Reality

I’m genuinely cursing it right now that I didn’t write down certain important passages. I don’t even know anymore where I read them – whether in my own text or in the extensive follow-up discussion with the AI.

It was about reality, and about the fact that we never perceive it directly, but always through the distortion of our own perception.

And then an image came to mind: a slice of cheese – not the glossy one from TV commercials, but the kind that has fallen on the floor, been stepped on by five people already, and then someone asks you whether you still want it.

Not a beautiful image of reality, I admit. I could jump ahead now and say that even this slice contains an entire universe within it.

But something would be missing then. Let’s better keep talking about reality and not about the slice of cheese, otherwise neither I nor others will feel much appetite for cheese for a while.

So let’s talk about reality. Why do I bring it into a primarily negative image?

I think because, cognitively, the negative is more tangible for me.

Like when people are told not to reveal whether they are left- or right-handed, and then are asked to catch a pen spontaneously.

Exactly.

But also because it is charged with knowledge of pain, guilt, and hatred. And in that moment, ignoring this feels like betrayal.

Or like in a maths exam: it’s not the result that matters, but the solution path.

And for a solution path you need an origin, a beginning – the classic from–to structure that I like to work with. And that beginning, for me, is negativity, which I then work my way up from toward positivity.

Which, of course, is the goal of my writing.

But light only works for me together with shadow. I miss the imperfect – because that’s where most of the truth hides. Because it’s honest. Because it doesn’t force itself to be something it isn’t.

This solution path, taken as a whole, changes, influences itself, feeds back into itself.

A long time ago I read a sentence:

“Life is shit, but the graphics are awesome.”

Today I would say: life is ambivalent – and the graphics are awesome. ^^

But yes, the beautiful also needs its place, and I value it precisely because it isn’t self-evident, because I have no claim to it, because things only remain beautiful when one treats them with care.

Chocolate comes to mind right now – don’t worry, I won’t hurt it.

But admittedly: if you eat less of it, but more consciously, it does – surprise – show on the scales.

Positivity has its place, even if I can’t measure it precisely. But I know that I write my way toward it.

…

Honesty, however, stands above everything else. It feels as if I am betraying it when I blank out the negative.

Certainly, positivity – especially in life – sells better and is more readily accepted.

You are what you read, at least for a brief moment, and in that sense it makes sense to invite positivity in.

After all, most people already have enough negativity in their lives – why read more of it?

I think because it feels more honest. But it is not a blank cheque. That’s something positivity and negativity have in common: the wrong text, maybe also at the wrong time, can intensify a losing spiral of thoughts that ends, for example, in stomach pain.

So what gives direction then? I think it’s one’s own inner sense – although I wouldn’t want to pin it to that word or to a specific body region.

Everyone explains life to themselves in their own way and draws strength from what matters to them. That is universal, even if the words don’t resonate in every head.

But this is my attempt – my language – to change the reality I’m talking about, or to preserve its state.

We are exposed to it, and yet responsible for it. We can do nothing, and yet we are free.

A strange condition – frightening and liberating at the same time. The more you think about it from different perspectives, the more you arrive at the thought that you can’t really say anything for certain.

Maybe because feelings are for moments in life. But when you think about reality, that also has very much to do with life – just on a different level.

It feels more peaceful (yes, that’s a feeling – but one that endures) to approach reality with logic. That leads to fewer disturbances.

It remains ambivalent nonetheless. But if you don’t stand still, if you move, and if you engage with lived realities rather than trying to understand reality itself, it feels safer.

But to stay with ambivalence: honesty can also crush you if it becomes too diffuse, too much, or undermines fundamental principles of life.

Measure is decisive. And I think that’s something I’m learning here, through writing the blog – how my writing changes me, because I try to give form to the thoughts that pass through my head, sometimes even carry them through to their end. It may be a limitation born of excess – but at least it is a limitation.

Written on February 02, 2026 at 09:58. © 2026 Whisper7. All rights reserved.