People Have Different Perspectives

April 23rd, 2023 4 min read

In the first picture, what do you see?

The first picture is an optical illusion. I saw a lady’s profile immediately. Some people would see a bare tree with branches blowing in a certain direction.

Optical illusions are being studied in psychology. The famous optical illusion that showed a young lady, as well as an old woman, has revealed that those who are 30 years old and younger see the young lady while older people will see the old woman.

This Optical illusion shows the complex nature of human cognition which can be influenced by your age, your bias, your prior knowledge, and beliefs.

The above picture clearly shows two dogs together. Yet another person sees a black dog in front of a round smiley moon.

The artist interestingly created a picture of a cat seeing its self-reflection as a lion in the water. It carries a very important point for human beings. What you see yourself is what you are, at least psychologically. It’s your self-image.

I am not going to expound on this research in illusions created for the study of the human brain by psychologists.

My simple conclusion is; These images disclose that people have different perspectives in life. Not everyone can see eye to eye. Something may not be good or bad but you have to decide for yourself.

There are three ways to use perspectives.

1 Don’t be swayed by a fixed or normal perspective.

As an example, people do not expect you as a senior to engage in active activities. As you grow older, you are expected to be slower and more sedentary. But You think otherwise.

Since we know about different perspectives, we can say that the minds of your opponents may have conformed to some preconceived ideas or bias watching their aunties and uncles, parents, and grandparents becoming more sedentary. Hence they assume the same outcome for other seniors.

So if you know that people can be biased, you have to believe in yourself when you want to achieve a goal. You may be their illusion so to speak but live the life you want and attain what you set out to do.

A concrete example would be some people watching a senior doing rock climbing. Usually, younger people could not fathom why she would do that while other seniors shun this activity. They did not believe seniors have the physical prowess to engage in this sport. It requires practice, planning, and persistence and many seniors are now increasingly involved in this activity.

Bias can happen to anyone. We may unintentionally demean someone’s ability due to his age or experience but remember the illusionary images. What you see may not be what it is.

That person may seem like a non-starter but He or She could turn out to be a champion, your mentor, or become your boss.

2 Enlarge your perspective for your success.

Back to the cat looking at the lion in the water picture, if we could all envision ourselves doing greater things with our innate talents, we will achieve. The self-belief system is a strong motivating force. What you believe, you can conceive.

3 Make your perspective a positive one.

Especially when things are unpleasant. Then you will gravitate toward a solution. Fear and anxiety only cloud one’s mind.

Recently, I was with my friend in Seoul and we were trying to locate our hotel. Somehow, Google GPS did not lead me to it. Instead, we walked for some km to and fro and were still lost.

Instead of feeling frustrated, I took the perspective of feeling grateful that my friend did not complain and she was understanding. I told her and she became more so. That took away a lot of stress on my part as the leader.

I reckoned I had to learn to read the GPS more skilfully. Instead of tiring ourselves further, we sought out a quaint cafe for a coffee break.

There, we figured out what went wrong with Google GPS. After some inquiries through messaging friends, we found that in Seoul, Google does not work but an app called Papago does.

From this incident, we learned that a topic can have many perspectives. Obviously, I had thought that Google was the only answer.

Had I sought out more views, we would have saved a lot of time and energy.

Conclusion;

Getting more perspectives makes one more knowledgeable and wise.

At the workplace, it is a sign of respect when we listen to others and receive more feedback and solutions.

Listening to others also builds empathy, increases tolerance, and minimizes disputes.

Be open-minded and open to perspectives by being a good listener. Adopt a positive perspective to get positive results.