Help understanding what Steve means

[SecretSeven]

Steve seems like a pretty nice guy. Reallly down to earth, but I've found a lot of contradictory statements. Here are a few:

1.

He said: " The reality is that you are indeed the only one who’s conscious. There’s only one consciousness, and that is your real identity. Everything else exists within you. That’s why you perceive only one consciousness. That’s the only consciousness that exists." In this post he says that I am the only one conscious.

Yet in another post he says:" I regard myself simply as consciousness and awareness."

So, who is the real consciousness? Is it him or I?

2.

When asked how many subjective realities there are he said:

"There can be only one. Subjective reality centers around consciousness, and that consciousness is the real you. There are no other people “out there” having their own subjective experiences. There is only you. And your subjective reality is the only one there is."

Yet at other times he says that he has a family, children, and lives within his own subjective reality. So, is he really conscious or is he just a manifestation of my consciousness?

3.

Another discrepency I have is when he said the following: "Everything that exists is a manifestation of you. This perspective takes growth to a whole new level, since now you are able to decide what kind of universe you wish to create."

What I don't understand is this: If he is conscious, and I am conscious and we are both manifesting, then who manifested the world? Me or him?

4.

He also said: "Since none of the other characters you encounter are conscious in a way that’s separate from you, nobody else can have intentions. The only intentions are yours. You’re the only thinker in this universe."

How could that statement be true? If he says that I'm the only thinker in this universe, then would have to deny that he has thoughts. How could that be true? I am so confused!

There are lots more, but I'll save them for another time. What do you guys think of all this? Your thoughts and ideas would be great.

Thanks

[Akashic_Librarian]

You havn't pointed out any contradictions as far as I can see

No actually you are basically repeating yoruself. Sorry I don't think you understand just what he is writing.

[Dan.Linehan]

You created (and continue to create) everything in your universe, including Steve and his stories.

[SecretSeven]

Hey,

Thanks for your reply. Would that mean I created you? Since you were probably born before I was, then how could I have created you?

[Shindra]

you create *now*, and your creations include their own histories.
Think of it as a dream - that makes it easier.
You can dream you meet an old man that tells you something about the life he's lived, including his childhood. Yet he only exists within your dream - your consciousness. And he didn't exists before you had that dream. You 'dreamed him up'.

Steve is not conscious. He is a character in *your* dream, a persona maintained by your consciousness. There's only one consciousness. It is the one that is aware of being aware.
I'm sure you can imagine a computer game with lots of characters that say 'I am aware'.
It's important to remember that awareness is not an ego/avatar/person/persona/character. And most of the continuous creation of the eternal present moment does not happen in the rational mind. When you dream (when you live) you do not look at someone and think "he has a personality like this and that, so when I say 'this' he'll say such-and-such because of those personality traits..." you just dream it up and know it as it is happening.

Steve, SecretSeven, Shindra - all exist within the one consciousness.

Others' memories are actually nothing more and nothing less than your ideas. This post also only exists within the one consciousness.

I once became a bit lucid in a dream - something seemed off as a bit of my logical mind came back online, and I asked another person if it was a dream. The person said, dismissively, that it wasn't a dream - and I believed that. When I woke up I knew that what that person said wasn't true. However, I didn't see it as a lie - it was just my dream. Now the characters of this top-level dream are beginning to say more accurate ('honest') things. You can have many dreams within dreams, but they only exist within the one consciousness. To not be dreaming would be to have an empty consciousness. The wonderful thing is to be aware that you are dreaming always - that there is nothing outside of you to fear. That you are not a fragile ego, but an infinite consciousness.

These are your words, that you might imagine to be coming from somewhere else, just because your primary ego didn't write them. But it *is* consciousness that is now creating and seeing these words. Only one consciousness. One.

[SecretSeven]

Thanks for the reply!

I find this topic really interesting.

So, are you basically saying that the 6 billion people on this planet come from one consciousness? So, Steve, yourself and I are one in a sense? And are you conscious in the same way that I am?

[ethereal]

Imagine the universal consciousness as a tree, and each person as a leaf on the tree. From the leaf's perspective, all the other leaves are different and separate, and it thinks it is alone. But from the tree's perspective, in one sense each leaf is part of the tree and fulfilling its own duty as a leaf, but in another sense they ARE the tree -- it is the tree's life-giving functions that keep the leaf alive, and you can't separate the two.

