Everyone Lives in a Snow Globe: Why You Can’t Judge Another Person’s Reality
Everyone Lives in a Snow Globe
Why You Can’t Judge Another Person’s Reality
In Scrubs, J.D. paints life in pastel daydreams even when the hospital is fluorescent chaos. He imagines the world not as it is, but as he wishes it to be. Unicorns in hallways. Surreal montages with Elliott and Turk. That signature internal monologue that sometimes feels more real than reality itself.
That’s a lot like lucid dreaming.
The moment you realize you’re the director, the set bends. What matters isn’t accuracy, it’s beauty.
In the movie Deception (the one with Hugh Jackman and Ewan McGregor), there’s a chess metaphor about appearance versus truth. What’s on the board versus what’s happening in the player’s mind. When your dreams grow as vivid as waking life, your psyche becomes both player and board. You start choosing experiences not by what’s externally real, but by what resonates with emotional weight.
And then there’s that SpongeBob episode.
You know the one.
SpongeBob and Patrick invent Imagination like a magical paintbrush. Suddenly the world exists because they decided it should. 🌈
In a lucid dream, imagination isn’t a toy.
It’s the entire amusement park.
When your internal world becomes as vivid as the external one, your mind stops labeling things as dream or real. It only tracks one metric:
Does this feel wondrous?
✨ To your psyche, the distinction fades. What matters isn’t where you are. It’s what moves you.
Three Screens, One Living Room
Picture three TV screens flickering at once.
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On one, J.D. narrates his life like it’s a musical, complete with slow-motion walks and fantasy cutaways.
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On another, a sleek thriller like Deception whispers that nothing is quite what it seems.
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On the third, SpongeBob stands in a white void, holding a rainbow between his hands, chanting “imagination.”
All three are ridiculous.
All three are accurate.
Because that’s exactly how the human mind works.
We like to pretend reality is a shared granite countertop.
Knock on it. Solid. Same for everyone.
But neurologically?
Reality is closer to a snow globe.
Shake it, and each person gets their own weather.
Your Brain Is Already Hallucinating (Very Convincingly)
Neuroscience has a quietly wild fact:
Your brain doesn’t show you reality. It constructs it.
Sight, sound, memory, emotion, and expectation blend into a private movie playing behind your eyes. A custom director’s cut.
That means:
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Two people can stand in the same room
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And live in completely different worlds
One feels safe.
One feels threatened.
One feels hopeful.
One feels trapped.
Same room.
Different universes.
The Scrubs Effect
Think about J.D.
Half his life happens in fantasy sequences, yet those moments guide his choices and relationships just as much as the “real” hospital scenes.
His internal world edits reality.
So does yours.
We replay conversations that never happened.
We imagine worst-case futures.
We daydream better ones.
Emotionally, those scenes hit just as hard as anything external.
Your brain doesn’t stamp them FAKE.
It stamps them FELT.
And to the nervous system, that’s basically the same thing.
The Deception Layer
Now add perception tricks.
Memories shift.
Biases bend facts.
Fear zooms the camera in.
Love softens the lighting.
Like in Deception, the board you think you’re playing on isn’t the board someone else sees.
You believe you’re reacting to truth.
Often, you’re reacting to interpretation.
And so is everyone else.
That “irrational” person?
They might simply be living inside a version of reality that makes perfect sense from where they stand.
Different map.
Same terrain.
SpongeBob Was Weirdly Onto Something
That Imagination episode is basically consciousness theory wrapped in jellyfish jokes.
SpongeBob creates worlds out of intention alone.
Honestly? That’s us.
In dreams, your brain renders oceans, cities, entire storylines with full sensory detail. While you’re inside them, you swear they’re real.
Only later do you wake up.
Here’s the twist:
Brain scans show lucid dreams can be as vivid as waking life.
Meaning your mind often can’t tell the difference.
So if someone’s inner world feels brighter, safer, or more meaningful than the outside one, of course they’ll gravitate toward it.
You would too.
Anyone would.
Beauty pulls like gravity.
So What’s the Point?
If reality is partly constructed…
If perception is filtered…
If dreams can feel as real as daylight…
Then judging someone else’s reality becomes a little absurd.
It’s like criticizing someone’s weather app while they’re standing in a thunderstorm.
“You’re overreacting. It’s sunny.”
Not in their sky.
A Gentler Way to Move Through the World
Instead of:
“That makes no sense.”
Try:
“That must feel real to you.”
Instead of:
“They’re delusional.”
Try:
“I wonder what their world looks like from the inside.”
Because everyone is walking around inside their own snow globe.
Their own J.D. montage.
Their own SpongeBob imagination void.
Their own carefully constructed version of truth.
Some globes are calm.
Some are blizzards.
Some are neon carnivals. 🎡
But all of them feel real to the person holding them.
And once you realize that, judgment softens into curiosity.
Curiosity turns into empathy.
And empathy feels a lot more like a reality worth living in.
Which, if you get to choose your world anyway, seems like the prettier one to inhabit. ❄️✨
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