perspective so I’m sorry you should see
the looks on your faces just priceless
what’s wrong you must be surprised after
all when he walked out here with that
fidget and that stammering you must have
thought I was a poor young teenager with
a bad bout of stage fright but now that
you’ve seen me stand here talk a bit
more confidently that has all changed
it’s quite interesting actually just by
giving you a little bit more information
about myself your perspective of me has
changed it is a pretty simple concept
the more you can hear taste touch smell
or see about an object or a situation
take this Apple for example I know I
know I know you must be thinking Ishita
are you crazy this is very clearly not
an apple it’s a boss but hear me out for
a second
we go about our daily lives and we just
see things and assume things about them
without really thinking Without Really
reflecting on what we observe maybe if
we took the time to reflect on what we
were observing maybe look a little
closer peel back the layers maybe I
don’t know open the box you would see
that the truth is something quite
but if something as simple as an apple
can fool our perspectives and our
perceptions what does that really say
about the reality around us after all we
go about our daily lives perceiving and
observing a plethora of things according
to a study done by the University of
California San Diego we consume about 34
gigabytes of data every single day
that’s enough to overload a laptop for a
week at least if you’re using Windows we
don’t have the time to sit back and
reflect on everything that we’re
observing to really think deeply about
the conclusions we’re making so if
something as simple as an Apple can
completely full our perspectives can we
truly trust the reality around us of
course not we humans are too
self-centered to egoistical too limiting
and our knowledge and too self-centered
to truly understand the nature of
reality around us our overabundance of
emotion and limited knowledge prevents
us from seeing the world around us my
overabundance of knowledge prevents me
from seeing reality all the time this
might be a strange question to ask but
how do you guys have siblings it’s quite
quite a lot I have a sibling too she’s
five years older than me and her name is
Jessica now as all people who have
siblings know we love to fight a lot
every day every night especially when we
were younger and when I was in eighth
grade I used to fight with my sister
daily my sister at that point was in
college and she was kind of the apple of
my parents eyes she was the idol the
person I was supposed to look up to but
I didn’t think that was true I wanted to
prove my parents wrong prove her wrong I
made it my wife’s goal to basically show
my parents that my sister was doing
something she wasn’t supposed to do so
one day when she was in the shower I
snuck onto her laptop used my crazy
hacking skills to open it up basically
inserting a password and lo and behold
began searching what do you think I
found
was it maybe a browser open with
twitter.com or facebook.com not quite
perhaps she had Netflix open watching
the latest episode of Breaking Bad nope
that wasn’t it either then definitely
definitely candy crush her sonic dash or
something along those lines that was a
no to what I did find did startle me
though there was an excel sheet open
with a bunch of numbers and dollar signs
and only later did I understand that it
was actually the record she was keeping
for all the financial transactions in
the numerous clubs she was involved in
in college she opened a tab open that
had a twenty page paper on the future of
economics and how it relates to
philosophy and no the next tab over a
document with two pages of notes I also
found an interesting private tab and I
was like this is definitely it I’m
definitely going to find some
incriminating evidence here so I opened
it up and what was there was a recipe
for cinnamon buns something I have been
begging my mom to make for my birthday
but something she wasn’t able to do at
this point I shut the laptop and kind of
snuck out of her room and sat down to
reflect over what I had seen to see if
there was any hint of incriminating
evidence I could use and later when my
sister came to me with the plate of
cinnamon buns I felt this indescribable
feeling of guilt of a sort of
disappointment in myself my sister had
been the idol she had been caring for me
and caring for her grades and cared for
entire family but I had been suspecting
her I hadn’t seen her true nature my
overabundance of jealousy
have prevented from seeing that she was
truly a sister no one else could have I
still wish I could turn back the clock
until older is shader’ little Ishita
that she should reflect on what she had
seen reflect on her sister before making
these misguided conclusions I wish I
could have told her to wait until she
had a broader perception of reality
but what does having a broader
perception of reality really mean does
it mean answering all of our questions
does it mean about lighting the details
of every situation in the world does it
mean finding the truth truth it’s an
interesting word for us it means the
absolute or a fact stuck solid a fact
that cannot be altered but the original
meaning of truth is not what you think
it is truth comes from Old English were
seen and Cotto Germanic and it’s
original meaning was just a constancy or
a faithfulness observed in the world
around us not what we think as the truth
but in reality that’s what the truth is
for us it’s a constancy or faithfulness
we observe in the universe around us I
mean think about it take gravity for
example you know the thing that keeps us
stuck here on earth I think that Newton
discovered when he was hit on the head
of an apple
well before Newton’s time people thought
that we were stuck here on earth for a
very different reason they believed that
we just naturally belonged here on earth
that we just tended towards the center
of the earth because the earth was the
center of the universe obviously we can