So it's just a question of how you identify yourself -- the leaf (ego/body-mind), or the tree (consciousness/awareness). If you identify yourself with the tree, then it means that you created everything and everybody -- including your current ego/body-mind. If you still identify with the leaf, then you can still think that your one leaf created all the other leaves and the tree as well, but of course that reality is distorted because it is from a limited leaf's perspective. That's called solipsism, which Steve warned about in one of his posts.

In more practical terms, everything and everyone come from the same consciousness, but they each reflect different "slices" of the same consciousness pie. Using the same analogy, in one sense all the slices are separate and unique, but in another sense they are all the same pie. Without the pie there wouldn't be any slices. This consciousness pie is basically the Map/Levels of Consciousness as shown here:

http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/200...consciousness/

Hope my interpretation of subjective reality clears things up

[Shindra]

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

Thanks for the reply!

I find this topic really interesting.

So, are you basically saying that the 6 billion people on this planet come from one consciousness?

Can you have a dream in which 'you' are walking through a crowd? Can you have a dream in which someone shows you statistics about the growth of the world population? Yes.

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

So, Steve, yourself and I are one in a sense?

Yes. That is *exactly* the thing. The great, ancient, 'spiritual' truth which has now been shown in a logical way. All is one. And if you shift your identity to awareness, you will feel this.

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

And are you conscious in the same way that I am?

There are many egos, but only one of them has a first-person conscious perspective. 'you' and 'I' exist within the real I that is consciousness. I am/is only aware of one ego 'from the inside'. That is, for example, it seems as if I is/am looking through the eyes of what might be called the first or primary ego, yet in fact I is/am just 'dreaming up', creating, visuals that I experience. When I lie down to sleep my eyes are closed, yet I dream I see things and have eyes within that dream.
Consciousness is conscious *of* one ego in first-person perspective, and many egos in second-person perspective. No ego is conscious, so it might be a mistake to even talk about "are you or I conscious?" when 'you and I' means 'Shindra and SecretSeven'. Do your thoughts exist if you're not conscious of them? Can you have a thought in your mind and not know it? Of course not. Thinking of something = being aware of it. And a mind is a part of the ego. It exists only dependently of consciousness, only in consciousness.
So your mind is not conscious of itself. Your body, too, only 'sends' impressions to consciousness (consciousness is actually just 'creating' the impressions/sensations, in accordance with seeing a body when you appear to look down (change your visuals), as it is experiencing them). Your mind and body, your ego, is not self-conscious. The only thing that can be self-conscious is consciousness.

[Glass Joe]

Great questions SecretSeven. I really liked Shindra's and ethereal's explanations, so I wanted add this additional way of looking at this. (And I'm also open to critique.)

I read some similar questions recently in a book and the answer helped me a lot with crystallizing my own understanding of the multiple-subjective-realities idea. I'm not quoting the book here, this is just my brief summary. So there's a chance this summary may be too simplistic to be of any use to anyone. But hopefully this helps.

- Consciousness/Universe/Mind/Spirit is Infinite.
- "Infinity" is not synonymous with "limitless", "unbounded", or even "non-dual" (as the word is commonly used).
- Infinity is beyond any and all conception. There is no such thing as "seeing infinity", "understanding infinity", "arriving at infinity", or for that matter "leaving infinity". There is no such thing as "infinity + 1" or "infinity + infinity".

- When others say that you are the center of the universe and only your perspective is the true perspective (i.e. subjective reality), they are right.
- And when others say that the person sitting there next to you is also the center of the universe, and the only true perspective of reality, they are also right.
- And when others say that the blade of grass by your feet is also the center of the universe, and the only true perspective of reality, they are also right.

- Although it's a paradox, Consciousness contains infinite subjective realities. There are infinite centers of the universe.
- How can there possibly be more than one subjective reality and more than one center of the universe? And if there can be more than one, how can there possibly be infinite centers of the universe?
- This is possible because Infinity contains an infinity of infinities.
- It's infinities all the way down, all the way up, all the way out, and all the way in.
- If this wasn't the case, then it couldn't be called Infinity.

