This is a piece I wrote some two years ago, a piece for my daughter before she was born. The reason I did this was because I felt that if something happened to me, I wanted her to have some idea as to who her father was, I wanted her to not be left wondering with nothing but the words of others. It is also where I began to actually connect with her, it made me think more heavily about who I am and what kind of parent I aim to be. It is also where I really started to connect with what I wrote. Perhaps there is some value in it for others too.
This is for the new tag #forthechildren
The Endless Conversation (part one)
I like to think.
I don't pretend to be a great thinker, nor do I assume correctness in how or what I think. To me, it is just thinking. One beauty of the human mind is our power to question, simulate, predict, create, develop and change without ever having to make a physical move. The power of imagination is a resource that leads to a new world. Not just an imaginary world, but the physical material world in which we live and operate.
Every invention, every product, every organisation and war has been brought about through a combination of thoughts, concepts and theories that have materialised in our reality. I don't think this is too difficult to understand yet at the same time, how come so many are unwilling to think differently and feel powerless in their ability to do differently?
The world is complex. So complex that we as humans are unable to understand all the linkages between components and how changing one node will create a shift in every other node in the system as well as have structural effects on the links. Some of these changes are large, some small, but all have an effect on everything else.
As humans we tend to think that we know a lot and it is true that each day our collective knowledge increases. However, we also seem to limit the amount of what we don't know which is perhaps a dangerous position to take as, every time in history we position ourselves as knowing, within some period of time, what we know grows to make what we knew obsolete. Now, we know better. Again, it is perhaps easy to see that knowing is always limited. It can grow, but can never be complete.
What we know and do can have impacts we may see as insignificant today, but create massive ramifications on our lives in the future. I think, a few examples will quickly come to mind but the history of smoking or fossil fuel usage should provide a bit of evidence. Inversely, what we think as an enormous breakthrough at the time, may wither into little more than a passing fad.
So, the world is too complex to fully comprehend yet we keep trying to fix it by knowing more of something we can never have complete knowledge in and then make our actions based on this limited information, complicating it further and increasing the chances of unexpected events. It seems this will be an endless journey and perhaps busy work as one correction leads on to new errors. This process may leave us feeling ineffective as we continue to chase a goal that is impossible to reach.
I think part of the reason we often feel helpless is that the system we have built is enormous, interconnected and constantly shifting. The knot we have created as a global society is in itself a massively complex system to understand and to fully understand something, objectivity is needed.
Yet, we are part of this society in which we operate and invested in certain actions and outcomes, even though those outcomes may conflict with other desires we hold. As they say: 'You can't have your cake and eat it too'. I want to be an individual and belong to a group, be nationalistic and support peace. Have more than the neighbour whilst encouraging equality. Perhaps our desires are incompatible or at the very least, we could entertain this possibility by using that amazingly capable skill of the human brain: simulation.
Thinking differently is a challenge. Humans generally want to be part of a group and being part of any particular group relies on thinking, rituals, traditions, actions and beliefs that are aligned with that of the group; group culture. Breaking ranks sets off cultural alarm bells and the culture police shift into top gear to bring order to their domain by expelling the divergent.
And, based on their judgement, the outcast can be ostracised, ridiculed and targeted with various forms of prejudice. Essentially, being or thinking differently is risky as it can effectively be performing social suicide. When everything one holds dear depends on conformity to a certain culture and their acceptance, being different is difficult.
Even when we aren't bound by group think, thinking differently is still challenging as it means going into an unknown and the unknown is scary. Fear stops us from a lot, even when we know it shouldn't. You can tell a child not to be scared of the dark and that monsters aren't real but, that massive simulation computer in the head will get to work, even without express permission.
Imagined beasts hiding under the bed waiting to hear a parent's footstep retreat down the hall before they make an appearance may be amusing to an adult, but is very real to the child. Remember, our thinking creates our world? A child's thoughts made a real heart beat faster, created real sweat on tiny palms and very real tears on cheeks. Even if there is no monster to see it, fear has an effect.
You see, the simulator is always running, day and night and if we don't give it something to do, it will do what it does based on what it knows. And because it would rather think itself right than wrong, it will avoid any areas that it is uncomfortable with (often the unknown) by creating fear when those areas are approached. Fear is natural. It keeps us alive in many practical ways. However, not being able to mentally simulate a process due to fear, how does that help us? Fear to think alternatively seems silly, doesn't it?
Taraz
Perhaps you have heard some of this before, perhaps not but it is was a point where many ideas converged and a point from which many more sprang. This was almost a year before I joined Steemit and started to write. Some of my thoughts might have changed, many have stayed the same but, I do feel like I am growing and each day, becoming a better parent than I was yesterday. Feel free to comment and add your views. I will link the next tomorrow.