Aug 18, 2022 (Medium.com)
Let’s unpack what he meant
From the man who once told his chef — “I am not a tiger” — comes another revelation. However, this one is perhaps more groundbreaking:
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one”
He also developed the theory of relativity along with the most famous equation ever written: E=mc2.
He then went on to lay the foundations for modern quantum theory, win a Nobel Prize, and hold 50 patents including one for a refrigerator, a camera, and an electromagnetic pump.
He did all this while raising three children, being a loving husband, playing his beloved violin, and becoming synonymous with the word “genius.”
But I digress. So, let’s talk about the illusionary nature of life, shall we?
The illusion of light and colour
Life is (literally) upside down. According to sight savers, anyway.
Here’s what they have to say for themselves:
“Because the front part of the eye is curved, it bends the light, creating an upside down image on the retina. The brain eventually turns the image the right way up.”
Colours are also deceiving.
An object that we know as blue, for example, has absorbed all the colours except blue. So, if anything, it’s not blue at all.
This is just one example of how life is not what it seems.
The illusion of density
Science has long proven that all material things are in fact, 99.99% empty space. And they’re not that dense at all.
But what makes all of that empty space move and dance into crystallised versions of matter like trees, humans, ants, and whales?
Energy baby.
What moves energy then?
Quite incredibly, our thoughts do.
So, let’s unpack this mysterious universal law as it’s a fascinating topic.
How thoughts create reality
“The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” Albert Einstein
It’s not just Albert Einstein who said such a thing though, lots of other great minds have said the same too:
“What you hope, you will eventually believe.
What you believe, you will eventually know.
What you know, you will eventually create.
What you create, you will eventually experience.
What you experience, you will eventually express.
What you express, you will eventually become.
This is the formula for all of life”
— Neale Donald Waslch
Mahatma Gandhi put it another way:
“Your beliefs become your thoughts. Your thoughts become your words. Your words become your actions. Your actions become your habits. Your habits become your values. Your values become your destiny”
Then Lao Tzu said:
“Watch your thoughts, they become your words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny.”
Buddha, of course, put it more humbly when he said:
“What we think, we become”
And surprisingly, Muhammed Ali did too:
“What you are thinking about, you are becoming”
All of the greats have had their unique way of saying the same thing but they’ve all said it.
And it seems they have all been patiently waiting for us to listen.
Is now the time?
Here’s a little food for thought
Mind-bogglingly, we think around 50,000 thoughts on a day.
Now, to put that into context, there are only 86,400 seconds in a day.
So, it doesn’t take a mathematician to work out that we think a thought every 1 and half seconds.
But what’s even more remarkable here though, is that of those 50,000 thoughts, 98% of them are the same thoughts we thought yesterday.
Now, if you’re thinking that you must have read that wrong, you didn’t. So, here it is again:
98% of the thoughts that you and I think today are the same thoughts we thought yesterday.
That means just 2% of our thoughts that you and I will think today are new.
And as thoughts and emotions go hand-in-hand, it can be hard to change existing patterns that are being fed by existing thoughts. That’s why they’re so hard to break.
That’s how the past literally carries into the future.
“The latest research supports the notion that we have a natural ability to change the brain and body by thought alone, so that it looks biologically like some future event has already happened. Because you can make thought more real than anything else, you can change who you are from brain cell to gene, given the right understanding” — Dr. Joe Dispenza
I don’t know about you but there isn’t a single more exciting or empowering discovery my little heart could learn.
Closing thoughts
To close, I’d like to leave you with one more pertinent quote from another of my favourites: Neale Donald Walsch (writer of Conversations with God).
“All that is required is to know this: For you are the creator of your reality, and life can show up no other way for you than that way in which you think it will”
So, what do you want to create? Who do you want to create with? And how big do you dare to dream?