Not sure if that helped or just made things worse.

Hmmm... now that I'm thinking about this topic more, here's some more info on infinity if it helps.

I guess the "Infinity contains an infinity of infinities" idea I read a while back helped me out because I've been interested in the nature of infinity a lot lately. I'm not sure why.

I mean, I always thought that when people said "infinity" we all meant the same thing, but it turns out that really isn't the case. Everything is subjective, even infinity.

For instance, a couple months ago I came across a heated online debate about the nature of infinity which was pretty confusing at first, and seemed like a total waste of time. Because from my (noob) perspective, I thought infinity was just, well, infinity.

However, there's more to it than that. For instance, some people say the sky is infinite, and goes on forever. That sounds right at first, but others say that the sky is simply limitless, and not infinite at all. Same goes for the "figure eight" symbol itself. A perpetual loop, although commonly called an "infinite loop", is not really infinite either, because you can still break out of that so-called "infinite loop". And I'm sure there are other assumptions about infinity that I'm not addressing here.

Anyways, the more I think about the nature of infinity, the more I like the idea that "Infinity contains an infinity of infinities". Which in turn helps me better understand the multiple-subjective-realities idea.

[Shindra]

Originally Posted by Glass Joe

- "Infinity" is not synonymous with "limitless", "unbounded", or even "non-dual" (as the word is commonly used).

When I look up "infinity" in a dictionary, I read it exactly means limitless, boundless, endless. So, if we're talking about something that is *not* synonymous with that... It's like you're bringing up a word common people ("as the word is commonly used") don't know. So, what is this "infinity" that you are talking about? If it is so different, I think we need another word for it than the old word "infinity".
I also understand infinity as something that nothing can exist outside of, which of course also means non-dual.

"Infinity contains an infinity of infinities" sounds Very interesting - it seems to be something along the lines of 'holographic'. But it's still an empty idea unless we have a description for it. So, do you think you could explain it, please? I realize this is probably something very complicated, but I hope you'll take the time to at least, ehm, give us some clues?

[SecretSeven]

Awesome responses! I'm still trying to grasp everything so tell me if I'm on the right track.

Alright, so let me see if I have this right. -Everything is subjective. We are all feeling/thinking beings, but all come from the same consciousness? In a dream, there's only your ego and no other egos. So, the dream analysis isn't a hundred percent correct, because there are other beings, and other people that think, feel, right?

So, is there 6 billion subjective realities? Does each person on this planet have their own subjective reality?

In one of Steve's posts he said everything that happens is of my own creation. So, if a child is being abuse I am responsible for it. But statistically, couldn't someone else have been responsible for it, and intended it to happen since every human sends out intentions?

Thanks again you guys,

[Shindra]

As is currently typical for threads like these, there are several explanations laid out here. I will continue to write (as well as I can) about the belief system that Steve has written about, in which there is Only One subjective reality.

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

Alright, so let me see if I have this right. -Everything is subjective. We are all feeling/thinking beings, but all come from the same consciousness? In a dream, there's only your ego and no other egos. So, the dream analysis isn't a hundred percent correct, because there are other beings, and other people that think, feel, right?

ego=person. There can be many people in a dream.
People are sentient (can feel things) because you believe they are. People show some manner of intelligence because you believe they are intelligent.

Originally Posted by http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/09/your-true-identity-ego-or-awareness/

Ego

The way I use the word, ego refers to your objective, physical world identity. This includes your physical body as well as your mind. Your ego includes your name, your job, your home, your relationships, your personality, your habits, your favorite movie, your spiritual beliefs, and so on. The contents of your mind are part of your ego. Your ego is your human character and all its individual trappings in the physical universe.

Remember, subjective reality isn't a projection of you *ego*, just as in a non-lucid dream you identify yourself as one character (ego) in that dream among others, and the dream does not come from that one character - it comes from the dreamer, which has identified with the ego temporarily.

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

So, is there 6 billion subjective realities? Does each person on this planet have their own subjective reality?

No, not according to Steve Pavlina's belief system. There is only one.

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

In one of Steve's posts he said everything that happens is of my own creation. So, if a child is being abuse I am responsible for it. But statistically, couldn't someone else have been responsible for it, and intended it to happen since every human sends out intentions?

