Whodunit?
How many times have you watched a tv detective, or read a detective story, where the detective is convinced from the start who the guilty person is?
He then works through the whole book or play fitting the evidence to the person!
He readily accepts any evidence that confirms his suspicions, and stalwartly rejects anything that doesn’t fit his preconceptions.
Of course, he arrests the wrong person, and then the crimes continue till he realises his mistake.
In the end he has the “detective shaft of light”, sees his mistake, and establishes who the villain actually is.
It’s a fairly common scenario in detective fiction - but it’s not confined to fiction: we may find ourselves going through exactly this!
It’s so common that it has a name:
Confirmation Bias
It means we accept ideas, facts, stories, that fit in with what we already believe, and reject anything that doesn’t fit - as untrue or dangerous.
Hmm - sounding painfully familiar?
Trouble is, we happily take on board all the things that confirm our ideas, then we often stick there, and don’t move forward to identifying the truth .. and the real villain in our lives.
Obvious examples of this will be seen all the time in the political arena. It’s the same world we live in, but each side sees only what they want to see.
The same even goes for sports. “The ref’s blind!” cry the supporters of the defeated side!
And in our own lives, maybe
😥 you see every mistake you make as confirmation that you are useless.
😥 Every person who rejects you proves you are unlikable.
😥 Every failed attempt with a new idea proves it’s unworkable.
❤️ But what about all the people who smile when they see you?
❤️ What about all the things you do right, every day?
❤️ What about all the things you’ve discovered won’t work, so you can move on to something that does?
It’s all in our perception
Is the image above of a heart, or a dry patch on the road?
How open are you to seeing it differently?
How open are you to seeing your life differently?
Tell us below where you think you may be limiting yourself in your thinking, by being unable to see the full picture!
