Turning Tables

I am constantly turning tables. That’s my whole point in life, I guess. Call it a calling. Or a curse. Or a catastrophe. That’s my perspective. If I am talking to someone and considering what they are saying, I will try to turn the tables. I ask myself the question: What do you see? How do you see it? Why is it important to you? Why do you believe what you believe? Where is your proof?

And what are the consequences of your beliefs? And what can I learn from them? Why do you want me to believe it? How does that challenge my beliefs? What should I take seriously from this discourse? How should I respond? Which of my beliefs should I try to compel upon you? Which must I agree to set on the table?

There must be a logical reason to believe what you believe as I have a logical reason to believe what I believe. And I have to have a logical reason to refute it. And, for that matter, what is my moral justification for instructing you to change your mind? Logical people can disagree, no?

I strive to see what you are trying to tell me from your own perspective. Your point of view. Your truth. Your lies. Your prejudice. Your integrity. Your cowardice. Or courage. Your culture. Can I see it? Can I look through your eyes? Can I see me as you see me and know me as no other can? Can I see your legitimate criticisms of me as well as your biases and backwaters?

No. Of course not. I can only see through my own eyes, blistered and bigoted though they be. Prejudiced by my understanding of how the world works from my most formative years, where my biases were born and also came to be. How should I expect otherwise?

All impressions of the world exist in one place and reply to one master. Yet they are ours. They are our view of the world. The way we see it. Absorb it. Process it.

Now. You deal with it.