Motives play a role in your attention. If you get jealous of someone, you will find things about them that you do not like. If you are running low on money, you will shift your attention to banks. An emotional stimulus can shift attention away from other information. A person who once seemed highly attractive to you may look quite different when your feelings about them change. Perceptual expectancies are frequently created by suggestion. This is especially true of perceiving other people.

For example, an economics professor once arranged for a guest lecturer to teach her class for a day. Half of the students in the class were given a page of notes that described the lecturer as rather cold person, industrious, critical, practical, and determined. The other students got notes describing him as a rather warm person, industrious, critical, practical, attractive, and focused. Students who reported the guest lecturer as cold were typically unhappy and irritable people and did not volunteer in class discussion. Those who said the lecturer was warm were happy and good natured students, and they actively took part in discussion with him.

Expectations may even explain why celebrities and persons of high status can seem larger than life. Sacramento, California is in a major drought.

Last December, Sacramento, California got half an inch of rain. Normal rainfall for the month of December is 3.5 inches of rain. So far for December 2014, Sacramento, California has gotten 1.85 inches of rain, so this is helping to water the ground, and the trees and refill lakes, streams, rivers and ground water, which will reduce or ease the drought conditions.

However, many people are now upset and complaining about the rain because the streets are flooding due to the fact that people were told to clean leaves out of the rain gutters, but decided not to listen and go shopping instead, so when the rain came down, it was not able to be drained from the street, as the gutters were clogged. Also, when it rains, drivers have to use lights, drive slower, and put more space between cars. However, people like to stay up late and sleep in and then rush to work in rain like fools. Also, when you are driving, you may want to remember to use your turn signals so people know where you are going, and this will reduce your chances of an accident.

The concepts we have reviewed are basic to an understanding of perception. Have you ever seen the sun set? You may think you have. Yet, in reality, we know the Sun does not set. Instead, our viewing angles changes as the Earth turns, until the Sun is obscured by the horizon. Want to try the alternative? This evening, stand facing the west. With practice, you can learn to feel yourself being swept backward on the rotating surface of the Earth as you watch an unmoving Sun receded in the distance.

This radical shift in perspective illustrates the limitations of objective observation. Like most experiences, seeing a sunset is a perceptual reconstruction (mental model) of an external event. Another way of appreciating this s to realize that it takes about 50 milliseconds for a visual signal to move from the retina to the brain; therefore, the images we see are always slightly in the past. An event that happens quickly, like the pop of a flashbulb, may be over by the time we experience it.

As we have seen, perception reflects the needs, expectations, attitudes, values, and beliefs of the perceiver. In this light, the phrase seeing is believing must be modified. Clearly, we see what we believe, as well as believe what we see. In some cases, subjective perception nurtures the personal vision valued in art, music, poetry, and scientific innovation. Often, however, it is a real liability.  Remember that perceptions are reconstructions of reality. This overweight female, called Stefanie reported that someone had been calling her fat.

However, this woman was simply yelling for a man named Pat, as she does every day. Therefore, learn to question your own perceptions. Are they accurate? Could another interpretation fit the facts? What assumptions are you make? Could they be false? How might your assumptions be distorting your perceptions? We all experience fantasies.  Fantasy is daydreaming, night-dreaming, or imagining. I like the good dreams of the future better than the history of the past.

People like fantasy as a means of escape or a place where only crazy or irresponsible people choose to live.  A fantasizer may not even be certain of all the details of the fantasy themselves, making it hard to describe to another person. Yet, in a rational process of thinking the thinker may not understand the process of thinking and logic very well either. There may be just as much distortion in conscious reason as there is in fantasy, conscious or unconscious.

Therefore, break perceptual habits and interrupt habitation. Each day, try to do some activities in new ways. Shift adaptation levels and broaden frames of reference by seeking out-of-the-ordinary experiences. Try foods you do not usually eat, to reading opinions very different from your own.

Be aware of the ways in which motives and emotions influence perceptions. Be especially wary of labels and stereotypes. Try to see people as individuals and events as unique, one-time occurrences. Pay attention. Make a conscious effort to pay attention to people and your surroundings. Do not drift through life in a haze. Listen to others with concern and full concentration. Watch their facial expressions.

Never again will an oppressor overrun my people, for now I am keeping watch.

Make eye contact. If you do not like something, then move or learn to accept it. For example, if you hate the rain, move to Las Vegas or the Middle East. Also, try to get in the habit of approaching perception like you are going to have to testify later about what you saw and heard. The first to present their case seems right, till another comes forward and questions him. Those who are left will belong to our God and become leaders.