- Linda Hesthag Ellwein
- Brooklyn, NY
- United States
Communication & Change Agent, Photographer, Rancher, Oikonomia, Inc.
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Have you believed something - or the idea of something - and discovered you were mistaken, or wrong? What's your story & what did you learn?
Our world view often conjures up ideas or beliefs that seem to 'fit' within it. We often cluster beliefs with ideas or behaviors that 'sound' right to us. Every now and then, the ideas we hold are simply wrong, or at least need to be questioned. I'd like to hear examples of paradigm shifts that changed your world view or point of view. When have you been mistaken?
These experiences, or paradigm shifts, often surface through cultural beliefs, politics, in beliefs relating to sustainability and environmental preservation, or human behavior/relationships - but are certainly not limited to these. What have you assumed to be true or right, and suddenly found yourself doubting your certainty?
Ben Jarvis 50+
i'm an ESL teacher, mostly at junior high school level. one of the things i try to do is have my students use english meaningfully, which sometimes means having them research a particular topic and present there findings using the language they've learned, and making a poster to support their speech with visual elements to aid the comprehension of the audience. on one occasion they'd spent a few eeks preparing and it was the due they were due to do their presentations, and the first group they got up and held up hastily drawn and unfinished posters, and accompanied them with short, half-assed, mostly forgotten speeches. i thanked them and moved on to the next group, but by the time the 4th or 5th group had presented the same level of work, i was angry, and told them so. it wasn't that the work was poor, it was that their effort was poor. they could do, and had done plenty of times previously, much better.
at the end of the lesson i returned to my office and immediately felt terrible about it and felt that way for the entire time until the next lesson. on the way to class, one of the groups caught up to me and asked if they could redo their presentation. of course i agreed, and entering the classroom i found the others practicing their speeches and upon seeing me also asked it they could do their presentation over. it was an important lesson for me, that sometimes the best thing you can do for someone is to give them a (metaphorical) kick in the pants to help them realise their potential.
being overly generous to kids does them no favours, since one day they'll come up second best against others who haven't been allowed to fall short. i'm not promoting shouting but it does have its uses - for me it's been about once every 2 years. praising mediocrity encourages mediocrity. call a spade a spade!
Dr J Douglas Brown
Brijesh A Shah
Estela Estela
Yeah, learning how ridiculous the categorizaiton of race is; learning that it has no solid biological basis and even further learning that even though many of us know better laws like the 'One Drop Rule' still exist, affected how I understood the world.
Now does that whipe away the inequities for those people who have been judged on their so called race? No, not at all. This foolish categorization has done so much damamge that we will be fixing things for decades to come. It is time that we all learn the truth about our own human variation. And if we are going to discriminate and judge one another, because unfortunately that probably is not going to stop anytime soon, don't do it in the name of an idiotic, antiquated, erroneous categorization system.
Right or wrong, you can judge a person on his/her character, his/her behavior but to judge a human being on his/her skin color is an affront to decency and intelligence.
Oh and for those who are confused about what you are because your mother is 'black', and your dad is 'white' and your grandmother, is 'Japanese' for example etc. I have an answer for you:
You are Homo,sapiens, sapiens with a diverse gentic background with bits of genes from vairous parts of the world, and more recently,possibly even from different human 'types' such as Neanderthal ;-) Read up people! Read up. The truth shall set you free.
Phillip Beaver 10+
Inspired, I considerd her opinions more earnestly than before (then twenty-five years’ marriage). For the first time, I realized that she holds that God and Jesus are the same—absolutely. There’s no explanation; it’s a mystery. In earlier discussions I could have grasped her opinion but had not listened to her.
That realization caused me, in discussions, to explore the word definitions we are using. Sometimes, I’d rephrase the question. In my writing, her review is my greatest asset.I would not change anything about my wife--especially her afterdeath.
But the Christian experience demanded action on my part.After so many years attending worship with her, I would not accept her sect. I withdrew from my inherited sect.
I focused on classical literature: Plato, Chekhov, Shakespeare, Nozick, and many more. Next, I focused on American literature through the seventeenth century.After about ten years, I realized I am digging out of the indoctrination my parents shared and am discovering my preferences.
Now, my belief is that humans should not hold beliefs but should stay open-minded to reality, most of which is unknown—in other words, hold faith in the truth most of which is unknown. To place faith elswhere probably involves rejecting the truth. I do not wish anyone to follow my path, because I could be wrong.
I am so fortunate to have discovered my bride and trusted myself to choose her, despite my sect's prejudices. Moreover, I am fortunate she waited so long for me to listen to her.
I trust and am committed to the Preamble to the US Constitution.
Phil
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
Phillip Beaver 10+
Walter Radtke
Edwin Jose Palathinkal
The real world as I experienced it was very harsh than the world the cult had created for me. I learned the hard way that merely wishing/praying doesn't make it so. I stopped believing. Much much later I discovered an author which changed my life forever.