Child, abuser, Hitler, Mozart, all are but projections of the one consciousness. There is child abuse in the world because you belive there is. Also, what you see most of in your world is what you hold in your awareness the most, what you believe in, what you think and feel most. So if you, say, feel much shame and harbor thoughts of violence, for example, you are likely to see more child abuse, and similar themes, manifest in your reality - people you talk to, news you watch etc..

There is only one that has intentions.

An important point in Steve-sub-R is that nothing exists outside your consciousness.

Originally Posted by http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/05/subjective-reality-qa/

In a truly subjective universe, there is nothing outside your own consciousness — no world, no bodies, no brain. Suppose I ask you the question, “If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?” With an objective belief structure, you might say yes, but you might also say no, depending on your views on quantum physics. However, if you believed in subjective reality, you have to reject the question entirely. You’d say that there’s no such thing as a tree outside your awareness. That tree doesn’t even exist. Nor does the forest for that matter. If you are not there to observe it, it doesn’t exist at all. Without consciousness there is no existence.

So in this paradigm, you are not a body with a mind walking around in a physical universe. You are pure conscious awareness, and the physical universe is “walking around” within you. And that includes what you think of as your body and your mind too… as well as every other body you perceive.

[SecretSeven]

Thanks again for the wonderful reply.....We both live in the same world, so wouldn't it be true then that you and I equally manifested all of this, since we are both conscious?

[ethereal]

Hmm, now I'm a little confused too and ask for some clarifications:

There is only one consciousness, and each projection of consciousness (i.e. individual egos) contain parts or slices of that consciousness. The singular consciousness, and its beliefs, is what is creating this shared reality between all the projections of consciousness. So far, so good?

1) The highest truth is that only the singular consciousness creates, and it creates everything. But since we are all part of this consciousness as projections, then we are all co-creators of reality, speaking as individual egos? Rather, this singular consciousness creates through us, by giving us the thoughts/feelings/motivations that our individual ego sets through intention? Can this single consciousness create individualized projections of itself that can also create, i.e. "made in the image and likeness of God"?

2) The more of the entire conciousness that your ego/soul can "own", i.e. the higher up you go on the Levels of Consciousness, the more "effect/power" you have in changing the Manifest reality due to aligning more parts of consciousness into setting your intention?

3) There is only one subjective reality, but it is experienced by all 6 billion people differently depending on their level of consciousness?

I think all the confusion regarding Subjective Reality is really just confusing the two different levels of truth, i.e. that of universal consciousness and that of the ego/mind/soul. Especially since "consciousness" and "you" refer to both types

[Shindra]

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

Thanks again for the wonderful reply.....We both live in the same world, so wouldn't it be true then that you and I equally manifested all of this, since we are both conscious?

Thank you for appreciating my replies.


In... maybe 'singular subjective reality' is a good term for this belief -
your question is wrong - only one of us is conscious. There is only on point of view that is actually experienced.

When people seem intelligent, it is actually the one conscious being's intelligence projected onto them. When 'other people' have emotions, they are actually *your* emotions - which is empathy and compassion, unless you have fully polarized with fear/fully believe in complete seperation in which other people don't matter and you think you are an ego among egos, believe fully in that and therefore care only about your own ego.


Since all are part of me, I choose for all to be reflections of experiencing powerfulness, freedom. So I organize it thus that everyone's beliefs/intentions become true for them.
Consider the mind. Consciousness creates thoughts. Conscious uses thought, lives out trains of thought, logic. Consciousness decides what to think. Also, thoughts feed back to consciousness and program decisions in it too. Consciousness will always abide the will of it's mind, because it is one with it. The mind is a part of it.
Believing you are The One only means you come to know what You (consciousness) have been doing all the time, remember what You (consciousness) have caused yourself (ego, when identified with) to forget, in order that you could experience lesser states of being, because the greater cannot be experienced unless there is 'lesser'. Steve has written something about this in his post 'perfection' http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/09/perfection/

[SecretSeven]

You said that only one of us is conscious........Soo....Are you saying that you aren't conscious? Lol, cuz I certainly am conscious.

[Shindra]

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

You said that only one of us is conscious........Soo....Are you saying that you aren't conscious? Lol, cuz I certainly am conscious.

