Consideration Archives - Scott's Thinking

You Don’t Have To Think But It Helps

Posted on April 15, 2021

Reacting is easy. It rarely requires thought. A person says or does something and you weigh in with your comments. You don’t have to think but it helps.

Why does it help if you pause and reflect on things before engaging your mouth? First of all, you probably only know the tip of the iceberg. Secondly, what you do know is likely biased by the provider of the information. Thirdly, your immediate opinion will be biased by your own experience and philosophy. Finally, you may not truly believe what you say. You may instead be giving an emotional response without clear balance.

In our fast paced society, many people have a tendency to see from one angle and comment from one perspective. It has also become more common to side with the purported underdog. We must take the time to improve this. Otherwise, we will find more people shouting and arguing over biased headlines without any substance.

Slow things down. Assess how everything progressed to where it is now. Acknowledge what you feel is the right answer. But then, take some time to explore alternative viewpoints. Remember, just because you don’t want gravity to exist doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

If you want a calmer, more enjoyable life, try this out. You don’t have to think but it helps.

Action Observe Think About It

How Do You Decide?

Posted on November 11, 2020

Decisions are based on feelings. But there are reasons behind them. Though often they are difficult to deconstruct. How do you decide?

People start with a gut instinct or initial reaction. This kind of thinking allows you to swerve your car or bike in a split second to avoid hitting a pedestrian. It can also be used when meeting a new friend or partner.

This fast decision making is based on our natural instincts and personal experience. Sometimes it serves us very well and saves our life. It is often referred to as ‘quick thinking’. This is more of a reactionary mode with little time, if any, spent on processing new information.

Other times, we make a decision but we don’t act quickly with it. We will observe, question, theorise and consider evidence a little more. You can recognise this when speaking to someone as they take time to reflect and give the idea some consideration before replying.

In the later, people who have ‘mulled it over’ have a better understanding of themselves and why they are making the decision. If you simply react, you are not open to new information and dismiss it as wrong or unnecessary.

If you don’t reflect, you may not understand what values and priorities drive your decision making. You’ll grow more if you do.

How do you decide?

Reframe your thoughts Think About It Time

Immersing Yourself In Another Person’s Shoes

Posted on June 21, 2020

Sometimes I see a picture of someone and start to wonder about their whole life. Immersing yourself in another person’s shoes is a fascinating challenge.

I know the old saying suggests walking a mile in someone else’s shoes. But is that really enough? I guess it depends on your intent and what you are trying to get out of the experience.

Understanding A Position

If you are trying to understand someone’s position on a topic, it could be a little more complex than you think. Most topics, at their most general, can be distilled down to a binary option. However, as you dig deeper into the detail, there can be dozens, or even hundreds, of nuanced positions.

Just as a person can be summed up in one word, it doesn’t really give you a good understanding of them. A brief bio is more helpful. An obituary can sum up an important figure in half a page of a newspaper. But these are mere snippets from a person’s life. These do not usually fully inform you of how they got to their current way of thinking on various topics.

So this immersion perspective comes from trying to understand a person more fully. A person is constantly absorbing and assessing information which allows them to make minor shifts in perception. Perhaps we need to understand all of these moments of shift to fully appreciate where someone is coming from in their discussion.

Time To Understand

Let’s say the main influencing time in a person’s life could be distilled into one accumulated hour per week. So one hour, times 52 weeks, for a 50 year old means 2,600 hours of influential moments to review. To do so, at a rate of 40 hours per week, would take over one year!

Immersing yourself in another person’s shoes may not be practical. However, we can be kind and listen. People are where they are based on their own experience. This includes all the formal and informal education, and training, they have received in their entire life.

Berating a person for their current opinion, based on their personal journey so far, is not helpful. Understanding how they have arrived there allows you to help them consider alternative views.

Try understanding people a little more today. Listen to their view and allow them to have it. People are often more open to considering a new perspective when it is presented openly as an option rather than in a coercive way.