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I really enjoyed this series I worked on during my early days at steemit called "Optimism at the End of the World. This is one of my favorite concepts to talk about. The post did OK but I always want more people to think about framing so I am raising it from the dead now.
Original Post
Post date: 10 months ago
Payout: $7.57
Commenters: 7
Today I want to talk about framing. This is a huge topic so there's going to be a lot I leave out in this post but there will be other posts exploring this topic in the future. So what do I mean by framing?
Life is hard.
We've all heard that before, but when you read those words do you agree? Is that the reality you are living in? Or is life a game? You may just think you are making an observation with these words but you are also defining how you interpret your future experiences. Once you make the observation that "life is hard" and let it stick, you see through a lens of "life is hard". This framing isn't set in stone, we may change our framing at any time, but deciding that something is the way that it is it takes a conscious choice and so does changing it. As we don't usually like to admit that we are wrong, changing our framing can take a lot more time and effort than creating it in the first place.
Adopted Framing
Because we are social creatures and we grow up around adults who have formulated ideas and opinions about a wide variety of subjects (including life, love, money, education, science, religion, sexuality, potatoes, airplanes, vaccinations, the sky, cartoons, bubblegum, god, and everything in between) we tend to adopt the framing of others. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but the fact that we hardly realize this framing, or socialization is occurring leaves us very vulnerable. We are encouraged to adopt the framing of our parents and the culture of the country we live in. We spend a lot of our time in schools sucking this stuff up, watching television, sucking this stuff up. Of course we don't HAVE to adopt anything if we don't want, but it's not always easy to reject an idea that is accepted by everyone (or seems to be accepted by everyone) around us. The framing is also backed by some pretty convincing arguments at times, making it very hard to question.
"Nothing in life is free."
I've heard this uttered by numerous steemians already, but is it true? It certainly sounds true in the context of most of our lives but what about in nature? Does a tree force you to pay for the fruit it provides? Does a tiger pay for the zebra? Does anyone pay for the rain? I can already see someone trying to argue that a tree requires you to climb it to pick the fruit and that this makes the fruit somehow not free of charge. All I can do is quietly face palm. This kind of thinking so perfectly proves my point. Does the tree have a concept of payment? If it is not abundantly clear to you that concepts such as of payment, ownership, debt, and money are human constructs, spend a few months living off the land without your iPhone, please. Again, I'm not labeling these things as bad, merely constructs that require certain framing.
And for the record, I've been on the giving and receiving end of kindness enough that I can say with confidence that some things in life are free.
Shaping your Reality
Do I even need to explain at this point how your framing will dictate how you see the world and your subsequent experiences？ As I mentioned in a previous post, I used to think life was a struggle, and it was. Then I thought life was fun and it was. No matter how little control you have over your situation, how you interpret it is always entirely up to you.
By consciously choosing our framing we can become exactly who we want to be. Do you see yourself as a loser or do you know that you are capable of anything? What's possible and what's impossible? Our beliefs are formed by our framing and tend to reinforce themselves due to our framing.
So how can we change our framing?
There isn't one correct way to change your framing and become who you want to be, but the first step should be to recognize your framing. This shouldn't be too hard, just observe your thoughts and reactions to the happenings of your daily life. If you aren't willing to challenge your beliefs, you won't be able to change anything. For a bigger change, you need a bigger challenge.
Sometimes it's best to just play with the idea that everything you think you know could be wrong. This will open you up to lots of other possible ways to frame things. Dabbling with new ideas and trains of thought can help too. Traveling, studying a new language or a new culture or trying new things are other ways to open your mind and "opening your mind" includes exposing you to new ways to frame things.
How have you changed the way you see things? As always, I love comments so let me know your experience.
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