Perception
“whatever exists appears like a painting or a shimmering mirage, all the forms that are seen, are like a dream in which nothing is real”
This gatha from the Lankavatara Sutra describes the illusory nature of the world as objectified by the ego-consciousness, the consciousness that premises all ordinary perceptions on the reality and solidity of the thinking/acting/perceiving subject; the “I” consciousness.
In the Yogacara/Hosso Buddhist way of understanding reality there are posited three modes; the imaginary mode, the dependent mode, and the perfected mode. In brief- the dependent mode is the base from which perceptions are drawn in contrast to the perceptions themselves. The perfected mode is revealed in the breaking through the strictures imposed on reality by the conditioning of the ego consciousness including the basic imposition of the subject/object bifurcation and all subsequent divisions and dualities.
The view of reality which is premised on the real, solid existence of the ego is called the “imaginary mode of reality”. It is so called because what is perceived subjectively as the objective world is conditioned through myriad filters, extending far beyond in scope, but based upon the initial condition of a perceiving subject viewing an object.
When we investigate the subject, we find that what we took to be self-evident is ungraspable. In fact, it is self-absent; it is a mode of perception that differentiates reality, that projects characteristics onto reality for practical purposes but which in doing obscures reality even as it reveals a focused interpretation of reality.
Whatever the true body of reality may be, it must be present in ordinary perception, but also obscured by it. It must include both the subjective and objective realms, but itself be neither subjective nor objective.
Thus, what we see (not just sight of course, but all the sensory fields, including the consciousness that unites and interprets then) is the “painting and shimmering mirage”. Like seeing the waves and the sea and focusing only on the individuated and shared characteristics of the waves, ignoring their inseparability from the sea.
In this way, both traditional western idealism and materialism can be regarded as one-sided abstractions from reality-experience. The foundation of which abstractions is the reification (or ignoring of) the thinking subject.