For most of my life I thought that reality was the experience that we all shared on this earth - a collective experience; well, in a way, that was true. But it was only part of it. 

Each one of us has within us beliefs, rules, and rituals learned in childhood that shaped who we became as adults.  That created an individual reality.  On top of that, we encountered a wide range of experiences once we went out into the world.  That changed our reality again. 

Your reality as a single person is quite different than the reality of a person in a long-term relationship.

In hypnosis, we are taught that “the map is not the territory.”  We may share part of ‘the territory’ with others, as the world “out there”,  but the personal ‘map’ that each of us uses to navigate our own world is different than the map used by every other individual.

When someone says, “Get real”, or “They just don’t have a grip on reality”, or “She’s not very realistic”, what do they really mean?  Those statements imply that others should see the world the same way we do, and that is actually impossible.  Each one of us has a unique perspective that we call reality, but it is truly a subjective view shared by no one else.