Mommy, what's reality?

Dreams are our gateway to another world. A world where the impractical and impossible alike become reality. A world where surrealism can rule or an alternative and outrageous truth can exist. Our most-desired of either allegiance or lust (at times one-in-the-same) can become our lovers and we alone can achieve self-sustained flight among the clouds. Who wouldn't want to live a place like that? Some on this planet do in fact live a life that most would describe as a all out "dream world" though, but we tend to refer to those select few persons as psychopaths, coma patients, or someone who're all "hyped-up" on drugs. Reality is only what an individuals tells or forces themselves to believe (sometimes delivered by others in a form of brainwash). But what an individual is taught to believe is almost always communicated through the popular consensus shared within a society. But what one is taught to believe is not always correct- or is it?

Let's give an example: A girl in a small society is brought up to believe that playing a very important and key role in the survival of her society is to be sacrificed on her 18th birthday. Another much larger society outside of the sacrificial one's belief structure learns of their others ways and takes action to "save" the girl by kidnapping her and assimilating her into their own culture. The girl truly believed that all her life, along with the people in her society, that her willing sacrifice would aid in the growth and continuation of her people; despite this the other society removed her from her surroundings. Who's in the wrong here? The girl and her society or the one disturbing the other's being. Sure most people would say the group killing another would be in the wrong, but what if the roles of the societies were reversed; the sacrificial one being the larger ruling society, and the other being the small minority one. And let's just say you belonged to the deleterious society and the other one tried to stop your practice (keep in mind the girl is willfully doing this)- you'd probably disagree with the opposition and maybe even get a little pissed yah?

We can all do things to bend what we know as reality though, be it on tiny or huge (sacrificial?) factors; all it takes it a little self-conditioning. Say a significant other starts singing  in the car and instead of telling them to shut the hell up, their other half decides to just tough it out and grit their teeth as their companion unleashes a furious melody on their ears. The person negatively bearing the sounds eventually grows more and more agitated by person singing and this causes them very unnecessary stress (even though they could easily still say stfu, let's take the other route) ultimately making their present condition unpleasant and their overall life slightly shorter. Instead of being annoyed though, they could easily teach themselves to be tolerant, and maybe even fond of the other person's singing. All it takes is for one to concentrate and control their thoughts: cool down, empty your mind, and tell yourself that there's no real reason for you to express distain towards the other person's singing. Some may call this an act of "lying to yourself" but is it really? After all what sounds "good" to us is usually brought on by our cultural upbringing anyways. I mean look at the crazy shit which some people refer to as music!

Shaping our minds into believing other things, in effect making them fact (because what is "truth" anyways besides what we are brought up to believe as right or wrong) is hardly impossible. But to do it on a level where "up" physically becomes "down", or where I can have my deepest desires delivered to me on a whim is harder to do. Just one reason I envy those trapped in comatose or living in a world of psychotic delusions. To them the world can actually be "right".