Imagined Reality

Categories: Blog Nov 15, 2021

A few weeks ago I was showing a group of friends how to Press RESET and how it immediately affected their bodies. I never tire of doing this. I actually get to see movement and function be restored in a person’s body at the speed of their nervous system, I get to see what was believed to be lost become found. And it’s amazing. Especially when the individual experiencing the change lights up in a mixture of joy and bewilderment. I love it.

Anyway, at the end of the presentation, I had everyone test their range of motion while frowning and then I had them test their range of motion while smiling. (You can do this, too, if you want. It’s pretty neat.) When smiling, everyone could move better. When frowning, everyone moved not so well. The body moves well when we are happy because the nervous system feels safe. The body moves not so well when we are sad, scared, or angry because the nervous system doesn’t feel safe. Even when we pretend. Even when we believe. 

You’ve probably heard this before, but your nervous system doesn’t know the difference between what’s real and what you imagine. As far as your nervous system is concerned, your imagination is real - it responds to the imagination as if it were real. YOU respond to your imagination as if it were real - how you move, how you feel, and ultimately how you think. I was explaining this to my friends or trying to when a bomb went off in my head. 

My thoughts went something like this…”Wait, our nervous systems can’t tell the difference between what is real and what we imagine. Maybe it’s because they are the same thing.” 

Boom! 

We create our realities. The stories we tell, the lens we see through filtered by the stories in our minds - it’s our imagined reality. Our thoughts, our opinions, our beliefs, our stories, our imaginations… They are all the same. Our nervous system responds to all of it as if they were real, or as if they were imagined…

We create it all and our nervous system responds, meaning our bodies respond and our lives follow suit. 

Have you ever let thoughts spiral out of control in your head? Or have you ever discovered that you had fabricated a story in your head about someone else or about a relationship that just wasn’t true? Have you ever worried yourself sick over something that never happened? These are all examples of how our imaginations take over and create suffering. 

Have you ever been bolstered or felt “good” because you received good news or because you discovered “facts” that aligned with your opinions or your hopes? Have you ever remembered a loved one or wonderful event in your life and just felt happy? These are examples of how your imagination can create pleasantness. 

But it’s all imagined. It’s all created inside of us. Our nervous system just takes the information we create and it responds accordingly. If we create or imagine a reality that is negative, our nervous system won’t feel safe and it will go into survival mode (stress, sickness, pain, suffering). If we create or imagine a reality that is positive, our nervous system will feel safe and it will go into “thrival” mode (peace, freedom, happiness, joy). 

I know I’ve oversimplified this. After all, things happen, circumstances happen. But it is our interpretation of life’s events, it is our imagined stories of life’s events, that lead us either to peace or to suffering. We decide how we respond to things, we label things, we judge things based on our interpretations. And we often miss the mark. 

What if our realities really were malleable? 

They are.

What if health and vitality were only a pleasant thought away? Or, what if they were only a relinquished thought away? What if living your best life was actually in your hands and all you had to do was either let go of stories you’ve been holding onto, or create stories that suit a better life for yourself? 

If your body doesn’t know the difference between what is real and what is imagined, maybe there is a reason for that. 

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