Karen Richardson
edward long 30+
You are disassociating the concept of wrong with the concept of truth. Thus only when I discover that something is not what I believed, or assumed, it was am I wrong. So long as I am unaware of the disparity between my belief and truth I am not wrong? Using that definition I think the question should not include the words "wrong" or "mistaken": For example: "Have you ever changed your mind regarding what you believed or assumed about something?"
Timothy Campbell
Yet there was still much to unlearn. Saying "There are no gods" was no answer at all; it was merely a negation. Indeed, most of the atheists I encountered seemed (to paraphrase C.S. Lewis) annoyed at God for daring not to exist. Was there a spiritual answer? I looked. And looked. And in nearly every case I found self-delusion.
Nonetheless, running underneath all that delusion, in science, in philosophy, in religion, was an attractive attitude. If this attitude had words, it would say, "Reality does not conform for your convenience."
I eventually took a year off from my life and dedicated myself to finding reality. Oddly enough, it was there all along, but I hadn't been able to see or otherwise sense it because I kept imagining what it was supposed to be, according to what I'd been told or what I thought I needed.
I learned, over the years, that there are countless people who will tell you that they have found the truth. In the vast majority of cases they have not found the truth. Rather, they crave for you to see things their way so they can further persuade themselves that they have successfully modelled reality.
There are few things as refreshing as the realization that I've been wrong. In each case, that's one less belief to defend.
Deepak --
If you don't mind me asking, what was it that you discovered from your quest?
Timothy Campbell
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
That is my experience too. Being wrong generally makes me laugh...belly laugh, as a matter of fact. It's one of the most refreshing things I know - when I've held on to a 'belief.' I find it most fun when it comes to politics, or beliefs I've bought into because they 'sound right' or politically correct. They're the best of all... :) Thank you!
Timothy Campbell
Thomas Jones 50+
"Reality does not conform for your convenience."
I collect quotes and I copied this line to my quote file.
Timothy Campbell
Christophe Cop 500+
Might probably my transition towards skepticism...
before, I thought I could understand the world through intuition and a 'feeling'.
It turned out to be terribly wrong... (went through a psychotic episode)
Like Nash, I now understand intuition can be terribly misleading, and you should never have absolute trust in your gut feeling (though it does work great most of the times)...
A skeptic questions his own beliefs all the time, and I think that is the only way one can take when one wants to reduce wrong ideas to the maximum. (It does not give always give you comfort though)
- The book is the next one I'm going to read, though I predict it won't teach me a lot of new insights, I do hope to be wrong on that account -
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
While it is probably true a skeptic questions his own beliefs all the time, I'd add the simply curious might also do that- without being skeptical in nature. But I could be wrong.... leads me to a thought for the next conversation. ;)
Walter Radtke
This cosmic shooting gallery idea also led me to investigate other astronomy theories that need to be updated, among them the theory that planets form from accreted material left over from the primordial solar disk constituents. There are many problems with this model. A contending theory that needs more air time is that planets are ejected from the cores of their suns. What this means is that life in the Universe may be far rarer than Carl "Billions and billions of galaxies" Sagan and the rest of mainstream astronomy would want to entertain. Life may be exceedingly rare in the Universe, to the point, I'd speculate, that it may take an infinite Universe an infinite amount of time to create, not only life, but sentient life capable of contemplating it. What if we were in fact the only sentient, let alone living, beings in this Universe? What would that do to our sense of responsibility to ourselves and the planet?
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
Maranda Marvin
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
Bemnet Gizachew
For a long time I thought that reading happens by starting from the first word right the way to the last word. Consciously understanding everything. Critiquing and questioning every sentence. Now I understand our mind more capable than that. It is not what on the paper that matter but what is happening in our head. You don’t need to read every sentence to extract information from a written material. And learning happens on layers. You can’t be expert right the way. To make this sustainable I question my ideas beliefs every day. Discuss with people, find out what the experts say ,Critically question your thoughts e.t.c.
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
David Irvine
everything we currently know should be open to question, the ability to rewire ourselves with new information is what keeps us going. Holding onto the past information is what slows down evolution (maybe nature made us like that for our own protection). I think the paradigm shifts start with one person who understands how to rewire and rethink knowledge and realise it was probably wrong. Searching in this area then we find greatness and new ideas and goals. I am sure this is how progress happens, but the poor person has to persuade others to look, really look and that's harder as there are more of us.
This is where peer review and establishment can actually do 2 great things
1: weed out irrational and unfounded ideas
2: Provide solid incremental improvements in state of art.
This is where peer review harms us and increasingly so by
1: No allowing changes to the current info base that are radical (so many people trained in the old wring way)
2: Ensuring only incremental change happens (no heads above a parapet either).
So in life we do not accept we are wrong much, but worse still it's become an institutionalised matter now and has the backing of large organisations, maybe natures brake on progress for our sakes, or perhaps we are just wrong in trying to compartmentalise information and maybe the people already invested in training the old ways, simply want to stay as they are and not change.
