If you’ve ever argued with another person, you know that people tend to be biased in their interpretation of what they see and hear. This idea refers to the phenomenon of motivated perception.

What is Motivated Perception?

Motivated perception, or motivated reasoning, is when our biases unconsciously drive us to come to a certain conclusion. In simpler terms, this means that our preconceived ideas about the way something is interferes with the way that we perceive a situation.

For example, say that you and your significant other were arguing because you were upset about the house being dirty. In their eyes, the house wasn’t dirty because they grew up in a household that was never clean or organized, but you grew up with parents who valued cleanliness. However, most people don’t think about this difference in perception, and they argue with their biases as their guiding principles.

The Problem with Motivated Perception

Motivated perception is problematic for several reasons.

Refusing to See Things through Another’s Eyes

Being able to empathize and see things through the eyes of someone else is necessary for conflict resolution. No one in the world thinks exactly alike. We all have different experiences, backgrounds, talents, and areas of expertise. When we only think about a situation or topic from our own perspective, we lack the ability to resolve conflict.

Coming To False Conclusions

Motivated perception can cause us to come to false conclusions because we are being driven by bias and assumptions rather than factual information. These false conclusions can get us in trouble by damaging relationships and causing others to view us in a negative way.

We Don’t See the World for What It Is

Everyone sees the world through their own lens rather than seeing it for what it actually is. The inability to take a step back and try to view the world from a different perspective can prevent us from being able to compromise and make informed decisions.

Can You Control Motivated Perception?

Yes, you do have some power over motivated perception. Read on for four strategies you can use to prevent motivated perception from clouding your judgment.

Recognize When You Are Speaking from Bias

Generally, you can tell when your biases are clouding your judgment if you take a second away from the argument. The next time you find yourself in a heated debate with another person, take a few minutes to consider where your perspective is coming from and try to separate your bias from the situation.

Avoid Letting Your Emotions Dictate Your Decisions

When we let emotions dictate our decisions, we don’t make the best decisions. When you sense that bias may be impacting your perception, take some deep breaths and give yourself time to calm down. 

Don’t Make Decisions Based on Assumptions

When making a decision, make sure you back up your decision with evidence rather than assumptions. If you have evidence for your decisions, you are less likely to be motivated by your biases.

Try Seeing the Issue Through Someone Else’s Eyes

Rather than only see a situation from your own perspective, try looking at it through another person’s eyes. When you actively try to see the issue from a different perspective, it can be easier to understand why the person thinks about the situation differently than you.

In The Matrix, Cypher meets with Agent Smith to negotiate terms to be put back into the matrix. He is sick of what his life is having taken the red pill and he wants to be put back into the pods of pink goo and be ignorant of what the truth is. He says that after nine years of being out of the matrix, he has learned that ignorance is bliss.

Is ignorance really bliss? No, I don’t think it is.   

Personally, I want to know the truth about things. Regardless of what the truth is. I can handle things being horrific, but I find it difficult to handle people going back and forth about what the reality of something really is.

Thing about it like this. What would happen if were ignorant to the past? It would be kind of dangerous…we could continue to make the same mistakes. What about being ignorant in the present? That could also be dangerous. There could be some crazy stuff going on that we should be cautious of. There is a huge difference between being ignorant and not believing what people say. The truth gives us knowledge and from there we can decide what to do. It is always better to deal in reality and truth.

In Game of Thrones, this quote is said twice. First it is said in Season 3, Episode 6 during a private conversation between Lord Petyr “Littlefinger” Baelish and Lord Varys. Baelish explains what chaos really is.  

Baelish being the pragmatist and opportunist that he is, sees chaos as a ladder. It is the ultimate opportunity to climb to a higher status. He says many who try to climb it fail and never get the opportunity again. And Baelish would never let a good crisis go to waste. For him, crisis is opportunity, and he uses it to advance his interests.

He notes that some who are given the chance to climb the ladder refuse to and cling to the realm, the gods, love, or illusions. The climb is all there is for Baelish. And we see Baelish’s ability to scheme and sow seeds of chaos while remaining undetected through most of the series.

