We change our experience, amplifying or diminishing it, and seeing it differently, as if in a fairground hall of mirrors. The third is Generalization . We take certain aspects of our experience as representative of a whole class and pay no attention to exceptions. This is useful because it lets us respond to new situations on the basis of what we have learned from similar ones in the past. It is a problem if we generalize wrongly or do not stay open to new experience.
Beliefs are examples of generalizations.
These gatekeepers are neither good nor bad in themselves, they are both an asset and a liability. If we did not delete some sensory information we would be overwhelmed. However, we may be deleting just what we need to pay attention to, for example, how we are feeling or important feedback from others. Sometimes we hear the negative in what others say and delete the positive, even when they are both in the same sentence. In the same way, if we did not distort we would stifle our creativity.