My Perception, My World

How does the space I live in effect my perception? My ‘space’ could be anything and everything but I’m going to focus on my home, my neighborhoods and my country.

My home is the farthest thing from a bubble, yet I’m not exposed to everything. The past year, for example, I’ve been learning what new terms such as ’blue waffle’ and ’bobble head’ mean, terms I would NEVER learn in my own home. Things I would learn about are things I would commonly see on the news like child neglection and rape. My home has led me to have a relatively uncensored perception of life and people as a whole. Growing up I was told, as well as witnessed- sometimes even first hand- just how unhappy and not innocent this world can be. Therefore my perception has somewhat been altered to be on the pessimistic side.

From the time I was in First grade to Eleventh grade I’ve moved six times, attended nine different schools and lived in four different neighborhoods. In each grade and each neighborhood I was exposed to different types of people. I’ve learned about different cultures and how unlike each ethnic neighborhood was from each other. I’ve lived in predominantly White, Black, and Spanish neighborhoods. The housing conditions in White neighborhoods (at least the one I lived in) tended to be fairly good to very good. Black neighborhoods were fairly decent to good. And Spanish neighborhoods were poor to fairly decent. As a child I believed that people were nice and everything is good in the world and people were treated the same way. Actually, no thoughts of social injustice ever crossed my mind (Duh, not something a child would or should think about), but now it does. Its clear to see. The Black and Spanish neighborhoods I stayed in were fairly decent, but the White neighborhoods were very good. Sometimes in the ethnic areas, you could see roads that needed fixing, poor housing conditions, et cetera. A clear class and race distinction. Is it all do to racial discrimination? Certainly not, but these kind of sights did cause me to change my oh-so-perfect views of the world.

As for my country as a whole, well you can say in a way we’re sheltered. Most of us don’t have to go through the pains of not having food or at least basic healthcare. Heck, even the homeless could find food- if not a homeless shelter than by pan-handling - and basic healthcare from a free health clinic. Seeing what people in third world countries go through everyday can change anybody’s perception of the world and it certainly did mines. I would see commercial ads on tv pleading with viewers to call and donate to help feed a starving family or surgically repair a child’s cleft lip and it pulled heart strings. It made me appreciate what I have, where I was born and the type of family I have.

Overall I would say the space I live in has affected my perception for the better