Understanding

One of the questions that our culture seems to be wrestling hard with, even if they don't know that they are, is How do I gain understanding?

There are a lot of controversial ideas coming up as we experience another shift in political power, and one of the things that is becoming clear is that most persons have absolutely no understanding about what they claim to be upset about. They don't know the fundamental truths about...whatever the topic is. Rather, they are simply spouting something that they read or heard somewhere else, and somewhere in their brain, it clicked - that must be it. 

When one group does this, the other shouts very loudly, calling them conspiracy theorists and telling them to get some understanding. At the same time, when they themselves do this, it is because they know the actual truth that everyone else is just blind to. 

The truth is...neither. Neither group is conspiracy theorists and neither holds sole claim on the truth. 

What's really happening is that both lack understanding. 

And neither is really interested in it. 

We live in a world where things "sound true" based on the biases we hold that we aren't even aware of - the experiences we've had, the lessons we've learned, the teachings we've picked up from our families of origin or our culture or whatever. If it sounds true, then it must be true, and most of us are willing to defend our perspective to the death of us. 

Add on top of that a world in which we have been told that truth is relative, that our feeling that something "sounds true" makes it just as valid as if it were actual truth, at least for us. 

There is no impetus any more for learning anything, for improving ourselves, for gaining understanding. It doesn't have to be true; it just has to be true for me. It just has to sound true enough to be plausible, and all of a sudden, most of us are willing to build our lives on it. And fight like fools against anything that might attempt to change our understanding. 

We aren't listening to each other because we've been told we don't have to. We've been told that the minute someone else has a different perspective, the minute they are seeing something that we didn't see, they are a fool. They are a conspiracy theorist. They are wrong. At the very least, they are disrespectful to us because they aren't taking into account our truth. Something that is very real for us. 

The thing is...is it really that real for you? I mean, really? Is it a truth you're really building your life on or is it something your party or your platform has told you you're supposed to hold dear and fight for, so you're doing that because what you really hold dear is your party or your platform? 

Our lack of understanding, and our complete disinterest in it, is actually a byproduct of our desperate need for belonging. We have struck up with sides and causes because it gives us somewhere to fit in, and we are so desperate to have a place in this world that we'll buy into whatever they sell us. Just please don't ask us to leave. 

So such things become our identity. 

We have the world at our fingertips - literally - and yet, we are the most misinformed generation that has ever existed. We are more mal-informed today than we were when we believed the world was flat. And it's because of this very thing - an aversion to true understanding in favor of a sense of belonging. 

We could talk about this forever, but I'll leave it here for now. Just something to start thinking about. 

What do you really believe and why do you think you believe it? Have you looked into the truth, or have you simply taken what you've been fed by a source you think you trust? How much can you tell anyone else about that source...besides your personal feelings about its reliability? What would happen to your life if it didn't fit so neatly in the box they tell you matters most?