The Relationship Between Beliefs & Perceptions

Perceptions involve the expectations you have of your reality.

Alan Saks and Gary Johns outlined there are three components to perception:

1 - You, who is the perceiver is aware of something that stimulates you and in kind you begin to perceive it. Your perceptions are influenced by your motivations, emotions, and finally your experience of a given situation. Oftentimes, you will default to what you already know and see only what you've conditioned yourself to observe.

2 - The target, or the object of your perception. What you are able to observe and discern affects your interpretation and understanding of the target.

3 - The situation, which includes the environment and contextual factors that affect your perception. Depending on how your brain filters the content of your observation, the target may be disregarded and not pulled to your conscious attention for further examination and interpretation.

One of the major concepts that defines the bridge between your beliefs and perceptions is your "Reticular Activating System" (RAS). The RAS is a bundle of nerves in your brain that essentially acts as a filtering mechanism in order to control and categorize the incoming sensory information you take in from your environment.

Your brain is unable to process everything in totality that is happening around you at any one particular time. This is because there's only a certain amount of information you actually will find useful or necessary to know. Your RAS analyzes this information for relevancy and blocks out everything you've conditioned yourself to disregard so that you are unaware of it.

This filtering is helpful because it automates your mental cognition and makes your behavioral operation more efficient. However, it can also be detrimental to you in terms of your growth and evolution as an individual, especially when needing to adapt and perform in novel/uncomfortable scenarios. If your RAS only reinforces your long-held existing beliefs, then it will keep you from seeing new possibilities and opportunities that you may deem as irrelevant or triggering in the moment.

In short, perceptions can cause beliefs and alternatively, beliefs influence perceptions, which shape and influence actions. If you are unaware of how your RAS is programmed then your autopilot may not be optimized for your own personal growth.

What are some ways in which you can expose yourself to new ideas to trigger your own growth?