In Season 7, Episode 4, Baelish is talking to Bran Stark. He’s talk to Bran and droning on and on illustrating is loyalty to the Starks. He calls Bran Brandon, which is weird because it’s the name of Bran’s uncle and the man who nearly killed Baelish. But Bran remains quiet listening to Baelish. He makes a comment about how difficult it must have been for Bran to go through all he did and come home to find such chaos in the world. Bran cuts him off and looks at him menacingly and replies, “chaos is a ladder.”

In the brief seconds before they were interrupted, you can see Baelish try to quickly assess what Bran may know about all his misdeeds. After all, Sansa is Bran’s sister, and she knows a lot about what Baelish has done. And it all ends up catching up to him in Season 7.

When you think of rain, what thoughts come to mind? You likely think of words like “calm,” “peaceful,” and gentle. Now, what do you think of when you hear the word “thunder”? You probably think of words like “loud,” “frightening,” or “booming.” So, do you prefer rain or thunder?

The quote “It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder,” refers to effective communication. More specifically, it means that yelling does more damage than good, and we should strive to use more effective means of conflict management. 

Why Do People Yell?

While there are many reasons that people yell, yelling is typically associated with aggression. People yell during arguments because they think it will make the other person listen to what they are saying, but it typically has the opposite effect by increasing stress and tension.

Yelling is also used to motivate someone to do something, though it is rarely a successful tactic. Rather than motivating, yelling often brings about strong emotions in the other person which makes them more resistant to change.

Yelling Causes Damage

It Increases the Probability of Psychological Conditions

Studies have shown that children and adults who are frequently yelled at are at higher risk of developing anxiety and depression. In addition, they are likely to have chronic stress, low self-esteem, chronic psychological pain, and chronic headaches.

It Can Be Considered Verbal Abuse

Yelling can cause significant damage to a person’s mental state. Yelling to threaten or hurt another person is, therefore, considered a form of verbal abuse.

It Doesn’t Solve Problems

Research has also found that yelling is not an effective way to change someone’s behavior or get them to think in a different way. In fact, yelling makes it more likely that people will maintain their current behavior, and it can also worsen the behavior of children.

It Triggers the Flight/Fight/Freeze Response

Yelling often induces a state of fear in the individual being yelled at, which can cause them to flee the argument, fight back with yelling, or shut down and refuse to continue. All three of these responses are not conducive to a positive outcome.

How to Effectively Handle Frustration

Speak Calmly and Clearly

People respond best when they are spoken to in a calm and organized way. Keeping your emotions in control is crucial to having a productive conversation.

Listen to The Other Person’s Perspective

When you and another person disagree, the most effective way to address the problem is to allow both parties to voice their side. Furthermore, you need to actively listen to the other person’s perspective to ensure that you understand where they are coming from.

Avoid Escalating Negative Emotions

Arguments tend to bring about a significant amount of tension. This tension can quickly lead to yelling when negative emotions escalate. To avoid this, make sure you reassure the other person that you are listening to them and want to understand their perspective. Creating an open and accepting space can keep negative emotions under control.

Take a Break If Necessary

If you notice that the argument is getting more heated, don’t be afraid to take a 5-minute break to allow both parties to calm down and get their emotions in a better place. Better yet, try using deep breathing exercises or a quick guided meditation to relax your body and mind before returning to the argument. 

The next time you find yourself in a heated argument, remember that “It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.” Use these strategies to prevent yelling and bring about a more positive outcome.

Do you remember who you dreamt of becoming when you were a child? Maybe you wanted to be a doctor or a dancer or an actress. What we seem to forget, as we “grow up” is that we can be whoever we choose to be. We lose sight of the fact that we have a lot more power than we think.

You have the power to be whoever you choose to, whether it is your occupation or your personality.

Freedom to Be

We are free to be. Regardless of money, education, or profession, we are free to be who we want to be. You can choose your thoughts. You can choose whether you focus on the positive or the negative. You can choose between fear or love. You are free to be fully alive, in this moment, and free to define yourself in any way you wish.

The Power of Intention

When you decide what you want to be, you increase your chances of becoming that. For example, if you decide you want to be confident today, you begin to subconsciously act more confident. When you face a situation where you are nervous, even if your conscious mind does not remember your intention, your subconscious mind remembers it all and will choose to act more confidently. You may not change overnight, but if you persist and focus on who you want to be, you will see a change. Remember, your focus determines your reality. The seemingly small actions you take and the tiny decisions you make, whether it is how you speak, your posture, or your thoughts, will all begin to reflect the person who you want to be rather than who you are.