You would say that, wouldn't you
By this I mean, don't believe egos who say they are consciousness.
as Steve explained about solipsism in http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/200...-reality-qa-3/.

It would be mighty egoistical for one ego to claim ownership of consciousness. A middle road is to say that there are many conscious egos. The other end is that consciousness is primary, consciousness 'owns' egos instead of the other way around. Though ownership is really a concept of egoism ("mine not yours"), so please don't get caught up in that word. 'Owning' becomes being when it is no longer a game egos play. If you're aware of something, you are that, it is in you - owning in that sense, like you own your mind and your body, heart and lungs and all.
It's a tricky concept to look at from within objective reality, but I've experienced that once you start trying to move your beliefs into singular subjective reality, it simultaneously begins to make more sense. It's a perspective - hard to speak of a perspective you've never had. But yes, there really is only one consciousness.

Questions, I've found, hold value. Does your thumb have a consciousness of it's own? Think of that concept.
There is only one consciousness of all, and from that perspective, saying things are independently conscious is strange.

______

"now both of us know who's reality this really is, don't we? Whichever one of us is the conscious being here." - Steve in podcast 'the true nature of reality'

[SecretSeven]

Yes, but obviously both you (Shindra) and I (Secret Seven) are both conscious , because we are both intelligently responding to eachother. That would mean that this is both our realities...right?

So here's the two possible scenarios:

1. I am conscious in this reality and you are not.

2. Or we are both conscious, and are both thinking beings in this reality.

lol which one do you believe is true?

It takes me awhile to understand things, but eventually I'll get it!

......this conversation is so interesting, but extremely confusing at the same time.

thanks again!

[Shindra]

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

Yes, but obviously both you (Shindra) and I (Secret Seven) are both conscious , because we are both intelligently responding to eachother. That would mean that this is both our realities...right?

Nope.
Example:
You can go to sleep and have a dream in which you have an intelligent conversation with a dream-character.
It is only the dreamer, one consciousness, that is creating people saying things.
Do you believe that all the characters in your dream actually exist when you are not dreaming about them? I wouldn't think so.

[Shindra]

I haven't yet integrated this belief system (chosen it)(it's a big choice, polarization, letting go of the ego), but I think - I 'intellectually believe' that

Anything which can be classified as "you" - by anyone - is not conscious/ness. When you dream you have a main character you identify with. But you cannot say that main character is the one having the dream. Consciousness is beyond everything - and it is also the stuff that everything is made of.

The one consciousness is the concept of "I" - not the word, which many egos can utter, but the awareness. It is the one that is aware of being aware, whereas everything else are but concepts consciousness is aware *of*.

[SecretSeven]

So, if I've understood you correctly, we are both just part of consciousness' dream, and we are just characters. But what I don't understand is that when I stop thinking about you, you still exist, and you still continue to live your life. You are aware of being aware, so wouldn't that make you conscious? And since I exist when you are not thinking of me and I am aware, wouldn't that mean that I am conscious too?

[SecretSeven]

I do believe that I am a conscious. I am aware, I feel, I think and I make decisions. I may be part of a greater consciousness, but my question is this: If this is a dream, and I am a dream avatar, then do the other characters in my reality think, feel and dream like I do?

And also.... you said that only one of us is conscious...so who is conscious then? Am I conscious or are you (Shindra) conscious?

[Shindra]

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

So, if I've understood you correctly, we are both just part of consciousness' dream, and we are just characters. But what I don't understand is that when I stop thinking about you, you still exist, and you still continue to live your life. You are aware of being aware, so wouldn't that make you conscious? And since I exist when you are not thinking of me, wouldn't that mean that I a conscious too?

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

You are aware of being aware

see that's what I don't believe. (My mind is not conscious of itself, it does not exist independently of my consciousness, my head and my hands and so on are not self-aware.)

Shindra is not aware of being aware, only awareness is. Awareness is aware *of* Shindra, and more personas than a mind can hold/ever calculate.

When something is not in awareness, it ceases to exist. When a person that is remembered from the 'past' (which is, time is, but a concept of the mind) comes into awareness, awareness remembers the personality and, together with the concept of time (which is also created by awareness as it creates the mind), creates a history and a body that looks 'older' than 'last time'.

