Winter - Spring 2023
The Stories We Tell: Perspective-Taking and Increasing Understanding of the Narratives We Hear in the Media
This page is still growing. Please come back again in 2024 to see it grow.
The stories we tell have a huge impact on us, collectively. Us, the world. So do the words we use to tell those stories.
For instance, the story of the world’s obsession with money and possession/s is ironic because we don’t seem to have much money unless we’re rich, and the things we have come at great cost to many. Therefore, we can understand that money is not the answer to our problems personally or collectively, but rather that our current understanding and treatment of money (that is, our story of money) is a significant cause of our problems both personally and collectively, and that collectively, we must find a way to distribute fair “pay”, not to mention necessary resources, for all people, many of whom suffer (and worse) to produce things that we buy while being exploited by a system that impoverishes them financially/economically; and impoverishes most of us emotionally, mentally, and physically; all while making a handful* rich / all to make a handful* rich. What is the difference between these two phrasings/wordings/ word choices? This means that we have to explore, question, and rethink the stories we hear that are associated with money, the economy, what is necessary to make sure a system runs well*, what is not necessary to make sure a system runs well, what is likely to perpetuate a bad system/s and stop our world from going on, and what is likely to support a good system/s and help our world to go on, much better than it is now, even ever so much better, where imagination is the limit.
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The Learning Word proposes that it will help to make our world better if people generally do the following: consciously explore the stories we tell, practice perspective-taking, practice understanding diverse perspectives, and explore what shapes perspectives and informs their development. Particularly, it is useful (and necessary) to understand the perspectives that create negative impacts on our minds, relationships, personal growth, and collective well-being, and therefore on our lives, and it is useful (and necessary) to understand perspectives that create positive impacts on our our minds, relationships, personal growth, and collective well-being. (//) It is useful and beneficial to try not to practice the former, and to try to practice the latter. the life that courses through the universe |
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This series, “The Stories We Tell”, sets out to explore perspectives around us, how they shape the stories we tell, and how those perspectives and stories impact our minds, relationships, personal growth, and collective well-being. It simultaneously is intended as an interactive language experience for those interested in language, and engages with texts that make up parts of The Learning Word Curriculum.
To begin our look at tools we can use for this exploration, let’s dive into listening through/via one wellspring of possibility in personal story and perspective, sound and communication expert Julian Treasure's talk "5 Ways to Listen Better". |
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One vital/essential/important way we engage with the world around us that is key to understanding perspective-taking is how we listen to others.
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Key to understanding perspective-taking
is one vital/essential/important way we engage with the world around us: How we listen to others. |
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One essential, or fundamental, way we engage with the world around us that is key to understanding perspective-taking is how we listen to others.
In his talk “5 Ways to Listen Better”, sound consultant Julian Treasure offers great insight into how we listen to others. To begin, he invites us to join him in understanding listening through a clear definition that he provides: “Let’s define listening as making meaning from sound. It's a mental process, and it's a process of extraction.” Then Treasures discusses some of the techniques we use to listen. The first and second are pattern recognition and differencing. The fourth and fifth are “Sound plac[ing] us in space and in time”. I’d like to focus on the third technique, what Treasure aptly* calls “a whole range of filters”. He says these filters “take us from all sound down to what we pay attention to”. He adds, “Most people are entirely unconscious of these filters. But they actually create our reality in a way, because they tell us what we're paying attention to right now” (emphasis added). In other words, “filters” determine/decide what we pay attention to and what we don’t pay attention to (that is, what we dismiss or don’t notice), as well as how we pay attention to what we are hearing (for example, to what degree we filter, with what unconscious biases we filter, if our current attitude or general attitude has an effect on how we hear and listen, etc.). Filters generally (for example, coffee filters or air filters) allow some things through while stopping other things from coming through. Filters also have different filtering capabilities, stopping more of one thing and letting more of another thing through. The filters Treasure is talking about, he explains, often operate/function/work unconsciously, but, he says, we can be aware of them, and we can even play with them. More on that in a little bit. Before we move on, though, to what Treasure says, I would add that filters contribute significantly to the narratives of our personal and shared realities. The filters through which we interact and engage with the world and accept information or reject information—the filters through which we listen to or ignore the world around us—these filters become the sriptors, editors, and recorders of the narratives of our lives. For further clarification and development, it will be helpful to turn to the examples of filters that Treasure shows on a slide as he discusses “a whole range of filters” that impact our lives: culture language values beliefs attitudes expectations intentions Now, take a minute to reflect on how these “filters” might act and have influence in your life and the creation of your “reality” or “sense of reality”, including your perception of yourself, and your perception of the people around you and the people and peoples throughout the world. For many if not most of us, we can expand this to our view of the universe, as well.
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* aptly (synonyms from MS Word) fittingly appropriately rightly suitably properly |
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To be continued . . .
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