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| Thinking by Shelley McElhiney |
The question this week is: If you had the means to change one thing about the world, what would it be?
My answer is both simple & complex, in basic terms, if I could change the world, I'd make it so that people would listen to each other. Everyone, always & when I say listen, I mean truly listen, actually hearing & processing what another person has to say. This is one of my biggest pet peeves. Often people will ask questions of each other without truly listening for an answer. Why bother with asking if you're just going to assume an answer anyway. Just skip the whole question part, it's an empty shell, a pretense to what you were going to do or think, regardless of the real answer. People would be much happier, there would be less confusion, miscommunication & hurt feelings if we were all better listeners. Strife would be less prevalent, maybe there would even be fewer wars, if we all regularly used our innate ability to listen to & process the information that surrounds us. Maybe this has become the issue. We are surrounded by or bombarded with constant bits of information. We've shut down against everything, as a kind of defense mechanism. We've shut down too much & its become a habit. Now I'm not saying we have to absorb everything, that would be an opposite extreme, we don't have to absorb advertising, for instance, we can take or leave TV & games, as we please. They don't have to penetrate the surface of our being, but we should listen to each other & that's where it gets complicated.
So, in short, if I could change anything about the world, I would give everyone back the ability to listen to & process each other & put it into widespread, universal use.
What about you? If you could change anything about the world, what would it be? SAM
