A random question, working through it in my mind…Have you ever found your brain suddenly interested in things that you never believed in before?  Like topics you thought were abhorrent suddenly become interesting and you want to know more?  Or behaviors you’d never support before seem to make sense?  It kind of feels like supporting the opposing team in a way or switching sides.  Part of that is human (animal) nature and we have to develop a tolerance for the possibility we are wrong because that is how we evolve and learn.  If we have to trust that we are in the right place at the right time, I have to trust that shifting thoughts/beliefs/opinions are a sign or a natural progression to look at things differently, a way to see something different in the world and, most importantly, to learn a new lesson.  Either that or I am severely in the throws of middle age and having yet another identity crisis.  Either scenario is likely at this stage of the game but I’m embracing it.  Curiosity is a gateway and I know they say curiosity killed the cat but the truth is sometimes we have to take that chance to see what we can learn.  And there is a lot out there we don’t know.  Humans like a good story and quick answer wrapped in a neat little bow—and there always has to be a reason for everything.  But the stories we tell have a spin on them from every person involved and in the middle lies the truth. 

So I’ve been on a huge documentary kick on all sorts of topics ranging from the Carnival Triumph disaster to the Toronto mayor issues and old controversies and crises and murder mysteries.  I love a good mystery because I have always believed there is more to every story—because there is. It’s also intriguing that all of this stuff comes out NOW.  Take a look on any streaming and you’ll see a ton of “unheard tapes” or “new theories” on things we all think we know.  I heard a conversation about how if we can believe x story from y person who really has no credibility, then what else would we believe and what do we really know?  All these years we “knew” the story of Nixon and what a crook, backasswards greedy son of a bitch he was.  And ok, that may still be true, but the point is it depends on perspective.  What happens when we shift our perspective to take in more of the story?  What happens when we look at all sides and deep dive?  Is there a possibility that ideas opposed to what we know might have a chance to be true?  Is there a crack in the story?  Because that is something we can’t handle—if the truth is too simple or too complex it doesn’t make sense but if there’s a POSSIBLE way to connect things, then we open a whole new revolution.  Are the conspiracies real?  What the hell don’t we know because someone didn’t tell us or they didn’t think we could handle the full story? I want to know the whole story—my brain can handle it and I know the truth is where that bow comes in for me no matter how painful or disturbing it may be.     

When I took debate class years and years ago, the teacher said the way to make a good argument is to research the side you DON’T support because it will give you something to argue FOR what you do support.  I understood it practically then but the way information flies around now, it makes sense experientially as well.  We have so many “facts” coming at us from different angles so quickly it is really hard to discern fact from reality—compounded by the idea that someone has to be the first to get the news out there, truth is harder and harder to find.  We  have to operate on speculation and opinion and we are quick to put our two cents into anything because now everyone has a platform to speak that the world can see.  So perhaps there’s a level of mistrust in what we’ve always been told, perhaps it’s the intrigue that there are other answers to what we thought we knew.  But there is a point to taking the time to understand something even if it goes against what you believe/think you know.  It’s how we learn.  There are infinite possibilities in this universe—perhaps the whole thing is like some giant SIM where we are the experiment to see what works.  I think that is what fascinates me about the brain: Even if these things don’t exist, the fact that we can imagine them in our minds makes them real on some level.  We are fascinating creatures.  The ability to make the complex look easy, the ability to make the easy complex—we are dichotomous beings with multiple trains of thought and there is no way that multiple worlds CAN’T exist together.  We know the reality is that mathematically speaking we are just one version of what can be.  So should we be upset with ourselves when our feelings or tastes or curiosities change?  It’s all for a reason.