Do you believe absolute truth exists?
I do. I believe some notions are set-in-stone, no-exceptions-allowed, no-question-about-it, all-time-and-forever true.
I also believe most ideas don’t qualify for that status. I’ve written about this before (Left, Right, Or Something Else?) but it’s one of those topics that keeps poking at me. Apparently I still have more to learn.
Maybe it’s the mid-term elections and the reappearance of nasty, negative campaign rhetoric. Maybe it’s my own tendency to argue and debate, my habitual need to win. But whatever it is, I seem to be bumping into an awful lot of either-or thinking lately.
It’s a natural tendency. We get attracted to an idea, accumulate some evidence, and decide that’s our position. So far, no real problem.
The difficulties begin when we drive a stake in the ground and decide that’s where we’re going to make our stand. So we set up camp, build a house, and suddenly an idea becomes a sacred fortress that must be defended at all costs.
It started with an idea, a thought, a perception based on what we knew at the time. We were traveling in the wilderness and came across a pleasant place to rest. But that stake-turned-camp-turned-fortress somehow became the destination, the ultimate end of the journey. We can’t move—too much invested in this spot. And if someone comes along with new evidence of a much more sensible place to settle, it’s as though they’re telling us we’re stupid for stopping here. Our identity is so intertwined with this place that we’ve almost become the location.
We’ve become the idea.
The guy with the new take, the fresh evidence, must be evil, the enemy. After all, he’s attacking OUR PLACE, which means he’s attacking us. We can’t allow that, so we fight back. We twist data, manufacture facts, and perform convoluted mental gymnastics to force the new square peg into our entrenched round hole.
Why? Because we can no longer perceive that it was just an idea. Pausing there made sense, at least until new information indicated the existence of a more suitable campsite. And now moving makes even more sense, but we can’t because the idea, the position, is our identity.
And now, not only do we refuse to move but we demand that everyone else move to our spot. If they don’t, then they’re saying we’re wrong. Can’t have that.
A man once told of defending a hill in Viet Nam. They’d fought to take the hill from the enemy, and now it was THEIR hill. People died to drive the other side from the hill, and if they didn’t defend it the sacrifice would be wasted. So they repelled withering assaults, suffered dozens of casualties, and eventually prevailed.
A few days later, they picked up their gear and marched off the hill. No replacements—they just vacated this space for which many died. And why did they fight for it in the first place? Because the other guys had it.
I think a lot of our ideas are like that hill. We defend them simply because they’re ours and we’ve invested in them. We can’t just toss them aside, so we defend the hill that may not be worth defending any longer.
This sort of thinking prevents learning and growth. If life is a journey, if there’s always more to be discovered, what’s the sense in picking out the first convenient spot and settling there?
Some hills are worth fighting for. Some are worth dying for.
But most of them aren’t. They’re just hills.
Are you so identified with any ideas that you can’t separate your self from the idea? How might that prevent you from considering new evidence?
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