An easy example for changing your Paradigm

Hello everyone,

I am going to use a simple example for paradigms and how to change them.  Are all of them going to be this easy?  That depends on you, your core values, and your willing to change or at least to accept a different point of view.

For many people, it is hard to accept a different point of view on a situation, hence the reason many of us have arguments, and disagreements. 

Sometimes, even when we can see and accept the different point of view, it still clashes with one of our core values, and again, the heated discussion ensues.

We have seen this many times in the past, wars have been fought over the inability (or unwillingness) to accept a different point of view.

My example should not create a war, or even a heated discussion, it is entirely meant to be used as a thought exercise to help one to understand the basics of trying to change one's own paradigm.

I will start with the question:

How many sides does a coin have?

Answer:

Almost everyone, immediately says two.  I would have to disagree, its more than that, and here is why.

We live in a 3 dimension world (really more than that, but I would like to keep this simple).

A coin has height, width, and breadth.  Most people forget about the edge of the coin.  So at the very least, the simple coin has 3 sides.

On occasion, I have taken this a step further, and added it has an outside and an inside.  So now, based on language, we are up to 5 sides.  Again, I still have not broken any major paradigms for people, I have just points out some not so commonly used ones to make a point.

Hence the simple coin, has now gone from a 2 dimensional circle (heads and tail) to a 3 dimensional round piece of flat metal, with a given thickness, giving us an edge in our thinking.  Furthermore, we just added 2 more dimensions, giving us a 5 dimensional coin, and still all we have done is changed how we think about describing the same object.

Changing our paradigms, can be this easy, we have to be able to accept, understand, and use the other points of view and the new rules to change how we think about a particular situation.  This is one of the key concepts to changing your own paradigm, and changing yourself for the better.

Until next time,

Dan W.