C4: WHAT POINT OF VIEW DO YOU HAVE ? A CLOSER OR A BLURRED VIEW ?

Hello, friends in the class without walls,

It is my hope that all is well, if not then I would encourage you be proud of yourself for having made this far, as it is not the final results that defines us, but also the person we've become through our goings. In this segment I will discuss a phenomenon that I’ve observed over a while ago on myself and other folks around me, which I would call “A closer point of view” and “a far point of view” of looking things.

 According to the John Hopkins neuroscience research and many other top neuroscience research institutes, the average person has about 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day. Of those, 95% are exactly the same repetitive thoughts as the day before and about 80% are negative. Among these thoughts most are influenced by inputs from friends or media in contact, thus shapes our attitude, motivations, perspective, imagination, and understanding of certain situations. Attitude and motivation formed from those thoughts for today are of special interest in our discussion because they play a huge role in how we act, interact and ultimately affects our level of happiness and consciousness.

For example, one particular weekend I was chatting with my fellow international students here at Tianjin university. Most of them were graduate students from departments of pharmacy, computer science, and architecture. One of the discussions during our mingle was chemists shouldn’t have stress because their stuff is just mixing a couple of solutions and observe color changes then the job is done. Some of us (including myself just for fun) attacked architects that the stuff they do is just drawing what it’s already known. A computer science student claimed his stuff are most difficult so he deserves the most attention from the university with bonuses in stipend. As a Chemistry major student, most of the claims stated were true in small part but too shallow to justify chemistry is too easy. Of course, the same to my claims towards other professions. Although it was funny somehow portrayed our perspective and attitude towards other professions.

As an African who got a chance to travel abroad and meet with many other nationalities, I got asked curious yet funny questions about Africa, like "are Africans in Africa sleep with lions?, ”at your home how many lions do you have ?”, "Africans are polygamous, how many wives do you have ?", "how do you survive in Africa while too hot ?” and many other such kinds of questions. Likewise, my understanding and attitude prior to traveling towards other nationalities. For instance, towards Chinese, I used to think Chinese eat dogs so I have to be careful in buying from a restaurant in China, "all Chinese are good at martial arts". In these cases some claims or attitude could be true but in a very small part out of a population of either case, in Africa or China, respectively. Hence, in both two cases, earlier the discussion about professions and later attitude or understanding towards other nationalities, one common theme is observed that the understanding or attitude of a particular idea is too narrow or shallow to justify a particular claim.

For this discussion, I would like to refer a closer point of view as a holistic, detailed, and critical consideration, imagination or thinking of a particular thing, society, or idea, whereas a far point of view is the one which is fuzzy or too general to be relied on understanding or forming attitude towards particular idea or society. Fuzzy thinking or imagination not only it is detrimental when meeting up with new people by portraying a bad attitude towards them, but also by forming “illusive” motivation towards certain goals and making wrong decisions. Various bigoted inputs in the form of media notably radio, TV, social media, and peers have been a crucial part in forming fuzzy thinking and imagination. since most of social media are controlled by people, therefore it is so easy to pass their agenda towards their favored direction which maybe far way from the truth.

As famous Brazilian writer, Paul Coelho once said, “If you want to be successful, you must respect one rule, NEVER LIE TO YOURSELF”. In fact, fuzzy thinking is the easiest and surest way to lie to yourself, therefore having a critical filter to our thought is vital to generate clarity of perspective, understanding and motivation on various issues in our life. Upon self-examination over the time, I adapted 5Ws rule that also I learned long ago during high school writing classes useful in generating clear expression of idea in writing.

5Ws rule simply stands for What, Why, Who, When, and How. In either case of the aforementioned examples, a particular phenomenon or thought can sequentially be filtered though series of questions. “what and when phenomenon happens? by who? if so Why? then How does it happen?” with these questions the fuzziness in thinking and attitude can easily be avoided. Some inputs from news that get our attention can partially be true by just small group of people or a particular phenomenon exists only at a particular time, hence by being clumsy we tend to make generalized reasoning leading to what I would call a blurred point of view. without these critical guiding questions that we lie to ourselves leading to undesirable aftermath. It is that small part which is true leading to generalization of the whole part is true. Thus with filtering tools, “The 5Ws” helps to see the clear bigger picture in detail.

Closer point of view using spectacles as a tool to see things in detail "The 5Ws" vs far point of view observing and believing things as they are. (Image source: iStock)

For the few examples above, about what Chemist do “just mixing couple of solutions and observe color change!”, it is true that most works by chemists involves mixing solutions and observing color change, however, not true per se. As a someone with filtering questions, would ask "who, what and why ?", the answer would be "chemist they mix solutions to make reaction between two solutions work". not all Chemist mix solutions, there are some branches of chemistry like computational chemist don't work with solutions, rather work with computer. then "when do chemist work with solutions ?, is it all the time", maybe not, hence you can see by being critical we can see many faults in the argument that "chemistry is too easy, is just a matter of mixing solutions. My discussions is not to justify that Chemistry is hard, rather to be critical on issues that we are exposed to.

For the case of attitude towards people from other nationalities, for example before coming to China I was thinking that "all Chinese people eat dogs", but when this go through our filter it fails in the gating “who ?, is it all Chinese eat dogs ?”. It may be true that some Chinese eat dogs,  but very few not like the way it is promulgated in the media (I have not witnessed with my own eyes seeing Chinese eating dog or snake). Regarding African, sleeping with lions, this is not true it fails in all gates. “are African polygamous?”, the question would be "who ?, is it all Africans". As an African, born and grew up there I would say very few society does so, although it was common in the past but due to globalization and economic changes, those practices no longer exists. Important suggestion, in meeting and engaging with other people, it is important to frame our questions in the curious and open minded way than attacking the person with "fuzzy idea", since doing so it may evoke anger and unusual emotions.

Friends, again, what point of view do you have in your pursuits ? a closer or blurred ?". Have you encountered with fuzzy thinking? how did you critically deal with it? how do you avoid kiss of death in your motivation towards your goals due to fuzzy thinking, I would love to hear them over the chat box.

Let’s get exceptionally better,

adios!

Masota