Choosing Between Good and Bad

One of the biggest choices we have when it comes to who we are is to choose between what is right and wrong. Although it’s easy to blame circumstances for pushing us to do something bad, whether it’s hurting a loved one or even stealing, we always have a choice.

Choosing Intentional Actions

We all have a choice when it comes to our actions. When you think about who you want to be, consider how that version of you behaves. Do they paint? Do they create YouTube videos every day? What are their personality traits? Do they approach people with a confident smile?

When you get clear on who you want to be, you can start to intentionally behave like that person. If you want to be an artist, start creating art. What is stopping you? If you want to be someone who has many friends, step out of your comfort zone and start conversations.

You get to choose to be whoever you want to be. You have a choice to think and act in a way that aligns with who you want to be. Your internal reality depends on you; you can choose your thoughts and work on your beliefs. Your external reality also depends on you; you can take intentional action every day to act more like who you want to be. So start. Get clear on who it is that you want to be, what they are like, what they do every day, what their thoughts are, and start to embody them.

Life doesn’t always go the way we plan it, and we don’t always understand why things happen in the way that they do. But the truth is, sometimes when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place. Maybe the universe is unfolding as it should, and we can’t see the bigger picture yet. Perhaps this means that we need to trust in divine timing.

What is Divine Timing?

Divine timing has many different definitions, but overall, it is the idea that everything happens when it is supposed to happen. Now, this doesn’t mean that you have no control over your life. What you choose to do definitely affects your destination, but you still need to allow things to naturally fall into place.

By trusting in divine timing, you accept where you are in the present and slowly work towards what you want with the understanding that things won’t always happen when you want them to happen.

Why is Divine Timing Beneficial?

It Can Take a Weight Off Our Shoulders

We often feel like everything is up to us and within our control. However, thinking in this way leads to a lot of unnecessary stress that can negatively impact our mental health. Trusting that everything happens in its time can help you feel more at ease and put less pressure on yourself to make things happen right away.

There is A Reason for Everything

This may sound a bit cliché, but everything happens for a reason. Even the worst events serve a greater purpose. When you believe this, you’ll find that it is easier to handle the tough parts of life.

We Can’t Always See the Bigger Picture

Unfortunately, we aren’t born with a map of what our lives will look like. We just have to go along for the ride and watch it unfold year after year. Divine timing is a reminder that we don’t know everything that lies ahead; we can only see what is happening now. While it may appear that your life is falling apart, it could be coming together in the most perfect way.

How to Trust Divine Timing

If you’ve felt like you’re not where you want to be in life, you may want to try these four tips for trusting in divine timing.

Have Patience

The most important way you can trust in divine timing is to have patience. Everything in life takes time, and you have to be willing to allow things to unfold as they were meant to.

Follow Inspiration When It Strikes You

You should also follow inspiration when it strikes you. Have you ever had a random thought about a new activity or occupation you wanted to try out? Follow those thoughts because they may lead you to your next destination.

Strive For What Makes You Happy and Fulfilled

Another way to trust in divine timing is to do what makes you happy and fulfilled. When you are constantly struggling to make something work or when you get no enjoyment out of a particular activity, it likely isn’t right for you. Find out what brings you joy and happiness and find ways to do more of those things.

Stay Flexible

Lastly, believing that things happen when they are meant to happen requires flexibility. You may have a plan set in place and a timeline you want to follow, but things don’t always go the way you planned. Being able to adjust your timeline and being okay with certain events not happening according to plan can help you remember that you don’t have control over everything, and that is okay.

If you ever feel like you’re not where you want to be, remember that “Sometimes when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place,” and trust that everything will work out fine in the end.

We all have an idea of our highest selves and an image of who we aspire to become. And instead of steadily changing things one step at a time to become that person, we feel the need to rush and try to change everything at once. As a result, we often find ourselves back in the same position we started when we had the idea of transformation.

Change can be difficult in all aspects, but it doesn’t have to be if you take small steps each day. As they say, true change happens when you change the small things that you do daily.

