What Color Are Your Sunglasses?

Filters are like sunglasses. We have them on all the time. We change their color as easily as we change our mood or our thoughts.

What I mean by 'filter' is that it is part of our process of perception. That is, how we view our life and everything happening within it.

Do you have a cup of coffee beside you as you read this? What is the color of the cup? (visual) Is there enough coffee in the cup that you can still smell it? (scent) Did you put sugar in to sweeten the taste? (taste) What is the cup like? Does it have a smooth surface or a rough one? (touch) Do you slurp your coffee or sip it? (hearing)

Is this the best cup of coffee you have ever tasted? (previous experience and learning) Do you have a favorite type of coffee? I love lattes. (attitudes and interests) Are you enjoying your cup of coffee with a friend at home or guzzling it at work to stay awake? (present situation)

These are all ingredients of perception that are involved in every experience you have. In fact the person sitting beside you will have a completely different experience of their cup of coffee. He or she just has on a different color of sunglasses.

A perceptual filter is about our attitude or point of view about that cup of coffee. And there are a lot of different ways of looking at it as you can see by my list of questions above. Now, imagine you are sitting at a restaurant in Istanbul and have ordered a cup of Turkish coffee to top off your meal. The Turkish people are very proud of their coffee, and their tea, for that matter. And for good reason. They are both fabulous! (my personal filter)

Our family spent a few days in Istanbul last summer on the way to our son's wedding in Izmir, Turkey. In Istanbul, one waiter (socio-economic filter) even told me indignantly that the Greeks stole their way of making coffee. (cultural filter) I am sure that the Greeks would tell the story differently, because they have on a different pair of sunglasses. It's amazing that one cup of coffee can involve so many levels of perception.

Do we have filters on our ears?

Of course we do! One big filter is your mood. (personal filter) Another one is the kind of music you like.

You wouldn't believe how two people sitting next to each other can have a completely different response to the same piece of music. A couple sitting next to us at symphony concert recently demonstrated this. She made a face and said, "I really don't like that piece at all." Her companion said in surprise, "I love that one!"

They are wearing totally different sunglasses! Everybody has different sunglasses on.

Here is another example. My son loves heavy metal music. (personal and cultural filters) It fills him with energy and power. Me? I don't like the words to some of the songs or the energy behind them. (personal, rather opinionated, filter) We certainly have different sunglasses on. However, I still love it when he shares his favorite bands with me. Our different sunglasses lead to fascinating conversations.

Consider advertising. Advertising is all about suggesting or creating specific perceptual filters. It is a filter of perception that has you buying one soft drink over another.

Advertisers also use music to create a specific perceptual filter. Do they play Lawrence Welk's favorite waltz with a chewing gum commercial? Have you even noticed the music they do play? The type of music used in advertising will attract a certain group of people they sell the most gum to.

So what do we do with all of this?

You can develop perceptual intelligence. Marisa Broughton in her article Perceptual Intelligence defines it as: "Perceptual Intelligence is the knowledge and understanding that everything we experience (especially thoughts and feelings) are defined by our perception. It's important to realize that this is an active, not passive, process and therefore we have the ability to control it or change it."

Here is an example of how it works. Someone cuts you off in traffic. You get furious and say something like, "Why does this always happen to me?" (victim filter) And it ruins your whole day.

There are many ways of perceiving someone cutting you off in traffic. The trick is to put you in a position of choice. That is, to put on another pair of sunglasses.

For example, you can ask, "What if that person was rushing to the hospital because a close family member was just in a bad accident?" "What if she was late for an appointment?" "I really don't know why that person cut me off."

Questions like these allow you to put on a different pair of sunglasses, change your perception of the event and change the whole situation. I invite you to check out your sunglass collection.

Sharon Carne has transformed a successful 30-year career of teaching and performing the classical guitar to teaching about how sound heals. She speaks for conferences, corporate retreats and interested groups on the power of music and sound to reduce stress, create deeper meditations, ease emotional release, create focus and concentration and ease the symptoms of illness and disease.