Perspective is a Matter of Perception

In other words, how we perceive, or view, our lives with our senses, added to our opinions, experiences, and beliefs, cause us to have a particular way of interpreting, thinking, and feeling about the people, places, and things in our lives. We obtain and store knowledge and our minds form ideas and images that interrelate. Then our thinking and feeling about our circumstances create the perspective we come to have of our lives. For example, if we interpret the world to be safe, we will be comfortable in the world. If we feel the world is an unsafe place, chances are our perspective on life is that the world is an unsafe, scary place, and we will react to it that way. The way we think and feel about our life, also influences our attitudes. Attitudes are complex mental states involving beliefs, feelings, values, dispositions, that cause us to act in certain ways. If our perspective on life is a positive one, our mental state may be one of lightness and happiness, and if we have a negative, bad perspective on life, we will see through the eyes of negativity. Perspectives are personal as they are our impressions about our situations, circumstances, and issues. If we are upset, frustrated, sad, angry, or any other negative strong feeling (an emotion), we hear "keep things in perspective," or "look at it with a fresh perspective." Easier said than done. In its purest form this means to bring our thinking back to reality. However, things are relative, and reality may not be to our liking. How we look at our lives is based on our experiences and beliefs and may or may not be true to the facts. Not recognizing this is called a state of denial. If our perspective is based on feeling, it gets even trickier. Feelings are difficult to change. When our perspective on something, or life in general, is sad, that sadness is a feeling that is hard to change and accept even when reality is understood. The most effective way that our perspective can be changed is if we compare our situation to someone else, and if it is worse, we'll no doubt feel better, and if it is better, we'll probably feel worse.