Helping you live in mid-life without a crisis
Get post updates - RSS
What I am working on
My good friend and business coach, Dawud, recently asked me on his bog about my current learning edge. It’s a great question. I think of learning edge as the place where I bump into the outer limit of something I can do or understand. It causes me to have to lean into it and stretch a bit. And that is uncomfortable - that reach beyond what is known.
While uncomfortable, it is required to grow. I think it’s required to just live fully.Â
So my edge? Right now it is how to be open to not believing I know the truth. Sounds kind of philosophical, but I mean more in the day to day stuff. I keep discovering I operate as if I know what is right or how it must be in situation. My son and I hit a bumpy patch and I know what needs to be done. I see the truth - it’s that simple.Â
Ahhh but it isn’t. You know we see life through the lens of our upbringing, culture, experiences and a myriad of other factors. So while I think I know the facts of a situation, I really don’t. This might sound simplistic, but it’s a pretty challenging. I have so many thoughts and conversations based on the idea I know the truth and if the other person doesn’t see it the same way….well, their wrong :-) They don’t have the facts. Kind of arrogant huh?
I have a phrase I try to remember to use: “Maybe”. Just that - “maybe”. That keeps me open to the fact something I think is rock solid may not necessarily be true”. This keeps me open. It helps.
Â
Popularity: 13% [?]
Email This Post to a Friend or Save as a Bookmark
Tags: The Disquiet, working with the Disquiet, dawud, learning edge, perceptions, truth
July 19th, 2007 at 6:36 am
Ah, Dave, that’s good stretching you’re doing…it’s difficult stuff. In my work with folks navigating conflict I often see how the search for The Truth (what really happened, what was really intended) gets people stuck because each person has a piece of the truth in what they recall. And, as you’ve noted, believing we know the right thing to be done is trap #2, because the right thing to be done usually needs to be jointly discovered. We’re better off trying to be uncertain in conflict, though our Egos try to stop that.
I love your phrase, “Maybe.” It’s perfect and a great offering to us.
July 24th, 2007 at 6:01 pm
Thanks Tammy!!!
April 18th, 2008 at 8:33 am
Nice one Dave. We all need to understand that we see the world through a lens that we created from our own experiences as we developed. Much of course is influenced by our parents or gardians and their own beliefs and upbringing. A
s a pyshodynamic counsellor that’s how I view most situations I come across but even then its only natural to me, and I would imagine others, to take what they know of the world and apply it to the situation they see before them.
best wishes
Guy
April 18th, 2008 at 8:41 am
Hi Guy, You are right about the lens. And just like glasses, we forget we are wearing them. The trick is to remember the glasses and take them off and look at them from time to time. What am I not able to see through them? is the million dollar question.