Azrael_NOIR at Vampirefreaks.com

Your Personal Prison of Perception:

Imagine being chained to wall by hands and feet in an unknown location. You reside in a dark dungeon that you have never seen, because not even the smallest ray of light penetrates its walls. You have been there your whole life and are completely unaware of the world outside; the sunlight, the stars. You have never known any families or friends; you�ve just been trapped in darkness alone.

I am talking about an illness. A disease of the mind. Often witnessed and rarely discussed, this disease�s symptoms are evident in almost 100% of the entire populous of the world. It has become so rampant, so common, it is simply overlooked and put aside.

Now face the reality that this is the truth for very nearly every person in the world: We are in bondage; not of the body however, but of the mind. Constantly victimized and restrained by this horrible illness. Humans suffer a condition. It affects us all, many of us to a vast degree.

Its consequences are frighteningly enormous, tragic, and in some cases, horrifically catastrophic. It is the root of all misunderstandings, disagreements, arguments, physical fights, international tensions, military conflicts, and most notably: wars.

It is a condition that is simple, yet complex. Simply put, the illness is:

Our own perception.

We are all born the same, pure of this disease of the mind. But then, tragically, we are raised by humans who have developed it themselves. Through limited and bias teachings we learn about the world. We go about our lives causing our own self fulfilled prophecies, and basing entire dispositions on people and types of people based on an extremely limited selection of samples. These biases change from town to town, country to country. It creates petty differences between relationships as small as two neighbors to as big as two countries.

Tragically, people live by these biases and limited perceptions, unaware that if they were on the other side of the issues they would behave the same way as their perceived enemy. They go about their lives preaching their �One Truth�, which is actually an opinion, and condemning all other life styles.

I�ve mentioned bias, perception, and opinion. But the worst form of this illness is none that causes none other than hate.

For some, this disease of the mind consumes them to the point that they can become enraged with people who are different them themselves. Others� views become �wrong� and their own become morally correct; while for the one on the other side who is just as consumed with hate, the same happens, but with different views attached with each. This quickly becomes a battle of who is right, when they don�t realize they simply have to do what�s right for themselves. It�s a battle of ethics, in which it is the differing ethics that are at war. People live by their own biases so strongly that they push them on others or already expect people to be living by them, which creates tension, disagreements, and ultimately, hate.

People easily forget that we all come from the same Earth, and that we are all of weak flesh, and that we all are people capable of feeling joy and pain, and therefore, are all worthy of respect.

The fact is, many of us are chained to that wall in that pitch black basement alone. We are chained the wall of our perceptions, views and opinions, and the perpetuation of hate. The only thing we can see is the wall behind us, but not with our eyes, we can only feel it. It is our wall and only we can feel it. But the darkness prevents us from seeing anything else, including other people, none of which are even within the same walls. We truly have never known our own friends and family. We are trapped in our own minds, vastly unable to relate to anyone else who we deem too different than us.

We have dug ourselves deep into this hole of bias perception. With every act of it the hole becomes deeper, and every second we wait to crawl out means a harder path ahead of us. Every act of wrong-doing requires undoing.

But there is a cure to this disease of bias and hate. By being aware of these walls and these chains we can effectively break free of them.

Imagine having been trapped in that shell of a basement your whole life, when finally something breaks through to you. A wall cracks open, and sunlight pours in. The cuffs holding you in place snap open. The walls crumble down all around you. All of a sudden you can see the world. You don�t feel so alone because you can see and understand other people, even if you don�t agree; from something as small as a persons favorite color, to religious and spiritual views, to how to handle international politics. Much is reviled to you now that you are free from your walls, and you realize that as you explore throughout the rest of the world, you will learn even more than what you know now from this glorious revelation.

It is impossible to hate someone if you can empathize with them completely. If everyone could break free of their own perceptions and bias, the illness would be defeated, all your misunderstandings, disagreements, and fights would never occur. International tensions would not exist. Wars would become obsolete. Without our bias perceptions, without our hate, without our selfishness, there would be no need to discriminate or resort to any kind of violence.

If everyone could find it in them to understand and respect others� beliefs, we would live in a world completely free of oppression and hate.