I can be completely captivated by a two hour debate that attempts to define and flesh out the concept of a profound five-letter word. In fact, these kinds of deliberations are so interesting to me, that I’ve filled my days with them lately.
I love podcasts and one I heard this week was all about the word Truth.
This kind of topic is right up my alley. I am fascinated anytime I can hear people discuss such a fundamental concept.
In this exchange, the intelligent atheist host had just begun his program when he and the guest found a divergent opinion on the definition and application of the idea of Truth.
I won’t go into each person’s argument and attempt to make interesting reading out of somebody else’s verbal chess match. I will say however that I LOVED the fact that they locked horns and dug so deeply into this deceptively simple notion.
I’m sure that we’ve all thrown the word Truth around in our lives, usually in order to cement an observation, recollection or prediction. We may even judge others in their behavior and claim to have some inside track on the Truth behind their ways.
In any case, I know that I don’t have a PhD in the usage of every word or phrase I spout. Therefore I find it so interesting when two people wear themselves out in argument over something as fundamental as this.
Don’t we too often take for granted wide swaths of understanding and assumption, when talking with ourselves or others? Don’t we just speak through a conversation like a drive to store and back home. Trying to get to the point and return as quickly as possible without expending real capital? Can you remember a time when you had the substructure of your very conception of a core value challenged openly and gentlemanly, with a chance to rebut? I really don’t find myself in these mental MMA matches and it’s a good thing too. I probably would tap out pretty quickly…
Hooray though, that we aren’t all just zombified, caring only about the next basketball game or Tee Vee Show. It does seem that as a culture we’re waking up more to questioning reality, politics and being outwardly opinionated. Many are constantly outraged and terrified too. I find it just a little disheartening though, to see so much barking and exclaiming online. It’s as if these clipart ideas are skipping across the top of the pond like stones flung with fury, but barely touching the surface.
I prefer the deeper dive. My heart was warmed to hear these two agents, staunch in their positions, trade blow after blow in defense of their idea of the concept named Truth.
It’s paramount that their discussion didn’t proceed beyond this little hiccup of difference in opinion, because that one little difference colored everything else that could be said afterward.
Our core beliefs are the womb that births all. If you and if I have opposite root perspectives, we will be spinning our wheels talking about situations and observations of life. The color of the lens that we see everything through, will convince us and solidify our opinion, in ways that another person can rarely alter.
So then, an in-depth study of the tiniest kernel of our ‘come-from’ and ‘inner stance’, is really the only conversation to have. It’s the thing, that will create all the other things that we have to say.
I will link to the podcast here. If you are like me, on a search for Truth, or find interesting the debate over an acceptable definition of the concept of the Truth, have at it. Otherwise, just take a moment to reflect on the last time you questioned yourself to the core. Could you articulate to someone else, and communicate on the nature of your human experience of life itself?
I haven’t tried to do that in any conversational debate. Maybe though, I’m hinting at it through the words you can read here. I’m compelled and provoked by stuff like this and maybe some of you are too. You must be, otherwise, why would you have read this far?
Until next week my friends, dive deep. Unpack and dissect the profound. I can’t wait to hear or see your Truth, so please share. 🙂
Sincerely,
Aaron Nichols
PS: if you want my take on the podcast I linked to, I tended to agree with the guest, rather than the host, on his interpretation of Truth. I appreciated the whole coversation however, obviously 🙂