Ground Chuck
The above cartoon demonstrates perhaps the primary skill required by cartoonists: the ability to see things from different perspectives. It’s a skill anyone can develop and it is not only useful in the field of humor; you can use it every day in the way you approach life.
I’ve lately come to realize that we each truly create our own reality and that no two are identical.
This is a profoundly deep topic that touches on everything from quantum physics to the nature of consciousness to spiritualism, but it’s basically the concept hinted at by the old adage about whether a glass is half-full or half-empty. The personal realities of an optimist and a pessimist are truly different, as both can attest.
But are their worlds literally, physically, scientifically different or is it just their imagination based on perception?
Whether the world around them is literally different doesn’t matter and isn’t the point. The point is that our individual version of reality is what our brain tells us it is via our five senses. If your brain is on the lookout for danger, it will find dangerous things. If it’s looking for reasons to be grateful, it will find more than it can keep track of. If it’s wary of liars and cheats, they’ll be everywhere. This is each person’s reality and you can’t convince them otherwise. This mechanism is also behind why people sometimes disagree so vehemently about politics and everything else.
If we know only what our brain tells us, does reality exist outside of the brain? Is there an actual world where things are clearly this or that? For instance, is a monarch butterfly actually orange, even if someone sees it as green?
Before answering, consider this: Colors don’t exist outside of your eye. Everything in existence—including you—is colorless (gray?), but the way light reflects off objects and is read by a given organism’s eye is what creates the illusion of color. This is why other animals don’t see things as humans do. So whether or not a monarch butterfly is orange depends on what kind of eye you view it through.
So again, is there an objective reality outside of the brain?
It doesn’t matter, because our individual access to the world is only through our brain’s perception of it. If your specific brain is convinced that people with blue eyes are lazy or that bananas make your scalp itch or that your local weather is too humid, that is your reality.
It follows then that if you could control your mind, you could control your reality. What would that be like? How powerful would it be to control your reality?
Well, you can. And probably to a larger degree than you realize.
Being able to alter your perspective on any topic—even ones you’ve already made up your mind about—is the first step. We talk about open-mindedness all the time and it’s not just a nice way to be, it’s a prerequisite to controlling your reality. The next step is recognizing your own fears, traumas, expectations, misconceptions, preconceptions, prejudices, and the like—anything your brain is doing automatically without you really thinking about it. No matter who you are, you believe what your brain tells you without even thinking about it, and you’re doing this thousands of times every day. Almost constantly.
A lot of people throughout history have found that one way to begin to alter your reality is through “mindfulness,” and one way to achieve that is through the widely misunderstood practice of meditation. Meditation is not religious and it is not thinking with your eyes closed. It is learning how to step back and train your consciousness to watch what your mind does. You don’t think anything, you pay attention to what your brain is thinking without your having asked it to. Eventually, this practice allows you to stop it from doing that and when that happens, you begin to experience moments very differently.
It’s a subtle skill, but one that can be quite amazing. If you’re new to it, the first thing you might realize is that your brain will not shut the F- up. Ever. At every waking moment of every day, it blabbers about everything and nothing without your asking it to AT ALL. Meditation is one way to help stop that. And once that constant static begins to be calmed, you may find that you can direct that powerful blob inside your boney melon in more productive directions.
Like anything worthwhile, it takes time and practice. I’ve dabbled in this off and on for many years but have never been able to maintain a daily meditation practice for more than a few weeks. Last January, however, I began a daily practice that I’m still at more than six months later and although that still is not a very long time, I can personally testify that the difference is profound.
As just one small, practical example, for the first time in my life I can stop a musical ear worm. For half a century, I’ve been walking around with songs playing in my head almost constantly—usually ones I particularly dislike—and it has driven me crazy. I can shut those off now.
And that’s just the beginning. I also find that I’m not as annoyed by things—big or small. And I no longer regularly want to strangle imaginary strangers who disagree with my worldview. It has been and continues to be amazing. I just wanted to share that.
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I apologize for the lack of humor in the above paragraphs. Sometimes I’m funny and other times I just turn into this blabbermouth amateur philosopher that won’t shut up. I’ll shut up now.
Thankfully, it’s time to discover what perspectives Wayno was writing from this week in his Bizarro cartoons…
Over on Wayno’s blog post about this same batch of cartoons, he mentions that the main influence for this cartoon was the film noir classic, Double Indemnity. I don’t know if any of the remakes are any good but the original with Stanwyck and MacMurray is great. Wayno also mentions a couple of sheep-related coincidences, so don’t miss that.
Numerous people didn’t get this joke and it was our fault. We should have made the mouse hole the shape of a giant, muscular mouse. Maybe next time.
Based on my long-winded essay above, does the dummy really see the letters on that sign? Are there letters at all? Is their hair even red?
I truly wish my dog’s poop would just float up and leave the atmosphere. No need to bag it. (I’m going to work on that reality. I’ll let you know how it goes.)
In this game, everyone’s a winner.
“Don’t you figuratively roll your figurative eyes at me, young lady!”
We’re done here. That sound you hear is our roadrunner coming to a screeching halt as it approaches a painting of a tunnel on a stone wall. Thanks for sticking around until the coyote is hit by a train coming out of that same trompe l’oeil tunnel. If you enjoy what we do here and that we do it for free, without ads, please consider helping us continue to do so by dropping a buck or two into one of the links below. Big thanks are already on the way!
Until next week, notice as many moments as you can and try to make friends with your inner drunken monkey.
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