scoff other beliefs now what silly old
cavemen and philosophers but who’s to
say that we’re not the same this was
their version of the truth for 1,300
years and in all honesty our theory of
gravity isn’t that much different it’s a
theory not a law not something that has
been set in stone it’s just a constant C
or faithfulness we’ve observed through
several experiments and scientists are
discovering crazy new things about
gravity every single day gravitational
waves bends in space-time and equally
alien sounding ideas so who’s to say
that we’re right about gravity that were
and close to it that we have even
reached the trip but if the truth is
such a hard thing to reach then what
should we do after all truth is
essential to our society truth is what
holds our world together what hold us
together without truth society people
our brains would run amok so what should
we do to at least take a step further
towards truth my good old friend
Friedrich Nietzsche had an answer to
this he was a philosopher who invented
the concept of perfect perspectivism a
philosophy based on the perspective
he stated that in order to be a better
human to reach that truth you must take
on as many perspectives as possible you
must know as much as possible about the
world essentially he took the phrase
step in everybody else’s shoes to a
whole nother level you know when we were
kids he used to sneak our hand into the
cookie jar and grab a cookie or fight
over our siblings over teddy bears and
our parents used to tell us go get some
perspective he’s just said the exact
same thing but to a whole new extreme he
said to almost go on a buddha-like level
and be one with everything being part of
every perspective but you know me I love
to question everything so when I first
read about Nisha I had a big question in
mind is there a point at which we can
have too many perspectives is there a
point at which we have so much knowledge
on the world that we just lack happiness
I mean it’s not such an alien question
if you think about it Santa Claus is a
great example when I was five years old
I was a Santa fanatic every Christmas
Eve I would run to the evergreen tree
which wasn’t mine and took a couple
branches then I would grab my old potted
plant in my storage room and kind of
stick those two figs on decorate it with
as many ornaments as they as I could
and warm up a cup of milk have some
cookies ready bite a little note to
Santa and that was it I had my entire
Santa preparation ready but one fateful
night when Ishida was five years old she
woke up early on Christmas day very
early so being a little curious brat I
decided to run out of my bedroom and
peek at the tree the tree and see if
anybody had left anything there what I
saw really surprised me and it’s still
with me today instead of Santa Claus
pushing some presents under the tree I
saw my parents drink a gulp out of the
milk by toke up here to pick up the card
read inside left a little bit and write
something there and they also slipped a
little present underneath the tree at
this point I was smart enough to know
that I shouldn’t be awake and ran back
to bed and when I woke up later that
morning and started investigating the
tree I realized that the card the
present they were all labeled Santa now
at this point I knew that Santa had just
been a figment of my imagination I had
learned more about it had observed more
and gained perspective I suddenly had a
newfound gratitude from my parents
because they had been doing this every
single year but was I necessarily
happier as a result not quite after all
it’s a irrefutable fact that our
perspectives continue to change and
those changes might not always be for
what we think is the better those
changes might bring those happiness or
sadness after all maturity is when the
big parts of perspectives and change
occurs as were maturing Society tells us
what we should do society gives us
perspectives to look through and our
peers shape our perspectives when I was
a kid I was super wacky
I had my head shaved at age four I ate
everything in anything with such fervor
that I went around my mouth instead of
in it and I thought that the beautiful
and majestic deer were actually horrible
carnivores of the night who loved
children’s flesh
most importantly I loved to write and it
was my dream to become an author but as
I grew up my perspective changed the way
people viewed me changed and I changed
as a result I started growing out my
hair because everybody else was doing it
I started eating a little less and using
a lot more napkins and I lost my
fascination with plants and animal in
nature I also lost my goal of becoming
an author now Here I am a student whose
goal is to achieve straight A’s to get
into a great Ivy League college to have
a stable job a stable house to live like
maturing has caused me to lose that
creative spark I had as a kid am I happy
that I’ve matured
well maturing is not a fun process and
childhood is perhaps the most beautiful
epoch of life but it’s also an
irrefutable fact that I have gained a
lot of knowledge and a lot of new
insight through this maturing process
whether it be about gravity or my sister
change whether it being ourselves our
bodies or our perspectives is a was a
natural part of life it happens and why
take the time and think about everybody
else when it’s your life
niece just says that you should take on
everybody else’s perspective to become
this better human being but I say what’s
the rush
life has ups and downs and the whole
point of the journey just to enjoy those
ups and downs to enjoy your changes in
perspectives nice you might say to try
and everybody else’s shoes but I say try
on this pair of shoes wait until it
grows into your
then move on to the next then move on to
the next take your time after all you
are unique not as a you of the past nor
the you of the future can even clean to
be like you in your perspective so enjoy
that uniqueness cherish that uniqueness
cherish your individuality cherish your perspective thank you