The computer technician hobbled on crutches.
No way… can he really repair the computer?
Forgive me. I was in college that time (20 years old?), and was a judgmental asshole.
But as soon as I observed him tinker the broken desktop, I could say he’s legit. He told me he needed to rewire the motherboard — the rats chewed some wires.
The next day, the motherboard was fixed. Everything’s normal. Thank you very much.
There are 2 lessons:
- Some broken desktops can be fixed.
- We can also rewire our brain, not just motherboards.
This is challenging.
Our brains are hardwired to believe in certain things our culture deemed as right.
What we believe or feel right now is greatly influenced by the culture we grew up with.
For example, I judged someone who has a condition, doubting whether or not he’s capable to do the job. This is because I grew up in a culture that only glorifies strong educated physically attractive people.
So whenever I see people-who-have-physical-condition, I automatically think that they can’t do things which most people usually do. Nah.
In other words, my brain is hardwired to think that they can’t do great things because they lack capacity, because they don’t… they don’t have arms or legs or eyesight.
Of course, I’m wrong.
It happens to most of us though. We all judge someone based on physical appearance.
But just because someone has a condition doesn’t mean they can’t do what other people do.
I’d guess that you’ve watched plenty of videos documenting people with physical condition, yet working normally and doing great things. Nick Vujicic and Gaelynn Lea are a few examples (go check them out).
It’s important to remind ourselves that most of the things we used to believe as true or false / right or wrong could be the opposite.
Just like the motherboard, our brain — the way we see things — also needs rewiring at some point.
To do this, I’d recommend 2 approaches:
- Keep challenging society’s preconceived notions.
- Keep finding different point of views.
Before making any conclusions, ask yourself:
“Is it really true? Am I right? What if I’m wrong?”