Paradigms. Now, that is one of the words that should be most known. We see the world in so many ways. We see the people around us in so many different ways. We see ourselves in so many different ways. A good substitute for this word would be making assumptions.
Some think that this isn’t really that important. We make assumptions about people all the time. But have we ever stopped to consider how much of an effect these assumptions have on the people we make assumptions about? We haven’t. And that is just sad, because these people could actually have a similar assumption about us. Would we really want to look the way we see them? We ought to ask ourselves this before we start making assumptions about them. About anyone.
Paradigms affect us in so many ways that it is hard to count all the individual incidents. They can be divided into a number of types. Namely, they are: The Paradigms of Self, The Paradigms of Others and The Paradigms of Life.
Paradigms of Self, are paradigms one has about themselves. It’s usually in a bad sense, limiting their potentials, holding them back. I have tons of friends who think they aren’t good for or at anything, they don’t deserve the kind of treatment they are getting, their lives are utter crap, they aren’t pretty or they aren’t smart enough to be where they are. It’s sad really. You can see the potential in them, you can see the budding artist, writer, fashion designer in them but you have to hear them degrade themselves, their qualities, their talents. They deny the gifts God has given to them, or act like they don’t deserve to have them. These kinds of paradigms are, pretty much, the bane of talent. The only way out of these is to break free of these paradigms, and move ahead with a motivating slogan. Perhaps something like “I can do it” or “This isn’t hard” or “Nothing is hard”, stuff like that. This is sort of where I got the tagline of this blog from. I’ll leave it to you, my readers to analyze it.
Paradigms of Others, as the name suggests, are presumptuous beliefs about others. You could believe that the girl sitting next to you in history class is crack, leading to the belief that she could never think up a normal idea. You could think that your biology teacher is out to get you, leading you to behave in an irate manner around him. It could be anything. Honestly, I make a lot of assumptions too. Most of the time though, my assumptions are proven wrong. None of us are Sherlock Holmes my dear Watson.
The biggest loss we suffer because of the Paradigm of others is the loss of potential friendships (sometimes even potential enmity but that’s rare). Last year, one of the girls in my class left the country. She came to school one day, sat in a corner, and started crying. I didn’t really no her, but this was very unlike her. She was always the fun person. Playing pranks and cracking jokes was her middle name. Seeing her in tears shook us all. When I heard that she was leaving for good, I felt really guilty. I never even tried to talk to her. I just assumed that she wasn’t someone I could be friends with. Now that I look back, I fell that we could’ve been friends. All it would’ve taken was a bit of effort from me. Today was her best friend’s birthday. She left a message for her without letting her know about it, before she left. When her best friend saw it, she burst into tears. I was reminded of my own best friend, who left two years ago, for almost the same reasons.
Life. What a curious thing. Life. Paradigms of life, even more confounding. Everyone’s life revolves around something. And different people have immensely different centers. We have the friend centered people, who no nothing but how to be noticed by their friends. We have the stuff-centered ones who only care about the number and/or value of the stuff they own. We have the celebrity centers, the school centers, the parent centers and what not. There is also a thing called a principle centered person. And guess which the best is?
It’s the principle center. Think about it.
While you do, I’ll take a break and come back on my next post. Ciao!
This article was reblogged in selfsurge.com
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