Nothing exists when awareness is not aware of it. No one will ever encounter anything that is not within awareness, the one will never encounter anything outside of am self. (that, thought not entirely gramatically correct, was a deliberate word choice, not a mistake)
- in objective words, you will never experience anything outside of your awareness, if you are aware of something it is within your awareness, and you will never see proof that anything outside your awareness exists, because to 'see' something you would have to be aware of it.

No "you" exists when I am not aware of it. And here I mean I=awareness again, not 'Shindra'.


Thank you for your questions, each answer I try to give help me clarify my thoughts.

[SecretSeven]

No problem, this is helping me as much as it is helping you. But I'm having trouble understanding your last post, it's a bit confusing for me.

[Shindra]

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

I do believe that I am a conscious. I am aware, I feel, I think and I make decisions. I may be part of a greater consciousness, but my question is this: If this is a dream, and I am a dream avatar, then do the other characters in my reality think, feel and dream like I do?

And also.... you said that only one of us is conscious...so who is conscious then? Am I conscious or are you (Shindra) conscious?

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

I am a dream avatar

I am not a dream avatar.
Objective-speak(means trying to translate subjectivese/objectivian): You are not a dream avatar. That is not the real you. Consciousness/awareness is not a dream avatar, is not any one dream avatar
It is the container, not the contained.

"Only I am conscious"

Nothing dreams like the I does, because nothing exists outside of the I/consciousness.
There is only one dreamer.

try not to shoehorn it into an objective belief sysem.
But, I should note that, if you do want to keep believing in objectivity/duality/multiple awarenesses, that is fine with me.

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

And also.... you said that only one of us is conscious...so who is conscious then? Am I conscious or are you (Shindra) conscious?

Shindra is not consciousness.
Objective-speak: No-one else is conscious but you. (that is true if you percieve it as someone else saying it to you)

[SecretSeven]

Ok, I understand that consciousness is the container. But if I am not a dream avatar, and you are not a dream avatar what exactly are we? Sorry I know this is probably really redundant...

[Shindra]

"I am that which is aware. I am the observer. That is my true identity. I am aware of my self. My 'self' can mean my first ego - that which I identified with. My self, my personality, I am aware of it. My body, my mind, I am aware of them. The true Self - that which I really am - is awareness." Awareness cannot be qualified as anything other than 'that which is aware of being aware'. It has no qualities but the one that it is aware of something. It has no length or width - it is not a spatial thing. It is not an object. It does not change - it is simply aware. It does not move, for it is not something in space. It is now, it is current, it is present. Spaceless and timeless. Zero dimensions.

Try being awareness. Try just sitting down and be aware of your body... be aware of your thoughts... be aware of whichever emotion you are feeling.
Those are things you are aware of.

I am the untouchable point of awareness. I am the observer.

Stillness, void. It simple is.

[Shindra]

Originally Posted by SecretSeven

Ok, I understand that consciousness is the container. But if I am not a dream avatar, and you are not a dream avatar what exactly are we? Sorry I know this is probably really redundant...

"You" are dream avatars. I am "every one of you".
"You's", avatars, meet within awareness all the time. Awareness observes and experiences this.

"I am you and what I see is me" - lyrics form the song Echoes by Pink Floyd.

Steve has written a post that directly answers your question:
your true identity: ego or awareness

[SecretSeven]

Again I am really sorry for the redundant nature of my questions. But you said: "You" are dream avatars. I am "every one of you". I don't quite understand what that means.

(I'll read over the Steve's post while I'm waiting)

[Dan.Linehan]

@secretseven

Subjective reality is a perspective that grants you empowerment over your own reality. It basically says that things don't come into your reality unless you invite them there. What happens outside of your experience doesn't apply, because it's not within your experience.

Subjective reality and LOA are both free will taken to logical extremes. It's the belief that anything you've experienced you've created through your own free will.

What happens to someone outside of your reality doesn't matter, because it's not part of your experience. Your experience is all that matters to you. My experience is all that matters to me.

You exist to me only because I've chosen to experience you existing. Correspondingly, someone only exists to you as much you choose to experience them existing in your reality.

Existence outside of your perception is not possible, as your perception is all that there is.