Raise your glasses for a toast at the end of your day(s). But before you do, look into your glass. Is it as full as it could be? Did you reach your potential in every possible endeavor? I know I sure haven’t.
There’s a term I picked up from “22 Jump Street” that I’ve looked into quite a bit ever since I watched Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum clown their way through the mythical MC State. It’s a simple word with a seemingly never-ending meaning: embedding.
Embedding is our natural response of latching on to the first piece of information we are presented and overlooking or blatantly ignoring conflicting information. We do it all the time without even realizing it, and it’s the reason many people believe our society becomes brainwashed by mass media.
The truth is there are very little news companies on the national level that are legitimately 100 percent unbiased. The problem with the truth is there can often be many sides to the truth.
For example, if my friend and I attend a concert and watch the same exact show, that doesn’t mean we are going to leave the arena with the same exact opinion of what we just witnessed. I may have thought the concert was terrible, and he may have thought it was amazing. To both of us, we believe how we perceived the concert — good or bad — to be true. Therefore, my truth isn’t his truth.
The same can be said with how we consume our news. Let’s use Fox News and CNN as our examples. The two rival networks often cover the same exact current events but have far different viewpoints on what they mean. If President Donald Trump makes a big decision, one network likely will praise and the other will crucify him. Whichever channel we’re on at the time is likely the side we’re going to agree with.
Why? Because that information becomes embedded into our minds. The only way to combat this is to be aware of it and force yourself to look at the truth from all sides of the spectrum. You have to sort through all of the opinions, identify the facts and be your own judge.
Embedding sways our opinion of others as well. If someone tells us something negative about a person we haven’t met ourselves yet, you’re likely to form a negative opinion about them when you do meet because your mind has only ever associated negative thoughts with that particular person regardless if they appear nice and genuine. The problem is we’re keen to hold those reservations about someone without knowing all of the facts because we have latched on to the first bit of information we were given.
Which brings me back to the question about whether or not our glasses are full. To have a full glass at the end of our day(s) — whether it be the literal end of the day or the end of all days — we have to allow ourselves to seek all knowledge available.
With each conflict we’re presented, try to look at it from every angle and examine the different truths of it. Every person, every bit of information and every situation — good or bad — contains multiple truths. It’s the reason no two people are alike.
You have to allow yourself to think outside of the box and examine all of the possibilities to reach your own personal truth. If you do that, the glass you raise will be full — with knowledge.
Joshua Campbell is sports editor of The Columbian-Progress. Reach him at joshuacampbell@columbianprogress.com.