Remember, the only thing that is constant in our lives is change. If you have an idea of who you aspire to be, it is necessary to let go of the patterns and behaviors that no longer serve you or your goals for growth. In other words, we cannot become what we want to be by remaining what we are.

Here are some ways to help you through the transformation process:

Accept That Changes Will Need to Be Made

Since change is difficult for most people, it’s often hard to accept that changes need to occur to meet goals. If I want to lose weight, continuing to make poor food choices doesn’t align with my stated goal. But boy, I sure wish it did. But it doesn’t and I need to accept that fact and formulate a healthier, sustainable dietary plan that will help me reach my goal.

Take Inventory of Your Current Habits

What habits do you have that supports your goals? What about habits that don’t support your goals? Be honest with yourself about what is working for you and what is working against you. You can only create an effective plan when you take an honest look at your daily habits.

Keep Things Simple

If you have identified that you tend to eat junk food late at night and you are trying to lose weight, make small changes at first. Instead of having candy or ice cream, have a piece of fruit. Slowly make the changes, so you don’t feel overwhelmed.

Keeping it simple helps us stay focused on one thing at a time and eventually complete all of our personal goals. Life is complicated enough, so use simplicity wherever and whenever you can. The goal is to change slowly over time to make these changes stick. As they say, slow and steady wins the race.

Establish a New Routine

Create a new routine that include the changes to your daily habits. Remember, you don’t have to change everything at once. You can gradually make changes and add them to your routine. And if you have bad day and don’t stick to your new habits, it’s okay. Forgive yourself and move on. Today is a new day and you can get back at it.

To feel good about changes we are trying to make in our life, we have to accept that it is a process. And sometimes it is a long one and it is often not linear. It is okay to fall back into old patterns or routines every now and again. Just don’t stay there.

We tend to associate storms with negativity or darkness. They appear in books and movies to set the tone for sadness, anger, loss, and fright. Perhaps, people are so wrapped up in this perspective that every storm, even inner storms, coincides with this negative attachment. But what if there was a different perspective? Could there be a possibility that our inner storms strike for specific reasons? In a previous post, I talked about how not all storms come to disrupt your life. In fact, sometimes they come to clear your path.

Chaotic as they are, these storms arise to bring unsettled burdens to the surface so that we can clarify what is essential and break free from things that no longer serve us. They force our hand to make a decision. One we have likely not wanted to make or didn’t realize we had to make until the storm arrived. To benefit from these occasional storms, you must see it as an opportunity and an ally. It is a chance to listen to your intuition, heal, learn, and rebuild your life.

For me the peace in the storm is often certainty about what I now must do. It’s clarity and an opportunity to re-evaluate what is important to me and what I want to do next.

Here are some ways you can start seeing your storms as an ally:

Embrace Your Emotions

Emotions are gifts that give us missing pieces to the very complex puzzles of ourselves. However, there’s a reason for every emotion you feel, and by accepting and reflecting on them, you can understand yourself better.

Human emotions have value and allowing yourself to feel them- even the bad ones- can help you through all storms. In short, allow yourself to feel what you feel and take the positive from each emotion.

I wrote about inner peace amid turmoil in a previous post. The more we can accept our emotions, the faster we will find peace.

Take A Step Back

When you take a step back to ponder the how’s and why’s of your emotions during a tough time, it allows you to detach and calm the waters. And calmness is the key to getting through rocky situations.

Doing this can also give you a different perspective. A lot of times, we react negatively to our emotions. So, letting yourself feel them and then detaching can help you see things in an alternative light. It might seem difficult at first, but a little bit of time and a shift in perspective can help clarify the steps you need to take next more rationally.

Use The Positive

Even if some of the things you are feeling are “negative”, understand that you have learned some important things about what makes you feel a certain way. And that, young padawan, is very important to know.

What you can do, is allow those feelings to fuel some positive change that you can make in your life. It is an opportunity to rebuild, reset and move on to another chapter with the experience and knowledge you gained from the storm.

It’s no secret that storms can take a toll. And once you go through one without taking the time to understand why you’re there in the first place, they can be repetitive. The universe has an uncanny way of presenting us with the same situations until we have learned what we need to learn from them.