for our divisive society). Instead I’m returning to my regularly scheduled post. They will link in a minute.

Last week my precocious 7-year old began drawing a spiral, turned to her older sister and announced “I’m making an Optimistic Illusion!” Of course, she meant optical…and she was rather crushed when she discovered she had used the wrong word.

But the idea of an Optimistic Illusion simply delights me.

Why? Because unlike many of my cohorts currently screaming on social media about THE DRESS, I am fully aware that whatever I want to be true is what I will perceive. I’m not looking for the truth…I’m creating my own. And my truth is pretty doggone Optimistic.

I choose how I tell my story. More snow can be yet another forced holiday with my kids…or an unexpected reason to bake cookies. A missed plane can mean I didn’t get to a meeting…or that I had a chance to meet someone I wouldn’t have otherwise. My husband’s last minute business trip can mean more on my plate for the evening…or a chance to take the kids out and not do dishes. If I’m looking for the brighter side, that’s what I’m likely to find. I can choose to believe the Divine (in whatever form) is working with my best interest at heart, or I can choose to believe I have to beat the system, work harder to make it happen, overcome a multitude of obstacles. In the end, I get to choose. So in a way, all of it is merely a perception I have created.

And the best part: no one can tell me I’m wrong.

It’s my perspective. My viewpoint. Me, who gets to experience life as I want to experience it. Why would I choose anything but an Optimistic Illusion?

So this brings me around again to the silly lace dress. In the end, the dress is black and blue. And I tell you what, I would have bet a month’s pay that it was gold and white. I actually found the dress pretty in those luminescent colors. I didn’t want the dress to be dark…in that basic black that everyone always wears to formal events. I liked the lightness, the shine. After more scrutiny than I care to admit, I’m able to perceive the dress in its actual coloring. And it’s nice enough as black and blue. But I prefer the other, and obviously my eyes prefer to SEE the other. Because when I look back at it, it’s always changed to the gold and white. This truly is an optical illusion.

And as with all optical illusion where you can choose to see an old lady or a young maiden, a goblet or two faces, the static or the moving, neither one is right or wrong. They just are. Both exist; you get to choose what you perceive.

Why not focus on the one you prefer?

So next time you have the opportunity to tell the story of your day to yourself, be it one of the past or the day coming up, choose what you wish to see. Realize that what you want to see is what you get. It’s all an illusion, and you get to decide which part your eyes will focus on…and what colors you want to invite to shine through.

If you really want to know the story behind the dress:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/02/27/the-inside-story-of-the-white-dress-blue-dress-drama-that-divided-a-nation/