An Exercise for You: What Do You See in the Picture?

A picture is worth a thousand words. There is so much you can learn by just looking at a picture.

Take some time to just look at the picture below. Gaze at it for thirty seconds to a minute, and notice what thoughts, revelations, or images come to mind. Write them down so you remember them, or say them into a recording device. Notice whatever impressions come to you, and don't try to think about them now. Let whatever comes to you do so without any kind of mental review or critique. That will come later. For now, leave your mind open to whatever comes into it, like a flowing river, and just notice what is there.

What do you see or learn from the picture?

Write down your observations from this picture. Write down any thoughts or images that come to you. Nothing is right or wrong. Just write down whatever you think, see, feel, or experience.

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Notice your present mood. How are you feeling right now? Do you think what you saw in the picture has anything to do with your mood? Describe your mood — the way you are feeling in the present moment.

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How do you think what you saw in the picture influenced your present mood? If it didn't have an influence on you, note that too.

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The image used in this exercise is a powerful one. Later, you can use this same exercise with other images that resonate with you.

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Now that you have experienced this exercise with fresh eyes and a clear mind, without expectations, in the next section I will discuss what you might expect to gain from looking at this or other images. I will also talk about what others have gained from looking at this image.

Understanding What You Have Seen

You got a chance to look at the picture and respond from your heart before being influenced by what other people saw in the picture. We are constantly exposed to all sorts of influences, such as the input of our parents, family, and peers; the teachings from our schools and congregations; the latest news presented by the media; and the latest comments from our friends on social media. Therefore, it is important to give ourselves time to meditate and to think for ourselves, isolated from any outside input.

Why Do Different People See Different Things in the Same Image?

When I show the same picture to different people, why do I get different perspectives?

In NLP we say, "The map is not the territory." This means that when one is presented with a map, other image, or reality, one sees what one wants to see, needs to see, or feels like seeing at a specific moment. That's because each individual is unique. Isn't that beautiful? We each have our own unique ways of experiencing the world and interacting with others. The meaning and interpretation that you give to reality make you who you are.

We also see different things because we "edit" (unconsciously) the information we see so we aren't overwhelmed by the huge amount of input we receive daily. Otherwise, we would experience information overload. When we do this editing, we apply our own filters based on our experiences and external influences. In the process, since we can perceive only a limited amount of information per second, we quickly delete, distort, or generalize some of the information.

Deletion occurs when we miss some of the information or leave out part of our experience.

Distortion occurs when we modify or exaggerate the accuracy of something or we assume certain things that are not true based on what we see. For example, we see a rope and think it is a snake.

Generalization occurs when we take a specific experience and think that it is one of a large number of experiences that are all the same. For example, if your little dog can't find his way back home, you generalize that all little dogs can't find their way back home.

We use these various filtering processes when we interpret things from the information we take in. Then, based on this processing, we form our own mental representations, which determine our behaviors, actions, and reactions.

Therefore, what you see and how it makes you feel is personal to you. Your perception is a reflection of who you are now, of your past, and of your wishes.

When you think about something, you will often see whatever you frequently think about. Commonly, you see what is relevant to you and things that relate to your current profession or studies. For example, when I was joking with my hairstylist and asked if she had readily noticed the cat's hair, she really had!

Thinking about something will also lead you to see it more frequently. Suppose you think about buying a specific car; all of a sudden you will see that car everywhere. Or suppose you learn a new word, and soon you hear it everywhere. There have been many times when I learned the meaning of a word in school and then went home and watched a movie or read a book in which I noticed that the word was mentioned multiple times. This increased awareness occurs because when something is on your mind, you are more aware of it around you and notice it more.

Some Examples of Different Ways of Seeing the Same Image

To illustrate these differences in the way people see the same image, a few people at my seminar described their perceptions of the expression in the tiger's eyes in the picture of the cat looking at the mirror. While some didn't even notice the tiger's eyes or expression, the participants who did see the eyes differed greatly in what they perceived. Some described the eyes as kind or eager, whereas others characterized them as sad or happy — two opposite extremes. What is amazing is the way one person can consider an expression to be sad and another can think it is happy.

Different perceptions can occur when people look at you and think you are feeling one thing and other people think you are feeling...