Experience & Reality

QUESTION: When you say that "experience is reality," what do you mean?

ANSWER: This idea is based on the 1st Principle of Huna, "The world is what you think it is," which is itself based on the Hawaiian word 'ike. However, the principle as stated in English is only one of the meanings of the Hawaiian word. It would be just as accurate to say that the world is what you feel it is, or hear it as, or see it as, etc. In other words, the basic meaning of this principle is that experience is reality. It doesn't matter whether it is a physical, emotional, mental, or spiritual experience. If you experience it, it's real for you. Even an experience that you interpret as Absolute Reality is a real experience for you. BUT, not necessarily for anyone else.

To put it still another way, all experience is personal experience, that is, subjective. Other people may have experiences that will be very similar to yours, but never identical. You can quiet your thinking, still your feelings, reduce all your physical, mental, and emotional activity to the minimum possible, and all you have is just another experience.

So, anyone's ideas about anything are no more than that individuals ideas about his or her own experience. Other people may be able to use that experience to create their own desired experience... or not. And many people may agree that certain experiences are real (for them) and that other experiences aren't. Nevertheless, no individual's experience, regardless of that individual's confidence, prestige, or position has any more validity than anyone else's experience. Unless you think it does.