Bottom line, until we embrace being mistaken and embrace change then we will evolve slower.
Great question.
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
Cindy Dong
The thing i cannot accept is that I used to believe in love and never suspect it, and think only if the two of us love each other, can we wait for each other no matter what happenned. But now, it seems i am wrong absoluty. What i have to believe is that something is changing totaly and true love can hardly be found......although i would not like to believe the fact.
Thank you
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
Over the years I've found the love lives on. The form it takes does not. Real love is bigger than any picture we hold in our mind. I hope your pain subsides quickly, and joy replaces it again.
edward long 30+
Who has not realized that something they embraced as being true was, in fact, false?
There are some epistemological definitions needed to weed-out the impossible things some people blindly embrace as truth. For example: What is Truth?
Also, regarding the words "mistaken' and "wrong", is your intended meaning exemplified by the act of embracing as truth that which is false?
Rafi Amin 10+
edward long 30+
I do believe it is essential to define terms prior to answering a question.
It is not clear to me precisely what the question means by, "discovered you were mistaken, or wrong?" For example, I once believed in Santa Claus. Was that a mistake, or wrong? If it was wrong of me to believe in St. Nick what made it wrong? Was it wrong because there is no proof that he exists? Or, was it wrong because there is proof that he does not exist?
The question is complex, I did not make it so.
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
Edward, your responses make me smile. Your mind can obviously take this in many directions. I think you should simply answer it in a way that works for you, or contributes to your thought process. Fyi, the word wrong was not intended to mean a moral judgement, but simply to imply things were different than we thought, or how we assumed, they were.
Claire Dillon
My story is a rather jumbled one, as the journey is ongoing. Though I am multiracial (Caucasian and Asian), I always saw myself as your average white kid, growing up in a sheltered and predominantly white suburb. I've grown up with my Chinese grandparents' war stories and other very "Asian experiences," but I always thought I was culturally white. However, from a young age I knew my classmates saw me differently. Generally they were never mean or exclusive, but as I got older I realized my race carried much more weight than I ever imagined. Whether it was an ex boyfriend who was attracted to my "exotic" features, or the casual suggestion I try a restaurant's Asian salad because "well, you know... [I] would probably like it," this label was fundamental to the way many people viewed me. I was really quite astonished, and even hurt, though most people didn't mean anything by their comments. I'm sure countless others have had similar experiences, regardless of race or ethnicity.
With this disparity largely cleared up in high school (not without some identity crisis and struggle!), I went to college thinking I understood myself. Again I was wrong. To make a long story short, I've learned that some of my other traits give people certain opinions of me that I hadn't anticipated. Thankfully to my knowledge they're mostly positive, and even make me seem more interesting than I really am! Perhaps I'm a little disappointed that my identity isn't completely my own, but this has been a fascinating process. Regardless, I hope I'll have it sorted out soon.
Thomas Jones 50+
Oh, and I'm not a teenager (far, far from it) and I'm still going through the same things you describe.
Claire Dillon
Many thanks for the kind comment. I guess it'll be a while before I can figure myself out -- if only there was a way to speed up the process!
Thomas Jones 50+
He removed all that was not a part of the beauty.
No more; no less.
Chris Pavlis
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
I beg to differ, yet I know what you mean. The projections others place on us is their picture or view, and the one we own is ours, imo. However, I imagine it gets rather jumbled up too - since we have projections we're throwing at others, and self images we want to portray. I loved this example too...I imagine all of us, no matter the age, have struggled with perceptions others have of us - some good, some bad. I've also had some real challenges with this in my life for various reasons, and it's been an ongoing process that continuously deepens and strengthens my own understanding of myself, and who I am in relation to others. Thank you so much for sharing this.
Claire Dillon
Your view is also fascinating! I can see what you mean. Certainly we create (or discover?) our own identities, but for me at least, the opinions of others have caused me to reflect and reevaluate myself. People's comments provoked thoughts such as "Oh, I guess I am pretty Asian!" or "I didn't realize my interest in art was so obvious, I guess people can see that," etc. and these ideas were incorporated into my self-image. Perhaps this incorporation was a conscious decision, meaning I ultimately have control over my own identity, like you said. Thanks very much for following up -- you've made me dig deeper when it comes to this issue!
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
Fábio Leite
Cole Barnshaw
Linda Hesthag Ellwein 50+
姜 垂克
Tony Kuphaldt 10+
The big lesson for me has been that *belief* is fundamentally an emotional reaction, not a rational one. We tend to cling to ideas which comfort us, and this emotional investment is what differentiates a false belief from a mere misconception. Once you identify your underlying emotional drives, it's a lot easier to avoid the pitfalls of false beliefs.
姜 垂克
John Duncan
Time went by and I got lucky several years later when I had an old physisist for a client that had worked on our original atom bomb. I told him the story and after he got a good laugh out of it he explained it to me. Took him all of 20 seconds to clear up 8 years of confusion. :-)