The times when I was so sure I was right only to discover I wasn’t, are what have made me repeatedly err on the side where caution is thrown to the wind. Many times I have talked myself out of knowing what I know by reminding myself of all the instances in which I was wrong. I have extensively considered this conundrum and decided that the real problem comes in when I interpret a situation beyond the stopping point. For example, I can acknowledge that I smell the emotions and recognize the patterns which point towards deceit. But I need to stop and pause there.
Where I go off track is when without enough information, I speculate too far ahead. This is partly because invariably, I factor in my insecurities. I now know that it is enough to acknowledge that I have picked up the scent of deceit. At least initially, I don’t have to decide that someone such as the plumber, is just nosy. Because in fact, they may be a thief or worse. Likewise, I don’t have to decide that they are hiding their murderous behavior when actually, they may just be hiding their nosy nature.
Without prematurely drawing conclusions, I can still take the highest precautions until I have more information or insight.
If it walks like a duck and sounds like a duck, it might actually be a quack. Similarly, the smell of apple pie does not always mean there is one. It might be a scented candle. But even if it is, that doesn’t mean that I didn’t pick up the scent of apple pie. The reason it is so important for me to have accurate discernment is because I never want to wrongfully accuse someone. Perhaps, this is because being wrongly accused has been the story of my life.
The times when I have even partially misjudged someone else have made me become very conscientious.
For example, I was wrong all those years ago in North Carolina when I thought my only stalkers were my ex-husband and his second wife. Yes, they were stalking and harassing me. But they were responsible for only a fraction of what I experienced. It wasn’t until I moved away to Arizona that I realized this, however. In the video below, Andrew Bustamante, self proclaimed former CIA spy, speaks on the difference between perception and perspective.
I constantly remind myself of “Onoda, the man who fought reality,” as described by Peter Tasker.
He says Hiroo Onoda “knew how to make shoes out of grass, brush his teeth with coconut shells and construct a waterproof hut out of branches and banana leaves. His greatest talent, though, was for manufacturing his own reality and forcing events to conform with it.” You see, because he had proof that the fight was still ongoing, Onoda stayed in the jungle and continued fighting in World War II for nearly thirty years after it ended. He was a master of confirmation bias.
I was willing to be wrong about the MIMIC-OPPS. I wanted to be wrong about Witches With A Purpose and the Ayahuasca group which included the shaman. I wanted it all to be purely coincidental and nothing more than an over active pattern recognition system. I wanted for me and my family to not be stalking victims. I wanted it to be something else like a little pile of socks in the drawer instead of a rat as Andrew said in the above video.
But for me, denial is no more an option than is confirmation bias.
Have you heard the story of Julie Jensen as told in the video above? Her husband tortured her through psychological warfare. He gaslit her and attempted to make her and everyone else think she was crazy. Because she couldn’t fully acknowledge her reality, she ultimately stayed too long and ended up dead. If she could have just trusted herself in the knowing that it was as bad as she thought it was, her children wouldn’t have had to grow up without her.